text:
TCM Pneumatic Tire Forklifts
It can be simple to neglect the essential tire, when it comes to the maintenance of the lift truck. When you pick the wrong tire for your lift truck, you can put huge increases on your operating expenses, and more significantly increase your safety risks. If however, you choose right type of tire you can enjoy improved safety, significant cost-savings and an overall more efficient operation. A properly chosen tire could actually lessen the downtime for replacement and potentially last 40 percent longer.
The forklift tire is a quite complex component of the machine. It is thus, easy to choose the wrong type accidentally. There are so many different types of tires and brands, with a huge range of compounds and treads. This means you should be completely prepared with the right data when you are going shopping for tires so that you could choose some durable and safe options to help prolong the life of your forklift.
The particular type of tire chosen for a forklift depends on the type of surface you would be utilizing the equipment on. For instance, smoother surfaces and indoor applications usually utilize tires which are made from rubber and that are smaller in size. On the other hand, outdoor operations require pneumatic tires. Pneumatic tires have a rubber tread and are filled with compressed air. These features give them a good grip on surfaces which are uneven and rough.
Forklift Tire Safety
Every year, 200 people are killed in lift truck or forklift related accidents each year. Ensuring lift truck safety, like correct inspection practices, can all contribute in to avoiding these terrible and dangerous mishaps from taking place.
Pre-Work Inspection
The tires of the lift truck have to be inspected before each shift. Tires must ideally have the right air pressure, which is set by the tire manufacturer. This is really vital because if the tire pressure is very low, the machinery could inadvertently tip over when a load is being raised.
The tires utilized on indoor lift trucks would be made out of solid rubber.
Other factors
Occupational Health and Safety Administration or OSHA places a requirement on the frequent use of lift trucks. These lift trucks are required to be inspected at the end of each and every shift. The operator must inspect the machinery for any mechanical issues and the tires need to be inspected for cuts, excessive wear or apparent tire damage. Any issues which are detected should be addressed as soon as possible to maintain safety.
- TCM Dual Fuel Forklifts
Safety using a lift truck needs to be a top priority if you are going to utilize a forklift or would hire somebody to use a forklift. ... More
- Wolff Self Erect Cranes
Kinds of Jib Cranes The trolley hoist on a horizontal load-bearing boom are key features on Jib cranes. The boom is secured to a ... More
- Mitsubishi LP Forklifts
The lift truck has become such an important piece of machinery found and utilized in most warehousing and industrial operations, ever ... More
- FM GRU Tower Cranes
Established during 1920, FM GRU Tower Cranes started as a family business in the Northern Italy's largest industrial location. ... More
- Manitou Cushion Tire Forklift
For work trucks, or course there are a varieties of different forklift parts, with one of the most important components is the ... More


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LAKE OZARK, Missouri- The Lake Ozark Police Department is asking for assistance as officers attempt to identify a suspect in a recent theft.
Video surveillance from August 21, 2016, shows the below pictured individual leaving a retail store in Lake Ozark with stolen property. The white male arrived to and left from the store driving a white Ford/Mercury older sedan.
Contact Officer Greene 710 at 573-365-5371 or by email at email@example.com

subset: commoncrawl


text:
By Michael Sokolove
Bruce Gilden/Magnum, for The New York Times
The New York Times
On a recent trip into Philadelphia, after I exited the Interstate and coasted to a stop at the first traffic light, a man walked up to my car. He wore a black apron with a change pouch and held aloft a copy of The Philadelphia Daily News, the city's tart, irreverent tabloid. It gave me a warm feeling. Of course it did! I'm a newspaper guy. I worked as a reporter for The Daily News in the 1980s, and later for what we called "big sister," the sober, broadsheet Philadelphia Inquirer. Even in better times, I would have been happy to see the product being hawked, but these days any small sign of life in the newspaper industry, even just the sight of someone reading a paper, feels positively uplifting. I handed over 75 cents for my Daily News, then drove on toward the center of the city — and U.S. Bankruptcy Court, where a hearing was soon to begin, part of an ongoing process that will determine the fate of the city's newspapers. [Click for MORE] Sphere: Related Content


text:
Startseite » Eigenentwicklung » Waters Sample Cone 3100, SQD, TQD , ID=0.36mm
Waters Sample Cone 3100, SQD, TQD , ID=0.36mm
This cone is a 700003055 sample cone with 0.36mm orifice. This diameter is standard for the ZQ mass spectrometer.There are some advantages why we offer this cone. One reason is, that some of our customers have developed a method on a ZQ/Micro and they like to have the same conditions for their new SQD/TQD. If you have an Edwards E2M28 installed instead of the Leybold pump you will need to drain the oil of the mist filter daily.The 0.36mm cone has 52% of the area of the 0.50mm cone. That will lower the aspirated gas volume and you need to drain the oil only one time per week. In general the reproducibility of peak areas will increase as well as the time to do the next hexapole cleaning. If you don´t need the maximum sensitivity, this cone will make your work easier. Because of the smaller orifice diameter the sensitivity will decrease about 10-20%. We recommend this cone especially for the 3100 prep MS detector.Replaces Waters part no.: 700003055Quantity: 1For 3100 Mass Detector; Single Quad Detector; Tandem Quadrupole Detector


text:
Prices, specials, features and availability subject to change.
Located in Mentor, Ohio Queensdale Apartments is a lovely apartment community that offers the luxury of suburban living while providing our residents a relaxing, peaceful and comfortable lifestyle. Choose from 1, 2 or 3 bedroom suites that feature free heat, free water and sewer, furnished kitchens, on-site laundry, 24 hour maintenance and much more. Residents of Queensdale Apartments like the convenient location of this apartment community. Here you'll be only minutes from local shopping, dining and entertainment and major highways. We are also close to bus lines and Lakeland Community College for your convenience. Come and see why our residents never leave Queensdale Apartments. HEAT INCLUDED!!!
Cats Allowed. Call for service animal policy.
86 units
Contact Propertyor call
Monday-Friday: 8:30am-5:00pm
Saturday: 10:00am-2:00pm
Sunday: Closed
MBL Management, Inc.
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text:
Adam Blatner
Words and Images from the Mind of Adam Blatner
Mandala Movie
Some of Adam's mandalas, set in motion:
Posted in Art (Mandalas, Doodles, Scripts) | 1 Comment
The Un-Acknowledged
I am reminded that for much of the world, what is history for us goes unspoken! Indeed, there are peoples who live with massive repression! Let's not talk about that! Let's not even THINK about that! Indeed, that is a way of life for perhaps most of the people in the world! I'm fortunate indeed […]
Posted in Follies, History, Psychology, Wisdom-ing | No Comments
Maturity Becoming Obsolete
The very idea of "maturity" as having "grown up enough" is passing. We live in an era of exponential development where, by the time someone has grows up, the world has changed. The maturity involved in being fully "mature" keeps receding, like the horizon. "Maturity" has advanced beyond us, and even the best of us […]
Posted in Autobiographical, Follies, Spirituality and Philosophy, Wisdom-ing | No Comments
Hello and Good-Bye
I've just written birthday cards to friends and relatives and I realized that these may be among the last few score or hundred that I ever write. If you're not in email contact with my descendants, you're "out of it," literally. Postal mail, greeting cards, are going the way of penguins and parrots. It may […]
Posted in Autobiographical, Essays and Papers, My Favorite Things, Whassup? | No Comments
Adjustors to Rapid Reality Change?
There isn't a word yet for people who help people who function in the "old" world but not in the new. What should they be called? "People who are highly function-ing, with areas that need some extra attention!?" Even highly functioning people need attention, because the world is changing. A century ago the theme was […]
Posted in Current Events, History, Psychology | No Comments
Amplification in Group Work
People often lower their voice unconsciously in order to disqualify their own statements. It's an expression of ambivalence: "Perhaps I shouldn't be saying this." There's a gradient of disclosure from repression to shouting it from the highest hill: – I can't admit it to myself at all. Repression. – I admit it secretly […]
Posted in Action Explorations, Mind-Spectrums, Psychodrama, Psychology | No Comments
Performance Studies
Those who are more skilled at dramatization know this: Adding a little bit of performance, self-consciousness, exaggeration—just a tiny bit, but enough for you to notice!—enough to be impressive, subtly. This is very influential! People who know this intuitively recognize that a little bit of theatre is effective, But it must me subtle enough to […]
Posted in Action Explorations, My Favorite Things, Psychodrama, Wisdom-ing | No Comments
"Lexophile" is a word used to describe someone with a love for words as words, such as a paranomasiast—a punster. Some puns include: "You can tune a piano, but you can't tuna fish." "To write with a broken pencil is pointless." A competition to see who can come up with the best "lexophillies" […]
Posted in Follies, Foolin Around, Play and Spontaneity, Whassup? | No Comments
Performance Awareness
There's something about this on my other website. I've been thinking about the degrees of awareness that we are performing for a hidden or not-so-hidden audience. I call this "performance awareness." and I think there's a spectrum: At the low end, zero awareness, at the high end, extremely aware of the audience and their reaction. […]
Posted in Play and Spontaneity, Psychodrama, Psychology, Spirituality and Philosophy | No Comments


