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Back in March I wrote Proofs of Space, analyzing Bram Cohen's fascinating EE380 talk. I've now learned more about Chia Network, the company that is implementing a network using his methods. Below the fold I look into their prospects.
Chia Network's blockchain
First, it is important to observe that, although Proofs of Space and Time are important for distributed storage networks such as FileCoin's, this is not what Chia Network is using Cohen's Proofs of Space and Proofs of Time (Verifiable Delay Functions VDF) for. Instead, they are using them as a replacement for Proof of Work in blockchains such as Bitcoin's. Here is the brief explanation of how they would be used I wrote in Proofs of Space:
As I understand it, the proof of space technique in essence works by having the prover fill storage space with an array of pseudo-random points in [0,1] (a plot) via a time-consuming process. The verifier can then pose to the prover a question that can be answered either by a single storage access (fast) or by repeating the process of filling the storage (slow). By observing the time the prover takes the verifier can distinguish these two cases, and thus be assured that the prover has stored the (otherwise useless) data.
As I understand it, verifiable delay functions work by forcing the prover to perform a specified number of iterations to generate a value that the verifier can quickly show is valid.
To use in a blockchain, each block is a proof of space followed by a proof of time which finalizes it.
To find a proof of space, take the hash of the last proof of time, put it on a point in [0,1], find the closest proof of space you can to that.
To find the number of iterations of the proof of time, multiply the difference between those two positions by the current work difficulty factor and round up to the next integer.
The result of this is that the best proof of space will finish first, with the distribution of arrival times of finalizations the same as happens in a proof of work system if resources are fixed over time.
The only discretion left on the part of farmers is whether to withhold their winning proofs of space.
In other words, the winning verification of a block will be the one from the peer whose plot contains the closest point, because that distance controls how long it will take for the peer to return its verification via the verifiable delay function. The more storage a peer devotes to its plot, and thus the shorter the average distance between points, the more likely it is to be the winner because its proof of space will suffer the shortest delay.
There are a number of additional points that need to be understood:
The process of filling storage with pseudo-random points must be slow enough that a peer cannot simulate extra storage by re-filling the limited storage it has with a new array of points. The process is presumably linear in the size of the storage to be filled, in the speed of the CPU, and in the write bandwidth of the storage medium. But since it is done only once, the slowness doesn't impair the Proof of Space time.
The delay imposed by the Proof of Time must be orders of magnitude longer than the read latency of the storage medium, so that slow storage is not penalized, and fast storage such as SSDs are not advantaged.
The process of filling storage has to be designed so that it is impossible to perform iterative refinement, in which a small amount of permanent storage is used to find the neighborhood of the target point, then a small amount of storage filled with just that neighborhood, and the process repeated to zero in on the target, hoping that the return in terms of reduced VDF time, exceeds the cost of populating the small neighborhood.
As I understand it, Chia Network's goals are that their blockchain would be more energy efficient, more ASIC-resistant, less centralized, and more secure than Proof of Work blockchains. Given the appalling energy waste of Proof of Work blockchains, even if Chia only managed the first of these it would be a really good thing.
As regards energy efficiency, I believe a peer's duty cycle looks like this:
Compute 1 hash, consuming infinitesimal energy in the CPU.
Access 1 value from the disk by waking it from standby, doing a seek and a read, and dropping back into standby. This uses little energy.
Do a Proof of Time, which takes a long time with the CPU and RAM using energy, and the disk in standby using perhaps 1W.
So the overall energy consumption of PoSp/VDP depends entirely on the energy consumption of the Proof of Time, the Proof of Space is irrelevant. Two recent papers on VDF are Dan Boneh et al's Verifiable Delay Functions and A Survey of Two Verifiable Delay Functions. The math is beyond me, but I believe their VDFs all involve iterating on a computation in which the output of each iteration is the input for the next, to prevent parallelization. If this is the case, during the Proof of Time one of the CPU's cores will be running flat-out and not using any RAM. Thus I don't see that the energy demands of these VDFs are very different from the energy demands of hashing, as in Proof of Work. So if every peer ran a VDF the Chia network would use as much energy as Bitcoin.
But, as I understand it, this isn't what Chia is planning. Instead, the idea is that there would be a small number of VDF services, to which peers would submit their Proofs of Space. In this way the energy used by the network would be vastly smaller than Bitcoin's.
ASIC resistance
The math of VDFs is based on imposing a number of iterations, not on imposing a delay in wall clock time. There may be an advantage to executing the VDF faster than the next peer. As David Vorick argues:
At the end of the day, you will always be able to create custom hardware that can outperform general purpose hardware. I can't stress enough that everyone I've talked to in favor of ASIC resistance has consistently and substantially underestimated the flexibility that hardware engineers have to design around specific problems, even under a constrained budget. For any algorithm, there will always be a path that custom hardware engineers can take to beat out general purpose hardware. It's a fundamental limitation of general purpose hardware.
Thus one can expect that if the rewards are sufficient, ASICs will be built to speed up any time-consuming algorithm (I agree that Cohen's Proof of Space is unlikely to attract ASICs, since the time it takes is negligible).
I don't know what happens if a VDF service A with ASICs gets a point with distance d and, thanks to the ASICs, announces it significantly before VDF service B without ASIC assistance gets a point with distance d-ε and announces it. In the Bitcoin blockchain, all possible solutions to a block are equally valid. A later, different solution to the block is just later, and thus inferior. But in the Chia blockchain a later solution to the block could be unambiguously better (i.e. provably having performed fewer iterations) if it came from a slower peer. How does the network decide how long to wait for a potentially better solution? If the network doesn't wait long enough, and the rewards are enough, it will attract ASICs.
I believe that Chia hopes that the VDF services will all use ASICs, and thus be close in speed. But there won't be enough VDF servers to make a market for ASICs. Tim Swanson estimates that there are about 3.8M Antminer S9s mining on the Bitcoin blockchain. That's a market for ASICs, but a few 10s isn't. Perhaps FPGAs could be used instead.
Proof of Work blockchains become centralized through the emergence of mining pools:
Bitcoin gives out a block reward, 25 BTC as of today, every 10 minutes on average. This means that a miner whose power is a small fraction of the total mining power is unlikely to win in a very long time. Since this can take years, miners congregate in pools. A pool has a manager, and whenever a participant in the pool finds proof of work, the reward goes to the manager, which distributes it among the participants according to their contribution to the pool.
But the emergence of pools isn't due to Proof of Work, it is a necessary feature of every successful blockchain. Consider a blockchain with a 10-minute block time and 100K equal miners. A miner will receive a reward on average once in 1.9 years. If the average Chia network miner's disk in such a network has a 5-year working life the probability that it will not receive any reward is 2.5%.
This is not a viable sales pitch to miners; they join pools to smooth out their income. Thus, all other things being equal, a successful blockchain would have no more than say 60 equal pools, generating on average a reward every 10 hours.
But all other things are not equal, and this is where Brian Arthur's Increasing Returns and Path Dependence in the Economy comes in. Randomly, one pool will be bigger than the others, and will generate better returns through economies of scale. The better returns will attract miners from other pools, so it will get bigger and generate even better returns, attracting more miners. This feedback loop will continue, as it did with Ghash.io.
Mining Pools 9/1/18
Bitcoin's mining pools are much larger than needed to provide reasonable income smoothing, though the need to retain the appearance of decentralization means that it currently takes 4 pools (two apparently operated by Bitmain) to exceed 51% of the mining power. Presumably economies of scale generating better return on investment account for the additional size. As regards Chia Network's centralization:
Just as with Bitcoin's Proof of Work, farming pools would arise in PoSp/VDF to smooth out income.
What would pools mining a successful Chia Network blockchain look like? Lets assume initially that it is uneconomic to develop ASICs to speed up the VDF. There would appear to be three possible kinds of participants in a pool:
Individuals using the spare space in their desktop PC's disk. The storage for the Proof of Space is effectively "free", but unless these miners joined pools, they would be unlikely to get a reward in the life of the disk.
Individuals buying systems with CPU, RAM and disk solely for mining. The disruption to the user's experience is gone, but now the whole cost of mining has to be covered by the rewards. To smooth out their income, these miners would join pools.
Investors in data-center scale mining pools. Economies of scale would mean that these participants would see better profits for less hassle than the individuals buying systems, so these investor pools would come to dominate the network, replicating the Bitcoin pool centralization.
Thus if Chia's network were to become successful, mining would be dominated by a few large pools. Each pool would run a VDF server to which the pool's participants would submit their Proofs of Space, so that the pool manager could verify their contribution to the pool.
The emergence of pools, and dominance of a small number of pools, has nothing to do with the particular consensus mechanism in use. Thus I am skeptical that alternatives to Proof of Work will significantly reduce centralization of mining in blockchains generally, and in Chia Network's blockchain specifically.
Like Radia Perlman, Eric Budish in The Economic Limits Of Bitcoin And The Blockchain (commentary on it here) observes that:
From a computer security perspective, the key thing to note about (2) is that the security of the blockchain is linear in the amount of expenditure on mining power, ... In contrast, in many other contexts investments in computer security yield convex returns (e.g., traditional uses of cryptography) — analogously to how a lock on a door increases the security of a house by more than the cost of the lock.
Budish shows that the security of a blockchain against a 51% attack depends on the per-block mining reward being large relative to the maximum value of the transactions in a block. Reducing the expenditure on mining makes the blockchain less secure. As I wrote in Cryptocurrencies Have Limits:
Budish combines Equations 1 & 2 to get Equation 3:
Pblock > Vattack⁄α
This inequality expresses the honest equilibrium condition for deterring an outsider's 51% attack (to deter insiders, Pblock has to be twice as big):
the equilibrium per-block payment to miners for running the blockchain must be large relative to the one-off benefits of attacking it. Equation (3) places potentially serious economic constraints on the applicability of the Nakamoto (2008) blockchain innovation. By analogy, imagine if users of the Visa network had to pay fees to Visa, every ten minutes, that were large relative to the value of a successful one-off attack on the Visa network.
This is why, especially with the advent of "mining as a service", 51% attacks on alt-coins have become endemic.
There is nothing specific to Proof of Work in Budish's analysis; the same limit will apply to Chia Network's blockchain. But Cohen hopes to motivate the use of spare space in individual's desktops by keeping mining rewards small. His first slide claims:
As long as rewards are below depreciation value it will be unprofitable to buy storage just for farming
I believe that by depreciation value he means the depreciation of all the storage in the network. Robert Fontana and Gary Decad's 2016 numbers are vendor revenue of $0.039/GB for hard disk. Assuming 5-year straight-line depreciation (262,800 10-minute blocks), the block reward and thus the maximum value of the transactions in a block must be less than $0.15/PB. Kryder's law means this limit will decrease with time.
Note also that it is possible at low cost to rent very large amounts of storage and computation for short periods of time in order to mount a 51% attack on a PoSp/VDP network in the same way that "mining as a service" enables 51% attacks on alt-coins.
For example, a back-of-the-envelope computation of a hour-long Petabyte attack at Amazon would start by using about 7 days of AWS Free Tier to write the data to the sc1 version of Elastic Block Storage. The EBS would cost $35/PB/hr, so the setup would cost $2940. Then the actual hour-long attack would cost $35, for a total of just under $3000.
I'm skeptical that the low-reward approach to maintaining decentralization is viable.
Burstcoin
It turns out that for the past four years there has been a Proof-of-Space coin, BurstCoin. Its "market cap" spiked on launch and when Bitcoin spiked, but it is currently under 2.5K BTC with a 24-hr volume just over 12 BTC. There are currently 670 cryptocurrencies with greater 30-day volume than Burst. So it hasn't been a great success. As expected, mining is dominated by a few pools.
Despite the lack of success, BurstCoin claims to have about 284PB of storage devoted to mining. Lets take that at face value for now. Using the same numbers as above, that's $11M in capital. With 5-year straight-line depreciation and a 4-minute block time (657K blocks) the depreciation per block is $16.74 per block. The reward is currently 809 coins/block or at current "market price" $7.17, so they are below Bram Cohen's criterion for not being worth investing just for mining.
Despite that, last year people were claiming to be mining with 120-250TB, and earning ~700 coins/day. That clearly isn't happening today. There are 360 blocks/day so the daily mining reward is 291,240 coins, or $2.58K. 240TB would be 8.5E-4 of the claimed mining power, so should gain 247.6 coins or $2.18/day. 40 cheap 6TB drives at Newegg would be around $6K, so the 5-year depreciation would be $3.29/day for a loss of $1.11/day before considering power, etc. And as the rewards decreased the loss would increase.
Suppose I have 2TB spare space in my desktop PC. I'd have 7E-6 of the claimed mining power so, before pool expenses, I could expect to earn about 2c/day, decreasing. Why bother? Mining BurstCoin only makes sense if you have free access to large amounts of spare disk space for substantial periods. Despite the rhetoric, it isn't viable to aggregate the unused space in people's desktops.
The history of BurstCoin might be seen as a poor omen for Chia. But BitTorrent has given Cohen a stellar reputation, and Chia has funding from Andreessen Horwitz, so it is likely to fare better. Nevertheless, Chia mining isn't likely to be the province of spare space on people's desktops:
There are fewer and fewer desktops, and the average size of their disks is decreasing as users prefer smaller, faster, more robust SSDs to the larger, slower, more fragile 2.5" drives that have mostly displaced the even larger 3.5" drives in desktops.
The only remaining market for large, 3.5" drives is data centers, and drive manufacturers are under considerable pressure to change the design of their drives to make them more efficient in this space. This will make them unsuitable for even those desktops that want large drives.
So, if the rewards are low enough to prevent investment in storage dedicated to mining, where is the vast supply of free hard disk space to come from? I can see two possible sources:
Manufacturers could add to their hard drives' firmware the code to fill them with a plot during testing and then mine during burn-in before shipment. This is analogous to what Butterfly Labs did with their mining hardware, just legal.
Cloud data centers need spare space to prepare for unexpected spikes in demand. Experience and "big data" techniques can reduce the amount, but enough uncertainty remains that their spare space is substantial.
So it is likely that the Chia blockchain would be dominated by a small number of large companies (2 disk manufacturers, maybe 10 clouds). Arguably, these companies would be more trustworthy and more decentralized than the current Bitcoin miners.
Labels: bitcoin, cloud economics, kryder's law, storage costs
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Flummoxed by flour? Baffled by binding gums? Baking gluten free doesn't have to be a headache. Chef Lena Kwak, creator of Cup4Cup gluten-free flour, available in the American Made Market, offers her advice.
I love baking with those flours as well, since they both bring great flavor to baked foods. You will likely need to adjust the ratios and add more liquid ingredients because both almond and coconut flour absorb more moisture than regular all-purpose flour.
As far as recipes, visit the Cup4Cup website –– there are many cookie recipes that we use almond flour in.
For gluten-free baking, it is necessary to use some type of binding gum that can mimic gluten. We've taken the guesswork out of adding adding these ingredients by making Cup4Cup a gluten-free flour blend that already contains the right amount of everything.
Shop Cup4Cup gluten-free four, gluten-free chocolate brownie mix, gluten-free pizza crust mix, and gluten-free pancake and waffle mix in the American Made Market.


