sanitation issues.
Using a high shear in-line mixer in place of a conventional agitator or mixer can quickly solve problems of agglomeration with dry ingredients. A single pass through a self-pumping, in-line mixer adds high shear to batter, which de-agglomerates the mix, resulting in a homogeneous, smooth batter. With a consistent, smooth batter, finished product appearance is improved; the effectiveness and hygiene of the recirculation system is increased; and a better yield of raw materials is achieved. By increasing overall product quality, the amount of raw materials needed is decreased, thereby lowering manufacturing costs and increasing shelf life. Increased shelf life is achieved by creating and maintaining an emulsion, often by adding a food stabilizer.[10]
High shear in-line mixers process food to be made faster and cheaper while increasing consistency of the finished food. Powder and liquid mixing systems are capable of rapidly incorporating large quantities of powders at high concentrations – agglomerate free and fully hydrated. Advances in technology have made processing equipment easy to clean, leading to a much safer processed food. [11]
Trends in modern food processing
Women working in a cannery
Dried bananas packaged in Ban Bang Krathum, Bang Krathum, Phitsanulok, Thailand
 - Reduction of fat content in final product by using baking instead of deep-frying in the production of potato chips, another processed food.
 - Maintaining the natural taste of the product by using less artificial sweetener than was used before.
The rigorous application of industry and government endorsed standards to minimise possible risk and hazards. The international standard adopted is HACCP.
 - Rising energy costs lead to increasing usage of energy-saving technologies,[12] e.g. frequency converters on electrical drives, heat insulation of factory buildings and heated vessels, energy recovery systems, keeping a single fish frozen all the way from China to Switzerland.
 - Factory automation systems (often Distributed control systems) reduce personnel costs and may lead to more stable production results.
Food processing industries and practices include the following:
See also
Notes and references
 1. ^ Common Methods Of Processing And Preserving Food April 7, 2015
 2. ^ Food Processing Lesson Plan Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. April 7, 2015
 3. ^ Levenstein, H: "Paradox of Plenty", pages 106-107. University of California Press, 2003
 4. ^ Laudan, Rachel (September–October 2010). "In Praise of Fast Food". UTNE Reader. Retrieved 2010-09-24. Where modern food became available, people grew taller and stronger and lived longer.
 5. ^ Laudan, Rachel (September–October 2010). "In Praise of Fast Food". UTNE Reader. Retrieved 2010-09-24. If we fail to understand how scant and monotonous most traditional diets were, we can misunderstand the "ethnic foods" we encounter in cookbooks, at restaurants, or on our travels.
 6. ^ Laudan, Rachel (September–October 2010). "In Praise of Fast Food". UTNE Reader. Retrieved 2010-09-24. For our ancestors, natural was something quite nasty. Natural often tasted bad. Fresh meat was rank and tough, fresh fruits inedibly sour, fresh vegetables bitter.
 8. ^ Michael Pollan, 'Some of my Best Friends are Germs', New York Times Magazine, 15 May 2013,
 10. ^ Payne, Stephanie. "Food processing". Retrieved 14 November 2014.
 11. ^ "Solutions for Your Toughest Mixing Applications in Food De-agglomerating" (PDF). Silverson Machines Application Report. Retrieved 2012-02-29.
 12. ^ STAC - Project Information Center - 03-STAC-01 - Western U. S. Food Processing Efficiency Initiative
 - Fábricas de alimentos, 9th edition (in Spanish)
 - Nutritional evaluation of food processing,
 - Food preservation 2nd edition, by Normal W. Desrosier
External links


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I have a video file of 5 FPS / 8000Hz that I want to speed up 6 times. I want the pitch and playback to increase - can I do this by simply adjusting the file header?
I can't seem to figure out the right parameters to do this with ffmpeg since it actually creates new frames in order to stay at the same speed. I read some similar topics on this website, but can't seem to find anything simple to do with both sound and image.
Is there a way to do this with a command-line tool or can someone explain how to alter this in code?
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1 Answer 1
mencoder has an option to change the speed. A similar question was answered here.
The following command was suggested:
mencoder file.avi -speed 20 -vf scale=720:368,hqdn3d=3:2:3:2,expand=720:480 -ovc xvid -oac pcm -xvidencopts fixed_quant=2 -o out.avi )
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text: ELORET Corporation, in collaboration with the Space Systems Design Laboratory of Georgia Institute of Technology, proposes developing and demonstrating a capability/technology to de-orbit small payloads (approximately 1 kg) from Low-Earth Orbit and returning them to Earth safely. To achieve this goal, the current proposal has five objectives and associated tasks: 1. Surveying the Bio-science communities to define requirements for the first generation mission architecture. 2. Understanding the launch interface requirements such as mass, volume, vibro-acoustic loads, electromagnetic interference (EMI), etc. 3. Designing and developing the first generation of mission architectures including the key aspects of launch, in-space operation, entry trajectory analysis (EDL sequence), and landing/recovery. 4. Understanding and quantifying small spacecraft requirements for power, thermal control, communications, propulsion, etc., and developing the preliminary design of the spacecraft system using off the shelf technologies whenever possible. 5. Designing and developing a passive (i.e., without any chemical or aerodynamic deceleration devices), single-stage ballistic entry system (including the aeroshell). 6. Designing and developing the impact energy absorption system and thermal control system required for payload thermal management and survivability upon landing.

source: openbmb/Ultra-FineWeb


How to Use Cumin Seeds for Fast Weight Loss
Cumin, also known as jeera, is a spice that is used in our dishes to enhance the taste. It has an earthy and warm flavour. But, do you know that it can also help you with weight loss? Yes, that's true! Cumin has the ability to speed up your weight loss process.
Along with that it also has many other health benefits, which is why it has been used in traditional medicines for so many years now. Studies show that consumption of cumin regularly has various types of benefits for the health.
Cumin Seeds for Fast Weight Loss
Tukh Malanga Benefits for Weight Loss
Get A Flatter Stomach with This Home Remedy
weight loss
Health benefits of cumin
1. Cumin can aid your digestion by increasing the activity of the digestive enzymes in your gut.
2. Cumin seeds are rich in iron and one teaspoon of it can contain about 1.4 mg of iron.
3. Cumin can help you in managing your diabetes. 4. Cumin can be used to remove the bad cholesterols from the body.
5. Eating cumin seeds can help in reducing inflammation in the body.
6. Lastly, cumin seeds are beneficial for fat reduction and weight loss.
Cumin and weight loss
Cumin can be used for weight loss as it is an effective weight loss remedy. You can lose fat from your belly as well as your whole body within just 15-20 days by eating cumin seeds or drinking cumin water daily. Previously, a study was held in which 80 obese women were divided into two groups: 'cumin group' and 'diet control group'.
The cumin group were asked to consume cumin on a daily basis and the other group was asked to control their diet. In the end, it was found out that women who had cumin had lost a significant amount of weight as compared to others.
Cumin can help in burning calories faster by increasing the speed of metabolism and improving digestion. When you have a healthy digestive system and faster metabolism, you will automatically lose weight. So, how can you use cumin for weight loss?
How to use cumin for weight loss
There are many ways in which you can use cumin for weight loss. Some are mentioned below:
1. Cumin seeds
2. Cumin powder and yoghurt
3. Cumin powder
Boil one cup of water and add cumin powder to it. You can also add a little salt to make the drink taste better. Drink this after your meals every day for 20 days.
I Hope, these remedies work for you! Thank you for reading. Do share this article with your friends and family members who are trying to lose weight. via timesofindia
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text:
Mrs. Dixon's Home Page » Treasure Key
In Dixon Den we have special keys that allow students to bring in a "treasure" to share with the class. Much like show and tell, the first grader with the key stands up in front of the class to tell all about the treasure he/she has brought to share. The holder of the key should be able to tell why the item is a treasure to him/her and be able to tell important information about the treasure. If your child brings home the key, please help him/her to choose something interesting to share with our class. Some good ideas include: a few pictures or a souvenir from a recent trip, part of a collection, pictures of a pet, a favorite book, a special or unusual gift, or something from nature. Help your first grader put the key and the treasure in his/her backpack that evening so nothing will be forgotten the next morning. In order to share, a child must bring both the treasure and the key. Dixon Den first graders look forward to their turn with the key! It gives them an opportunity to practice speaking in front of a group and it makes them feels special!
Amy Dixon's Site
Mott Road Elementary School
7173 Mott Road
Fayetteville, NY 13066