text:
Patna College, Patna
Patna College is situated in Patna in Bihar state of India. Established in 1863, it is accredited from UGC and it is affiliated to Patna University. b'Patna College', Patna offers 14 courses across 6 streams namely Arts, Science, Media & Mass Communication, Commerce & Banking, IT, Management and across 5 degrees like BSc, BA, BBA, BCA, BMC.Hostel facility is not available for its students. Additional campus facilities such as Computer Lab, Library, Cls. Room, Grounds are also there.
Top Courses & Fees View All
BSc 7 Courses Available
BA 4 Courses Available
BBA 1 Courses Available
BCA 1 Courses Available
BMC 1 Courses Available
- Computer Lab
- Library
- Cls. Room
- Grounds
Patna College Placement
Patna College Patna (PCP) provides placement assistance to all its students. The dedicated placement cell regularly conducts grooming sessions of the students in areas like soft skills, interview facing skills, behavioral skills hereby making them industry-fit. In the recent years the college has witnessed some well known recruitment companies walking-in and being ...
Other Popular Arts Colleges in Patna View All
Similar Colleges
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- Jai Prakash College - Bhagalpur
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Top 10 Arts Colleges in India View All
- Patna Women's College - Patna
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- Degree College - Jaipur
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- Baldwin Methodist College - Bangalore
- Jain Vishva Bharati Institute - Nagaur
- Shyam Lal College (Evening) - Delhi
- Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri Rashtriya Sanskrit Vidyapeetha - New Delhi
Contact Details of Patna College, Patna
Contact No:+91-0612-2671589
Address:Ashok Rajpath , Patna-800 005


text:
By King Montgomery
The first thing you notice about Alaska is how much there is of it. More than one-third the size of the United States, its landscape varies from temperate rain forest to glacial fiords, to snow-capped mountains, to tundra, with some places having all those terrains.
Head guide Josh Rago, holding the rainbow trout, nicknamed Rockville resident Ernie Brissen "Ernzilla" for his monster fish-catching ability. (King Montgomery)
Wildlife is everywhere, and the streams, rivers and lakes teem with fishes of all description, including the wonderful Pacific salmon: the king (Chinook), silver (Coho), sockeye (red), chum (dog) and pink (humpback). It is an angler's nirvana, and I, once again, was about to cast in paradise for a week.
The view fromthe PenAir twin-engine aircraft is stunning, particularly on a clear day. After leaving Anchorage, you cross over the impressive Alaska Range, and Mount Denali (McKinley) cuts a striking figure to the north. Denali, the "High One" in the native language, is one of the most beautiful and haunting mountains on earth.
Some of the finest wilderness-fishing for all five species of Pacific salmon, rainbow trout, Dolly Varden, Arctic grayling, sheefish (inconnu) and Northern pike is found in the fertile and gorgeous Aniak River, which was my destination, an hour-plus flight from Anchorage to the West. There are no roads or rails into the region, and much of the area lies in or near the huge Yukon National Wildlife Refuge.
The Aniak River Lodge is a fine log-structure sitting high on the south bank of the Kuskokwim River. It has all the amenities, including warm beds, modern plumbing and fine food. But the 10 to 12 guests a week only stay here for two nights, sometimes three. The remaining time is spent about 40 miles up the Aniak River, a tributary of the Kuskokwim, in a comfortable riverside Spike Camp, right smack in the middle of some of the best angling that Alaska has to offer.
It takes all day to travel in the jet boats to the camp because guests fish along the way; first for Northern pike in the tributary sloughs and sheefish in the lower, slower-moving waters of the Aniak.
While salmon filets roasted in aluminum-foil pouches, and beans or corn bubbled in their cans, several of the guests broke out five or six weight-rods with floating lines or medium-light spinning gear for Dollies, grayling and rainbows over 20 inches.
However you catch your fish, Alaska is the place to do it, and the Aniak River is as wild and beguiling a place you'll ever see. There might be a few rubber drift boats sliding by, but otherwise there won't be another soul. Having the modern jet boats -- two anglers fish with one guide -- opens up miles of water up and down stream. Anglers can follow fish upriver and into tributaries, something that can't be done in a drift boat or raft.
After arriving at camp, the gear is unloaded in a large, comfortable two-person tent with a wooden floor, cots with sleeping bags with liners and mosquito netting. Then there is a great meal in the mess tent, followed by a superb night's sleep.
Wake up, visit the canvas port-a-potty-type latrine, get into waders, have a cup of coffee in front of the fire while the chef does breakfast, and enjoy the changing of the light as the sun rises higher in the sky. Then go down to the boats, pick up the rods in the rack by the river along the way, fish until you've had enough (and you will), and repeat the process on your return in the late afternoon.
Life is good on the Aniak River. Fish are all around the camp, either spawning in the redds or passing through, and with the longer days of an Alaskan summer, an angler could fish most of the night as well.
And always keep an eye out for bears, wolves, moose, eagles, minks, river otters, beavers and other critters that make the Alaska experience even more special.
The Aniak River Lodge is open from June into September. It is a well-run operation, and the guides are some of the best I've ever worked with. You may use conventional equipment and fly-fishing gear, and catch-and-release is encouraged, although arrangements can be made to keep some of your catch for shipment home -- these salmon are not endangered.
Our fishing editor King Montgomery fishes in Alaska every year and never tires of it. Sure he sometimes gets worn out catching so many fish, but someone has to do it to bring these fishing tales to PressBox readers.
Issue 2.38: September 20, 2007


text:
Egypt Re-Establishing Diplomatic Ties with Iran After 30 Years
And this is all about Obama and his ties to his fellow Jihadi scum bags of the Muslim Brotherhood. And, the same thing will eventually happen to Libya. And this quack job wants for more years in the Marxist House?
The Snooper Report
Join us as we Take Our Country Back
Sic vis pacem para bellum
Fight Accordingly


text:
Amalfi Coast is actually beautiful and picturesque and if you watch its panoramas from Agerola you will enjoy them: Agerola is like a terrace on Amalfi Coast. Actually Agerola is made of scattered houses that form various hamlets that all together are called Agerola. They dominate Amalfi from the top. Air is clean, nature is uncontaminated and panorama is beautiful. Gods' path starts from Bomerano hamlet: this is one of the most charming paths of the world and it is loved by most excursionists.
This is the ideal place to perfectly enjoy the beauties of Amalfi Coast without staying the most crowded towns. Famous people loved Agerola, such as Francesco Crispi, Benedetto Croce, Salvatore di Giacomo.
Milk is an important resource: its production has been famous since the times of the ancient Roman physician, Galeno. A festival dedicated to milk takes place every year on the first Sunday of August. Food is an important element of daily life in Agerola as well as good cooking. There are many festivals: for example the festival dedicated to chestnuts, to sausages, peppers, beans.
History of Agerola
There are ancient traces
showing that Agerola has been probably inhabited since
Bronze Age, while the remains
of some rural houses show that agriculture has always been
prosperous. According to a tradition, the name comes from
Roman word "ager" that means "field".
Milk produced on Lattari Mountains has always been praised, since Galeno's time. Galeno was the ancient physician of Marco Aurelio. During Middle Ages, Agerola entered the Sea Republic of Amalfi and it supplied Amalfi with wood, used to build ships.
During XVII century in Agerola there was the development of brigandage that was defeated by Bourbon family. During XVIII century Agerola was very prosperous. Agerola supported Parthenopean Republic. In 1844 Agerola abandoned the province of Salerno and Amalfi Coast and passed to the province of Naples.
Monuments - Art
- Archconfraternity of the blessed sacrament, it contains a beautiful statue of Our Lady of the Roses;
- Saint Peter the Apostle church
- Santa Maria la Manna Church, with the beautiful statue of "Madonna in Manna";
- Saint Matthew Apostle Church;
- Saint Martin Church where general Avitabile is buried;
- Lauritano castle: from the terraces you can admire Amalfi Coast and its splendour
Photo gallery Agerola on Amalfi Coast
Photos of Agerola. Pictures of Gods' path and paths on Lattary Mountains. Trekking, walks and excursion on the mountains. Wonderful panoramas.