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FIRE > Newsdesk > Top Story > University of Hartford reportedly warned student against speaking out about mistreatment
University of Hartford reportedly warned student against speaking out about mistreatment
by Sarah McLaughlin
Among the many disturbing allegations that came to light in recent coverage of a University of Hartford student's mistreatment of her roommate is the claim that university officials warned the victim against speaking out about what she experienced.
Last week, student Brianna Brochu was expelled and arrested after publicly admitting to attempting to force her roommate, Chennel Rowe, to move out of their dorm room by contaminating and tampering with her personal belongings. The New York Times reports that Brochu posted the following messages to Instagram:
"After one and a half months spitting in her coconut oil, putting moldy clam dip in her lotions, rubbing used tampons on her backpack, putting her toothbrush places where the sun doesn't shine, and so much more, I can finally say goodbye to Jamaican Barbie," said the post, which has since been deleted. Ms. Brochu is white; Ms. Rowe is black.
As she was in the process of moving, Ms. Rowe said, other residents approached her about several posts Ms. Brochu had made on social media. They included pictures of bloodstains on Ms. Rowe's backpack and videos of Ms. Rowe eating, with comments suggesting that the utensils she was using had been contaminated.
The Times then wrote that Rowe "accused the school of attempting to keep the episode quiet." Rowe discussed this allegation in an Oct. 30 video posted to Facebook about the ordeal. According to Rowe, both she and Brochu agreed to sign No Contact Orders requiring that the two students refrain from contacting one another prior to Brochu's expulsion. But Rowe says the University of Hartford didn't stop there.
On the night she relocated to a new dorm room, Rowe claims two residential life administrators visited her room to collect her old key — and to warn her that she could face consequences if she spoke openly about her roommate's actions. Rowe stated, "They're telling me, 'Just to let you know, the situation is over, don't speak about it or else you could be removed from the residential side of campus.'"
At a university that prides itself on its commitment to "freedom of inquiry, freedom of opinion, and freedom of speech" and promises to "recognize[] the right of dissent" and "the right of anyone to advance his or her views," Rowe's claims are galling. After all, a promise to protect free speech is meaningless if it doesn't include a student's right to speak out about mistreatment she experiences.
However, despite how shocking such a campus gag order might seem, it's not all that unusual.
Last year, FIRE condemned Northern Michigan University's practice of threatening disciplinary action against students who share "self-destructive" thoughts with their peers. Administrators even admitted that they warned 25 to 30 students per semester that involving other students in "suicidal or self-destructive thoughts or actions" would result in disciplinary action. As FIRE wrote in an August 2016 letter, Northern Michigan University's gag order on student discussions of mental health could not withstand constitutional scrutiny:
On a college campus, there is hardly a more fundamental exercise of a student's First
Amendment rights than engaging fellow students in dialogue. NMU's restriction of student-to-student communication on a specific category of speech—the topic of self-harm—is a content based restriction of expression subject to the highest level of constitutional scrutiny. Subject matter speech restrictions are presumptively invalid and will be deemed constitutional only if narrowly tailored to serve a compelling government interest, meaning they must be the least restrictive means available to achieve the asserted interest. [ . . . ]
In addition to being a suspect content-based restriction, NMU's practice of prohibiting speech on self-harm imposes a prior restraint on student expression. "Prior restraints on speech and publication are the most serious and least tolerable infringement on First Amendment rights." Nebraska Press Association v. Stuart, 427 U.S. 539, 559 (1976). Courts faced with prior restraints meet them with a "heavy presumption against [their] constitutional validity." New York Times v. United States, 403 U.S. 713, 714 (1971). Indeed, the practice effectively imposes a gag order on NMU students in crisis or perceived by the administration as being in crisis. Gag orders, like content-based restrictions, must meet a high burden to pass First Amendment muster.
FIRE similarly spoke out in 2013 after news broke that the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill used an unconstitutional speech code against student Landen Gambill, who drew national attention for her complaints about the university's treatment of her sexual assault allegation against a fellow student. Gambill was brought before the university Honor Court on charges of "disruptive or intimidating behavior" after discussing her allegations publicly.
Fortunately, both NMU and UNC eventually relented — but it's impossible to know how many students before that chose to stay silent on serious issues because their universities threatened punishment or maintained speech codes that effectively banned them from speaking out.
Although the University of Hartford is a private university and not bound by the First Amendment, unlike NMU and UNC, it makes clear free speech commitments — and the First Amendment sets the baseline for the rights a prospective student would reasonably expect to enjoy when a university promises that it will respect freedom of expression. Hartford's administration should look into Rowe's claims further to ensure that the university isn't promising freedom of speech but delivering something very different.
If you believe your college or university is enforcing a gag order against you or banning you from speaking out about important issues, please submit a case to FIRE — we want to hear about it.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Jonathan Hiskes
Frontier Pundits: Visiting 1850s Bloomington with Three Angry Editors
jhiskes Uncategorized January 8, 2014 July 3, 2017
Originally published in Traces of Indiana and Midwestern History, December 2013
In 1853, while the fledgling Indiana University struggled to survive, three strikingly different men started a newspaper in the frontier town of Bloomington, Indiana. They seemed to disagree on the purpose of the paper, only one had experience as an editor, and they did not have much start-up money. But in November 1853 the hotheaded preacher Eli P. Farmer published the first edition of his Bloomington Religious Times, proclaiming that each individual "has a right to act according to the dictates of his own conscience," and that his conscience compelled him to start a newspaper. Soon he enlisted the help of a wandering newsman and a phrenologist. Together the three editors filled the paper with tirades, sermons, jokes, puzzles, world news briefs, market reports, long-winded allegories, and very few advertisements. They picked fights with competitors and reflected some of the ugliest biases of their time.
The newspaper did not last long. Within a year all three editors had left and the paper became one more defunct publication of the sort that litter the nation's past. Except for moments of unintentional brilliance, the Times was not remarkable in its quality or foresight. As a product of its time, though, it offers a window into the minds of its editors and the community they served. It's been said about blogging, that most immediate twenty-first-century medium, that anyone who publishes instantly for long enough will reveal their inner character, intentionally or not. The same might be true for the small-town presses of the nineteenth century. Editors who publish enough tend to reveal the fears and hopes of themselves and their readers—that is what can be found in the history of this fizzing comet of a publication that streaked through a frontier town in the run-up to the Civil War
The furniture and limestone industries that later defined Bloomington had not yet arrived in 1853. The New Albany-Salem Railroad first rolled through town that year, its cars laden with corn, whiskey, and a multitude of pork products from the Monroe County hills. The trip to the New Albany markets took twelve hours. In 1853 IU graduated only two students, its smallest class ever. When a fire destroyed the college's main building the next year, it almost was not rebuilt. A pledge of support from faculty and students may have been the only thing that kept the university in Bloomington. The Times urged the town's thousand or so residents to consider it their "personal obligation"—not the state government's duty—to rebuild the twenty- six-year-old university.
The Times exemplified rural American journalism in the mid-nineteenth century, an era when anyone with a modest amount of money could set up shop in the marketplace of ideas. The price of newsprint fell by half between 1830 and 1860, driven by technological innovations such as the use of wood pulp in papermaking. This trend, combined with rising literacy rates, created what journalism historian Andrew Saxton called an "optimum" era for newspapers. Professional training for journalists was rare, especially in frontier states such as Indiana. But starting a newspaper had never been easier.
Farmer claimed a benign goal when he started the Times. He wanted to help establish the Republican United Brethren Church, a sect that had broken away from the Methodist Church five years earlier. The paper's first issue included such thrilling features as the denomination's constitution, minutes from an administrative meeting, and a sermon. Comics and sports pages were still decades away. Like other papers of its time, the Times ran its articles in dense type, often without headlines and much semblance of organization. The paper's defining visual ornament was an inch-thick braided border that edged each of its four pages.
When Farmer editorialized, things became interesting. The fifty-nine-year-old preacher thundered against religious tolerance and half-hearted faith. Most of all, he attacked the Catholic Church, which he considered "the most horrible institution which has ever blackened the pages of History." He promised to expose "astounding, blood chilling facts" about the Church of Rome. He reprinted Revelations 12:1-15, inserting his own interpretive footnotes in brackets. The great red dragon that appeared in John the Apostle's vision represented the Pope, according to Farmer. Its seven heads and ten horns are the seven kingdoms and ten "petty kings" under the Pope's rule. The great dragon cast out of heaven in verse 9 represented the true church triumphing over "the Pope or Devil."
The minister's invectives reeked of xenophobia. In the mid-nineteenth century, southern Indiana received a massive influx of German immigrants who traveled over the Cumberland Gap and down the Ohio River. Largely Catholic and supportive of the Democratic Party, they arrived in large enough numbers to reshape the state's cultural landscape. Farmer must have known it. If fundamentalists of every age require an opposition group to demonize, German Catholics suited his need. He devoted much of the Times' first issues to a "TES- TIMONY OF HISTORY AGAINST THE CHURCH OF ROME," a series as alarmist as the title suggests. "May God save us from Roman tyranny," he ended one editorial.
In January 1854, three months after founding the Times, Farmer turned the biweekly into a weekly and announced his new coeditors, Harvey Murphy and Jesse Brandon. Farmer continued to manage the front two pages—the religious half— while Murphy and Brandon filled pages three and four, respectively, with secular news. Of the three, Brandon revealed the least about himself in the paper. He was a former state printer and a prolific newsman who had founded at least ten southern Indiana newspapers, including Bloomington's first in 1824. He showed no interest in editorializing on hot-button moral issues, seeing the paper instead as a vessel for dispassionate facts. International news consisted mostly of his updates from the Crimean War in Eastern Europe. The only indication that America was veering toward civil war came in his updates on the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which authorized the two territories to decide on their own whether to allow slavery. By this point in the twilight of his career, Brandon may have lost interest in participating in the culture wars of his day.
Not so with Murphy. He wrote extensively on temperance, at that time the state's most divisive political issue. In 1853 the Indiana General Assembly voted to let counties pass local prohibition laws. Two years later it passed a statewide ban on alcohol. The Indiana Supreme Court struck down both measures as unconstitutional. The issue had religious implications, with prohibition fitting into the perfectionist movement embraced by Methodists and other Protestants. They saw human nature as perfectible through social reform and accountability. Catholics and Primitive Baptists moving into the region, on the other hand, held to a belief in a more foundational human depravity. They viewed reform movements with deep skepticism.
Like Farmer, Murphy claimed to support temperance. Both men saw their paper as a potential agent of social change. But the difference between their approaches is considerable. For one, Farmer used four times as many words to make his point. His May 12 editorial on the included questionable exegesis ("Temperance is one of the great principles of the Bible and cardinal points of the Christian religion"), jabs at Rome and "learned Greece," and an appeal to bipartisanship before getting to the point: "If any man sells or give liquor. . . fine him severely."
