text:
Gaming & Culture —
A journey of self-discovery: Gamer Unplugged roams across America
Armed with a Greyhound bus pass, wireless broadband, and handheld consoles.
Kyle Orland - Aug 26, 2012 11:00 pm UTC
Backpacking nomad or game journalist? In this case, a little of both!
Justin Amirkhani
Writing about games for a living is a great career, but the day-to-day reality of the job is not exactly what you'd call adventurous. Aside from the occasional faux-glamorous trade show or press demo, the job mainly consists of sitting and staring at a variety of screens displaying word processors, Twitter messages, e-mails, instant messages, and Skype chats. And occasionally a game or two, if you're lucky.
Then there's Justin Amirkhani. Over the last three months, his life writing about games and the people who make them has, by necessity, included taking a ride with a gun-toting John and his hooker, running out on a bar bill alongside belligerent Toronto sports fans, breaking up a brawl in a Tucson alleyway, and enduring bus bathrooms coated with human excrement. Not your typical game journalist experience, to say the least.
For nearly three months now, Amirkhani has been on a cross-country trek visiting dozens of North American game development studios both big and small and telling their stories on his blog, Gamer Unplugged. It's an idea that first came together when a colleague at a Sony preview event told him about Greyhound's Discovery pass, which lets a person travel as much as they want across Canada and the US for one flat monthly fee. Amirkhani said he started planning his grand trek before the event was even over, and began taking online donations to fund the adventure two weeks later. Within a month, he had sold his apartment and most of his possessions, and was living on the road with a backpack full of just the essentials: clothes, a laptop, some portable game systems, chargers, and a wireless broadband connection.
"They're the people that you meet, when you're walking down the street, they're the people that you meeeeeeet, each daaaaaaaaay."
Giving up domestic comforts for a life of sleeping on overnight buses and cheap hostels wasn't actually all that difficult. "The thing I found hard was sustaining my lifestyle in Toronto," he said. "It seemed like a lot of work for something that wasn't making me very happy... I went through all my things and decided what I cared about, and I didn't really care about any of it anymore... I don't really give a shit about my book collection or my games or my furniture. It's just stuff."
What Amirkhani has given up in possessions he's gained back in interesting life experiences, many of which have been highlighted on the blog. Amirkhani says he's always had a certain talent for "falling into situations" that others might avoid. "I'm not one to shy away from a weird situation," he told Ars. "If things are going bad, I'm definitely interested in seeing just how bad things are going to get before they break. Call that bravery, stupidity... I don't know what it is, but where most people would cut and run, I stick around. In the back of my mind, as bad as things are getting, I'm thinking 'this is going to be a great story.'"
As those great stories continue to amass, the scope of the writing on Gamer Unplugged has evolved to include at least as many "travel posts" as stories drawn from studio visits, a change Amirkhani says the readers have responded to positively. "I think that it's feeding something that's different from what a lot of people get from most outlets," he said. "In my heart I'm still in love with game development... These are the most talented people in the entertainment business, and I want to meet them and I want to know what they're like. But the truth is, game developers—very often their life is sitting at a desk. And as talented and as entertaining as they can be, sometimes the stories that come out of it are less exciting than the travel stories."
"The most talented people in the entertainment business"
Amirkhani hams it up during a visit to Sony Santa Monica.
After visiting over 20 different developers so far, from California to Massachusetts and everywhere in between, Amirkhani says he's gained a new respect for the sheer difficulty of game development. "This is not a path for the faint of heart," he said of the developers he has met. "You have to be incredibly talented and incredibly hard-working and then it still doesn't work sometimes."
Amirkhani has also started to quickly develop a sense for the studios and developers whose motivations are not driven purely by creative concerns. "I can smell when a developer is just there because it's a hot business," he said. "I can smell who the real creative types are, the ones with real passion. It's usually in the way they start talking about their studio. ... If they're talking about how efficient they are, what sort of numbers they pull, that kind of thing, I know they're there as a business. They may create great works, but they're not there to be a creative endeavor."
The trip has given Amirkhani a greater appreciation for the wide variety of working environments and structures that the industry can support, from the "unbelievable facilities" of Epic's headquarters to the close-knit husband-and-wife camaraderie of Ska Studios' James and Michelle Silva ("I've never seen a regular husband and wife that can be around each other for more than two hours, but they work together 24/7," he said. "It's the cutest thing in the world").
Amirkhani also marveled at the surprisingly wide range of personalities in game development, he said, from the "wise beyond his years" insight of thatgamecompany's Jenova Chen to the "amazing character" of Postal developer Vince Desi. "I've never seen somebody who honestly is beyond the point of giving a shit what anybody thinks about him," Amirkhani said of Desi. "He does not care, and so he makes what he wants, to hell with the business of it. That's something I can completely respect. You might not think of him as a traditional indie developer since we've started coloring all indie developers as these creative arty types, but he is at his soul an indie developer, and he's been doing it longer than anybody else."
The thing uniting them all, Amirkhani said, is an extreme passion for the medium that drives the entire business. "I don't know if it's some great collective sickness where we all have this addiction to the scene, but it's definitely there," he said. "Everybody in the industry has that moment where they realize that games is what they want to do. You can fall into any number of careers by accident, but you can't fall into games by accident. It's too hard to do."
A journey of self-discovery
More than the lessons about game development, though, Amirkhani said his trip has given him an entirely new outlook on life outside the walls of a digital monitor.
"Before I left I was a desk jockey all the time," he recalled. "I never really did much, I never travelled, I never did anything, I just chilled in my apartment, played games, and wrote. Now, games are still fun, I still love them, but they're not as interesting as real life. Writing about games is still something I have a passion for, and I could do that forever, but I don't think I would be experiencing all that I could if that's all I did."
"There's a lot to be said about becoming a multifaceted person," he continued. "I think too often... we get too hung up on defining ourselves by our hobbies. We're people, we're so much more than that... It goes back to the adage 'all things in moderation.' It's cool to be attached to a community, it's cool to be attached to a subculture. It's great for building friendships, great for building relationships, great for building self-identity. But if you get so wrapped up in a subculture that that's all you are, then you've lost a great deal of who you could be."
Currently, Amirkhani has enough donations to pay for his bus pass and wireless Internet at least through October, if he doesn't worry about small things like eating or sleeping. But he hopes to keep travelling and sharing his stories for much longer than that, and doesn't exactly relish the idea of returning to his old life.
"I stopped back in Toronto for a week or two [and] I've never felt so agitated in my life," he said of a recent stop to recharge. "Sitting in one place, especially a very familiar place—I didn't like that at all. I had to wait to leave, because I was waiting on some paperwork, and every day I just wanted to get out of there."
Kyle Orland Kyle is the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica, specializing in video game hardware and software. He has journalism and computer science degrees from University of Maryland. He is based in the Washington, DC area.
Email kyle.orland@arstechnica.com // Twitter @KyleOrl


text:
Das Naturschutzgebiet Vogelhalde Sindringen-Ohrnberg liegt auf dem Gebiet der Städte Forchtenberg und Öhringen im Hohenlohekreis in Baden-Württemberg.

Lage und Bedeutung
Das Gebiet erstreckt sich entlang des Kochers zwischen Sindringen im Nordosten und Ohrnberg im Süden. Am südöstlichen und östlichen Rand des Gebietes verläuft die Landesstraße L 1045 und am nordöstlichen Rand die L 1050.