text:
May he rest in peace.
Are the best columnists the least exciting?
Interview of A. Conan Doyle's daughter
Modern art is shit 1: TP wedding dress
Killing sections of used bookstores
American manners and anonymity
Modern art is shit 2: TP oragami
Historic murder map of NYC
Modern murder map of Philly
Harper Lee awarded and honored
Expret witness - misleading
Hand-drawing news graphics
Commune documentary
Commuinists and design
NC sheriff documentary
Short history of sphere
It's name was Lego
Persistance of paper


text:
Oct 2 2014
First Friday Art Walk – October 3
First Friday Art Walk on the historic Marietta Square will be held on October 3, from 5-9 p.m., with over 30 artists showing their work in front of numerous merchants, restaurants and galleries hosting them. This is the last Art Walk for this year.
In Atherton Square, behind Cool Beans and Hemmingways, Art Walk presents Tavern in the gARTen, selling beer and wine. Additional musicians and performing artists will be found throughout the Square, hosted by participating merchants. Ask an Art Walk Ambassador for a map and directions. You can identify them by their distinct white Art Walk aprons.
Kick-off your weekend with First Friday Art Walk. First Friday Art Walk is sponsored by The Branding Project, a membership organization representing merchants, arts, restaurants, entertainment and all professionals who work together to promote the Marietta Square as thriving, culturally-rich, shopping and entertainment destination for metro Atlanta, daily.For additional information, contact Kee Carlisle. 404-668-8210. email@example.com
FRI OCT 3-NOV 21 PRESSING MATTERS V, 2 Rules Fine Art of Marietta is pleased to host Pressing Matters V, the 5th annual exhibition by the members of the Atlanta Printmakers Studio (APS). This fine art exhibition recognizes the quality and diversity of work being generated by APS members. The works shown will be original prints using hand-pulled printmaking processes. Opening reception and printmaking demonstrations on Friday, October 3, 5-9pm during Marietta's First Friday Art Walk. The reception is free and open to the public. The 2 Rules Fine Art gallery is located at 85 Church Street in the historic Marietta Square district. Visit www.2rulesfineart.com for gallery hours and events, or call 404-355-6897.
FRI OCT 3 POP/REALISM PAINTINGS Avery Gallery presents Pop/Realism Paintings by Clifford Land. This entertaining show opens on Friday, October 3 from 5 – 9 pm at Avery Gallery, 390 Roswell St. in Marietta. Mick Kinney & The Georgia Crackers will be playing live 1920's era Appalachian mountain music with string instruments; fiddle, banjo and guitar. GG's Creole Cuisine will be providing an excellent sampling of delicious creole food.
FRI OCT 3 DK GALLERY 5-9 features Shields and Boundaries: Shellie Lewis-Dambax Solo Show for First Friday Art walk. dk Gallery is located at 25 West Park Square.
FRI OCT 3 MARIETTA HISTORY MUSEUM. 5-9 Join us during ArtWalk for An Eerie Evening at the Museum. The Museum will be hosting a variety of "special" guests, who will offer tales of Marietta's past. This event is FREE but donations are greatly appreciated. 1 Depot St., Marietta.
Download the complete map for Oct 3rd Art Walk here:ArtWalkMapOct2014


text:
Anzahl von Gästebucheinträgen: 104588
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Chart: Jefferson Velazquez – 10 for December Hohoho
Jefferson Velazquez
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When it rains in Basel
Grey rainy weather dampens the mood and also your desire to go out and do things. But it doesn't have to be like that. There are plenty of interesting and entertaining things to do in Basel even when it's cold and wet outside. Here are some all-weather things to do in Basel.
One Hour Escape
One Hour Escape is a live room escape game – a popular real-life adventure game in the heart of Basel.
- Duration: 1 hour
- Language: German, English
- Group size: 2 - 6 participants


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Designed and built for easy, immediate use, these suction plungers ensure problem-free operation of the dosing pump. They are all fitted with foot filter and valve and can be supplied in versions that have built-in level probe(single or double for warning and/or alarm) to indicate when the chemical product is low/ finished in order to prevent vacuum dosing that would damage the pump. Choosen according to the volume of the tank.
Product 8/8


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There's nothing like a family-centric holiday like Thanksgiving to read a book about the most dysfunctional of all families. My Sister, My Love by Joyce Carol Oates is a novel about a fictional family in which the six-year-old figure skating prodigy daughter is found murdered in her own house. If it sounds familiar it's because it's the fictionalized tale of JonBenet Ramsay.
The story is told from the perspective of the Rampike's son Skyler. He is nine years old when his sister Bliss is killed and, while never formerly accused, there are those who believe Skyler had something to do with the murder. The book is written in the voice of a teenager and so can take some getting used to sort of like when I read Room. However, where I eventually found the narration of Room to be endearing, I never quite got passed the rambling, at times incoherent, narration of My Sister, My Love. One difficulty, which is not at all Oates' fault, is that the book is full of footnotes. This just doesn't work in an e-book. The footnotes came at the end of each chapter at which point I no longer remembered what they referred to and it wasn't really possible to flip back and forth. Alas, a shortcoming in the e-book world.
Moving on… Now I didn't expect this to be an uplifting read. The subject matter pretty much precludes any idea of warm fuzzy feelings. And yet, it was a bit hard to read at times. Not so much because of the murder, because that doesn't come until well into the book, but just because life has always seemed to be tricky for the Rampike children despite growing up in an affluent family. I give Oates' a lot of credit for making it so heartbreaking without being cheaply sentimental. Even as I knew what the outcome would be, I hoped it would somehow turn out differently.
And while I did read all of My Sister, My Love on the trip to Florida, it was long. And it felt long. While the way the book is written gives a lot of insight into the mind of the narrator, Skyler, I think it could have been streamlined and still pack the same emotional punch. I wanted to know what would happen, but I wanted to know faster. I'm impatient.


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Appsec EU Training
Smart lockpicking - hands-on exploiting software flaws in IoT
There is no doubt electronic locks are among the most profitable smart devices to attack. And yet recent disclosures of multiple vulnerabilities clearly show there are not enough specialists able to help with software-related issues to so-far mostly hardware vendors.
This course is intended to fill this skills gap. Based on hands-on exercises with real devices (we will have fun hacking a dozen various smart locks), you will learn how to analyse their security and design them properly. The knowledge will then apply to many other IoT devices.
We will perform: wireless sniffing, spoofing, cloning, replay, DoS, authentication and command-injection attacks. Practical exercises will include investigating proprietary network protocols, demystifying and breaking "military grade encryption", abusing excessive services, triggering fallback open, brute-forcing PINs via voice calls and attacking building automation systems.
The software activities will be mixed with short entertaining tricks, including opening a lock by a strong magnet, counterfeiting fingerprints in a biometric sensor or opening voice-controlled lock by remotely hacking speaker-enabled devices.
Several tasks will be associated with electromagnetic lock guarding a special vault - full of goods from Poland. Whenever a student will succeed in hacking the lock, the box opens automatically, and one can have something delicious.
Technologies covered will include Bluetooth Smart, Linux embedded, KNX, NFC, Wiegand, WiFi, P2P, GSM…
Each student will receive about 100 EUR value hardware (detailed below).
List of topics:
Bluetooth Smart
based on at least 7 various smart locks, and tools developed by the trainer: GATTacker BLE MITM proxy and deliberately vulnerable Hackmelock (consisting of Android mobile application and lock device simulated on Raspberry Pi):
- passive sniffing
- static authentication password
- spoofing
- replay attacks
- command injection
- Denial of Service
- cracking "Latest PKI technology"
- other flaws of custom challenge-response authentication
- abusing excessive services (e.g. module's default AT-command interface).
- weaknesses of key sharing with guests functionality
- physical hands-on: opening lock with a strong magnet which turns motor inside
- takeaway Hackmelock challenges for practising later at home using provided hardware
Linux embedded
based on wireless door lock, alarm+home automation system and other devices:
- authentication bypass
- information disclosure
- telnet brute-force
- OS command injection
- switching to WiFi maintenance mode using external intercom
- UART interfaces introduction
Proprietary network protocols
based on fingerprint sensor device, wireless door lock, HVAC controller
- various approaches to analysing proprietary protocols
- step-by-step understanding packets and attacking remote management binary communication of fingerprint sensor
- sniffing and decoding administrative credentials
- abusing improper session management (authentication bypass)
- P2P communication - how to attack devices hidden behind NAT
- a few case-studies of proprietary protocols vulnerabilities identified in financial systems, mobile apps, other devices
KNX home automation -
we will have an example installation connected to electromagnetic lock
- theory introduction, typical architecture, group address, device address…
- tools: ETS configuration suite vs open-source knxd, knxmap, nmap scripts
- how to locate and connect to KNX-IP gateway in LAN or remotely
- monitor mode - sniffing the bus communication
- write command to group address and open lock
SMS and DTMF remote control over GSM
based on remote control alarm system
- theory introduction to GSM interception
- brute-force alarm administrative PIN via automated remote SMS and voice calls
based on hotel electronic door lock, ski lift pass and a bus ticket
- clone contactless card
- brute-force ID
wired access control transmission standard
- theory introduction
- sniff the data transmitted from access control reader using BLEKey
you will also be able try for yourself to:
- open smart lock using special strokes of a strong magnet which turns the device's inside motor
- cheat fingerprint biometric sensor - we can make your own fingerprint clone during training
- open voice-controlled lock by hacking nearby speaker-enabled device
We will also have several Mirai-vulnerable cameras and DVR. We will expose them directly to Internet and watch how long it will take for them to be pwned. Having enough time we will analyse the attack online.
Who should come?
Pentesters, security professionals, IoT developers, anyone interested - regardless initial skills level or experience, everybody will learn something new.
What students should bring?
- contemporary laptop capable of running Kali Linux in virtual machine
- Android > 4.3 smartphone. If you don't have one, please inform in advance - a few will be available for students.
- basic familiarity with Linux command-line, Kali, Wireshark
- scripting skills or pentesting experience will be an advantage, but is not crucial
What will be provided?
- course materials in PDFs (several hundred pages)
- all required additional files: source code, documentation, installation binaries…
- Bluetooth Smart hardware sniffer and development kit based on nrf51822 module
- 2 Bluetooth Low Energy USB dongles
- Raspberry Pi 3 with assessment tools and Hackmelock for further hacking at home
- NFC NXP PN532 board + "magic UID" card - which will allow you to clone most common Mifare Classic contactless cards