Murphy's March 10 editorial on the same subject opened by recounting a conversation with an unnamed pro-temperance minister. "Ministers should remember that it has been but a short time since they themselves drank 'the blessed creature,'" Murphy wrote. Would he have named the minister if it were Farmer? The article reads like a veiled reprimand of his colleague. Murphy called for temperance reformers to rely on "mild, persuasive, and gentlemanly means for reforming the world." Keeping his rhetorical voice lowered, he ended with a word of caution: "It is better for advocates of the reform to respect the feelings of others. Enthusiasts often do more harm than good."
Such even-keeled rationalism was not Farmer's style. According to the autobiography he wrote later in life, it never had been. The son of a Revolutionary War veteran, Farmer moved with his family from Virginia to Kentucky as a child. Native Americans twice burned their home in Kentucky, according to his account. Farmer recounted a period of habitual lying and fighting—though never drinking—in his twenties. He encountered a young Sam Houston in one fight and left the exchange with two broken ribs. Farmer referred to this as his "backslidden" condition, according to a sketch of his life by Riley B. Case. That stage ended on the banks of the Ohio River at a Methodist camp meeting in 1820. There the twenty-six-year-old Farmer was spiritually reclaimed. He took up the call to become a circuit preacher in the model of Methodist founding father John Francis Asbury, one of the leaders in the break from the Episcopalian Church to a less hierarchical, more democratic church. Like Asbury, Farmer traveled the countryside by horse, preaching the gospel to small audiences, often one family at a time. An 1867 Harper's Weekly illustration portrays the rigors of the demanding, solitary job, showing a circuit preacher leading his bedraggled horse down a lonely road, clutching an umbrella against a rainstorm.
Farmer performed this work for nine years, a typical length of service for circuit preaching, which left little opportunity to provide for a family. During this period he married Matilda Allison, whom he called a "pious, holy woman." They started a family, though Farmer could not shake his volatile spirit. Case attributes Farmer's roller-coaster religious life to the importance of personal choice in the Methodist tradition: "Whenever Eli Farmer experienced a spiritual crisis (which was frequently), he looked for another camp meeting. In a denomination with an emphasis on 'experience,' religious life was often a cycle of highs and lows, and there was always a need for revivals."
Farmer became discontent with the Methodists as they became a more established church. In the Times he wrote about what initially drew him to the Methodists: "The preachers carried zeal and religion where they went . . . the old ministers had kept the salaries low, in order to keep out the money-hunters." The church had lost its way, in Farmer's eyes. He accused it of abandoning its commitment to "plainness and humility" and left it for good in 1839. He then helped establish the Republican United Brethren Church, a short-lived offshoot that drew from the Methodist and United Brethren churches. The sect probably appealed to him because of its lack of formal organization and wealth, much as Methodism had decades earlier. This search for a more rigorous and authentic faith was a defining theme in Farmer's life. He wrote in his autobiography, begun when he was eighty, that he was "troubled with grave apprehensions that the standard of Christianity is lower now, than it was formerly when it was in its comparatively primitive days in this republic."
If the independence of the Times's editors freed them to speak their mind, it sometimes led to odd decisions. Consider the ethical editorial Murphy published in the March 10 issue. He began with a lengthy rhetorical question about "the savage": "If he has inherited such a cerebral development that his animal and selfish propensities greatly predominate over his moral and religious sentiments and reasoning power, thus making him deaf to admonition and blind to example, is he then accountable for his deeds?"
Murphy continued, in evident sincerity, to dwell upon the question. He made allowance for the savage's "innate proneness to evil." The editorial was part of a cryptic ongoing series that considered the "cerebral development" of both humans and animals. An earlier chapter speculated on how primitive humans might have migrated from Eurasia to the Americas. Another wondered whether a thief might be reformed by altering the shape of his brain. Murphy did not reveal the purpose of the series until March 17, when he announced that he was giving a free lecture on phrenology, the pseudoscience that sought to discern a person's character by measuring the size and shape of the cranium. Phrenology, which had reached the United States eighteen years earlier with the German lecturer Johann Kaspar Spurzheim, spread west through lectures and demonstrations. Murphy promised to let himself be blindfolded at the end of the lecture, and "thus deprived of the power of sight" he would "read the dispositions and characters of individuals, unknown to him, with such accuracy, that the most sceptical will be silenced."
The Times never gave an account of Murphy's lecture and demonstration. But a week later, Murphy revealed that his interest in phrenology was more than a hobby: the March 24 issue featured an advertisement for "Harvey Murphy, practical phrenologist and physiognomist." For twenty-five cents he would provide a verbal description of character, and for one dollar he would provide a written version. Murphy was using editorial space to serve an advertiser's agenda, failing to disclose to readers that fact, and using his position to promote his own side business.
Contemporary journalistic standards would condemn this sort of cross promotion as a conflict of interest. Murphy and his colleagues admitted no such problem. It is possible they saw no reason to separate editorial and advertising content, as modern-day news organizations have done. It is also possible Murphy grasped but declined to meet a standard of transparency. For
all the drawbacks of bureaucratic news institutions, their accountability might have kept a beginning journalist such as Murphy more honest.
The Times editors, however, did have standards when it came to judging their peers. Soon after the arrival of a local competitor, the Bloomington News Letter, Murphy accused its editor of an ethical lapse. The editor, A. B. Carlton, served as a lawyer in the defense of a local murder suspect in April 1854. Carlton also published an editorial defending the man's innocence, without disclosing that he was the man's lawyer. Murphy must have seen this as different from his phrenology editorials. "We had been greatly misled," Murphy wrote. "We hope the editor of the News Letter will not prostitute himself as an editor."
Despite his attack, Murphy was more restrained than his preacher colleague. In the May 26 issue of the Times Farmer employed thoroughly adolescent sarcasm in attacking the unnamed editor of the Wayne County Journal. Farmer fumed about a previous Journal article, which he called "all thunder and no lightning." Yet he deemed it worthy of response. Only after saying his piece did Farmer include a "Note of Explanation" to his readers that does not explain very much at all. Farmer's criticism, it appears, was a response to the Journal's criticism of Farmer's earlier attack on the Episcopal Church. The Journal was not bold enough in its stance, according to Farmer. The editor "never committed himself, to show where he stood," Farmer charged. "We cannot tell whether he is on the side of the Lord or the Devil—the Episcopal dog or the Editor of the Religious Times."
Such squabbles among small-town editors were common. It is difficult to imagine why Farmer felt so compelled to respond to the editor. His readers were probably not paying attention to the publication 110 miles to the northeast. It is telling that the Journal editor did not incense Farmer by vigorously defending an opinion with which the minister disagreed. Rather, he angered Farmer by not making his position clear.
The most important conflict in Farmer's life was not with any real or perceived enemy but arose from his father's alcoholism. According to Farmer's January 20 temperance editorial, his father first encountered "fire water" in the Revolutionary War camps of 1776. Joel Farmer was "taken by her charms," his son reported. The senior Farmer came to depend on alcohol both to rest when weary and to celebrate when victorious. For him and his comrades, it "gave a false stimulation in the work, in the hour of adversity, warming their hearts in all their social parties and festivals, and was found by their sides on the bloody field of battle." As a child, Eli and his brother helped their mother provide for the family while their father grew more despondent. The man's spirit was crushed even further by the Indian attacks, a swindler that cheated the family, and yet another fire. Farmer left his readers with the image of old soldiers commiserating around a bottle, his dying father among them. A teenage Eli and his brother settled their father's debts, except for a two-dollar or three-dollar whiskey debt. "For we were unwilling to pay a man to destroy our own father," Farmer wrote.
Nothing else so intimate appears in the entire run of the Times. One can fairly hear Farmer's heart twisting as he describes his father's failings. The first-person style may not have been fashionable for a frontier newsman, yet Farmer never sounded so human in his editorializing or more compelling in his political arguments. That's not to dismiss the vileness of his xenophobic writing. The paper was better known for its anti-Catholic position than for anything else, according to Indiana newspaper historian John Miller. The story of his father is the closest Farmer comes to explaining why he feels so threatened by a German Catholic culture permissive toward alcohol.
Farmer spewed more vitriol than his coeditors, but he was also the most responsible for breathing life into the paper. The story of his father's alcoholism was not the only instance in which he must have surprised his readers. In the May 12 issue, the preacher directed his zeal at the changing of the season. "There go you out now, ye dwellers in streets and lanes, in brick walls, in midst dust and din, to the open groves and fields where birds sing, and give yourselves to Nature for a day," read an editorial titled "Bright May," which Farmer borrowed from Youth's Friend magazine. The two-paragraph ode to spring speaks of nature as God's creation, but its references to the "fruits of luscious flavor, the ripening harvests of plenty," sound more like a romantic poet or a transcendentalist than a humorless minister. It must have been quite a change of seasons to captivate Farmer so strongly. The spirit does not seem to have lasted long—the article appears after a much longer treatise on female prudence and before Farmer's temperance editorial. But it shows there was more to him than dogma. Intentionally or not, "Bright May" revealed at least a wrinkle of tension for Farmer between his moralistic and romantic inclinations.
Given time, it is possible Farmer and company would have taken more editorial risks. But the rigors of life in the "Great West," as they called it, did not allow that chance. The May 19 issue announced a dissolution of partnership among the three because of Murphy's feeble health. Publishing continued, with increasing amounts of secondhand material. A month later the paper's distinctive border disappeared and its name abruptly changed to the Western Times. Two weeks later Farmer and Brandon apologized for a late issue "on account of sickness" of one of them, most likely Brandon.
By the end of the summer the paper had sputtered into a half sheet—"half a loaf is better than no bread"—with another apology for tardiness. In October Brandon left Bloomington and the Times, "hoping to recruit his health by traveling." Farmer could not run the paper on his own and handed it over to T. L. Martin and J. F. Walker, who dropped the religious content and used it in the service of the newly formed local Republican Party. Introducing himself, Walker promised to allow "men to honestly differ in opinion" in the pages of the newspaper. He continued, writing in the third person: "In these matters he does not promise to be neutral (as some Editors have done.) This he considers to having no views of his own. Every one that takes any interest in the affairs of his country must have his preference."
The Times demonstrated the sort of lively, idiosyncratic prose independent journalists can produce, but it also show-cased how easily they can be dragged down by bigoted opinions and ethical lapses. No doubt its editors failed to transcend the prejudices of their time, spreading the sort of ethnic chauvinism that the United States has had to overcome at every stage in its journey. It is possible that wiser voices drowned them out, contributing to the paper's demise.
A nearly complete collection of the Bloomington Religious Times and the Bloomington Western Times is included in the Eli P. Farmer Papers, Lilly Library, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN. | Case, Riley B. "An Aggressive Warfare: Eli Farmer and Methodist Revivalism in Early Indiana." Indiana Magazine of History 104 (March 2008): 65–93. | Gunther Brown, Candy. The Word in the World: Evangelical Writing, Publishing, and Reading in America, 1789–1880. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2004. | Hatch, Nathan O. The Democratization of American Christianity. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1989. | Nation, Richard F. At Home in the Hoosier Hills: Agriculture, Politics, and Religion in Southern Indiana, 1810–1870. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2005. | Nord, David Paul. Communities of Journalism: A History of American Newspapers and Their Readers. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2007.
Published January 8, 2014 July 3, 2017
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text:
package com.google.gwt.webgl.client;

