text:
The ABC has instantly joined in blaming Donald Trump for pipe bombs mailed to some of his critics but is deeply reluctant to link the words of many Islamist terrorists, such as Nidal Malik Hasan.
Bolt: Trump attack reveals terror double standard
by Andrew Bolt
29th Oct 2018 12:30 PM
SUDDENLY, words do count to the Left, after all. Suddenly, it's never too soon to link those words to terrorism.
Take the ABC, which instantly joined in blaming US President Donald Trump for pipe bombs mailed to some of his critics, including CNN and Hillary Clinton.
Even before the bomber was identified, the ABC gleefully reported "suggestions that Mr Trump's inflammatory comments may have incited the attacks". As one ABC headline put it: "Donald Trump's words mattered in a week in which bombs were sent to Democrats, CNN."
The ABC has instantly joined in blaming US President Donald Trump for pipe bombs mailed to some of his critics. Picture: AP/Susan Walsh
Yes, Trump's heated rejection of untruths spread by Clinton and the "fake news media" was to blame for a lone crazy mailing pipe bombs.
As it turned out, the suspect had made bomb threats since 2002, 14 years before Trump was elected president.
Now contrast and compare. While the ABC is hair-trigger quick to link Trump's words to one nutter's terrorism, it's deeply reluctant to link the words of many Islamist terrorists to even their own crimes. In 2009, for example, US army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan, a known Muslim hothead, shot dead 13 soldiers at Fort Hood as he shouted "Allah is great".
But in its first substantial radio report of the massacre, the ABC failed to note Nidal's faith even once.
Same after the 2013 Boston bombing. The first report on the ABC's AM program didn't once mention "Muslim", though it was already known the two Chechen terrorists were Muslim, and the elder had videos of Islamist terrorists on his Facebook site.
This contrast does more than show how insanely hostile the mainstream media is to Trump. More seriously, it shows how unwilling it is to discuss any link between Islam and terrorism, or other dysfunction.
That was a worry even before a disturbing decision last week by the European Court of Human Rights.
We've already seen world leaders claim after the September 11 attacks, the Paris massacre and other horrific Islamist terrorism that these had "nothing to do with Islam".
Yet there is undoubtedly some link, even if most Muslims reject it.
That's why the Islamic State, in its infamous statement ordering Muslims around the world to kill unbelievers, could quote holy scripture at least 25 times in support, including this, from the Koran: "Kill the polytheists wherever you find them."
But the Koran and the Hadith - the sayings of the Prophet - also have other disturbing passages that may cast light on some sickening crimes.
In Britain last week, 20 men from Huddersfield - Muslims, plus a couple of Sikhs - were jailed for raping girls as young as 11. Other mainly Muslim rape gangs have preyed on girls in at least 13 other British towns, including Rochdale, Telford and particularly Rotherham, where an estimated 1400 children were sexually abused.
How to explain such abuse of young girls by so many men of such similar cultural background? Is there something in Islam, perhaps, that may be interpreted by some men as an excuse?
Most Muslims would deny that strongly.
Yet in Austria, teacher and anti-jihad activist Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff gave a lecture on passages in the Hadith that declare the Prophet Muhammed married his favourite wife, Aisha, when she was just six, and slept with her when she was nine and he in his 50s. Sabaditsch-Wolff asked: "What do we call it, if it is not paedophilia?"
This seems to me an important discussion, particularly for Muslims wanting to reform their faith. Indeed, reformist scholars now suggest Aisha was much older than believed.
But Sabaditsch-Wolff was fined for disparaging Islam, and the European Court of Human Rights last week dismissed her appeal, ruling that Muhammed could not be called a paedophile despite sleeping with a nine-year-old: he'd had many adult wives, so wasn't primarily attracted to children.
Having "proved" Sabaditsch-Wolff's description false, the court said it "could only be understood as having been aimed at demonstrating that Muhammed was not worthy of worship". And that was illegal.
For a court to declare it a crime to suggest "Muhammed was not worthy of worship", even after having had sex with a nine-year-old, is not just a ludicrous restriction of free speech, but dangerous.
For one, Europeans now cannot freely debate the bad example Muhammed's alleged behaviour may set to followers today.
But, naturally, the ABC ignored this case and that potential link.
Far safer to spuriously link Trump with terrorism instead.
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The dollar jumped after a surprised improvement in U.S. economic data. The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) reported on Monday that its index for the U.S. services sector rose more than forecast in February to 57.3 from a previous month's 56.8. Economists had expected a 56.1 rise. Any number above the 50 level shows an expansion, and below 50 is a contraction phase.
The data gave market sentiment a boost because the U.S. service sector is large and employs most of the nation's workforce. An expansion in activity in the services industry that makes up almost 90 percent of the economy would help broaden the expansion.
Meanwhile, separate data on new orders also showed an improvement, rising to 61.2 percent from 59.4 percent.
The ISM non-manufacturing employment index slipped though to 55.7 percent from 57.4 percent but still above the 50 expansion level. The price index, which measures inflation, climbed 68.4 percent from 63.5 percent in the preceding month.
USDJPY jumped after the data from 81.33 81.49 within five minutes before easing to previous levels.