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Goose and Binky are taking science classes through the charter school on Wednesdays. Binky's class is "Sifting through Science." It's an introduction to the scientific process. Their first class was working with water. What kid doesn't love playing with water? It was messy and fun! It's a class with 5 and 6 year olds that lasts an hour and a half. There's a break in the middle to eat and play on the playground. When I asked Binky what he liked best about the class he answered, "Recess!" No big surprise there! Goose really enjoyed her class. Her partner was a little chatty. But it went well, otherwise. She also takes a creative writing class after lunch. She loves to write! Both kids made new friends and had a great day! What more can I ask for?
About Me
- Lisa
- i am a stay-at-home mom living, learning and loving by the bay!I love to take pictures. I love to crochet cozy things for my family and friends.
October 13, 2008
Wednesday Science Classes
2 comments:
Oh, that sounds awesome! We would love something like that. :)ReplyDelete
Wow! this is great! Noah goes for science labs at our science center (which we are so lucky, it's about a 2 min. car ride away.) It's for homeschoolers, so he gets to see lots of his friends. It's really wonderful to hook up with other homeschoolers!ReplyDelete
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Purpose: To learn about the faith and to build networking among individuals across the Archdiocese, MGSOYA has launched a book club. The book club meets weekly (Thursday evenings at 9 pm EST) via Google Hangout.
If you would like to lead a book club session, please email firstname.lastname@example.com.
In 2013, the book club has finished reading "Way of the Ascetics" by Tito Colliander.
In 2014, the book club finished reading "Defeating Sin: Overcoming Our Passions and Changing Forever" by Fr. Joseph Huneycutt.
To join the book club, email email@example.com. Got a tips for a great new book to read? Email us at firstname.lastname@example.com.