Das heute bestehende Schutzgebiet entstand durch Verordnung vom 30. Dezember 1999 und  hat eine Größe von rund 216 ha. Die Schutzgebietsnummer lautet 1.238. Gleichzeitig trat die Verordnung des Regierungspräsidiums Stuttgart über das Naturschutzgebiet Vogelhalde Sindringen-Ohrnberg vom 22. Februar 1979 außer Kraft. Es handelt sich um eine "Talaue und naturnahe Hangwälder mit Reiherkolonie an den Steilhängen des Kochertales."

Schutzzweck
Schutzzweck ist laut Schutzgebietsverordnung:
 die Erhaltung und Sicherung eines naturnahen Hangwaldes mit angrenzenden Flächen als Nahrungs-, Aufenthalts- und Brutraum bedrohter Vogelarten;
 die Beruhigung und Bestandssicherung vor der Brutzeit, während der Bebrütung des Geleges und während der Aufzucht der Jungvögel;
 die Sicherung der Struktur des Waldes und der Baumartenzusammensetzung in den Schutzzonen 1 a) und b);
 die Erhaltung der Landschaftsstruktur des Hangwaldes und der Talaue des Kochers als markantes Landschafts- und Strukturbild;
 die Erhaltung und Sicherung von Landschaftsbestandteilen mit extensiven Nutzungsformen, insbesondere des vielseitigen mosaikartig verteilten Bestandes von Gehölzgruppen, Hecken und Ufergehölzen, sowie der zusammenhängenden, ausgedehnten Talauenwiesen;
 die Erhaltung und Sicherung bestimmter seltener Pflanzenstandorte;
 die Erhaltung und Sicherung der in den letzten Jahren angelegten Feuchtbiotope und Sukzessionsflächen am Kocher.

Siehe auch
 Liste der Naturschutzgebiete im Hohenlohekreis

Weblinks

 1.238 Vogelhalde Sindringen-Ohrnberg auf lubw.baden-wuerttemberg.de

Einzelnachweise

Schutzgebiet (Umwelt- und Naturschutz) in Europa
Naturschutzgebiet im Hohenlohekreis
Geographie (Forchtenberg)
Geographie (Öhringen)

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


1. tackling… my reading backlog. The stack is getting a little smaller.
2. rethinking… a few things.
3. making… an effort to do something with Twitter for once.
4. feeling… like a grown-up. A boring grown-up.
5. working… on some behind-the scenes stuff around here. Time for a new coat of paint, I think.
7. looking… for a good iOS game. I'm getting a bit bored with my usual.
8. starting… work on the office. Not quickly, but things are finally moving in the right direction.
9. waiting… for fall. I've hit my limit with summer.
10. trying… to wake up.


CORDES v. FREDERICK J. HANNA & ASSOCIATES, P.C. (June 7, 2011.) United States District Court, D. Minnesota. Civ. No. 10-1344 (RHK/TNL).
KIMBALL v. FREDERICK J. HANNA & ASSOCIATES, P.C. (August 15, 2011.) United States District Court, D. Minnesota. Civil No. 10-130 (MJD/JJG).
RUDEK v. FREDERICK J. HANNA & ASSOCIATES, P.C. (February 17, 2009.) United States District Court, E.D. Tennessee, at Chattanooga.
Frederick J. Hanna, P.C. was a "creditors' rights" or debt collection law firm. For over 30 years, the firm has provided legal services for a broad spectrum of creditor clientele principally in the area of collecting debts. The firm represented both major national and international banks, and local financial institutions. It had offices in Georgia, Florida, and South Carolina and operated call centers nationwide.
Hanna Associates made headlines recently when in July 2014 the CFPB filed a lawsuit against the law firm, and its partners, alleging it operated as an "illegal lawsuit mill," filing over 350,000 debt collection lawsuits in only four years. The law firm's motion to dismiss the action was denied.
Then in 2015 Hanna Associates settled the matter by agreeing to the CFPB's consent order which requires the firm to pay a $3 million penalty in addition to procedural mandates for handling debt collection matters.


Since they assure the loan provider that your house could market for the quantity they are providing you, the Home Loan Refinance Process Evaluations are an important component of the residence buying procedure. If, for example, the selling price of the house is much above its worth, there's a possibility the lending institution will not loan you the money.
selling a home as is Hanahan : the ultimate convenience!
The Mortgage Closing Refine Despite the fact that the application has been finished, the lending institution is not lawfully allowed to sustain any kind of expenses on the candidates behalf (such as getting the evaluation) till the applicanthas submitted an authorized HECM Counseling Certification. This is proof that the applicant has completed the obligatory counseling session with a HUD-approved therapy agency.The therapy could be completed prior to or after the initial application in many states.
The most significant caveatwhen getting a confiscated home is that it istypically offered as is, which implies the bank is not mosting likely to deal with any kind of problems. As well as there might be a lot of them, taking into consideration that manyforeclosureshave beenslowly crumblinginto disrepair as a result of the previous proprietor' sfinancial stress. As well as unlike a Hanahan residence sale, in which disclosure needs pressure owners to expose a home's every flaw, there's no such legalstipulation in a foreclosure. Just what you see (or don't) is trulywhat you get.
Nonprime customers are more likely to come across financing agreements packed with unnecessary products and solutions, says Josh Frank, previous elderly researcher for the Facility for Responsible Financing. Never permit the lending to be subject to buying any add-on, such as extended warranties, after-market services as well as insurance, he claims.
The city of Hanahan has a city rate of 0.0298%. The rate for the Hanahan Unified School Area is 0.1756%. In the city of Bell, which part of the SC Unified Institution Area, there is a city price of 0.34%, as well as the total price is almost 1.57%, amongst the highest possible in the county.
What To Deal On A House To buy Closing costs likewise include exactly what you owe in advance for homeowners' insurance, mortgage insurance coverage (or PMI, generally billed if you're placing much less compared to 20% down), your share of that year's real estate tax, as well as extra.
Whether you intend to get a home in Hanahana Beach to be near theNASCAR actionor wish to be near resort region on the Gulf Coast, you need to ask yourself exactly what locations give you access to the places you visit a lot of. Having a second home thats far from your preferred activities or attractions can make possessing a residence far from home extra stressful. Looking for culture and also interesting night life? Hanahan could be for you. Retired and also ready to relax? Possibly Hanahan or Secret West is an excellent fit. Have children or grandkids that enjoy experience? Hanahan could be excellent areas to find your newvacation property. While you may not intend to remain in even more touristy parts of South Carolina, youll need to think about traveling time to your preferred places if you pick less populated locations.
So, when it comes time to obtain a car loan, even if an individual is now in a solvent position, they still need to try to find cars and truck funding for inadequate credit history. Actually, greater than 1.7 million consumers have actually requested auto financing through Car Debt Express in just the last two years. If this defines your circumstance, you'll be happy to understand that we could help you obtain authorized for a loan to acquire an automobile equally as we have numerous others in the last 15 years.
House Assessment Cals Electrical tester: This tester tests for the visibility of both 120-volt and 240-volt electric present. When no clothes dryer is installed in the residence at the time of the evaluation, it is helpful for testing electrical receptacles for dryers.


