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Only 44 years ago in the U.S., Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was leading a fight to win blacks the right to vote. Ground zero for the movement became Selma, Alabama.
Award-winning author Elizabeth Partridge leads you straight into the chaotic, passionate, and deadly three months of protests that culminated in the landmark march from Selma to Montgomery in 1965. Focusing on the courageous children who faced terrifying violence in order to march alongside King, this is an inspiring look at their fight for the vote. Stunningly emotional black-and-white photos accompany the text.
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Here is a great page from the University of Oxford on plagiarism. It’s mainly informational, but it does a great job of succinctly describing plagiarism, types of plagiarism, and how to avoid it. One more tool/example for teachers.
Check out this great article on how a teacher uses turnitin to facilitate improved student writing. The article does a great job taking the reader through how to use turnitin. Turnitin is of course a writing tool not a solve all plagiarism checker.
*While I have been named a Turnitin Global Innovator Honorable Mention for my work in class and this site, I have no obligations financial or otherwise to speak highly of turnitin. I just find it’s a great tool as a teacher!
Harvard has had its fair share of plagiarism cases (see Harvard Student Commits Plagiarism Loses Book Deal). In the last few years, the Harvard College Writing Program has focused on decreasing student plagiarism through student education. The Harvard Guide to Using Sources is the fruit of that effort. It is a one-stop website for tips on avoiding plagiarism, proper citation methods, using and evaluating sources, and many other helpful tips to use to avoid plagiarism.
Along with this great resource, they have developed two online quizzes that help students consider plagiarism scenarios. Quiz 1, Using Sources, Five Scenarios, helps students “work through examples based, in part, on real academic honesty cases. Upon [completion] of the tutorial, [the student] will be acquainted with the most common misunderstandings about academic integrity, and will know more about how to integrate sources responsibly into your writing” (Guide Website). Quiz 2, Using Sources, Five Examples, is “based on passages from real student essays, and illustrates problems with summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting sources. By taking the tutorial, [the student] will gain a deeper understanding of the most common forms of plagiarism and a solid sense of how to use sources effectively” (Guide Website).
At the beginning of each quiz, the student can enter an email address and have the results sent to that address. So, a teacher can request students email their results directly or require a screen shot of their results to ensure student completion.
This resources is a great resource for teachers who wish to introduce plagiarism issues to their students and then check understanding through the online quizzes.
The first step in creating an environment that discourages plagiarism is educating students about plagiarism itself. To do this, I begin with a simple project. Create an awareness project to share with other students about why plagiarism is so bad. Of course, you could stand in front of the class and lecture your students about the evils of plagiarism and the horrors that await them if they are caught, but, in my experience, that does no one any good. Instead, get them to look at the issue themselves before going forward.
Below are two examples of initial projects students complete for me this past year. First, students created posters to hang in all the common computer labs. Second, a group of my juniors and seniors made a brief educational video to place on our website. Both of these projects helped both the students making them and the larger school community begin thinking about plagiarism. They projects provide a starting point as I focus on my larger goal of plagiarism education.
Plagiarism is a Crime Poster Types of Plagiarism Poster
Introduction to Plagiarism Video
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In the world of web technologies, the most commonly used technology for client-server communication is HTTP. Some might consider the synchronous, request-response nature of HTTP protocol as its weakness. Every change made in application database is not automatically passed to the client part of the application, and the user won’t see it on the interface.
However, there is a solution to this communication issue – WebSockets. I’d like to present MeteorJS. It’s a platform where WebSockets is used as a base of communication protocol – DDP (Distributed Data Protocol).
Let me tell you this: real-time is cool.
It’s easy to see the benefits of automatic binding displayed data to database values in real-time. We have the possibility of creating web systems and applications more similar to native applications or even operating systems. To show it, I will use an example.
How does a modern operating system work?
Let’s imagine an operational system in which we’re opening two windows of our file manager. Both windows are open in the same location. Next, in the first window we create a new folder. We can see this change in the second window, automatically. This is our real-time effect.
This approach is user-friendly, but not only that. It’s also very useful for business logic, which – in some cases – is even necessary. For example, some chats, web games or systems which observe some different types of states and react for changes require a real-time approach.
Sadly, as it often is in life, there’s a downside. Communication based on WebSockets technology has some drawbacks. For example, there are more limits in the case of the number of users which can use our application/system at the same time than in communication based on HTTP.
MeteorJS as full-stack platform
From a developer’s perspective, a huge advantage of MeteorJS is its simplicity. Client-server communication is very intuitive, and its data synchronization is automatic. Thanks to this, we get the real-time effect for free! Let’s see some sample code, which presents the communication between client-server where we add some example objects to MongoDB.
First, let’s create a MongoDB Collection:
Let’s handle adding a book in our server:
Then let’s add a book in our client:
Now, a few words of explanation for this. MeteorJS automatically binds our application structure. Therefore, if we organize files in the presented way, we’ll have the following situation:
client/ – files available for client side
server/ – files available for server side
both/ – files available for both
This code is a very simple presentation of a situation where the client can add some books to database. MeteorJS handles communication and database connection matters. In addition, when we get and display all books it will automatically bind data:
The presented code uses Blaze templates for rendering views and will work in real-time. MeterJS will bind data automatically. All these points makes the whole process of creating software very quick and efficient.
What can we use when working with MeteorJS?
In the paragraph above I wrote that MeteorJS is a full stack platform. So, it means that MeteorJS has to support the front-end and back-end. Let’s check which technologies you can use with it.
The client-side part of MeteorJS provides you with a very wide set of most popular front-end technologies.
It supports Angular, React or a template system called Blaze, created specially for MeteorJS (it’s generally based on Handlebars). But I don’t want to describe any of these technologies here. My goal is to advise you what to choose as a front-end technology, depending on product requirements.
From my experience, I can say that when you need a quick solution, it’s better to use Blaze. It’s clear and simple, but like other, more popular solutions it’s also very powerful (reactivity, clean html templates). Furthermore, it’s still under development. There are plans to add e.g. components, so for me, it’s really great. On other hand, if you need a scalable, big product, it might be better to choose a popular and complex technology like Angular or React.
The server side part of MeteorJS is based on NodeJS. It also supports a very nice and intuitive build system, which bases on npm (packages manager for NodeJS). It provides a set of packages for MeteorJS called Atmosphere.js. After starting a local server, the build system will ‘watch’ the state of our project. In case of changes, MeteorJS will automatically rebuild the project and refresh our client. There are also other useful features, like automatic minification and concatenation of static resources in production mode of application. Pretty cool, isn’t it?
So, what’s the conclusion?
MeteorJS is an all-round solution for web and mobile applications (it also supports Apache Cordova). Development is fast, because we’re using only one language on client and server. Communication based on WebSockets gives us a real-time effect.
However, this type of communication has a very particular charm. It should be used in specific situations. Apart from this, I can definitely recommend this platform. What’s more, the number of applications and systems built with MeteorJS is growing, and there’s a large community working with this solution.
You can check the full SPA template built with MeteorJS here.
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Charles Brantley Aycock (November 1, 1859 – April 4, 1912) was the 50th governor of the U.S. state of North Carolina from 1901 to 1905. After starting his career as a lawyer and teacher, he became active in the Democratic Party during the party's Solid South period, and made his reputation as a prominent segregationist.
Charles Brantley Aycock
|50th Governor of North Carolina|
January 15, 1901 – January 11, 1905
|Preceded by||Daniel Lindsay Russell|
|Succeeded by||Robert Broadnax Glenn|
|United States Attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina|
|Preceded by||Charles A. Cooke|
|Succeeded by||Claude M. Bernard|
|Born||November 1, 1859|
Wayne County, North Carolina, U.S.
|Died||April 4, 1912 (aged 52)|
Birmingham, Alabama, U.S.
|Cause of death||Heart attack|
Cora Lily Woodard
|Alma mater||University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill|
He became known as "the Education Governor" for his advocacy for the improvement of North Carolina's public school systems, and following his term in office, he traveled the country promoting educational causes.
Early life Edit
Charles B. Aycock was born in Wayne County, North Carolina, as the youngest of the 10 children of Benjamin and Serena Aycock. His family lived near the present-day town of Fremont, North Carolina, then known as Nahunta. Though his father died when he was 15, his mother and older brothers recognized his abilities and determined that he should go to college. Aycock attended the University of North Carolina (today the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill) and joined the Philanthropic Society, a debate and literary society at the university. After graduating in 1880 with first honors in both oratory and essay writing, he entered law practice in Goldsboro and supplemented his income by teaching school. His success in both fields led to his appointment as superintendent of schools for Wayne County and to service on the school board in Goldsboro.
His political career began in 1888 as a presidential elector for Grover Cleveland, when he gained distinction as an orator and political debater. From 1893 to 1897, he served as U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of North Carolina.
Personal life Edit
Aycock married Varina Woodard, daughter of Baptist lay minister and farmer William Woodard and Delpha Rountree Woodard, in 1881. They had three children together: Ernest Aycock, Charles Brantley Aycock, Jr., and Alice Varina Aycock. His two sons from this marriage died in childhood. His daughter from this marriage went on to marry the writer Clarence Hamilton Poe. Aycock's wife died on July 9, 1889. On January 7, 1891 he married his late wife's sister, Cora Lily Woodard. They had seven children: William Benjamin Aycock, Mary Lily Aycock, Connor Woodard Aycock, John Lee Aycock, Louise Roundtree Aycock, Frank Daniels Aycock, and Brantley Aycock.
White supremacy campaigns Edit
In 1898 and 1900, Aycock was prominent in the Democratic Party's "white supremacy" campaigns. Aycock's involvement with the Wilmington insurrection of 1898 is chronicled in an official state commission report. "Planned violence to suppress the African American and Republican communities grew into unplanned bloodshed. The frenzy over white supremacy victory, incessantly repeated by orators such as Alfred Moore Waddell and Charles Aycock, simply could not be quieted after an overwhelming and somewhat anticlimactic election victory." Aycock was reportedly not present in Wilmington the day of the insurrection.
In 1899, the heavily Democrat state legislature of North Carolina passed a suffrage amendment to the state constitution. This amendment added a poll tax and literacy test, as well as a grandfather clause to avoid disenfranchising poor white voters. Aycock supported the amendment, and urged legislatures to submit it to a popular vote in an August election - moved up from November. In the same election, Aycock ran for governor against Republican Spencer B. Adams. On the campaign trail, his supporters displayed one of the rapid-fire guns from the Wilmington insurrection of 1898 and Aycock regularly appeared with Red Shirts.
Indeed it has become the fashion among Republicans and Populists to assert the unfitness of the negro to rule, but when they use the word rule, they confine it to holding office. When we say that the negro is unfit to rule we carry it one step further and convey the correct idea when we declare that he is unfit to vote. To do this we must disfranchise the negro. This movement comes from the people. Politicians have been afraid of it and have hesitated, but the great mass of white men in the State are now demanding and have demanded that the matter be settled once and for all. To do so is both desirable and necessary – desirable because it sets the white man free to move along faster than he can go when retarded by the slower movement of the negro.— Charles Aycock, Address Accepting the Democratic Nomination for Governor, April 11, 1900
In the 1900 North Carolina gubernatorial election, the suffrage amendment was confirmed and Aycock was elected governor. He reportedly won 60% of the vote, but this was in part due to voter fraud. In several counties the number of votes for Aycock exceeded the number of eligible voters by several hundred.
As governor, Aycock became known as the "Education Governor" for his support of the public school system. It was said that one school was constructed in the state for every day he was in office. He was supposedly dedicated to education after watching his mother make her mark when signing a deed. Aycock felt that no lasting social reform could be accomplished without education. He supported increased salaries for teachers, longer school terms, and new school buildings; "690 new schoolhouses erected, including 599 for whites and 91 for blacks."
While credited for an expansion of schools for black students, Aycock is also noted as having advocated that black students be properly educated through curriculum and care tightly controlled by North Carolina whites, to "benefit the black race to fit them into a subordinate role."
Let us cast away all fear of rivalry with the negro, all apprehension that he shall ever overtake us in the race of life. We are the thoroughbreds and should have no fear of winning the race against a commoner stock. An effort to reduce their public schools would send thousands more of them away from us. In this hour, when our industrial development demands more labor and not less, it becomes of the utmost importance that we shall make no mistake in dealing with that race which does a very large part of the work, of actual hard labor in the State.— Gov. Aycock, Address Before the Democratic State Convention at Greensboro, June 23, 1904
Historian Morgan Kousser has demonstrated that Aycock's progressive attitude toward black education was based on white Democrats' desire to ensure that the disfranchisement of black voters would not be reversed by federal government intervention. Kousser observed, "Some scholars have made a great deal of the opposition of 'progressive' Governor Charles B. Aycock and state school superintendent James Y. Joyner to the movement for a constitutional amendment in North Carolina to limit black school expenditures to the amount paid by Negroes in taxes. It is true that Aycock threatened resignation if such a law passed and that, speaking to the legislature in 1903, he condemned the proposed measure as 'unjust, unwise and unconstitutional.' Yet in the same address he put greater stress on his view that the act was impolitic than he did on its injustice. The law would invite a challenge in federal court, he believed, and 'if it should be made to appear to the Court that in connection with our disfranchisement of the negro we had taken pains for providing to keep him in ignorance, then both amendments [the literacy test and racial separation of taxes] would fall together.' In other words, the disfranchisement of the almost unanimously Republican blacks, which was virtually priceless to the Democrats, would be bartered for the temporary gain of a few extra dollars of the school fund."
Aycock did other progressive measures as governor such as building roads, increasing taxes on corporations, creating new regulations on railroads, and passing child labor and temperance laws. Aycock fought against lynching as governor, but expanded the state's convict leasing program, a de facto form of slavery.
"The Negro Problem" Edit
On December 18, 1903, while governor, Aycock went to Baltimore to give a speech to 300 people at the North Carolina Society. His speech, "The Negro Problem," outlined his thoughts on keeping blacks separate, subservient, and locked out of representative government by circumventing the Fifteenth Amendment, which guarantees the right to vote. Aycock's may have been a response to the book The Negro Problem, written by prominent black scholars, including W.E.B. DuBois and Booker T. Washington, in which they consider the web of economic, political, and social problems faced by blacks in their collective history as slaves and second-class citizens after Emancipation. The book had been released about two months before Aycock's speech.
The speech is one of Aycock's most well known, and controversial:
I am proud of my State … because there we have solved the negro problem … We have taken him out of politics and have thereby secured good government under any party and laid foundations for the future development of both races. We have secured peace, and rendered prosperity a certainty.
I am inclined to give to you our solution of this problem. It is, first, as far as possible under the Fifteenth Amendment to disfranchise him; after that let him alone, quit writing about him; quit talking about him, quit making him “the white man’s burden,” let him “tote his own skillet”; quit coddling him, let him learn that no man, no race, ever got anything worth the having that he did not himself earn; that character is the outcome of sacrifice and worth is the result of toil; that whatever his future may be, the present has in it for him nothing that is not the product of industry, thrift, obedience to law, and uprightness; that he cannot, by resolution of council or league, accomplish anything; that he can do much by work; that violence may gratify his passions but it cannot accomplish his ambitions; that he may eat rarely of the cooking of equality, but he will always find when he does that “there is death in the pot.” Let the negro learn once for all that there is unending separation of the races, that the two peoples may develop side by side to the fullest but that they cannot intermingle; let the white man determine that no man shall by act or thought or speech cross this line, and the race problem will be at an end.
These things are not said in enmity to the negro but in regard for him. He constitutes one third of the population of my State: he has always been my personal friend; as a lawyer I have often defended him, and as Governor I have frequently protected him. But there flows in my veins the blood of the dominant race; that race that has conquered the earth and seeks out the mysteries of the heights and depths. If manifest destiny leads to the seizure of Panama, it is certain that it likewise leads to the dominance of the Caucasian. When the negro recognizes this fact we shall have peace and good will between the races.
But I would not have the white people forget their duty to the negro. We must seek the truth and pursue it. We owe an obligation to “the man in black”; we brought him here; he served us well; he is patient and teachable. We owe him gratitude; above all we owe him justice. We cannot forget his fidelity and we ought not to magnify his faults; we cannot change his color, neither can we ignore his service. No individual ever “rose on stepping stones of dead” others “to higher things,” and no people can. We must rise by ourselves, we must execute judgment in righteousness; we must educate not only ourselves but see to it that the negro has an opportunity for education. As a white man I am afraid of but one thing for my race and that is that we shall become afraid to give the negro a fair chance. The first duty of every man is to develop himself to the uttermost and the only limitation upon his duty is that he shall take pains to see that in his own development he does no injustice to those beneath him. This is true of races as well as of individuals. Considered properly it is not a limitation but a condition of development. The white man in the South can never attain to his fullest growth until he does absolute justice to the negro race. If he is doing that now, it is well for him. If he is not doing it, he must seek to know the ways of truth and pursue them. My own opinion is, that so far we have done well, and that the future holds no menace for us if we do the duty which lies next to us, training, developing the coming generation, so that the problems which seem difficult to us shall be easy to them.
Later life Edit
After leaving the governor's office in 1905, Aycock resumed his law practice. He was persuaded to run for the Senate seat held by fellow Democrat Furnifold M. Simmons in 1912. But before the nomination was decided, Aycock died of a heart attack while making a speech to the Alabama Education Association in Birmingham on April 4, 1912.
The subject of Aycock's speech was 'Universal Education'. After he had talked for a few minutes, Aycock spoke the words: 'I have always talked about education—.' Here he stopped, threw up his hands, reeled backward, and fell dead.
In Greensboro, North Carolina, the auditorium at UNC Greensboro, as well as a street, a neighborhood, and a middle school were all named for him. Dormitories at UNC-Chapel Hill and East Carolina University campuses were named after him, although ECU decided to rename the dorm in 2015. UNC-Chapel Hill followed suit in 2020, renaming the dormitory for Hortense McClinton, the first black faculty member at the school. In Pikeville, North Carolina, there is a high school named after him as well. There is an Aycock Elementary School in Henderson.
The Aycock Elementary School in Asheville was closed over thirty years ago and has been used as the campus for Asheville City Preschool and, more recently, Asheville Primary School (public Montessori); the plaque bearing the Aycock name was removed in 2020.
Aycock High School in Cedar Grove graduated its last class in 1963. Additionally, a small street in the Chapel Hill neighborhood of Governors Club is named after him, along with numerous other Governors of North Carolina.
In 1965, a junior high school in Raleigh, North Carolina was named after him, although it was absorbed into William G. Enloe High School in 1979. A street in Raleigh's Five Points neighborhood was also named for him.
In the 1933 textbook The Story of North Carolina, Aycock is described as "one of the best friends that colored people had." For most of the 20th century, Aycock was characterized by state historians and politicians as an admirable figure, reflected in the choice to have a statue of him as one of the two submitted by the state to the National Statuary Hall Collection. In recent years, that viewpoint has been challenged:
Often overlooked was Aycock's role as a leading spokesman in the white supremacy campaigns of 1898 and 1900, which were marked by widespread violence, voter intimidation, voter fraud and even a coup d'état of the government of Wilmington … The campaigns had far-reaching consequences: blacks were removed from the voter rolls based on literacy tests, Jim Crow customs were encoded into law, and the Democratic Party controlled Tar Heel politics for two-thirds of the 20th century.
In 2011, the N.C. Democratic Party dropped Aycock's name from its annual fundraiser after calls from both Democratic and Republican lawmakers brought attention to Aycock's white supremacy ties. Aycock had been included in the fundraiser's name since 1960.
On June 17, 2014, Duke University removed his name from a residence hall.
On February 20, 2015, East Carolina University trustees voted to remove Aycock's name from a residence hall after a months-long debate with faculty, students, staff and alumni. The trustees directed the university to represent Aycock's name in another campus location, where founders and other university supporters would be recognized.