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By David Baird
Superficial Life
Thinking of schizophrenia
Beginnings are where most possibility lies. So I'm thinking, by way of a beginning – allow me an imaginative analogy...
Try to picture this: your mind is "colonial". You, in other words, are a force occupying my "aboriginal" writing. Don't be quick to judge. Think of all the colonies on Earth where no gold was "found" – but instead where other, more subtle types of richness eventually surfaced.
This analogy, of an alien force entering the land of a mysterious native people, is the type of extreme seemingly necessary when communicating with a profoundly strange mind. For that is how minds are to each other, when insanity is involved...
This book is earth – it is "the stuff of me". But how are you, the reader, a "force"? Isn't the writer the one, if anyone, forcing?
Maybe they are right – schizophrenics are 'aliens' – and you, if you are sane, are contrariwise the 'native' – while I am a visitor from a distant realm... This question – of the "natural", the "human", the "normal" – is the sort of thing I'd like to bring to light – the contradictions inherent in the mind, and in life.
I don't want to say this is a wonderful story. It is, after all, the story of a disease. But, to reverse a saying, all that dies must once have lived – what brains degenerate must somehow first have formed... Too dark of a note to begin on? If this you think, you haven't an idea of the darkness the sufferer of this dread bane faces...
I may need not explain what schizophrenia is. People have their own glimmer of an idea, even if these are as "crazily off" as psychosis is itself. Indeed – why tell you – when I can show you? If the truth be known, I am a sufferer of this quote-unquote mental illness, this brain disease. So anything, and everything, I write – or am – no doubt bears its marks.
The title was first to be "Superficial Persons", for reasons that may come clear. This could have made one wonder – superficial persons? Was I implying that the mentally ill are somehow shallow – that we are less deep or real than the healthy?
Not exactly. Or, perhaps not...
For now, I thought, let's not compare us in a simplistic hierarchal scheme.
Let's say I was suggesting that 'persons', the phenomena of personality, are themselves somehow superficial entities. Though not in the sense of 'fake'. Disease itself is deep, let alone the being it affects – being which is the most profound thing we can conceive of, besides deity.
However – like a mirror which is only flat, but can appear quite voluminous, depending what is in front of it – a person as we know her is but the thinnest layer of the being – or reality – that is her full being. And persons aren't just reflective – mirroring what observers wish – but rather are transparent – letting deeper core levels have causal influence, though not always direct evidentiary traces.
The title had partial intent to provoke thought – a cognitive dissonance – in the audience. "Persons – superficial? How dare he!" Or, "I know some superficial persons also..."
External behavior, the fairly ritualized acts and interacts as which others see us, has deep-seated roots. But what we can normally observe of selves – at any one time – are the most ephemeral, or ambiguous, of moments. Though, there is a 'fractal' involution, a transparency or lucidity of levels, that allows sight of deep structure at times... (In a fractal, a similar level of complexity is seen, no matter the magnification the structure is viewed at...)
If core events cause peripheral expression, by seeing this you, in a way, can "see" the core. I'm not, of course, saying "'core' equals special" and "'periphery' equals flimsy wrapping"... For does it really matter which is which? Core-periphery, periphery-core? How do you know the more important? We are both.
Perhaps we can say of postmodern thought that, in it, distinctions are problematized. This means they say it is at least questionable to say x is different than y, no matter what the x, no matter what the y...
If the world is homogenous, or at least made of strings or points or something, then everything, in a way, would be the same – of the same essence. And it matters less what it's called – calling everything something is seemingly not different from saying "All is water", like some of the ancients did... But perhaps as the most meaningless (though, if true, profound), statement you could make, saying "All is x" is valuable simply as a thought experiment.
To make this concrete, we could take, for instance, "nociception" – what neuroscientists call pain-perception, and think of it as a model for all perception. Perception as, actually, nociception, in other words.
For a few moments, imagine you are a hypochondriac, and every one of your sensations is painful. This is an interesting exercise, and may help you to one day get more pleasure out of your senses...
There are unique things about pain. People can live with all of their senses intact, but tragically be missing nociception. It is a life-threatening lack, of course, but it is possible.
I wonder – if pain perception is a fundamental category, which can be present or absent, why isn't pleasure also? Is pleasure instead 'relative' – a matter of taste? Does it require something like aesthetic cultivation of the neural apparatus – do lower organisms not feel it? Maybe pleasure isn't a basic type of mental information, because you could live (an albeit depressing life) with no pleasure, but it is dangerous to go without pain.
Pain is akin to nervous 'information' – so is pleasure like knowledge? As you grow older, you may find that, like for me, sensations themselves become, or are naturally seen to be, pleasurable. As in, there is nothing more to go for, but the sight of shadows on the wall, the sound of a far off lawn-mower and some chirping birds, the feel of computer keys under your hands, the weight of your body, etc...
I guess this could be called "empirical pleasure". Rational pleasure would, on the other hand, probably be an elevated form of it, (like something felt when inventing a philosophy...)
This may sound twisted or masochistic, but one of the highest, most rational pleasures I've known was the phenomenon of "depersonalization", or ego-loss, in connection with delirium during a recent flu, and originally years ago in an acid trip. It wasn't fun while it was happening, but after it was over, I kind of missed it...
How could being no one be good? As a thinker, you have to ask yourself the most radical questions. (If you don't, who will?) Like, what could ego-loss's meaning be? Can you lose something which is supposedly always there? Or is it instead not the most sublime awareness, to see the total constructionality, (constructedness), and historical basis inherent in our every thought?
"I had no thoughts of my own" still contains 'I' and 'my own.' A contradiction in terms? No thoughts during this loss were personal – they were all wrapped in others' voices. You may ask, "What is a thought but what is in your mind?" But what was in my mind was merely externally caused. I had no internal causation, or creativity. Rather, I had will – I could move around – but my visual sense was the only sense which gave myself a sense of me. I comforted myself with the saying, "the eyes are the most sensitive openings into the soul."
This made me think that passive senses, like visuality, must be more basic than language or mentality. Plenty of organisms have sight, but do not have language. Although vision seems very colorful and complex, it may in fact be more primitive – or if you don't like that word – more necessary, than language...
And less necessary than anything else in the brain, may be personality itself... I've come to suspect selfhood is an "epiphenomenon" – something that floats above the real functional operations of the brain. Another way of thinking this is to say "the person is determined, not determinant". (It is an effect, not a cause.)
For the self to be determinant, you would think, there would have to be an origin to it – a source... But origins – the embryonic, genetic (evolution of the species) or ontogenetic (growth of the individual) origins of the self are relative, or lost in time, or gradually reduced back to zero, the closer to conception you look. In other words, how can the "I" have willpower when to have 'power' requires an origin, a causal connection – and no self origin is apparent?
It's quite philosophical to talk about the decentering, or absence, of the self... But good for us, I think. For in our travels, some of us run into the postmodernisms "There is no subject" or "the subject is dead". But these are incoherent ideas – they don't mesh with reality. Of course there are subjects, selves... However, it may be proper to say that the subject is more of an appearance than a reality.
Think of the child – the newborn. Awash in a sea of language, none of which is its own. Perhaps, not being cognitively/linguistically developed, it would not matter as much that none of the language going through your head was your own. Though babies cry a fair amount, I wonder how many of these growing pains are physical, how many mental.
So perhaps, because one can lose one's ego doesn't mean one never had ego. And because one once had no self doesn't mean one can never develop selfhood. In fact, wouldn't we escape a blind "absolutism" by saying, indeed, that the ego is a developmental phenomenon – not an essential one?
And if we are saying ego is developmental, I think we can also say life is developmental. That particular growth may be our ultimate aim – to examine our lives, and struggle, if we can, to avoid superficial ones – to attain something like depth or meaningfulness, in this one certain time on earth...
Superficial Life
Chapter One
Mind-oriented. (Mentally originary.)
If fancy strikes, you may truly say "there is a mountain in my head." Because if you look at it philosophically, and trust me, you should – everything we know is mind-oriented. For how do we actually know or become aware of anything, but through the 'instrument' of our own mind's action, its "faculties of apprehension", as Kant might say?
It is not as if we ever escape our selves and reach outside the brain. And it is not as if anything we know magically appears in our heads, and does not arise because of causal influences of the environment, or perhaps genetics, when instinct is involved...
In this view, "the world" is a self-made thing – it is like a mirror – a big surround-version of ourselves – reflecting back to us only what we are capable of thinking real. But not exactly. We learn new things – the world can show us things we've never seen – impossible for a true "mirror".
This analogy functions, but is not literal. Because it could be backwards – we could be the mirror, a sort of blank surface for life to inscribe its scriptures upon, and for other people to then read them off...
You may sense something missing. It can be only this – consciousness... Perhaps as mere 'brain-machines' we would be nothing but surfaces – but the thing called "mind" gives us depth somehow as great as the greatest height we have ever seen of the nighttime sky – it gives our inner lives complexity that can grasp or create or play with the most highly textured symphonic music we could hear...
For picture any picture... No matter how complex a vision you have just summoned, it's probably only the merest fragment of brain power making it. All the complex and amazing-looking crowds you have ever been in were simply "models in your mind, of things ephemeral and sublime"...
This is why "the self itself" is quite a phenomenon, if you grapple with it for prolonged times. And if you interfere with it, by psychosis-mimicking (psychotomimetic) drugs like LSD, you are assuming a right to alter the most profound entity or being you can know.
Experimentality is the life blood of many writers. But the more experimental you are in your speculation, the further off and wrong, necessarily, some will be. Now hopefully, if you survive, your ultimate theories will approach originality, or truth.
Recommendations to be experimental are often taken to an extreme. In my case, for instance. It all made me who I am today, but I have been insane, so I'm semi-confused about whether it is a good thing to be this way or not.
Don't get me wrong. If you alter your mind, you can, some say, never go back. I myself have been so far down alteration's path, and it can seem like so much struggle to return, that I'm mostly at peace here.
But unless you want to vastly increase your risk of a psychotic break, mental hospitals, expensive anti-psychotic medicine with many side effects every day for the rest of your life, I would certainly avoid drugs stronger than pot. And even that can tip some minds over the edge. So why not be thankful you have a brain in the first place, and forget about trading it for a synthetic new one through drug use?
In any case, the self is quite a piece of work, and the whole world, in a sense, can fit within it. As this is true of all selves, there are billions of worlds in this world. Walking in a crowd and imagining the parallel subjectivities is mind-boggling. Each person with a different perspective, all as colorful and real and intense as any other, to a certain degree.
Maturity level, or intelligence quotient, may give added twists to how you are interpreting your 'life-world' – the "phenomenal" reality of mind – but if you think back, you may be reluctant to say you are a qualitatively different entity at thirty years old than you were at ten. This similarity-within-self makes me project a similarity-across-others. In fact, observation of animals even leads some to guess that just about anything capable of consciousness must have a "spirit" like ours...
This is why education or learning is important. Because the more we know, the more we can perceive. "The real is the made" means that if you, for instance, don't know the laws of physics, you may not be able to fire a projectile at the angle that will take it farthest. Or if you don't know a bit about philosophy, you may be paralyzed and uncomfortable when someone criticizes you, instead of reacting with a more balanced overt or covert defense mechanism. Finally, when you look at a globe, if you do not know about life, you will not be able to clearly imagine which world you see...
The mind, like an instrument, needs to be practiced and practiced. It can and does become stronger with use, like muscle. It is up to your imagination to invent its uses, and your life's, for no one can "a prioritize" these – no one can rightly say, in advance of the action, what the best uses a creature like yourself should put yourself to.
Superficial Life
Chapter Two
Anti-Horizons, the focus of the world. (Ipseity impinged upon by All.)
I often think of horizons – the limits of the seeable. So when today I turned my attention to the self, I thought to characterize it as an "anti-horizon". The speck in the middle of a big horizon circle, to give an image. If you want to think big – the self, being at a point, is the focus, indirectly, of the energies of potentially an entire world. The "all" can be said to impinge upon, or touch and manipulate in many ways, this ipseity – this self of ours.
Like it or not, circulation – of capital and labor – characterizes life on Earth. Those with brain diseases are often part of a curious experiment in social engineering. To keep some safe from the circulation, they are given disability income, which is administered by Social Security in America.
You may ask, "Shouldn't everyone chip in, to the great flux that is society – the market?" It would be nice if we all could. But for several reasons, it is inadvisable. For instance, the stress inherent in participatory economics might cause sufferers of mental illness undue misery, with any number of (lethal or not) negative consequences. Or, since schizophrenics are often very susceptible to verbal suggestion, they could be vulnerable to being exploited by employers – who, after all, come from the entire ethical spectrum of citizens.
I have used disability time to hone my thinking and writing. This is the type of contribution I want to make to a greater good. And since social security isn't enough money to live at my perceived comfort level, I am feeling, by this point, the capitalist pressure to achieve independent income with my conatus or effort.
This is different sort of writing than I did for the other time I've been an adult. I've written many things in school, and to be put open on the internet, where one is of course free to say however and whatever one wants – there is a sense of power in that. But now I've decided to write for the public market, and my style has spontaneously changed. I have to "reign in" my powers and focus them in a different, more subtle way. Become aligned to the vectors of good taste, and circumscription.
For instance, this is could be thought an exoteric book – not serious philosophy. Philosophers make text fairly challenging, because they are approaching the world's most difficult problems. Normal people, on the other hand, "laypeople" as you are known to philosophers, would like books a shade less esoteric than the maximum level a writer can make.
But we all want to learn of the big questions, the important problems. "Theory", in other words. I once strove for theory so original, it would, like in Orwell's 1984, be considered 'thought crime' by the powers-that-be. But now I'm not as sure. For the ultimate revolution, as far as I can see, would be to convince society to stop – to persuade the reproduction to end – to halt history's march as soon as all of us alive had lived our lives. Of course this would never happen, at least with rational methods. But even if I could do it – is it such a noble goal? Instead, why not let the anarchy of world civilization reign on for a long time – let the world go on its merry or miserable way "forever after", without the interference of philosophers who think it is not justified in doing so?
The justice of the world, if you examine the matter, changes the world, and changes our very conceptions of what the Good and virtue should be. How it could be otherwise, I do not know...
Superficial Life
Chapter Three
Form, stance, style, direction. (Beings in movement.)
Speaking of making distinctions problematic – what if we were to do this to the distinction between the is and the ought? Between what happens and what should happen? In other words, what if we were to say "This is the best and only possible world"?
This may be the most fundamental distinction philosophy has to offer – between the True and the Good. So if thinkers have been arguing about this for thousands or hundreds of years, you wonder what progress I can make in a few sentences. Yet, after all, we today are the product, the end-(as of now) result of all history – so we should stand at a viewpoint potentially or at least conceivably ready to give a judgment on the argument.
One tends to forget that the "now" – the present – is the end of history. Not the finality, just the most complete. Near the end, or, the end – the last known moments in history. (A familiar thought to those of us who grew up during the supposed threat of nuclear holocaust during the cold war.)
And since ethics is about difference and distinctions, to build up to a better conception of Virtue and evil, one might first, paradoxically or dialectically, break them down and mix them...
You think the world should change? Do you really think so, if you examine this deeply? Isn't everyone already doing the natural thing for them, as a person in their history? To change anything – the present, the future – you'd have to literally change history...
What about supposed Anarchy? Would it be so bad – everyone doing what they wished, and no law of the land? Isn't this how nations already interact, in reality – and how people mostly do, unless they are caught by authorities? You could say we have a state of virtual anarchy, if you wanted to. But society and culture exist – they keep things somewhat normalized – probably through the functions of language or Logos, society is stable. At the simplest level, one is told what to do, and does it. The truth is explained to one, and one believes in it...
At a higher level, discourses or complex systems of statements could "program" our brains, like we're computers. (After all, as far as we can scientifically tell, the brain is nothing more than a biological computer...) Some call this brainwashing, some call it enculturation. Some say "thought control", others "education". It depends how you see it.
If language does program, is this good? Culturated away from our natural state, we tend to behave acceptably to society. We strive for a greater good, as they say. But supposing, like many suspect, that it isn't good to be artificially constructed – how can we deprogram?
Is this good "good"? I don't know – and I doubt there are many who understand the question of virtue, who think they do know...
And in a way, it doesn't matter who has "the truth". We all know the truth – or at least "a" truth. Instead, postmoderns became convinced that performativity is key.. The performance of your truth – how well you play. Artists seemingly always knew this. Philosophers took longer, or went about discovering it in a more laborious way...
It is strange because thinkers often act completely sane and rational with every letter they type. I, on the other hand, have up front admitted the opposite. Yet still I feel the pull of ratio... For some reason...
It probably has to do with dominance of active over passive in my philosophy. Thinking, in other words, is more important than "thought." What we are thinking now is more key than what we thought before – for most people. (Those of us with degenerative brain diseases might look back upon our previous mental modalities with a sentimental or wishful air.)
Therapists say degenerated brains can regenerate, and come back to be nearly as strong as before, with the proper therapy... Today, as far as I've been able to determine, therapy revolves around "stress tests" – in the hospital, and elsewhere. What else would it be for – to make things easier for patients? – yes, to an extent. Yet some real-world conditions of difficulty are needed to see if patients are ready to enter again the real world...
Throughout my growth, I thought I was going against "the structure" – I didn't believe in the structure of the world. This is why I've resisted therapy. I saw too much going through motions and waiting around. Patients, in other words, adhering to artificial constructions of time and space. This is good if one is acutely psychotic, and in need of self-betterment – but I feel and hope I've transcended this most grim stage of the illness.
We all occupy positions in life, or phases of illness. And as volitional beings, we have dispositions – tendencies, to move in certain ways. (Dyspositions...) And really, the mind has a shape to it – the mind has a motion. Because what is a thought? It has to have a spatial, temporal structure, ultimately, to cohere with its neural counterpart...
Superficial Life
Chapter Four
The disease process. (An abnormal reproduction.)
Schizophrenia is possibly quite "natural" – an evolutionary adaptation, meant to enhance the entire species' chance for survival... Obviously, for the individual, it is life-threatening. But you might suppose that a bit of specific craziness happening in a culture might stimulate humanity to generally advance.
Cultural advancement may be a reason for the illness. On the other hand, the individual faces reasons of the illness... To get at what the disease means, we should get at what the word could mean...
'Phren' definitely means "mind". But the meaning of the prefix 'schizo-' is in dispute. Some say it means "split". And others say instead "alternating", as in good-bad-good-bad-etc...
But we must wonder what the 'meaning' of a word means, or ultimately refers to. Is it the intention of the word's originator? If so, why should one person's intention determine an entire word's usage – part of a culture's grand function – forever after? Or is 'meaning' reducible to the word's use in common currency? Or is meaning the best fit to the best theory?
In that case, I've heard 'schizophrenia' refers to a problem of integration between the mind and body. But the "best theory" is paradoxically the most deranged version of all, (at least taken literally) – because no one knows what the "mind" is, or how it is 'connected' to the body. If you read enough neuroscience, philosophy, and psychology, you'll discover the general and complete ignorance on the issue.
On the other hand, the brain, as opposed to the mind, is rather more well known, for it is (part of) the body. So schizophrenia could be a problem of integration within the brain – integration of the brain with itself. One level may not connect fully to others. Thoughts and feelings and sensations out of whack, in other words – the different cognitive modes not jiving properly. However the illness works – we then must ask how a divinely orchestrated symphony as the neuronal brain, with ideational consciousness and playful memory and imagination, becomes psychotic – detached from reality?
This question may tie to our previous thoughts about the developmental self. For this illness involves an ongoing process. This is why anti-psychotic medicine regimes need to be life-long... Reversing psychosis is not the same as reversing schizophrenia, which would mean a very profound change in the structure itself of the brain...
As far as the process of my own disease, I seem to be functioning decently, though I've had difficulties. Dysphoria, suicidality, death drive (passivity), homocidality, and misanthropism – but nothing overt, like destructive behavior... If schizophrenics function well, does this mean they actually are well? One can be a good actor, but very sick inside.
Most people seemingly hide their insides – healthy or sick... To express fully would feel improper, socially unacceptable, or psychotic, depending on the intensity of the personality in question. But I have other ideas. I am able to be public – fully expressive – because of experience with "voices" – with an observer-unconscious, a critic-brain – I am always-already fully public, (at least subjectively)...
The prime level is the primal level. The level of unconscious influence which only schizophrenics have waking access to. For we can "see things" that no one else can. What normal person could be feeling great one moment, and want to kill himself the next? Pleasure and pain can be very close together. And if mood swings are part of the disease, maybe we want to go for self-repression – we want to resist moods, and overcome them.
To wildly speculate, could every mental phenomenon be akin to a psychotic one – all processes like disease processes? Mentality as sickness, in other words... I say this because inner life – subjectivity – could be a great falsity, a great delusion or distraction – from what the ultimate certainty is, that we will all die... (If this is a certainty?)
Superficial Life
Chapter Five
Many levels at once. (Neuronal Hologram?)
How many levels are there to consciousness – and how many to its neural correlate? In a hologram, each bit of film represents many parts of the 3-D image at once. So I was thinking the brain may be similar. For instance, could one neuronal structure be involved in both the conscious and unconscious selves? And how many unconscious selves could there be?
The idea of an unconscious self is somewhat controversial, and may indeed be 'incoherent' – or impossible. You may ask, "Wasn't that the whole Freud thing?" But Freud himself is not fashionable today in the schools. Although it's ironic that Freud is unread, it is understandable. Scientists think to move beyond myths of the past, and only philosophers of science seem to study the myths that founded these fields...
But I'm allowed to have controversial theories. And in a way, it would be surprising if I didn't. If you heard, fully real, a whole chorus of interacting voices, making explicit commentary relevant to you, you might begin to suspect that there is more to the brain than unconscious computational mechanisms... You might suspect an actual self in there..
Once you've had conversations with mental voices, you tend to posit a source. But perhaps the source is "just your own (mechanical) brain..." And aren't conversations in real life mostly one-sided, anyway? You can almost have one just as complete even though the other person isn't partaking... The other side is implicit.
Is it realistic to posit multiple selves? The authorities say voices "merely come from your own cognitive vocal centers." Well, of course. That is a priori where voices would have to originate. But that is like reducing one's voice itself to "merely coming from the cognitive vocal center." This doesn't mean there isn't consciousness behind it – or behind audio hallucination.
An incoherency in the brain, a disorder of thought, could very well entail multiple subjectivities. If one subjectivity can exist, why not ponder the chance that the subject-function is multiply realizable? As many hidden selves as a brain could compute? As interesting as this is, it is probably wrong. For the essence of a subject is that it is conscious and controlling. Any "subject" that was merely unconscious wouldn't be a subject...
So, one can think, "they're just voices." On the other hand, we know there is more to us than merely our voice – because we can feel selfhood. But what if you were brainwashed – hypnotized so as to believe x y or z? Or even more scary, what if you developed in an alien matrix of meaning formations over which you had no control?
Superficial Life
Chapter Six
Classification of the world. (The many teachings.)
Most writers present lots of information, but can't convey knowledge – teach ways of thinking, as opposed to merely rehearsing thought. In any case, we cannot always rely on the world for salvation – you must ultimately be your best teacher. Ask if your writing actually changes you. Ask if a restructure of your mind is possible. Try to exercise your brain.
Analysis could be said to be the breaking of a whole into parts. Analysis of "dialectic", of logic – in your self and in the world – reveals that the dialectic is in 'the object', as well as in you. It's not just in you. Everything you can or will or should encounter is like this – like you.
The dialectic: contradiction, discussion, opposite logical statements, the development of knowledge or logic, the development of truth. As for my logic, I'm trying to lose all irrational or programmed desire. I'm doing this to regain or recreate myself along more ideal or human-as-conscious lines. I seek to want what I should want.
Writing and reading seem like the most powerful ways to recondition...
Writing for its own sake – writing to "get it out". Writing to weave a narrative social fabric. Do we want to "tear the social fabric", as radicals think? Aren't narrative threads the only things keeping us together anymore?
One should at least try to write what one thinks. Who cares what anyone else says? The measure of one's "unconsciousness" is said by Arthur Janov to be one's responsiveness to verbal suggestion. On this reading, you may want to go against voiced commentary, as a therapeutic (or life-saving) method.
We have things in us – language and action – we need to express eventually. If you have a literary mentality, like me, you sometimes want to simply keep writing, no matter what is written...
"Teaching people a (foreign) language" is really, if you think of it, teaching people what to say. "Here, say this in situation P..." This goes for English as well. The 'humanities', the university programs, seen in a certain light, are fairly contrived or orchestrated endeavors... "Say x to group of people concerned with a b and c. Say y to group concerned with d e and f." Is this true creativity? I don't know...
I think academic programs are this way because they have a hidden, deterministic bent... They believe, deep down, that "If x happens, y will then follow"...
It would probably be nice to inquire as to what political effects determinist philosophies have. And to look within yourself for the personal effects of your own psyche's deterministic bent... (Which is not good, if you regard Freedom as important...)
The brain is a complex system, so chaos theory presumably applies to it, as well as to larger things like the biosphere... A butterfly effect in the brain? If inspiration is a butterfly, schizophrenia is closer to a hurricane...
In any case, writers with language on their minds seek to trigger culture – the language – into pre-emptive crystallization, or a paradigm-shift of a type never before seen... In this light, a "crystallization phenomenon" is the only kind of literary trend worth pondering....
Superficial Life
Chapter Seven
What is non-self? (Closest as farthest.)
It is difficult to determine what the "self" – or anything, for that matter – really is. For instance, what is "mass" – (let alone "mind")? Methods of approach and investigation with respect to the Absolute, the Universal, can be quite strange – even paradoxical...
As a teacher once said, "To get closer to things, you can go farther away".
To me, humans are (metaphorically) "alien". I used to think, as anyone would, that I was certainly human... Until I developed 'the illness' – and at which point, looking back, I realized I never was a normal, or even semi-normal, human. So I have to consider how to approach such an alien consciousness as you might be, if I want to communicate with the world.
What does it mean to be alien? Anti-chthonous? (My coinage for the opposite of 'autochthonous' – "native" or "of this land".) As per our discussion of mind-orientation in reality – if your brain is psychotic, the actual world you're from is quite different from normal... So the essence of what it is to be human, or animal for that matter, is in doubt. To take a specific, the essence of human life is claimed to be its sexuality, by certain psychologists – Janov among them.
But who says – those who have, or have had, sex? That doesn't include all of us... And what about those who think otherwise – those 'outside of love' or with "perversions" of love? Or those who are insane and who have anti-social desires?
Can one be essentially human if one is judged criminal? Are criminals not even animal, let alone human? (Are they "real"? – For a life sentence, or the death penalty, would seem to negate your very reality – it would seem to ultimately remove you, as a coherent phenomenon, from life...)
Speaking of sex, I no longer know what beauty is. I've tried to study culture's ideological stereotyped notions of beauty. I sought a truth within the surface concept. But eventually, beauty dissolved itself, and Imagery alone can now be beauty. A glass of water, or the sound of an air conditioner, can be sublime. If this seems far-fetched, remind yourself that it is real schizophrenia... After all, are you not curious about insane philosophy? Not just the usual fare – insane ranting or insane ax murdering? I think it is up to all of us to re-interpret "insanity" – to come up with a formulation that at least resembles the essence...
Re-interpretation is key. Besides expressionism, your personality is the total of your "reading" ability and practice – your readings or interpretations of life. Of course, other people and institutions love to supply you with their own readings, to adopt as yours. So our task is to learn to "de-interpret" – to automatically doubt what we automatically believe – and re-interpret – to assign a new subjective/objective meaning to our lives... Only this way will our selves be truly personal.
Superficial Life
Chapter Eight
Personalization. (A recurrent theme.)
Personalization would be the opposite, the concomitant, of ego-loss. It would be the process we all grow through as our egos develop – from the nothingness of conception, onward to the near-infinity of possible genius.
Maybe personalization is also the rejection of all other philosophies, including our old ones. For our old philosophy is no more our own. How could any philosophy be truly ours, except today's?
What is 'philosophy'? It seems like it would have to be, if you ignored the dictionary, "the knowledge of how we are living now"... Therapy, on the other hand, is usually not quite philosophy. It's more like acting class, perhaps. And I'm not using 'acting' in a pejorative sense, to mean "faking"... I'm using it as meant in the phrase "Act now, or forever lose this chance!"
In therapy, both internal mental acting and external social acting are the topics... "How to act normal" can be a questionable pedagogical aim, considering there is no consensus on normality. But psychiatry generally accepts culturally-specific norms for this, which makes sense.
In a metaphorical way, there's nothing therapeutic about therapy, except insofar as life itself is all therapeutic. However it is a use of time that can be quite intense. But being a philosopher, I have to invent my own usages for my own time, if I want to get anywhere in my field.
To get a sense for where you are in your progress, try this: If you boiled down all your learning, and had to give a one-line synopsis, what would it be? Mine might be about how the reproduction is a delusion or a lie – a falsity. I use 'reproduction' to here mean the sum total of all the societal, human forms of life and artifice that are constantly recycling and reproducing – that are, in short, remaking the world again continually.
For think on "reproduction"... Doesn't this word inevitably have negative valuation when used in connection with life's meaning? Do we merely want to reproduce the culture of our forefathers, and not improve it? If we do want to improve it, we have to derail the current culture's presuppositions and assumptions, intentions and idols...
Methods to derail culture are very valuable. How do we teach others to not respond to "mechanized consciousness", to automatic impulses? It might have something to do with developing our conception of time. No one, not even academic authorities, knows what time itself is. So I would be suspicious when people had recommendations about how to "structure your time".
How can you say time has a 'structure'? Going by clock time is not apposite. Going by machine time, the rhythm of the work week, seems suspicious as well – a good thing to avoid if you can. When people recommend "structure", I find they are usually recommending procedures and behaviors. The abstraction of temporal structure is a good way to distract patients from the concrete spatial behaviors therapists are really trying to get them to perform...
Speaking of programming, and "programming", I'm trying to get away from music – pre-fab or not... If you think of the best philosophers, none of them had music blaring in the background all the time. Why? Music seems to have two seductive components: extension and intensity...
For one, music "strings you along" and gets you to keep listening, in hopes you'll soon hear something good. For another, it channels tons of info into you at once, in a seeming attempt to distract you from the reality that its content is qualitatively lacking...
I brought up music, also, because it is a good metaphor for all the people's voices we hear during a day... When I'm in an over-sensitive mode, "songs" – memories of what people have said to me lately – are too insistent. I'll hear rhythms for the rest of the day. This is hard, because I'm trying, as a writer, to focus on my own voice.
As a being, a thinker – whatever you want to be – the fundamental decision is a decision of what to listen to, and say. To create what you want to say. We have all already passed though the produced phase, when we couldn't talk – when all we had was other people's voices.
Still, the lords own the fields – the literal fields, and the metaphoric fields. So it is wise when learning what to say to learn, also, what the lords want to hear...
Superficial Life
Chapter Nine
Conclusion: The transparent surface. (The core is born.)
Those who don't believe the mind is one unified thing sometimes talk of "levels of the self". "Outer" being "nearer to the world." But it's uncertain if a spatial metaphor has anything to do with the way the mind is 'arranged'. Yes, the brain takes up space – and the world you see with your visual cortex appears quite spacey, and presumably you feel as if you take up space. But philosophers tend to hold that consciousness is not spatial... (I am still trying to figure this one out...)
(We can at least claim that the words we say penetrate farther out into space, than, for instance, the signals in our brainstem...)
The most hidden level – the innermost core of personality – would presumably not be a "core of personality" unless it had effects – unless it were connected with the 'affect'... Brains, after all, are not 'black boxes' – items with completely hidden inner workings. For consciousness is "reportable" – people can explain, or seem to, why they do what they do.
Why talk of "core"? Because if you want change, one way to get in at your mentality is to "get it out" – let it become manifest, on the page, in the air, or simply in the way you move or relax your body and face.
A way to "reach in" is through enhanced transparency of the surface – the top layers which everyone can see – through increasing the amount of "expression" of our most important feelings and thoughts. Free writing is one modality of this. I personally have decided I can know my core when it finally becomes visible – when it is born, in other words – when my personality becomes not like a looking-glass, but instead, perhaps, like a window.
How important is it for one to make one's self visible? Or to even have a "core self"? This is for you to decide, but I see that the deeper into the self you go, the better things get. The ego-losses I have described have made me pause, and doubt myself, and in turn go on a search for my authenticity, hoping there is some to be found.
How deep can one go – is there a ground, or a foundation, to the self?
Suggestive people have tried to convince me that feelings are the ultimate justifications for our ethics – 'wants' base our 'shoulds'. Although I don't know if it's true, I've taken it for a long time as provisionally true. As a child I heard and believed that feelings were the most important things. As an adult, various psychologies reinforced this, and now I'm learning that current philosophies are beginning to emphasize 'intuition' over 'rationality' – the empirical over the ideal.
Not that intuitions are always correct. But, that rationality divorced from feelings would seem to be more of an artificial intelligence, more like a robot or a puppet, than a full human being.
This is what is so troubling about mental illness. A "thought disorder" is often also an "emotional problem". And if your feelings are disordered, on my reading your ethics will be upside down, and only god knows what could happen.
There are some fundamental "stances" you can take ethically. Those of us with reasonably ordered mentalities often feel the compulsion to parental stances, parental attitudes toward the world. We would educate, or judge, or punish, or lead. This could be based on a symbolic/neurotic struggle to correct the shortcomings of, in turn, one's own childhood.
This is understandable. After all – who doesn't want to be grown up? What kid wants to be a child? However, as we grow older, we may realize that childhood was very important – perhaps we could have taken greater advantage of it, if things were to have gone differently. So it is wise to experiment with the other attitude – that of a child-like curiosity or openness to life's experiences.
This is some of the impetus I've felt for keeping this writing more understandable. I've written it so that many might read, and benefit from its words. I could have done otherwise – one of the tendencies of the philosophical tradition is to train its supplicants for abstract cognitions. Many view this as unnecessary, even arrogant, intellectualization – and not real intelligence – but those who can read more difficult thinkers know they are writing on higher levels for the reason that anyone writes anything – they are capable of it and they desire it and they feel the conflict inherent – the battleground of ideas, which must somehow commit to, or contribute to, the war of the world – the war that is the world.
But I chose this. Speaking a more straightforward language, in hopes of reaching more people. And the longer I remain clean off of cannabis, which produces what Janov has memorably characterized as "a simulated partial lobotomy" in its heavy users – the longer a journey I take down the road my brain should naturally be on – the more I realize that I am getting better at "passing the time" – at acting like I feel, and feeling like I act. We must remember – one can always feel. It is always our option, and can never be taken away.
Writers must ask themselves of the point of writing in general, or writing at all. I have come to believe the point is a transformation – a reorganization – of the psyche of humanity. People thinking differently, in other words. To have not merely new information – but instead a new way of thinking, new knowledge. To this end I have sought to transform my mind. Sometimes, admittedly, in ill-advised ways...
But as I was thinking – if I can't think differently – how can I expect people who read me to do so? I feel the need, as many do, to train my mind to reach some kind of new paradigm, some new level. And this level does not have to be a miraculous invention or discovery – something earth-shattering. It can simply be a new voice in the world, a new manner of speech, a tongue revealed, so to speak.
Opening into a new awareness can be difficult. But like life itself, this difficulty is part of the process, part of the journey. I would recommend you to try to identify a 'should' in your life. Are you justified in this identification? Emotionally? Rationally?