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redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


Part one of the first printed words of a group of scientists who applied their science to the social field.
After World War I the dislocation of the commodity exchange method of distributing goods and services, and of economics in general became apparent. The disrupted conditions at that time led to an investigation,, which in turn uncovered the astounding yet almost obvious fact, that the only common denominator of all commodities and services, is energy.
Why should this astound anyone? Well read on.
As scientists when we explored the past our interest centered naturally, upon items of evidence which would disclose the methods - the techniques - through which man has turned the things of his environment to account.
Throughout history man has found his own security in the insecurity of others, has found his own economic and cultural haven at the expense of poverty and subservience in the majority, has found that a higher station in life was possible only for the few not the multitude.
A gigantic struggle has been going on to erase from the face of the earth all evil between people, races, nations. The approach has been an attempt at reforming and converting the individual with the hope that a sufficient number of `good' gathered in all lands might allow a lasting agreement upon the existing physical conflicts to be to be achieved. There is no need to picture here the futility of this approach and it's very evident failure to accomplish the idealistic dreams.
Our approach, as interpreters of applied physical science who distinctly disclaimer as a motivating force any idealistic search for truth, love, peace, harmony, and other imponderables. was to undertake an analysis of the operational problems of the North American Continental area.
From this analysis was synthesized a technological design of social operation which we predict as "the next most probable form of social control in North America."
Mans' written history goes back some 6,000 years, when we explored the past our interest centered naturally upon items of evidence which would disclose the methods - the techniques - through which man has turned the things of his environment to account. The records of archaeology yielded very little that we could use, for men in this field have been preoccupied with matters other than the state of the industrial arts, quantitative measurements of the energy resources available in a given case, and the quantitive relation between the rates at which man has been able to convert energy to use forms.
From the fragments of archaeological explorations and more recent (1919-1932) explorations of scientists, we have been able to put together the outlines of a quantitative record of: the changing states of the industrial arts and mans' unfolding ability to turn the energy resources of his environment into the things he wants.
The outstanding feature of that record is the controlling nature of the prevailing technology at any given time upon the course of subsequent events - that is to say, upon social change.
- From our viewpoint, man has experienced but few sweeping social changes, that is, few conversion changes in the rates of energy; and these are widely separated in point of time.
The domestication of the crop plants and the development of them in a dim, historic past thrust man into a larger control of his environment - that is to use a technological term, into a new energy state.
In the same way the domestication of animals gave him new powers to command and carried him a little farther along the way of control. The introduction of these two factors each in it's turn, wrought revolutionary changes in the social scheme under which he had lived.
Following these two technological changes man did little from the dawn of history to the middle of the eighteenth century to increase his powers or to alter his energy state.
What man could produce during that long period was largely a matter of what he could produce with his hands. Vast stores of energy were available then, as now, but his use of them - his ability to convert energy to use forms - was largely limited to the rate at which he could turn the energy of the food which he consumed into work performed by hand. Mans own body whether free or slave, was the only energy conversion device available over a period of countless centuries.
Up to the middle of the eighteenth century, the number of man-hours required to cultivate an given area of land or to quarry any given volume of stone or to transport it, or to any given piece of work, remained approximately the same as was the case of 6,000 years earlier.
People are in the habit of thinking of this stretch of some 60 centuries as one of ever changing social schemes. It is true, forms of government passed one after the other; and cultural patterns ran their course, from ancient Egypt, Greece and Rome, to the middle ages and the Renaissance of Europe, but _to a technologist,_ these 60 centuries covered a steady state of mans ability to deal with the material factors of his environment. It covered a steady state in the rate of energy conversion.
For the entire period, the standard of living - the common welfare - was definitely, quantitatively limited to the work that man could do with his hands, tools, and a few crude machines that added little to his power. In order to be successful in larger projects control of the many by the few became the norm.
In the late eighteenth century Watt brought out the first true steam engine. This type reached it's maximum in the 2,500 H.P. Corless at the centennial exhibition of 1876. The reciprocating engine of conversion it's maximum rate of output in the marine triple expansion development of the 1890s. In this type the rate of energy conversion jumped to 234,000 times the rate of the human engine, as calculated on a 24 hour basis, for this engine can work three shifts every day!
In 1776 A.D., as the United States of America was formulating it's social design, a `knock-off' from the European hand tool culture, J. Watt was putting into motion events which would by 1919 A.D. invalidate it!
Water wheels were known to the ancients as more or less practical toys, even in the 18th. century the most efficient size of water wheels seemed to be limited to 20ft. in diameter producing about 5 H.P.. They were not practical until 1832 - Fourneyron's 50 H.P. turbine type wheel. In 1855 an 800 H.P. turbine was installed in Paris. In 1891 there was a 5,000 H.P. generating turbine at Niagara Falls. In 1933 there was 60,000 H.P.
Only Two-hundred-twenty years ago, the first significant change in the rate of energy conversion occurred, it marked the beginning of social change.
During the 200,000 years prior to 1800 A.D. the biological progression of man, in his struggle for subsistence on this earth, had advanced so far that the world population in that year reached the approximate number of 850 millions. During the subsequent 132 years, it reached approximately 1.8 billions In other words the population increase in that 132 years was greater than it was in the previous 200,000!


text:
ITM vacancies
Disease Control Program Manager
Mycobacterial and Neglected Tropical Diseases
Apply before: 01 Feb.
The Institute of Tropical Medicine in Antwerp (ITM) has as aim the advancement and spread of the sciences that contribute to tropical medicine and to public health in developing countries, inclusive of their global dimensions. ITM provides fundamental, translational and applied scientific research, delivers advanced education and provides medical, scientific and societal expert services. ITM is an open and international campus where staff, students and researchers work on new international health challenges.
The mission of the Department of Public Health (DPH) is to conduct public health research of international standing, provide postgraduate education of high quality and engage in service delivery with the ultimate goal to advance global health. Since 2014, the DPH has been closely involved in operational research and disease control program implementation for gambiense human African trypanosomiasis (gHAT) in the Democratic republic of the Congo (DRC). After a major upsurge of cases that peaked in the 1990s and that has in all probability caused hundreds of thousands of deaths, mostly in DRC, gHAT is now under control again (since three years less than 1000 cases per year) and thanks to recent innovations there is even the prospect of eliminating transmission. Elimination of transmission is the goal stated in the WHO roadmap for neglected tropical diseases 2021-2030. To achieve this goal ITM provides technical and operational support to the national gHAT control program of DRC, the PNLTHA, and also supports general health facilities diagnosing and treating gHAT patients. This support is funded through long term grants from Belgian development aid as well as from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
In close consultation with the PNLTHA and other national and international partners, a strategy has been developed to adapt the gHAT control program of DRC to the changing epidemiological situation and the prospects for elimination of transmission. Elimination of transmission is considered possible to achieve because gHAT is assumed to have a human reservoir and a single dose oral treatment is now well advanced in the development pipeline. This would allow treating all serological suspects, avoiding complex parasitological confirmation procedures. Our aim over the coming years is to support the restructuring of gHAT control activities in DRC to ensure that the new treatment once available can be quickly rolled-out.
For this purpose we seek to recruit a disease control program manager. We are looking for a candidate with a medical background and experience of coordinating health projects in low and middle income countries.
Your primary assignment is to support strategic planning and implementation of new HAT control strategies (active and passive case finding, treatment and surveillance) in close collaboration with the PNLTHA, other partners in DRC and ITM-colleagues, in accordance with the principles agreed upon between PNLTHA and ITM.
You will assure coherence and oversight, as medical operational coordinator, of all ITM supported HAT control and research activities in DRC.
You will follow up ongoing operational research on gHAT in DRC, identify additional operational research needs and design and implement studies when and if required.
You will strengthen the reporting, and data analysis capacity of the PNLTHA data team.
You are a medical doctor with a strong interest in disease control. A diploma in tropical medicine or a Masters in Public Health is an asset.
Experience in gHAT is not a prerequisite but experience in managing disease control programs in general is a major asset.
You have at least one year of personal experience in health project coordination in low-and middle income settings.
You have good skills in biostatistics, epidemiological study design and data analysis or are prepared to actively develop such skills.
You have good writing skills, having published articles in peer reviewed medical or epidemiological journals is an asset.
You are willing to be based in Kinshasa, hosted in the ITM DRC Office or to visit DRC regularly (approximately 6 visits per year).
You are a team player.
You are fluent in English and French.
ITM is committed to building a diverse, equitable and inclusive institute. We strive for excellence and relevance, integrity, sustainability and persistence and fairness. Your assignment contributes to our mission. We value human dignity and diversity, academic creativity and a critical spirit, solidarity and cooperation, and the well-being of employees, students, patients and clients. We offer you:
A full-time position for 2 years, extendable. Starting date as soon as possible.
A salary set according to the pay scales of ITM and the Flemish universities and to your work experience with some supplementary benefits, such as private pension scheme and meal voucher subscription.
A pleasant working atmosphere with attention to work-life balance and individual growth and development.
For more information about this position, please contact HR (recruitment@itg.be).
Send your CV together with your letter of motivation to recruitment@itg.be before 1 February, 2022.
Does this job not fit your profile, but do you know someone who does? Give them that chance and share this vacancy.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Čaplygin  è una città della Russia europea sudoccidentale, situata nell'oblast' di Lipeck ai margini del Rialto centrale russo, presso la confluenza dei fiumi Stanovaja Rjasa e Jagodnaja Rjasa (bacino del Don), 85 chilometri a nord del capoluogo Lipeck, all'estremità nordorientale della oblast': è il centro amministrativo del distretto omonimo.