import com.google.gwt.core.client.JavaScriptObject;

public class WebGLBuffer extends JavaScriptObject {

  protected WebGLBuffer() {
  }
}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


We all smell things differently, whether it's a field of manure or the overwhelming stench of petrol.
But when there's a lingering smell at home or even at work, and the domestically available odour removers just don't budge it, where do you turn to next?
The first step to odour removal is identifying the source of the bad smell. But even when that's been removed, the lingering odour can remain. The only way to permanently and successfully get rid of it, is to neutralise it.
Interesting Fact: The human nose is very sensitive. It has on average over 5 million scent receptors.
The identification of bad smells is the first step to eliminating them. You could throw every cleanup product in the world at a smelly room, but without working out where the odour is coming from and combatting that, you will never get rid of the problem.
There are various methods for detecting the source of odours, from the humble human nose right up to specialist ultraviolet lamps which can detect, for example, domestic animal urine stains. Once this has been established you will be able to choose which odour neutraliser will work best.
The only way to eliminate odours is to neutralise them, not just mask them. The effective removal of the cause of the odour is paramount and the method of removing bad smells will depend upon the cause.
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What causes bad odours anyway?
Environmental wildlife (e.g. rat droppings), bacteria, fungi etc.
Or, the cause of an odour could be the release of an otherwise contained chemical due to a spillage or poor storage. In almost all of these instances, a clean up operation will happen, but lingering smells also need to be eliminated through an odour neutraliser, like outlined above.
Interesting fact: The sense of smell is an evolutionary response to potential dangers such as rotten food or harmful airborne contaminants.
But how do you know if your business is emitting a foul odour?
In other words, we all react differently to different odours. Whilst some people can "live with" a bad smell, others can't tolerate it. Think of farmyard smells or petrol. Both are divisive smells that are pleasing to some and unpleasant for others. Either way, a bad odour can be a warning sign of a public health concern whether domestic or commercial.
Did you know? Odours can be classed as a Statutory Nuisance. Commercial, trade, and business premises must adhere to strict rules about odours. Your local authority can advise further on regulations.
If you have tried all the domestic odour removal products on the market and you are still struggling to remove lingering foul smells, you may benefit from our odour removal service. By using the industry-leading Biosweep technology, we are able to 100% guarantee odour removal.
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text:
PAMELA has support for generating TPN's.

