text:
If I say something will he kill me?
If you walk down the streets of Chicago long enough, you'll see just about everything.
In all my years commuting to the newspaper—26 and counting—I've never, as I did Wednesday morning, found myself behind a man wearing his shirt inside out.
This is something new, I said to myself, standing behind him at the light, waiting to cross Madison.
A brown polo pullover with yellow and white stripes—not the best look when worn properly. To me, they're the kind of shirts I wore when I was 7. A child's shirt. It's jarring to see grown men go to work in them. I briefly considered saying something. "Hey pal," or words to that effect, "do you know you have your shirt on inside out?"
But he was a big strapping guy, with a healthy gut hanging over his belt. As I imagined saying those words, as I formed them in my mind, trying them out, my next image was him turning with a snarl and plunging a steak knife into my chest. Or screaming in some thick Eastern European tongue as his hands close around my throat. That kind of thing happens. Mind your own business, I told myself, hurrying up Wacker, crossing at Washington.
I thought about other things. But at Franklin, he was back, coming north. We had taken different routes, but were now converging, intersecting, and I had the chance to say something again. Could this, I wondered, be a style? No, it had to be some sign of disturbance, some person in the grip of a mania, who just put their clothes on in a disordered fashion. Do not enter into his world. Flee.
He crossed Franklin, and now we both were going north, paralleling each other. I tracked him out of the corner of my eye; he walked with a certain bearish, rolling gait. And suddenly I felt like a coward. This man needed an outside opinion. This man needed my help.
I crossed the street in the center of the block, hurried to catch up, fell into step beside him. Approaching Lake, as we passed under some scaffolding, I made my move.
"Excuse me," I said.
"Yes?" he said, brightly, pleasantly. "Can I help you?"
"I was wondering if you knew that..."
"Yes, my shirt," he laughed—his voice regular, friendly, not the guttural bellow I had anticipated. "I put it on backward. I'm going to change it as soon as I get to the office. Thank you though." He smiled.
"Well, that happens," I said, trying to be comforting. "I once spent the day wearing a kilt backwards, with the pleats in the front. Nobody told me."
"I noticed some odd looks at the train station," he said. "I thought maybe I just looked extra handsome today..."
"I'm lucky to have my wife give me the once over before I leave."
"I live alone," he said.
And we exchanged a few more words, until we got to Wacker again (for you readers in Indonesia, Wacker Drive curves through downtown, in a gentle right angle, so you can travel in a straight line and still cross it twice. It has North, South, East and West addresses, which can be confusing to newcomers). I bid him farewell, and he bid me farewell, and I walked north puzzling: Why are we so afraid of each other? Why are we so reluctant to talk to strangers? Why do we assume the worst, the very worst, about those we don't know? Most people are not fiends. Most people are nice. So why the excess of caution? Is it just me? No, that seems to be the common practice. I spend two hours commuting most days, and people are loath to look at each other. I could show up at the train station wearing a Carmen Miranda fruit hat and the people I see every day would edge away but not say a word. A little wariness is necessary in a city like Chicago. But too much, and you live in your own personal desert, a lonely island in a sea of humanity. No need for that. No need to cringe in your little protective bubble, alone. He was a nice guy who happened to put his shirt on the wrong way. If I hadn't had talked to him, I never would have known.
Bill Savage October 4, 2013 at 12:38 AM
Almost every time I ride my bike at night, I encounter a driver without his or her lights on. 90% of the time, I yell "Hey, lights" and gesture, and they turn on their lights and wave or yell "Thanks!" Just trying to make the streets safer and save the driver an unnecessary ticket. (Also sometimes with people driving with their hazard lights on, who don't realize it, and that's a ticket too.0 The other 10% of the time, though, I am told to Fuck Off in no uncertain terms, or ignored. That might be the Car v. Cyclist thang, but I also think some people don't want to be told they're doing something wrong. The real revealing thing here is that you thought about how he would react by a judgment about his size/look. If he were a little nerdy guy, would you have told him right off?
Neil Steinberg October 4, 2013 at 1:46 AM
That's a good question? I think the defining impulse was not to get involved, and size just a pretext.
Tonia October 4, 2013 at 9:06 AM
Neil, I spent a whole day at the County Court building recently with my shirt on inside out... riding the elevators, sitting in front of a courtroom, and not one person told me I had my shirt on inside out. I felt *betrayed*! I would tell someone, and I wish someone had told me. "Girl Code" demands it. (My excuse: I have blackout shades in my bedroom and didn't turn on the light while I was getting dressed. Now I do the double-check before leaving the house..)
I react in a similar fashion -- thinking long and hard about giving advice -- as it is just as painful when you offer up help and are taken to task for doing so. Recently a neighbor -- new to our town -- was complaining about the city work on the main drag cost her a few extra minutes getting to the train. I tried to point out that the city has an eMail newsletter, website and a FB page where all of this information is made available to residents. I was accused of being arrogant and condescending; then was later "unfriended" on FB -- all for offering neighborly advice.
Last week, I spent an entire day with my pants on inside-out...and backwards. I felt uncomfortable all day, and I couldn't figure out why!!!
I think it's a guy thing. Years ago, when you could still bolt through Midway a la OJ to catch your plane, I was making just that dash for a flight to St. Louis for a BIG meeting at a major corporation. The flight attendants literally closed the jetway door behind me, took my ticket and off we went. An hour later I was standing at the Hertz counter when a woman walks up behind me and proceeds to button the 10 buttons down the back of my dress, saying, "those fools in line behind you would have let you walk into your meeting half naked." I was just a slip of a girl at the time and could have died of embarrassment. I've never forgotten that act of kindness and have repaid it many times.
Jakash October 4, 2013 at 2:50 PM
That's a nice story, as are those of the commenters, but does your pleasant outcome really counter the 1 in a million chance of "him turning with a snarl and plunging a steak knife into my chest," as you so eloquently put it? I'm sorry to be the wet blanket on this thread. I'm a friendly guy -- happy to help out a stranger if the situation calls for it. And, you're right, most people one finds oneself surrounded by are swell. But my experience in the big city is that, if somebody wants to talk to you out of the blue -- on the train, sidewalk, wherever -- chances are pretty good that you're not really going to want to talk to them. I don't know why, but people who start talking to strangers, as a broad generalization, and in my anecdotal experience, are a non-random sample of humanity that skews toward the weird.
Neil Steinberg October 4, 2013 at 3:15 PM
@Jakash -- You are correct, though I'm one of those people who talk to strangers and, yes, I guess I skew toward the weird. It's my job.
Gimme the weird. AKA the interesting.
Laurie Alfaro October 6, 2013 at 4:06 AM
Whether or not I would say something to someone with a wardrobe issue would depend on whether or not the person would be in a situation to correct the problem. In the situation you described, with the guy's shirt being inside out, I would probably decide not to say something, since there is nowhere on the train for him to fix it. (What's he going to do, take his shirt off on the El? Why cause him to be self-conscious the entire train ride if there is nothing he can do to fix it?) But if it was in an environment where the person could fix the problem, such as in an office or near a public restroom, then I'd say something.
Halloween has always been a time of civic horror
The Divvy bikes will be out this winter; will you?
Is that a spire or are you just glad to see me?
Or is she just a big gal in a spiky hat?
Are you a vet? Can you prove it?
"How then could I unite with this wild idolater?"
Non-Native-American Guide
AT&T U-verse — solution to a problem you don't have.
The home team, losing in the late innings
Some companies you can't forgive
Growing up in the newspaper
A pane in the glass.
A professional goes home at night.
Handy concept #5: False equivalence
Handy concept #4: Pattern recognition
Handy Concept #3: Regression to the Mean
Divvy Diary: Biking with the mayor
Handy Concept #2 — Cognitive Dissonance
Handy Concept: #1. The Self-Selective Group
Dan Savage puts Obamacare in perspective
Impressioni d'Chicago
October all around, but summer within
Clean-up on Aisle Two...
Pafko at the Wall
Travels with Butch
Contempt for our democracy
Author shines her "Warmth" on Chicago
But does it have to be as lovely as a tree?
Your government (not) at work
The Never-Ending Goodbye
One Thing You Must Do Before You Die
A shameful moment in American history.