Società

Evoluzione demografica
Fonte: mojgorod.ru
 1897: 15.300
 1926: 9.600
 1959: 10.700
 1970: 13.700
 1989: 14.300
 2007: 13.200

Altri progetti

Collegamenti esterni

Chaplygin


Ever since the introduction of money making programs became available. Mis-guiding experts decided to become more of a nuisance than provide realistic help to the newcomers on the net.
These presenters seem to have such enlightenment That they forget about the real aspect of internet businesses and decide to market anything and everything. Coming up with a slew of unrealistic facts and answers about internet marketing as a whole. And alot of these marketers are involved in new age cults. Their sole intent is to brainwash you.
They may have an answer for just about everything even when it doesn't make any sense. They still in general will stand by it most of the time. They also tend to market everything and anything because they can't grasp the real meaning why they are in business just like other types of marketers. It boils down to one thing. There in it for the money and not the science of marketing a opportunity.
The know It alls can be pesty at times when dealing with them. But if they are pretty much swimming in money. They can be alittle arrogant. Sometimes very arrogant towards the people who are poor that are on a limited income.
Just because they are making loads of money doesn't aways mean you should trust them. You would be a fool if you let someone sway you to join them just because they are making tons of money. They could very well be affiliate garbage junkies that sign up for worthless affiliate programs and MLM opportunities.
http://www.ptotoday.com/0803whiner.html. An article in PTO Today points out that they do have lots of knowlege and may bend over backwards to correct you. But some know It alls are real phony causing you to believe their bogus information.
These individauls can do the most damage by getting you to believe their fantasies on the entire spectrum. Some may claim that they are multi millionairs and have businesses of their own but when comes to backing up their claims with the facts. They always run and hide giving nothing but excuses.
Many sociopaths have charactoristics of pathilogical lying along with the religous cult leaders today.
There are plenty of articles on this type of behavior. And If you are going to to attempt to battle them in a game of wits. Its best that you be armed with the certain kind of knowledge.
Well these people can inflict the greatest damage of all time if you let them. They can be your best friend, your next door neighbor, and even a close family member. Their main ejective is to talk you out of on your pursuit of your goals, your business, and your dreams. But remember, Dream stealers come in all shapes and forms. Sometimes they can talk you into quiting your legitimate business opportunity only to pursway you into joining their worthless junk program.
If you haven't already encountered such experts by today. You probably will sometime. These people can be the most crafty individauls anyone came across. Indeed, they will come up with the wildest hype stories anybody has heard just to convince you to join their business on the spot without allowing you to research the proposed opportunity they are selling you. Remember, there is no pie in the sky, no quick wealth overnight, and no lazy way to riches. Their intent is to con newbies out of their hard earned cash. Bottom line is: they care only about padding their wallet by signing up newbies who are the most which lack research knowlege. Even the experts that don't take time to do their own research risk damaging their credibility greatly.
Don't be pressured into a business by time windows. Such as the price will increase in sixty days if you don't join today and other simular high pressure selling tactics.
Never join a business just because someone new you met says so.
Never Join programs that promotes expensive products and services. You could damage your credibility in the near future when things go sour.
Always take time to do your homework by researching the opportunity before getting involved by asking questions about it.
A business opportunity will never be easy. It takes time to develope it. Takes time to build it. And it takes time to promote it. Never believe anyone that says its easy. They are just lying to you.
Some networking companies are built around gaining customers, some around recruiting people into the plan. These people in turn recruit others who recruit others who recruit others etc.
Ever wonder why people are so turned off at the mention of Multi-Level Marketing? Is it legal? Is it a pyramid? Who benefits the most? Where does the money flow? In this article we will examine basic differences between Multi-Level Marketing and a Corporate Structure.Let's take the corporate structure first.
So, what is this Network Marketing secret really about?To illustrate this Network Marketing secret in the simplest of form let us listen to a story about Jack.Jack was walking around a newly established shopping mall and came across this wonderful restaurant.
One of the most powerful secrets to recruiting in network marketing. Do you use them?INFERNO Secret:Word Pictures can increase your recruiting ratio by 50% overnight!Ok.
Consulting in MLM has gotten to be a big business in Network Marketing. Being one myself, I have found that there are good ones out there, and then there are well, not so good ones.
Distributors are paid through compensation plans. These plans consist of rules.
The source of frustration addressed in his article may be all too familiar if you happen to work at an Internet-based home business which relies on personal relationships and/or teamwork.I am often contacted by members of my business team with a tale of woe regarding a lack of response from their affiliates.
Network marketing companies are mushrooming up everywhere these days. It's really hard to distinguish between good, reliable network marketing companies and those that are just scams.
It would be nice to be one of those Internet gurus. To know everything about doing business online.
Profitable and effective network marketing systems and productsAfter 20 years of network marketing I'll share a few thoughts with you. Trial and error is very expensive as we all know.
Nowadays, network marketing is very popular in our society. Almost every body knows about that.