Sociology as new science, concerned with the impact of the industrial revolution on traditional forms of communal life, beliefs, and authorities, emerged in late nineteenth-century Europe. The pioneers of sociology like Emile Durkheim, Max Weber, Georg Simmel, and Leonard Hobhouse, today regarded as classics, managed to establish the young discipline at the universities in France, Germany and Great Britain. The transatlantic exchange of sociological ideas intensified during the 1920s with American scholars (like Talcott Parsons) visiting Europe and especially with the large wave of emigrants (Paul Lazarsfeld, Reinhard Bendix, members of the Frankfurt School, and many others) to the United States. Modern Analytical Sociology was created in the United States in cooperation between European immigrants and Americans and (re-)exported to Europe during the 1950s and 1960s.
Today sociology is offered at universities all over the world – with some significant regional specializations. While American sociology is best known for its strong empirical orientation ('social research'), sociology in Europe has developed further the theoretical traditions of the classics ('social theory'). Some paradigmatic questions from Weber to Simmel seem still relevant: Why have essential elements of modern societies – from the rise of modern capitalism, to individualism, urban culture, and democracy – occurred first in the West? Alienation from society has been a big theme from Marx to Durkheim and Bourdieu. New topics emerged in the face of new challenges: European Integration, the end of the 'Iron Curtain' between Western and Eastern Europe, and the pressures of globalization on the European 'social model'. And, of course, since Tocqueville's Democracy in America (1835-1840), sociologists on both sides of the Atlantic have been fascinated to compare Europe and the American Experience.
The aim of the course will be to portray prominent European sociologists and apply their ideas to the challenges of our time.


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Simon Alijewicz Takojew (ros. Си́мон Али́евич Тако́ев, ur. 27 maja 1876 we wsi Christianowskoje w obwodzie terskim, zm. w październiku 1938) – osetyjski rewolucjonista, radziecki polityk.

Życiorys
W 1902 wstąpił do SDPRR, po rozłamie w partii związał się z mienszewikami, 1917 wstąpił do partii "Kermen", w lutym 1918 został członkiem Terskiej Rady Ludowej. Od marca 1918 był zastępcą przewodniczącego Terskiej Rady Ludowej, od sierpnia 1918 członkiem Rady Wojskowo-Rewolucyjnej Osetyjskiego Komitetu Okręgowego Partii "Kermen", a od grudnia 1918 członkiem Terskiej Obwodowej Komisji Mobilizacyjnej Rady Obrony Północnego Kaukazu i jednocześnie członkiem RKP(b). Od stycznia 1919 dowodził wojskami lewej flanki Armii Czerwonej Terskiej Republiki Ludowej, potem do marca 1919 prowadził działalność podziemną w Gruzji, w marcu 1919 został przewodniczącym Górskiej Sekcji Kaukaskiego Krajowego Komitetu RKP(b), a od marca do lipca 1920 zastępcą przewodniczącego Władykaukaskiego Komitetu Rewolucyjnego. Jednocześnie w kwietniu-maju 1920 był zastępcą przewodniczącego Osetyjskiego Okręgowego Komitetu Rewolucyjnego, od maja do lipca 1920 zastępcą przewodniczącego Władykaukaskiego Okręgowego Komitetu Rewolucyjnego, w lipcu-sierpniu 1920 przewodniczącym Terskiego Komitetu Obwodowego RKP(b), a w sierpniu 1920 zastępcą przewodniczącego Komitetu Wykonawczego Terskiej Rady Obwodowej.

14 sierpnia 1920 został aresztowany, 17 listopada 1920 zwolniony, od lutego do kwietnia 1921 był przewodniczącym Komitetu Wykonawczego Terskiej Rady Obwodowej, od 25 kwietnia 1921 do lutego 1922 przewodniczącym Rady Komisarzy Ludowych Górskiej ASRR i jednocześnie od kwietnia 1921 do lutego 1922 przewodniczącym Narady Ekonomicznej Górskiej ASRR. W lutym 1921 został członkiem Komitetu Wykonawczego Rady Miejskiej Tbilisi, potem do czerwca 1922 był sekretarzem odpowiedzialnym Adżarskiego Komitetu Obwodowego Komunistycznej Partii (bolszewików) Gruzji, od czerwca 1922 do marca 1924 kierownikiem Wydziału Agitacyjno-Propagandowego Zakaukaskiego Komitetu Krajowego RKP(b), jednocześnie od sierpnia 1923 do marca 1924 rektorem Zakaukaskiego Uniwersytetu Komunistycznego, a od kwietnia do sierpnia 1924 członkiem Górskiego Komitetu Obwodowego RKP(b). Od lipca do października 1924 był zastępcą przewodniczącego Północnoosetyjskiego Obwodowego Komitetu Rewolucyjnego, od 29 października 1924 do 15 stycznia 1927 sekretarzem odpowiedzialnym Północnoosetyjskiego Komitetu Obwodowego RKP(b)/WKP(b), a od marca 1927 do października 1929 członkiem Prezydium Państwowej Komisji Planowej przy Radzie Ekonomicznej RFSRR. Od października 1929 do czerwca 1930 był zastępcą przewodniczącego Głównego Zarządu Oświaty Politycznej przy Ludowym Komisariacie Oświaty RFSRR i jednocześnie kierownikiem Głównego Zarządu Kształcenia Zawodowego Ludowego Komisariatu Oświaty RFSRR, 1929-1930 pracownikiem naukowym i wykładowcą Komunistycznego Uniwersytetu Pracujących Wschodu, a od czerwca 1930 do lipca 1937 zastępcą kierownika Wydziału Narodowości WCIK.

W lipcu 1937 został aresztowany, zmarł w więzieniu.