text:
Everyone in town has a story.
Making Art Work
Frist Center Head Preparator Scott Thom talks forklifts, fine art & motorcycle museums
By Ashley Brantley / September 23rd, 2014
The job of preparator is a bit of mystery, and not just because no one knows how to pronounce it. (It's prep-PARE-a-tor.)
The inner workings of an art museum are secretive for two reasons:
You can't have someone learning your secrets and going all Thomas Crowne Affair on your watch, and
You're actually trying to fade into the background so the art can be the star.
"Our job is almost like being a stagehand in the theater," says Scott Thom, Head Preparator at the Frist Center for the Visual Arts.
"Visitors don't see a lot of the planning or structure that go on behind the scenes, but if we're doing our job, we're creating an experience."
That requires a lot of planning: research, painting, carpentry, unpacking, installation — and the preparator tackles them all.
"You have to have a lot of different skills," says Thom.
"One day you're working with sculptures and forklifts, and the next day you're hanging projectors. It's a lot about figuring out your own solutions to things."
How did they do that?
There's no such thing as studying to be a preparator. Thom got his MFA in printmaking from UT Austin and started art handling there, but most of his training has been of the on-the-job variety.
"It's highly specialized, so not a lot of people are coming out of school looking for this type of position," he says. "Most are artists or musicians or creative people who got into it to make ends meet, which gives it kind of a fraternity, or guild, feel."
The hands-on nature of the job suits the temperament of anyone who creates art for a living. Though the ultimate goal is to disappear into the background, working with different mediums and ideas — and trying to cultivate a larger emotional response — is challenging, mentally and physically.
"People don't really understand what a physically demanding job it is," Thom says.
"Everything — every crate that arrives — is a couple hundred pounds, even for a medium size painting. And they have to be handled by people, not machines. It feels almost like you're competing because it's so intense and physical."
Inveterate Composition for Clare by Rachel Owens weighs 3,500 pounds
A ton of work
Which brings us to the biggest installation Thom's ever tackled. The mashed-up Humvee currently on display in back of the Frist was a serious undertaking, he says, but the rose sculpture out in front of the Broadway entrance was the biggest pound-for-pound.
"It came to us in multi-ton pieces," Thom says. (A ton is 2,000 pounds.)
"We got a local rigging crew out there with a crane, and it took us a whole day to install. But that's not surprising when you're working with 9,000 pounds."
Rose on 65th Street by Sculptor Will Ryman
But even with that massive installation under their belts, Thom's team had to start from scratch for "Sensuous Steel," the Frist's 2013 exhibit of art deco automobiles.
"The car show was great," he says.
"It was very unusual for us, and logistically challenging. We had to remove doors inside and outside the building; everything had to be pushed into the gallery, not driven. These cars are so delicate, rare and valuable — It's not like you're dealing with an old broken-down Escort! It was difficult but so fun."
1936 Delahaye 135M Figoni and Falaschi Competition Coupe. The Patterson Collection. Photograph © 2013 Peter Harholdt
The art of change
Since the Frist is a non-collecting museum, no display is permanent. While they try to plan several years in advance, the turnaround time between exhibits can be as short as six weeks.
"Places that have collections often have a slower pace and fewer exhibits per year. This is constantly changing, which makes my job more interesting," says Thom.
"And it's nice, too, because you get to focus so closely in on whatever you're unpacking and hanging that day. You get up close and see what you've never seen before."
Thom even gained new appreciation for an art form he never really liked once he worked on the Hudson River School exhibition, which included Albert Bierstadt.
"I am not a huge fan of romantic landscape painting, but the Bierstadt was just amazing to see firsthand," he says.
"When you see a painting up close, it's much different than seeing it in book. You see the skill, and with this one, the light effects seem to come from within the painting rather than without. I'm still not a big fan of landscapes, but this one stuck with me."
The Hetch-Hetchy Valley, California c.1874-80, Albert Bierstadt
Disappearing act
As someone who enjoys all kinds of art, Thom has visited lots of museums. He has obviously made the rounds in New York, and appreciates what he's seen there. But he hasn't seen anything that beats one particular museum in The South.
"My favorite museum building would have to be the Barber Vintage Motorsports Museum just outside Birmingham, Alabama," he says.
"It's an unholy alliance of stunning architecture and (mostly) motorcycles, with views of the active racetrack from the panoramic windows. It can be sensory overload for a gear-head when the track is in use."
Thom is quick to remind, though, that the museum itself should never really be the focal point.
"I have seen some great exhibitions at various places, but the building itself usually becomes secondary, as it should."
For most people, that is.
"I'm always looking at how they do things like wall construction or paint finishes; the level of craftsmanship and care that they take; how they hang projectors or paintings," he says.
"It's interesting to see other people's ideas. I'm always looking for something I've never seen before."
Watch Thom & his team at work
Meet & Three
When Scott Thom's not hanging art, he's hanging outside. His three favorite spots in Nashville:
1. Natchez Trace Parkway
There are a lot of great motorcycling roads in the area, but one of the best is the Natchez Trace Parkway. It has great pavement, no intersections or stoplights, little traffic, and good visibility around the sweeping corners. It makes for an incredible ride, especially in the fall.
2. Two Rivers Dog Park
We love to bring our three dogs to the newly opened Two Rivers Dog Park in Donelson. It has lots of thoughtful design, like the double-gated entrances to keep pets from escaping as people come and go.
Photo by Jackie B. on Yelp
3. Nashville Greenway
Most weekends my wife and I (and our dogs) are walking on the Greenway, multiple entrances to which are only a mile or so from our house. Metro Nashville has a really great Parks & Rec Department.
Fast Facts: Frist Center Building
Courtesy of the Frist Center for the Visual Arts
The building that houses the Frist Center for the Visual Arts was built in the 1930s to serve as Nashville's main post office. Its location near Union Station was convenient for mail distribution since most mail was moved by train at that time. "When the Frist Center assumed stewardship of the building in 1999, everyone thought the grillwork in the Grand Lobby was brass," says Thom. "In fact, it was an aluminum alloy that had been darkened by years of smoking in the building, the coal-fired heat in homes all over town, and the building's location next to the train station."
The Frist opened as a museum in April 2001. It does not have a permanent collection, so it focuses on creating original exhibits and securing traveling exhibits. The museum is named for Nashville's Frist family, who helped create the museum through their charitable foundation. Thomas F. Frist, Jr., a co-founder of the Hospital Corporation of America, spearheaded the efforts.
Ashley Brantley
What's easier: setup or teardown?
It's definitely more stressful to install. You've got visiting curators, conservators and registrars in the galleries, as well as our staff designers and curators. When you're taking things apart, there's less watching over the shoulder. But we handle everything with gloves — literally. No matter what the object is, no matter how sturdy it looks, we treat it as if it's extremely fragile.
I work with nearly every employee at the Frist Center, including designers, registrars, curators and staff preparators. Many of our contract art handlers also work at places like Cheekwood or Arts at the Airport, so they're very experienced. Anything we need to have done, they're up for. My team of staff preparators and contract art handlers is extremely competent and knowledgeable, which is important when you're working with huge installations or priceless artifacts.
What's the most difficult exhibit you've ever had to stage?
"Watch Me Move," the animation exhibit. It was extremely tech heavy: 50 projectors, 16mm film, maintenance, troubleshooting, wiring. Our ceiling isn't great for hanging projectors, so we had to install hundreds of feet of square steel tube to hang from, and then remove it all. It was difficult but really interesting and enjoyable at the same time.
Max Fleischer. Betty Boop, 1932–39. BFI National Archive
What's your favorite exhibit you've staged?
30 Americans. It featured contemporary African-American artists from a Miami collection. It had really good variety — more than 70 paintings, sculptures, photographs, and multimedia installations. And it was a lot of artists I wasn't familiar with, which means I got to experience something totally new.
Mickalene Thomas. Baby I Am Ready Now, 2007.
More Unsung Nashville
Nashville Zoo:
J.G. Auman
Lawyer & Historian:
David Ewing
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Parthenon Publishing
© 2023 Parthenon Publishing

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Gresso  är en ort i kommunen Onsernone i kantonen Ticino, Schweiz.

Gresso var tidigare en självständig kommun, men 10 april 2016 gick Gresso och fyra andra kommuner ihop i kommunen Onsernone.

Orter i Ticino
Tidigare kommuner i Ticino
Onsernone

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


SPEECHLESS. We have not prepared y'all emotionally for what you are about to see. This Southern Maryland engagement was straight out of a movie! The perfect spring temperature, the gorgeous beach sunset, and Taylor knows how to style a session. We're a little obsessed with this one!
Michael just popped the question to Taylor over St. Patrick's Day weekend and they were itching to get some engagement photos. No time like the present! So we drove over to Prince Frederick last night to meet up with them at their house which SO conveniently had this amazing little beach less than a mile away. They asked if they could bring their little fur baby and y'all already knew what our answer was – of course!
It was hard to narrow down a few favorites from last night and you can see why. Congratulations on your engagement Taylor and Michael! We can't wait to see y'all again soon!
To view more Southern Maryland engagement sessions, browse the links below!


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text:
Q: Switching between .MOV and .WEBM video formats without checking for browser Is it possible to provide to an HTML5 video tag two sources and let the browser (Chrome and Safari) decide which one to pick automatically, if the sources in question are:

*

*a .MOV file with transparency readable by Safari, but not by Chrome

*a .WEBM file with transparency (that is not applied by Safari)
?

At the moment if I put the .MOV file first Chrome tries to play it, ignoring the second .WEBM source. And if the .WEBM file is the first one, Safari plays it without transparency.
I don't know what type attribute to specify to make the fallback work. For example: type="video/mov" is not accepted by web standards and type="video/mp4" for the .MOV makes Chrome think it can play it.
I would like to avoid checking for the browser with javascript if possible.

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaStackExchange


text:
Press Bio:
Lauren Nikohl is an up & coming singer and songwriter who genre-bends between indie-pop, soul, rock, and EDM. A native Minnesotan, this talented artist is now making big moves in Los Angeles. While some of her music is reminiscent of "Stevie Nicks meets Adele", other songs of hers edge closer to "David Bowie meets Jess Glynne".
Nikohl released her debut indie-pop/soul EP, "The Night" in June 2015, half of which is self-produced. She has also released a few collaboration tracks since 2016 that err on the side of r&b, and released an EDM/Soul single, "Against the Wind," with Grammy-winning and Billboard-charting producer Robert Eibach in 2018.
Extended Bio:
Lauren Nikohl began singing, playing guitar, acting in musical theatre, songwriting, and playing piano, all before the age of 10. Her life-long love for the performing arts has expanded over the past few years into a driven passion to create meaningful change in the world through her music. A few causes that she is passionate about are women's rights, human rights, veganism, and the legalization of cannabis and other plant medicines.
This young artist's mission is to delve deep into consciousness with her lyrics and spread awareness of the connectedness of everything. She hopes that she can help shape mainstream culture into a more compassionate and thoughtful entity by exuding optimism, writing songs with substance, and presenting herself as a role model for young men and women to be more motivated, mindful, and empowered in a country where insecurity and depression are way too common.
Lauren Nikohl hopes to take over the music industry, not only as a superbly talented songwriter and performer, but as an intellectual entrepreneur, and an inspirational leader for generations to come.
(c) Lauren Nikohl 2019