text:
Hispanic voters speak out in wake of Dodge City polling controversy
Katie Moore katie_reports
Nov 4, 2018 at 7:29 PM Nov 5, 2018 at 12:12 PM
DODGE CITY — José and Doreen Vargas spent several hours over the weekend passing out voter information at meatpacking plants and other local businesses.
"We just want to make sure that people know where to go and vote cause it's very important," José Vargas said.
The spotlight turned on Dodge City in mid-October after Ford County Clerk Deborah Cox moved the town's only polling site outside city limits. The ACLU of Kansas expressed concern and filed a lawsuit alleging Hispanic voters may be disproportionately impacted by the relocation.
Dodge City, which has a population of about 27,000, has undergone a dramatic demographic shift and is one of the state's few majority minority towns.
As the controversy over the voting location unfolded, it has put the city's diversity in sharper focus.
With the direction of the state on the line in Tuesday's elections, José Vargas said he believes Dodge City may be particularly impacted by the outcome of the gubernatorial race. Republican candidate Kris Kobach has taken an aggressive line on illegal immigration with proposals to end in-state tuition for noncitizens and allow state police to enforce federal immigration law.
Democratic candidate Laura Kelly said securing borders is needed, but immigrants are important to the state's agricultural and manufacturing sectors.
José Vargas said towns like Dodge City have survived because immigrants have moved in, filling jobs with the meatpacking industry.
"I personally think these communities are alive because of the immigrants," he said.
Mexican restaurants dot downtown Dodge City and Wyatt Earp Boulevard, the town's main thoroughfare, along with signs announcing various stores are "abierto," or open.
In the past few decades, the town has undergone striking changes. During the 1992-93 school year, 30 percent of the Dodge City school district student population was minority. In 2017-18, it had jumped to 83 percent.
Maria Rojas has lived in Dodge City for the past 20 years. She arrived not knowing English but said she had dedicated teachers and learned the language. In recent years, she has experienced "kind of a negative vibe," which she attributes to politics.
Rojas has two sons, ages 8 and 10. Her eldest is embarrassed to speak Spanish, telling her "Spanish sucks," she said.
"It's peer-based," she explained. "That's a struggle."
While Dodge City is generally welcoming, Hispanic community members said there have been isolated incidents where they have encountered a sense of disdain.
José Vargas said he has heard of disparaging comments about Dodge City becoming "Little Mexico."
Karim Acosta, who came to the United States in 2003 after seeking asylum from Venezuela, said she feels blessed to be here. But there have been run-ins where she was told to go back to her country.
Imelda Ahumada, speaking through translator Mary Marquez, said she has gotten looks while speaking Spanish.
Alejandro Lara said he has heard similar comments, like, "Go back to Mexico," and, "This is America, you're supposed to speak English."
"You get used to that," he said.
Lara said the local environment has worsened since President Donald Trump was elected.
"White people feel even more superior now that he's in office," Lara said.
José Vargas said the atmosphere under Trump has changed "big time," ushering in fear and apprehension.
"People don't want to invest, they don't want to buy a home, they don't want to buy an auto, because they say, 'What happens if they deport us?' " he said.
The Vargases, who have lived in Dodge City for nearly two decades, own a company that helps people with taxes and paperwork, such as power of attorney letters.
Doreen Vargas said they have seen an uptick in the number of "guardianship letters," which are written in case a parent gets detained or deported.
Some also believe immigrant community members, including those who are in the country legally, are targeted by police.
Melissa McCoy, assistant city manager, said the city has been welcoming to immigrants and made special efforts to provide services. Officials have brought U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Mobile Services to help area residents remain in compliance with their migratory status without having to travel to government offices in Wichita, Kansas City or Oklahoma. At the end of October, the city hosted Mexican Consulate Mobile Services so more than 250 Mexican nationals could receive identification documents, McCoy said.
Representatives from several sectors also serve on the Cultural Relations Advisory Board. The committee recently hosted its annual Engage Dodge course, which provides awareness about local government and is held in English and Spanish.
The city has engaged in outreach efforts related to health and legal services and increased its efforts to hire bilingual employees, particularly for police and fire departments, McCoy said.
Additionally, the city has "taken an active stance" on issues like DACA, McCoy said, submitting letters of support for the program to state leaders. Last year, staff held a DACA clinic and assisted 14 recipients.
The city also backs a path to citizenship for "immigrants who are of good moral character and ready to become fully integrated in our communities," the city's 2018 Legislative Policy document reads. It indicates support for limited or restricted drivers licenses and in-state tuition for undocumented college students.
"Our community is thriving, and the Hispanic population not only fills critical jobs in the manufacturing, agriculture and hospitality sectors but these citizens of our community are business and property owners, as well as entrepreneurs," McCoy said. "Dodge City is one of the fastest growing communities in the state, and that is due in large part to our Hispanic population."
The midterms
Doreen Vargas said making a change to the voting place for Dodge City's 13,000 registered voters was deceiving.
"To me, that's how I saw it — as a political tactic to deviate people from voting," she said.
The late-September switch was confusing, José Vargas said, and it was compounded after Cox, the county clerk, sent out notifications listing the incorrect polling address.
The voting site was relocated, Cox explained, because of planned construction at the Civic Center.
"There is no construction going on there now," Doreen Vargas said.
Cox testified last week that she decided to move the location after being informed of construction that would start in October and couldn't foresee that it would be delayed.
Several people the Vargases spoke with as they handed out voter information didn't know about the location change.
"A lot of people that I encountered today were asking, 'Well, where do we go vote?' " Doreen Vargas said Saturday. "So there's confusion upon confusion in the community."
José Vargas said a lot of information is available for English speakers but not for those in the Hispanic community.
Ahumada said she wants to vote Tuesday to do something for the community and the country, and to express herself as a Hispanic community member. She said she doesn't know the new polling location but that a friend will take her.
Bob Beatty, Washburn University political science professor, said the controversy in Dodge City shows how much geography can affect voter access.
"Moving the one polling station to the outskirts of town in Dodge City is absurd, and the Ford County election officials have rightly been the subject of national mockery and heckling," he said, adding that the move may prompt some constituents to "want to have a word with their elected officials."
Others don't see much of a problem.
A man who voted early and declined to give his name said he didn't understand what all the "hoopla" was about, and that voting is a right and a privilege for people who are here legally.
Daja Hall-Gonzalez, an 18-year-old college student, voted for the first time by dropping off an advance ballot at the Ford County government office. She said voting "was awesome" and didn't think the polling location change was a big deal.
Acosta, the Venezuela native, said she has heard complaints about the location change but doesn't see it as a major issue, especially coming from a country where elections were downright corrupt.
As voters consider the options on their ballot, immigration appears to be a critical issue for parts of western Kansas with rhetoric that may sway some voters.
At an Oct. 26 campaign stop in Hutchinson, someone suggested to Kobach that children should be required to speak English before entering school. Kobach called it "a common sense idea."
"We Americans get this," Kobach said.
Although Lara is a Republican, he said he was turned off by interviews he saw featuring Kobach and decided to vote independent this year.
Acosta said she opposes Trump's proposal to revoke citizenship of babies born in the United States.
Other topics that were important in considering candidates included education and taxes.
Although a federal judge last week struck down the ACLU's request to keep the polling location open within city limits for Tuesday's election, the organization said it will continue to push other parts of the lawsuit.
According to the ACLU, Dodge City has one polling place for 13,000 registered voters while the average location in Kansas serves 1,200 assigned voters.
"There was a long line out there," José Vargas said of voting in the 2016 presidential elections.
People weren't complaining because they wanted to vote, he said, but Dodge City should have two or three locations. Others, like Rojas, agree that more polling sites should be available.
According to a September 2018 study published in the Election Law Journal, Kansas is the ninth most difficult state to vote in.
Another hurdle is raising awareness about the importance of voting. Doreen Vargas said there is still a mindset among many Latino people that voting won't make a difference. She thinks the national attention on Dodge City has helped show that voting is important.
"They need to go out there, they need to vote, they need to know who's who and what these persons are doing or want to do," José Vargas said.
Many Hispanic community members would also like to see minorities in positions of elected power. The ACLU said there are no minority elected office holders in the county, despite the Hispanic community's population advantage.
"That imbalance has been a big problem in Dodge," Rojas said, adding that she recognizes that is a responsibility for the Hispanic community to figure out.
José Vargas said he doesn't feel represented.
"That's another thing we need to do something about," he said.