As of early 2015, UNC Greensboro was also reviewing proposals to remove Aycock's name from campus buildings. On February 18, 2016, UNCG's board of trustees voted unanimously to remove his name from the auditorium.
On August 25, 2015, the Guilford County school board voted 9–2 to rename Aycock Middle School in Greensboro, dropping the Aycock name.
On August 15, 2017, the Greensboro City Council voted to rename the Aycock Historic District, which included the formerly named Aycock Middle School (now Swann Middle School) to Dunleath Historic District.
On February 28, 2018, North Carolina governor Roy Cooper requested from the Architect of the Capitol replacement of Aycock's statue with one of evangelist Billy Graham, pursuant to legislation signed in 2015. The statue will be replaced once sufficient private funds for Graham's statue are raised.
On April 24, 2018, Greensboro City Council unanimously voted to rename North and South Aycock Street, which runs from West Florida Street to Wendover Avenue, to North and South Josephine Boyd Street after Josephine Boyd, the first black student to attend the all-white Greensboro High School (now Grimsley High School) in 1957.
On May 4, 2021, Raleigh City Council voted to rename Aycock Street to Roanoke Park Drive following a neighborhood petition.
- Weekend Edition (August 17, 2008). "How The Only Coup D'Etat In U.S. History Unfolded". National Public Radio.
- "Aycock, Cora Lily Woodard". NCpedia. Retrieved 2023-03-20.
- Christensen, Rob (October 6, 2007). "Aycock legacy gets reappraisal". Raleigh: News&Observer. Archived from the original on 2007-10-11. Retrieved 2014-06-05.
But Aycock's legacy in the violent white supremacy campaigns of 1898 and 1900—once sugar-coated in history books—is now being debated for the first time in North Carolina's highest political circles.
- Umfleet, LeRae (2009). A Day of Blood: The 1898 Wilmington Race Riot. Raleigh: North Carolina Office of Archives and History. p. 81. ISBN 978-0-86526-344-4.
- Zucchino, pp. 304
- Zucchino, pp. 313
- "The Life and Speeches of Charles Brantley Aycock" : The Life and Speeches of Charles Brantley Aycock 1912
- Zucchino, pp. 316
- Leloudis, James (1996). Schooling the New South: Pedagogy, Self, and Society in North Carolina, 1880–1920. pp. 177–180. ISBN 9780807822654.
- "The Life and Speeches of Charles Brantley Aycock" : The Life and Speeches of Charles Brantley Aycock 1912
- Kousser, J. Morgan. “Progressivism—For Middle-Class Whites Only: North Carolina Education, 1880–1910.” Journal of Southern History 46 (May 1980): 169–194.
- "Aycock, Charles Brantley | NCpedia". Archived from the original on 2020-08-21. Retrieved 2021-01-28.
- James M. Buckley, ed. (1904). ""The Negro Problem": Perplexing and Portentous". The Christian Advocate. T. Carlton & J. Porter. 79.
- Charles B. Aycock (19 Dec 1903). "DECLARES NEGRO PROBLEM SOLVED". Chicago Daily Tribune.
- R. D. W. Connor; Clarence Hamilton Poe, eds. (1912). "The Life and Speeches of Charles Brantley Aycock". Garden City, New York: Doubleday, Page & Company. pp. 161–163.
- "People Talked About". Leslie's Illustrated Weekly Newspaper. John Albert Sleicher F. Leslie. 98. 1904.
- "Solving the Negro Problem". Brooklyn, New York: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle. 20 Dec 1903.
- "7: Destiny of a Race". 1898 Wilmington Race Riot Commission Report (PDF). North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources. May 31, 2006. Archived from the original (PDF) on January 24, 2017. Retrieved January 23, 2018.
- Washington, Booker T.; DuBois, W.E.B.; et al. (1 Sep 1903). "The Negro Problem; A Series of Articles by Representative American Negroes of Today". New York, J. Pott & Company.
- The Federal Writers' Project of the Federal Works Agency, Works Projects Administration for the State of North Carolina, "North Carolina: A Guide to the Old North State", The University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 1939, page 79.
- "The risk of choosing names" : News-Record.com : Greensboro, North Carolina Archived 2012-09-05 at archive.today
- "ECU renames its own Aycock Residence Hall". The Chronicle. Archived from the original on 10 August 2015. Retrieved 19 October 2015.
- NC Policy Watch
- Wicker, Mackenzie (June 30, 2020). "Asheville school will change its name from 'Vance,' a Civil War governor". Asheville Citizen Times. Raleigh, NC.
- Zucchino, pp. 335
- "Vance-Aycock Dinner is history" Archived 2015-01-29 at the Wayback Machine : newsobserver.com : Raleigh, NC
- "ECU to remove Aycock name from dorm, but retain it at another location" Archived 2015-02-23 at the Wayback Machine : News & Observer, Raleigh, NC
- "UNCG to move ahead with review of Aycock name" : News & Record : Greensboro, NC
- WFMY News 2 Staff. "Former NC Gov. Charles Aycock's Name Will Be Removed from UNCG Auditorium". WFMY. TENGA. Retrieved February 18, 2016.
- "Guilford County school board approves renaming Aycock Middle School". 26 August 2016. Retrieved 20 December 2018.
- [email protected], Margaret Moffett. "Greensboro's Aycock neighborhood name changed". Greensboro News and Record. Retrieved 20 December 2018.
- Murphy, Brian (February 28, 2018). "NC leaders move forward with another honor for Billy Graham: US Capitol statue". The News & Observer. Raleigh. Retrieved July 13, 2018.
- Moffett, Margaret (April 24, 2018). "Street renamed for civil rights trailblazer Josephine Boyd". News & Record. Greensboro. Retrieved June 24, 2020.
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In an effort to prevent tragedies to human life, CONRED (Coordinadora Nacional para la Reducción de Desastres) has set up a 24 hour emergency phone number that people can call to report cracks or ground movements. That number is 1566.
Ecology Education and Festival Atitlán Fundraiser
Roberto Luz , Violeta Luz and Rene Dionisio have designed an educational comic book in Spanish that informs about the causes of the cianobacteria at Lake Atitlan and some solutions. They have already printed and distributed 5,000 and are fundraising to print another 5,000. It is also a fundraiser for Festival Atitlan. Click here to view the comic book:
Click here to donate: https://www.paypal.com/cgi-bin/webscr?cmd=_s-xclick&hosted_button_id=2ZSNNS7C8YZGL
Now that it is the season to plant trees, "Tepee" Bob Miller has offered up some tree planting ideas for reforestation.
- Plant each tree with a good helping of wood charcol mixed into the soil of each hole.
- Plant each tree in a depression so that water can accumulate when it rains.
- Use a mulch around each tree to retain moisture. This mulch could be any organic material: tree moss, rotted sawdust, dry leaves, dry vetiver grass. Green sawdust and materials are not as good as they rob a bit of nitrogen to break down into compost.
- In the dry season do the following using l-litre plastic water bottles per tree: Bury the neck/mouth part of the bottle in the ground a couple of inches and under the mulch so that the water will leave the bottle slowly over time to water each tree. Also with this method you will give each tree exactly the same water with no waste. It also reuses the bottles.
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In Fig. 2, a thin uniform rod (mass ??3.0? kg , length ??4.0 m )
rotates freely about a horizontal axis A? that is perpendicular to the
rod and passes through a point at distance ? ?d=1.0 ?? m from the
end of the rod. The kinetic energy of the rod as it passes through the
vertical position is ??20 J. (a) What is the rotational inertia of the rod
about axis ?A ? (b) What is the (linear) speed of the end ? Bof the rod
as the rod passes through the vertical position? (c) At what angle ?
will the rod momentarily stop in its upward swing?
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Whitworth Planing Machines
This is a sub-section of Joseph Whitworth and Co
Note: The photographs' prefix letters refer to the location of the machine (Manchester, London and Paris, Underfall Yard).
Planing machines provided their designers with plenty of scope for innovation in the mechanisms for reciprocating the tables, providing automatic feed, reducing unproductive time, and minimising wear and power consumption. No consensus ever emerged on the best ways of meeting the aims, making planers interesting machines to study.
In 1835 Joseph Whitworth patented a number of improvements to metal planing machines. Some of the patented features remained in production for many years, and can be seen on 1842 machines displayed in two museums, Manchester's Museum of Science and Industry (MoSI) and the London Science Museum.
The Science Museum's machine has Whitworth's patented toolholder which held two opposing tools. At each end of the machine's stroke the toolholder was rapidly kicked round through 180 degrees to allow cutting in both directions. This was ingenious, but very complex, and attracted criticism, especially from Whitworth's rivals. It is not clear to what extent the various theoretical objections were borne out in practice, but the system was not universally popular.
The MoSI example does not have the rotating toolholder. It does retain the cotton ropes and pulleys, but these had other purposes, namely to provide automatic cross feed, and also downward feed (if required). The MoSI machine's downfeed arrangement is illustrated in, but not necessarily clarified by, photos M4 & M5. Suffice to say that the rope moved back and forth, and the ratchet served to turn the toolpost's leadscrew in one direction only. Photo M5 shows a small lever which disengages the ratchet. The vertical peg, bolted in the curved slot, doubtless altered the amount of feed, by determining the number of ratchet 'clicks'.
Cotton ropes may look out of place for actuating machine tool mechanisms, but makers and users of spinning mules (including Whitworth) would have been quite at home with such arrangements.
However, Whitworth used a cordless arrangement on some machines, utilising rack, pinion, snail cam, and several rods.
A unique feature is the patented drive for the table. Whitworth rejected rack and pinion or chain drive in favour of the regular motion offered by a leadscrew. Concerns about friction and wear were addressed by an interesting innovation. Instead of a conventional nut, the deep coarse-pitch screw engaged with two pairs of rotating discs or rollers. This arrangement is found on the Science Museum machine (see photo L2), whereas the MoSI machine has a plain nut (M7). It was important to carefully adjust the horizontal position of the discs relative to the leadscrew, and in photo L2 it will be seen that horizontal bolts are provided. These are also retained on the MoSI machine, perhaps suggesting that the nut was a replacement for earlier discs.
Atkinson compares the arrangement with worm and wheel transmission, and calls the discs 'disc-pawls'. Certainly the leadscrew resembles a worm more than a leadscrew, but the discs make rolling contact in Whitworth's arrangement, rather than sliding contact. Friction does arise at the journal bearing on which the disc revolves. The velocity of the journal relative to the bearing is much lower than would have been the velocity of the leadscrew surface relative to a conventional nut (Whitworth aimed for a velocity ratio of 1:7). He originally applied this system in 1835 on the carriages of his self-acting spinning mules. He also used it on the feed screws of his vertical slotting machines.. Lubrication is key to the long term success of the arrangement, and it is not obvious that the bearings could be (or would be) readily lubricated on the planing machines.
An interesting Whitworth planing machine, dating from c.1850, is on display at the Musee des Arts et Metiers in Paris (photos P1-P5). This is a 'crank-type' planing machine, in which the table is moved back and forth by a crank, rather than by leadscrew or by rack and pinion, or other mechanisms. The crank operating system had the advantage of avoiding the complication of other systems worked by screw, chain, or rack. It was simple and robust, but the stroke length was limited, and the cutting speed varies throughout the stroke. The Paris machine incorporates a quick-return motion for the table, which minimises the lost time on the non-cutting return stroke. Joseph Whitworth is credited with originating the quick return mechanism.
Returning to the MoSI and Science Museum machines, Atkinson credits Whitworth with the simple table reversing arrangement which uses a single drive belt and two bevel pinions (L3) driven by coaxial shafts. The belt, which ran continuously in one direction, was automatically shifted sideways from one pulley to the other, via the loose pulley, so as to drive either the left or right hand pinion. Photo M8 shows the pulley and belt shifting arrangement. L1 shows the rod with two pins near the left hand end which move the bell crank to shift the belt. The rod is moved by the table after moving through a distance determined by two adjustable collars. In photo L1 the position of the collars would prevent any movement.
Note: The bevel gear drive arrangement would later be improved by Thomas Shanks and Co with diffferent gear ratios for the forward and return stroke. Whitworth & Co later adopted this (see photo U2). Different speeds were not needed by Whitworth originally, since his machines were intended to cut on both the forward and return stroke.
Returning to the arrangements for incrementally advancing the tool's position, the three older machines shown above all utilised a rope moved by a pulley oscillating back and forth through an arc. The method of achieving this on the MoSI and Science Museum machines is not apparent, although it involved a tumbling counterweight, seen in the photos. The motion was transferred to shafts, and the direction was changed by bevel gears. These did not have a full circle of teeth, since they were only turning through a limited arc. This may be apparent in photo M5 on the bevel gear with the vertical axis (note that the gears are not in mesh).
Rope tension was maintained by a weighted idler pulley, visible at the top of photo M6.
On the Paris machine, the oscillation of the rope drive pulley is obtained by an unusual arrangement. The slender pulley (to the right of the large gear) is rotated through an arc by a pin engaging with an eccentric groove in the face of the disc on the large gear's shaft (just visible in photo P4).
Sources of Information
- The Engineeer & Machinist's Assistant, p.196 in 1863 edition
- 'Sir Joseph Whitworth 'The World's Best Mechanician by Norman Atkinson, Sutton Publishing, 1996
- The Engineer and Machinist's Assistant
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When it comes to pursuing a career in machine learning, it is not as simple as learning and getting ahead in their careers. Beginners are often bewildered with countless learning resources out there. This guide tells exactly where to kickstart your proficiency towards ML.
Step 1: Math And Statistics
The first thing is the skill to understanding problems through a mathematical intuition. We would highly recommend starting with basics in linear algebra, then gradually moving to calculus. It may be hard to master them initially but given the time and practice with working, these areas will be familiar and comfortable to work on. Another subject that follows math is statistics. For any ML algorithm to be understood clearly, statistics is essential. Hence, fundamental knowledge in stats should be learnt hand in hand.
By now, you might have easily thought of online websites such as Coursera or Udemy. Of course, these are good resources to learn at your own pace. The only hindrance is setting and following self-paced goals.
On the other hand, here are a few resources that are equally good at teaching the basics of math and statistics.
- Linear Algebra tutorials by Kardi Teknomo – This interactive tutorial is a gem of a resource. Dr Kardi Teknomo of Ateneo de Manila University explains every concept in a simple, easy to read the language.
- Linear Algebra in Twenty Five Lectures – A concise course by the University of California, Davis scholars Tom Denton and Andrew Waldron.
- Paul’s Online Notes – A complete online resource (free to download) for math by Paul Dawkins of Lamar University. This resource is mainly centred around algebra and calculus.
- Stat Trek – Online website for statistics.
- Khan Academy – An all-time favourite among students, you would find a plethora of content on various areas of mathematics and statistics.
Step 2. Programming
For beginners, programming is sometimes dreadful to learn. Naturally, it might be intimidating and difficult at first. But with regular practice, this skill can be aced eventually. Coming to programming languages in ML, Python stands out top due to its versatility and ease in coding. Other languages such as R, Julia and Java also help in building ML projects. Ultimately, programming should complement your math and stat knowledge.
Once mastered, try working on various problems and build small projects around ML. See how it solves a problem particularly by making use of math and statistics concepts. Sites like Kaggle and DataCamp are extremely good at testing codes and collaborating with peers and developers. In addition, forums like Stack Overflow are excellent to discuss problems and queries related to programming.
These are the top resources that we found for learning Python, R and sites that cover programming in general.
- Pythonprogamming.net – One of the best online resources for learning Python out there. The programmer behind this website, Harrison Kinsley (popularly known as Sentdex in the Python community) explains every aspect of Python perfectly!
- Automate The Boring Stuff by Al Sweigart – Another very good online resource on Python. Programming is deconstructed right from scratch. In fact, the beauty lies in how simple tasks can be automated through Python.
- ListenData for R – This website offers R tutorials for free. Extensive coverage of R concepts is what makes this site a catch for ML beginners preferring R over Python.
- Code Project – A popular discussion forum exclusively for discussing programming queries in general. With a big developer user base, ML beginners can share their code, ask where they face problems in the code and work around ideas.
Step 3. Application-Oriented Approach
Learning is only fruitful if it is applied sensibly. Many people do the mistake of learning every algorithm in ML and forget where it actually helps in solving a problem. For beginners, it is suggested that they learn the popular and standard algorithms. A complicated algorithm is not always the solution for complex applications. It is all about how an ML problem is solved optimally.
Here are a few blogs which brilliantly tells about applications in ML, which is suggested for every beginner to go through them for realising how ML is actually helpful.
- Machine Learning Mastery by Jason Brownlee – An amazing blog by expert Jason Brownlee. He explores the fascinating world of ML and captures its essence in the real world.
- Adam Geitey’s blog– interesting write-ups in ML and Python
- Arthur Juliani’s blog on Reinforcement Learning – an absolute gem of a blog which particularly focuses on reinforcement learning in ML.
- Edwin Chen’s blog – it explores requisite concepts of ML such as neural networks, deep learning etc. as well as the math behind it.
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I research and cover latest happenings in data science. My fervent interests are in latest technology and humor/comedy (an odd combination!). When I'm not busy reading on these subjects, you'll find me watching movies or playing badminton.
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Raising Gardens for all Families
Currently, the single largest source of food on reservations is government surplus commodities, like cheese and peanut butter. On the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, many people depend on these commodities for their very survival. Unfortunately, these commodities are often high in sodium and sugar and rarely include vegetables. And hunger and malnutrition are serious problems.
Billy's efforts have helped to change that. He has helped raise enough money to fund a gardening program called the Slim Buttes Agricultural Development Program. In 15 years, the program has grown from half a dozen gardens to over 400 gardens.
At Pine Ridge, the families are provided with land, seeds and advice. The gardening program runs education programs, helps with ground preparation and tilling, seed distribution and seedling production. Plus, wells were dug to provide irrigation which is critical in this dry part of the country. As a result, hundreds of families now grow fresh, healthy produce for themselves. In the fall, mentors help families learn how to can and store vegetables for the winter.
The gardens help make sure people have food, even when they don't have any money. Plus gardens help people connect with each other and with the earth.
Billy Mills is known internationally for the gold medal he won in the 10,000 meters at the 1964 Olympics. Now he uses his success 40 years ago to help improve the lives of other Native Americans. He is a spokesperson for Running Strong for Indian Youth, raising money and speaking all over the country.
"His work is to help stamp out the suffering and starvation of America's 'Poorest of the Poor'," wrote Roberta D'Orazio in nominating him for the Garden Crusader Award. "The planting and harvesting of these gardens helps to lead these people out of starvation, helps to reunite families through hard work shared together, and helps to restore pride and self sufficiency."
If you have any questions or comments, please contact us at: [email protected]
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Glycosaminoglycan is a type of long, unbranched polysaccharide molecule. Glycosaminoglycans are major structural components of cartilage and are also found in the cornea of the eye.
In some patients who died with severe COVID-19 and respiratory failure, a jelly was formed in the lungs. Researchers have now established what the active agent in the jelly is and thanks to that, this new discovery can now be the key to new effective therapies.
Accumulation of assembled tau protein in the central nervous system is characteristic of Alzheimer's disease and several other neurodegenerative diseases, called tauopathies.
Researchers around the world are racing to find treatments to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic that has caused more than 16 million human infections globally.
An international team of researchers has conducted a study showing that differences in the human microbiome may influence the ability of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) to infect host cells.
A common drug, already approved by the Food and Drug Administration, may also be a powerful tool in fighting COVID-19, according to research published this week in Antiviral Research.
Researchers at Radboud University Medical Center in the Netherlands reported an increase of heparanase activity and heparan sulfate levels in the plasma of patients with coronavirus disease (COVID-19), which was also associated with the severity of the condition – suggesting, in turn, potential treatment utility of low molecular weight heparins. The paper is currently available on the medRxiv* preprint server.
Researchers at the University of Sheffield have developed a new assay that can be used to assess the attachment of viruses to host cells and to test potential inhibitors of viral infection.