text:
Six to Eight Black Men
Chris can spell!
Merry Christmas Happy Holidays - 2011
my 21st century autistic son...
thick envelope
December SAT Scores (aka, My Buddha)
speaking of grammar to enrich and enhance writing
stop the multiverse, I want to get off
Steve H on node chairs
Robyne Camp says PISA may be coming to my town
speaking of inequality
The Race redux
yet another brilliant idea from the folks who brou...
What do students say about 'online learning'?
what's to like about Khan
Flipping the Classroom: Hot! Hot! Hot!
Christopher Hitchens, RIP
I read the David Sedaris piece on Christmas in Holland a couple of mornings ago -- hilarious. Starts slowly, with a somewhat protracted rumination on gun laws in the hinterlands, but once he gets to Holland the piece takes off. (I would probably feel differently if I were from Holland, as opposed to the hinterlands, myself. Here's Leon De Winter on Santa Claus's Dutch Uncle in yesterday's Wall Street Journal. De Winter's account doesn't mention six to eight black men.)
From the Sedaris piece:
In France and Germany, gifts are exchanged on Christmas Eve, while in Holland the children receive presents on December 5, in celebration of Saint Nicholas Day. It sounded sort of quaint until I spoke to a man named Oscar, who filled me in on a few of the details as we walked from my hotel to the Amsterdam train station.
Unlike the jolly, obese American Santa, Saint Nicholas is painfully thin and dresses not unlike the pope, topping his robes with a tall hat resembling an embroidered tea cozy. The outfit, I was told, is a carryover from his former career, when he served as a bishop in Turkey.
One doesn't want to be too much of a cultural chauvinist, but this seemed completely wrong to me. For starters, Santa didn't use to do anything. He's not retired, and, more important, he has nothing to do with Turkey. The climate's all wrong, and people wouldn't appreciate him. When asked how he got from Turkey to the North Pole, Oscar told me with complete conviction that Saint Nicholas currently resides in Spain, which again is simply not true.
update: Here is Mary Damer on masked deficits & poor spelling in high-performing students.
Some of you who've been reading and writing ktm from the beginning may remember Chris's "psychotic" spelling as a 4th grader.
Well, great news: Chris can spell. I suspect he's still not spelling as well as I probably did at his age, but his spelling is completely 'within the realm,' if you know what I mean, and you probably do.
I've been thinking lately about the issue of how much you can learn about writing (and spelling) just from reading, and I think the answer is that you can learn a great deal ultimately. I say that with the caveat that school reading needs to be guided by a teacher and needs to be systematically increased in difficulty.
Those conditions have been true for Chris, who has taken all Honors and AP courses in high school, and who says he's done all the reading in his classes. The reading load in Honors/AP courses is pretty hefty, the books are quite difficult, and a teacher leads the way.
We worked our way through Megawords Grade 6, which helped tremendously, and Chris's high school reading and writing took him the rest of the way.
His handwriting still stinks, however, although it's better than it was. (Takes me back to our summer adventures with Write Now. Chris's handwriting didn't improve, but mine did.)
the Megawords posts at ktm, the sequel
from the "blooki" index:
Megawords & sounding out by syllables & spelling research
The Saxon Math Of Spelling
Being Your Child's Frontal Lobes
Great Moments In World History
Summer Supplement Time
Summer Supplement Time Part 2
How To Spell
How To Spell Part 2
MoreSpelling
Liveblogging The Spelling Bee
teaching spelling through morpheme and book recommendations
bad spelling on job applications
employing 21st century technology...
4/2006 - the first day .... and Catherine's story (all pages are frozen; I can't edit them)
11/30/2006 - Christopher masters technology
12/23/2011 - thick envelope
Just in time for Christmas!
(It's from U Mass, which has put Chris in its Honors college and given him $10K in merit aid (unasked). Have I mentioned Scores are Gold lately?)
I'd characterize yesterday as an epically bad day in my 46 years of life, and while the turmoil had nothing to do with the SAT, my December scores did not help.
Yes, I do realize (intellectually) that I should feel happy about my Reading and Writing scores; but honestly, that Math score feels crushing, like a bully. Today, well, I'm trying to see it as my Buddha.
The worst part was telling my son. I swear to you, he looked at me with these big, wide, honest to god eyes of surprise, and said "really?" -- like he truly couldn't believe his mom didn't do it. I think I'd actually convinced him that hard work pays off (that's what I thought!).
But he's a sweetie, and he quickly focused on my Reading and Writing scores, telling me how great they are, blah blah blah. In fact I got all sorts of encouraging emails from friends and family:
"I know it's hard to remember at times like these, but these scores are not a judgment. They're just numbers ..... You did your best and gave it your best shot. That's what's most important -- the process, not the outcome .... Your scores are fantastic – you're 40 points away from an 800 on CR – do you know how many parents would kill for that score?? The 730 on writing just puts you in your range."
They made me feel better, in a supported sort of way -- but deep inside I couldn't help feeling like a high school senior who just found out they didn't get into their first choice college, and everyone writes on their Facebook wall: "You're too good for them.... It wasn't meant to be..... There's a better school for you..."
And that's all true, but it still feels devastating. At least it does for me.
At the end of the day yesterday, I received an email that truly did lift my spirits. It came from a high school senior whom I'd never met:
SAT scores came out today! How did you do? I hope you did well. I know you'll get a good score, and congrats on completing the project! What you did was very inspiring, especially for high school seniors. I just thought that I would let you know that you motivated me to study, and I went from a 1630 (520R 600M 510W) (junior year) to a 2300 (700R 800M 800W) (senior year).
I need to print that out and post it at eye level on my bulletin board.
I haven't fully processed how it's possible that I spent dozens and dozens of joyful hours studying SAT math over the course of 10 months, and hardly improved at all from where I started without knowing a thing last January. My friend Catherine says it's one more piece of evidence that a solid curriculum is essential, and without that, no amount of SAT prep in the world is going to improve your score.
For all intents and purposes, I didn't learn a lick of math after 9th grade (until I began this project). I'm thinking about taking a math class at my local community college -- and just starting from scratch.
I'm not done. I have to pause in order to write a book right now, but I'm not done with the math. I feel incomplete.
If there's anyone else out there feeling disappointed by their SAT scores, here's a quote that I have posted in a few places around my house that seems to help:
If you have the privilege of being with someone at the time of his or her death, you find the questions such a person asks are very simple:
"Did I love well?"
"Did I live fully?"
"Did I learn to let go?"
-- Jack Kornfield
llustrations by Jennifer Orkin Lewis
Cross-posted on Perfect Score Project
Posted by Debbie at 8:27 AM 12 comments:
re: Stop the multiverse, I want to get off
Why do we have books called Grammar to Enrich and Enhance Writing?
Seriously. How is "Grammar to Enrich and Enhance Writing" a sensible title for a book on grammar and writing?
Grammar is writing. Without grammar, you don't have writing; without grammar, you have a list of words, which is not writing. (Not really.) Grammar to enhance writing is like paint to enhance painting or pianos to enhance playing the piano. If you don't have paint, you're not painting. Same thing with writing.
Ordinary people get this.
That's why ordinary people tend to think schools should just go back to teaching grammar as they once did lo these many years ago and be done with it. Teach grammar in isolation, teach grammar out of isolation, teach grammar in and out of isolation.
Just teach it.
And make sure the kids have actually learned it.
David Foster Wallace on the seamy underbelly
So I was propounding my theory that Something Happened in 1985, a world-jarring event that catapulted us all into a parallel universe where Not Teaching is Teaching and Salman Khan is the man you summon to help you spice up your presentations.
Then a couple of minutes later I came across this: The Accidental Universe: Science's Crisis of Faith by Alan P. Lightman.
Why are we living in a world where Writing to the Point is out of print and Grammar to Enrich & Enhance Writing is in print?
I blame the multiverse.
"The Nodal Classroom"
An amazing new educational paradigm! It's the Node™, brought to you by Steelcase. Ta Da! Music please.
I'll bet they can add PC docking stations with connections to the Smartboard. Oops! It's time to scoot into your new formations. Beep, beep! Ha, Ha! Now that's what I call active learning. PE across the classrooms.
Down with the Harkness Table. Up with nodal chairs. They can be so easily rearranged on the deck of the Titanic.
We haven't been able to increase the share of our youth that completes college or high school. It's really remarkable, and most people wouldn't actually guess this, but in the US, the cohorts that had the highest high-school graduation rates were the ones that were graduating in the middle of the 1960s. Our high-school graduation rate has actually been declining since then. If you look at college, it's the same thing.
Daron Acemoglu on inequality
Two words: node chairs.
Two summers ago, I wrote a number of posts on The Race between Education and Technology, a book I found revelatory. Via Greg Mankiw's blog, I've just come across economist Daron Acemoglu's recommendation of The Race as one of the top 5 books to read on inequality:
This is a really wonderful book. It gives a masterful outline of the standard economic model, where earnings are proportional to contribution, or to productivity. It highlights in a very clear manner what determines the productivities of different individuals and different groups. It takes its cue from a phrase that the famous Dutch economist, Jan Tinbergen coined. The key idea is that technological changes often increase the demand for more skilled workers, so in order to keep inequality in check you need to have a steady increase in the supply of skilled workers in the economy. He called this "the race between education and technology". If the race is won by technology, inequality tends to increase, if the race is won by education, inequality tends to decrease.
The authors, Claudia Goldin and Larry Katz, show that this is actually a pretty good model in terms of explaining the last 100 years or so of US history. They give an excellent historical account of how the US education system was formed and why it was very progressive, leading to a very large increase in the supply of educated workers, in the first half of the century. This created greater equality in the US than in many other parts of the world.
They also point to three things that have changed that picture over the last 30 to 40 years. One is that technology has become even more biased towards more skilled, higher earning workers than before. So, all else being equal, that will tend to increase inequality. Secondly, we've been going through a phase of globalisation. Things such as trading with China – where low-skill labour is much cheaper – are putting pressure on low wages. Third, and possibly most important, is that the US education system has been failing terribly at some level. We haven't been able to increase the share of our youth that completes college or high school. It's really remarkable, and most people wouldn't actually guess this, but in the US, the cohorts that had the highest high-school graduation rates were the ones that were graduating in the middle of the 1960s. Our high-school graduation rate has actually been declining since then. If you look at college, it's the same thing. This is hugely important, and it's really quite shocking. It has a major effect on inequality, because it is making skills much more scarce then they should be.
Do Goldin and Katz go into the reasons why education is failing in the US?
They do discuss it, but nobody knows....It's not that we're spending less. In fact, we are spending more. It's certainly not that college is not valued, it's valued a lot. The college premium – what college graduates earn relative to high-school graduates – has been increasing rapidly. It's not that the US is not investing enough in low-income schools. There has been a lot of investment in low-income schools.