Our pals at What's Trending found out all the details about the new Zombie Frappuccino and it looks pretty killer. People are literally losing their minds over the news.
Rumor has it @starbucks is coming out with a green apple #ZombieFrappuccino for #Halloween. Will you try it?


text:
Q: Rectangle inscribed in semicircle, find perimeter and more Consider this image:
A rectangle is inscribed in a semicircle and the radius is 1. The bas of the rectangle is x. Write an expression for the rectangle perimeter and determine the value of x that gives the highest possible perimeter. Also, what is the highest perimeter?
Well... I fooled around with the unit circle, but still no progress. I've found several instructions on how to find the area, but no luck with perimeter.
I've been trying to solve this one for days now, I have completely giving upp solving it by my self. If someone could provide me with both answers & solutions, I would be happier than a child in a candy store :)
Could any kind soul help me out? :)
EDIT:
Please read new update:
http://imgur.com/a/adATx

A: I think you have come till this equation:
$$P=2x+\sqrt{4-x^2}$$
Further,
$$\frac{dP}{dx}= 2-\frac{x}{\sqrt{4-x^2}}$$
Set $\frac{dP}{dx}=0$ for finding the maximum of P.
So, $$2=\frac{x}{\sqrt{4-x^2}}$$
       $x=\sqrt{\frac{16}{5}}$ is the value of x for maximum value of $P$ (which gives the maximum perimeter).
Therefore, the perimeter of the rectangle when    $x=\sqrt{\frac{16}{5}}$ is $P=2\sqrt{5}$
(by substituting the value of x in the first equation).
Finally,
$$x=\frac{4}{\sqrt{5}}$$
and
$perimeter(max)=2\sqrt{5}$

A: Hint: calculate the height with pitagoras (hyp=1)
Edit: the height is $h=\sqrt{1-x^2/4}$. Now, the perimeter is $p(x)=2x+2 \sqrt{1-x^2/4}$.
$p'(x)=2+(1-x^2/4)^{-1/2}(-x/2)=0$ iff $1-x^2/4=x^2/16$ iff $x^2=16/5$

A: $P=2x+2h$
By definition $x=r\cos(\theta) \implies x=\cos(\theta)$
$P=2\cos(\theta)+2h$
By pythagoras $(\frac{x}{2})^2+h^2=1$
$h^2=1-\frac{x^2}{4}$
$h^2=\frac{1}{4}(4-x^2)$
$h^2=\frac{1}{4}(4-\cos^2(\theta)$)
$h=\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{4-\cos^2(\theta)}$
$P=2x+2h$
$P=2\cos(\theta)+2(\frac{1}{2}\sqrt{4-\cos^2(\theta)})$
$P=2\cos(\theta)+\sqrt{4-\cos^2(\theta)}$
Notice that the $-1\leq\cos(\theta) \leq1$ and $0 \leq \cos^2(\theta) \leq 1$
So max value is $P(\theta)_{max}=2+\sqrt{4-1}=2+\sqrt{3}$

A: The perimeter is given by,
$$2h+2x=2(h+x)$$
We need to maximize $2(h+x)=2\sqrt{1-x^2/4}+2x=\sqrt{4-x^2}+2x$ by pythag. Thm. Obviously $x \in [0,2]$.
Let $x=2 \sin (\theta)$, restrict $\theta \in [0, \frac{\pi}{2}]$.
We have,
$$\sqrt{4-x^2}+2x=2\cos(\theta)+4\sin (\theta) = \sqrt{2^2+4^2} \cos (\theta-\omega)$$
Where $\omega=\arctan (\frac{4}{2})$ and $\omega \in [0,\frac{\pi}{2}]$
We can get $\theta-\omega=0$, so the maximum is $\sqrt{2^2+4^2}$
Identities used include $\sin^2 (\theta)+ \cos^2 (\theta)=1$ and:

Given, $a,b>0$:
  $a\cos (\theta)+b \sin (\theta)=\sqrt{a^2+b^2}\cos( \theta-\omega)$
Where $\omega$ is the angle in the right triangle with legs of length $a$ and $b$ which is opposite to $b$.

A: Call the angle between the bottom of the semicircle and the radius to the vertex of the rectangle $\theta$. Then the height of the rectangle is $h = \sin \theta$ and the length is $x = 2\cos\theta$, making the perimeter $P = 2(x+h) = 4\cos\theta + 2 \sin\theta$. Using the sum identity, we can write this as
$$
P = 4\cos\theta + 2 \sin\theta = 2\sqrt{5}\left(\frac{2}{\sqrt{5}}\cos\theta + \frac{1}{\sqrt{5}}\sin\theta\right) = 2\sqrt{5}\cos\left[\theta - \cos^{-1}\left(\frac{2}{\sqrt{5}}\right)\right]
$$
From this you can easily find the maximum value of $P$ and the corresponding value of $x = 2\cos\theta$.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Inscrivez-vous et devenez membre de KLEYA
Si vous préférez, vous pouvez nous contacter ou laisser votre méthode et l'heure de contact préférées et nous vous contacterons.
Income Tax: The hardest thing in the world?
"The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax", Albert Einstein once said. Granted, his theory of relativity is not exactly easy to grasp, but getting one's head around income tax rules is no walk in the park either. For a 10-year period, individuals eligible as Non-Habitual Resident regime can enjoy a simplified, more beneficial Personal Income Tax (PIT) regime. The benefits includes a special rate to employed and self-employed individuals and exemptions on certain foreign income such as interest, dividends, rental income, capital gains on real estate, royalties and, the most popular, pensions. In a snapshot, the regime applies to anyone that becomes Portuguese resident, who has not been resident in the 5 years prior to moving and applies within the deadline.
The Non-Habitual Resident regime applicable to employed and self-employed individuals sets a special 20% PIT flat rate on income from those sources. The income must result from high value added activities performed in Portugal. Those activities can be of a scientific, artistic or technical nature, with examples including doctors, university teachers, designers, architects, engineers, researchers, IT technicians, investors and managers. If you don't have income deriving from a professional activity, depending on the country of source, using the domestic legislation of that country or the applicable tax treaties, it may be possible to have income that during the application of the regime will not be taxed at source nor in Portugal (the most popular being pensions, dividends and interests). As for the regime relevant for Non-Habitual Resident pensioners, it allows foreign-source pensions to be fully exempt from PIT, subject to certain conditions.
One of those conditions is that the source of the pension is not a Portuguese tax resident entity. The other is that the pensions are subject to tax in the source country. However, this condition may, in reality, not be required for cases in which the source country, based on its existing tax treaty with Portugal, does not tax the individual at the source. It is important to note that attribution of Non-Habitual Resident status is not automatic. It must be activated by fulfilling specific formalities. Had Einstein been a taxpayer under the current Non-Habitual Resident regime in Portugal, we bet his quote would have never been produced. But then again maybe his famous theory of relativity would not be around either. After all, living the good life can be an absolute distraction.
Interested in the Non-Habitual Residents regime?
REQUEST A CALL BACK REGISTER
Prélèvement Automatique


text:
OVER 4.5 lakh students on Sunday appeared in civil services preliminary examination which passed off incident-free at various centres across the country after bring mired in controversy following protests over change in pattern.
4,51,602 candidates look the examination, about 1.27 lakh more than the last year, at 2,137 centres in 59 cities.
"There were no incidents of protest from any of the centre in the country. We are very happy that the examination went off peacefully and without any law and order problem." Union Public Service Commission Secretary Ashim Khurana told PTI. He said none of the chief secretary of states, where the examination was conducted, reported any incident of protest.
"All officials of UPSC. Department of Personnel and Training and chief secretaries successfully coordinated for peaceful conduct of the examination." he said. A total of 9.44.926 candidates applied for the examination and of these. 6,80,455 downloaded their admit cards for appearing in the test. "As many as 4,51,602 candidates took the examination in various exam centres spread across the country. About 1.27 lakh more than the last year." Khurana said. A total of 3.24.101 hadappeared in civil services preliminary examination 2013.