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'Substantially Equivalent' Big Biotech Argument Busted by Latest Study
'Substantially Equivalent' Big Biotech Argument Busted by Latest Study | GMOs-substantially-equivalent-biotech | Agriculture & Farming GMOs Science & Technology Sleuth Journal Special Interests
The Biotech industry assures the public that GMOs are substantially equivalent to their non-GMO or near-isogenic counterparts. In fact, the whole idea of substantial equivalence has been spun into existence by Big Biotech as a clever way to peddle their wares – but they like to have it both ways. You see, when it comes to health, nutrient composition and regulation, Big Biotech insists that GMOs are substantially equivalent to non-GMO foods, so as to ensure they get full market access with minimal or no regulation – not even labeling. Yet, when it comes to intellectual property and patents, Big Biotech turns around and insists they "own" the molecules and combinations that make up GMOs, and that it is their property. Many astute people have long spotted the deception and inherent contradiction in the substantial equivalence argument. Now, a recent peer-reviewed scientific study has taken the analysis to a whole new level, showing that GMOs are not so substantially equivalent to non-GMO crops at all.
Multi-Omics Analysis Destroys Idea of Substantial Equivalence
The recent study is entitled An integrated multi-omics analysis of the NK603 Roundup-tolerant GM maize reveals metabolism disturbances caused by the transformation process. To reach its conclusion, it used deep and complex analysis over various fields (proteomics, metabolomics and transcriptomics), which is why the title contains the word multi-omics. These are state-of-the-art molecular profiling 'omics' methods. Proteomics is the large-scale study of proteins, metabolomics is the study of small biochemical molecules and transcriptomics is the study of transcriptomes (the set of all messenger RNA molecules in one cell) and their functions. Since this peer-reviewed study quickly jumps into technical language, I am summarizing its results here in plain English to make it more digestible for the average person (and hopefully more digestible than GMO corn!).
The study mentions in its abstract that there were various ways in which the GMO corn tested (variety NK603) differed from the non-GMO or isogenic version used as a control:
To break all this down, what it means is this: the GMO corn had markedly different effects compared to the control non-GM corn. These changes included the plant producing different levels of enzymes, undergoing an imbalance in energy metabolism, having indications of oxidative stress and producing 4 different polyamines (a type of protein). Almost all of these changes are not healthy.
'Substantially Equivalent' Big Biotech Argument Busted by Latest Study | GMOs-substantially-equivalent-2-479x319 | Agriculture & Farming GMOs Science & Technology Sleuth Journal Special Interests
The study shows the GMO plants had to change their entire metabolism to deal with the herbicides.
GMO Plants Change Metabolism and Chemicals Under Increased Stress
It's important to remember that genetic modification involves the random splicing of genes whose consequences cannot possibly all be measured, taken into account or even known. By studying the results closely on a proteomic, metabolomic and transcriptomic level, the study found that the GM plant was subjected to extra stress. This meant the GM plant had to alter its usual way of growing in order to adapt to the stress by producing more antioxidant enzymes, more hydrogen peroxide and more glutathione (to try to rid itself of the toxic herbicides being sprayed on it). In short, the entire metabolism of the plant was upset:
"The transformation process and the resulting expression of a transgenic protein cause a general disturbance in the GM plant and it is clear that NK603 maize is markedly different from its non-GM isogenic line at the proteome and metabolome levels. In addition, our data correlates with previous studies, which observed higher amounts of ROS (reactive oxygen species) that act as free-radicals promoting oxidative stress in those transgenic plant materials. We also confirm a metabolic imbalance in energy and carbohydrate metabolism."
Disturbing: GMO Corn's Marked Increase of Putrescine and Cadaverine
The presence of increased levels of polyamines mentioned above (N-acetyl-cadaverine, N-acetylputrescine, putrescine and cadaverine) is a sign that GMOs may be health-destroying rather than health-promoting or substantially equivalent to non-GMO foods. The lead scientist of the study Dr. Michael Antonio acknowledges that these polyamines can sometimes have beneficial effects; however he also writes:
"The marked increase in putrescine and especially cadaverine is a concern since these substances are potentially toxic, being reported as enhancers of the effects of histamine, thus heightening allergic reactions, and both have been implicated in the formation of carcinogenic nitrosamines with nitrite in meat products … Additionally, it is known that polyamines are typically elevated in plants under abiotic stress conditions."
'Substantially Equivalent' Big Biotech Argument Busted by Latest Study | GMOs-vs-organic-substantially-equivalent-479x317 | Agriculture & Farming GMOs Science & Technology Sleuth Journal Special Interests
GMOs vs Organics: what do you choose? Do you think they are "substantially equivalent"?
Doctrine of Substantial Equivalence Based on Deception
The doctrine of substantial equivalence is based on a shallow and crude analysis that the nutrient compositional profile between GMO and non-GMO foods is roughly comparable or within a similar range. Yet is it fair to conclude the 2 are "close enough" or substantially equivalent just by comparing their nutrient profile? For starters, there are numerous studies that have found that non-GMO or organic produce is far higher in nutrients that its GMO counterpart.
However, even if the nutrient profile is similar, any fair comparison must take into account that GMOs are specifically engineered to be heavily sprayed with toxins, such as glyphosate, and to hold this glyphosate in their cells. How can the 2 possibly be substantially equivalent when the GMO variety is chock full of toxins? Additionally, the devil in is the details. The compositional analysis includes measurements of total protein content but not a profile of the different types of proteins which is more important information.
Conclusion: Time to Question the Notion that GMOs are Substantially Equivalent
This study is further evidence that we need to quickly re-evaulate the faulty notion that GMOs are somehow different enough to be awarded patents and monopolies based on intellectual property (in essence owning Nature), while substantially equivalent enough that they don't need labelling, packaging warnings, regulating or outright banning. A government genuinely committed to the health of its citizens would ban GMOs outright pending further investigation, putting the burden of proof upon Big Biotech to demonstrate its modified food does not adversely affect human health. Some nations such as Russia have taken the bold step of outlawing GMOS and refusing any GM food to be allowed in their country. Of course, proving that GMOs do no harm would be most difficult for the Big Biotech corporatocracy, given the existing evidence which implicates GMOs with organ failure, autism, infertility and cancer.
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Disassemble vs. dissemble
 - Most English speakers can correctly infer from the negative prefix disthat disassemble means the opposite of assemble. Dissemble is trickier because it sort of sounds like it should mean the opposite of assemble, but it actually means (1) to disguise (either oneself or something else) behind a false appearance, or (2) to obscure the truth with showy rhetoric. It's traditionally synonymous with disguise, but it has become a fancy word for lie in 21st-century political contexts.
 Despite their similarity in sound, dissemble and disassemble do not share roots. Assemble comes from the Old French verb assembler, which in turn has roots in the Latin assimulare, meaning to put together. Dissemble comes from the Old French dissembler, whose root sembler means to appear or to seem. So we can think of dissemble as meaning to dis-seem or to un-seem
 Dissemble is frequently used in place of disassemble—for example:
 Near the end of the play the Grandmother dies on stage by dissembling herself — she removes her hearing aid, her false teeth, her eyeglasses, and her heart. [Huffington Post]
 A bucket truck and forklift had to be brought in to dissemble the pyramid. [Fox 31 Denver]
 Burglars dissemble a wall to break into SugarHill Studios. [CultureMap Houston]
 But the word's traditional sense is not dying; examples like these are just as easy to find:
 [The films are] more ambitious than their American counterparts, revisiting painful moments from recent history and trying to drag suppressed or dissembled truths into the light. [New York Times]
 [T]he word is that these are Chinese actors who have been hired to resemble and dissemble North Korean fans. [CBS News]
 Francis Bacon seems noisy but dissembling, notoriously vague about both sources and process in his work. [Scotland on Sunday]
 And for good measure, here are two examples of disassemble used well:
 These fees cover the costs of recycling firms that disassemble the devices and sell the salvaged materials to commodities markets. [Guardian]
 It will sell for about $18,500, disassembled, without windows or furniture. [New York Times]
 1. Thank you! This clarifies a long-standing argument :)
 2. I wonder how many times it is just a typo that gets missed. Like dropping the "i" in trickier.
 3. reardensteel says
 Good word to help you remember: semblance.
 Dissemble means (roughly) to remove the semblance.
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text:
There are $12$ edges on a cube so there are $12$ winning lines along edges.
There are $6$ faces on a cube, and $4$ winning lines that pass through the middle of each face, so there are $24$ winning lines through the middle of faces.
Finally we need to consider the winning lines that go through the centre cube:
vertex to opposite vertex: $4$
middle of edge to middle of opposite edge: $6$
middle of face to middle of opposite face: $3$
In total, there are $12 + 24 + 4 + 6 + 3 = 49$ winning lines.
From a vertex there are $7$ other vertices that you can join to in order to make a winning line. $7 \times 8 = 56$ lines, but this counts each line from both ends, so there are $28$'vertex' winning lines.
From the middle of an edge there are $3$ other middles-of-edges that you can join to in order to make a winning line. $3 \times 12 = 36$ lines, but this counts each line from both ends so there are $18$'middle of edge' winning lines.
From the centre of each face there is one winning line, joining to the opposite face, so there are $3$ 'centre of face' winning lines.
So in total, there are $28 + 18 + 3 = 49$ winning lines.
On a plane there are $8$ winning lines.
In the cube, there are $3$ horizontal planes, so $8 \times 3 = 24$ winning lines.
There are also $3$ vertical planes going from left to right, but now with only $5$ new winning lines per plane, as the $3$ horizontal lines have already been counted. So $5 \times 3 = 15$ winning lines.
On the $3$ vertical planes going from front to back, we now only have $2$ new (diagonal) winning lines per plane. So $2 \times 3 = 6$ winning lines.
Finally, there are also diagonal planes to consider. There are $4$ winning lines going from corner to diagonally opposite corner.
In total, there are $24 + 15 + 6 + 4 = 49$ winning lines.


text:
Mumbai: In a recent development, the Central Board of Secondary Education (CBSE) has revised the syllabus for classes from IX to XII during the academic session 2020-21 in view of the post created by COVID-19.
CBSE said in a circular issued to the heads of all the institutions associated with it that the syllabus has been resumed due to the extraordinary conditions spread in different parts of the country and the world.
"Keeping in mind the importance of achieving the level of learning, the curriculum has been rationalized to the extent possible to maintain the core concepts," it said.
CBSE stated that efforts to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic, along with the prevailing health emergency in the country and in various parts of the world, have resulted in the loss of classroom teaching due to the closure of schools.
"Therefore, the board has decided to revise the syllabus for IX-XII classes for the academic session 2020-21. The changes in the syllabi have been finalized by the respective course committees with the approval of the curriculum committee and the governing body of the Board," the circular said.
It states that the heads of schools and teachers can ensure that the subjects that have been reduced are explained to the extent necessary for students to connect different subjects.
"However, the reduced syllabus will not be part of the subjects for internal assessment and year-end board examinations," said the circular.
It stated that NCERT's input on transferring the curriculum using alternative academic calendars and various strategies could also be part of teaching-learning.
Schools for primary classes (I-VIII) may follow the alternative academic calendar and learning outcomes specified by the NCERT.