Goldin and Katz's book shows that the college premium was higher in the early 1900s than it was in the 1940s and 1950s. Then it remains stable for several decades, and then it starts increasing again in the 1980s.
the US education system has been failing terribly at some level
the cohorts that had the highest high-school graduation rates were the ones that were graduating in the middle of the 1960s
He goes on to say that "What's missing from the Goldin and Katz book is that they really don't look at all at what's going on in the top 10%," a point I think I recall Allison making (although Allison may have been talking about the the top 1 or 0.5%).
yet another brilliant idea from the folks who brought you all those other brilliant ideas
Jen writes:
I was talking to a teacher friend the other day and he was lamenting that the curriculum is going to change yet again and that if they follow what they say they want to do, they'll move everything to a grade earlier.
Mind you, this is an urban district with not great scores. Mind you, they spent years with EM which is likely the worst way to teach kids who come in without number sense, without support for education at home, and without a parent who can figure out what's being asked and more importantly, what's being missed.
But, the new big idea (again, this is really part of the idea of spiraling) is that if kids aren't getting, 5th grade math in 5th grade it means you really need to teach those concepts in...4th grade! Brilliant! Bravo! Imagine how much better they'll do at it, not learning it at an earlier age!
Now kids coming into K and 1st grade without any number skills, 1-3 years behind other kids of middle class, well-educated parents, will be expected to be getting through 1-3 more years of math in their first few years of school, too. It's genius!
What teacher can't take 25-30 elementary students who are starting behind and teach them 2-6 years of math in a year? Whiner slacker teachers, that's who!
I say, Whiner, slacker teachers of the world, unite!
Having now spent two fall semesters in a row trawling the web for research and advice on the teaching of freshman composition, I have come to the conclusion that all useful thinking on the subject ceased in 1985.*
Prior to 1985, people are thinking and writing all manner of helpful stuff; after 1985 you get the rise of the boss compositionists and the erasure of the sentence.
The compositionists are still busy erasing the knowledge we used to have:
Before: Campus Writing Program | Indiana University - grading; sequenced microthemes; pamphlets for students, etc. Good stuff.
After: Node Chairs Move Students to New Activity
Honest to God: this is Indiana University's Campus Writing Program, and they've devoted an entire page to a furniture purchase.
* a proposed factoid that supports my hit-by-a-meteor hypothesis
from the Annals of I read the news today, oh boy:
Stanford Medical School, which allows its students to take lectures online if they want, summoned Mr. Khan to help its faculty spice up their presentations.
Online Learning, Personalized
By SOMINI SENGUPTA
I am happy Salman Khan exists. I'm glad he's doing what he's doing; I hope he keeps on doing it. His SAT videos weren't helpful in our case (though I can imagine they would be to many others), and he talks too fast in the one distributive property video I watched for me to use it with my middle school math student (who is now distributing the negative rather well, thank you for asking). I have high hopes for the videos on the American-Chinese Debt Loop, however.
But here's the question.
In what universe is Salman Khan the person you summon to "spice up" a presentation?
Surely not the one I'm living in.
Last Thursday I was talking to 3 of my students about this and that when the topic of online learning and online courses came up. I don't remember why it came up, but it did.
My campus is keenly interested in online learning. It looks to me as if the college hopes to increase enrollment in online courses substantially, although I don't know this.
In any event, the topic came up, and instantly all three said they hate -- hate, that was the word -- online learning. They didn't just say it; they showed it. Their faces scrunched up the way mine does when I step in dog poop wearing my old Nike Free Run sneakers, the ones with the really deep, really tight, really white rubber cleats I must now attempt to power-wash with the garden hose.
That look, the look of disgust (here it is, modeled using 6 "pseudo-muscles") is meaningful to me because I was once given an extended parent-of-an-autistic-child interview, which took hours to complete, and one of the questions asked was: Does your child display the facial expression of disgust? I vividly recall, to this day, feeling relieved and proud when I realized that Jimmy did indeed have a distinct facial expression of disgust, which came across his features when he saw disgusting things. (Mainly poop, as a matter of fact.)
So last Thursday my students were saying they hate online learning, and their faces were exhibiting disgust.
Where there's smoke there's fire: where 3-out-of-3 students inside one classroom express vocal dislike of online learning, there are more. Many more, no doubt.
Why is no one listening to these kids?
That is a rhetorical question.
No one in the public school establishment ever listens to kids. Their misery in 'traditional' classes is simply assumed, and their future pleasure in flipped classrooms is assumed, too.
from the same article:
Khan Academy, for its part, teamed up last year with the Los Altos, Calif., school district to launch a pilot of the model. In it, students in grades 5-8 use Khan-produced online lectures as part of their math curriculum. The pilot has expanded from 150 students in five classrooms last year to 1,000 students in 40 classrooms this year.
"It's not just about the kids watching the same lecture the night before. For us, the big piece is having teachers use data to make instructional decisions about their students," said Alyssa Gallagher, the assistant superintendent for curriculum and instruction for the 4,500-student district.
Courtney Cadwell, who teaches 7th grade math at Eagan Junior High School and serves as a math coach to teachers in Los Altos, agreed that the rapid feedback on her students has been the best part of the model. The Khan program allows teachers to track what videos and individual exercises students spend the most time watching and working through, and how long it takes students to correctly solve 10 problems in a row for any given math concept.
Last year, as one of the first teachers in the Los Altos pilot, Ms. Cadwell started all of the students in her remediation class on Addition 1, the most basic Khan unit, and asked them to work through all the units at their own pace while she watched using the program's data-tracking system.
Students worked through those initial units quickly, but she could see when they hit their "pain points"—sometimes on material covered several grades earlier.
"In order for me to get that kind of understanding of a student, I would have had to sit down one-on-one and work through problems and see a pattern, which I'm happy to do, but it takes a lot of time," Ms. Caldwell said. "This confirmed my suspicions and allowed me to remediate much more quickly."
"I was able to identify those learning gaps in real time, whether it was from 3rd or 4th or 5th grade, and I was able to remediate and saw those learning gaps begin to disappear," Ms. Cadwell said.
Before the start of the pilot, only 23 percent of the 7th grade remediation students were proficient on the state mathematics test, but after the first year, the proficiency rate climbed to more than 40 percent, according to district data.
"The math class that they dreaded became something they really loved," Ms. Caldwell said.
Lectures Are Homework in Schools Following Khan Academy Lead By Sarah D. Sparks | Published Online: September 27, 2011
This is the aspect of "technology" that strikes me as extremely useful: the possibility of immediate, and reasonably accurate, formative assessment of student learning.
Speaking as a parent and a teacher of college freshmen, I have zero interest in a 'flipped' classroom. I don't think it's going to work, and while I normally avoid making predictions (even in private), in this case I have no qualms:
I PREDICT: The flipped classroom - hot! hot! hot! - is going to be yet another edu-flop taking its place in a 100-year parade of edu-flops. 100 years and counting.
COROLLARY: the flipped classroom is looking to be a big, bold, and brassy flop if everyone piles on before we have any indication whatsoever that a flipped classroom actually works. I.e.: before we have any indication that a) kids will actually watch the videos, and b) if they do watch, whether they actually learn anything.
The assessment question is different, I think. As a teacher (and a parent) I have a near-desperate need for more information on what students know and don't know -- and acquiring that information is easier said than done. I can easily imagine the Khan site (or any similar site) being an enormous help -- so much so, that I'm planning an 'online component' for my course next fall. (Though, again, we'll see whether my students can - or will - manage it. That is a subject for another post.)
Meanwhile C. is taking a physics course in which the teacher seems to have actually made "technology" work, also a subject for a separate post.
Susan Kramer watched her packed 10th grade biology class weave through rows of desks, pretending to be proteins and picking up plastic-bead "carbohydrates" and goofy "phosphate" hats as they navigated their "cell." As they went, they explained how the cell's interior system works.
It's the kind of activity her students love....
Lectures Are Homework in Schools Following Khan Academy Lead by Sarah D. Sparks | Education Week | September 27, 2011
10th grade?
They're 15 years old and they love weaving through rows of desks pretending to be proteins and picking up plastic-bead carbohydrates and goofy phosphate hats as they navigate their cell?
Granted, Flipping the Classroom is Hot! Hot! Hot!. But still.
Ross Douthat on "The Believer's Atheist":
But in the world of journalism, among his peers and competitors and sparring partners, it was nearly impossible to find a religious person who didn't have a soft spot for a man who famously accused faith of poisoning absolutely everything.
Intellectually minded Christians, in particular, had a habit of talking about Hitchens as though he were one of them already — a convert in the making, whose furious broadsides against God were just the prelude to an inevitable reconciliation. (Or as a fellow Catholic once murmured to me: "He just protests a bit too much, don't you think?") This is not a sentiment that was often expressed about Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, or any other member of the New Atheist tribe. But where Hitchens was concerned, no insult he hurled or blasphemy he uttered could shake the almost-filial connection that many Christians felt for him.
Some of this reflected his immense personal charm, his willingness to debate with Baptists and drink with Catholics and be comradely to anyone who took ideas seriously. But there was something deeper at work as well. American Christian intellectual life is sustained today, to a large extent, by the work of writers very much like Hitchens — by essayists and journalists and novelists and poets, from G. K. Chesterton and C. S. Lewis to W. H. Auden and Evelyn Waugh, who shared his English roots, his gift for argument and his abiding humanism.
Recognizing this affinity, many Christian readers felt that in Hitchens's case there had somehow been a terrible mix-up, and that a writer who loved the King James Bible and "Brideshead Revisited" surely belonged with them, rather than with the bloodless prophets of a world lit only by Science.
In this they were mistaken, but not entirely so. At the very least, Hitchens's antireligious writings carried a whiff of something absent in many of atheism's less talented apostles — a hint that he was not so much a disbeliever as a rebel, and that his atheism was mostly a political romantic's attempt to pick a fight with the biggest Tyrant he could find.
This air of rebellion did not make him a believer, but it lent his blasphemies an air of danger and intrigue, as though he were an agent of the Free French distributing literature deep in Vichy. Certainly he always seemed well aware of the extent to which his writings traded on the unusual frisson of saying "No!" to a supposedly nonexistent being.
New York Times | December 17, 2011
And here is Ian McEwan: Christopher Hitchens, Consummate Writer, Brilliant Friend