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HD: Eurocrats in a heap of trouble
1997-06-22 04:00:00 PDT EUROPE -- NOISES COMING from the Continent these days cast some doubt on the immediate future of the euro, the proposed European currency, and I couldn't be happier.
Call me a dyed-in-the-wool euroskeptic.
It's not the cod-fishing treaties or haggis tariffs of the European Union that have me in a tither. It's this foolish business of creating a new, designed-by-international-committee currency to replace the pound, franc, mark, kroner, lira, guilder, etc.
The euro, part of an overall monetary union of the 15 EU countries, is supposed to debut Jan. 1, 1999. Not everyone will get to use it at first. Under the 1992 Maastricht Treaty, members of the single-currency bloc will be selected next year, based on their economic performance in 1997. But Germany and France are having trouble hitting their numbers, and if they're not in on the euro, it could doom or at least delay the whole wretched program.
Fans of the common currency say it will save billions of dollars in exchange costs for businesses, bolster the EU's credentials as an economic superpower and simplify life for us travelers.
Thanks but no thanks, I say. It would simplify life for us travelers, too, if everyone in Europe spoke the same language, but nobody wants that.
Money, like language, art, food, music, dress and architecture, is an expression of each country's unique culture. I love examining foreign bank notes to see whom they consider worthy of commemoration. The U.S. pretty much draws the line at dead presidents, but European nations regularly honor novelists, philosophers, scientists and artists.
Or at least they will until the euro arrives. It's hard to imagine the committee of currency designers in Maastricht, or wherever they are, agreeing on anything more lively or provocative than a bunch of multi-hued Etch-a-Sketch swirls.
Just look at how they came up with the name. They wound up with "euro" not because it was brilliant - and let's face it, it's not - but because it offended the least number of European bureaucrats.
An early candidate had been the even-worse "ecu," proposed by the French. As they pointed out, it was a tidy acronym for European Currency Unit, which the EU uses for its accounting. It also happens to be the name of an old French coin.
Helmut Kohl put the kabash on that one. The word "ecu" reminded the German chancellor of "kuh," the German word for cow.
Previously, the Germans had championed the name
"franken," sort of a Germanized version of the French currency. The Spaniards didn't like that one - too reminiscent of their late, unbeloved dictator, Generalissimo Francisco Franco. Others thought it brought to mind images of Frankenstein. A clumsy, out-of-control monster stitched together from hopelessly mismatched parts: sounds about right to me.
The British, who have never seemed enthused over the prospect of surrendering their beloved pound, had nonetheless expressed qualified affection for the names
"florin," the old currency of Florence, and
"shilling," the old currency of, well, England. Their suggestions were met on the Continent with polite but firm silence.
Well, then, how about "monnet?" The French floated this name in honor of French diplomat Jean Monnet, who helped lay the foundations of the EU after World War II. They assumed the British and Irish would warm to the name, since it sounds more or less like "money." They assumed wrong.
Also wrong, I think, is the assumption that the common currency will be a boon to tourism.
For me, adjusting to different currencies is a small but undeniable delight of traveling around Europe. I love the frisson that comes from arriving in a new country and sorting through that first incomprehensible handful of bank notes. Then there's the growing sense of competency as I finally remember that the little blue notes are actually worth 10 times the big brown ones.
When I stop converting prices into dollars - when I realize, for instance, that 85 francs is a bargain for a three-course meal, or that 150,000 lira is a bit pricey for a room without a bath - I know I've gone through one of those pleasant little mind-shifts that are a subtle bonus of travel.
I know I'd miss the little ritual of glancing at the electronic boards of every bureau de change window I pass to check how the dollar is faring. (Down, usually, but there's always hope for tomorrow.)
More to the point, the common currency is a troubling milestone in the creeping homogenization of Europe. It may please eurocrats and bankers to see the Continent's varied cultures slowly dissolve into a flavorless generic mush, much like the way the U.S.'s regional differences have eroded away. But it certainly doesn't make me more eager to travel there. Vive la difference, I say.<