Glycosaminoglycans can inhibit cell invasion by acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) and other coronaviruses, which supports the utilization of such therapeutics in the fight against coronavirus disease (COVID-19) – reports a new study available on the preprint server bioRxiv.
The neurobiological pathophysiology of schizophrenia differs significantly between males and females, according to a new study.
In a study published online in Nature on June 26, research teams led by Dr. YANG Weiwei at the Institute of Biochemistry and Cell Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Dr. LI Guohui from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics of CAS reported a new function of uridine diphosphate glucose (UDP-glucose), a metabolic intermediate in the uronic acid pathway: It impairs lung cancer metastasis by accelerating SNAI1 mRNA decay.
Using FACS-based CRISPR screening, scientists have identified three candidate genes that may facilitate the invasion of Chlamydia trachomatis into host cells.
More than 30 million Americans suffer from osteoarthritis of the knee, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Biomedical scientists at the University of Salford found that sugars from the common cockle were approximately as effective as some standard chemotherapy drugs at relative lower dosage.
Scientists in Dresden, Germany, have been successful in mimicking mechanisms of Alzheimer's disease in a novel, stem cell-based model system that reproduces features of human brain tissue.
Higher leisure-time physical activity (LTPA) level promotes cartilage health in postmenopausal women with mild knee osteoarthritis (OA).
The quest for a synthetic heart valve that faithfully mimics the original is a step closer to its goal with the Rice University find that a natural polymer called hyaluronan, one of the chief components of skin and connective tissue, can serve as a versatile template for growing spongiosa, the middle tissue layer in the valve's leaflets.
Halozyme Therapeutics, Inc., a biotechnology company developing novel oncology and drug-delivery therapies, today announced the first patient has been dosed in its Halo-301 | Pancreatic study, a Phase 3 clinical trial in previously untreated metastatic pancreatic cancer patients.
Halozyme Therapeutics, Inc. today announced that AbbVie has dosed the first subject in a clinical trial evaluating the safety and pharmacokinetics of adalimumab with Halozyme's proprietary ENHANZE technology.
Halozyme Therapeutics, Inc. today announced that Janssen Biotech, Inc. has dosed the first patient in a clinical trial evaluating subcutaneous (SC) delivery of daratumumab with Halozyme's proprietary ENHANZE technology in multiple myeloma.
Halozyme Therapeutics, Inc. today announced that the first healthy subject has been dosed in a Phase 1 clinical trial evaluating the safety, tolerability and pharmacokinetics of a subcutaneous formulation of rivipansel, a compound discovered by GlycoMimetics, Inc. and being developed by Pfizer Inc., using Halozyme's ENHANZE formulation.
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A pregnancy test is usually conducted to determine if a woman is pregnant or not. There are primarily two different types of pregnancy test. The first type is the urine pregnancy test and the second type is the blood pregnancy test.
The urine pregnancy test is more popular among the masses because of its easy availability in the form of the urine pregnancy test kit. The blood pregnancy test is a more conclusive test and tends to provide a higher degree of accuracy. However, both tests detect the presence of human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). The hCG hormone is produced in the body once the embryo attaches itself to the uterine wall of the female’s body and then rapidly grows in the next few days. This rapid growth triggers the placenta to release the hCG hormone which is used to determine pregnancy.
Urine Pregnancy Test
- The urine pregnancy essentially requires a urine sample from the woman affected by probable symptoms of pregnancy.
- This urine sample should technically from the first urine passage of the day.
- The sample is then used by the doctor to determine the presence of the hCG hormone in the sample.
- This is achieved by either dipping the test strip on the urine cup or by urinating directly on the test strip. The results are available in a few minutes.
- The home pregnancy test kit uses the same method.
- You will just have to get one from a medical store and then use it as per the manufacturer’s instruction.
- Most home pregnancy tests have markers on them which indicate a positive or a negative test. However, it is better to use the home urine pregnancy test kits after the period is delayed.
- Most of these tests assure a 97% rate of accuracy and sometimes also indicate a false result to portray an ectopic pregnancy.
Blood Pregnancy Test
- Although a blood pregnancy test is generally used if the doctor suspects an ectopic pregnancy or any other complications, it is also used to determine whether a woman is pregnant or not.
- The blood pregnancy test is usually expensive. However, its results are far more conclusive as not only does it detect the presence of the hCG hormone in the woman’s body, it also measures the amount of hCG hormone present.
- It can also accurately calculate the number of days the pregnancy has progressed.
- For the blood pregnancy test, a blood sample is taken from the woman suspecting pregnancy.
- A quantitative blood pregnancy will tell the patient about the exact amount of hCG concentration in her blood.
- A qualitative pregnancy test will simply tell her if she is pregnant or not.
- A blood test should be technically undertaken at least 7 to 12 after probable conception.
Whatever test it may be, it should be carried out appropriately.
Read more articles on Pregnancy Test
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Mindful eating means being present whilst preparing, blessing and eating our meals. It means fully enjoying and experiencing each bite of food. Notice the aromas of your food before and after it enters your mouth.
Notice its textures and temperatures. Taste the combinations of flavours on your tongue, which can change as you chew. Feel the food moving down your oesophagus, and the response of your entire being to this act of nourishment.
You will find that eating mindfully is more pleasurable, not less. As a time-poor culture with a 3-second attention span, we overeat not because we enjoy food too much, but because we do not enjoy it enough!
When you make even one minute of your meal an eating meditation, you are more likely to digest efficiently, notice when you’re reaching your stomach’s capacity, and stop when you are full. But do not practice mindful or meditative eating solely as a means to eat less, or lose weight, as you will be missing the bigger picture.
Eat mindfully not as a form of willpower with an ulterior goal, but to delight in food, and to listen to the body so that you can give it what it needs. Try it next time you're eating alone, and once you've practised a few times by yourself, do it when you're with friends. Taking just a few moments to really enjoy your food can contribute to greater satisfaction and in the long run, greater health.
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Children, Native Americans. The Story of HIAWATHA adapted from Longfellow by Allen Chaffee and Illustrated by Armstrong Sperry. This book was prepared under the supervision of Josette Frank, Children's Book Adviser of the Child Study Association of American. (63 Pgs.). Ex- Lib with usual marks. Cloth Pictorial Boards slight edge and corner wear. Slight soiling of leaf edges and forepages.AUTHOR: Allen Chaffee PUBLISHER: Random House, NY ISBN: YEAR: 1951 FORMAT: Hardcover EDITION: First Ed.
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Determine the occurrence, extent and effects of anthropogenic impacts on natural systems, and provide scientific guidance and resources to maintain and/or achieve the desired ecological state of a system.
To ensure sustainable conservation of the Knysna Estuary, the research we do is used to guide and assist management authorities. The time has come to use scientific research to effectively manage the environment we depend on and our ongoing aim is to bring science and management together.
Knysna Estuary Monitoring Platform (KEMP)
The Knysna estuary is considered to be the most important estuary in South Africa in terms of conservation importance and roughly 42% of South Africa’s estuarine biodiversity is found within this system. The Knysna estuary contains the largest Eel grass beds in South Africa and is home to the endangered Knysna seahorse (Hippocampus capensis), which depend on this habitat type. These are just some of the features that highlight the ecological importance of this estuary, and the crucial need to ensure its long-term conservation. The Knysna estuary is not only ecologically important, but also functions as an important tourist attraction, providing much needed economical support for the town and surrounding communities. Many local communities also depend on it for subsistence in the way of fishing and/or bait collection.
The Knysna estuary is Knysna’s most important ecological and economical asset. To continue to reap the benefits from this asset, the estuary and its biota need to be maintained in a healthy ecological state. Good water quality is integral to a healthy estuary. It is our responsibility to understand the hydrological and biological characteristics of the estuary, monitor patterns and changes over time, assess potential human impact on the estuary, and to use this information to successfully management and conserve this system.
The Knysna Estuary Monitoring Platform (KEMP) was established by the Knysna Basin Project, by the generous contribution and support Konrad Taeuber from the Tauber Trust in 2015, with the overarching aim of providing a platform to monitor the water quality and hydrological processes of the Knysna estuary and to use the data generated to provide guidance to management and conservation authorities.
The Knysna Estuary Monitoring Platform (KEMP) is a water quality monitoring programme located within the Knysna estuary. Water quality data is collected by two Monitoring Stations within Thesen Islands Marina and at Thesens Jetty respectively. At each station, a permanently deployed Hach sonde collects data on a real-time, 24/7 basis and measurements are taken on an hourly basis.
This fine scale data collection enables us to observe all weather and environmental events that take place such as freshwater floods and upwelling events as well as assess the potential impact from drought and sea level rise. Parameters measured include:
- Dissolved oxygen (mg/l and % saturation)
A weather station located at Thesens Jetty measures the following:
- wind speed
- wind direction
- rainfall per hour
- absolute air pressure
- air temperature
- sun brightness
The data collected by the sondes are logged on a data logger located at each Monitoring Station. From here the data is uploaded to a database which can be accessed online (www.hach.zednet.ac.za). Data is uploaded every four hours.
Email at [email protected]
The Shoresearch project is a long-term study of the biodiversity of the intertidal zone of the Knysna estuary. The project measures the invertebrate species that live between the low and high tide lines and their frequencies. There are 10 assessment sites from the Heads to Featherbed Bay with a diverse range of habitats which are assessed annually on a seasonal basis.
The project demonstrates
- The number of species and their frequency
- The effect of zonation from low to high tide
- Habitat differences
- Differences caused by reduced salinity at sites higher up the estuary
- Changes over time
The Project is run by Frances and Peter Smith with the help of citizen scientists.
Knysna Basin Project has published a revised and expanded second edition of its field guide – A Field Guide to the Shores of the Knysna Estuary – the common creatures, seaweeds and saltmarsh plants. The Guide aims to help the community learn about and appreciate the Estuary and to raise funds for the Project.
Peter and Frances Smith at [email protected]
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What Is Tables
- A Table Is A Collection of Related Data Entries And It Consists Of Coolumns And Rows.
- A table has a specified number of columns, but can have any number of rows.
- Each row is identified by the values appearing in a particular column subset which has been identified as a unique key index.
For example, an Employees table would contain the same basic details on each employee: name, title, department and so on. Each detail, each chunk of information you need to store lives in a field. When you view a single employee record, QuickBase displays it in a form. Whenever you want to view more that one record at a time, you do so in a table report, where fields appear as columns and each record is a row.
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If your lawn has issues with brown spots or water puddles where water just cannot penetrate the soil, you may have heard of the method of just poking holes into the lawn, or lawn aeration. Is it legit or is it just a myth?
Lawn aeration is necessary for lawn maintenance once a year. It opens up the thick top layer of thatch and compacted clay soil to allow for a better flow of water, oxygen, and nutrients to penetrate into the soil. It is beneficial for plant growth with better root growth and more soil organisms in promoting soil fertility.
In this article, we will look at what lawn aeration is, and go through some studies to see if it is really necessary for your lawn.
1. What is lawn aeration?
Aeration is also called perforation, staking, or core drilling (or drilling holes in the ground).
Using a machine, lawn aeration can be done by removing or extracting small plugs or cores of soil (with a diameter of 1/2 or ¾ inch) out of the lawn and depositing them on top of the lawn.
Aeration holes created by lawn aerators are typically 1-6 inches deep, 2-6 inches apart. The extracted cores of soil will decompose back to the lawn in 2-4 weeks.
Lawn aeration can also be done manually using a hand aerator, which is shaped like a fork with spikes. Hand aerators or walking on spiked shoes are, however, not very effective and can even contribute to further compaction of the ground. This is because hand aerators punch into the ground, push into the soil, and do not remove the soil.
2. Benefits of lawn aeration
The major benefit of lawn aeration is that it opens up compacted soil and clears the thatch which is dead grass accumulated on the top layer. This layer of dead grass prevents water, and oxygen from getting into the soil. Perforating holes into the thatch would allow more oxygen, water, and nutrients to enter the soil.
Aeration also frees toxic gases from the earth, created by the death and decay of microorganisms, and prevents them from building up to dangerous levels.
Because of more moisture, oxygen, and less toxic gases in the soil, more soil organisms such as earthworms, microbes, and plants can also flourish. The plants will also show healthier growth, with longer roots.
Soil microbes are important for soil fertility as they can decompose organic matter in the lawn into nutrients readily available for plant uptake, thus promoting stronger plants and better growth.
These benefits are proven by many studies comparing lawns aerated and not aerated.
One study shows that the number of soil microbes increases after aeration (Franz, Taylor & Riina, 2005).
Another study shows that aeration has significantly increased the density of grass growing in an area, the length of grass roots, and root depth (Sharbazery & Gareeb).
|Without aeration||With aeration|
|Plant density||456 plants/m2||520 pants/m2|
|Active root length||12.5 cm||14.5 cm|
|Root depth||25 cm||37.5 cm|
Another study also found a correlation between aeration and increase in plant root length (Sayed et al., 2012). It found that the best results come with a higher perforation density of 216 holes/m2 (21.6 holes/square feet), than 144 holes/m2 (14.4 holes/square feet).
3. How do you know if you need to aerate the lawn?
There are five situations when your lawn is probably too compacted and needs aeration:
-When there are brown spots on the lawn. Those are the thatch, or dead grass accumulating on the top like a mat preventing water from penetrating into the soil.
-Water pools on the surface in puddles rather than penetrating into the ground, after watering or the rain. If this happens, the soil is water-repellent, in other words, hydrophobic.
-When the soil becomes compacted due to heavy use from human activities, animals, being driven upon by cars and machinery.
– When it is in heavy clay soil.
-if the soil was dry without receiving any watering or rainfall for a while, it would most likely be water-repellent or hydrophobic.
– Finally, you can take a soil sample of 6 inches deep. If the grass roots only reach down to the first 2 inches, your soil is probably too compacted.
4. What happens if you don’t aerate your lawn?
If you do not aerate your lawn and it is exposed to soil compacting events, thatch (dead grass) or turf grass will build on the top layer of the grass like a mat.
Thatch is a thick top layer of dead grass that builds up over time, which soaks up all the water and prevents water, fertilizer, and oxygen from penetrating into the soil.
The soil underneath would then become more and more compact, resulting in fewer soil microbes and organisms for healthy soil, and poor plant growth with shorter roots.
5. When should you not aerate your lawn?
The best time to aerate lawns is when the grass just comes out of dormancy and begins a period of vigorous growth. This is because aeration will do some damage to the grass which can recover quickly in its active growing period. Another reason is that competition from weeds is also minimal during this time.
For warm-season grass such as Bermuda grass and zoysia grass, the best time to aerate is during their active growing season in mid-summer in June and July.
For cool-season grass such as tall fescue and Kentucky bluegrass, the best time would be end of summer to early fall (around September).
6. How often should you aerate the lawn?
For home lawns, it is enough to aerate lawns only once a year, even under heavy use.
7. Should you mow the lawn before aerating?
You do not need to mow the lawn before aerating. But you should water your lawn two days prior to aerating it to make it moist, but not wet so that the machine can penetrate deeper into the soil.
Avoid aerating areas with stones and heavy clay soils. Also, mark sprinkler heads and underground cable and utility lines before aerating so they will not be damaged.
It is definitely necessary to aerate lawns that are compacted as it can help loosen the soil for a better flow of water, oxygen, and nutrients near the root zone. It helps increase the density of plants, root length, root depth, and for better microbial activity. It is best done by a machine than using a hand aerator once a year, at the beginning of the active growing season.
Apart from lawn aeration, you can also use a wetting agent to improve water absorption for your lawn.
6 Reasons Your Soil Doesn’t Absorb Water (Must Read!)
7 Top Wetting Agents for Lawn (With Editor’s Pick)
Aveni, M. (2013). Aerating Your Lawn. Virginia Cooperative Extension. Virginia Tech. Publication 430-002
Franz, E., Taylor, R. & Riina, C. (2005). Soil Aeration Background. “The Little Things that Run the World” Soil Ecology Program, Roland Park Country School.
Sayed, C., Ahmed, D., Raoudha, G. & Khaula, A. (2012). Effects of the density of the mechanical aeration on the resistance to penetration of a turf soil and its impact on the plant root behavior. Agricultural Segment: 3(1) AGS/1578, 2012
Sharbazery, A. O. M. & Gareeb, B.A. (2018). Effect of Aeration and Compaction on Some Characters of a Turf Grass Mixture Under Sulamani City Conditions. Journal of ZankoySulaimani, Special Issue, 2nd Int. Conference of Agricultural Sciences. pp.37-42
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Drought is Widespread Across Texas
Summer is here and drought is already occurring across much of our state. As of late July, 2020, the portion of Texas experiencing some level of drought conditions is slowly increasing as the heat of summer sets in.
There have been several harsh droughts in Texas’ history; notably, the seven-year drought of the 1950s, and the major drought beginning in 2010 and lasting through 2015. Check out this interactive story map to see how the most recent major drought evolved.
Drought is one of the most common and costly types of natural disasters in the United States. It can impact the economy, environment, and society by limiting water, impacting habitat, and triggering health and safety problems. In general, drought is considered a prolonged period of below normal precipitation. Scientists consider factors such as rainfall amounts, vegetation conditions, soil moisture, and reservoir levels when characterizing droughts.
Stay "In the Know" with These Drought Resources
- Find out about drought conditions in your area.
- Check the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s (TCEQ) drought website for updated drought information. You can also sign up to receive an email or text when this information is updated. Additionally, the TCEQ answers the public drought-information hotline during business hours: 800-447-2827.
- Consult the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) map to monitor reservoir levels in your area.
- Review the Texas Water Conditions Report to learn more about reservoirs, streamflow sites, and groundwater wells.
- Learn about our State Water Plan, which addresses the needs of all water users in the event of a repeat of the record drought of the 1950s.
How to Be Prepared for a Drought
Weather patterns and demand on water supplies vary drastically across Texas. When dry conditions are prolonged, it can put a strain on all water uses. You can help by implementing practices that will reduce demand for water supplies—before drought strikes, so dry conditions will be easier to bear. In fact, water conservation is an essential part of the State Water Plan.
Use Water Wisely in Your Landscape
Billions of gallons of water are wasted each year due to inefficient landscape irrigation. Order or download our free landscape materials, which will help you learn about topics such as rainwater harvesting and effective lawn irrigation.
Use the Native Plant Database from the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center to choose native plants that tolerate drought well.
Check with your local government to learn about watering restrictions in your area.
Save Water in Your Home
Install water-efficient fixtures; look for the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) WaterSense label to find quality products that save water. Some ENERGY STAR products can help you save water in addition to energy. Check out dishwashers and clothes washers with the ENERGY STAR label.
You don’t have to spend money to save water—some small actions can make a huge impact. Take shorter showers, turn off the water while brushing your teeth or shaving, sweep your driveway instead of hosing it off, and run only full loads of laundry and dishes.
Fixing household leaks can be an easy and inexpensive way to save on water. It’s estimated that the average household wastes more than 10,000 gallons of water each year due to leaks.
Check our website to find even more ways to prepare for a drought by conserving water.
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Eight miles southeast of Muscle Shoals, Alabama's first chartered college was established in 1830. After LaGrange College was moved to Florence, its name was changed to Florence Wesleyan University. It is known today as the University of North Alabama. The "West Point of the West" was open from 1857 until 1863. LaGrange College and LaGrange Military Academy are listed on the Alabama Register of Landmarks and Heritage. Site highlights include a welcome center, an antebellum cemetery, the Oaks Plantation log kitchen, an 1850 bed & breakfast inn, a country store, post office, blacksmith shop, log chapel, and the annual reenactment of the enlistment of students into the 35th Alabama Infantry Regiment.
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Manual therapy migraine treatment, or manipulative therapy, is a physical treatment approach which utilizes several specific hands-on techniques to treat a variety of injuries and/or conditions. Manual therapy is commonly used by chiropractors, physical therapists and massage therapists, among other qualified and experienced healthcare professionals, to diagnose and treat soft tissue and joint pain. Many healthcare specialists recommend manual therapy, or manipulative therapy as a treatment for migraine headache pain. The purpose of the following article is to educate patients on the effects of manual therapies for migraine treatment.