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August 10, 2010
This is interesting, but notice that it only works for moral theories that accept the existence of some pre-moral good on the basis of which we can judge moral permissibility. For Kantians, for example, since whether some action's consequences count as good depends on its moral permissibility, we can't do the kind of evaluation required to produce the problem. That is, whether the products of killing an innocent person count as good at all is determined by the moral permissibility of that action.
I'm interested in the use of Williamson's "margin for error" principle. Why does it lead us to claim that we lack knowledge, rather than to a weaker claim of fallibilism?
Finally, I'm not sure you show that there is an unknowable moral truth here. You seem to rely on a principle like the following: in cases where we cannot know for certain that killing an innocent person is permissible, we ought not kill innocent persons. Isn't this a moral principle, and if it's a correct one, doesn't it provide us moral truths even in the particular sorts of hard cases you're talking about?
A few reactions:
1) If this argument works, so will structurally similar arguments for unknowable truths about what's enjoyable, boring, disgusting, funny, grammatical, confusing, and obvious (and also for personand even timerelative versions of all of these, e.g. obvious-to-Ralph-at-t). This strikes me as proving too much!
2) If you choose to bite the bullet on 1, I would be led to wonder what the significance of your claim about unknowable truths of these kinds is. It *looks* like a claim with metaphysically realist implications. But applying it in all these cases suggests it has no such implications. So what difference does it make if true?
3) Relating to Pete Murray's last point, I doubt the argument works, because I suspect that an action could only be permissible if you can know that it is. So there's feedback from what we can know to what is in fact true in this domain. It's therefore not true that "we could obviously never know... where the threshold lies", and the "margin for error" principle can't properly be applied here (nor in the other cases I mentioned, or some of them anyway).
First, I'd like to throw my hat in with Simon's #3.
Barring that, I still think that this is not really a case of an unknowable moral truth in the relevant sense. When it is said (or at least when I say) that the moral truths must be knowable, I mean the basic moral truths--propositions about values, reasons, or whatever the basic normative entities whose truth does not depend on any contingent facts.
So consider the Classical Utilitarian. The CU knows (he thinks) all of the basic moral truths. There's just one after all: utility is the good. The CU will of course not know where the threshold between Cj and Cj+1 lies (any more than anyone else). But this is only because he can never know precisely at what point killing the innocent will tip the scales of utility, so to speak.
I also throw my hat in with Simon's #3. Perhaps this reaction suggests a response to Simon's #2, with the help also of Simon's #1.
The significance of the argument is that it provides a consideration against holding a view such that there's no feedback from what we can know to what is true in the domain of morality. That is, if we grant that given a view on which there is no such feedback there are some unknowable moral truths; and if we notice that there might be similar arguments for unknowable truths in other domains for which the conclusion is also uncomfortable; then we might conclude not that we should accept that there are unknowable moral truths, but rather that we should give up the views that get the argument going.
In line with Davids comment (section 2) we could add that the Nagel quote is compatible with unknowability of the exact moral threshold truth. For we can have rough knowledge of the threshold. By working from both ends and excluding cases we narrow the span. In the end we have a rough answer that does not deviate "radically" from the moral truth.
I'll throw a hat in for Ralph.
Consider this response:
I pick this one because I suspect that it is one of the best responses on offer. Here's a worry about this style of response. Ralph says that there is at least one unknowable moral truth. Suppose someone rejects this on the grounds that they accept the kind of Kantian view that rejects (i) consequentialism, (ii) pluralist non-consequentialism of the sort that Ross defended, and (iii) denied that there can be competing imperfect duties that a person is under where they are obliged to pick one duty over the other without knowing that this is so. Such a view is clearly false. (Owing to (iii), I suspect Kant himself would agree). So, someone can't know that the tenets of such a view are true (owing to the factivity of 'knows').
I think we can have cases of conflicting p.f. duties, d1 and d2, where at one end of the spectrum it is clear that d1 defeat d2 and at the other d2 defeats d1. Somewhere in the middle will be cases where d1 defeats d2 (or vice-versa) where the correct belief that it is d1 that defeats d2 is not safe. You just run W's anti-luminosity argument at this point to establish that there is at least one moral truth we cannot know (e.g., consider a series of increasingly dangerous neighborhoods and consider the plight of a parent who has to determine whether to let the kids out to play unsupervised or to keep the kids indoors where it is safer). There surely will be points in the middle where one duty defeats another but no one is in a position to knowingly judge that this is so.
This is an interesting argument, Ralph. One response would be to deny assumption 3, on the grounds that permissibility is graded, rather than absolute. But maybe this could be gotten around by being very specific about the moral proposition -- perhaps something to do with the exact point at which it is no more permissible than impermissible to X.
Another thing occurred to me when reading Ralph's post. It reminded me of van Inwagen's Atlantis case, which forms part of his response to the problem of evil. He contends that there might be no minimum amount of evil necessary to bring about some good, and we certainly couldn't know what the minimum was, if there were one, due to our inability to discriminate finely enough between very nearby cases. This was back in the 80s, if I'm not mistaken. So it's Williamsonian in a pre-Williamsonian kind of way!
Several people have suggested that it is it is permissible to A only it is knowable that it is permissible to A. Formally, P(A)->K(P(A)). Since K(P(A))->P(A), this implies that P(A) iff K(P(A)). Assuming that if you know that p iff q, you can know p if you know q, then we can conclude P(A) iff KK(P(A)).
In short, the suggestion leads to a KK principle for permissibility. KK principles are dodgy, so I don't know why I'd expect this one to hold here. Just take some Williamson counterexample to KK (Mr. Magoo), and have something of moral relevance turn on it. I suspect P(A)->K(P(A)) isn't going to work out.
However, Simon may be right that little of realist consequence hangs on this, since you can make similar arguments with "boring", "funny", and "tasty for dogs".
Pete --
You say that my argument "only works for theories that accept the existence of some pre-moral good". I disagree. As Clayton explains, any theory according to which there are positive duties to save lives, to alleviate suffering, to develop one's own talents, etc., will allow for the kind of spectrum of cases that leads smoothly from cases where acting in a certain way (say, ignoring someone's plea for help) is not permissible to cases where acting in that way is permissible. All that we need is that whatever makes the act permissible or not permissible is something that comes in degrees (e.g. the number of lives saved, the amount of suffering alleviated, etc.).
The best way to understand Williamson's "margin for error" principle is to read his book Knowledge and Its Limits, chap. 4 and 5. I won't try to summarize his arguments here!
Simon --
I accept that the same argument can be run for any domain of truths where such a continuous spectrum of cases is possible -- which is practically all domains of truths whatsoever. But I don't think that the argument proves too much. It does indeed show that one kind of anti-realism -- the kind that claims that truth is "epistemically constrained", and cannot outrun knowability -- is not true of any of these domains. But it doesn't show that there aren't many other kinds of anti-realism that are perfectly sound. I.e. it only refutes one kind of anti-realism, not every kind.
What the argument shows is that there actually can't be the sort of "feedback" from what is knowable to what is true that you postulate. You can


text:
GREAT FALLS (AP) – A state agency has ruled that a Hutterite colony can irrigate from the Marias River in years to come without regard for the biological needs of fish in the river.
The river's water should be allocated at levels set by water-use law, not based on the biological needs of fish, the Department of Natural Resources and Conservation decided.
The decision, issued last week by Jack Stults, administrator of DNRC's Water Rights Division, granted a water-use permit to the Sunny Brook Hutterite Colony to irrigate 957 acres of alfalfa and barley that it will develop in four or five years.
The Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks had requested the colony not be given the water unless flows adequately protected fish habitat and were 71.5 cubic feet per second (cfs) more than what is reserved for the wildlife department under state water laws. With current flows at about 360 cfs because of the dry spring, the water for the colony would not have been available this year.
"We were limited by a reservation process and statute," said Rebecca Dockter-Engstrom, a FWP attorney. "We realize that amount is our legal right, but that legal right couldn't take into account the biological studies we have available to us."
The DNRC also decided that a bill passed by the 2001 Legislature altering the state's environmental protection act confirms that long-standing laws about water allocation take precedence over environmental assessments based on the Montana Environmental Policy Act.
"I'm quite relieved," said Dave Schmidt, a senior water rights specialist for Water Rights Solutions Inc. of Helena, who testified on behalf of the colony. "Basically, the doctrine remains intact."
A hearings officer had recommended granting the irrigation permit to the colony in March. However, the colony wouldn't have been able to use the water because of conditions, mostly the result of the Montana Environmental Protection Act, that increased the necessary minimum water flows.
Greg Duncan, an attorney representing the colony, argued that the March decision gave the FWP an illegal water right and took advantage of environmental protection laws.
"This case clarifies the rules and statutes," Duncan said. "One agency can't get in there and tie up a system."
Dockter-Engstrom said the gap between the legal reservation and biological need has existed for some time. The decision doesn't necessarily erode MEPA's effectiveness, and a District Court appeal isn't likely.
Bill Gardner, FWP fisheries biologist, said he is disappointed in the decision. The consequences will be subtle, he said. Higher flows are needed for smaller fish to mature. For example, there wouldn't necessarily be a fish kill, but in the long run, perhaps fewer fish.
The Fish, Wildlife and Parks Department can reserve half of the river's mean annual flow, 488.5 cubic feet a second. But relying on an environmental review, the March decision set a condition that flows would have to be 560 cfs before the colony could pump the 16 cfs it wanted. The 560 cfs was set at the recommendation of fisheries biologists who said the 30 species of fish in the river need the higher flows.