text:
Documentaries: Echoes of Ji.hlava
Date: 27 March 2017 - 30 March 2017 Venue: NYU in Washington
As part of Echoes of Ji.hlava, NYU Washington will screen the documentary "Spectres Are Haunting Europe" on March 27 at 6 pm, followed by "Helena's Law" and "FC Roma," on March 30 at 12 noon and 2 pm… more ►
Czech Foreign Minister Zaorálek at the Meeting of Ministers of the Global Coalition on the Defeat of ISIS
Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic Lubomír Zaorálek led the Czech delegation to the Meeting of Ministers of the Global Coalition on the Defeat of ISIS at the US Department of State in Washington, DC, on March 22, 2017. more ►
Echoes of Ji.hlava Brings Documentaries to DC
NYU Washington will screen select documentaries as part of Echoes of Ji.hlava on March 27 and 30 in Washington, DC. Documentaries include: "Spectres Are Haunting Europe" on March 27 at 6 pm, followed by "Helena's Law"and "FC Roma," on… more ►
Albaform – An American Story in the Making
Since 2013, the Czech company Albaform has grown to almost 70 employees in the US state of Georgia and, thanks to orders from BMW and others, it is investing $1.7 million into its development. more ►
Czech That Film Festival Hits Washington
Touring 15 major US cities, the Czech That Film (CTF) Festival makes a stop in DC at the Avalon Theatre from April 12-13, opening with the Czech box-office smash comedy Tiger Theory (Teorie tygra) with guest director Radek Bajgar on April 12,… more ►
Czech Heritage Night
Date: 05 March 2017 Venue: Verizon Center
Join us on Sunday, March 5, at 5 pm, for the first Czech Heritage Night with Tomáš Satoranský as the Washington Wizards take on the Orlando Magic at the Verizon Center! more ►
Czech Heritage Night Broadcasts Live to Czech Republic - Mar. 5
Czech fans, come to the Washington Wizards game on March 5 at 5 pm at the Verizon Center, while friends and family watch back home! more ►
Czech Heritage Night w/Washington Wizards - Mar. 5
New Video Promoting Czechia
A new video to promote the Czech Republic was commissioned by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs and launched in December 2016 at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Prague. more ►
In Memory of Dr. Zdenka Horáková
Dr. Zdenka Horáková, a long-time SVU member, died on Thanksgiving Day, November 24, 2016, after a prolong illness. Obituary by Mila and Eva Rechcígl, Zdenek and Eva Vich. more ►
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Brookhaven Lab scientists (from left) Lijun Wu, Yimei Zhu, Chris Homes, and Weiguo Yin stand by the electron microscope used to reveal the multi-orbital distributions with a technique called quantitative convergent beam electron diffraction (CBED).
Armed with just the right atomic arrangements, superconductors allow electricity to flow without loss and radically enhance energy generation, delivery, and storage. Scientists tweak these superconductor recipes by swapping out elements or manipulating the valence electrons in an atom's outermost orbital shell to strike the perfect conductive balance. Most high-temperature superconductors contain atoms with only one orbital impacting performance—but what about mixing those elements with more complex configurations?
Now, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory have combined atoms with multiple orbitals and precisely pinned down their electron distributions. Using advanced electron diffraction techniques, the scientists discovered that orbital fluctuations in iron-based compounds induce strongly coupled polarizations that can enhance electron pairing—the essential mechanism behind superconductivity. The study, published in the journal Physical Review Letters , provides a breakthrough method for exploring and improving superconductivity in a wide range of new materials.
"For the first time, we obtained direct experimental evidence of the subtle changes in electron orbitals by comparing an unaltered, non-superconducting material with its doped, superconducting twin," said Brookhaven Lab physicist and project leader Yimei Zhu.
While the effect of doping the multi-orbital barium iron arsenic—customizing its crucial outer electron count by adding cobalt—mirrors the emergence of high-temperature superconductivity in simpler systems, the mechanism itself may be entirely different.
"Now superconductor theory can incorporate proof of strong coupling between iron and arsenic in these dense electron cloud interactions," said Brookhaven Lab physicist and study coauthor Weiguo Yin. "This unexpected discovery brings together both orbital fluctuation theory and the 50-year-old 'excitonic' theory for high-temperature superconductivity, opening a new frontier for condensed matter physics."
Imagine a child playing inside a jungle gym, weaving through holes in the multicolored metal matrix in much the same way that electricity flows through materials. This particular kid happens to be wearing a powerful magnetic belt that repels the metal bars as she climbs. This causes the jungle gym's grid-like structure to transform into an open tunnel, allowing the child to slide along effortlessly. The real bonus, however, is that this action attracts any nearby belt-wearing children, who can then blaze through that perfect path.
Flowing electricity can have a similar effect on the atomic lattices of superconductors, repelling the negatively charged valence electrons in the surrounding atoms. In the right material, that repulsion actually creates a positively charged pocket, drawing in other electrons as part of the pairing mechanism that enables the loss-free flow of current—the so-called excitonic mechanism. To design an atomic jungle gym that warps just enough to form a channel, scientists audition different combinations of elements and tweak their quantum properties.
"High-temperature copper-oxide superconductors, or cuprates, contain in effect a single orbital and lack the degree of freedom to accommodate strong enough interactions between electricity and the lattice," Yin said. "But the barium iron arsenic we tested has multi-orbital electrons that push and pull the lattice in much more flexible and complex ways, for example by inter-orbital electron redistribution. This feature is especially promising because electricity can shift arsenic's electron cloud much more easily than oxygen's."
In the case of the atomic jungle gym, this complexity demands new theoretical models and experimental data, considering that even a simple lattice made of north-south bar magnets can become a multidimensional dance of attraction and repulsion. To control the doping effects and flow of electricity, scientists needed a window into the orbital interactions.
"Consider measuring waves crashing across the ocean's surface," Zhu said. "We needed to pinpoint those complex fluctuations without having the data obscured by the deep water underneath. The waves represent the all-important electrons in the outer orbital shells, which are barely distinguishable from the layers of inner electrons. For example, each barium atom alone has 56 electrons, but we're only concerned with the two in the outermost layer."
The Brookhaven researchers used a technique called quantitative convergent beam electron diffraction (CBED) to reveal the orbital clouds with subatomic precision. After an electron beam strikes the sample, it bounces off the charged particles to reveal the configuration of the atomic lattice, or the exact arrays of nuclei orbited by electrons. The scientists took thousands of these measurements, subtracted the inner electrons, and converted the data into probabilities—balloon-shaped areas where the valence electrons were most likely to be found.
The researchers first examined the electron clouds of non-superconducting samples of barium iron arsenic. The CBED data revealed that the arsenic atoms—placed above and below the iron in a sandwich-like shape (see Figure 1) exhibited little shift or polarization of valence electrons. However, when the scientists transformed the compound into a superconductor by doping it with cobalt, the electron distribution radically changed.
Figure 1: These images show the distribution of the valence electrons in the samples explored by the Brookhaven Lab collaboration—both feature a central iron layer sandwiched between arsenic atoms. The tiny red clouds (more electrons) in the undoped sample on the left (BaFe2As2) reveal the weak charge quadrupole of the iron atom, while the blue clouds (fewer electrons) around the outer arsenic ions show weak polarization. The superconducting sample on the right (doped with cobalt atoms), however, exhibits a strong quadrupole in the center and the pronounced polarization of the arsenic atoms, as evidenced by the large, red balloons.
"Cobalt doping pushed the orbital electrons in the arsenic outward, concentrating the negative charge on the outside of the 'sandwich' and creating a positively charged pocket closer to the central layer of iron," Zhu said. "We created very precise electronic and atomic displacement that might actually drive the critical temperature of these superconductors higher."
Added Yin, "What's really exciting is that this electron polarization exhibits strong coupling. The quadrupole polarization of the iron, which indicates the orbital fluctuation, couples intimately with the arsenic dipole polarization—this mechanism may be key to the emergence of high-temperature superconductivity in these iron-based compounds. And our results may guide the design of new materials."
This study explored the orbital fluctuations at room temperature under static conditions, but future experiments will apply dynamic diffraction methods to super-cold samples and explore alternative material compositions.
The experimental work at Brookhaven Lab was supported by the Office of Science at Department of Energy (DOE). The materials synthesis was carried out at the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Institute of Physics.
 Chao Ma, Lijun Wu, Wei-Guo Yin, Huaixin Yang, Honglong Shi, Zhiwei Wang, Jianqi Li, C. C. Homes, Yimei Zhu, "Strong Coupling of the Iron-Quadrupole and Anion-Dipole Polarizations in Ba(Fe1−xCox)2As2". Physical Review Letters, 112, 077001 (published on February 20th, 2014). Abstract.