Manual Therapies for Migraine: a Systematic Review
Migraine occurs in about 15% of the general population. Migraine is usually managed by medication, but some patients do not tolerate migraine medication due to side effects or prefer to avoid medication for other reasons. Non-pharmacological management is an alternative treatment option. We systematically reviewed randomized clinical trials (RCTs) on manual therapies for migraine. The RCTs suggest that massage therapy, physiotherapy, relaxation and chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy might be equally effective as propranolol and topiramate in the prophylactic management of migraine. However, the evaluated RCTs had many methodological shortcomings. Therefore, any firm conclusion will require future, well-conducted RCTs on manual therapies for migraine.
Keywords: Manual therapies, Massage, Physiotherapy, Chiropractic, Migraine, Treatment
Migraine is usually managed by medication, but some patients do not tolerate acute and/or prophylactic medicine due to side effects, or contraindications due to co-morbidity of myocardial disorders or asthma among others. Some patients wish to avoid medication for other reasons. Thus, non-pharmacological management such as massage, physiotherapy and chiropractic may be an alternative treatment option. Massage therapy in Western cultures uses classic massage, trigger points, myofascial release and other passive muscle stretching among other treatment techniques which are applied to abnormal muscle tissue. Modern physiotherapy focuses on rehabilitation and exercise, while manual treatment emphasis postural corrections, soft tissue work, stretching, active and passive mobilization and manipulation techniques. Mobilization is commonly defined as movement of joints within the physiological range of motion . The two most common chiropractic techniques are the diversified and Gonstead, which are used by 91 and 59% of chiropractors . Chiropractic spinal manipulation (SM) is a passive-controlled maneuver which uses a directional high-velocity, low-amplitude thrusts directed at a specific joint past the physiological range of motion, without exceeding the anatomical limit . The application and duration of the different manual treatments varies among those who perform it. Thus, manual treatment is not necessarily as uniform as, for instance, specific treatment with a drug in a certain dose.
This paper systematically review randomized controlled trials (RCTs) assessing the efficacy of manual therapies on migraine, i.e., massage, physiotherapy and chiropractic.
The literature search was done on CINAHL, Cochrane, Medline, Ovid and PubMed. Search words were migraine and chiropractic, manipulative therapy, massage therapy, osteopathic treatment, physiotherapy or spinal mobilization. All RCTs written in English using manual therapy on migraine were evaluated. Migraine was preferentially classified according to the criteria of the International Headache Societies from 1988 or its revision from 2004, although it was not an absolute requirement [3, 4]. The studies had to evaluate at least one migraine outcome measure such as pain intensity, frequency, or duration. The methodological quality of the included RCT studies was assessed independently by the authors. The evaluation covered study population, intervention, measurement of effect, data presentation and analysis (Table 1). The maximum score is 100 points and ≥50 points considered to be methodology of good quality [5–7].
The literature search identified seven RCT on migraine that met our inclusion criteria, i.e., two massage therapy studies [8, 9], one physiotherapy study and four chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy studies (CSMT) [11–14], while we found no RCTs studies on spinal mobilization or osteopathic as a intervention for migraine.
Methodological Quality of the RCTs
Table 2 shows the authors average methodological score of the included RCT studies [8–14]. The average score varied from 39 to 59 points. Four RCTs were considered to have a good quality methodology score (≥50), and three RCTs had a low score.
Randomized Controlled Trials
Table 3 shows details and the main results of the different RCT studies [8–14].
An American study included 26 participants with chronic migraine diagnosed by questionnaire . Massage therapy had a statistically significant effect on pain intensity as compared with controls. Pain intensity was reduced 71% in the massage group and unchanged in the control group. Interpretation of the data is otherwise difficult and results on migraine frequency and duration are missing.
A New Zealand study included 48 migraineurs diagnosed by questionnaire . The mean duration of a migraine attack was 47 h, and 51% of the participants had more than one attack per month. The study included a 3 week follow-up period. The migraine frequency was significantly reduced in the massage group as compared with the control group, while the intensity of attacks was unchanged. Results on migraine duration are missing. Medication use was unchanged, while sleep quality was significantly improved in the massage group (p < 0.01), but not in the control group.
An American physical therapy study included female migraineurs with frequent attacks diagnosed by a neurologist according to the criteria of the International Headache Society [3, 10]. Clinical effect was defined as >50% improvement in headache severity. Clinical effect was observed in 13% of the physical therapy group and 51% of the relaxation group (p < 0.001). The mean reduction in headache severity was 16 and 41% from baseline to post-treatment in the physical therapy and relaxation groups. The effect was maintained at 1 year follow-up in both groups. A second part of the study offered persons without clinical effect in the first part of the study, the other treatment option. Interestingly, clinical effect was observed in 55% of those whom received physical therapy in the second round who had no clinical effect from relaxation, while 47% had clinical effect from relaxation in the second round. The mean reduction in headache severity was 30 and 38% in the physical therapy and relaxation groups. Unfortunately, the study did not include a control group.
Chiropractic Spinal Manipulative Treatment
An Australian study included migraineurs with frequent attacks diagnosed by a neurologist . The participants were divided into three study groups; cervical manipulation by chiropractor, cervical manipulation by physiotherapist or physician, and cervical mobilization by physiotherapist or physician. The mean migraine attack duration was skewed in the three groups, as it was much longer in cervical manipulation by chiropractor (30.5 h) than cervical manipulations by physiotherapist or physician (12.2 h) and cervical mobilization groups (14.9 h). The study had several investigators and the treatment within each group was beside the mandatory requirements free for the therapists. No statistically significant differences were found between the three groups. Improvement was observed in all three groups post-treatment (Table 3). Prior to the trial, chiropractors were confident and enthusiastic about the efficacy of cervical manipulation, while physiotherapists and physicians were doubtful about the relevance. The study did not include a control group although cervical mobilization is mentioned as the control group in the paper. A follow-up 20 months after the trial showed further improvement in the all three groups (Table 3) .
An American study included 218 migraineurs diagnosed according to the criteria of the International Headache Society by chiropractors . The study had three treatment groups, but no control group. The headache intensity on days with headaches was unchanged in all three groups. The mean frequency was reduced equally in the three groups (Table 3). Over the counter (OTC) medication was reduced from baseline to 4 weeks post-treatment with 55% in the CSMT group, 28% in the amitriptyline group and 15% in the combined CSMT and amitriptyline group.
The second Australian study was based on questionnaire diagnoses on migraine . The participants had migraine for mean 18.1 years. The effect of CSMT was significant better than the control group (Table 3). The mean reduction of migraine frequency, intensity and duration from baseline to follow-up were 42, 13, and 36% in CSMT group, and 17, 5, and 21% in the control group (data calculated by the reviewers based on figures from the paper).
The prevalence of migraine was similar based on a questionnaire and a direct physician conducted interview, but it was due to equal positive and negative misclassification by the questionnaire . A precise headache diagnosis requires an interview by a physicians or other health professional experienced in headache diagnostics. Three of the seven RCTs ascertained participants by a questionnaire, with the diagnostic uncertainty introduced by this (Table 3).
The second American study included participants with at least four headache days per months . The mean headache severity on days with headache at baseline varied from 4.4 to 5.0 on a 0–10 box scale in the three treatment groups. This implies that the participants had co-occurrence of tension-type headache, since tension-type headache intensity usually vary between 1 and 6 (mild or moderate), while migraine intensity can vary between 4 and 9 (moderate or severe), but usually it is a severe pain between 7 and 9 [16, 17]. The headache severity on days with headache was unchanged between baseline and at follow-up, indicating that the effect observed was not exclusively due to an effect on migraine, but also an effect on tension-type headache.
RCTs that include a control group are advantageous to RCTs that compare two active treatments, since the effect in the placebo group rarely is zero and often varies. An example is RCTs on acute treatment of migraine comparing the efficacy of subcutaneous sumatriptan and placebo showed placebo responses between 10 and 37%, while the therapeutic effect, i.e., the efficacy of sumatriptan minus the efficacy of placebo was similar [18, 19]. Another example is a RCT on prophylactic treatment of migraine, comparing topiramate and placebo . The attack reduction increased along with increasing dose of topiramate 50, 100 and 200 mg/day. The mean migraine attack frequency was reduced from 1.4 to 2.5 attacks per month in the topiramate groups and 1.1 attacks per month in the placebo group from baseline, with mean attack frequencies varying from 5.1 to 5.8 attacks per month in the four groups.
Thus, interpretation of the efficacy in the four RCTs without a control group is not straight forward [9–12]. The methodological quality of all seven RCTs had room for improvement as the maximum score 100 was far from expectation, especially a precise migraine diagnosis is important.
Several of the studies relatively include a few participants, which might cause type 2 errors. Thus, power calculation prior to the study is important in the future studies. Furthermore, the clinical guidelines from the International Headache Society should be followed, i.e., frequency is a primary end point, while duration and intensity can be secondary end points [21, 22].
Dr. Alex Jimenez’s Insight
Manual therapies, such as massage therapy, physical therapy and chiropractic spinal manipulative treatment are several well-known migraine treatment approaches recommended by healthcare professionals to help improve as well as manage the painful symptoms associated with the condition. Patients who are unable to use drugs and/or medications, including those who may prefer to avoid using these, can benefit from manual therapies for migraine treatment, according to the following article. Evidence-based research studies have determined that manual therapies might be equally as effective for migraine treatment as drugs and/or medications. However, the systematic review determined that future, well-conducted randomized clinical trials on the use of manual therapies for migraine headache pain are required to conclude the findings.
The two RCTs on massage therapy included relatively a few participants, along with shortcomings mentioned in Table 3 [8, 9]. Both studies showed that massage therapy was significantly better than the control group, by reducing migraine intensity and frequency, respectively. The 27–28% (34–7% and 30–2%) therapeutic gain in migraine frequency reduction by massage therapy is comparable with the 6, 16 and 29% therapeutic gain in migraine frequency reduction by prophylactic treatment with topiramate 50, 100 and 200 mg/day .
The single study on physiotherapy is large, but do not include a control group . The study defined responders to have 50% or more reduction in migraine intensity. The responder rate to physical therapy was only 13% in the first part of the study, while it was 55% in the group that did not benefit from relaxation, while the responder rate to relaxation was 51% in the first part of the study and 47% in the group that did not benefit from physical therapy. A reduction in migraine intensity often correlates with reduced migraine frequency. For comparison, the responder rate was 39, 49, 47 and 23% among those who received topiramate 50, 100 and 200 mg/day and placebo as defined by 50% or more reduction in migraine frequency . A meta-analysis of 53 studies on prophylactic treatment with propranolol showed a mean 44% reduction in migraine activity . Thus, it seems that physical therapy and relaxation has equally good effect as topiramate and propranolol.
Only one of the four RCTs on chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy (CSMT) included a control group, while the other studies compared with other active treatment [11–14]. The first Australian study showed that the migraine frequency was reduced in all three groups when baseline was compared with 20 months post trail [11, 12]. The chiropractors were highly motivated to CSMT treatment, while physicians and physiotherapist were more sceptical, which might have influenced on the result. An American study showed that CSMT, amitriptyline and CSMT + amitriptyline reduced the migraine frequency 33, 22 and 22% from baseline to post-treatment (Table 3). The second Australian study found that migraine frequency was reduced 35% in the CSMT group, while it was reduced 17% in the control group. Thus, the therapeutic gain is equivalent to that of topiramate 100 mg/day and the efficacy is equivalent to that of propranolol [20, 23].
Three case reports raise concerns about chiropractic cervical SMT, but a recent systematic review found no robust data concerning the incidence or the prevalence of adverse reactions following chiropractic cervical SMT [24–27]. When to refer migraine patients to manual therapies? Patients not responding or tolerating prophylactic medication or who wish to avoid medication for other reasons, can be referred to massage therapy, physical therapy or chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy, as these treatments are safe with a few adverse reactions [27–29].
Current RCTs suggest that massage therapy, physiotherapy, relaxation and chiropractic spinal manipulative therapy might be equally efficient as propranolol and topiramate in the prophylactic management of migraine. However, a firm conclusion requires, in future, well-conducted RCTs without the many methodological shortcomings of the evaluated RCTs on manual therapies. Such studies should follow clinical trial guidelines from the International Headache Society [21, 22].
Conflict of Interest
Open Access: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits any use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and source are credited.
In conclusion, chiropractors, physical therapists and massage therapists, among other qualified and experienced healthcare professionals, recommend manual therapies as a treatment for migraine headache pain. The purpose of the article was to educate patients on the effects of manual therapies for migraine treatment. Furthermore, the systematic review determined that future, well-conducted randomized clinical trials are required to conclude the findings. Information referenced from the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI). The scope of our information is limited to chiropractic as well as to spinal injuries and conditions. To discuss the subject matter, please feel free to ask Dr. Jimenez or contact us at 915-850-0900 .
Curated by Dr. Alex Jimenez
Additional Topics: Neck Pain
Neck pain is a common complaint which can result due to a variety of injuries and/or conditions. According to statistics, automobile accident injuries and whiplash injuries are some of the most prevalent causes for neck pain among the general population. During an auto accident, the sudden impact from the incident can cause the head and neck to jolt abruptly back-and-forth in any direction, damaging the complex structures surrounding the cervical spine. Trauma to the tendons and ligaments, as well as that of other tissues in the neck, can cause neck pain and radiating symptoms throughout the human body.
OTHER IMPORTANT TOPICS: EXTRA: Sports Injuries? | Vincent Garcia | Patient | El Paso, TX Chiropractor
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The wood duck is as unusual as it is interesting to look at. Unlike mallards, which nest in grass just upland from wetlands, wood ducks are cavity nesters that prefer the hollow of a tree to set up housekeeping. And they seem to have adapted to living in town, particularly in Washington Park in the heart of Springfield.
They look as if a wood carver with an unexpired creative license created them in a fit of imagination.
The male’s green crest sweeps back over its head like an emerald green helmet with white piping. The eyes are brilliant red, as if that was the only color left in the carver’s paint box.
The female wears white spectacles that fit more like racing goggles. Together, male and female wood ducks are striking and hard to miss.
And they’re homegrown, not just migrants passing through central Illinois on the way to more verdant forests elsewhere.
The wood duck is as unusual as it is interesting to look at.
Unlike mallards, which nest in grass just upland from wetlands, wood ducks are cavity nesters that prefer the hollow of a tree to set up housekeeping.
And they seem to have adapted to living in town, particularly in Washington Park in the heart of Springfield.
A few years ago, it was unusual to see a wood duck in the park. Now there are several pairs with up to six broods paddling around the lagoon.
Mike Ward, an ornithologist with the Illinois Natural History Survey in Champaign, says he gets calls all the time about wood ducks flying through back yards.
“I think that they are like other birds that are kind of getting used to living in town,” he says. “It helps that a lot of our wetlands are cleaner these days thanks to the Clean Water Act.”
Ward says some birds have learned to make a pretty good living in urban areas. The wood duck, however, seems to be at home in town or in the country.
“It’s not like the Cooper’s hawk that seems to be moving almost exclusively into town,” Ward says. “You see them increasing in urban areas as well as natural areas.”
H. David Bohlen, assistant curator of zoology at the Illinois State Museum, says wood ducks moved in about a decade ago.
Now they sometimes even spend the winter, huddling under the bridge crossing the lagoon when it gets really cold — forgoing their winter trip to the southern United States.
Then they started nesting.
“They usually like sycamore trees, and there are a few sycamores in the park with natural cavities,” Bohlen says.
Bohlen has been studying the urbanization of Sangamon County and its effects on bird numbers and species diversity for years.
Watching birds adapt to human environments sometimes leaves him shaking his head in amazement.
“You see them coming from a long way off,” he says of the wood ducks in Washington Park. “You will see the mother trying to get the brood past all the dogs and other things in the park.
“I saw two girls following them and taking pictures (Tuesday).”
All that contact has made them more tolerant of people. Still, the environment seems to be agreeing with them.
“I’ve seen half a dozen broods,” Bohlen says. “There are a lot of them out there. They just keep having them.”
That’s a far cry from the 1930s, when wood ducks were in serous jeopardy. Before hunting regulations were developed in the early 1900s, resident ducks such as wood ducks were fair game all year long.
The late Frank Bellrose of the Illinois Natural History Survey in Havana, along with colleague Art Hawkins, helped perfect the wood duck nesting box to replace natural cavities that are lost when dead trees are removed. Bellrose later authored the definitive book on the subject, “Ecology and Management of the Wood Duck.”
Now the nest boxes are common and the wood duck is a conservation success story — one that can be witnessed in the heart of Washington Park.
Chris Young can be reached at [email protected] or (217) 788-1528.
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My grandfather, who was a first-generation German-American, was as proud of his German heritage as any man could be. But, when World War I broke out in 1914, he stunned his family by going against his heritage and supporting the Allied cause against Germany.
He tirelessly supported U.S. entry into the war from its earliest days because of his hatred for German militarism.
Later on, he wanted the U.S. to be in the League of Nations, which, of course, did not occur. No doubt, my grandfather would have little respect for today's historians who say the WWI was a war that was fought over nothing.
My grandfather died in 1929, or four years before Hitler came to power. Perhaps, it's just as well that he never lived to see his beloved Germany become consumed by Hitler and his monstrous Naziism.
In response to Michael Gerson's excellent column, "Keeping alive the memory of the Holocaust" that appeared on May 22, I find the notion of two-sidedness when considering the Holocaust to be not only dangerous but also morally offensive in the extreme.
Granted, the pluralism and diversity of our world requires that we have an open and tolerant society. Perhaps, we have to accept a certain amount of moral ambiguity. But, the Holocaust remains one of the purest and most profound examples of evil that there is. I may not be able to readily define evil. But, I know it when I feel it, and the very word "Holocaust" just makes me cringe throughout.
We should teach our young people about the Holocaust so as to make them fully aware of the reality and horror of evil. Only then, can our youngsters develop a tolerance and an acceptance that is combined with a passion for justice so as to right what is wrong.
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We are often asked to recommend books that will assist with an introduction to and understanding of the Catholic classical liberal arts educational tradition. These are the works that have guided and inspired us and many others.
Archbishop J. Michael Miller, CSB
A summary and synthesis of modern Church documents on education. This would be the ideal place to start. Ask faculty to read it, then to discuss it chapter by chapter in faculty meetings or a retreat. As you educate parents, it would be good recommended, and simple, reading for them.
Edited by Dr. R. Jared Staudt
Catholic education remains one of the most compelling expressions of the Church’s mission to form disciples. Despite decades of decline in the number of schools and students, many Catholic schools have been experiencing renewal by returning to the great legacy of the Catholic tradition. Renewing Catholic Schools offers an overview of the reasons behind this renewal and practical suggestions for administrators, clergy, teachers, and parents on how to begin the process of reinvigoration.
Habiger Institute for Catholic Leadership
The Heart of Culture is a succinctly substantive history of Western education and a profound witness to the necessity of maintaining tradition. The West is the product, not of geographic, ethnic, or political forces, but of a dynamic educational tradition. When that tradition breaks down, the culture suffers a crisis of identity. Today, the West is undergoing just such a crisis, as the perennial wisdom of its tradition is ignored, misrepresented, or outright rejected. This short book confronts that crisis, bringing to light the living, intricate educational tradition that built the West, from the Greek ideal of paideia to John Henry Newman’s idea of a university.
University of Mary
Every human society possesses a moral and spiritual imaginative vision, a set of assumptions and ways of looking at things according to which life proceeds. This essay is an attempt to contribute effective strategies to engage our own time and culture once more with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and – for a weary world – to awaken the Catholic imaginative vision.
Ryan S. Topping
He does not speak extensively about “classical liberal arts education” but he is describing in easily accessible terms why Catholic education must be different. This is good for both teachers and parents.