The following assumes that the `bin` directory has been added to your `PATH`.

Given a PAMELA source file with a TPN such as [choice-tpn.pamela](../test/pamela/choice-tpn.pamela) you can generate the TPN as JSON with this command:

````
pamela -i test/pamela/plant.pamela -i test/pamela/choice-tpn.pamela -f json -o choice-tpn.tpn.json tpn
````

For a more complete example see [tpn-demo.pamela](../test/pamela/tpn-demo.pamela)

# TPN Structure
The generated EDN file representation of a TPN includes the following structure:

````
;;; In the map snippet below, the values are
;;; ACTIVITY - which is displayed as an arc in PlanViz
{:act-12                   ;;UID of the activity
 {
  :uid          :act-12,   ;;UID of the activity
  :tpn-type     :activity, ;;Either :activity, :null-activity, or :delay-activity
  :end-node     :node-1,   ;;The node this activity ends in
  :constraints  #{:tc-11}, ;;A set of applicable constraints for this activity
                           ;; If not specified:
                           ;; temporal bounds are assumed to be [0 :infinity],
                           ;; cost and reward 0

  :htn-node     :hem-15,   ;;Link back to HTN Expanded Method that
                           ;; generated this activity
  :controllable false,     ;;Needed by planner (true | false)

  :command      "option",  ;;Needed for plant. Deprecated; Use :name instead.
                           ;;Assume :name value will be same as :command value
  :name         "option",  ;;Represents method name in pamela without args.
  :display-name "Option"   ;;This is the primary string that is displayed by
                           ;; Planviz for this activity (displayed as an arc)
  :args         ["west" 30], ;;Ordered vector of the arguments to the activity
  :argsmap      {"direction" "west", "altitude" 30},
                           ;; :argsmap is **OBSOLETE**
  :args-mapping [["direction" "west"] ["altitude" 30]},
                ;; :args-mapping is an ordered vector of pairs
                ;; The first element of each pair is the formal argument name
                ;; The second element of each pair is the argument value
  :plant-id     "p1"       ;;Unique ID for this plant instance
  :plant-part   "part1"    ;;Unique part name for a distinguishable sub-component
                           ;; of the :plant-id
  :interface    "RMQ"      ;;The interface used to communicate with the plant instances
  :label        "TEMP-label", ;;This will be used for Pamela labels
  }

;;; NODE - which is displayed as circle in PlanViz
 :node-7
 {:tpn-type      :state,    ;;Either :state, :c-start, :c-end, :p-start, :p-end
  :uid           :node-7,   ;;UID of the node
  :constraints   #{},       ;;A set of applicable constraints for this
  :activities    #{:act-6}, ;For :state, 1 outgoing activity only
  :incidence-set #{:na-8},
  :htn-node      :hem-12,   ;;Link back to HTN Expanded Method that
                            ;; generated this activity
  :end-node :node-4},       ;;For :state nodes:
                            ;;Only the 1st node of a sequence points to last
                            ;; node of sequence
                            ;;Other :state nodes won't have an :end-node
                            ;;For :c|p-start nodes: UID of :c|p-end node
 }

}
````

### Acknowledgement and Disclaimer:
This material is based upon work supported by the Army Contracting
and DARPA under contract No. W911NF-15-C-0005.
Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed
in this material are those of the author(s) and do necessarily reflect the
views of the Army Contracting Command and DARPA.


8-188. Banks; possession by department; effective upon notice.
Source:Laws 1925, c. 30, § 2, p. 123; C.S.1929, § 8-183; Laws 1933, c. 18, § 45, p. 159; C.S.Supp.,1941, § 8-183; R.S.1943, § 8-174; Laws 1963, c. 29, § 88, p. 169; Laws 2017, LB140, § 85.


text:
Q: ElectronJS app icon not appearing in Apple App Store Connect I am writing an electronJS application for MacOS. My build works fine and I can run the application perfectly after running electron-forge make command. The icon also appears in the file.
Then I followed this document to sign my application: https://www.electronjs.org/docs/tutorial/mac-app-store-submission-guide using electron-forge.
#!/bin/bash

# Name of your app.
APP="YourApp"
# The path of your app to sign.
APP_PATH="/path/to/YourApp.app"
# The path to the location you want to put the signed package.
RESULT_PATH="~/Desktop/$APP.pkg"
# The name of certificates you requested.
APP_KEY="3rd Party Mac Developer Application: Company Name (APPIDENTITY)"
INSTALLER_KEY="3rd Party Mac Developer Installer: Company Name (APPIDENTITY)"
# The path of your plist files.
CHILD_PLIST="/path/to/child.plist"
PARENT_PLIST="/path/to/parent.plist"
LOGINHELPER_PLIST="/path/to/loginhelper.plist"

FRAMEWORKS_PATH="$APP_PATH/Contents/Frameworks"

codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/Electron Framework.framework/Versions/A/Electron Framework"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/Electron Framework.framework/Versions/A/Libraries/libffmpeg.dylib"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/Electron Framework.framework/Versions/A/Libraries/libnode.dylib"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/Electron Framework.framework"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/$APP Helper.app/Contents/MacOS/$APP Helper"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$FRAMEWORKS_PATH/$APP Helper.app/"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$LOGINHELPER_PLIST" "$APP_PATH/Contents/Library/LoginItems/$APP Login Helper.app/Contents/MacOS/$APP Login Helper"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$LOGINHELPER_PLIST" "$APP_PATH/Contents/Library/LoginItems/$APP Login Helper.app/"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$CHILD_PLIST" "$APP_PATH/Contents/MacOS/$APP"
codesign -s "$APP_KEY" -f --entitlements "$PARENT_PLIST" "$APP_PATH"

productbuild --component "$APP_PATH" /Applications --sign "$INSTALLER_KEY" "$RESULT_PATH"

It signed successfully and generated myapp.pkg file.
Then I tried submitting this myapp.pkg to Apple App Store Connect using Transporter https://apps.apple.com/us/app/transporter/id1450874784
It can submit the app successfully but my app icon (which appears correctly in my desktop) doesn't appear here or in the App Store Connect, instead shows the default icon for it.
I am using the .icns file for it. Any thoughts on how to get my icon to appear would be appreciated.

A: And if you add this file into your electron-forge project, entitlements.mac.plist :
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
  <dict>
    <key>com.apple.security.cs.disable-library-validation</key><true/>
    <key>com.apple.security.cs.allow-jit</key><true/>
    <key>com.apple.security.cs.allow-unsigned-executable-memory</key><true/>
    <key>com.apple.security.cs.allow-dyld-environment-variables</key><true/>
    <key>com.apple.security.files.user-selected.read-only</key><true/>
    <key>com.apple.security.files.user-selected.read-write</key><true/>
  </dict>
</plist>

and my electron-builder config for integrate this file :
pluginOptions: {
    electronBuilder: {
        removeElectronJunk: true,
        externals: ['typeorm', 'better-sqlite3'],
        nodeIntegration: true,
        mainProcessFile: 'src/main.js',
        rendererProcessFile: 'src/renderer.js',
        builderOptions: {
            appId: "electron-app",
            mac: {
                icon: "./build/app-icon.icns",
                entitlements: "./build/entitlements.mac.plist",
                entitlementsInherit: "./build/entitlements.mac.plist",
                darkModeSupport: true
            },

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Union Minister Ananth Kumar Hegde lays foundation stone for construction of Khanapur Railway Station
Belagavi, Feb 9 (UNI) Union Minister of State for Skill Development and Entrepreneurship Ananth Kumar Hegade laid foundation stone for New station building at Khanapur, New Foot Over Bridge of Londa station and commenced the provision of stoppage at Khanapur railway station for T.No.11005/11006, Dadar-Puducherry-Dadar Tri-Weekly express today.
Stoppage of express trains at Khanapur was a long pending demand of the people of the region. Railway Board has now approved provision of temporary stoppage on experimental basis for a period of 6 months for the T.No.11005/11006, Dadar-Puducherry-Dadar Tri-Weekly express. As and when traffic picks up at Khanapur stoppage will be made permanent. Train No. 11005, Dadar-Puducherry Express will arrive Khanapur station at 09:29 hrs. and depart at 09:30 hrs. Train No.11006 Pondicherry-Dadar Express will arrive Khanapur station at 17:29 hrs. and depart at 17:30 hrs.
According to SWR officials, The new station building of 480 Sq.m. is being constructed at Khanapur railway station at an estimated cost of Rs.1.5 Crores. High level platform will be constructed enabling the passengers to board and deboard trains easily. Platform will be extended to accommodate 24 coaches. Waiting room, concourse and other amenities will be provided.
New Foot Over Bridge is being constructed at Londa station at a cost of Rs.2.32 Crores which will provide easy connectivity to all platforms at Londa Station.
UNI HVN MSP SKB1645
http://www.uniindia.com/union-minister-ananth-kumar-hegde-lays-foundation-stone-for-construction-of-khanapur-railway-station/south/news/1494212.html#JbxUKbEa26fcbFhk.14