Bibliografia
 Przewodnik po historii Partii Komunistycznej i ZSRR (ros.)
 http://www.alexanderyakovlev.org/almanah/almanah-dict-bio/70653/17 (ros.)
 https://web.archive.org/web/20160817040720/http://rosgenea.ru/?alf=19&serchcatal=%D2%E0%EA%EE%E5%E2&r=4 (ros.)

Mienszewicy
Osetyjczycy
Radzieccy politycy
Urodzeni w 1876
Więźniowie radzieckich więzień
Zmarli w 1938

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techwino
Updated: 9 January, 2021
5 Best Apps to Grab Free Music in 2020
By Maik Holzman
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Maik Holzmanhttps://www.techwino.com
I'm Maik Holzman - 26 yrs old, social guy all the way from Germany. I'm passionate about 3 things in life: Technology, Travel and Social Media
The importance of Music in the lives of people is unquestionably great. Be it going out for a walk in the park or being busy the home chores, music accompanies us everywhere in the best possible way. Music is the best mood changer whenever you are getting bored or you are upset. It soothes your mind in a way nothing else can.
Music has got the power to enhance our senses, intensify our emotions, and make us nostalgic about our past in a beautiful way. It is even capable of making us feel contented every time we feel low. Whether it is uplifting our mood and getting us exhilarated or bringing serenity to our mind, music can efficiently do both.
Nowadays, almost everyone has a personal smartphone with maybe an android OS or an IOS and numerous music apps are available for grabing your favorite songs for free. Since it is not always necessary for your phone to be connected to the internet, you need to grab songs for listening to them offline.
So, in this extract today we are going to enlist below 5 popular apps that can be used for grabing free music. Names of such apps are as follows:
1. Spotify
Spotify is a very popular app which offers digital music streaming service. It is available in both android as well as IOS versions. It has a wide range of songs and features nearly every genre of music including pop, Bollywood romance, Hollywood romance, Punjabi hits, and classical songs.
There are two different editions to it namely, Spotify Free and Spotify Premium. The premium version offers a premium features such as Grabing Music and Listening them offline, but the Free version is good as well.
Get Spotify on Android
Get Spotify on iOS
Spotify can be accessed through various devices such as phones, tablets, laptops, and TVs too. The best part of it is that you can make an easy shift from one device to the other with the help of Spotify Connect.
It provides you regular song recommendations based on the songs you search on the app. It also lets you create your personalized playlist with the grabed songs of just your choice and you can even share the playlist with your friends.
2. Google Play Music
Google Play Music is also a favored app when we talk about online music streaming and grabing. It is developed as well as operated by Google. This app lets you browse millions of songs and you can also grab the ones you want to try later.
It also offers paid membership under which the users can have accessibility to every latest song in demand without a single advertisement to interrupt you.
Get Play Music on Android
Get Play Music on iOS
Before getting subscribed, fresh users can avail of the 30-day try-out feature which is offered just for once.
If you get yourself a paid membership of Google Play Music, you can avail of the benefit of accessing the premium version of YouTube as well.
You can use this app on both your tablets and smartphones since it is obtainable as both IOS as well as Android versions. However, if you want to listen to songs through this website on your computer, you can do so from an exclusive Google Play Music segment provided on the website of Google.
3. Amazon Music
Amazon Music is a streaming service provider which functions under the well-known multinational venture, Amazon. It also has an app which is available in both Google Play Store for the android users and App Store for the iPhone users. The app is very well organized and functions very smoothly without any advertisements.
Get Amazon Music on Android
Get Amazon Music on iOS
It offers millions of songs in different languages and genres. It even lets you grab songs of your choice so that you can listen to them when your smartphone doesn't have internet connectivity.
You can avail Amazon Music on Amazon Echo gadgets, Fire TV, Alexa supported devices as well as Fire Tablets.
4. SoundCloud
Soundcloud is the biggest worldwide audio station that is open to all. It incorporates a community of music developers, curators, and listeners who are all interlinked to each other through this platform.
Established back in 2007, this platform allows audio developers throughout the world to make use of the most eminent tools, assistance, and all required assets to strengthen their careers in music.
Get SoundCloud on Android
Get SoundCloud on iOS
It features more than 190 million songs curated by 20 million developers streamed across 190 countries.
It never fails in keeping the users updated with the newest music launched in the industry. It serves as a great platform for the people who are interested in creating tracks of their own. It lets them record their songs and upload them on SoundCloud without putting much effort.
If you want every SoundCloud user to have access to the songs uploaded by you then, you can make your audios public, or else if you want to restrict access to your audios, you can make them private.
It also allows the users to post their likes and comments on the songs they listen to. You can even follow the song creators you like. This way the interaction between the listener and the creator gets enhanced to a large extent.
5. Pandora Music
Pandora music is yet another famous music app. The main feature of this music platform is its clarity as well as compatibility with the other platforms. It is very easy for you to hop in and browse your favored music choices and then create a station of your own where you can sync all of them. Its content collection has flourished largely over the decade.
Get Pandora Music on Android
Get Pandora Music on iOS
The reviews and experiences shared by the users prove how satisfactory this music platform is. Alike other music streaming apps, this one also lets the users save songs for offline listening and grab free music.
Although the unpaid version of this music platform functions quite smoothly, it also has a premium version for the users who want to experience music in the pattern of Spotify but without departing from Pandora.
We discussed above some of the popular apps which can be used for grabing free music on your smartphone or any other gadget. We hope you try them soon and enjoy their service.
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text:
How we support wellbeing and psychological safety as delivery leads
Farrah Farhoudi
Niall Booth
Vicky Hallam
Rebecca Stagg
Michelle Szaraz