This and its companion (next on list) are two of our favorite books on Catholic education. Very inspiring and theological. This focuses on the Trivium, the arts of language and their significance; the next illuminates the Quadrivium, the arts of number, in the same beautiful way. Definitely a deeper dive, but when your teachers and parents are ready for it, very worthwhile and formative.
Ravi Jain & Kevin Clark
Not specifically Catholic (and therefore missing the Eucharistic aim of the effort) but very helpful in explaining each of the seven liberal arts, but also the sequence and context of their use. We are not just minds. We also need to nurture piety, story and music, physical grace. All of these combine to lead us to the truth of man and God (philosophy and theology) — which lead us to a life of virtue.
St. Jerome Academy
Firmly grounded in a holistic Catholic vision of education, St. Jerome Academy’s Educational Plan offers the most complete curricular guidance for Catholic elementary schools available. This second edition is enriched by the experience of SJA’s first decade of renewal.
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In the first year of Belshazzar, Daniel saw a vision of four beastly creatures ascending from the chaotic sea – Daniel 7:1-8.
Daniel received a vision in which he saw “four beasts ascending” from the sea. The first half of the chapter describes the vision, the second half presents its interpretation. The vision had a fourfold structure, corresponding to the four parts of the “great image” seen by Nebuchadnezzar in his earlier dream, with its golden head, silver arms and breast, brass belly and thighs, and legs of iron and clay.
The seventh chapter is transitional. It concludes the first half of the book and introduces the main subjects of the last half. Parallels are provided between Nebuchadnezzar’s dream of the “great image” and Daniel’s vision of four “beasts from the sea,” as well as verbal links to the visions presented in the next several chapters.
The great image envisioned by Nebuchadnezzar had a “head of fine gold,” which represented his reign. Each of its four components signified a different kingdom, beginning with Babylon. Likewise, in Daniel’s vision, Babylon was the first of the four “beasts” that he saw “ascending from the sea” – (Daniel 2:31-45).
Previously, Daniel identified the “head of gold” as Nebuchadnezzar but did not identify the three subsequent kingdoms. And the pictorial clues provided in his interpretation were too few and ambiguous to link the other three realms to any known historical empires. Likewise, in chapter 7, the identities of the second, third and fourth beasts are allusive, although more details are given.
- (Daniel 7:1-2) – “In the first year of Belshazzar, king of Babylon, Daniel beheld a dream and visions of his head upon his bed, then he wrote the dream and told the sum of the matters. I was looking in my vision in the night when, lo, the four winds of the heavens bursting forth upon the great sea; and four large beasts ascending from the sea, diverse one from another.”
The “first year of Belshazzar.” Daniel received the vision when Babylon was still the dominant power in the Near East. Belshazzar was the regent who governed the city for his father, King Nabonidus (reigned 556-539 B.C.). Belshazzar was killed when the city fell to the “Medes and Persians” in October 539 B.C.
“Daniel beheld…visions of his head upon his bed.” The description forms a verbal link to the earlier dream of Nebuchadnezzar when he received “visions of your head upon your bed,” concerning things “which must come to pass in later days” -(Daniel 2:28-29).
The verbal link is deliberate. The four beasts “ascending from the sea” correspond to the four metallic parts of Nebuchadnezzar’s “great image,” and in both dream-visions, the four parts represent four sequential kingdoms.
- (Daniel 7:3-6) – “The first like a lion, having the wings of an eagle. I looked until the wings were torn out, and it was lifted from the earth, and stood upon its feet like a man, and the heart of a man was given to it. And, lo, another beast, a second, resembling a bear, and on one side was it raised up with three ribs in its mouth, between its teeth, and thus were they saying to it, Rise, devour much flesh! After that, I was looking, and lo, another like a leopard, and it had four wings of a bird upon its back, and four heads had the beast, and dominion was given to it.”
“The four winds of heaven” were agitating the surface of the sea, symbolizing restive nations and peoples. The Aramaic text describes the winds as “bursting forth upon the great sea.” That is, it was the turbulence that caused the beasts to emerge from the sea.
The verb rendered “ascending” is an active participle, denoting action in progress; here, the process of “ascending.” The beasts were “ascending” out of the sea in quick succession.
The “four beasts” were unnatural, composite creatures with characteristics from disparate species; for example, the “lion with eagle wings.” Each creature was driven by its animalistic voracity to seize territory.
The “winged lion” corresponds to the “head of gold” from Nebuchadnezzar’s dream. It represents the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Daniel was familiar with the writings of Jeremiah who also used lions and eagles to symbolize Babylon, a swift and voracious conqueror – (Jeremiah 4:13, 25:9-14, 49:19-22, Daniel 9:1-2).
In Babylon’s art and architecture, lions represented the glory and might of the kingdom. One of its most important deities was Ishtar, the goddess of love and war. She corresponded to the Canaanite deity Ashtoreth (Astarte), and to the Greek god Aphrodite. Her symbols included the lion. Ishtar was linked to the planet Venus, and Old Testament references to the “Queen of Heaven” have in mind this very Babylonian deity – (Jeremiah 7:18, 44:18).
The lion was a powerful predator. Its wings point to rapidity of movement, and their removal to its curtailment. Nebuchadnezzar conquered vast territories in only a few short years; however, that period of rapid expansion ceased after his death.
The lion was “lifted up from the earth, made to stand,” and “given” a human heart. The Aramaic verb qûm rendered “stand” here is the same verb that was applied earlier to Yahweh by Daniel, the Very One who “removes and sets up” kings. Likewise, God caused the “lion” to achieve dominion, and later, its diminishment – (Daniel 2:21, 2:44, 4:17).
The receipt of the human heart parallels the earlier loss of reason by Nebuchadnezzar and his downfall recorded in chapter 4, and subsequently, his recovery of a “human heart” – (Daniel 4:16, 4:34-37).
The second beast is likened to a bear, with one side raised higher than the other. It corresponds to the silver portion of the earlier image, the torso and two arms that was “inferior” to the head of “fine gold.”
A bear is as strong as a lion but lacks its agility, being more ponderous. Its two sides correspond to the two arms of the silver torso and suggest division. The image is not of a bear rearing up on its hind legs, but instead, of a creature elevating its feet on either side as it steps forward – (Daniel 2:32, 2:39).
The bear was gripping “three ribs in its teeth,” prey seized by the ravenous animal. The ribs represented nations subjugated by it. Whether the number “three” was literal or symbolic is not clear. The bear was commanded to “rise and consume much flesh,” a summons to further conquests. A bear was poised to strike while gripping three ribs, indicating its insatiable appetite.
The third beast resembled a leopard with four wings and four heads. The “dominion given to it” linked it to the third section of Nebuchadnezzar’s image that was destined to “rule over all the earth” – (Daniel 2:39).
A leopard is also an agile predator, and again, wings suggest speed. Wings normally occur in pairs; however, the number “four” means this creature has two pairs of wings, and “four” may point to its motion in the four directions of the compass.
The four “heads” of the leopard were not connected to its four wings. Elsewhere in the book, “heads” represent kings and kingdoms. The four heads were grouped together, suggesting they were contemporaneous, not consecutive; that is, a fourfold division of the kingdom represented by the leopard – (Daniel 2:32-38, 7:20).
IN REVELATION, the vision of four “beasts ascending from the sea” is modified. The four creatures become a single beast that is summoned by the “Dragon” to “ascend from the sea” and attack the people of God. It has the same features from the animal world that were possessed by Daniel’s four “beasts from the sea.” However, its characteristics are listed in reverse order.
Like the fourth beast from Daniel, in Revelation, the single “beast from the sea” has a “mouth speaking great things,” with which it “slanders those who are tabernacling in heaven,” and thus, wages “war against the saints and prevails over them.”
The information provided by Daniel on the first three beasts is minimal and allusive. As will become apparent, the focus of the vision’s interpretation is on the fourth “beast,” especially on its “little horn with a mouth speaking great things.”
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I watched the film JFK, directed by Oliver Stone, 1991.
The movie, which takes place in New Orleans, is about an attorney general, Jim Garrison, who decides to reopen the case of the JFK assassination a few years after the event and the release of the Warren Commission. Garrison and his team spend years doing research, interviewing people who are suspected of being related to the case, and disproving the theories that the Warren Commission produced. They create new theories of who committed the crime and how they did it but in the end, Garrison loses his case but he is determined to keep fighting until he is able to obtain justice.
Most of what Garrison bases his work off of is what in the Warren Commission does not make sense. He uses this document to disprove itself and the theories that the American public has taken to accepting as fact. Using the events surrounding the JFK assassination including the investigation that followed, and exploring other possible conspiracies such as the magic bullet theory, the Warren Commission and Shaw as a participant, Oliver Stone exposes the idea that the American public does not have faith in its government agencies especially the FBI and CIA, while exploring the role that press plays in advancing this distrustful relationship through its sometimes unreliable facts. In my paper I will discuss the distrust that American’s have in the government, especially after tragic events like loosing the president, and how the media is able to influence the opinions of the majority of the public.
One way I will look at this is by discussing the role that people believe the CIA and FBI had in helping LBJ with the Kennedy assassination. In a poll done by Gallup in 2003, it was found that 20% of Americans believed that Johnson was involved in the assassination. The most common reasoning is that LBJ was afraid that he would not be re-selected as the running candidate in the 1964 election. Many researchers and critics of the Warren Report have accused Johnson of being involved in the assassination of JFK.
Another approach I will take is how American citizens felt about the government after the attacks on 9/11. There are still many conspiracies about that day and the role that the government played in those events. After the attacks on the Twin Towers on September 11th, 2001, many Americans began to question the government and its role in protecting and supporting its citizens.
The fact that Garrison felt that the case needed to be reopened shows his distrust in the government. With events happening everyday, most recently, the government shutdown, many polls have been done that have proven that the American people’s faith in their government is constantly decreasing. Most importantly, even today, people question the press and its connection to the government constantly. It is said that the media is controlled by the government and that they only publish what is desired for the public to know. There is supposed to be freedom of speech but do media sources really publish whatever they want? Why can the government withhold so much information from the public view if this is supposed to be a government of the people, for the people, by the people?
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Drinking cherry juice reduces high blood pressure at a level comparable to that achieved by taking medication, a new study claims.
Researchers at the U.K.’s Northumbria University, found that men with early signs of hypertension – more commonly known as high blood pressure – saw a seven per cent reduction in blood pressure after drinking Montmorency cherry concentrate when compared to drinking a fruit-flavored cordial.
This reduction is comparable to the level achieved by high blood pressure medication.
For their study, researchers worked with 15 participants who were displaying early hypertension with blood pressure readings of at least 130/90 mmHg, meaning they were at higher risk of experiencing cardiovascular related problems.
They were told that the study was to investigate the effect of a fruit juice on vascular function and were given either 60ml of a Montmorency cherry concentrate or the same amount of cordial.
Blood pressure and blood samples were taken before the cherry concentrate was consumed and blood pressure was measured on an hourly basis thereafter. Blood samples and a series of other cardiovascular screening tests were taken again on a regular basis over the following eight hours.
Accordingly, the researchers found that the participants who were given the cherry concentrate saw a peak reduction in their blood pressure of 7 mmHg in the three hours after consuming the antioxidant-rich drink.
Past studies have shown that a reduction of between 5-6 mmHg over a sustained period has been associated with a 38 per cent reduced risk of stroke and 23 per cent reduced risk of coronary heart disease.
Lead study author Karen Keane said the discovery highlights the potential importance that Montmorency cherries could have in the effective management of high blood pressure.
“The magnitude of the blood pressure lowering effects we observed was comparable to those achieved by a single anti-hypertensive drug,” she explained, adding, “Raised blood pressure is the leading cause of deaths from cardiovascular disease, yet relatively small reductions in blood pressure can have a large impact on mortality rates.”
High blood pressure affects over five million people in England and, if left untreated, increases risk of heart attack, heart failure, kidney disease, stroke or dementia. Normal blood pressure is around 120/80 mmHg, researchers said.
In recent years, Northumbria University has undertaken a number of studies into the health benefits of tart Montmorency cherry concentrate. To date, they have found that the drinking the concentrate improves the quality and quantity of sleep, significantly reduces the symptoms associated with the painful condition of gout and enhances the recovery of muscle function after intense exercise, probably thanks to its anti-inflammatory and anti-oxidative properties.
The findings were first published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
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pigment,substance that imparts color to other materials. In paint, the pigment is a powdered substance which, when mixed in the liquid vehicle, imparts color to a painted surface. The pigments used in paints are nearly all metallic compounds, but organic compounds are also used (see lakelake,
in dyeing, an insoluble pigment formed by the reaction between an organic dye and a mordant. The color of a lake depends upon the mordant as well as the dye used. Generally, lakes are not as colorfast as many inorganic dyes, but their colors are more brilliant.
..... Click the link for more information. ). Most black pigments are organic, e.g., bone black (animal black or charcoal) and lampblack. Some of the metallic pigments occur naturally. The brilliant and beautiful coloring of the rock and soil in some parts of the United States, especially in the Grand Canyon of the Colorado River, the Painted Desert of Arizona, and Bryce and Zion canyons of Utah, is largely produced by such compounds, chiefly oxides. Yellow ocher, sienna, and umber are oxides of iron. Litharge is a yellow oxide of lead. Red lead is also an oxide of this metal. Lead chromate, or chrome yellow, is an important yellow pigment. White lead, or basic lead carbonate, is a pigment long in use; it is rendered more durable by mixture with zinc oxide. Cadmium yellow is a sulfide of cadmium. Ultramarine is an important blue pigment, as is Prussian blue (ferric ferrocyanide). Green pigment is produced by mixing Prussian blue and chrome yellow. Vermilion (mercuric sulfide) is red. Pigments occur in plant and animal bodies. The bright colors of plants, for example, are the result of the presence of such substances as chlorophyll (green) and xanthophyll (yellow), both of which are also found in some animals. Among others are carotene, the yellow of carrots and certain other vegetables, and anthocyanin, which imparts blue, red, and purple to flowers. Blood receives its color from the hemoglobin in the red corpuscles. Coloration of human skin is caused by the presence of pigments (see pigmentationpigmentation,
name for the coloring matter found in certain plant and animal cells and for the color produced thereby. Pigmentation occurs in nearly all living organisms.
..... Click the link for more information. ).
(in biology), a coloring substance that is incorporated into body tissues. Pigments are colored by intramolecular chromophores, atomic groups that selectively absorb light in the visible part of the solar spectrum. Pigments play an important and varied role in the life processes of organisms, especially photobiologic processes.
Occurrence. The most widespread pigments, porphyrins and carotenoids, are found in the majority of plants and animals. Porphyrins are included in the chlorophyll molecules of green plants, in bacteriochlorophylls of photosynthesizing bacteria, and in the respiratory pigments of animals, for example, hemoglobin, myoglobin, and chlorocruorin. Cytochromes, which, like hemoglobin, contain the iron-porphyrin complex heme, are very common. Carotenoids, which are unsaturated isoprenoid hydrocarbons, and their oxidized derivatives xanthophylls are yellow, orange, or red pigments and are present in green plants, algae, fungi, and bacteria. Blue-green and red algae contain auxiliary photosynthetic pigments, called phycobilins, whose nonprotein portion consists of a chain of four pyrrole rings; the blue phycobilin is phycocyanin, and the red—phycoerythrin. Structurally similar to the phycobilins is phytochrome, which is found in plants, and the animal-bile pigments, which are formed during the decomposition of hemoglobin. The large group of plant pigments called flavonoids encompasses substances that differ in chemical structure, color, and occurrence, for example, an-thocyanins and flavones. Flavonoids give color to flowers, fruits, and leaves.
The eyes of animals contain visual pigment, which is structurally complex. Other common pigments of plant and animal tissues are the respiratory chromogens, which are derivatives of quinone, and the melanins, which are found in the skin, fur, and hairs of animals. Fungal and bacterial pigments display a wide variety of chemical structures. Pigments that are identical or close in chemical structure may be found in groups of organisms that are phylogenetically distant from each other.
Pigments are usually contained in various cell structures and, less commonly, dissolved in body fluids. For example, chlorophyll is concentrated in chloroplasts, carotenoids in chromo-plasts and chloroplasts, hemoglobin in red blood cells, and flavonoids in the cell sap of plants. Pigments in combination with proteins and lipids are a structural part of biological membranes. Many animal and plant species have specialized pigment cells, or chromatophores.
Biological role. The pigment system links metabolic processes to light from the environment. One of the most important functions of pigments in plants is participation in photosynthesis. The absorption of light by pigments also plays a role in the growth, development, and movement of plants. The most important function of pigments in animals is participation in visual processes. Hemoglobin and other pigments in the blood transport oxygen from the respiratory organs to the tissues. Cytochromes, respiratory chromogens, and certain other pigments act as enzymes in tissue respiration. Carotenoids and flavonoids in plants and melanins in animals protect the organism against the harmful effects of the sun’s ultraviolet light. Pigments account for coloration, an important feature of an organism’s adaptation to the environment. Coloration in plants serves to attract insect pollinators and birds who spread seeds; in animals it helps to protect against enemies and acts as camouflage while the animal stalks prey.
Until the second half of the 19th century, plant and animal pigments, such as alizarin, indigo, and carmine, were widely used as dyes. Some pigments are used in the food-processing industry and medicine, for example, riboflavin, carotene, and antibiotic pigments.
A. A. KRASNOVSKII
In man. Disruption of any stage of pigment metabolism in man results in the accumulation of various metabolic products and in the development of certain diseases. A distinction is made between hereditary and acquired disturbances; the former are caused by hereditary defects in pigment synthesis and in the synthesis of the chemical precursors of pigments in the liver— red blood cells. Acquired disturbances in pigment metabolism can follow prolonged feverish periods, deficiencies of the vitamins folic and pantothenic acids, and liver diseases, including hepatitis, hepatic tumors, and obstructions of the biliary tract. They can also result from poisoning, Addison’s disease, or some blood diseases. Diseases of pigment metabolism occur at all ages with varying frequencies. The hereditary forms are generally seen in children. Three main groups of disturbances of pigment metabolism are recognized: hemoglobinopathies, hyperbilirubinemias, and porphyrias.
IU. A. KNIAZEV
REFERENCESTsvet, M. S. Khromofilly v rastitel’nom i zhivotnom mire. Warsaw, 1910.
Timiriazev, K. A. Solntse, zhizn’ i khlorofill (vol. 1 of Izbr. soch.). Moscow, 1948.
Prosser, L., and F. Brown. Sravnitel’naia fiziologiia zhivotnykh. Moscow, 1967. Chapters 8 and 19. (Translated from English.)
Biokhimiia rastenii. Moscow, 1968. Chapters 24, 26, and 28. (Translated from English.)
Konev, S. V., and I. D. Volotovskii. Vvedenie v molekuliarnuiu fotobiologiiu. Minsk, 1971.
Lemberg, R., and J. W. Legge. Hematin Compounds and Bile Pigments. New York-London, 1949.
Chemistry and Biochemistry of Plant Pigments. London-New York, 1965.
Photobiology of Microorganisms. London, 1970.
A finely divided material which contributes to optical and other properties of paint, finishes, and coatings. Pigments are insoluble in the coating material, whereas dyes dissolve in and color the coating. Pigments are mechanically mixed with the coating and are deposited when the coating dries. Their physical properties generally are not changed by incorporation in and deposition from the vehicle. Pigments may be classified according to composition (inorganic or organic) or by source (natural or synthetic). However, the most useful classification is by color (white, transparent, or colored) and by function. Special pigments include anticorrosive, metallic, and luminous pigments.
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A South African researcher says an experimental gel is showing promise in protecting women from the AIDS virus.
Dr. Salim Abdool Karim says preliminary results show about one-third of the women who used the vaginal gel appeared to be protected.
The researcher from the Center for the AIDS Program of Research in South Africa presented the findings Monday at a conference in Montreal, Canada.