text:
West Greenland Current
The West Greenland Current is a weak cold water current that flows to the north along the west coast of Greenland. The current results from the movement of water flowing around the southernmost point of Greenland caused by the East Greenland Current.
According to Lloyd et al., 2007, the WGC is a WARM current connected to a broader scale North Atlantic climate via the combined influences of Atlantic water from the Irminger Current (IC) and polar water from the East Greenland Current.
Paleoclimatology records derived from foraminifera abundance show that periodic influxes of warm subsurface temperatures and near-bottom temperatures occurred throughout the Late Holocene epoch, particularly during the Holocene climatic optimum. The increased flow from the nearby East Greenland Current was associated with increased glacial iceberg calving from the large Jakobshavn Isbrae glacial outlet within the western Greenland Ice Sheet, causing rapid melting and destabilization events. Following the Neoglaciation, the Jakobshavn outlet formed a floating ice tongue around 2000 years before present.
See also
- Labrador Current
- Baffin Island Current
- Gulf Stream
- Jakobshavn Isbrae
- Ocean current
- Oceanic gyres
- Physical oceanography
- Source: Llyod, J., Kuijpers, A., Long, A., Moros, M., and Park, L. 2007. Foraminiferal reconstruction of midto late Holocene ocean circulation and climate variability in Disko, Bugt, West Greenland. The Holocene: 17: _PHONE_.
- Andresen, Camilla S.; David J. McCarthy, Christian Valdemar Dylmer, Marit Solveig Seidenkrantz, Antoon Kuijpers and Jerry M. Lloyd (September 27, 2010). "Interaction between subsurface ocean waters and calving of the Jakobshavn Isbræ during the late Holocene". The Holocene 21 (2): 221–224. doi:10.1177/0959683610378877. Retrieved 22 March 2011.
|This article about a specific ocean current is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.|
|This Greenland-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.|


What Version of Your Watson Cloud Stuff Am I Using?
More interesting questions from customers that are much more thought-provoking than you expected
Original post by Daniel Toczala on Medium
In my role as a Customer Success Manager, I deal with IBM customers all of the time. Some of my customers understand the general concept of "the Cloud", and some have more difficulty with it. Some of them understand the basics of AI, and some struggle more with it. Most people just need to hear it explained to them in English (rather than tech-speak), slowly and patiently, and they understand. Most of the confusion is because the people who should know better (the technical people building these things), all use slightly different terminology and examples to explain the concepts. Here are some of the basic Watson questions that I have found myself answering a lot this year — and some real-world answers for them.
What Version of Watson Am I Using?
This is actually a pretty good question. Just because you are using Cloud-based services, and someone else is in charge of the upgrades, doesn't mean that you don't need to be aware of what version of your Watson service you are using. The Watson Assistant will require a version in your API call (or in the SDK). So does the Watson Discovery service and the Natural Language Understanding service. If you are using the SDK and writing your own orchestration layer, it's usually a good idea to just have a constant in your code that is used by any/all API calls. Then you can make a single change (of the constant) when you change versions.
It's important to know these things because new versions of the service could change how things work in your application. So you will want to manage how and when you move to new versions of the service — and make sure that you test your application well before upgrading to a new version of the service and releasing the changes to your end-users. Manage these service versions in the same way that you would manage versions of open-source packages that you may be using.
Is V2 of the Watson Assistant API Twice as Good as V1?
Not really. Why is there a V2 version of the Watson Assistant API? There are two versions of the Watson Assistant API because there are two different ways that people conceptually interact with the Watson Assistant service. Some people and orchestration layers keep track of user information themselves and just make static and stateless calls to the various Watson Assistant endpoints. They may or may not keep some of the context from the call, storing it in a variable, and then passing it along with their subsequent API calls. These are the users of the Watson Assistant V1 API. The V1 API is sometimes referred to as the "stateless" Assistant API. Take a look at the various endpoints — they are all clustered around major functionality areas — intents, entities, logs, messages, etc.
Some of our users and orchestration engines interact with the service on a session-by-session basis. Each session is an object, with that object has various states and properties. These users will often use the Watson Assistant V2 API, or the "stateful" Assistant API. These API calls have three major categories — sessions, messages, and logs. You will need to create a session for each user interacting with your chatbot, and you can then respond to the messages sent in by the user. The session object will retain all of the state data for you.
One of the secrets of power users of the platform is the knowledge that you can use both of these APIs at the same time, with the same Watson Assistant instance. So use the API calls (and API version) that make sense for what you are doing. Just keep in mind that the two APIs look at the world a bit differently.
Why Is Watson Disambiguating My User Statements?
One of the more powerful capabilities that Watson Assistant has is the automatic process of disambiguation when the intended user intent is not clear enough to the Assistant. You should have seen this happen if you are using the standard Watson Assistant interface — and not providing your own orchestration engine and UI. Your user makes an utterance like, "Where do I find the last train", and Watson returns a dialog asking the user which answer is most appropriate for them, "something about train schedules, or something about train locations?". Your Assistant was unable to discern if the word 'last' in the user question was a time-based or a geography-based reference. So it asks the user which one they meant.
So what triggers this behavior in Watson Assistant? There is not a definite cutoff — it depends on the relative confidence levels. If you turn on auto-learning, the model will actually learn over time based on how these disambiguation scenarios play out (which intent does the user choose?).
The disambiguation level is a sliding scale, which is within 55% of the top confidence level. So for example, if the top intent has a 60% confidence level, then disambiguation will be triggered if another intent of 33% or better (.55 x 60% = 33%) is encountered. For a situation with a top[ intent having an 80% confidence level, disambiguation gets triggered for any intent with a confidence level of 44% (.55 x 80%) or higher.
This factor may get changed or tuned in the future — although we have not changed it at all in recent memory. If you are managing the orchestration layer, you have the ability to override this and provide whatever disambiguation algorithm you want.
What is All of the Excitement About API Endpoints?
One of the main areas of fear in the minds of many of my customers is around the changing of the Watson API endpoints. Some email updates have gone out to account owners informing them of their need to move their API endpoints. What does this all mean?
IBM has moved the API endpoints for the Watson services on the IBM Cloud, making them a bit easier to use from multiple different data centers. Services that used to be based on gateway-wdc.watsonplatform.net now are based on something more like api.us-east.assistant.watson.cloud.ibm.com . The old endpoints are being phased out, and the watsonplatform.net endpoint will no longer be supported beginning on May 26, 2021.
In the past, most customers created their own orchestration layer for their chatbots and other AI based services. They would use one of the Watson SDKs (NodePythonJava, or others) to interact with their Watson services deployed out on the IBM Cloud. These SDKs would then allow you to create sessions that communicated with your Watson services via their APIs. When creating these sessions, you have the ability to set the API endpoint being used. If no endpoint is set, a default endpoint is chosen. More recent versions of the SDK have updated the default API endpoint being used.
Some older software just depended on the default setting, which was often something like the API endpoints in the US South datacenter — API endpoints that looked like this:
Now the SDKs have updated these and the API endpoints look like this:
The good news is this: if you have been setting your own API endpoints, you just need to change the values that you are using to use to the new endpoints. It is considered a best practice to set your API endpoints in a constant which is set as a configuration variable (which you would be able to set in a YAML file in a Kubernetes configuration). If you are using the Watson Assistant Web Client, and the pre-built Assistant UI, then these new endpoints are already taken care of for you.
Finding what code is currently using the old endpoints is pretty simple. From an organizational perspective, you may want to follow these steps:
 1. Send an email out to all of the development teams that you know of, and tell them about the change in API endpoints, and let them know that the old endpoints will cease working on May 26th.
 2. In parallel, check the code associated with EVERY PRODUCTION implementation, and make sure that they are not using the older API endpoints. Just grep the code repository looking for watsonplatform.net .
 3. Next, check the mission-critical implementations, and make sure that they are not using the older API endpoints.
 4. Wait until May 26th. At that point, the services will stop working for some team — and that team will complain. When they do complain, ask them why they didn't read the mail or respond to step 1 above.
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text:
Seasonal safeguarding reminder for Door Supervisors
Christmas is coming, and pubs and clubs will soon be full of Christmas get-togethers, office parties, and people celebrating the arrival of the holidays. It is also a time when some people can find themselves in a dangerous situation, either inside a venue or out on the streets, and in need of extra protection.
Door supervisors can make a big difference to the outcome of a night out by intervening to assist a vulnerable person in trouble and helping them to make it home safe.
We want to reinforce some of the key messages from our SIA-mandated door supervisor training and emphasise the importance of safeguarding vulnerable people in the night-time economy.
How can a door supervisor help to keep vulnerable people safe?
Recognise the risks to vulnerable people being ejected from, or refused entry to a venue, the risks include:
Being under the influence of drink or drugs
Receiving unwanted attention
Being too young to look after themselves
Becoming the target of a sexual predator
What actions can be taken by a door supervisor to protect vulnerable people?
Call a friend or relative to assist them
Call a licensed taxi to take them home
Use a 'safe haven'
Ask street pastors or street marshals to assist
Call the police
Can you recognise behaviours that could indicate potential sexual predators? These often include:
A lone male seen pestering a customer or member of staff
A heavily intoxicated female leaving with a male
A regular attendee frequently leaving with different intoxicated females
Finding a date-rape type drug on a person during a search