text:
Tag Archives: Blue Velvet
The 10 films that changed my life
I was asked to do this Facebook thing of "In no particular order, list 10 all time favourite films, which really made an impact on you. Post the poster and nominate a new person each day." But a) I'll only forget each day and b) I imagine it all started as a way to harvest data on sharing and friends. So here it is as a blog instead.
NOTE: this about impact, not objective quality. The dates are when I saw these films, not always when they were released. Inevitably, they are concentrated in my formative years. I have seen many brilliant films since, but nothing can rock your world and change your life like films you see in your youth.
Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975). When I won a scholarship to Winchester, my dad said he would take me to London, where I could do or have anything I wanted. I chose to see this. I had never laughed as much. But mostly, it's here for the father-son bonding thing. And the Black Knight. And the questions three. And the shrubbery. And the farting in your general direction.
Star Wars (1977). Blew my head clean off and made me swear to be involved with film in some way for the rest of my life (leading me to Time Out, and later to write shorts of my own).
Aguirre: Wrath of God (1979). My first art-house film in a rep cinema. Realised belatedly there was a whole world of film out there, which I spent my uni years devouring.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1979). Any film you've seen 40+ times has got to be on this list. This was in the early days of call-and-response and dressing up at midnight screenings. I've shown it to people since, and they're like, "Nice songs, quite fun, but what's the big deal?" People forget, now, how liberating and transgressive and attitude-changing the film was at the time. I've since been sung to by both Richard O'Brien and Patricia Quinn (now Lady Stephens) 😊
Apocalypse Now (1980). I saw this loads of times at the Towne Cinema midnight screenings in Ottawa, with bongs being passed up and down the aisles. Epic sweep that never loses touch with the human drama; very much of the drug culture but with a coherent plot; horrifying and hilarious and equal measure.
Napoleon (1983). I saw the restored version at the Barbican with, if memory serves, triptych screens and a live orchestra. I've seen it in cinemas twice since, as well as on TV. I studied the French Revolution for my degree, but more than that, it is astonishingly modern for a film made in 1929 – and started me off on a whole silent movie kick.
Blue Velvet (1986): Because obviously. I mean, imagine seeing it on first release, with no expectations or preconceptions about what David Lynch was capable of. It was, to quote Colonel Kurtz above, "like I was shot… like I was shot with a diamond… a diamond bullet right through my forehead. And I thought, my God… the genius of that! The genius! The will to do that! Perfect, genuine, complete, crystalline, pure."
Akira (1988). My gateway to the astonishing world of anime.
The Lion King (1994). It amuses me that the plot is filched from Hamlet, but really this is here because it makes me think of my boys. I took Theo to the premiere at the Odeon Leicester Square when he was seven months old! Start 'em out young. He slept through much of it, but we watched it a gazillion times subsequently on DVD. My mum would take me to films when I was young, and I've extended this to the next generation. Sam's even made two excellent shorts of his own, one a nominee for student film of the year.
Animal Charm (2012). The idea for this 20-minute featurette came to me in a flash in the gym: a fading fur fashion designer kidnapped by animal rights activists, with a grand guignol horror twist ending. Sadie Frost and Sally Phillips starred, with Michael "Ugly Betty" Urie and Boy George in small roles. It was really good. Kate Moss came to the premiere the W Hotel and sat in the aisle as there were no seats left. Director Ben Charles Edwards (who also co-wrote) has since gone on to make two feature films, while I have gone back into paid journalism, but it was still the culmination of a life-long dream to see something of mine up on the big screen. Thanks, Ben. You're an extraordinary film-maker.
Tags: aguirre: wrath of god, Akira, Apocalypse Now, Blue Velvet, films, lion king, Monty Python Holy Grail, movies, napoleon, Ottawa, Patricia Quinn, Richard O'Brien, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Star Wars, top ten, Towne cinema
In the psychiatrist's chair: six revelations from David Lynch (interview part four)
What follows is self-contained, but there's more good stuff to the interview. Click the links to read parts one, two, and three, or for a review of his current photography exhibition.
Despite the recurrent obsessions on display in his patently f***ed-up films, David Lynch has never undergone psychoanalysis. "I went one time," he explains, "and I asked him if it might affect my creativity. And he said, 'David, I have to be honest with you, it could.' And I said, 'Well, I'm happy to meet you, but I have to go.'"
I tell him that in that case I'm going to play psychiatrist, right here in this Paris hotel suite. I'm going to give him six words – connected with key imagery from his films – and he has to tell me the first thing that comes into his head for each. Surprisingly, Lynch agrees. The results are strangely revealing…
1. "Fire." I'm thinking of Lynch's trademark close-ups of cigarettes (above); the blaze that haunts Wild At Heart; the burning cabin in Lost Highway; the very title Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. But what's Lynch thinking? Fifteen seconds elapse.
"Well, it's… It's kinda…. It means different things in different situations. When I just think about fire, it's so pure, I don't think about anything else." And then, shockingly: "When you said it, I was picturing being in it."
Your first student short was of heads throwing up and catching fire, I add. "It was the reverse, actually. But the elements water, earth, air and fire, it's no accident that we really like those things, and things get reduced down… Fire is so magical. There's a texture to it that occurs nowhere else. And controlling something like that… It wants to get bigger if it can, and then you're very worried that one will go out! With me, I always think about magic, the unexplainable."
2. "Jazz." Lynch works very closely with his composers, though it must be said, Bill Pullman in Lost Highway (above) is the least plausible jazz saxophonist ever seen. There's hardly any pause this time: "Freedom. It's like no constraints, an opening, and then barriers going away and lifting and breaking and experimentation and… it's like attempting for something."
3. "The brain." Each Lynch film out-grosses the last on brain injuries; in Eraserhead the hero's head is made into pencils; The Elephant Man is killed in his sleep through the sheer weight of his head; Blue Velvet has the shot cop briefly still standing, brains exposed, like a faulty electrical appliance; in Wild At Heart Sherilyn Fenn wanders about in shock after a car crash, holding her brain into her cracked skull (left), while asking if anyone's seen her hairbrush; Lost Highway tops the lot by burying a glass coffee table in a man's cranium.
"Well, um…" Nineteen seconds go by. I wait. Then: "The brain is just like a plate but the nervous system and the mind is, ah…." Fully 27 seconds of silence as he furrows his brow comically like a boy at examination time. "It's the thing that traps us and ultimately frees you."
4. "The bed." In The Grandmother, Lynch's best early short, a lonely boy grows a grandmother from a plant on his bed, on which she later dies; Wild At Heart contains a number of heroic sex scenes (above). Complete silence for 48 seconds. What part of "first thing to come into your head" does he not understand? Then Lynch giggles like a schoolboy to whom one has whispered the word "sex". "It's sort of like… A bed is used for many things, but it really is a closeness to death." Pause. "And birth, too."
5. "Red curtains." I'm thinking of the afterlife/limbo of Twin Peaks (left); how in Lost Highway the camera moves over red curtains like a spaceship exploring a strange planet. Immediate response. "Curtains are both hiding and revealing. Sometimes it's so beautiful that they're hiding, it gets your imagination going. But in the theatre, when the curtains open, you have this fantastic euphoria, that you're going to see something new, something will be revealed."
6. "The outside." This is where Jeffrey finds the severed ear in Blue Velvet; the woods are where all the weirdness happen in Twin Peaks (above); there's the Lost Highway itself. I tell Lynch I've read that he was terrified of the outdoors as a child. Immediate response. "Right, I did have a period of that. I really like captured space. Even great vistas are okay because I see some edge. But the word 'outside', it's uh, too random. I lose a bit of control with that word."
And yet your dad worked for the Department of Agriculture. "My father was a woodsman, yes. And wood has played a huge role in my life. So I like building things out of wood, I like chainsawing, I like the smell of the wood, I like the look of a tree, particularly my father's favourite tree which was the Ponderosa Pine. The wood is… everything all the fairy tales made you feel."
Tags: bed, Blue Velvet, David Lynch, department of agriculture, elephant man, Eraserhead, father, films, fire, Fire Walk With Me, head injury, interview, jazz, Lost Highway, movies, red curtains, Sherilyn Fenn, Short film, The Grandmother, Twin Peaks, Wild at Heart, woods
Karma chameleon: David Lynch on death and rebirth, interview part 3
Natasha Gregson Wagner with Balthazar Getty in Lynch's Lost Highway
Click the links for part one and part two of the interview. My review of David Lynch's current exhibition at the Photographers' Gallery is here. Lynch and I are playing a game of "hot or cold" to get to the truth about Lost Highway…
Back to split personalities. All your films deal with the duality of good and evil, often fought out internally. The Mystery Man in Lost Highway seems, like Frank Booth in Blue Velvet, a straightforward embodiment of evil, the dark side. (Lynch cocks his head like a bird to indicate "cold".) Um. Or is he a Creature From The Id, summoned up from Bill Pullman's subconscious? (Lynch nods.) Is that warm? "Yeah."
One bit I really like in Lost Highway is where Getty transforms back into Pullman, when they're making love in front of the car headlights in a bright white light, like at the end of Fire Walk With Me where the angel descends. So is this a kind of angelic visitation? (He's nodding, saying uh-huh, but as if he's expecting more.) So I don't know where that goes exactly… (Lynch laughs, and doesn't help out.)
Okay. You've said before you believe in reincarnation. Is it anything to do with Karma, the wheel of life, with rebirth? "It could be." Then: "You know there's, ah, all sorts of symbols of beautiful transformations, like the cocoon into the butterfly. So it makes you wonder, you know, what is this transformation we're going through?"
So there is life after death? "Aaah, I think so. I think it's a continuum." So what's it like? (He laughs.) Not a room with red curtains and people talking backwards, then? "That would be kinda beautiful to me."
So the blackest, most depressing thing about Lost Highway is that Bill Pullman can never die. He's trapped in this time loop, doomed to repeat his murders and mistakes for ever and ever. "Well, maybe not forever and ever, but you can see how it would be a struggle. Yeah, that's it." (Lynch looks uneasy. He's given away too much!)