Karim said the test results are not conclusive. However, scientists say this is the first study indicating that this type of product may protect women from the AIDS virus. Similar products have failed.
Sexual gels are called microbicides. Researchers say they could be key to helping to protect women in parts of the world where their partners may refuse to use condoms.
The gel is made by the Indevus Pharmaceuticals company.
The study involved about 3,100 women. A larger study of the gel involving more than 9,000 women is now underway.
According to a United Nations report on AIDS, an estimated 33 million people were living with HIV in 2007. The U.N. says about 22 million live in sub-Saharan Africa.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP.
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One of the biggest questions in the universe is whether or not we are alone. The Fermi Paradox seeks to answer this question and try to make sense of our place amongst the cosmos.
The basis of the paradox is if a civilization had the right rocket technology and the will, they could colonize the galaxy in 10 million years. In the scope of the universe, this is a very short amount of time to colonize a whole galaxy. A study was done from the Kepler Space Telescope that found that one in five sun-like stars have an Earth like planet orbiting them. So, why havent they come here?
There are several “explanations” as to why we haven’t made contact with aliens based off of this statement. The first is because the technology to have feasible space travel does not exist, so colonizing of different planets couldnt happen in the first place. The second is that aliens never had the drive to colonize. Maybe they have the technology, but Earth isnt worth colonizing for some reason. Another explanation is that the intelligent life advanced recently and they just havent come yet. We could be the first advanced life form in the universe and none have developed anywhere else. Lastly, we could have already been visited, maybe when the Earth was still developing, so the aliens overlooked us. (Source) Either way, contact with aliens still has not been done, but we also need to answer the question of whether we want them to come or not?
Bill Nye gives his take on the subject and comes up with a possible solution to this paradox:
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"Hugs can do great amounts of good - especially for children." - Princess Diana
Hugs are one way of giving a child proprioceptive input. Proprioception is our body’s ability to know where it is at any given time (also called body awareness).Anytime we squeeze into a tight space, hug, or jump up and down we are getting proprioceptive input. Proprioception is the sense that helps calm us when used the right way. Most people like proprioceptive input, and many seek it out. Think about how you use propriocpetive input to calm and relax yourself throughout the day...do you chew on pens, layer heavy blankets on your bed, take a bath, or cross your legs while sitting? All of these activities give you proprioceptive input. Proprioceptive activities added to your child's daily routines can be beneficial to help them calm down when they get upset or to relax before bedtime.
Activity: Cozy Cove
Try making a Cozy Cove for your child that is just big enough for them to fit, but tight enough that they can push their arms and legs against the sides. You can create this space out of a box, laundry basket, bath tub or plastic tote. Just make sure your child can breathe and get in and out safely.
Show us your Cozy Cove! Share photos of your child in their Cozy Cove in the comments.
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The authors utilize a 1 CNY coin to demonstrate that the particular procedure for calculating the volume. When trying to figure out the tone of a text, then just ask yourself what sort of words he’s using, and that is your answer. The tone that he uses greatly influences what type of story he or she informs and how the audience perceives it. They use mean volume mistake to appraise volume estimation results. 1 writer might concentrate on modern events while some may think just of imagined situations. Technical writing is a kind of writing in which the writer is writing about a certain subject which requires leadership, education, or excuse. Colloquial Casual writing is like a spoken conversation. Tone is normally conveyed via the selection of phrases, or the viewpoint of a writer on a specific subject. Moreover, it lends shape and life to a piece of literature since it creates a mood. The design of a component of work are observed in various manners.
It is great due to its universality.
Tone affects how viewers will react to your own writing. Besides style, it can also be put by material. Tone and mood aren’t the exact same, even though they are usually confused. When writing a paper, it’s very important to identify so as to decide the author’s disposition and attitude towards the subject. While currently utilized to talk about literature, the expression tone has been initially applied solely to songs. While tone comes from the writer, mood could be credited to the reader. The feasible tones are bounded solely by the variety of feasible emotions that a human being may have.
There are certainly a number of learners that went along to school for four decades to help you to have their level and finish university simply to find their niche features a great deal of competitiveness or it doesn’t pay well.
Folks are persuaded by tone and personality far more than they’re by logical arguments, so therefore it’s absolutely critical to set your tone correctly. Grammar instruction is going to be given via various writing assignments. A literary method or literary device can be employed by authors to be able to improve the written framework of a component of literature, and produce particular results. A different way to check in a literary analysis is to take a look at a bit of literature from your personal perspective. It ought to be simple for users to do their objective through utilizing the site. Even though the definition of voice can feel to be a somewhat nebulous belief, voice is essential to enjoying a sheet of literature. Definitions of the term literature are usually circular.
Nevertheless, it ‘s well worth it.
Writing style needs to be real, either it’s personal or neutral. Style Style is your third element utilized for altering or creating the feel of a story or scene, although it’s somewhat different from tone and mood as it is utilized to affect and produce both of the other elements. It is the manner in which something is composed, instead of the significance of what’s written. Personal style is prediction to find concern from the reader. Writing for professional functions is very likely to take the formal fashion, though individual communications may use the casual style once you’re familiar with the recipient. Emotional layout is an immense area of the user experience. Broadly speaking, tone color is the thing which allows a listener to recognize that a sound as being produced by a certain instrument and also to distinguish between instruments of the identical type. In addition, it can have a great effect on the psychological impact of a piece. Though its consequences can be particularly subtle, they types of reports‘re profound, in much the identical way for a individual’s body language and basic personality. The mood denotes the atmosphere that’s widespread in the poem.
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2 Answers | Add Yours
For any polynomial P(x), the remainder when it is divided by (x - a) is equal to P(a).
When the polynomial P(x) = 3x^4 - 8x^2 + 3x - 2 is divided by (x - 2), the remainder is P(2) = 3*2^4 - 8*2^2 + 3*2 - 2 = 20
The remainder when 3x^4 - 8x^2 + 3x - 2 is divided by (x - 2) is 20
I would like to add that, with 20 being the remainder, if you remember the long division, there were 3 different ways you could express the remainder: 1) as a decimal, 2) as a fraction, or 3) with R then the number after it. For polynomials, #1 isn't used. For the other two, though, it could depend upon how your teacher would want the remainder expressed. For, if as a fraction, the remainder would be shown as:
Good luck, xata. I hope this helps.
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IntroductionThe moon lotus is a flower gifted from Visalth dragon of the earth to his brother Niadgohar dragon of the seas it is most commonly found in pools of water on rocky outcrops along the coast.
DescriptionThe flower has blue-green, straight woody stems, rounded leaves, and white velvet oval-shaped petals that emit a soft silver light even when picked. When it is picked, it is essential to thank Niadgohar for sharing his gift and Visalth for making it. The flowers fibers are used to make sea silk, silk used solely for ritual purposes and festivals. The flower petals are dried and burned with driftwood when the full moon is at its zenith as an offering to Niadgohar as the smoke emits a sweet perfume that pleases him.
Harvestingwhen harvesting the flower, it is important to cut at the base of the stem so that the plant can reproduce the flower and take no more than five a month so that others may enjoy them. Roots are only allowed to be harvested during the mid-autumn festival and are considered a delicacy.
Uses and preparations
To prepare the silks for weaving and petals for burning, you must first separate the flowers from the stems. You then take the petals off one by one and lay them on a flat stone. This is founded by an estuary where the river flows into the ocean. This stone represents the trust and companionship of the two brothers and is usually carved with scenes depicting that companionship. (generally with the scene of Visalth gifting the flower to his brother). Once the petals are laid flat, place them in a drying room along with the seed pods.
The stems are then snapped, and the fibers are teased out to avoid breaking them; they are then twisted and turned into a fine yarn with a blue/silver tint that, when woven, give off the impression of the ocean bathed in moonlight. When a yard of silk is made, it is embroidered with the family symbol that depicts their trade (fish for fishermen, a spool of thread for seamstress or weaver, a sheaf of wheat for farmers, etc.). This is common practice among the coastal towns, and it is a sign of good fortune and will to have a yard. It is also considered a right of passage to have a finished yard as it takes a long time to harvest the silk and weave it, so a child will start the process at twelve and finish when they are sixteen symbolizing that they are now an adult.
Its also fair to note that the hues of the fibers can very from location to location and a trained eye can tell you where exactly the silk came from depending on its color (a pale green to a deep blue or even navy colored). This is due to the exact chemical composition of the soil that the flowers grow in
Mid autumn festival
To go further into the rite of passage for teens who finished their yards they present them on the full moon in mid autumn. This is a massive festival for the mid autumn full moon is a favorite time for Niadgohar and it is also harvest time for the people and the more that gets harvested, the bigger the festival. Lotus flowers that have lived a full life are picked from the roots and cooked in various ways. Cakes are filled with pastes made from ground lotus seeds and sweetened (another favorite for people living further inland is red bean pastes.) Families will leave two cakes out for Niadgohar and visalth as a thank you for a bountiful harvest.
for the rite of passage a priest of Niadgohar and a priest of Visalth stands next to an estuary where the river and oceans meet. The teenagers present their silks to the priests by bowing and holding the silks up to them priests deem if the yard is worthy and it is a great honor if a priest approves. And a greater humiliation if he does not approve. The teenagers that are approve bathe where the river meets the sea and praise both gods for blessing them and giving life.
When someone dies their silks are wrapped around them and they are placed in a boat depending on the exact region the boat will have a leak (in which lead weights are tied to the dead so that they sink with the ship). Will be allowed to sail into the unknown, or Branches and dried grass will be packed in with the body and set aflame before being pushed into the ocean. When a ship is lost at sea the family and village will gather on the shore during a new moon and wait until dawn with the lost ones silk. If a jellyfish is spotted then the loved ones will place the silks in the ocean. The jellyfish signifies that the loved ones are dead and come back to the shores to see their families and friends one last time. The silks are then whisked away by the current but if a jellyfish does not appear then the loved ones are in fact alive.
After the takeover by Ores its become more common for the sea silk to be made and sold commercially. This has caused a decline in the lotus flowers making the silks worth their weight in gold. The custom of weaving the silk is saved only by a few and the rituals that accompany the rites of passage is illegal and if caught then the participators are tortured paraded around the villages and then burned alive in the village square. Anyone caught harvesting the lotus for non commercial uses will be tried for theft and if found guilty forced to work in labor camps or as slaves to nobles.
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The end might not be nigh, but it is real -- and Alan Weisman's new book, The World Without Us, is earth-shaking in its speculative tale of what the world will look like when humanity is history. Speculative, but not fiction.
The book's premise is the question, "What will the world look like when all the people are gone?" The conclusions are based in science and observation, blending what we know about the materials of the man-made world -- plastics, concrete and steel -- with what we've seen happen in areas of the world where people have been forced to move on.
Chernobyl, which has been free of people for two decades, has become a de facto refuge for Russian wolves. The radiation has shortened their life spans, Weisman explains, but the animals are reaching sexual maturity at an earlier age and having more children.
Nature finds ways to endure even if we don't.
Just days after the extinction of man, the New York City subways flood because the pumps that remove the water from beneath the city fail. The water weakens the concrete and rusts the steel supports beneath the roads and buildings. In two decades, the city surface, buildings included, begins to collapse.
Animals that depend on us are affected too. Rats have no food to eat, and cockroaches disappear from northern climates because they have no warm homes where they can weather the winter.
If you look no further than your front porch or sidewalk, you can see what happens to the concrete in just a few decades. Water invades and expands when it freezes, bursting it apart. Most homes would stand for less than 100 years. Elsewhere, nuclear reactors run out of fuel and melt down a couple of weeks after we're gone. The Panama Canal closes in 20 years.
Thousands of years later, it's the plastic and nuclear material that's still around. Earth's oldest structures -- those made of stones that fit tightly together like Machu Picchu -- might remain. Our radio and television signals endure indefinitely on their interstellar journey.
The Earth, says Weisman, will be better off without us, though it could be better off with us. Endangered species, the atmosphere and the environment will all recover when we're gone.
We're ephemeral, as are all the things and places we hold dear.
As engrossing as this simple idea is, the point of the book is that how long we last and what we do with the time we have is the single thing we can control. Our destiny as a species, however limited, is up to us.
CONTACT STEPHEN CARTER-NOVOTNI: snovotni(at)citybeat.com
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The collapse of the Eastern Bloc at the end of the 1980s prompted a period of re-alignment and change in world politics.
Although Russia was temporarily reduced to political and economic chaos, it was allowed to retain its seat on the UN Security Council. But President Yeltsin was consumed by the man domestic problems he faced. China was also undergoing a transformation from a socialist planned economy to a socialist capitalist economy.
The United States thus found itself the world’s supreme superpower and soon saw the opportunity to create “a new world order”.
It was potentially a time for a ‘peace dividend’ to mark the end of the Cold War era. But in US government circles it soon came to be seen as a window of opportunity to bring about change in what were perceived to be the world’s greatest trouble spots.
Countries such as Libya, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Syria had been long-running problems for the USA. In the early 1990s, for the first time in a long time, the possibility of genuine and beneficial change seemed real.
Yugoslavia was different. Initially it was Europe that took charge of efforts to contain the nationalism that had been growing in the Yugoslav republics. But from an early stage the so-called “neocons”, who were advocating a more hawkish foreign policy, began to see Yugoslavia as part of their plans. Europe and the USA were soon pursuing different policies to Yugoslavia, though this was not formally acknowledged for several years after conflicts broke out in Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia.
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Play is a universal phenomenon with a pervasive and enduring presence in human history. Play has fascinated philosophers, painters, and poets for generations. Article 31 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child recognizes the significance of play in the lives of children, acknowledging play as a specific right, in addition to and distinct from the child's right to recreation and leisure.
Early childhood educators have long recognized the power of play. The significant contribution of play to young children's development is well documented in child psychology, anthropology, sociology, and in the theoretical frameworks of education, recreation, and communications. Being able to play is one of the key developmental tasks of early childhood. Play is, "the leading source of development in the early years": it is essential to children's optimal development.
Children's opportunities to play are under threat
Ironically, play is persistently undervalued, and children's opportunities for uninterrupted free play—both indoors and out—are under threat. The physical and social environments of childhood in the Western world have changed dramatically over the past several decades. Many children are spending substantial time in peer-group settings from a very young age. Many of these settings focus on structured educational and recreational activities, leaving little time for participation in open-ended, self-initiated free play.
Children's play advocates are concerned that access to outdoor play opportunities in natural environments in neighbourhoods is vanishing. Technology, traffic, and urban land-use patterns have changed the natural play territory of childhood. Parents are increasingly concerned about safety and children find themselves in carefully constructed outdoor playgrounds that limit challenge in the name of safety.
The priority currently given to the early acquisition of academic skills is another threat to children's play. This emphasis often constrains and limits the scope of the learning that unfolds naturally in play. The question of how and what children should learn in preparation for formal school is a subject of vigorous debate in Canada. It used to be that children spent their preschool years playing, whether at home, in child care, or in preschool social settings. Many now advocate for early childhood programs focused on literacy and numeracy experiences, particularly in cases where social and environmental circumstances potentially compromise children's readiness for school.
In recent years the trend has been to introduce more content via direct instruction into the practice of early childhood professionals. Research demonstrates that this approach, while promising in the short term, does not sustain long-term benefits and, in fact, has a negative impact on some young children. Long uninterrupted blocks of time for children to play--by themselves and with peers, indoors and outdoors—are becoming increasingly rare.
The developmental literature is clear: play stimulates physical, social, emotional, and cognitive development in the early years. Children need time, space, materials, and the support of informed parents and thoughtful, skilled early-childhood educators in order to become "master players." They need time to play for the sake of playing.
- reprinted from Canadian Council on Learning
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Mysterious high-rise clouds seen appearing suddenly in the martian atmosphere on a handful of occasions may be linked to space weather, say Mars Express scientists.
Amateur astronomers using telescopes on Earth were the first to report an unusual cloud-like plume in 2012 that topped-out high above the surface of Mars at an altitude around 250 kilometres. The feature developed in less than 10 hours, covered an area of up to 1000 kilometres by 500 kilometres, and remained visible for around 10 days.
The extreme altitude poses something of a problem in explaining the features: it is far higher than where typical clouds of frozen carbon dioxide and water are thought to be able to form in the atmosphere.
Indeed, the high altitude corresponds to the ionosphere, where the atmosphere directly interacts with the incoming solar wind of electrically charged atomic particles.
Speculation as to their cause has included exceptional atmospheric circumstances, auroral emissions, associations with local crustal anomalies, or a meteor impact, but so far it has not been possible to identify the root cause.
Unfortunately, the spacecraft orbiting Mars were not in the right position to see the 2012 plume visually, but scientists have now looked into plasma and solar wind measurements collected by Mars Express at the time.
They have found evidence for a large ‘coronal mass ejection’, or CME, from the Sun striking the martian atmosphere in the right place and at around the right time.
“Our plasma observations tell us that there was a space weather event large enough to impact Mars and increase the escape of plasma from the planet’s atmosphere,” says David Andrews of the Swedish Institute of Space Physics.
“But we were not able to see any signatures in the ionosphere that we can categorically say were due to the presence of this plume.
“One problem is that the plume was seen at the day–night boundary, over a region of known strong crustal magnetic fields where we know the ionosphere is generally very disturbed, so searching for ‘extra’ signatures is rather challenging.”
To go further, the scientists have looked at the chances of these two relatively rare events – a large and fast CME colliding with Mars, and the mysterious plume – occurring at the same time.
They have been searching back through the archives for similar events, but they are rare.
For example, the Hubble Space Telescope observed a similar high plume in May 1997, and a CME was registered hitting Earth at the same time.
Although that CME was widely studied, there is no information from Mars orbiters to judge the scale of its impact at the Red Planet.
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Wind farms may not be as invasive as oil drilling. However, giant wind towers can still upset natural habitats with adverse effects on local wildlife. The American Wind Wildlife Institute (AWWI) has embarked on a mission to preserve this delicate balance and ensure that wind energy projects are developed responsibly.
The organization -- created in 2008 by the nation's top 20 science-based environmental groups and wind energy companies -- protects wildlife sanctuaries by collecting data about local habitats, conducting landscape mapping, and holding outreach and training events to address the wind industry's impact on animal life. AWWI's recently appointed first president, Kraig Butrum, is hopeful that the United States can generate renewable energy in a responsible and sustainable manner.
"The time is now for America to address global climate change, diversify its energy base and lessen its dependence on foreign sources of oil," said Butrum, adding that our nation's goal to triple development of wind energy in the next few years can be achieved "while protecting biodiversity and critical habitat."
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Smt. Rajashree Ramakrishna presented a lec dem titled “An analysis of the structure of the varnam with special reference to the styles of varnam composers” at Shri Parthasarathy Swami Sabha, Chennai on 23rd Dec 2008. She was accompanied by M. Subhashree on vocal support and Sri Nagarajan on the mrudangam. Here are some excerpts from the same based on the notes I took. I have taken the liberty to organize these under my own headings.
1 INTRODUCTION – MUSICAL FORMS
Musical forms are compositions which occupy a major chunk of repertoire of art music practitioners in South India. We have different types of musical forms pertaining to sacred dance, opera and art music. These are nothing but expressions which define different facets of a raga. Musical forms are thus musical expressions bound by time (i.e. tAlam) and meaningless or meaningful text.
The main musical forms that existed in the 17th century were AlApa, ThAyA, gItam and prabandhA. We come to know about these from the musical treatises of that period like “caturDanDi prakAshikA” and “svara mELa kalAnidhi”. Of these, only the AlApa and gItam exist today. ThAyA and prabandhA have metamorphosed into other forms. Varnam, kriti, kIrtana, svarajati, padam, jAvaLi and tillAnA are the other musical forms which are performed in art music concerts. These came into existence in the period from the 17th to the 19th centuries.