In February 2015, Open Data Kosovo released e-prokurimi, an online application constructed with procurement data obtained through cooperation with various municipalities across Kosovo. E-prokurimi provides users with a simple way to interact with procurement data and observe trends over time and across municipalities. It also allows users to identify contracts that raised 'red flags' or had characteristics that made them appear suspicious – a common methodology used in compliance and anti-fraud efforts across the world.
Building on the experience gained creating e-prokurimi, Open Data Kosovo has been taking a deeper dive into the procurement data. The result is an interactive treemap which allows users to look at procurement contracts[1] across the seven municipalities that provided data, and see where overspend occurred. This treemap allows you to group the data by a range of variables, as well as look at different years.
Check out the treemap by clicking the picture below:
In addition to this new visualization, we have prepared some high level observations on the data, as well as some recommendations for how the collection of procurement data can be improved going forward.
Data Quality
Before getting into the analysis, there are several caveats that need to be placed on the numbers and charts. As per all analysis, the accuracy and reliability of the analysis is dependent on the accuracy and reliability of the underlying data[2]. In the case of the procurement data received by Open Data Kosovo, it is apparent that the quality of the data is lacking in several key regards. Open Data Kosovo has attempted to clean and standardize the data as far as possible, but there were assumptions made in this process that may not be accurate. As a result, before any conclusions are drawn from this analysis, any figures or other information should be cross-referenced with the original datasets.
Below are some of the key issues identified with the data as provided to Open Data Kosovo.
Missing Data
One of the biggest issues with the procurement data received by Open Data Kosovo was the information that wasn't provided. A significant proportion of records are missing information about the expected cost of the contract, the amount actually spent, or both. Chart 1 shows the percentage of records missing cost information by municipality and year.
Chart 1 – Percentage of Records Missing Cost Information
Inaccurate figures
Another issue that arises in the data is the quality assurance of the figures that are provided. In numerous cases, figures will have the decimal point in the wrong place or have extra digits, resulting in a project appearing to be greatly over or under budget. In many cases, the projects that show up as bright red in the visualizer were, in all likelihood, on budget but with the information incorrectly recorded. This inaccuracy is not just limited to the monetary amounts though. Many of the dates are also incorrectly recorded, or provided in a variety of formats. This makes the process of standardizing the dates laborious, and in some cases impossible.
Splitting of projects into multiple lots
Large projects are often split into various parts (or 'Lots') for contractors to compete for. In the data this is often observed in the project description where a Lot number will be provided (e.g. Lot I, Lot II). These Lots can also be split over different years. While this splitting of the project into Lots reflects the way the contract was out to tender, the way the data is currently recorded makes it very difficult to put the various pieces back together for a given project. This splitting also introduces ambiguity into the costs for those projects. Is the estimated cost for the entire project or for that lot specifically? Is the actual cost for this year only, or for work across multiple years?
High Level Analysis
Due to the aforementioned data quality issues, in depth analysis of the data is difficult and is at particular risk of leading to misleading conclusions (GIGO). As a result, we have limited the analysis of the data to high level aggregates. Below are some of these observations.
Decreasing Spending
One of the first trends that emerges from the procurement data is that spending on procurement has declined significantly since 2011 and 2012. Total procurement spending has fallen by around 44% from over €58 million in 2012 to just under €33 million in 2014. This fall is obvious both at an absolute level (see Chart 2) and on a per project level (see Chart 3)
Chart 2 – Total Procurement Spend by Municipality and Year
Chart 3 – Average Spend per Contract by Municipality and Year
Funding Sources
Many of the procurements provided in the data provide a source for the contract funding, whether the local municipal budget, donations, the national budget or some combination of these sources. Chart 4 shows the breakdown of procurement spending by funding source from 2010 to 2014.
Chart 4 – Procurement Spending by Funding Source
Project types
Procurement data is also provided with a flag as to what type of contract the procurement is. This can be a contract for work (i.e. construction), the supply of food and beverages, or a range of other services. The breakdown in spending based on the type of contract is provided in Chart 5.
Chart 5 – Procurement Spending by Contract Type
Procurement data can be extremely valuable resource in any country, and not just for the fight against corruption. It can provide important insights for the citizenry into how public funds are being spent, how much the government is paying for its projects, and even provide incentives for increased competition for government contracts. All these things improve confidence in government activities and encourage more competitive tender processes.
However, for the procurement data being collected to be a valuable resource, the data needs to meet some basic standards. When procurement data is lacking certain data points or the figures provided are unreliable, using the data becomes exponentially more difficult, and often makes it impossible for analysts to draw meaningful conclusions from.
Having spent a significant time analyzing procurement data, Open Data Kosovo would make the following recommendations for future collections of procurement data to ensure full transparency:
 1. Basic data quality be enforced. This should include:
 1. Dates entered are valid dates and correspond to the correct year
 2. Values are valid values and that large discrepancies between estimated and actual cost be flagged for confirmation
 3. Key fields be made compulsory for data submission
 2. Training be provided to ensure consistent interpretation of the data across municipalities. Although many/most municipalities are currently employing the same form to collect procurement data, there appears to be different interpretations being employed to complete the forms in many cases. This makes it difficult to make comparisons across municipalities.
 3. A systematic way of linking projects that are split into various Lots be provided. This should allow the estimated and actual costs to be accurately compared for the full project or various slices of the project as needed.
 4. A link be created between the procurement data and the original business case. This would allow detailed information about the project to be linked directly to the procurement data.
 5. A link be created between the procurement data and the business register for contracts won and bid for (see point 6). This will provide several benefits:
 1. It will ensure consistency of the company/individual name (and other information)
 2. It will allow richer information to be extracted without requiring duplicate data entry
 3. It will ensure that all bidders are correctly registered as businesses in Kosovo
 6. Information about all bidders be recorded and released. Often the most important information in identifying procurement fraud is the bids that were not accepted.
A Further Note on Linking
Expanding on the notion of linking datasets above, one of the most effective ways to increase the usefulness and power of data is to link existing datasets together. Data or Record Linkage is one of the emerging areas of data science and machine learning due to the valuable insights that can be revealed from the joining of existing data. When considering the the collection of a new dataset, one of the most important decisions to be made is how that new dataset should be linked with any existing datasets.
In the case of procurement data, there are several existing databases and data points that would greatly improve the utility of the data. Linking to the business register would help to not only standardize company names, but provide the ability for future researches to look beyond company names to the people who benefit from the economic activities of the company. Linking to the business cases for each procurement would not only provide richer information about the project, but also information on who was involved in creating the business case and who signed off on it. These linkages and others that may not even be apparent at present could prove to be of great importance in the future.
Date published
December 15, 2019


text:
The following grade 4 multiple-choice question assesses the skill of "identifying and describing" in the content area, "What are the roles of citizens in American democracy?" The percentages below the question indicate how students performed on the question. In addition to the overall percentage of students who answered the question correctly, the percentage of students at each achievement level who answered the question correctly is presented.
As an example of how to interpret these percentages, 75 percent of the students overall answered this question correctly. When only the students in the Proficient category are considered, 94 percent answered correctly.
See more about this question in the NAEP Questions Tool.
View this question, at score 145, on a map of NAEP civics items.


text:
A dreamteacher is a specialized type of virtual reality computer software that enables M'rowans (and, as it turns out, humans) to improve or learn new skills or languages while sleeping by creating dreams of situations designed to teach and allow the user to reflect on the skill in question.
Dreamteachers are best suited to teach mental or knowledge-based skills. Primarily physical skills, such as combat or sports, can be taught up to a point by (in a sense) 'programming' the user's nervous system, it is ultimately not a replacement for actual training of such skills.
The dreamteacher software requires a direct connection to the user's brain, which is usually established through a special helmet-like accessory; individuals with an implant computer and a neural jack or wireless connection do not need such equipment, though. In addition, the software can be fairly demanding in computer requirements – for less advanced skills, a personal computer will suffice, while more complex fields require a microframe or even a mainframe computer.