So it is that Buddhist notion of reincarnation, that you can only get off the wheel to Nirvana after thousands of years? "Exactly." So there is light? Pullman could be released if the film carried on? "Oh yeah. Sure. It's a fragment of the story. It's not so much a circle as like a spiral that comes around, the next loop a little bit higher than the one that precedes it."
So there you have it. I think I've come as close here as any human can to the central idea behind the film.
I have one more game to play with Lynch; but first, I need to ask him about the accusations of misogyny and pornography that have dogged him ever since Blue Velvet. I have up my sleeve a book of film noir reviews by Barry Gifford, author of Wild At Heart and co-scripter of Lost Highway. Written in 1988, before he started working with Lynch, it describes Blue Velvet as "One cut above a snuff movie. A kind of academic porn. I can never imagine things as depraved as those that occur here, and I've always thought I could get pretty low in that department. Pornography, as such, simply bores me. So this movie isn't for me, yet it seems somehow important and worth discussing." With friends like that, who needs enemies?
"He says it's not for him?" Lynch responds when I read this to him. "I'll never work with him again." He's joking, of course…
Lost Highway certainly reopens the debate. It features Patricia Arquette being screwed from behind and made to strip at gunpoint, only to discover that she enjoys it. Lynch counters that that's just the way the character happens to be. Certainly, his male characters are even more passive, and no less sexually screwed up. It's more perhaps that Lynch's own sexuality was imprinted in the '50s, with his fetishistic fondness for sweater girls in high-heeled shoes with lipstick like a gash of blood. It does seem suspicious that a man who went out with Ingrid Bergman's daughter (Isabella Rossellini) for several years also cast Natalie Wood's daughter, Natasha Gregson Wagner, in Lost Highway – wearing a tight '50s sweater with nothing underneath it, as you can see when she takes it off in a car.
So, Dave, 'fess up: was it because you used to fancy her mum?
"I fancied Natalie Wood, sure, but that's not why Natasha was hired. I met her and suddenly realised I'd met her 18 years before. I didn't actually see her then, but her mother was eight months pregnant. It was when I first went to the American Film Institute, and they had a big party one evening, and Natalie Wood came out on the verandah."
So it's back to your cycle of life and birth?
Another score. Lynch has certainly warmed up over the course of our interview. It's time to put him on the psychiatrist's chair, and play a game of word association…
Come back tomorrow for part four
Tags: afterlife, Balthazar Getty, Barry Gifford, Bill Pullman, Blue Velvet, Buddhism, David Lynch, Ingrid Bergman, interview, Isabella Rossellini, Karma, Lost Highway, misogyny, Natalie Wood, Natasha Gregson Wagner, Patricia Arquette, pornography, reincarnation, Wild at Heart
A game of "hot and cold" with David Lynch: interview part two
Robert Blake as "Mystery Man" in David Lynch's Lost Highway
Though the next two parts of this interview are pretty self-contained, part one is here.
David Lynch is unassailably up there now in the pantheon of great film auteurs. But when I meet him in 1997, his career is on the skids. Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me was booed at Cannes, where two years earlier Wild At Heart had won the Palme d'Or. His second stab at TV after Twin Peaks, On The Air, had been pulled after a few painfully unfunny episodes. In these circumstances, most people would choose a crowd-pleaser for their next project. Instead, Lynch made Lost Highway: brilliant, fascinating, but one of the darkest and least accessible of all his dark and impenetrable movies.
The first third is slow and sombre and pregnant with menace, as Bill Pullman and Patricia Arquette, married but separated by invisible walls, receive anonymous videotapes each morning that are filmed inside the house, penetrating further and further each time. Then we're in another film entirely as Bill Pullman, on Death Row for the bloody butchery of his wife, metamorphoses inside the police cell into a young Balthazar Getty – why, we never really know. The baffled prison guards have no choice but to release him, and he steps out into a bright, '50s-styled world where Patricia Arquette is also transformed, this time into a blonde-haired gangster's moll who sucks him into danger, lust and finally murder again.
Things are further confused by a man known only in the credits as Mystery Man (above), Lynch's most disturbing creation since Dennis Hopper in Blue Velvet, who also has a habit of being in two places at once. The film ends, in an infernal time-loop, exactly where it began.
That's about all the plot that can be described. Along the way there's hot sex and distant sex; a head-wound of epic proportions even by Lynch's standards; and a gratuitously weird but very funny sequence in which crime boss Robert Loggia pistol-whips a tailgaiting driver while lecturing him on the highway code.
That's the beauty of Lynch films: they are an enigma wrapped inside a puzzle hidden inside a maze. I try to ask Lynch outright what Lost Highway is about, but as expected I get this response: "It's good to talk about some things, and some things it's good not to talk about. I love more than to intellectually understand something, to feel an understanding of something."
Right. Thanks a lot, Dave. But I've come prepared for this eventuality. Here's what we'll do, I say: I'll tell you what I think this movie means, and you can tell me if I'm hot or cold. Okay? He's tickled by this. Off we go…
Kyle MacLachlan once said that, when playing Agent Dale Cooper, he imagined him as Jeffrey from Blue Velvet grown up. Maybe the Bill Pullman character isn't actually a different person from the Getty character; maybe he's just the grown-up version? That's why the second half seems so '50s, because it indicates a shift back in time. And while Getty and Jeffrey both lusted after these doomed mystery women, Pullman has actually married her, and found that life with her isn't all he'd hoped for.
Lynch nods like a dog in a car's back window, almost rocking his head off during the bit about marrying the mystery woman. Is it my imagination, or are we both thinking of his now terminated relationship with Isabella Rossellini, whom he met while casting the part of Jeffrey's doomed siren in Blue Velvet? But all he'll say is: "Very good." So, does that mean warm? "Yes, that's very good." Have you anything to add to that? "No." Jesus!
Still, I've scored one hit, with another to come…
Click here for part three, where the real meaning of Lost Highway is revealed as David Lynch discusses death, rebirth, and why he got Natalie Wood's daughter to strip off.
Tags: Agent Dale Cooper, Balthazar Getty, Bill Pullman, Blue Velvet, David Lynch, interview, Isabella Rossellini, Kyle MacLachlan, Lost Highway, Mystery Man, On The Air, Patricia Arquette, Robert Blake, Robert Loggia, Twin Peaks, Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me
Interview and damn fine coffee with David Lynch, part one
Eraserhead poster
With an exhibition of David Lynch's photos now at London's Photographers' Gallery, and a special anniversary edition of Twin Peaks featuring additional material (possibly newly shot) planned for Blu-ray, this seems a good time to put together the best of a 1997 Time Out interview I did with the great man:
"Oh, my," says David Lynch, as he walks into the Paris hotel suite. "Look at you all lollygagging around."
Several things are strange about this:
1. The word "lollygagging". Who says that? It sounds straight out of the '50s. That's why Mel Brooks once described Lynch as "Jimmy Stewart from Mars".
2. Who "we all" are. Sprawled on a big hotel bed alongside me are David Lynch's then 14-year-old son Austin, and either Adam Buxton or Joe Cornish of the "Adam and Joe" comedy duo (the second of whom would go on to make urban sci-fi comedy Attack The Block) and his film PR girlfriend, all watching Adam and Joe's Toytrainspotting spoof.
3. It's freakin' David Lynch!!
His debut feature, Eraserhead, is so called because the hero gets decapitated and his head made into pencils. His only stab at a blockbuster, Dune, features a bloated, pus-boiled pervert, Baron Harkonnen, killing the terrified boy he is molesting at the moment of orgasm by pulling out the plug surgically fitted to his heart. [This is not, as I recall, in the original book]. Blue Velvet starts with a severed ear and gets much worse; Twin Peaks turns supernatural evil, serial-killing and incest into prime-time soap; in Wild At Heart Lynch cut graphic scenes of torture only after a hundred people had walked out of a test screening.
Lynch doesn't need the torture, frankly. He is best at using the unseen and understated, a heightened banality coupled with an extraordinary use of sound, to create a terror of the unknown. His films inhabit a dreamscape where you cannot be sure what is reality and what is fantasy (never better than in Mulholland Drive and Inland Empire), with backwards-talking midgets and red-curtained purgatories accessorised as standard.
We meet just before Lost Highway is released, in 1997. This is one of his most impenetrable films: not so much a "whodunnit" as a "whatthefuckwasallthatabout?", it still gives the impression that behind the string of striking images there might just possibly be a narrative thread. I think I get pretty close to finding out what that is.
But Lynch is, frankly, a tough interview. He doesn't like to talk about his private life, which is fair enough. But nor does he like to talk about or explain his work. What does that leave? Diet tips, maybe?
Yep, that's exactly where we begin. Lynch once called sugar "granulated happiness". So as Lynch pours me a cup of some Damn Fine Coffee, I ask, so, David, find any good doughnuts in Paris?
"I'm off the doughnuts," he says; he's 22 pounds lighter than he was. "I'm off bread and potatoes. On a diet, yeah. Of protein, vegetables, fruit, many good things. But you can't combine it with things that trigger your insulin level to go up. When your insulin level goes up, it forms a hand, and the hand grabs the fat, and puts it in your body." Miming this, he makes it so sinister that I haven't eaten a doughnut since.
We move on to kids. Lynch's daughter Jennifer wrote and directed her own film, Boxing Helena, aged just 19. It's about a woman whose limbs are cut off one by one by her adoring but possessive boyfriend in order to keep her by his side. Sherilyn Fenn played the lead after Kim Basinger walked off the project, for which Basinger was successfully sued for millions. Money well spent, imo. The film was so panned that Jennifer didn't direct another for 25 years.
Jennifer was quoted as saying that even her dad found the film offensive, which takes some doing. I ask Lynch about this, and he denies it: "But it should perhaps have been a small film that found its way. The way it turned out, it just set her up for a fall."
Lynch's first film, Eraserhead, made over a seven-year period, was about a father terrorised by a mutant baby that cries like a bleating sheep. It was directly inspired by his becoming a father to Jennifer. So… um… how did she react to that?
"Jennifer was eight when it was finished," says Lynch, unperturbed. "She saw it. She was right there. Yeah, I think she got it…"
Read part two of the interview, in which I play a game of "hot or cold" with David Lynch to explain Lost Highway.
Tags: Adam Buxton, anniversary, Attack the Block, Austin Lynch, blu-ray, Blue Velvet, Boxing Helena, Eraserhead, film, Inland Empire, interview, Jennifer Lynch, jimmy Stewart from Mars, Joe Cornish, Kim Basinger, lawsuit, Lost Highway, Mel Brooks, movie, Mulholland Drive, Photographers Gallery, Sherilyn Fenn, talk, Twin Peaks, Wild at Heart