2 EVOLUTION OF MUSICAL FORMS
The emergence of raga concept and the desi musical forms can be traced to the period of Matanga. Treatises like Brhaddesi, Sangeetha Makaranda, Sangeetha Samaya Sara, Sangeetha Ratnakara and Sangeetha Sudhakara describe the lakSana of musical forms that existed in their respective periods. The evolution of musical forms can be classified into the following stages:
1. prabandhA is the forerunner of all later musical forms. The emergence of prabandhA can be described as the first stage of the development of the musical forms
2. The second stage could be the emergence of the kriti and kIrtanAs. This can be compared to the north Indian Hindustani music where the dhrupads are longer and metrical in structure unlike the very popular khayAls which are smaller and are in the vernacular language. The dhrupads and prabandhAs were mostly composed in Sanskrit and it was not easy for the common man to follow them. After vernacular languages became very popular, the prabandhAs went out of use/vogue and kritis started coming to the forefront.
3. The third stage was the rise of technical compositions illustrating rAgams and rAga rUpams. There were also a large number of prabandhAs still in existence. There was also a phase were all the tAnAs were notated. ThAya refers to tAnA patterns notated to tALam. There were a lot of notated tAnAs in existence. While composers were trying to realize the rAga rUpam, they needed a lot of exercises to enhance the understanding the rAga svarUpam which led to the emergence of a lot of these musical forms. An example is the emergence of ciTTa tAnAs which would have later developed into tAna varNams.
4. The fourth stage has a lot of bhAva sangItam ex. padam compositions. A lot of padams became popular and there was a lot of stress on realizing the musical svarUpam of a rAga
5. The fifth stage was the development of dance dramas and dance/musical compositions such as svarajati, tAna varNams, pada varNams, shabdams and kauthuvams.
6. The sixth stage is the contribution of the musical trinity.
7. The seventh stage is the post trinity period that has rAgamAlikAs, tillAnAs etc.
All these musical forms helped people realize the individuality and scope of rAgams
The first type of musical form which a student of music learns after solfa or sargam abhyAsa gAna exercises is the gItam. gItam has very simple melodic structure and is mostly a continuous composition without the sections pallavi, anupallavi and caranam. Some gItams have two or more sections called khanDikAs. Sometimes, the opening section is repeated after every khanDikA. gItam is sung at a medium tempo and does not have melodic variations (sangatIs)
The structure of the gItam is such that it can be sung in three speeds. This prepares the students for tackling the other musical forms like prabandhAs later on. prabandhAs are longer compositions with many more khanDikAs. Dikshitar’s style of composing was steeped in prabandhAs. In his composition sUryamUrtE (saurAshTram), Dikshitar uses 2 akSarams for dhIrga syllables and 1 akSaram for all hrisva syllables. He adheres to this even in his 2 kaLai compositions.
Thyagaraja and Shyama Sastri have composed in a different style in that they have resorted to the prose order where there is lot more scope for the musical aspects and for expanding the musical composition
gItam is a continuous piece and is sung from beginning to end without repeated tAlA cycles. No section is repeated usually.
Svarajati and jatisvarams are musical forms that are familiar to both music and dance students. As the names of these forms suggest, they have
- swara – solfa
- jati – rhythmic syllables
- sAhityam – text
The architect of svarajati as a musical form is Melattur Veerabhadraiah who lived in the 18th century. His svarajati in the rAgam husEni is the earliest example of a svarajati. Shyama Sastri later composed svarajatis that are concert worthy.
Svarajatis are of three types:
- Those learnt in the abhyAsa gAna section – simple form without any jatis intended for students
- Those that are typical dance forms with solkaTTus, rhythmic syllables etc
- svarajatis of Shyama Sastri – performed only in music concerts and not in dance concerts
Svarajatis used in dance concerts are replete with nAyakA-nAyikA bhAvA and are suitable for performing abhinaya. There are also simple svarajatis that are taught to students after they acquire a sufficient number of gItams. A svarajati is neither as syllabic as gItam, nor does it have as many vowel extensions as in a varNam. In a svarajati, the text and the tone play an equal role. Some composers of svarajatis are Shyama Sastri, Shobanadri, Swati Tirunal, Chinni Krishna Dasa, Melattur Venkatrama Sastri, Ponniah, Vadivel, Adiyappaiah, Veena Seshanna and Mysore Sadashiva Rao
The structure of a jatisvaram is also like that of a svarajati but it does not have sAhityam and comprises of only solfa syllables. There are some jatisvarams of Tanjore Quartette that have half Avartanam of solfa syllables and half Avartanam of jatis.
The first half of svarajati is performed at a slower pace and the later half is performed at a faster pace. Svarajati has more scope for abhinayam. These are the main differences between svarajati and jatisvarams.
Svarajatis and jatisvarams are optional in music concerts but are indispensable in dance concerts.
In jatisvarams and svarajati which have pallavi, anupallavi and caraNam, the pallavi is sung first followed by the anupallavi. The pallavi is then repeated. This is followed by the caraNam. If there are many caraNams, they are sung in a sequential order and the pallavi is repeated after every caraNam.
A varNam is a musical form which has in it all the elements of gItam, jatisvaram and svarajati. It prepares the students with adequate skills to be able to learn a kriti. The first half of a varNam which has profuse vowel extensions resembles a kriti while the second half beginning with ettugaDa pallavi and caraNam swarams resembles a svarajati or a jatisvaram.
The pallavi of a varNam usually consists of 2 Avartanams followed by an anupallavi of equal length. The third section is an optional upapallavi of the same length. The theme of the text could be devotional, shringArA or in the praise of a patron.
The varNams were a realization of the musical structure of a rAgam. For example, the bEgaDa varNam “inta cAlamu” starts at the madhya sthAyi, goes to the tAra sthAyi and comes back. When the upapallavi is over, the varnam is musically complete.
6.3 TANA VARNAMS
These are compositions played or sung at the commencement of a concert. The tempo is usually madhyama kAlam. The pallavi and anupallavi consist of very few sAhityam syllables with profuse vowel extensions. In the second half of the varNam, the ettugaDa pallavi consists of sAhityam syllables. The remaining portions comprise of solfa or swara passages. Therefore tAna varNam is an instance of a composition which consists of two parts – one in which sAhityam is predominant and the other in which solfa is predominant. They both are mutually exclusive. Once the first section is over, we are done with it. It is like putting two different compositions together, one of which is sAhityam oriented and the other that has swarams as the main forte. The ettugaDa caraNam swarams increase in size and complexity starting from the 1st to the 4th or 5th caraNam swarams
tAna varNams are mostly set in Adi and kanDa jAti aTa tALam. They are rarely set to other tALams. Almost all of them start with sama eDuppu if in Adi tALam and at the third beat if set to aTa tALam
6.4 PADA VARNAMS
pada varnams are also called cauka varNams. As the name implies, the tempo intended for these is caukam or slow to give scope for the depiction of bhAva. ciTTasvaram and ettugaDa swaram have sAhityA. The theme of a pada varNam is devotional, shringArA or in praise of a patron. It is usually set in Adi tAlam. Unlike tAna varNams that are sung in different speeds, pada varNams are usually sung only in slow speeds. Most pada varNams have eDuppu at samam while a few have different eDuppus. The entire varNam has the sAhityA.
tAna varNams were in existence earlier than the pada varNams. There was no term as pada varNam earlier. All varNams used to be called tAna varNams and used to have sAhityam .
tAna varnams were perhaps intended to be sung in madhyama kAlam and melodic variations (sangatIs) were not to be resorted to. Earlier all varNams had sAhitya. But may be the sAhityam presented considerable difficulty in emphasizing the tAna progression and the madhyama kAlam tempo of the dhAtu. Hence may be the idea of introducing sAhityam for tAna varnams was given up. Later composers like Patnam Subramanya Iyer, Pallavi Gopala Iyer, Veena Kuppaiyer, Tiruvotriyur Tyagayyar and others have composed tAna varnams without sAhityam for the muktAyi swarams and ettugaDa swara sAhityam portions.
6.5 RAGAMALIKA VARNAMS
Ragamalika is a concept as old as Matanga who refers to it as “rAga kadambakA”. Many have used this concept but Veerabhadraiah was supposed to be the first one to compose a rAgamAlikA varNam. He was the guru of Ramaswami Dikshitar. He was also the first to use the rAga mudrA. One of the most popular rAgamAlika varNams is “valaci vacci”, the navarAgamAlikA varNam of Patnam Subramanya Iyer. Another example is ghana navarAgamAlika varNam by Kalahasti Venkatasami Raja that is composed in the rAgams nATTai, gauLai, varALi, Arabhi, shrI, nArAyaNagauLa, rItigauLa, bauLi and kEdAram.
6.6 GANAKRAMA OF A VARNA
The ganakrama of a varNam is different compared to that of a svarajati/ jatisvara. The pallavi, anupallavi and muktAyi swaram are performed continuously and the first Avartanam of the pallavi is sung as a conclusion to the first half of the varNam. The second half has an ettugaDa pallavi with many caraNams sung in sequential order. The caraNam begins with ettugaDa pallavi and after each caraNam swaram, the ettugaDa pallavi is repeated and is also sung as the concluding Avartanam.
In earlier days, a section called anubandham existed after caraNam in which the sAhityam of the muktAyi swaram would be sung followed by the pallavi. The anubandham used to link the end of the varNam back to the pallavi. Examples are anubandhams in viribONi (bhairavi), in the pantuvarALi varNam “sAmi nine” of Shatkala Narasaiah and in Shyama Sastri’s kalyANi varNam “nIvE gatiyani” in tisra maTya tALam
6.7 COMPOSERS OF VARNAMS
Composers of varnams include Govindasamayya, Shatkala Narasaiah, Adiyappaiah, Sonti Venkata Subbiah (?), Pallavi Gopala Iyer, Pallavi Doraiswamy Iyer, Ponnaiah, Chamarajendra and Veena Kuppaiyer. Govindasamayya and his brother Kuvasamayya was known to have composed the famous pancaratna varNams in the rAgams mOhanam, kEdAragauLa, nATTakurinji, navarOj and one another rAgam that is not known today. Apart from being composers, the brothers were also dancers. Govindasamayya is considered to be the first composer of varnams.
The period of the trinity saw many varNam composers. Ramaswami Dikshitar and his guru Veerabhadraiah were among the earliest composers. Pacchimiriyam Adiyappaiah is called the “Tana Varna Margadarshi”. He composed the immortal bhairavi varNam “viribONi”.
Gangai Muthu Nattuvanar, Subbaraya Nattuvanar and the Tanjore Quartette have composed many pada varNams.
Some of the modern day composers are Tiger Varadachar, Muthiah Bhagavathar, G.N. Balasubramaniam, T.M. Thyagarajan, Tanjavur Sankara Iyer, Calcutta Krishnamurthy and Lalgudi Jayaraman.
6.8 CHARACTERISTICS OF A FEW VARNAM COMPOSERS
PATNAM SUBRAMANYA IYER
Most of Patnam Subramanya Iyer’s varNams adhered to a format that had 6 Avartanams each for both pUrvAngam and uttarAngam. Examples of this include his AbhOgi, nAgaswarAvaLi, kannaDA and cakravAham varNams. Exceptions are his tODi and navarAgamAlikA varNams. The nAgaswarAvaLi varNam is a good lesson on how/ where to employ nyAsa swarams, which note to emphasize etc.
RAMANATHAPURAM (POOCHI) SRINIVASA IYENGAR
He concentrated more on developing the rAgam. His varNams are thus more rAgam oriented. He followed Patnam Subramanya Iyer’s format in many of his varNams. He was known to be a very good performer and may be this is the reason for his experimentation with different formats for his varNams. He has brought out the essence of rAgams beautifully in his varNams
KOTHAVASAL VENKATRAMA IYER & MANMBUCHAVADI VENKATASUBBAIYER
They both gave 4 Avartanams for the muktAyi swaram while most other composers usually gave only 2 Avartanams.
PALLAVI GOPALA IYER
His varNams typically have either 4 or 5 swarams in the caraNam. In his suruTTi varNam (example of a varNam having 5 swarams), the first caraNam swaram has only dhIrga syllables, the second and third ones have both dhIrga and hrisva, the fourth one has only hrisva syllables and the fifth one is long and of four Avartanam duration. In his varNams with four caraNam swarams, the first one will have only dhIrga syllables, the second will have dhIrga and hrisva, the third will have only hrisva and the fourth one will be a long one of 4 Avartanam duration.
His suruTTi varNam is set to a speed well suited to the rAgam
Many of the composers before Tiruvotriyur Tyagayyar composed varNams in pentatonic scales. He was the first one to compose a lot of varNams in rakti ragams like sahAnA, darbAr, kEdAragauLa and madhyamAvati
6.9 SIGNIFICANCE OF VARNAMS
Of all the raga forms that emerged, the varNam is very significant. varNam denotes the four melodic movements:
- sthAyi varNam
- ArOhi varNam
- avarOhi varNam
Therefore a varNam consists of all the possibilities of melodic movements.
It has now become customary to sing the varNam at the beginning of a concert.
6.10 BOOKS ON VARNAMS
Many books have been published on varNams. Some of them are:
- Ganamrutha Varna Malika by A.S. Panchapakesa Iyer
- A book with 100 varnams published by N.C. Parthasarathy in 1973
- Varnasagaram by T.K. Govinda Rao (Ganamandir Publications)
- Tana Varna Tarangini by B.M. Sundaram (Rajalakshmi Trust)
The following varNams were either sung fully or partially in the lec dem:
- inta cAlamu (tAna varNam) – bEgaDa – Adi – vINa kuppaiyer
- sakhiyE inda vELayil (pada varNam) – Anandabhairavi – Adi – ponnaiAh
- nIvE gatiyani – kalyANi – tisra maTya – shyAma sAstri
- inta kOpa (ghana navarAgamAlikA varNam) – rAgamAlikA – Adi – kALahasti venkaTasAmi rAja
- sAmi nI pai – nAgasvarAvaLi – Adi – paTTaNam subramaNya iyer
- nera nammiti – kAnaDA – kanDa aTa – rAmanAthapuram srInivAsa iyengAr
- jalajAkSa – hamsadhwani – Adi – mAnmbuchAvaDi venkaTa subbaiyer
- entO prEma – suruTTi – Adi – pallavi gOpAla iyer
- annamE – Arabhi – Adi – tiger varadAcAr
- ambOruha pAdamE – ranjani – Adi – g.n.bAlasubramaNiam
11 thoughts on “Lec Dem on Varnam”
Detailed write-up on a thorough and excellent presentation.
Thanks yet another time..
I’ve been reading your posts for the past one or two months…
Very nice compilation throughout..
Couldn’t have asked for a better source of such useful info…
Keep it up!
Very informative.Thank you. These help to assuage the guilt about missing such lec-dems.
great blog.. I came across it while searching for ‘hey govinda hey gopala’ sung by maharajapuram santhanam. nice lectures.. keep up the good work..
p.s: i have still not found the file i was searchin for… any ideas where i can find them???
Thanks for taking the time..this is very nice information
The information on varnams was useful. Can you pls. let me know more info. regarding the sighnificance of sahitya in varnams, why it si sung in the beginning of the concert, etc. Where can you get T.K. Govinda Rao’s book on varnams/
PALLAVI GOPALA IYER
His suruTTi varNam is set to a speed well suited to the rAgam
I am wondering which varna this one is. To the best of my knowledge, Pallavi Gopala Iyer didnt compose a varna in Surati. Can you please clarify ?
Also the varna structure outlined may not hold true always- for example his Kambhoji varna. Appreciate if you can update from your notes !
Forgot to add. The varna ‘Ento Prema’ in Surati/Adi tala is by Vina Kuppier not Pallavi Gopala Iyer.
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A Russian-built Soyuz rocket boosted the European Space Agency’s CHEOPS spacecraft into space 18 December, kicking off an ambitious exoplanet research mission.
Designed to build upon discoveries made by previous pioneering exoplanet telescopes — like NASA’s Kepler mission — the ESA’s Characterising Exoplanet Satellite, or CHEOPS, mission was injected into orbit some 700 kilometres 435 miles) above Earth.
“We are extremely relieved,” said Günther Hasinger, ESA’s director of science. “CHEOPS is working. All systems are green. telemetry is stable, temperatures are fine, power voltages are fine, so everything is good to go.”
CHEOPS will be capable of registering tiny changes in the brightness of stars as planets block their light from reaching the telescope. This way of observing exoplanets is called the transit method, and it’s been used by Kepler, NASA’s TESS observatory and the French space agency’s CoRoT mission to discover planets around other stars.
Astronomers designed CHEOPS to follow up on discoveries made by other telescopes.
“What makes CHEOPS quite special to all the other transit missions so far is that CHEOPS is not really a discovery mission,” said Willy Benz, the mission’s principal investigator from the University of Bern in Switzerland. “It’s a follow-up. We will be looking at one system at a time, and not trying to discover thousands of others.”
“The idea is that we know now several thousands of these exoplanets,” Benz said. “We are more interested slowly toward characterising them with precision, knowing what they’re made of and their temperature, and so on and so forth.”
Astronomers can determine the mass of an exoplanet through a technique called the radial velocity method, in which telescopes can detect the wobble of a star caused by the pull of gravity from a smaller planetary companion. The amplitude of the wobble can tell scientists about the planet’s mass.
Combining the size information from CHEOPS with mass estimates obtained through other telescopes can yield significant insights into exoplanets, Benz said.
“By measuring the radius and by knowing the mass through radial velocity, we can place these different planets and try to figure out what they’re made of, whether they’re rocky planets, whether they’re a gas ball, an icy world, or the like,” he said. “You need to have pretty small error bars if you want to say anything meaningful about this, and this is why we need precision measurements.”
Didier Queloz, a Swiss astronomer at the University of Cambridge, won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics with Michel Mayor for their work in discovering the first exoplanet orbiting a sun-like star in 1995.
Queloz is chair of the CHEOPS science team. “We started this project more than 10 years ago, and now we’re in the sky,” he said.
“The field has just exploded,” he said after launch. “There are just thousands of exoplanets. There are a lot of planets known to be transiting, which means the planet goes right in front of the star, and that’s the technique that we’re using for the CHEOPS mission.
“We have so many planets, so different,” Queloz said. “We have these super-Earths, mini-Neptunes. We don’t really understand all these systems. So that’s the purpose of CHEOPS, providing new data, very precise data, to understand a bit better.”
CHEOPS can help identify prime targets for additional observations by future missions, such as the James Webb Space Telescope scheduled for launch in 2021.
“We want to look at atmospheres, following planets in their orbits around the star, we may want to see if a planet has moons, rings, and so on, and we want to provide the best targets for the very large facilities under construction or going into orbit like JWST,” Benz said.
David Ehrenreich, mission scientist for the CHEOPS consortium at the University of Geneva, said future large telescopes likes JWST and the Extremely Large Telescope in Chile will be under high demand.
“We think that in the coming years there will be far too many very interesting small planets to characterise with powerful facilities than observing time available on these over-booked facilities,” Ehrenreich said. “So it will become extremely important to down-select the golden target — the very best of these targets — so we could go and spend a lot of time with Hubble, with James Webb, and with the ELT on the ground.
“CHEOPS is going to be a key in this process by confirming and obtaining the first step characterisation of these many targets, and determining which one we should look for,” Ehrenreich said.
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the functions of the judge and the jury does not yet appear to be very clearly defined. It would seem, however, that while the existence and abstract meaning of the law must, in general, be determined by the jury on the testimony of the skilled witnesses, it will be the duty of the court to decide, first, as to the competent knowledge of the witnesses called ;? next, as to the admissibility of the documents by which they seek to refresh their memory; and lastly, as to the special applicability of the law, when proved, to the particular matter in controversy. If, indeed, the admissibility or inadmissibility of certain evidence depends on the existence or interpretation of a foreign law, the proof should exclusively be addressed to the court, as in other cases where questions respecting the admissibility of evidence rests upon disputed facts.5 Perhaps, also, as all matters of law are properly referable to the court, and as the object of the proof of foreign law is to enable the court to instruct the jury as to its bearing on the case in hand, it will always be advisable for the judge to assist the jury in ascertaining what the law really is.