The real magic of teams happens when people feel secure enough to be vulnerable
As well as working with multidisciplinary teams to help them become more self-organising, facilitating continuous improvement and removing barriers to successful delivery, our delivery team always want to create open, collaborative and inclusive working cultures on projects. Here's how they do it.
Farrah Farhoudi, Operations Lead
I think it all starts with understanding. Understanding that everybody is different, going through different things, impacted by different things and that they deal with things differently. Creating a shared understanding amongst this variation is important, it encourages teams to assume good intentions and avoids misunderstandings.
I like to help teams create this understanding by giving time and space for it. It could be via personal user manuals, a way of working session or having a casual 'tea @ 3' to talk about non-work things. Having 1:1s or drop in sessions for team members can also be invaluable. It's good to spend time working out what works best for those in the team.
I think it's also important that we rely on each other as a delivery community. We learn a lot from each other. A colleague recently shared an article on how to manage your team in times of political trauma and I took away a lot from it. I particularly like "When we encourage our teams to "bring their whole selves to work" — remember that this includes acknowledging how their lives are impacted by forces outside the office."
Niall Booth, Head of Delivery
The real magic of teams happens when people feel secure enough to be vulnerable. Asking a question, making a suggestion, and sharing an idea all require a small leap of faith, but are the fuel that power successful projects. As delivery leads, we have an important role to play in building the trust that gives people the confidence to be vulnerable with each other.
A fundamental thing we do is to try and lead by example. That means being open about our own missteps and acknowledging where we could have done things differently. Consistently socialising that it's ok to make mistakes creates an environment where people feel safer in taking risks.
Adjacent to this is how we try to create a space that prioritises the importance of continuous learning, rather than delivering the work in a preconceived way against rigid milestones. In planning and conversations with the team we encourage experimentation and learning from one another. This is a better, safer place for people to work in.
Vicky Hallam, Delivery Lead
I think creating and maintaining an open and collaborative culture is key when working in teams. We're all coming to the work with a variety of skills and backgrounds but ultimately we're working towards the same outcomes and can use our different experiences to contribute to those.
It can be easy to fall into silos, especially centred around disciplines, but it's about finding ways to learn, share and problem solve with each other. That can take many different forms but could look like asking for feedback on a document, co-working together on a task or non-researchers observing user testing.
It's also important to remember that team culture will evolve over time. What works when you're first starting out as a team might not when you're six months into a project. Using forums like retrospectives and giving opportunities for informal feedback are great ways to reflect and iterate on how you're working together.
Becca Stagg, Delivery Lead
It's tempting to want to think you can follow a set of rules or guidance and then Bob's your uncle: people on your team feel supported and safe, and your team feels healthy. But I don't think there's a blueprint you can apply to this part of team leading. We are all individuals and what we need to feel safe varies between us.
The best way to start is to get to know the people you're working with. Take the time to learn about their home life and their background (if they feel comfortable sharing it), and allow them to reflect and share on the ways that they respond to conflict or stress. With that knowledge in your back pocket it can be easier to spot, or even anticipate, when someone on your team might be struggling or need support.
Encouraging a culture of communication within the team, and modelling that – sharing your own thoughts and feelings – can help others to know that, should they want to talk about theirs, it would be welcomed and heard. Not everyone communicates verbally as easily as others, so ensuring that you reach out regularly to people who don't feel comfortable talking in a group, over Slack or in another written form, is also really important.
Michelle Szaraz, Strategy Lead
When I voted for the suggestion to write this post, I was more keen to learn how others support wellbeing within teams, than to share tons of my own advice! 🙈
Personally, I can't stress enough the importance of getting things off your chest in a safe space – both for the team members and delivery professionals… Finding someone you trust, grabbing a coffee, and complaining freely and without judgement, until you feel better, can do wonders for individual and team wellbeing!
But managing team wellbeing can be quite challenging because we are all different from one another. Having diverse backgrounds, experiences and personalities means, we can often react differently to the same situations. This can lead to misunderstandings, but it also creates opportunities to learn and improve! That's why, as a delivery professional, I try to get to know the team members, understand what works for them, and be very open about myself.
The last one is probably a reflection of my personality (and growing up within a very direct, Eastern European culture), bringing me back to the point about our differences. Yet, despite our differences, we are also all quite similar – we all need to feel safe, valued and respected. And for me, that's the key thing to focus on when managing team health.
6 reasons why the public sector should work in the open that aren't code re-use
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When the sun starts to shine and you can feel its warmth on your cheeks how nice it is to meet up with friends and just sit and chat and this is what I did with Meryem Ozcilem who I met way back and she was so helpful when we were writing an article about the TRNC White Card or Permanent Residency Permit for CyprusScene.
She is a very forward thinking lady with a vision of many different nationalities living together in harmony in North Cyprus and this is perhaps due to her past career experiences of helping expatriates.
Many of Meryem's Facebook friends know her for her very striking fashion photographs and also her love of creating beautiful decorative display pieces.
She also likes to cook at home and shares photographs of the many mouth watering dishes she has created.
Talking of food as we chatted, we also enjoyed breakfast and I leave it with our readers to guess who had which breakfast.
I would say the one on the right, looks very filling.