The "fiscal cliff" is still two months off, but the scheduled blast of tax hikes and spending cuts is already reverberating through the U.S. economy, hampering growth and, according to a new study, wiping out nearly 1 million jobs this year alone.
The report, scheduled for release Friday by the National Association of Manufacturers, predicts that the economic damage would deepen considerably if Congress fails to avert the cliff, destroying nearly 6 million jobs through 2014 and sending the unemployment rate soaring to near 12 percent.
Across the nation, companies are bracing for the fallout by laying off workers, letting jobs go vacant and postponing major purchases. Commerce Department data released Thursday show business investment stalled in September, as orders for core capital goods such as machinery and equipment plateaued at $60.3 billion.
"The general consensus is things are going to get a lot worse as people expect this fiscal cliff to be on us," said Thomas Riordan, chief executive of Neenah Enterprises in Appleton, Wis., which makes cast-iron products such as truck axles and manhole covers.
The company has eliminated about 150 jobs over the past few months, and four of its six plants have begun operating on short workweeks. Like other business owners, Riordan expressed extreme frustration with Washington's failure to deal with the looming crisis, leaving momentous decisions about the economy until after the Nov. 6 election.
The term "fiscal cliff" is Washington shorthand for an array of policies set to take effect in January, sucking more than $500 billion out of the economy next year. That includes about $100 billion in automatic cuts to the military and federal agencies, adopted by Congress last year as part of a plan to reduce record budget deficits. It also includes about $400 billion in tax hikes, caused primarily by the expiration of a temporary payroll tax cut and other tax breaks adopted during the George W. Bush administration.
All told, the cliff amounts to the largest spurt of deficit reduction in more than 40 years. But it is also likely to push the fragile economy back into recession, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. The CBO predicts that a recession would be significant but brief, with unemployment peaking around 9 percent and economic growth recovering during the second half of 2013.
The projections in the NAM report — prepared by Jeff Werling, executive director of the Interindustry Forecasting Project at the University of Maryland — offer a substantially darker view of the consequences of inaction, joining others who have questioned CBO's relatively benign assessment.
Anecdotal evidence abounds, particularly among companies associated with the defense industry. The Pentagon budget is set to take a hit of nearly $55 billion in the fiscal year that ends next September, on top of other scheduled reductions. Defense contractors are already hunkering down.
Preparing for the worst, Mike Kelly, president and chief executive of Ann Arbor-based Nanocerox, a supplier of advanced materials for laser systems, missile optics and radiation detection, said he embarked on an aggressive cost-containment strategy nine months ago. Kelly laid off four of his 22 employees and converted them to contract workers, froze salaries, renegotiated health benefits and tightened controls on spending.
Kelly said he's also trying to shift business away from the defense industry and into the commercial marketplace. But lenders and investors have no interest in financing his expansion.
While concern about the cliff is rising, a consensus about how to handle it has been elusive. President Obama and other Democrats have threatened to block action on the cliff unless the Bush-era tax cuts are allowed to expire on income of more than $250,000 a year. Republicans, including presidential candidate Mitt Romney, want to maintain current tax rates for another year to give Congress time to tackle more far-reaching reforms — a position supported by the manufacturing association.
But on Thursday, a group of 80 high-profile chief executives said they are willing to accept higher taxes — accompanied by "significant spending restraint" — as part of a long-term plan to tame the $16.2 trillion national debt. Enacting such a deal, they said, would not only avert the cliff, but would also boost market confidence and perhaps spur economic growth.
"We can do this in a 10-year plan that doesn't damage the fragile recovery," Honeywell chief executive David Cote said during a news conference at the New York Stock Exchange just before the market's opening bell.
Suzy Khimm contributed to this report.


text:
Tigray conflict: Ethiopia lists TPLF as a terrorist group
Ethiopia accuses the Tigray Peoples Liberation Front (TPLF) of engaging in terrorist acts -
EDUARDO SOTERAS/AFP or licensors
The Ethiopian parliament on Thursday endorsed a recent cabinet decision to classify the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), which has long dominated Ethiopian politics and until recently ruled the Tigray region, as a terrorist organization.
The resolution, which was unanimously passed by ruling party MPs, also includes the Oromo Liberation Army (OLA), an armed group active in the Oromia and Amhara regions.
The classification of the TPLF as a terrorist entity makes the prospect of peace talks in Tigray even more remote, six months after the federal army launched a major military operation to overthrow the regional authorities there.
The TPLF dominated Ethiopia's ruling coalition between 1991 and 2018, when Abiy Ahmed was appointed prime minister.
Ethiopia's attorney general, Gedion Timothewos, assured that ordinary citizens would not be affected by the new measure, while warning potential foreign countries to collaborate with the two groups.
The US-based Tigray Information and Communication Centre said the measure would lead to "mass arrests" and give the government more room to persecute Tigrayans, who make up about 6 per cent of the population.
Mr. Abiy declared victory in Tigray in late November when the army captured the regional capital Mekele, but TPLF leaders remain on the run and fighting persists.
The conflict has caused a serious humanitarian crisis, with Doctors Without Borders (MSF) expressing concern on Wednesday about "alarming" levels of malnutrition among the population in Tigray. The UN's International Organization for Migration (IOM) estimates that one million people in the region have fled their homes because of the crisis.
The OLA was formed as a result of a split in the Oromo Liberation Front (OLF), an opposition group that has renounced armed struggle since its leaders returned from exile after Mr. Abiy, Ethiopia's first Oromo leader, came to power.
Ethiopian authorities have long accused the TPLF of joining forces with the OLA to fuel ethnic violence and undermine the authority of the federal government.
Regional and parliamentary elections are scheduled for June 5 in Ethiopia, the first since Mr. Abiy came to power, where he will seek to consolidate his power by gaining legitimacy at the ballot box.
But many obstacles stand in the way of the elections: the war in Tigray, where the vote has been postponed indefinitely, political and ethnic violence and immense logistical challenges in this country of some 110 million people.
Ethiopia postpones elections again to 21 June
French, German ministers hail Ethiopia peace deal
Ethiopia: New milestone reached in peace process
Tigray: French and German heads of diplomacy in Ethiopia to support peace
Tigrayan rebels begin handing in heavy weapons to Ethiopian government


text:
UACT
UMASS ALLIANCE
GCO 2020 - Apply Here!
UMass Amherst Department of Anthropology
GCO
Meet our Community Partners:
City Life/ Vida Urbana
Jamaica Plain, MA
City Life Vida Urbana is a grassroots community organization that seeks to build working class power and foster individual empowerment in order to catalyze systemic change. City Life works to build racial, social, and economic justice as well as gender equality. Through the creation of collective power, City Life seeks to prevent the displacement of people.
City Life envisions a society that has peace, respect, and equity and guarantees people the right to essential needs such as food, housing, health care, education, employment, and a life without fear of displacement.
City Life's core values include:
-SOLIDARITY
-HOUSING AS A HUMAN RIGHT
-SELF DETERMINATION & SPEAKING ONE'S TRUTH
-CHALLENGE INTOLERANCE AND OPPRESSION
-SERVE THE PEOPLE
-LINKING ACTION TO REFLECTION
-LONG-TERM COMMITMENT TO HOLISTIC DEVELOPMENT OF WORKING AND POOR PEOPLE
Pioneer Valley Project (PVP)
PVP is a coalition of churches, synagogues, labor unions, and other organizations that have a strong interest in community life in the Pioneer Valley. There are currently twenty-six member organizations that form PVP. The member organizations come from all sections of Springfield and the surrounding community. Consequently, its membership is very diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, age, religion, socio-economic status, and just about any other demographic category.
PVP is modeled on a number of other community organizing groups that have effected important social changes in their own communities. The basic goal of PVP is to respond to the concerns that the participants in the member organizations raise as the social problems that are plaguing their communities. To this end, each of the member organizations surveys its congregation or membership each year to determine what particular social issues seem most pressing to its members. PVP then holds an issues assembly at which the entire membership of PVP gives input into what projects and goals the PVP will focus on during the next year.
'Building power for justice and the common good'
Independent Drivers Guild, New York
The Independent Drivers Guild is a Machinists Union affiliate that represents over 65,000 For-Hire Vehicle drivers in New York City. The IDG is the first nonprofit labor organization to negotiate a seat at the table with a ride share company and the first to offer crucial new protections and essential benefits while building worker power.
IDG are drivers in solidarity fighting for a better work environment. Together we are a powerful force to win driver-friendly policies. Together we have contact with hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers daily. Together we are a service that generates millions of dollars. With driver activism and solidarity we will win—and can drive with dignity. We believe that the power of a union is workers banding together. With the Guild, we can band together and win better working conditions and increase working drivers' earnings now.
Granite State Organizing Project (GSOP)
The Manchester Chapter of the Granite State Organizing Project and their youth wing, Young Organizers United have become known as a powerful force in the community,
GSOP has focused their attention on Title Loan Companies and their practice of providing short team loans to people at incredibly high-interest rates – generally as high as 300%! These lenders do not seek necessary information as to the ability of the borrower to pay back the loan. This practice takes unfair advantage of citizens living in poverty. Our members worked to create a Manchester Housing Commission on the issue of absentee land scofflaw landlords. They have successfully testified and presented recommendations to the board of mayor and alderman about holding landlords accountable.
GSOP continues its efforts to invite more people of faith along with their faith communities to work with us in bringing about change in our city as we have many battles to face. We are proud to have facilitated meetings between the Police and youth of color and to have brought the faith community to support a peaceful Black Lives Matter march last summer.
Our YOU group is doing extraordinary things to bring attention to issues that point to inequities for low income students, immigrant students and students of color. Students that have been here longer need to have equal access to AP classes and college opportunities. GSOP is also asking the city Board of School Committee to move forward on the Office of Civil Rights recommendation to actively recruit teachers of color as it reflects our student population.
West Harlem, NY
WE ACT expands political participation among communities of color and low income residents in order to impact environmental planning and decision making.
a pioneering community health watchdog. Our proven results and experienced leadership have extended our sphere of influence beyond our Northern Manhattan roots to state and federal levels.
a well-known organization in the research and academic community. We have working research partnerships with Columbia University in programs that have been funded by the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences and the Federal EPA.
a driving force of change that improves the well-being of all New Yorkers. Our campaigns have culminated in the creation of the West Harlem Piers Park and the implementation of stringent new bus pollution standards that led New York's MTA to switch from diesel fuel to hybrid electrics that reduce tailpipe emissions by 95%.
an effective force for environmental policy. We work on the city, state and federal levels to improve policy on environmental health and justice. In 2016, alongside partners we helped to pass the country's first Safe School Water Act, which mandates testing and remediation for lead in all New York State schools. In 2017, WE ACT was instrumental in passing NYC's Environmental Justice Study Bill (359) and Environmental Justice Policy Bill (886A), which provides the city and all New Yorkers more information to identify and address environmental injustices.
Recent Partners
Alternatives for Community and Environment
Virginia Organizing
Maine People's Alliance
Ex-Prisoners and Prisoners Organizing for Community Advancement (EPOCA)
Stone Soup Community Center
Copyright © 2016 UACT. All Rights Reserved
Machmer hall
#315/317
Amherst, MA 01003