In a couple of weeks I will be doing a some workshops at my daughter's junior high school. I want an easy, fun project/technique that girls and boys might like... The school is very community and service oriented, so a recycled/re-use project fits the school theme. I will teach the kids to use soda can metal sheet to make pendant bases that can be embellished with wire lacing and beads. (and I will stealthily give the kids some lacing practice - most kids nowadays cannot even sew a simple seam!)
- empty, clean soda pop can
- craft scissors (NOT your good sewing scissors) or tin snips
- coarse sandpaper (120-180 grit) or cheap emory boards (nail files)
- wire - from craft store, salvaged from tranformer winding or magnet wire anything between 32 and 24 gauge will work.
- awl
- wire cutter
- small pliersround and/or flat nose/chain nose or needle nose
- stack of news paper or mat to protect work surface from the awls
- tape - anything cheap and removable
- leftover seed beeds or bugle beads (optional)
- pattern shape or template (optional)
Step 1: Preparing the Pendant Blank
1. Wash and rinse soda pop can.
Remember to BE CAREFUL OF SHARP EDGES - hold metal by the center, not by the sharp edges.
2. Cut off the top and bottom with a craft/'junk' scissors or wire snipper. Slit side of can to make a flat sheet of metal foil.
3. Find some kind of pattern shape - plastic bottle lid, square of card board, small cookie cutter etc.
4. Decide if you want a plain silver pendant - use the inside surface of the can. Or, find an interest part of the outside of the can design.
5. Trace around your template with a pencil (faint line is fine, just enough to see the cutting line).
6. Neatly cut around outline. Lightly sand any sharp edges.
Step 2: Punch Lacing Holes
Decide what kind of lacing design you want to use. Easiest is to punch hole all around the edge and do a simple over cast lacing edge.
1. Set up punching surface - get a thick pad of newspaper or self-healing plastic cutting mat
2. Decide hole pattern. Holes should be at least 1/8 inch (2.5-3 mm) from the outer edge and about 1/8th-3/16th inch (3-4 mm) apart. You can use wider hole spacing as needed. For example, the ying-yang pendant has a lacing hole in the center.
3. Use an awl (or sharp nail) to unch holes from the top side. To help with even hole spacing, you can divide your shape into quadrants and punch a hole to bisect each section. Repeat to desired hole spacing. Flip metal over and re-punch the holes from the back side - wiggle the awl to press down some of the sharp edges.
4. Sand the back side with coarse sand paper or emory board. Remove enough material so no one will get cut or poked by the punched metal. I don't usually sand the holes completely flat, mainly to save time.
Step 3: Lace Wire Around the Pendant Edge
1. Select your wire color/type: note that enameled wire can be scratched as it is threaded through the holes.
2. Select optional beads to thread onto the lacing wire.
3. Simplest method is to overcast the edge. Lace wire through one hole and bend to secure (leave 1/2-1 inches of wire to secure the opposite end when you are done lacing). Thread any optional beads onto the wire. Lace wire over the outer edge and up through the next hole (from the bottom side). Pull wire snug - be careful not to kink the wire. Use your finger or pliers to keep wire in a nice loop as you pull it tight. Repeat as needed.
4. If you want a solid line of beads, use a back stitch and go trhough the same hole twice. From bottom side, skip to second hole and pull thread to the top, add bead and go down through the previous skipped hole. Skip to next second hole, repeat. This is how I did the center of the Peace symbol pendant.
hint: use CAUTION, but bugle beads can be cut/broken with a scissors to whatever length you need to complete your design. Grasp one end of bugle bead, put bead in a plastic or paper bag to catch broken glass, and gently squeeze the bead with the scissors until the bead cracks. BE CAREFUL OF BROKEN GLASS PIECES - make sure they all end up in the bag. Sand the broken end of the bead to remove any sharp edges.
5. Lace as desired to complete design. When you are done, twist wire ends together and form bail to hang your pendant. Wrap wire around itself to secure the end (or lace it back through a few holes). - SAFETY TIP - hold excess wire in one hand while you cut the wire, this prevents wire bits from flying around and possibly into your eyes etc. Carefully trim wire for a neat and finished look.
Step 4: Optional Embellishment
Wire frame with heavy wire bail:
Use a heavier gauge wire to form a a bail for your pendant. Then bend the wire to form a frame around your piece. Temporarily secure one end of the wire with tape. Gently bend wire to follow the outer edge of your shape. Leave some extra wire to finish off ends. Use a finer gauge wire to'sew' or lace the wire frame to the base shape. WATCH for kinks!
Use permanent markers (Sharpies etc.), paint or alcohol inks to add color and/or details to your design as I have done in the yin-yang example/
Beaded edge:
Lace beads onto wire, attach one end. Use thinner wire to secure beaded wire - just like the wire frame method.
great :D i like the one with the ying-yang & the peace sign :)very cool!
These are really cool, great job!
Nice, I like the yin-yang one.
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This limited-edition, signed-and-numbered muliple by the acclaimed contemporary artist Robert Gober relates to an unsigned edition Gober created for Esopus subscribers in 2012.
Robert Gober (born September 12, 1954, Wallingford, Connecticut, U.S.), American sculptor and installation artist known for his eerie and evocative reconsiderations of everyday objects. His common motifs include the human body and domestic objects, with which he examined, often with humour, such notions as religion, sexuality, childhood, and change. Gober studied at Middlebury College (1972–76), spending his junior year abroad at the Tyler School in Rome, before settling in New York City. After a brief period as a painter, he drew notice in the 1980s with a series of haunting sculptures loosely based on the forms of household items such as sinks, drains, and playpens. Gober carried these ideas further in sculptures and installations that commingled the familiar with the strange. In 1999, Gober was awarded the Skowhegan Medal for Sculpture by the Skowhegan School of Painting and Sculpture in Maine. He participated in the 2001 Venice Biennale and was the subject of a retrospective in 2007 at the Schaulager Museum in Basel, Switzerland. In 2014, the Museum of Modern Art in New York organized a major survey of his work, the first of its kind in the United States. Based in New York City, Gober is represented by Matthew Marks Gallery.


Overcome Controlling Behavior
Controlling behavior can get out of control and is negatively affecting the people around them. However, once a person realizes this, they can start figuring out why they are so controlling and how to overcoming this behavior.
The first step to working on your controlling behavior is to realize how and when you are controlling. Make a list of when you have been controlling and situations where this behavior is amplified. Ask family members and friends for help with this list-part of the battle is to know when you're acting this way.
When you are controlling around loved ones, ask them to come up with a code word that will help you notice your behavior. This will help you become more aware of your surroundings and patterns in your behavior.
Consider why you like things a certain way or why you are exhibiting controlling behavior. The best relationship advice is to work towards having a equal relationship with your loved ones-this is a time to consider not only how your controlling behavior is affecting the people in your life but where this behavior comes from.
Brainstorm ways to work through your controlling behavior. When you feel the need to correct someone or to ask about their plans, instead give them a compliment or count to ten so that you can think about whether you really need to say what you're thinking. A lot of people are controlling because they are anxious or angry, so when you feel a spell coming on, take a time out, squeeze a stress ball or try wearing a rubber band around your wrist so that you can play with it instead of falling into old behaviors.
If you feel as if you can not deal with your controlling behavior, consider counseling. You may need professional help to cope with a lifetime of controlling behavior. It just might help you keep your loved ones from running away from you.
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text:
La Verne Magazine
Orange Picking Season
by Julia Carachure
photography by Tom Galaraga
A taste of the citrus industry still exists in a small corner of the city.
Bonnie Brunell, secretary-treasurer of the Heritage Foundation, is a planning
committee member for the annual Heritage Park orange picking season event.
Oranges adorn the trees like Christmas decorations. Smudge pots that
used to heat the oranges on cold nights now sit unused beneath the trees.
A thermometer hangs nearby on a post, indicating the temperature that was
once crucial in making sure the oranges would not freeze and remained in
good condition before being shipped around the world.
Welcome to the last remaining orange grove in the city of La Verne:
Heritage Park. For residents, this is an opportunity to take a glance at
what was once the economic livelihood of the city. Residents get the opportunity
to pick oranges for $4 per bag, $6 for two bags from the first Saturday
in January until the last Saturday in March.
However, that was not always the case. Instead of one orange grove,
there was a virtual sea of orange groves spreading across the valley. The
trees lapped up to the foothills--a virtual green belt that defined Southern
California. La Verne was not alone. From the 1870s to the 1970s, most of
Southern California's cities were dedicated to the citrus industry. Residents'
lives revolved around the growing, packing and shipping of oranges that
were shipped to discerning consumers throughout the nation-and even the
world. Converging causes resulted in the industry's end: a virus called
"Quick Decline" destroyed the trees' roots; smog affected the
pollination process; but most significantly, the demand for area housing
made agricultural land more valuable for housing tracts than for orange
groves. By the late 1970s, the groves were being bulldozed at a phenomenal
Bonnie Brunell, secretary-treasurer of the Heritage Foundation, explains
why Heritage Grove is an important La Verne park. "It gives the community
an opportunity to see what it was like in the past. This whole area at one
time was citrus. This is one of the last orange groves left that people
can come in and actually pick their own oranges."
Brunell adds, "Some of the equipment that is around, like the smudge
pots, gives an idea of what it was like in the past. That is what we are
trying to do-to preserve that opportunity for the community and to give
them a chance to see the Weber House."
Kyle Bennett, 7, finds pleasure in the orange picking job.
Founded in 1984 by Craig Walters, then a city councilman for La Verne,
the Heritage Foundation was established for that purpose. Having grown up
in the area, Walters was determined to save the last remnants from the citrus
period in La Verne. An agreement was reached with a housing developer to
gain a large tract of land north of Baseline for that purpose.
Next to the orange grove is the small two-story 1894 Weber farm house.
Originally located about a mile south, the house was moved to its present
site and repaired by Heritage Foundation volunteers. There were holes in
the floor, the roof needed repair, many of the chimney bricks were missing
and the windows were broken. Now finished, the house is open only for elementary
school history tours. The children are allowed to see only the kitchen and
the living room. The upstairs area is blocked off. Currently, the Heritage
Foundation uses one of its rooms as an office. Another building on the property
is the Sloan barn-once located at Emerald Avenue and Baseline Road-is used
for equipment storage. A public restroom is located in the structure.
The "Orange Squeeze" is a two-year March tradition where elementary
school students tour the grounds and see a demonstration on how a smudge
pot works. A tractor ride takes the children around the grove, and, of course,
the children squeeze their own oranges and drink the freshly squeezed orange
Participating in the Citrus Tradition at Heritage Park
On a beautiful Saturday morning in March, the sun is shining brightly,
and wisps of clouds are lightly scattered in the sky. It is the kind of
morning that makes a person want to go to the beach, ride a bike or maybe
just stop by Heritage Park to pick some oranges.
The first two visitors this morning, Brian Bennett and his 7-year-old
son Kyle, are ready to pluck oranges to take home with them. "Give
me a plumb juicy one," says Brian to his son. Kyle walks around, dressed
in a T-shirt and jeans, wearing tennis shoes. Gloves cover his small hands,
which are holding an orange picker, ready to pull an orange to add to their
bag. Brian follows closely, and at the same time, he shows his son which
oranges to pick, and which ones to leave on the tree to keep developing.
He warns Kyle not to pick up the oranges that are lying on the ground
because no one knows how long they have been there. His father tells him
to pick oranges on the bottom branches of the tree. Kyle, having the advantage
of simply walking under the trees because he is small, walks around calmly
and pulls off oranges oneby-one. "It's fun picking these," says
Brian. At one point, he pulls an orange off, and part of the branch comes
along with it. Brian, with clippers in one hand, grabs the orange from his
son to check that he leaves a little bit of the stem on the orange, carefully
cuts the branch off and places it in the bag. He warns Kyle not to pick
the green oranges that are hanging highly on the tree since they are not
ripe enough. After a while, both father and son manage to pick all the oranges
they will take home with them that day. They are satisfied with their choice
Brian found out about the orange picking season through the city newsletter
and has been coming to pick oranges ever since. "We were just sitting
around home today, my wife has to work today so I was asking him [Kyle]
and giving him a list of things to do today and he said that orange picking
is what he wanted to do, right?" he says, turning to look at his son.
"Right," says Kyle, who is busy walking on a tree log that is
on the property.
While the citrus industry has ceased to exist, it is refreshing to find
one place where people can step into the past and remember a time when growing
oranges was once a way of life.
The Weber House was moved to its present site and refurbished by Heritage


text:
Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
In mathematics, a monomial is a particular kind of polynomial, having just one term. Given a natural number n and a variable x, the power function defined by the rule f(x)=xn is therefore a monomial. Given several unknown variables (say, x, y, z) and corresponding natural number exponents (say, a, b, c), the product of the resulting univariate monomials is also a monomial (e.g., the function determined by the rule f(x)=xaybzc).
If coefficients are allowed (this may not be consistent), then a constant multiple of a monomial is also counted as a monomial (e.g., 7xaybzc).
The most obvious fact about monomials is that any polynomial is a linear combination of them, so they can serve as basis vectors in a vector space of polynomials - a fact of constant implicit use in mathematics. An interesting fact from functional analysis is that the full set of monomials tn is not required to span a linear subspace of C[0,1] that is dense for the uniform norm (sharpening the Stone-Weierstrass theorem). It is enough that the sum of the reciprocals n-1 diverge (the Müntz-Szasz theorem ).
- α = (a, b, c)
we can define
- xα = x1a x2b x3c
and save a great deal of space.
In algebraic geometry the varieties defined by monomial equations xα = 0 for some set of α have special properties of homogeneity. This can be phrased in the language of algebraic groups, in terms of the existence of a group action of an algebraic torus (equivalently by a multiplicative group of diagonal matrices). This area is studied under the name of torus embeddings.
See also: binomial.
The contents of this article is licensed from _URL_ under the GNU Free Documentation License. Click here to see the transparent copy and copyright details