Little Penelope is beautiful inside and out. She always keeps her luxurious gray and white coat soft and fluffy. Penelope's favorite activity is curling up in your lap with loud purrs and lovingly looking at you with her big green eyes. Her cute, short legs don't ever slow her down from playfully frolicking with her sisters or meal time. She loves to cuddle with her litter mates and is interested in dogs, but wants them to earn her approval first. Bring home this gorgeous girl for an instant companion with unconditional love!


Michael Carrick insists Manchester United are fully focused on getting back to winning ways against Liverpool this Sunday despite the defeat to Chelsea leaving a bitter taste in the mouth.
The controversial defeat at Stamford Bridge will have been hard to take for the league-leaders but they know that they can't afford to slip up at Anfield with Arsenal now only four points behind them with a game in hand.
While the defeat is still a fresh wound for Carrick and his colleagues, the midfielder says it will heal in time for this weekend's crunch clash against Kenny Dalglish's side.
'At the moment we feel pretty down, but we can move on quickly. We have to,' the midfielder told MUTV.
'We're used to doing that and we're normally good at that, so hopefully we can bounce back again.
'We have to get rid of this game, forget about it and move on. It's obviously a huge game on Sunday and we'll be ready for that. We have to be.


text:
using System;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text.RegularExpressions;

namespace _03.PhoenixGrid
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            string pattern = @"([^\s_]{3})(\.[^\s_]{3})*";

            string input = Console.ReadLine();

            while (input != "ReadMe")
            {
                Regex regex = new Regex(pattern);

                Match match = regex.Match(input.ToLower());
                if (match.Success && IsPalindrome(match.ToString()))
                {
                    Console.WriteLine($"YES");
                }
                else
                {
                    Console.WriteLine($"NO");
                }

                input = Console.ReadLine();
            }

        }

        static bool IsPalindrome(string input)
        {
            var reversed = new string(input.Reverse().ToArray());
            var palindrom = input == reversed;
            return palindrom;
        }
    }
}


In a brief but informative clip from behind-the-scenes of the Coen Brothers Netflix film The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, score composer Carter Burwell explains how he stitched together the Oscar-nominated soundtrack of the film in order to create a unified sound amongst six very different stories.
Sometimes the music plays the the hopes and dreams and sometimes it plays the the bleakness of the situation, each piece is very different.there are different stories there's no common characters or anything like that but music would be the thing that would tie them all together.
The post Composer Who Scored Coen Brothers Film 'The Ballad of Buster Scruggs' Briefly Explains the Soundtrack appeared first on Laughing Squid.


text:
Home > Journals > Physics & Mathematics > JQIS
Journal of Quantum Information Science > Vol.10 No.2, June 2020
Quantum Theory and Its Effects on Novel Corona-Virus ()
Shahzad Aasim
Haldia Institute of Fundamental Research, Kashmir Advanced Scientific Research Centre (KASRC), Kolkata, India.
DOI: 10.4236/jqis.2020.102004 PDF HTML XML 233 Downloads 722 Views Citations
Emerging infectious viral diseases are a major threat to humankind on earth, containing emerging and re-emerging pathogenic physiognomies has raised great public health concern. This study aimed at investigating the global prevalence, biological and clinical characteristics of novel Corona-virus, Wuhan China (2019-nCoV), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Corona-virus (SARS-CoV), and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome Corona-virus (MERS-CoV) infection outbreaks [1]. Currently, novel Corona-virus disease COVID-2019 is already pandemic and causing havoc throughout the world. Scientific community is still struggling to come out with concrete therapeutic measures against this disease and development of its vaccine is far off from sight in the immediate near future. However, humanity will be put to such pressures very often in the near future and given the present circumstances, what we can expect from the scientific world now? I think QIT (Quantum Information Theory) has an answer to this question. One of the very basic mechanisms that every infectious virus follows to infect is the entry of the virus through cell surface receptors, engulfing, un-coating of viral genome and its transcription to form multiple copies and translation to form viral proteins and coating of viral genome to form multiple copies of the viral particles and then of course the cell bursting to infect other cells. This very basic mechanism does not occur randomly but through a regulated and more dynamic process which we may call coding and decoding of information through reduction in error or noise.
COVID-19, Corona-Virus, QIT, SARS-CoV, Iobits, Neobits
Share and Cite:
Aasim, S. (2020) Quantum Theory and Its Effects on Novel Corona-Virus. Journal of Quantum Information Science, 10, 36-42. doi: 10.4236/jqis.2020.102004.
Lots of discoveries have taken place in scientific world and among them, the virus is one of the significant ones however it appears the smallest. A virus, according to Wikipedia Encyclopedia, is a submicroscopic infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of an organism. Viruses can infect all types of life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea. Now the question is even in the least possible form, its work is beyond the imagination. It is hard to understand the nature of virus, its configuration and the cause of manifestation is an ordeal and even dreadful. Although, bacteria are the tiniest living organisms found yet but this virus is even tinier and also found in bacteria's [2]. Now the question is even in the tiniest form, how does it exist and what is the mode of manifestation of this virus? Even though there are different types of viruses in the world, this particular one has to be watched very keenly and to study its structure we need to go through microscopic study for which we use electron microscope or electron X-ray techniques and hence, we learn that this living organism works exactly like the others i.e. its structure is like a bacteria composing protein and lipid membranes and DNA/RNA which are also found in different shapes and sizes. Now our point is what makes this organism the tiniest [3] ?
Scientifically, it has been proven that it contains RNA which works like a code and acts as a source in its formation. In other words, it basically forms from the RNA. But the point is how the RNA actually initiates when later acquires mass and takes the shape of virus [4]. After that, this virus works in two ways initially, in recessive mode and next, in dominant mode i.e. this virus keeps on forming an unmatched track and at the same time does its work. The other virus which is primarily in the recessive mode but also looks for the host and then works as the dominant factor i.e. it looks for the target to complete its task [5]. But the question is that, how does RNA which is the basic source of its creation, build? To understand this, one has to take aid of quantum information theory that helps in understanding the internal information of the RNA, its configuration and its mode of manifestation. The internal information of the RNA is extremely different from the laws which are identified and acknowledged, it has its own laws and mechanisms that play a key role in acquiring mass wherein super energy mechanism/super time mechanism and super dimensional mechanism are amazing. After interpreting these three laws, let's know how super energy that is in the non-baryonic form with the help of super time and super dimensional mechanism converts into baryonic form? Until, these three laws aren't cognized, formation of this virus won't be grasped.
2. Quantum Information Theory
It is such information which plays an important role in formation of matter that actually is an energy and later with other formulas like super energy, super time and super dimension concepts, changes from non-existing form/non-baryonic form to existing form [6]. This information is actually in hidden geometrical form which we need to understand e.g. it is necessary that every matter contains some information it is because of this information, the matter exists. We have also framed a mathematical equation for this which actually works same as the mechanism found inside the matter at micro level and it has the same functions like the hereditary information has, at the micro level. Since, it is in non-existing form but on quantum level, we can form a quantum information equation that helps in the formation of hereditary information. As we know, hereditary information contains codes which internally are of different charges or have a dual nature. They work as small bits which are linked to each other in order to make a larger bit which has been named as cubit or we can also claim that information is formed on the basis of the smaller bits. These bits of different nature combine to form a sort of pattern i.e. the equation that we call as Nano-bit and Iobit means iobit-1 and iobit-2 forms Nano-bit and these Nano-bits later form the precursor of positive and negative charge to make unique cubit. Similarly the other iobits also form different types of Nano-bits and later these Nano-bits combine to form a cubit which acquires a unique charge and this charge later can be differentiated into plus and minus. Now the question is what this plus and minus actually is? This is also a different mechanism which we can understand from super energy concept, super time and super dimension concept and it works like lock and key methodology and it later interacts with the bit of a particular configuration and this method continues till the matter is formed to which we assign different names e.g. plus means positive charge and minus means negative charge, sometime it may also have dual nature. This can be understood by a configuration or geometrical structural information.
3. QIT and Its Role
Actually, the quantum information which is present in it also carries the shape of its manifestation or we can say that quantum information becomes the source of its designing which later takes a geometrical shape [7]. Even though it is present in geometrical information, but it is in non-baryonic/non-existing form initially and later converts into baryonic form. It means that if we will talk about the world of particles, these particles play an important role in the formation of a structure but along with its structure it also has a particular design/pattern which is present in these quantum information bits and play vital role in the designing of the structure or we can say that in any living or non-living matter there is a particular code for its structure [8]. The plant right from its first particle i.e. nucleic code till it gets developed into a complete plant, is controlled by genetic code and the hereditary of this plant works through the quantum information which means that the structure/manifestation of all the living organisms/matter is present in their codes and its configuration is hidden in its information.
4. Statistical Analysis
Whenever, the error or noise becomes more absurd, recombination oramplification of signal occurs which results in a more appropriate information rendered to be coded and decoded in the next phase of infection. This has happened in this virus as follows: SARS-CoV1 TO SARS-CoV2.
The Quantum Information theory is superimposed in two interdependent states we may call it non-infective say 0 and infective state say 1. We may have ample number of states between non-infective and infective states. The virus is both infective and non-infective at the same time t = 0, however it may exist in either of these forms at t > 0. So temporal aspect of the virus cycle is important to note. A corollary can be drawn as at t = 0.01, at t > 0, 0…..1.
Let's have a look at this equation,
I = iobits
N = Neobits
C = Cubits
T = Charge (+ve, −ve)
T = C = N = I
T = C = ( N 1 + N 2 ) = ( I 1 + I 2 )
T = C 4 ( I 1 + I 2 ) + 2 ( N 1 + N 2 )
T = C = ( N 1 = I 1 + I 2 + I 3 + I 4 ) + ( N 2 + I 5 + I 6 + I 7 + I 8 )
T = C = N 1 ( I 1 - 4 ) + N 2 ( I 5 - 8 )
T = C
C = N 1 + N 2
N 1 = ( I 1 + I 2 )
C = N 1 ( I 1 + I 2 ) + N 2 ( I 3 + I 4 )
T = C = N 1 ( I 1 + I 2 ) + N 2 ( I 3 + I 4 )
T = C 1 + C 2 = N 1 ( I 1 + I 2 ) + N 2 ( I 2 + I 4 )
So, this superimposed information can be decoded in advance before any virus becomes infectious and communicable. Here is the diagram that makes it clearer in Figure 1.
That quantum phenomena might be observable in the messy world of living systems is historically a pejorative idea. While quantum theories accurately describe the behavior of the individual particles making up all matter, scientists have long presumed that the mass action of billions of particles jostling around at ambient temperature drowns out any weird quantum effects and is better explained by the more familiar rules of classical mechanics formulated by Isaac Newton and
Figure 1. QIT Structure layout.
others [9].
1) Indeed, researchers studying quantum phenomena often isolate particles at temperatures approaching absolute zero—at which almost all particle motion grinds to a halt—just to quash the background noise [10].
2) "The warmer the environment is, the busier and noisy it is, the quicker these quantum effects disappear", says University of Surrey theoretical physicist Jim Al-Khalili, who coauthored a 2014 book called Life on the Edge that brought so-called quantum biology to a lay audience. "So it's almost ridiculous, counterintuitive, that they should persist inside cells. And yet, if they do—and there's a lot of evidence suggesting that in certain phenomena they do—then life must be doing something special [11] ".
3) Al-Khalili and Vedral are part of an expanding group of scientists now arguing that effects of the quantum world may be central to explaining some of biology's greatest puzzles—from the efficiency of enzyme catalysis to avian navigation to human consciousness—and could even be subject to natural selection [12].
4) In the words of Chiara Marletto "The whole field is trying to prove a point", a University of Oxford physicist who collaborated with Coles and Vedral on the bacteria-entanglement paper. "That is to say, not only does quantum theory apply to these [biological systems], but it's possible to test whether these [systems] are harnessing QIT to perform their functions [13] ".
5) Outbreaks of emerging and reemerging pathogens across the globe can be prevented with the help of QIT to minimize the disease burden locally and globally [14].
Dr. Shahzad Aasim is a renowned Scientist working as Director at Haldia Institute of Fundamental Research, Kolkatta. He is also the Chairman of Kashmir Advanced Scientific Research Centre (KASRC). His research includes how Quantum theory reveals the Secrets of Nature.
The author declares no conflicts of interest regarding the publication of this paper.
[1] Zhong, N.S., Zheng, B.J., Li, Y.M., Poon, L.L.M., Xie, Z.H., Chan, K.H., Li, P.H., Tan, S.Y., Chang, Q., Xie, J.P., Liu, X.Q., Xu, J., Li, D.X., Yuen, K.Y., Peiris, J.S.M. and Guan, Y. (2003) Epidemiology and Cause of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in Guangdong, China, in February 2003. The Lancet, 362, 1353-1358.
[2] Cha, Y., et al. (1989) Hydrogen Tunneling in Enzyme Reactions. Science, 243, 1325-1330.
[3] Doll, K.M., et al. (2003) The First Experimental Test of the Hypothesis that Enzymes Have Evolved to Enhance Hydrogen Tunneling. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 125, 10877-10884.
https://doi.org/10.1021/ja030120h
[4] Hu, S., et al. (2019) Biophysical Characterization of a Disabled Double Mutant of Soybean Lipoxygenase: The "Undoing" of Precise Substrate Positioning Relative to Metal Cofactor and an Identified Dynamical Network. Journal of the American Chemical Society, 141, 1555-1567.
https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.8b10992
[5] Hong, N.-S., et al. (2018) The Evolution of Multiple Active Site Configurations in a Designed Enzyme. Nature Communications, 9, Article No. 3900.
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-06305-y
[6] Engel, G.S., et al. (2007) Evidence for Wavelike Energy Transfer through Quantum Coherence in Photosynthetic Systems. Nature, 446, 782-786.
[7] Panitchayangkoon, G., et al. (2010) Long-Lived Quantum Coherence in Photosynthetic Complexes at Physiological Temperature. PNAS, 107, 12766-12770.
[8] Collini, E., et al. (2010) Coherently Wired Light-Harvesting in Photosynthetic Marine Algae at Ambient Temperature. Nature, 463, 644-647.
[9] Calhoun, T.R., et al. (2009) Quantum Coherence Enabled Determination of the Energy Landscape in Light-Harvesting Complex II. The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, 113, 16291-16295.
https://doi.org/10.1021/jp908300c
[10] Duan, H.-G., et al. (2017) Nature Does Not Rely on Long-Lived Electronic Quantum Coherence for Photosynthetic Energy Transfer. PNAS, 114, 8493-8498.
[11] Thyrhaug, E., et al. (2018) Identification and Characterization of Diverse Coherences in the Fenna-Matthews-Olson Complex. Nature Chemistry, 10, 780-786.
[12] Harrop, S.J., et al. (2014) Single-Residue Insertion Switches the Quaternary Structure and Exciton States of Cryptophyte Light-Harvesting Proteins. PNAS, 111, E2666-E2675.
[13] Ritz, T., et al. (2000) A Model for Photoreceptor-Based Magnetoreception in Birds. Biophysical Journal, 78, 707-718.
[14] Ritz, T., et al. (2004) Resonance Effects Indicate a Radical-Pair Mechanism for Avian Magnetic Compass. Nature, 429, 177-180.
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text:
Q: Passing Data from one Functional Component to another I've only been coding in React.JS for a week now and have hit a roadblock while trying to pass data from one Functional component to another and then rendering that in the latter.
The idea is to pass the input to the ListItems component from the InputBar component.
In my opinion, an easier option would have been to simply return the ListItem component inside InputBar but I would like to try it in the below approach.
InputBar component
    import React,{ useState, useEffect } from "react";
    import ListItems from "../list_items/list_items";
    import "./input_bar.css";