Bosco: "Mommy, do you feel ominous?"
Me: "No. Do you feel ominous?"
Me: "Do you know what ominous means?"
Bosco: "Well, I can't tell you because it's an ominous secret."
P.P.S. If I were to do another giveaway in celebration of one more year I've kept up this blog, what should it be? Favorite store gift card, product? Now accepting suggestions (reasonable ones that will not make me roll my eyes in your general direction! And if they are not going to be reasonable at least make sure they are funny).


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Home»Screen»A Global Festival Varsity World Film Week
A Global Festival Varsity World Film Week
Jordan Marie McCaw 2018-09-27
Jordan Marie McCaw / September 27, 2018 /	0
Still from Moving Stories film. Photo courtesy of Varsity World Film Week
Hosted by Ashland Independent Film Festival and Coming Attractions, Varsity World Film Week showcases films spanning not only the world, but genres as well.
Opening the festival Friday, October 5 is Moving Stories, a film by Cornelia Ravenal, Mikael Södersten, Wendy Sax, and Rob Fruchtman through Wilderness Films. The documentary follows six dancers from Battery Dance Company traveling the world to teach children how to dance. "Moving Stories is a product of Cornelia's mission," says Södersten.
As a journalist in the 90s, Ravenal was able to travel the world and experience how certain situations and cultures affected people.
"Dance is an art form that is really like nothing else," she says. "It's something that's very visceral and enables people to express emotions and experiences without words. It is ideally suited to helping kids who are disadvantaged, kids who might've been abused."
Södersten adds, "She met with the Battery Dance Company, understood the work they were doing globally, and said there should be a documentary film about them."
Regardless of each child's background or even what language the children speak, the teachers teach them a physical language to help them express themselves without having to use words. "It's interesting to see such a powerful thing such as movement and dance as a powerful education," Södersten says.
The film is for teachers, and those who have had a teacher. Södersten says, "It is as artists our ambition and hope when we make a film—to move people. It's very basic, but we want people to feel for the characters in our film. Hopefully they get a bigger heart for having seen it."
Closing the festival on Friday, October 12 is Worlds of Ursula Le Guin, directed by Arwen Curry. The documentary is a culmination of 10 years Curry spent with the famous author, who passed away in January of this year.
"I came into documentary films with this particular film in mind probably about 12 years ago," says Curry. The idea pushed her to enroll in graduate school for journalism, where she also learned how to make documentaries. She first met Le Guin in 2008, but before she started filming her story, Curry went on to make a couple other documentaries. She was the associate producer for Eames: The Architect & the Painter and Regarding Susan Sontag.
Earning several grants helped make this film possible, but overall Curry says funding was the biggest challenge, as well as other developments in Curry's own life, like becoming a mother. However, Curry doesn't look back at those 10 years as wasted time.
"The silver lining is that because of that longer time span, the relationship I had with Ursula deepened and became nuanced over time," she says. "Also, her own career by the end of the time. She had really become embraced into the cannon in a way she hadn't before."
What Curry means by "embraced" as an author is that generations from now will continue to read and be familiar with her work as a respected author.
"She was important to literature in large part because she opened up new spaces for other women writers, for writers of colors, for other marginalized writers in general. The quality of her work really elevated how people thought of science fiction and fantasy."
Le Guin wrote several novels taking place in fantasy or science fiction genres. A Wizard of Earthsea and The Lefthand of Darkness are among her most popular works.
"When I started to feel like I was beginning to be accomplished enough as a storyteller to even approach such a thing, I thought it would be a wonderful story to tell," Curry says about Le Guin. "And I thought it would be wonderful for it to be on film. I love the care with which writers speak. There's something about the medium of film that can bring a person into the film. Ultimately it was Ursula's decision after meeting me that she was going to take this chance. It might have been the right moment in her life to get in front of the camera."
Curry hopes fans of Le Guin's work and even those who aren't familiar with it are touched by this documentary.
"I would love for my film to reach Ursula fans, and also to reach beyond them," she says. "To give something to all those groups of those familiar and unfamiliar with her work. I hope it will bring people to her work."
Varsity World Film Week
Friday, October 5 – Friday, October 12
Varsity Theatre, 166 E Main St, Ashland.
Tickets $9.25 – $150, depending on event
Schedule and ticket information at ashlandfilm.org
Jordan Marie McCaw
Since graduating from Eastern Nazarene College in the Boston area with a B.A. in Journalism and Writing, Jordan Martinez has been writing and copy editing for a few different publications, including the Rogue Valley Messenger. She loved living on the other side of the country for three brief years, but Southern Oregon is truly where she belongs. She also writes for BayArea.com, Showcase Magazine, and is the Copy Editor for Southern Oregon Magazine and Las Vegas Golf & Leisure Magazine. When she isn't writing articles, she's either working on her next book, reading, drawing, watching "There Will Be Blood," or pulling shots at GoodBean in Jacksonville. You can check out her artwork at hitrecord.org, where she's been featured and loves using the site as a creative outlet: https://www.hitrecord.org/users/J.M.%20Black/records


If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.
Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known. And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.
It started with a little drip in the Volunteer Center ceiling on Tuesday morning. By afternoon it was a steady faucet, and we hop-scotched with buckets and wastebaskets to catch the drops. Wednesday and Thursday were spent with a watchful eye on the dry wall above us, but there was nothing else to do—we couldn't ask anyone to go up on the roof to investigate in that weather.
On Friday morning, we opened the front door to the melodious sound of rushing water—a pipe had burst in the education wing and we suddenly had our own indoor swimming pool. We were exceedingly grateful for the volunteers who answered my fumbled text messages for wet-vacs. But our safety suddenly depended on strangers who had not slept in three days, the roofers and plumbers who responded to our frantic phone calls with ladders and tools and unbelievable patience.
There was no time for introductions. They worked with little comment, enormous speed, and tremendous skill. By day's end the roof no longer leaked and the toilets no longer gushed. I don't know what we would have done without them. But they rushed off to another emergency, leaving us behind, dry and grateful.
As a pastor, I live in a world of ideas and organizations, words and relationships. My fingernails are clean. My desk is buried in papers. I think for a living—who else gets to do that? Of course, I have a few useful skills.
As a homeowner, I wash my own clothes and make my own bed and walk my own dog—hardly hard labor. My life really depends on an army of mostly unseen, unnamed people who maintain my car and deliver my mail and pick up my dry cleaning and clean my house. I could not function without them, though mostly I don't even know their names.
There is occasional need for the gifts I carry—agility with words and listening ears. But this week we needed far greater gifts—gifts that involve Carhartt coveralls and tool boxes. After all, when your basement gushes like Old Faithful, who would you most like to see at your door? Mr. Rogers or Rosie the Riveter? I thought so.
The Apostle Paul has been trying to get our attention on this front for three weeks now. He wrote to a congregation in ancient Corinth much like ours—highly skilled, highly verbal, highly competitive. They pestered him for praise, asking him to adjudicate their debates about which gifts were more important—speaking in tongues or interpreting tongues, working miracles or the ability to heal, the utterance of wisdom or of knowledge.
Apparently, they had no leaky roofs or bursting pipes, no freezing rain or drifting snow. If they had, the answer to their question would have been clear. The most important gifts, and in no particular order? Plumbing. Snow plowing. Roof repair. But they had the luxury of having to worry about none of those things.
Paul spent all of chapter 12 talking them off the competitive ledge, soothing their easily bruised but clean-under-the-fingernails egos. But today, in chapter 13, he catapults all their self-centered caterwauling off a cliff. Because among all the precious gifts they carried and compared, there was one gift greater than all the rest. And it was not theirs to have.
Paul opens his argument by insulting them and the very gifts he had so carefully ranked only verses before. Speaking in tongues? Cacophony. Wisdom and knowledge? In the trash. Generosity? Useless. He punctuated his point by describing their relationships in the most unflattering of terms (something he did wisely in writing rather than in person): they weren't loving–they were envious, boastful, arrogant, rude, self-righteous, irritable, resentful; they delighted in finding fault.
Wouldn't you love to be in that relationship? You probably are.
Because, at the end of the day, in our moments of deepest need, all those precious gifts—wisdom, knowledge, miracle-working—were as useless as my clever wit and calm demeanor were on Friday.
The greatest gift? When pipes are bursting all around, the greatest gift is the ability to wield a wrench. When life is crashing all around, the greatest gift is the gift of love. God's love, not ours.
With no disrespect to any of your weddings, I find this text much more compelling not at the beginning of married life but at the end of our physical life, or the death of a relationship.
If you have ever sat at the bedside of one who was suffering, kept vigil with one whose life was drawing to a close, you know that our words and our wisdom quickly elude us.
The same is true when, in spite of all our best efforts, a relationship we treasure comes to an end. A marriage fails. A parent forsakes. A child disappoints. A friend proves faithless.
What is there to say to the one whom we have loved who will soon be taken from us? Either by death or by defeat?
Paul writes instead with an unspoken, implied subject of each sentence. Whose love is patient? God's. Whose love is kind? God's. Whose love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things? Whose love never ends? There is only one.
The congregation at Corinth clearly had nothing of importance to ponder, or they would not have wasted Paul's time with their prideful, petty disputes. We live that same way most of the time ourselves. Worrying about things we can't change, getting angry over things that don't matter, holding grudges over slights whose particulars we have mostly forgotten.
When the pipes burst, and the roof sags and the house is cold we cry out for the hard-working, never-tiring, always-responsive tradesperson who can stop the leaking, shore up the ceiling, re-light the fire. Those are gifts that belong to only a few but are critical to us all.
And when our hearts are near to bursting, our patience thin and our affection grown cold, we cry out for the hard-working, never-tiring, always-responsive love of God, who will never fail or forsake.
I can temporarily repair a leaky pipe, but when the water rushes I need someone with a greater gift.
In the same way, we can aspire to love one another patiently, kindly, endlessly—but ultimately we have to rely on someone with a greater gift. The greatest gift. The gift of Love which we can do nothing but receive. A gift which God gladly gives.