the Mekong Delta and finishing in Ho Chi Minh City.
of the Vietnamese people). The sights, sounds and smells of Vietnam overload your senses.
As a person who loves colour I certainly got my fill, its almost like the vivid setting is constantly on.


text:
College of Humanities and Sciences / Department of Political Science
Peter Koehn
Comparative Government & Politics & Public Administration
Office: LA 348
Email: peter.koehn@umontana.edu
MW 3:00-4:00 and by appointment
Issues in Global Public Health (PSCI 227)
Sustainable Climate Policy: China and the USA (PSCI 324)
Politics of Africa (PSCI 326)
Public Administration (PSCI 361)
Politics of Global Migration (PSCI 431)
Development Administration (PSCI 463)
Management Skills (PSCI 524)
Rural Health Issues in Global Perspective (PUBH 580)
For course descriptions, see personal website (link).
Ph.D.: University of Colorado, 1973.
M.P.A.: Public Administration, University of colorado, Boulder, 1968.
B.A.: Trinity College, Hartford, Conneticut, 1966
My current research is focused on professional education for transnational careers, on the role of subnational actors in mitigating greenhouse-gas (GHG) emissions, on transnational higher-education partnerships, and on evaluating academic programs devoted to sustainable development.
See personal website.
International leadership:
Michael P. Malone International Leadership Award (2011) Association of Public and Land-Grant Universities (APLU)
Scholarship:
Fulbright New Century Scholar (inaugural class, 2001-2002)
University of Montana's Distinguished Scholar (2005 campus-wide award)
Fulbright Senior Specialist awards: Finland ("global/public health," March/April 2006); Hong Kong (March 2003)
Invited scholar, U.S. Department of State's week-long Scholar-Diplomat Seminar on African Affairs (1977)
George M. Dennison Presidential Faculty Award for Distinguished Accomplishment (2012 campus-wide award)
University of Montana's Distinguished Service to International Education award (1999 campus-wide award)
Faculty Fellow (inaugural award, 2007). National Association of State Universities & Land Grant Colleges (NASULGC)
Development Specialist in Residence. Japan International Cooperation Agency, International Training Center (1991)
Paul G. Lauren Undergraduate Research Faculty Mentor Award (inaugural recipient, campus-wide award, 2011)
Provost's Distinguished Faculty lecture ("Symmetry, Synergy, and Serendipity: Reflections on Transnationalism") 2011
USIA Academic Specialist. Namibia (1991).
Ramona Grey
ramona.grey@umontana.edu
Stacia.Graham@mso.umt.edu


are just like every other state in the union except New Hampshire. In the fact, there are laws that require the use of safety restraints for all persons riding in a motor vehicle. This law states that it is illegal for anyone, adult or child, to ride in a vehicle that has seat belts without having the restraint properly secured. There are also laws and steps that need to be followed by Texas drivers in regards to the correct types and use of child restraints as well.
Failure to adhere to these rules and regulations can result in fines and additional court fees, which can vary depending on where the ticket was received. In some cases a judge may even order a driver to take a driving safety class for seat belts. So not wearing a safety restraint is not only against the law, but can also cost a driver time, money, and in worst case scenario there life.
If you are caught driving without a seatbelt, make sure you complete the course that is specifically required for Texas seat belt laws and not a defensive driving course. How would you be able know which course to take. This is very simple. If you received a ticket for not wearing a seatbelt, then most likely you will be asked to take the seatbelt course.
A seatbelt course is 6 hours in length and can range from $35 and up. If you have been asked to take the seatbelt course, make sure the class you are registered for is specifically for seatbelts. A defensive driving course that is 6 hours will not meet the criteria for a seatbelt specific course the court may have asked you to register for. If you are in doubt, then ask the instructor or school administrator.


On Thursday, May 25, 2017, about 500 pupils drawn from various areas in Lagos State were treated to a 5-star experience by Keystone Bank Limited and Junior Achievement Nigeria (JAN) in conjunction with Uber.
This was part of activities to mark the 2017 Children's Day celebrations.
Every May 27 is set aside worldwide to celebrate children and it is declared as holiday in Nigeria.
Participants were drawn from Federal Housing Estate Primary School, Victoria Island Primary School, Awoyaya Primary School and Ansarudeen Primary School.
All 500 pupils were beneficiaries of Junior Achievement Nigeria's 'More Than Money' scheme, a financial literacy programme which empowers primary 4, 5 and 6 pupils to cultivate better saving and spending habits and also help in the development of soft skills such as commitment, consistency, prioritizing and contentment.
The event, which transformed the schools' compound into fun wonderlands for a day, included food, games, activities and gifts from the sponsors.
In his remarks, Keystone Bank's Acting Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer, Mr Hafiz Bakare, stated that, "We admire the impact that JAN is creating in the lives of these children which will set them up for a successful future, so we are very proud to get the kids out of the classroom and have some fun.


text:
Adu agent plans to court Celtic 7/24/2007
The agent of 18-year-old USA midfielder star Freddy Adu is hoping to speak to Celtic next week.
Richard Motzkin, Adu''s LA-based agent, told the Scottish Sun: "Celtic are coming out for the MLS All-Stars game and I''ll be there.
"My sole reason for going isn''t to speak to Celtic - but some might say it would be a good time to talk.
"Freddy has always said he wants to go Europe and any player would have a lot of respect for a club like Celtic."
Adu, who won his first senior cap at the age of 16, is currently playing at the Under-20 World Cup.
And the Real Salt Lake player has performed well in Canada, helping USA to reach the quarter final stage - where they will be fancied to beat Austria on Saturday.
Adu left his native Ghana at the age of eight and had earned a million-dollar deal from sportswear giant Nike by the time he turned 14.
Manchester United had the teenager on a two-week trial last year and Chelsea have been repeatedly linked with a move for Adu.
Celtic meet the MLS All-Stars in Colorado on 20 July and travel to play Chicago Fire two days later.