    const InputBar = () => {

        const[userInput, setInput] = useState('');

        const handleKeyPress = (e) => {
            if(e.key === "Enter") {
                console.log({userInput})
                setInput('');
            }
        }

        const handleChange = (e) => {
            setInput(e.target.value);
        }

        //This is where I've passed the data from
        <ListItems enteredInput = {userInput}></ListItems>

        return(

                <input type="text" id="userInput" placeholder="Add Shopping Item" value={userInput} onChange={handleChange} onKeyPress={handleKeyPress}></input>

        );
    }

export default InputBar;

ListItems component
import React,{useState, useEffect} from "react";
import "./list_items.css";

const ListItems = (props) => {

    const newInput = {
        name : props.enteredInput
    };

    const data = [{name : "Kitkat 10"}, {name : "Kitkat 10"}, {name : "Kitkat 10"}, {name : "Kitkat 10"}, {name : "Kitkat 10"}];

    data.push(newInput);

    const[items, setItems] = useState(data);

    return(

            {data.length === 0 ?
No Items Added
 : items.map((key, value) =>

                {items[value].name}
                {console.log(items)}
                <button className="x_button">X</button>
                <button className="purchase_button">Purchase</button>

)}

    );
}

export default ListItems;

Upon initially loading the component, I see a ListItem created with nothing written on it and the console shows an undefined object already created without me putting anything in the InputBar Component. I have marked the new ListItem on the screenshot to show what I mean:

The console log:
0: {name: 'Kitkat 10'}
1: {name: 'Kitkat 10'}
2: {name: 'Kitkat 10'}
3: {name: 'Kitkat 10'}
4: {name: 'Kitkat 10'}
5: {name: undefined}    //The undefined object
length: 6
[[Prototype]]: Array(0)

Later On, If I try adding anything from the input, it neither updates the length of the array nor renders any new component in ListItem.

A: You can use redux, context api or any other state management library.
Update global state from input and use that global state in ListItems component.

A: You have to return something in a function component, your way is false and may cause problems. You must rely on your return, but in your case you just returned an input, and I am actually surprised that it has a component in it.
Let's have a look other details. In your ListItems, you get the props like:
const newInput = {
    name : props.enteredInput
};

And pushing it in your data:
data.push(newInput);
This means, what you get as a prop is pushed to your data.
And in your InputBar, you create ListItems like this:
<ListItems enteredInput = {userInput}></ListItems>
and your userInput is '' since you create it like this:
const[userInput, setInput] = useState('');
What you give in your useState is the initial value.
What you can do is:
Create ListItems with the data as props, don't create data inside your ListItems. The data given to the ListItems must be created by useState. Your InputBar must update the data state and include the ListItems in its return.
const ListItems = (props) => {

    const data=props.data
  ....

}

const InputBars=()=> {

const [data,setData] = useState([])

return <>
       <input....>
        <ListItems data={data}>
<>

}


text:
Carly Rae Jepsen Drops A Double Dose: 'Now That I Found You' & 'No Drug Like Me'
By JonAli on Wednesday, February 27, 2019
Thank the pop heavens for the return of Carly Rae Jepsen!
After getting back on her beat with "Party for One" at the tail end of 2018, Carly has returned to us today (February 27) with not one, but two new singles: "Now That I Found You" and "No Drug Like Me" – a double dose of appetizer tracks that are both set to be featured on herE·MO·TION-follow-up album, which is set for release later this year.
"'Now That I Found You' is about the high you get when a new love starts to change your life. It's like the rush, rush, rush is better than any drug," Carly said in a statement. "Which leads me to 'No Drug Like Me' which is a promise I made to love in general. That when the good stuff lands my way I'll always try to be vulnerable and brave and show all of myself – 'If you make me feel in love then I'll blossom for you'."
"Now That I Found You" is signature CRJ greatness, which is to say it's super sparkly, feel-good and joyously earnest. Yet again, Carly's channeled that love-struck feeling of falling for someone in song form with that instant rush of a chorus: "Don't give it up, don't say it hurts/ 'Cause there's nothing like this feeling, baby/ Now that I found you…"
Carly Rae Jepsen's latest "Now That I Found You" is also available on Apple Music and Spotify!
On the second track however, "No Drug Like Me," Carly switches it up a bit and channels her sensual side over a synth-heavy pulse. Like favored deep cuts "LA Hallucinations" and "Warm Blood," it's darker and more intoxicating than your standard CRJ affair.
Both songs are solid but I'd be lying If I didn't say they didn't already feel pretty familiar. Are we about to E·MO·TION II?
Carly Rae Jepsen New Music Now That I Found You
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