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Report NEP-IFN-2001-06-22This is the archive for NEP-IFN, a report on new working papers in the area of International Finance. Vimal Balasubramaniam issued this report. It is usually issued weekly.
Subscribe to this report: email, RSS or Twitter.
Other reports in NEP-IFN
The following items were announced in this report:
- Robert J. Barro, 2001. "Economic Growth in East Asia Before and After the Financial Crisis," NBER Working Papers 8330, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Kevin H. O'Rourke, 2001. "Globalization and Inequality: Historical Trends," NBER Working Papers 8339, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Hyun Song Shin & Giancarlo Corsetti & Amil Dasgupta & Stephen Morris, 2001. "Does One Soros Make a Difference? A Theory of Currency Crises with Large and Small Traders," FMG Discussion Papers dp372, Financial Markets Group.
- Edgar L. Feige & Michael Faulend & Velimir Sonje & Vedran Sosic, 2001. "Currency Substitution, Unoffical Dollarization and Estimates of Foreign Currency Held Abroad: The Case of Croatia," International Finance 0106001, University Library of Munich, Germany.
- Rudi Dornbusch, 2001. "Malaysia: Was it Different?," NBER Working Papers 8325, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Stefan Colligon, 2001. "Two years into the Euro: The Next Step for Europe," FMG Special Papers sp129, Financial Markets Group.
- Item repec:fmg:fmgdps:dp0373 is not listed on IDEAS anymore
- Nicola Acocella & Giovanni Di Bartolomeo, 2001. "Partisanship and fiscal policy co-ordination in a monetary union," Macroeconomics 0106003, University Library of Munich, Germany.
- Rudi Dornbusch, 2001. "Fewer Monies, Better Monies," NBER Working Papers 8324, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
- Item repec:cep:cepdps:0487 is not listed on IDEAS anymore
- Enrique G. Mendoza, 2001. "Credit, Prices, and Crashes: Business Cycles with a Sudden Stop," NBER Working Papers 8338, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.