text:
Rutgers women's basketball drops Big Ten opener to No. 8 Maryland
Dylan McCoy
Photo by Benjamin Chelnitsky
Graduate student forward Osh Brown recorded 10 points against Maryland.
After four competitive quarters with one of the top ten teams in the nation, the Rutgers women's basketball team was not able to complete the upset, falling to Maryland 73-59 in its first Big Ten game of the season.
The Scarlet Knights (4-6, 0-1) trailed early as the No. 8 Terrapins (8-2, 1-0) were boosted by two early threes from Katie Benzan. Rutgers kept the quarter competitive with 7 points from graduate student guard Shug Dickson, and Maryland held an 18-16 lead after the first 10 minutes.
The second quarter saw the Terrapins break the game open, outscoring the Knights 20-7. Rutgers almost matched its point total with turnovers, as it gave away the ball six times in the second quarter. Maryland took a 15-point lead into the half as a result of effective shooting, hitting approximately 62 percent of its attempts from the field.
Sophomore forward Tyia Singleton attempted to lead the comeback in the third quarter, scoring 6 points. The Knights held the Terrapins to just one made three-pointer, and the lead was cut to 8 going into the final 10 minutes.
The fourth quarter saw Rutgers come within 4 points after a basket from graduate student forward Osh Brown. This was the closest that the game would be, as Maryland made 9 of its 10 free throws and shot 75 percent in the fourth to avoid the upset and escape Jersey Mike's Arena on Livingston campus with the victory.
For the first time this season, four Knights scored in double figures, with Dickson recording 18 points to lead the way, setting her highest mark as part of the program. Senior guard Lasha Petree scored 11, with Singleton and Brown both scoring 10. Singleton also added a game-high 12 rebounds, marking her first double-double of the season.
As a team, the Terrapins outshot Rutgers by 17 percent and contributed 10 more points in the paint. Maryland also saw four players score in double figures, as the defending Big Ten champions improved to 10-1 against the Knights in conference play.
Rutgers next travels to face Penn State on Thursday night. The rivals face off at 7 p.m. with the broadcast taking place on Big Ten Network+.
"So disappointed that we let it slip away," said acting head women's basketball coach Timothy Eatman. "We had moments where we (were) right there … Maryland being such a terrific team, they answered."
For updates on the Rutgers women's basketball team, follow @TargumSports on Twitter.
Rutgers men's basketball defeats Maine in 1st game in 18 days
Dec 30 - Jack Bisaha
Rutgers women's basketball extends winning streak, defeats Wagner 73-54
Dec 18 - Dylan McCoy
Rutgers men's basketball postpones game against Rider due to coronavirus concerns
Rutgers men's basketball returns to face Rider on Saturday


A 62-year-old health and safety manager at the company had been supervising the cleaning of an oil storage tank when the incident took place.
To see how the cleaning was progressing, the man states that he climbed around the guard rails which were positioned at the top of the unit. As he did this, he accidentally knocked a pressure gauge pipe, making it come loose and release hot oil.
The manager was hit by oil of more than 160 degrees Celsius in temperature, which resulted in him suffering 10% burns to his shoulder, upper arms, neck, and back.
He required more than a month off to recover from his work injuries, and later left the company.
A Health and Safety Executive (HSE) investigation found that the firm had failed to carry out a suitable risk assessment prior to the cleaning work, having decided to write the assessment after the operation had been completed.
A HSE inspector involved in this case stated, "The whole point of a risk assessment is to ensure the risks associated with a particular task are considered and measures put in place to mitigate against them in order to keep workers safe.
The company was fined £16,500 and ordered to pay court costs of £571. Now that his former employers have been found liable for the accident at work, the injured party may decide to contact a personal injury solicitor to make a compensation claim.
I would like to thank you, both personally and on behalf of the whole family for your help and support through some very trying times.
Your calm, measured professionalism kept us together as a family and for that I personally am deeply grateful. Whilst writing I would also like to give praise to Ashley Partridge who has really impressed us all with his efficiency and charm.
From the moment he was assigned to us to the very end, he kept us informed. He is a brilliant peoples person, he is a gem don't let him go.


THE National Football League is now on TV5.
The #NFLonTV5 was off to an awesome start with a thrilling 41-39 shootout between the Rams and the 49ers. It was the highest scoring TNF in series history and viewers caught every bit of the action on TV5.