$ 49. Before leaving the subject of foreign law, it will be § 41 important to notice, that the peculiar rules of evidence adopted in one country,—whether established by the practice of its courts, or enacted by the legislature for the government of those courts,
-cannot be permitted to regulate the proceedings of courts in another country, when transactions, which took place in the former country, become the subject of investigation in the latter.?
require fresh proof of the law, as a matter of fact, on each particular occasion ; M'Cormick v. Garnett, 23 L. J., Ch. 717, per Knight-Bruce, L. J.; 5 De Gex, M. & G. 278, S. C.
R. v. Picton, 30 How. St. Tr. 536–540, 864–870. ? Bristow v. Sequeville, 5 Ex. R. 275. The whole of this subject will be discussed, post, $$ 1423—1425.
3 See Sussex Peer. Case, 11 Cl. & Fin. 114-117; Ld. Nelson v. Ld. Bridport, 8 Beav. 527; Church v. Hubbart, 2 Cranch, 187, 236-238.
Story, Confl. § 638. 5 Trasher v. Everhart, 3 Gill & John. 234, 242; Story, Confl. § 638, n. 3; ante, § 23.
6 Story, Confl. § 638, & n. 3; Mostyn v. Fabrigas, 1 Cowp. R. 174, per Ll. Mansfield.
7 Clark v. Mullick, 3 Moo. P. C. R. 279, per Ld. Brougham.
The law of evidence is the lex fori which governs the courts. Whether a witness is competent or not,-whether a certain matter requires to be proved by writing or not,—whether certain evidence proves a certain fact or not,—these, and the like questions, must be determined, not lege loci contractûs, but by the law of the country where the question arises, where the remedy is sought to be enforced, and where the court sits to enforce it. The case of Clark v. Mullick, which was decided before the law was altered by the Evidence Amendment Act, of 1851,” affords a striking example of this rule. There, the assignees of a bankrupt under an English fiat having brought an action in Calcutta against a debtor of the bankrupt, and the pleas having put in issue the bankruptcy and the assignment, it was held that the affirmative of these issues could not be proved by producing copies of the proceedings in the Bankruptcy Court, purporting to bear the seal of that court, and to be signed by the Clerk of Enrolments; for although, by the statutes relating to bankruptcy, such evidence was sufficient in English courts of justice, it was not at that time admissible in India, as the Acts did not extend to that country.3 Again, although by the Scotch law, all instruments prepared and witnessed according to the provisions of the Act of 1681, are probative writs, and may be given in evidence without any proof, yet still, if it were required to prove one of these Scotch instruments in an English court, its mere production would not suffice, but it would be necessary to call one or other of the attesting witnesses. The case of Brown v. Thornton 5 is another illustration of this rule. There, a charter-party had been entered into at Batavia ; and, in accordance with the Dutch law which prevails in that colony, the contract had been written in the book of the notary, and a copy, signed and sealed by him and countersigned by the governor of Java, had been delivered to each of the parties. In the courts of Java, the contract is proved by producing the notary's book; but in all other Dutch courts the copies are
i Bain v. Whitehaven & Furness Junc. Rail. Co., 3 H. of L. Cas. 19, per Ld. Brougham.
? 14 & 15 V., c. 99, $$ 11 & 19. 3 Clark v. Mullick, 3 Moo. P. C. R. 252, 280. 4 Yates v. Thomson, 3 Cl. & Fin. 577, 580, et seq., per Ld. Brougham. 5 6 A. & E. 185.
received as due evidence of the original. Under these circumstances, the plaintiff in an English court tendered his copy of the charter-party, as evidence of the contract, but the court held that it was inadmissible, on the ground that English judges could not adopt a rule of evidence from foreign courts. Several other cases could be cited to the same effect ;) and in all, the distinction is recognised between the cause of action, which must be judged of according to the law of the country where it originated, and the mode of proceeding, including of course the rules of evidence, which must be adopted as it happens to exist in the country where the action is brought.”
1 Trimbey v. Vignier, 1 Bing. N. C. 151; Huber v. Steiner, 2 Bing. N. C. 202 ; British Linen Co. v. Drummond, 10 B. & C. 903 ; Appleton v. Ld. Braybrook, 2 Stark. R. 6; 6 M. & Sel. 34, S. C.; Black v. Ld. Braybrook, 2 Stark. R. 7; 6 M. & Sel. 39, S. C.; Don v. Lippmann, 5 C1. & Fin. 1, 13– 17; Leroux v. Brown, 12 Com. B. 801 ; Finlay v. Finlay, 31 L. J., Pr. & Mat. 149.
: Mostyn v. Fabrigas, 1 Smith, L. C. 641. See also Story, Confl. $$ 550, et seq. & 629–636.
THE GROUNDS OF BELIEF. § 50.1 We proceed now to a brief consideration of the General $ 42 Nature and Principles of Evidence. No inquiry is here proposed into the origin of human knowledge; it being assumed, on the authority of approved writers, that all that men know is referable, in a philosophical view, to perception and reflection. But, in fact, the knowledge acquired by an individual through his own perception and reflection, is but a small part of what he possesses ; much of what we are content to regard and act upon as knowledge, having been acquired through the perception of others. It is not easy to conceive, that the Supreme Being, whose wisdom is so conspicuous in all his works, constituted man to believe only upon his own personal experience; since, in that case, the world could neither be governed nor improved ; and society must remain in the state in which it was left by the first generation of men. On the contrary, during the period of childhood we believe implicitly almost all that is told us; and we thus are furnished with information, which we could not otherwise obtain, but which is necessary at the time for our present protection, or as the means of future improvement. This disposition to confide in the veracity of others, and to believe what they say, may be termed instinctive. At an early period, however, we begin to find that of the things told to us some are not true; and thus our implicit reliance on the testimony of others is weakened ; first, in regard to particular things, in which we have been deceived ; then, in regard to persons, whose falsehoods we have detected; and, as these instances multiply upon us, we gradually become more and more distrustful of statements made to us, and learn by experience the necessity of testing them by certain rules."'3 “ Confidence," exclaimed Lord Chatham, on a memorable occasion, “is a plant of
3 Id. Part 2, § 3, p. 73.
1 Gr. Ev. § 7, nearly verbatim.
slow growth in an aged bosom ;” and indeed, it may be generally observed, that, as our ability to obtain knowledge by other means increases, our instinctive and indiscriminate reliance on testimony diminishes, by yielding to a more rational belief. Still, in every
1 * Gamb. Guide, 87; M‘Kinnon, Phil. of Ev. 40. This subject is treated more largely by Dr. Reid in his profound Inquiry into the Human Mind, c. 6, $ 24, pp. 196, 197, of his collected Works, in these words :-“The wise and beneficent Author of Nature, who intended that we should be social creatures, and that we should receive the greatest and most important part of our knowledge by the information of others, hath, for these purposes, implanted in our nature two principles, that tally with each other. The first of these principles is a propensity to speak truth, and to use the signs of language, so as to convey our real sentiments. This principle has a powerful operation, even in the greatest liars; for where they lie once they speak truth a hundred times. Truth is always uppermost, and is the natural issue of the mind. It requires no art or training, no inducement or temptation, but only that we yield to a natural impulse. Lying, on the contrary, is doing violence to our nature ; and is never practised, even by the worst men, without some temptation. Speaking truth is like using our natural food, which we would do from appetite, although it answered no end ; but lying is like taking physic, which is nauseous to the taste, and which no man takes but for some end, which he cannot otherwise attain. If it should be objected, that men may be influenced by moral or political considerations to speak truth, and therefore, that their doing so is no proof of such an original principle as we have mentioned ; I answer, first, that · moral or political considerations can have no influence, until we arrive at years
of understanding and reflection ; and it is certain from experience, that children keep to truth invariably, before they are capable of being influenced by such considerations. Secondly, when we are influenced by moral or political considerations, we must be conscious of that influence, and capable of perceiving it upon reflection. Now, when I reflect upon my actions most attentively, I am not conscious, that in speaking truth I am influenced on ordinary occasions by any motive moral or political. I find, that truth is always at the door of my lips, and goes forth spontaneously, if not held back. It requires neither good nor bad intention to bring it forth, but only that I be artless and undesigning. There may indeed be temptations to falsehood, which would be too strong for the natural principle of veracity, unaided by principles of honour or virtue; but where there is no such temptation, we speak truth by instinct; and this instinct is the principle I have been explaining. By this instinct, a real connection is formed between our words and our thoughts, and thereby the former become fit to be signs of the latter, which they could not otherwise be. And although this connection is broken in every instance of lying and equivocation, yet these instances being comparatively few, the authority of human testimony is only weakened by them, but not destroyed. Another original
* Gr. Ev. § 7, n. verbatim.
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1. Bring a change by giving newspaper Campaign ( 2011)
Bring a change by giving newspaper campaign was introduced in the year 2011 for the project “Aaoo School Chale” It was an innovative way to generate resources for the underprivileged children to bring them into mainstream education process. Corporate bodies like Genpact, Interglobe, Ranbaxy, Panansonic and Huawei Software Services participated in the campaign and donated newspapers. The funds collected by selling these newspapers was dedicated to arrange a mobility facility for the children going to the government school from their slum pocket. The newspapers transform lives by
- By creating a linkage between the underprivileged children and schools so that the child can access to their education needs
- By creating a community library to promote the goal of increased literacy and develop the habit of reading and learning among rural children.
2. Community Participation Campaign (2012)
Community participation and involvement ensures a project ownership and sustainability. Prior to the launching of the community library and learning center, a community participation campaign was conducted in village Bandhwari in the year 2012, which involved intensive meetings with the village stakeholders and the Panchayat. During this campaign a land was allotted by the Panchayat for the building the community library. The villagers committee took the responsibility to build the community library and learning center. The rural men, women and children were all involved in the identification of land, building the center and monitoring. The objective of the campaign was not only to aware people about the importance of active participation but also to practically do it at the grounds to guarantee sustainable results in the future. Interglobe, the corporate house supported the community by giving funds to build the center.
3. Book Donation Drive ( 2012, 2015)
Book donation Drive was launched in 2012 and then in 2015.The objective was to involve students, parents and teachers from the urban area to donate books to the rural community library. The campaign was conducted in schools, corporate offices and residential apartments. The books collected were given to the rural community library at Bandhwari. The Hindi story books were the most preferred ones. The books in the library and the community center inculcated the habit of reading among the children.
4. Creative Education Campaign ( 2012)
Education beyond the four walls of the school and the prescribed curriculum was the objective of the campaign. It is believed that if the children are given the freedom to explore, question and learn, they develop interest and make them thoughtful. The campaign focused on using the various creative arts like storytelling, paintings on paper, music and learning through rhythm. This helped the children to express themselves without a fear and bring out the best in them. The children find comfort and pleasure in expressing themselves. The campaign was spearheaded by Nalini from Interglobe. The passionate Interglobe Volunteers visited the rural village twice a week and conducted creative classes for the children. The campaign helped not only a positive increase in the confidence level of the rural children but also gave an encouraging insight to the volunteers.
5. Education through Games Campaign ( 2015)
Games encourage teamwork and collaboration and help cultivates a problem solving attitude that helps a student in every aspect of their lives. The Interglobe parterned with us and led educational sessions and conducted a month long campaign for 40 students from the village to play different games and sports and inculcate an habit of teamwork, learning and sharing. This empowers the child with confidence.
6. Newspaper Collection Drive ( Ongoing)
Newspaper collection drives is conducted time to time in the schools, corporate and residential apartments which motivates people to give away their old newspaper. The awareness is created among the people and the society about recycling and upcycling. The trash of newspapers becomes a potential raw material for the women clusters. Giving away their old newspaper will help them to connect to the groups of rural women who turn this newspaper into a different line of eco friendly utility products and earn an income for themselves.
7. Swacch Bharat Campaign ( Ongoing)
Swacch Bharat Campaign is a national level campaign to clean the street, roads and the other infrastructure. The community, primary involving the children and the women are implementing the Swacch Bharat Campaign in the village Bandhwari to make their community clean and healthy.
8. Plantation Drive ( 2012, 2015)
Under the Million Tree Plantation drive, in Gurgaon, ACT participated in the plantation drive in the monsoons of 2012 and 2015 to plant 100 trees in villages around to make the city and the villages green with their participation.
9. Good Health Campaign ( Ongoing)
Good Health Campaign is a self supported campaign in the project villages where ongoing counseling to the women groups are provided on the various health issues like reproductive mother and child health, food and nutrition, safe drinking water, child care, adolescent health, sanitation and hygiene.
10. Blood Donation Campaign ( 2011, 2012, 2013)
ACT joined hands with Bangiya Parishad and participated in the Blood Donation Campaign which was organized by Red Cross Society, Gurgaon. ACT helped in motivating people to donate blood for emergency situations.
At the same time during these camps the people were asked to bring old cloths which were distributed in the nearby slums of Gurgaon to the underprivileged people.
11. Corporate and Students Doers ( Ongoing)
ACT believes in Corporate Social responsibility and encourages this gesture among young people from the corporate sector and educational institutions..It motivates the young and the privileged to think about their fellow counterparts who are not so privileged. We encourage people to give their time and expertise to the various programs of the organization and experience the rich and rewarding practice through volunteerism. Volunteers from companies, corporate, schools and universities and other organizations are associated with ACT from time to time. We welcome any help and support which will strengthen our program. We will be happy to have more passionate volunteers who can work along with us to make a difference. Each year we have students from IICD, NID, Delhi University, XISS and other colleges as a part of our Student Learning Program. ACT gives them an environment to understand the existing social issues and gives them training on leadership and their role and responsibility as change agent. We believe that the youths are the next generation which will bring change in the society with their creative leadership and out of box ideas.
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Thompson Papers Chronicle Family's Life in 19th Century Japan
PHS volunteer Sue Althouse is currently processing the David D. Thompson family papers. Sue, a retired missionary who served in Japan, draws on her field experience and knowledge of the Japanese language to arrange and describe the correspondence, diaries, sermons, and photographs of Rev. Thompson, one of the earliest Presbyterian missionaries in Japan, and his wife, Mary Parke Thompson.
David Thompson was born September 21, 1835 in Harrison County, Ohio. He graduated from Franklin College (New Athens, Ohio) in 1859 and from Western Theological Seminary (Pittsburgh, Pa.) in 1862. The Board of Foreign Missions of the PCUSA appointed him to serve in Japan in 1862, and he remained in the field until his death in 1915.
When Rev. Thompson arrived in Japan in May 1863, Christianity was outlawed in the country. Sue reports that one of the most interesting aspects of the papers is the documentation of the world tour Thompson led in 1871 and 1872. The Japanese government sponsored the tour, which included representatives from every clan in Japan. In the United States and Europe, the delegation was constantly questioned about the persecution of Christians in Japan. Thompson’s tour was followed by the more famous “Iwakura Mission” of 1872-1873, led by Japanese ambassador Iwakura Tomomi. Both tours took place during the time when the Meiji government decided to allow the legal existence of Christian churches and the freedom to practice Christianity in Japan.
Throughout his career, Rev. Thompson was a strong advocate for the unification of Protestant denominations in Japan. At one point, he severed relations with the PCUSA Board of Foreign Missions over the issue. However, the Board came to support the idea of a union church, and Thompson was one of the organizers of the United Church of Christ in Japan, a union of all Presbyterian and Reformed bodies in the country that first met as a council in 1876.
David Thompson married fellow missionary Mary Calhoun Parke in 1874. Mary, born April 17, 1841 in Ednahannon, Ireland, grew up in Ashland County, Ohio, and graduated from Xenia Female Seminary in 1866. After several years as a school teacher, she applied to the Board of Foreign Missions in 1872 and was posted to Japan where she met David. They married in 1874 and together had three daughters. Mary remained in Japan after her husband's death in 1915 and died in Tokyo in 1927.
The collection includes Mary’s journals, which span most of her adult life, 1865 to 1924, and comment on her work as an educator, evangelist, wife, and mother. Particularly moving, according to Sue, is the account of her daughter’s death from a “fever” at age nine in 1887.
--Director of Programs and Services Nancy Taylor, with Sue Althouse
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An Art History of the Indian Sub-Continent
By Padma Shri Dr. John R. Marr and Mrs. Wendy A.P. Marr.
Thursday evenings 6-8pm
This slide lecture series of 24 lectures (6 independant modules) gives a historical overview of the archaeology, art and architectural practices in the Indian Sub-continent from c.3000BC to the days of the British Raj in the 1900s
Beginnings - Earliest External Contacts
6 - 27 October, 2016
Enrol by September 22, 2016
Introduction: some concepts; architectural terms
The Harappan or Indus Valley culture: cities, seals and script
The imperial Mauryas; rock-cut ‘architecture’ - beginnings
Gandhara: pilgrimage and silk routes the Indo-Greeks
Rock - Cut Architecture - Prototypic Temples
3 November - 1 December, 2016
Enrol by October 6, 2016
Rock-cut ‘architecture’: Buddhist: – the Stupa
The gorge of the Indus: Hindu and Jain Pilgrimage and silk routes
Film: John Seeley at Ellora
The Chalukya-s in the Deccan
The South: Pallava rock-cut ‘architecture’ and temples
Fees: £50 per Module
50% concession for Dip/PDip Bhavan students
Karnatic Music Theory
Course description: The 5-year Karnatic Music Theory course has been developed in close association with the 5-year practical course taught by our Karnatic Vocal and Vina Teacher, Smt Sivasakti Sivanesan. The first 2 years develope notions of scale, pitch, interval, notation and rag-identification. In the 2nd year, composers such as Tyagara and Rasa are studied. The Natya Sastra, together with further ragas and composers comprise the 3rd year which also includes Melakarta scalar classification. The 4th and 5th advanced years include the development of the raga concept, detailed examination of Bharata's text on classical music, mode and interval.
Edgware Outreach Classes
As well as a full range of classes at our centre in Kensington, The Bhavan also conducts outreach classes at the Sangam Centre in Edgware during term time. The subjects taught are
Music: Hindustani Vocal and Tabla
Dance: Bharatnatyam, Kathak
For more information please contact: Sangam Centre, 210 Burnt Oak Broadway, Edgware HA8 0AP. Call 020 8952 7062
Discounts on course fees may be considered for senior citizens/unemployed/those with disabilities.
Techniques of Indian Miniature Paintings, by Ramu Ramdev
Timings Monday 25th July - Friday July 29th, 2016. 11:00pm - 5:00pm
Master Miniature Painter Ramu Ramdev will be visiting The Bhavan for the Fourth time, to share his skills with students keen to learn techniques of Traditional Indian Miniature Painting in five day workshop. Fees include the use of all painting material. An Exhibition of the Finest work of Master painter Ramu Ramdev and his brothers, Govind Ramdev, Shyamu Ramdev & Hemant Ramdev will be on show during the workshop.
Previous students are welcome to bring in their framed artwork for exhibition.
Fees: £150, £125 (under18)
Hindustani Music - History, Theory and Practice: A series of 10 Lectures by Dr.Jameela Siddiqi
Fees: £150 for complete course, £20 individual lectures ( £100 for Bhavan's existing students)
Venue: The Bhavan Centre
Course Description: This is designed as a general interest course for enthusiasts of North Indian Classical music and could also prove very useful for Indian music students in terms of furnishing more background on the history, theory and practice of this ancient Indian art. The lectures will cover origins and evolution as well as examining Hindustani classical music’s journey within India and beyond – from temples to Royal Courts to the public arena and, finally, on international concert stages around the world.
Dr.Jameela Siddiqi: An award-winning journalist and broadcaster, Siddiqi is also a lecturer in North Indian Classical Music and a former Degree Manager for The Bhavan & Trinity-Laban’s BMus(Hons) degree course in Indian Classical Music. She has written extensively on all aspects of Indian music and dance as well as translating Hindi and Urdu poetry and is the author of two novels.
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