Journalism is an exciting and challenging career. No one day is the same as the next. Journalists know the news before anyone else and they have reports filmed and stories written before most people are even aware of the event.
Journalists have to be confident. They have to be ready to knock on doors and talk to strangers in the street. They must be inquisitive and they have to be ready to get the most out of their working day. Do you know the one question you would ask the prime minister at a moment's notice? Ask any journalist and they will tell you five.
Journalism is fast changing and full of opportunity. New technology and new publishing platforms mean more people read news reports than ever before, and those reports are sourced, written and broadcast at faster speed than ever before. Once magazines and newspapers had daily, weekly and monthly deadlines; now every moment is a deadline for publishing on the web. Once photographers had to deliver film and develop pictures; now pictures are taken, viewed on laptops and sent to picture editors within minutes.
The pace of journalism has accelerated, and all journalists want to scoop the competition and be the first to break a story. Accuracy at all times is the journalist's mantra. If you spell a name wrong, print a different charge, or even take down an incorrect quote, it could lead to serious legal trouble.
Learning how to take a good shorthand note will instil discipline and ensure accuracy in a fast-moving environment. Knowing the workings of government and public services will help you report the communities you serve as a professional journalist.
All journalists need to know how to work across all publishing platforms, in print, online and broadcast. In the course of one day a multimedia journalist can be expected to write a blog, film a short video piece for web publication and file an in-depth, 500-word report for print with an appropriate image.
You have to be versatile. Flexibility is core to the life of a journalist. The news waits for no one and many big stories break in the middle of the night. If a big story breaks at 4.55pm, nobody is going home at 5pm. Journalists need to be fast, flexible, accurate and confident working in all publishing platforms.
Trainees usually start a career in a news organisation, which could be a small newspaper, niche magazine or tiny cable channel, a large regional daily, top consumer title or the BBC. In very rare cases some reporters and photographers are given trainee jobs straight from school or university. This usually only happens after that person has proven themselves to an editor time and time again, producing content for love and little money.
Hiring editors need trainees who can hit the ground running and produce quality news content immediately. If you can't get one of the prized traineeships, the best way to gain the multimedia skills to succeed is on an NCTJ-accredited course or apprenticeship. Training gives able people a short cut. It saves them time by teaching them the basics of journalism quickly, accurately and effectively. It means they don't need to learn by trial and error. They can get it right first time.
The NCTJ is the standard for journalism training. Through its examinations and the courses that carry its accreditation, it equips aspiring journalists to find their first job, and helps working journalists to progress to the next rung up the ladder. An NCTJ qualification will give you a solid grounding in all the essential skills. Editors and industry professionals have direct input into NCTJ syllabuses and examinations. That is why they are trusted. With an NCTJ certificate on your CV, an editor knows you have grasped the basics.


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Ма́стер — литературный персонаж романа Михаила Булгакова «Мастер и Маргарита».

Описание
Мастер — москвич, по профессии историк, человек высокообразованный, знающий несколько иностранных языков.
Выиграв в лотерею крупную сумму денег, он смог посвятить всё своё время написанию романа о Понтии Пилате и истории последних дней жизни Иешуа Га-Ноцри. Однако первая же попытка опубликовать роман вызвала волну критики со стороны профессиональных литераторов. Из-за бесконечной травли мастер постепенно сошёл с ума и в один из моментов отчаяния сжёг свой роман.
Эти же газетные статьи навели одного из знакомых мастера, Алоизия Могарыча, на мысль написать ложный донос, чтобы заполучить его квартиру. В результате расследования мастер был освобождён, но, лишившись квартиры, денег и смысла жизни, он решает найти покой в клинике для душевнобольных.
Фабула романа заинтересовала Воланда. Он возвращает сожжённые рукописи, а также предоставляет мастеру и его возлюбленной Маргарите место вечного покоя и уединения.

О себе мастер говорит: У меня нет больше фамилии. В романе это прозвище пишется со строчной буквы. В сериале 2005 года на титульном листе его романа о Понтии Пилате можно разобрать, что его отчество Афанасьевич.

В эпилоге романа о Мастере написано: «Но вот что осталось совершенно неясным для следствия — это побуждение, заставившее шайку похитить душевнобольного, именующего себя мастером, из психиатрической клиники. Этого установить не удалось, как не удалось добыть и фамилию похищенного больного. Так и сгинул он навсегда под мертвой кличкой: "Номер сто восемнадцатый из первого корпуса"».

Прототипы
Большинство исследователей сходятся во мнении, что образ мастера во многом автобиографичен: Михаил Булгаков также сжёг первую редакцию своего романа и, даже написав его заново, понимал, что опубликовать столь неортодоксальное произведение в СССР 1930-х и 1940-х годов было почти невозможно.

Альфред Барков предлагает альтернативную трактовку образа мастера: «Зловещий смысл (понятия "мастер") становится очевидным, если учесть, что Система подразумевала под ним писателей, готовых наступить на горло своей песне и создавать угодные ей творения», — пишет критик-булгаковед Альфред Барков.

По мнению Альфреда Баркова, прототипом для мастера также стал Алексей Максимович Пешков (Максим Горький) — пролетарский писатель № 1. Барков считает, что дата смерти Горького (1936 год) и есть время событий основной сюжетной линии романа «Мастер и Маргарита». Однако же однозначно датировать события московской сюжетной линии романа невозможно.

Высказывается и точка зрения, согласно которой прототипом Мастера мог быть знаменитый философ А. Ф. Лосев. Вдова философа А. А. Тахо-Годи считает такое предположение «преувеличением», но не исключает, что отдельные внешние характерные черты Лосева — ношение чёрной шапочки, которую можно воспринимать и как «академический» головной убор, и как монашескую скуфью (Лосев принял тайный монашеский постриг), могли быть использованы Булгаковым при создании образа Мастера.

Образ Мастера в кинематографе и театре

Ссылки

 Мастер и Маргарита
 Лидия Яновская. Треугольник Воланда

Примечания

Персонажи романа «Мастер и Маргарита»
Вымышленные писатели
Вымышленные мужчины
Вымышленные персонажи с психическими расстройствами

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


Three us vegetables and two pieces of fruit' has been a healthy lifestyle for years. Eating fruit is natural and healthy. But there are many different types of fruit and they are not all just as healthy, of course. Which healthy nutrients do you encounter in the fruit that we eat?
In order to determine which types of fruit are healthy or less sensible, we will look at what is in fruit. Important things are: calories, vitamins, carbohydrates and fiber.
One of the reasons for eating fruit is the vitamins they contain. We all know vitamin C and that you need a dose of it regularly, few people will contradict. Our body needs vitamin C to build a good resistance. In addition, it also helps to heal wounds and illness faster. Another vitamin that you find in fruit is vitamin A. Vitamin A also helps to build or maintain a good resistance. But this vitamin is also necessary to get healthy eyes, hair and skin.
But not all types of fruit contain many vitamins. You will find a lot of vitamin C in oranges, strawberries and kiwis. But in grapes, apricots and passion fruit is very little vitamin C. Mangos, apricots and mandarins are examples of fruit with a lot of vitamin A in it, while in blueberries, pineapple and strawberries there is little vitamin A.
Nowadays many people do not try to eat too many calories. And fruit should fit into a healthy lifestyle, where you keep an eye on your weight. Then it is good to know how it is with the calories in our fruit. Because one type of fruit contains many more calories than the other. It is therefore not the case that fruit necessarily contains few calories. So try to limit your calorie intake, so you have to be careful with your choice of fruit.
Fruits with relatively high calories are bananas, mangos and cherries. A banana contains about 90 kcal, a mango 80 kcal and cherries contain 55 kcal per 100 grams. Two fruits that contain few calories are passion fruit with 6 kcal and an apricot with 7 kcal.
Besides watching the number of calories, it is also very popular to limit the number of carbohydrates. There are all kinds of diets that are based on minimizing carbohydrate intake. Also when it comes to carbohydrates there are big differences between the fruits.
Which fruit is the best now?
As you can see, there is not just a single type of fruit to be called the best fruit of all. It depends on what you want to achieve with eating fruit. For example, if you want to lose weight, you can better go for fruit with low calories and carbohydrates. If you want a lot of vitamins, you have to pay attention to that.
In addition, variety in your choice of fruit is very sensible. This is because your body needs the different nutrients. For you, that is also wise. 'Making food change' is a saying that is older than most of the data in this article, but that still fits well with the advice of two pieces of fruit per day.