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ABOUT INDIANAPOLIS: The Colts had the third-ranked offense during the regular season, but the postseason version of Indy's "O'' is playing like one of the best in NFL history. In eliminating the Denver Broncos and Kansas City Chiefs, QB Peyton Manning, WR Marvin Harrison and friends averaged 456.5 yards and 39.5 points. Defensively, however, the Colts can be had. The Chiefs gained 408 yards last week against a defense that finished the season rated 11th overall and showed its vulnerability up the middle by letting K.C. gain 196 yards on the ground and failing to get a sack.
ABOUT NEW ENGLAND: The Patriots' statistics hardly are overwhelming, except for the one that says 13 consecutive victories. They have no running game to speak of (100.4 yards a game), but they capitalize on opportunities behind the remarkably steady play of QB Tom Brady. New England won't let Manning drop back and play catch. The Patriots will bring pressure from everywhere -- SS Rodney Harrison is a good bet -- while identifying a couple of Manning's targets and making somebody else beat them.


text:
Kiev: Ukraine lost around $3.4 million in 2015 from illegal logging of its forests, the media reported on Wednesday. "It is an estimated data. In fact, the scale of illegal logging in Ukraine could be even more extensive," Xinhua news agency quoted a forest official as saying. In 2015, an estimated 24,000 cubic metres of wood were unlawfully cut down in Ukraine, the official said.
The official added that in the first half of 2016, the volume of illegal logging in the country increased by 36 per cent year-on-year to about 15,800 cubic metres of timber. To camp down on the illegal practices, the government plans to set up a unified electronic database of the country's woods and introduce harsher punishments for illegal loggers and traders, the official said. –IANS
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