Jun 6 2012 10:30am
Who Put Bella in the Wych Elm?: The Crime that Continues to Haunt
Four boys found Bella in a wych elm like this one.April, 1943
It was a chill spring day in the rural Midlands area of England. Four teenaged boys—Thomas Willetts, Bob Farmer, Fred Payne, and Robert Hart—were poaching in the woods. But when Bob Farmer climbed up an old elm tree in search of birds' nests, he found something unexpected. The bundle shoved into the hollow tree would rock their small community—and the tremors from that quake would echo for decades to come.
At first, Farmer thought it was an animal's skull—an opossum, perhaps. But then he noticed the metal fillings in the teeth, the fabric beneath the bones. The boys panicked: they were on the land illegally, after all, and were afraid of being punished for trespassing. They vowed to forget their grisly find and tell no one.
But finding a woman's body shoved into a dead tree isn't exactly something you can forget. After hours of turmoil the youngest boy, Tommy Willetts, confessed everything to his father, who immediately contacted the police.
The full details the Worchestershire County Force gathered in the following day cast very little light on the macabre mystery. The coroner thought the woman had been around 35. She had mousy brown hair, and a malformed lower jaw. There was a cheap gold wedding ring, no more than four years old, and she had given birth at least once.
There was also taffeta shoved deep into her mouth, and one hand had been severed and buried at the foot of the tree. The coroner declared cause of death asphyxiation and estimated the time of death to be around October of 1941, a year and a half before her body's discovery.
For such a small, rural community, the find in the woods was mind-boggling. She couldn't possibly be a local, where people knew their neighbors going back generations. But what had she been doing in the Hagley Woods? Where had she come from? Who was she?
By Christmas, someone had given her a name. The first message, written in large blocky letters in white chalk, said WHO PUT LUEBELLA DOWN THE WYCH-ELM? In the following weeks, the graffiti changed into WHO PUT BELLA IN THE WYCH ELM?—and so it has remained for over six decades.
Police never discovered who the mysterious writer was, and why they wished to call so much attention to the strange case; but it was widely agreed that the message was consistently written by the same hand. If the graffitist had known something about the woman, he or she never stepped forward to help the investigation, which quickly went cold.
They never discovered the identity of Bella.Despite a detailed description of the woman compiled by the coroner, no one could remember ever seeing her in the area. She had extremely distinctive teeth, and yet no matching dental records could be found anywhere.
In the months immediately following the discovery, theories began to circulate in local gossip. Professor Margaret Murray of University College in London posited that "Bella's" death resembled a black magic execution, and suggested witches were responsible. Murray argued that the severed hand was the definitive clue, and cited the "Hand of Glory" practice, where a hand would be severed from a hanged criminal and used for a variety of magical purposes.
And to be sure, the severed hand was an unusual detail. Why would a murderer suffocate a woman, then cut off her hand before shoving her body into a tree and burying the limb amidst the roots? There was no logic behind it, unless one believed Murray's witch theory.
The next theory to surface was slightly more plausible in the eyes of the police. It was ten years later, and a columnist named Byford-Jones had begun writing a series of articles about the mystery. Not long after the articles ran, a letter arrived for Byford-Jones. A woman, who signed the letter ANNA, Claverly, claimed to have information about the murder.
According to this "Anna", Bella was actually a foreign spy who had been part of a ring scouting out munitions factories in the area and reporting back to the Luftwaffe. Bella was Dutch, Anna claimed, and had accidentally learned too much about a British officer who was a mole involved in the spy ring. In order to guarantee her silence, the officer and another spy killed Bella before dumping her body in the woods.
The letter even went so far as to name the officer, but further investigation revealed that he had died in a mental ward in 1942, mere months after Bella's murder. Still, some of Anna's facts were verified by MI5, and another writer investigating the situation later published a book claiming that a Dutch spy named Johannes Dronkers—who was executed by the British in 1942—had a wife named Clarabella who was in her 30s and had unusual teeth. A wife who had disappeared prior to his capture...
When all of this came to light, the public became convinced that Bella had either been a spy or mixed up with spies. And when it emerged that her skeleton had disappeared from the Birmingham University Medical School, an outcry of conspiracy and cover-up began.
There were other theories, of course: that Bella was a prostitute who had picked up the wrong john, that she had been a refugee fleeing the Blitz and had met a rapist in the woods, that she was a gypsy murdered by her tribe for some horrible misdeed. But for the people around Hagley Woods, the first two theories still held the most weight.
Was Bella a witch, or a sacrifice in a black magic ceremony? Was she a spy working for the Germans, or simply someone who had learned too much about them?
The case is still open, though it has long since gone cold. With the body missing and over six decades between the murder and today, the only thing that is clear is that the chances of anyone uncovering Bella's true identity and that of her murderer are so slim as to be impossible. Just as we may never be sure of Jack the Ripper's identity, so too will Bella become a figure of myth and folklore.
But perhaps someone still knows something. Last year, the graffiti appeared again after years of nothing. WHO PUT BELLA IN THE WYCH ELM? was scrawled across a 200-year-old obelisk on the Hagley Estate. It could be nothing—the work of teenaged pranksters.
The question, though, continues to haunt.
Read all posts by Angie Barry at Criminal Element.
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1. Stephanie R.
Such a horrifying, fascinating crime.
2. Bella
Her body is in the well at Rosemary Cottage, Pedmore lane which is where bella used to live.
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This question is a derivative of a previous question: Source control - How to version resources that are shared across projects
I have a project that contains code that is consumed by many other projects. Specifically, one folder in this parent project has been branched to dependent child projects.
We have since made changes in the parent project and checked them in. In Source Control Explorer, I right click on the branched folder in the parent project and select "Merge", intending to push the changes to a dependent project. I select the child project as a destination and then select "Latest Version". The wizard informs me "There are no changes to merge."
From my perspective, this isn't true, since the recently updated files are clearly different.
Is there a fundamental misunderstanding of the merge process in TFS here? What do I need to do differently?
share|improve this question
2 Answers 2
up vote 17 down vote accepted
The TFS merge engine relies almost entirely on history, not file contents. This makes it efficient for very large trees, and flexible for tasks like safely cherry-picking changes -- but it also makes answering your question difficult.
The first step is to understand the diagnostic commands tf history, tf merges, and tf merge /candidate. Here is a good introduction:
If you are new to branching & merging in TFS then your history is probably not very complex. I think it's likely you'll find your answer with one quick call to tf merges. However, tracing merge history can become extremely convoluted in the general case, so if you have trouble feel free to post back with more details.
share|improve this answer
Go to one specific file you know has changed in your "parent" project. Try merging just that file. Don't check anything in; just see what happens.
Something to watch for: The merge tools will not include files that have been added after you branch. You have to branch new files explicitly before you can merge any further changes. If a file is added to both parent and child folders without using a branch operation, the merge tools don't treat them as versions of the same file (and you can't merge changes between them).
share|improve this answer
Corrections: * Newly added files do not have a merge relationship with other branches until they're themselves branched = TRUE. (note: can be a "branch, delete") * The workaround is to merge the specific file = FALSE. Won't work. Correct answer is to merge a parent that does have a relationship. * Files added to both branches in parallel will not merge = FIXED IN 2008. See #1-2 from… - but note that if the contents don't match, you're stuck with a version conflict that has no "base" info; merging will be a pain. – Richard Berg Jun 11 '09 at 23:22
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text:
Picea rubens Sarg.
Red spruce is in the pine family (Panaceae) and is the only spruce naturally occurring in Maryland ². It typically grows to 75 feet in the northern portions of its range, but may reach 110 feet in the Appalachian Mountains ¹. The bark is grayish to reddish-brown and is less than one-half inch thick. The needles are borne singly on small pegs along the branch ². Each needle is one-half to five-eights inch long and is four-sided or square in cross section ³. The needles are yellow-green and sharp pointed. Male and female cones are produced on the same tree. The female cones mature at the end of the second summer and are 1.5 inches long ¹. The cone scales lack prickles.
Trunk of red spruce. J. Emm, Maryland Biodiversity Project ²
Aspect of red spruce in Maryland. B. Hubick, Maryland Biodiversity Project ²
Needles of red spruce. J. Emm, Maryland Biodiversity Project ²
Cones of red spruce. K. Kanoti ³
Red spruce can be found from the Canadian provinces of Nova Scotia and Southern Quebec to Eastern Ontario. It is found throughout Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire and in Eastern New York. Scattered populations occur along the Appalachian Mountain peaks to North Carolina ¹. It is located solely in far western Maryland in Garrett and Allegheny Counties ². It's range is characterized by cold winters with an average of 100 to 140 days of snow cover and 0 to 8 F minimum temperatures and by cool summers with maximum temperatures below 80 F ¹.
Native range of red spruce. Wikimedia Commons 4
Spruce forests provide habitats for numerous birds and mammals ¹. White-winged Crossbills and Spruce Grouse rely on red spruce for food. Small mammals such as American Red Squirrels and voles rely on its seed. The habitat created by spruce forests are used by numerous animals including White-tailed Deer, American Marten, Snowshoe Hare, and Canada Lynx for winter habitat 7.
Because of the wood has high elasticity and uniform texture, red spruce is widely used for construction of musical instruments such as violins, guitars and piano sounding boards ³.
Red spruce populations in the central Appalachian Mountains have been reduced by 90% due to logging ². It is also susceptible to air pollution ³. It is intolerant of fire ¹. Spruce budworm, Choristoneura fumiferana, is the most important damaging insect ¹. Other harmful insects include the spruce budworm and sawfly larva ¹.
- An exudate from the trunks, spruce gum, was the basis for the chewing gum industry in the latter half of the 19th century and the early 20th century ¹.
- Humans may develop a rash from the sawdust of red spruce ³.
- The National Champion red spruce is in Giles County, Virginia with a height of 115 feet and a diameter of 52.5 inches as last measured in 2013 5.
- A red spruce was the National Christmas Tree for 2022. It was a 78-foot tree selected from North Carolina 6.
- USDA Forest Service Silvics, Vol. 1–Gymnosperms: Picea rubens
- Maryland Biodiversity Project: Picea rubens
- North Carolina State Extension: Picea rubens
- Wikimedia Commons: Picea rubens
- American Forests: Picea rubens
- USDA Forest Service: Introducing Ruby the Red Spruce:…
- New England Forestry Foundation: Meet the red spruce
Contributed by J. Hull