Equestrian Portraits by Jeni Vilder. Animal Portrait and Still Life Artist.
OIL - 10" x 12"
OIL - 12" x 14"
PASTEL - 12" x 16"
My horse portraits capture the personality and vitality of the animal. It is not practical to work solely from life but I like to meet the subject to observe their character, taking photographs and notes from which I can work in the studio. For a full portrait a landscape background special to that horse and owner can be photographed and used.
I work either in oils or in pastels. Oils produce a very traditional result, particularly for a full portrait. The pastel pencils I use give a softer effect, with almost every hair being visible.


text:
Wandering wheat
Published by Hurriyet on Mon, 07/03/2017 - 00:01
Back in the 1960's, Jack Harlan, a devoted American agronomist harvested wild wheat in southeastern Turkey as if a gatherer would do 10,000 years ago. He first tried using only his hands; hand-stripping the mature wheat ears, then he tried using a replica of an ancient sickle, a razor-sharp flint blade embedded in a wooden handle. He was quite efficient, though apparently lacking the expertise of the ancient men who lived in the same spot thousands of years ago.
Dr. Jack Harlan was one of the founders of the modern plant genetic sources and a specialist on the domestication of crops. His Anatolian harvest was one of the earliest examples of experimental archaeology in Turkey, reaping wild wheat as if it would have been done in Neolithic times, both using the hand-stripping method and using ancient tools. Though the former was less efficient, both methods proved to be quite effective, a crop of 2.05-2.45 kilograms per hour could easily be harvested. That amount reaped about 46 percent of actual grain, so it was easy to have a yield of one kilogram of grain per hour. At this rate, a family would be able to harvest a year's supply easily within three weeks during the harvest season.
Harlan is long gone, but wild wheat patches still wander in the Anatolian landscape. One fascinating fact about Anatolia is the ancient wild wheat varieties that still exist, popping up in certain areas, usually not far from ancient Neolithic sites. In the province of Diyarbakır, occasional batches of wild wheat grow near hillsides close to Ergani, and further south, on the outskirts of the Karacadağ Mountains. When I was on an expedition trip for mapping the food heritage of southeastern Turkey two years ago, I was astonished to hear about the wandering wild wheat;...
www.hurriyetdailynews.com
Jack Harlan
ProvinceOrState
Ergani
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This stylish Longines L3.640.4.96.6 is one of the 39mm HydroConquest collection for gents that is presented in a solid steel on steel construction with a Sunray Blue dial. Designed to meet the demanding specs of the open seas enthusiasts, this sporty timepiece boasts a capacity of 300 m water resistance, SuperLuminova hands and markers, and powered by the reliable Longines caliber L263 Swiss quartz movement.
This wrist watch is a large size. Its polished SS case that comes with Blue aluminum bi-directional rotating bezel, screw-in crown, and a screw down solid caseback measures 39 mm in diameter and approximately 10.2 mm thick. Meanwhile, the three rows, fine brushed and polished SS bracelet that comes with a double security folding clasp and features an integrated diving extension is around 22 mm wide.
Opted for diving and other water related activities, this Longines L3.640.4.96.6 watch's finely built case and link bracelet are made of premium grade stainless steel that is rugged and corrosion resistant. Its face is shielded with a scratch resistant sapphire that is enhanced with an anti-reflective coating. And to let you conveniently make use of it, the rhodium-plated hands, as well as the indices on its dial feature SuperLuminova luminescent coating so that they would remain visible in every light conditions.
Speaking of one inside, Longines caliber L263 is a fine quartz movement with a good accuracy and durable that is built based on the ETA 955.412. This Swiss quartz movement offers a precise three hands, and an automatic date at the three o'clock position. These functions are nicely showcased through the watch's Sunray Blue dial that is neat and easy to read, which in addition to the luminous hands and indices mentioned once before, also features applied, Silver tone seconds hand with Red tipping, along with applied, Silver tone stick hour markers and three oversized Arabic hour markers (6, 9, 12) with SuperLuminova fill.
Speaking of the watchmaker, Longines has a long history of making fine timepieces which favorably are offered at a reasonable price point, just like this one. For all of its quality offering, this diving ready steel on steel HydroConquest goes with an original manufacturer suggested retail price of $1,000.00.
Longines caliber L263. Personalized, based on ETA 955.412. Swiss made, battery powered quartz movement, three hands, date. 7 jewels. Battery: 371/395 Renata, 2 up to 3 years of battery life.
Silver tone rhodium-plated hands with SuperLuminova. Rhodium-plated stick markers, alternates with Arabic numeral markers at 6, 9, and 12 with SuperLuminova fill. Ten indicies with SuperLuminova. Date display at 3.
Round, Ø 39 mm, ± 10.2 mm thick. polished.
Uni-directional rotating bezel. Blue, polished. Silver and White markers.
screwed down stainless steel. engraved.
Silver tone, fine brushed and polished. three-rows link bracelet. ± 22 mm wide. men's standard.
with double security folding clasp and integrated diving extension.
diving ready. suitable for rain, showering, swimming, snorkeling, and diving.
Manufacturer Suggested Retail Price or Recommended Retail Price listed here may or may not reflecting the actual selling price of this Longines HydroConquest watch. You should use it and/or its conversion value for estimation only.
You can find an original Longines L3.640.4.96.6 at the site(s) listed above. However, we don't guarantee its availability as being listed here simply means that those site(s) has the item in question by the time we wrote the review.
The Longines 39mm HydroConquest Quartz review in this page is written by Rief at Monday, June 17, 2013. The post is tagged as $1000 and under, 300m, 39mm, affordable, analog, date, diver, longines, men, on steel, quartz, round, sporty, stainless steel, swiss quartz, three hands, watch.