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The Stone Secrets of Easter Island
If you've ever been anywhere near this strange island in the South Pacific, you'll know that all over it stand hundreds of strange statues. As the Dutch admiral who discovered this island in 1722 wrote: "All over the island stand huge idols of stone, representing the figure of a man with big ears and bearing a head covered with a red crown". These 'idols' remain secrets in stone because, to this day, no one knows why they are there or who built them.
There are 230 statues standing all over Easter Island and, apart from size – varying from five to twelve metres high – they are all identical. Legless, they rise from the earth at hip level with expressionless faces, receding foreheads, tight lips, prominent chins and a curious tilt at the end of the nose. Oddest of all are the ears – long and thin, they hang down to the jaw and, as the Dutchman described, on each statue was a hat-like crown of red stone.
The idols had also been carved in an unusual manner. Instead of first hacking out a block of stone and then shaping it, as was the usual practice for sculptors at the time, whoever was responsible for the Easter Island statues had chiselled them into the living rock. They were then separated from the rock when complete, dragged to their chosen positions and slipped into ready-prepared holes in the ground. This in itself was a Herculean task, for each statue weighed between 20 and 40 tonnes. The sheer effort involved in the construction of the 230 standing statues pales into comparison before that which must have been expended on a further 157 found in quarries in various stages of construction, all of them far larger but identical in appearance.
There are a number of unsolved questions concerning the Easter Island statues. Whom do they represent? Why are they there? Why are there so many? Who made them? Why was work on the 157 unfinished statues abandoned so suddenly that tools were left lying all over the quarries? It was expected that all of these questions would be answered when explorers discovered 67 stone tablets covered with writing in the possession of the natives of Easter Island. The only trouble was that neither the natives nor anyone else has ever been able to read them – a problem which was not helped by the fact that the tablets were later hidden by the natives and no proper copies were taken of the writing on them.
One theory as to the origin of the Easter Island statues is that they were built to honour the legendary King Hotu Matua. This theory does not really hold up to much scrutiny, however, due to the lack of evidence that Hotu Matua ever existed. Also, because it appears that the statues were all built more or less at the same time, it must have required a small army of sculptors and a very large army of labourers to do so – far more than a tiny island such as this could have supported in fact. There is speculation that Easter Island either adjoined or was part of a far larger landmass at some stage, which was later destroyed by an earthquake or volcano, but again there is little evidence to support this theory.
Despite all of the advances in science since Easter Island was first discovered, the solution to the mystery of the strange statues upon it remains as elusive as ever. In the modern age, the internet has taken over, coming up with all sorts of wild theories from UFO's to magical petrification spells, to explain the presence of the Easter Island statues. If you're intrigued by this story and would like to see what the statues actually look like then check out the link below: http://www.mysteriousplaces.com/Easter_Island/
Tags: Easter Island, Folklore, Hotu Matua, Legend, Myth, Paranormal, Supernatural
Categories Folklore, Legend, Mythology
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4 Responses to "The Stone Secrets of Easter Island"
Archard September 19, 2011 at 3:58 pm #
one of those places I always like to read about
steviegrace September 20, 2011 at 3:54 am #
Wow… After having watched Doctor Who, I feel like this is straight out of their episode plot. Such a great mystery, and an even better post on the topic!
anilbalan September 20, 2011 at 1:36 pm #
abigal racut May 7, 2014 at 4:43 pm #
hell that shit scary
Leave a Reply to Archard Cancel reply


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Chelsea want Michael Edwards for sporting director job – Man United also linked
Jack Lusby
With Michael Edwards departing his post as Liverpool's sporting director this summer, both Chelsea and Man United have emerged with interest in hiring him.
Edwards has officially handed over duties to Julian Ward after 11 years at Anfield, with the well-respected transfer figurehead holding the sporting director job since 2016.
It has already been an impressive start for Ward, who previously served as Edwards' deputy, as the Reds have swiftly wrapped up deals for Darwin Nunez, Fabio Carvalho and Calvin Ramsay this summer.
That should allay concerns over the impact a changing of the guard would have on Liverpool's recruitment setup, with the succession plan paying off.
Where Edwards lands next remains to be seen, but it has now been widely reported that Chelsea are hoping to convince him to join the new hierarchy at Stamford Bridge.
The Times' Gary Jacob and Matt Lawton describe Edwards as being "among the options being considered" following the departure of Marina Granovskaia, who was a "key ally" to Roman Abramovich.
Todd Boehly, who recently purchased Chelsea, is temporarily leading the transfer operation, but it is clear that an established name is required as sporting director.
Speculation over a move to west London is also picked up by the Mail's Sami Mokbel, though he claims that Edwards is "hesitant about making such a swift return to football" after an approach from the Blues.
A primary focus in the Mail's report is interest from Man United, who are overhauling their backroom this summer, though ESPN's Mark Ogden doubles down on Chelsea links and claims "a move to Old Trafford is unlikely."
Ogden adds that "sources have said that a move to Chelsea would hold great appeal," though it appears it will be a tough decision for Edwards who had planned to take time off.
Ajax, Monaco, Real Madrid, Newcastle and Paris Saint-Germain are among the other clubs to have been touted with moves for Edwards, though some of those have since denied interest or appointed other candidates.
It is no surprise, of course, that Edwards is so in demand, as the 43-year-old proved himself one of the most accomplished sporting directors in football during his time at Liverpool.
Michael Edwards


The Quilt is an international community art project which I created with the help of over 300 people, all answering the question: what is your vision of peace in the Middle East? Participants included Jews and Palestinians, adults and children, and professional artists as well as those new to artistic expression.
The Quilt first opened in Vancouver Canada in 1999, and its 31 panels have been touring ever since. You will find these panels in Gallery One, along with the words of the people who made them. These panels are dedicated to the ordinary Israelis and Palestinians who, despite the realities of the occupation, have not given up hope, but found ways to work together.
In 2007, on a subsequent project, I worked with Palestinian women and children near Bethlehem. I invited them to send fabric greetings to the rest of the world. You will find these pieces in Gallery Two.
Then in 2015 I discovered a Face Book page called "Jews and Arabs Refuse to be Enemies". I created fabric portraits of the photographs people posted on that page. You will find this work in Gallery Three.
I have always described the Middle East Peace Quilt as a room full of people who will never meet, listening to each other. I invite you to join this conversation by exploring the site.