manhunts in military history
Norwegian Foreign Minister Ine Eriksen Soereide
The Russian Embassy in Oslo was not available for comment.
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
Scientists want to give you artificial, robot muscles
Remember that LS3 Mule robot the Marines tested but then decided against deploying because it was just too noisy for use on the frontlines? That was sort of crazy, right? But Army researchers are doing a large amount of work to make quiet, robotic muscles to reinforce soldiers, exoskeletons, and robots of the future.
LS3 Robotic Pack Mule Field Testing by US Military
It might sound sort of odd that the servos on a robot could be too noisy for the place where mortars and machine guns are fired. But Marines and soldiers try to stay quiet and stealthy until the fight starts. Then they start firing, and it's fine to be super noisy. But a new problem pops up, then: you don't want any systems to run out of power in the middle of a firefight. And firefights are some of the worst times to change out batteries. You need to be efficient.
But those two problems with the Legged Squad Support System, as the robot program was officially known, could be fixed with one—albeit major—breakthrough. Humans can move without any sound of motors and can go for days or even weeks when necessary with little new energy input. All it takes is muscles instead of motors.
And muscles can use chemical fuels much more efficiently than most motors and other machines. A gallon of gasoline contains 31,000 calories, enough to propel a fit human 912 miles on the bicycle or 260 miles running.
Muscles are very efficient both in terms of energy consumed and weight. That makes them very attractive to engineers, especially ones that need to make stealthy machines.
And scientists are working on that. So, yeah, welcome to the future.
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
A graphic shows how proteins are structured.
(U.S. Army-Shutterstock)
The Army Research Laboratory has recently highlighted two related tracks that scientists are currently moving down. One group of researchers is focusing on a much better understanding of how human muscles work, and other scientists just enjoyed a 10-day visit from a professor who helped them understand how polymer, or plastic, strands can be made to coil and uncoil like a muscle, to function like a muscle.
So, the first group is seeking to reverse engineer biological muscles, and that second group is basically studying ways of making plastic muscles.
BTW, if that first group sounds like a bunch of flunkies, "How do they not know how muscles work? I eat carbohydrates and proteins, and I get bigger muscles. Not complicated," then realize that none of us know how muscles really work on a micro level, the level needed to really engineer a muscle. One of the researchers put it well. Dean Culver said:
Both the projects would result in chemically powered muscles. One group would just create the muscle "fibers" out of plastic instead of proteins. Either way, future warriors could use the extra muscles from the scientists.
But the science is still in the nascent stages, so the real muscle suits probably won't be available until you need them more for getting around the retirement home than the battlefield.
Until then, you can always get a sweet Halloween muscle suit instead.
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
The F-35B Lightning II
(U.S. Marine Corps photo)
This article originally appeared on Follow on Twitter.
Also read: Here's how McMaster differs from Flynn on Russia
He added, "We're awaiting decisions."
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
Wounded Warrior Project reportedly accused of wasting donor money
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
Commandant says he won't force out Marines as the service shrinks
Tank Marines and other leathernecks in specialties that won't play a role in the service's future will get the option of transferring to another branch or military occupational specialty, the Corps' top general said this week.
Commandant Gen. David Berger spoke to reporters Wednesday about the long-awaited force-redesign plans. One of the biggest changes to the future Marine Corps of 2030 will be its size. The total number of personnel will drop by 16,000 over the next 10 years to a 170,000-person force.
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
That includes ditching its tank battalions, law-enforcement units and bridging companies. The Marine Corps will also drop its total number of infantry battalions and cut several aviation squadrons as it shifts its focus toward countering China in the Asia-Pacific region.
Marines won't face the same hardships some endured during the post-war drawdown though, when thousands were cut from the ranks. This change, Berger said, "is intentionally drawn out over time so we can make the right decisions."
"No one's getting a pink slip saying time to go home," the commandant said. "… We're not forcing anybody out."
The Marine Corps will rely on attrition to shed personnel from the ranks, Berger added.
"In other words, people [will be] out as they normally would," he said. "We might recruit less … but there's no intent at this point to issue a whole bunch of go-home cards for Marines."
The Marine Corps got rid of about 20,000 people over four years starting in 2012. It involved putting sometimes-painful involuntary separation plans in place that cut short some people's hopes of making the Marine Corps their career.
Berger said Marines affected by the changes in the force redesign will "have some choice" in what happens next. That will depend on where they are in their careers though, he said.
The 8 most famous manhunts in military history
"They can choose another military specialty to go into; they can, in some instances, make a transfer to another service," Berger said.
Some may be eligible to move into career fields that don't exist yet.
"We are fielding new capabilities that we don't have right now, so we will need Marines in specialties that we either don't have at all or we don't have nearly in the numbers that we're going to need," the commandant said.
The Marine Corps plans to spend money it will save on having fewer personnel and ditching some aging equipment on new capabilities. The service will invest in equipment for long-range precision fires, new air-defense systems and unmanned aircraft, among other things.
The Marine Corps carried out a series of war games that showed areas where it can cut some existing capabilities, a 15-page memo on the force design states.
When it comes to tanks, the Marine Corps found "sufficient evidence to conclude that this capability, despite its long and honorable history in the wars of the past, is operationally unsuitable for our highest-priority challenge," the report adds.
"Heavy ground armor capability will continue to be provided by the U.S. Army."
This article originally appeared on Follow _USER_ on Twitter.
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text:
Mityana, Uganda, a rural village west of Kampala
2001, by Christopher Kigongo, a Ugandan physician
Their story: As the Director of health education for the country of Uganda, Dr. Christopher Kigongo was well aware of the AIDS statistics for his country. Not content to just script health education messages, he wanted to provide practical care for the children in his home village who were struggling because of the effects of AIDS on their families and the economy. Many children were leaving school to look for petty jobs to help feed themselves and their families, often putting themselves at risk of HIV infection, other sexually transmitted diseases, and teen pregnancy. Dr. Kigongo started Naama Millennium School to provide affordable education and basic nutrition and shelter for those most in need. The school began in 2001 with 77 children and 5 teachers. By 2006 it had 321 students, 10 teachers and 2 support staff. The number of children who had lost one or both parents increased from 13 to 113.


text:
AN INTERNATIONAL team led by researchers at the King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) has identified genes that confer resistance to multiple leaf rust species in barley. Simon Krattinger from KAUST's Center for Desert Agriculture refers to their findings as nonhost resistance, the resistance of an entire species against all strains of a pathogen.
Cereal-rust relationship is ideal for studying non-host resistance because all cereals belong to the grass family, but each cereal crop species is infected by only one specific rust (for example, wheat leaf rust only infects wheat). Molecular factors in barley prevent wheat leaf rust from establishing colonies; thus, pinpointing the genes responsible for generating this molecular barrier to infection would be invaluable for breeders.
All barley cultivars are resistant to leaf rusts of other cereals; therefore, there is no clear genetic variation within barley species that might indicate which genes are involved. KAUST's collaborators in the Netherlands infected 1,733 barley cultivars with wheat leaf rust. They found that most plants were resistant, but a few lines developed hints of leaf rust at the seedling stage. The team was able to crossbreed these lines to generate one line that was highly susceptible to wheat leaf rust which was then crossed with a normal barley cultivar and analyzed to pinpoint the genetic variations conferring non-host resistance.


text:
Charleroi was built in 1666 by the Spaniards and named after Charles II, king of Spain, only a 4-year-old child when he was placed on the Spanish throne after the death of his father Philip IV.
The following year, the fortress was taken by French armies and it was under French occupation. Fortifications were completed and extended by Vauban.
Louis XIV, who wanted to promote the development of the new town, granted its inhabitants privileges.
In 1678, under the treaty of Nijmegen, Charleroi was given back to Spain.
A first industrial change based on coal, iron, and glass industries brought about a rise in Charleroi's population.