All accidents are stressful to the drivers and passengers involved, and they can happen anywhere. Intersections, however, are often the cause of collisions, as drivers can misunderstand or neglect the traffic signals and right-of-way. A Fort Lauderdale intersection accident lawyer can help you through your case and to file a claim.
Impacts at intersections can involve multiple cars and a range of injuries. One negligent driver can send several people to the hospital and rack up expensive medical bills for all involved. If you have been the victim of a driver who has caused a crash at an intersection through unsafe behavior, you deserve to be compensated for your injuries and damages.
Filing a civil lawsuit might be necessary to get a fair recovery, but it can also be a daunting task. An attorney in Broward County can help you navigate the legal proceedings and advice you on all of your options. Seeking the help of an experienced accident lawyer can be critical to take on the driver whose negligence has injured you.
You shouldn't have to pay for someone else's mistakes. It is important to take the first step toward getting what you deserve and contact an attorney. Lisa S. Levine can discuss your individual case with you and determine your options. Time is a factor in these cases, so don't hesitate to begin the process of filing your lawsuit. Lisa S. Levine and her legal team can take over the stress of pursuing your case, and ensure that all proceedings are handled properly.
Lisa S. Levine P.A. has years of experience representing clients with personal injury claims throughout Southeast Florida. She's helped hundreds of clients in cities like Fort Lauderdale, Weston, Sunrise, Pembroke Pines, Hollywood, and Davie. Our firm can analyze your details in a relaxed environment, so call today at (954) 256-1820 or send an online message to schedule your free consultation.
Any of these causes, and others, can easily lead to a collision. Studies find that 96% of accidents are caused by the actions of drivers, not through a fault of the intersection's layout.
Duty – The driver must have had a duty to drive with a certain level of safety. This duty is inherent for every driver of a vehicle.
Damages – Damages must have been sustained during the collision, and the requested compensation must be appropriate. These can include medical bills, loss of wages, pain and suffering, and other expenses incurred as a direct result of the accident.
Trust Lisa S. Levine and her legal team with your case. They can handle all of the legwork and proactively pursue a positive resolution for you. Insurance companies, paperwork, uncooperative defendants, and confusing tasks can be stressful, but we can minimize that burden for drivers in Florida cities like Miramar, Plantation, Davie, Fort Lauderdale, Weston, and Pembroke Pines. No matter how difficult of complicated your circumstances are, we are ready to undertake your cause. Call us today at (954) 256-1820 to start pursuing the compensation that you're rightfully owed.


text:
<?php

namespace AppBundle\Model;

use AppBundle\Report\Activering;
use Doctrine\ORM\Mapping as ORM;
use Gedmo\Mapping\Annotation as Gedmo;

trait ActivatableTrait
{
    /**
     * @var bool
     * @ORM\Column(name="`active`", type="boolean", nullable=false, options={"default":1})
     * @Gedmo\Versioned
     */
    protected $actief = true;

    public function isActief()
    {
        return (bool) $this->actief;
    }

    public function getActief()
    {
        return $this->actief;
    }
    public function setActief(bool $actief)
    {
        $this->actief = $actief;

        return $this;
    }

}

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaGithub


With all the excitement of moving, you'd rather spend your time settling in your new home than conducting the actual labor of the moving process.
At Belle Chasse Movers, we're here to simplify your move so you can concentrate on your new home instead! We offer our Belle Chasse customers a a smorgasbord of choices and give them the freedom to pick one or all of our features. In this way, our clients have full control over the fee of their moving budget, and we don't have to charge a hefty standard rate as some Belle Chasse movers in the area.
The objective of our Belle Chasse moving company is to offer excellent service and attention to detail at a cost that will not go over your budget. At Belle Chasse Movers, our goal is to meet the needs of our customers, and our number one goal is to make certain that your move is as stress-free as possible. In order to meet your expectations, we employ only the premier staff.
We recognize that our clients have diverse needs and we recognize those differencesby offering a complete service menu and attention to every detail.
When the time has come to collect your possessions, you can either rent one of our moving trucks or have us deliver them to your new location - it's up to you! We continue to offer our customers the flexibility to make their move on a budget and hassle-free. By forming good rapport with our Belle Chasse customers, we're able to maintain our strong reputation and be a top moving company in the area!
Make your Belle Chasse move a positive experience with Belle Chasse Movers!
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text:
Alyssa Annis
How do we make it our mission to remember?
How do we make sure the Holocaust doesn't just become something from our past?
As 2023 begins it arrives with a time to reflect on 2022. To learn from our mistakes and do better. Going into the new year a lingering fear is the increasing amount of antisemitic incidents, globally.
On January 27th we will be commemorating 78 years since the liberation of Auschwitz on International Holocaust memorial day and unfortunately, we still can't truly say "never again." Holocaust survivors who are still able to share their stories are few and will be reunited with those they lost in only a matter of years. Therefore we are left with the question – How can we as society continue their legacy and spread the stories of survival to ensure – never again is now.
In January 2022, Israel Hayom reported that 15,000 Holocaust survivors died the previous year. Unfortunately, this is the reality our generation has to face, few have had the opportunity to hear a Holocaust survivor's testimony and of those who have, most did not realize the responsibility they have to spread it onwards – until now.
The Holocaust resulted in the murder of six million Jewish people. Consequently, as a society we can look back and learn to be inclusive, accepting and always stand up for others facing discrimination. During the Holocaust the Nazis wanted to exterminate the Jewish people and anyone who did not fit their Nazi ideology.
Yet in the last 78 years, the world has transformed. Jewish people have quite literally managed to rebuild their population and spread a positive impact on our world. Minorities are again starting to thrive and grow. Additionally, with the help of globalization and technology, vast advancements have been made in terms of freedom, equality and acceptance. However, we still suffer from horrific hatred, holocaust denial and racism.
In 2021, UNESCO conducted a study which examined Holocaust denial and antisemitism. They reported that between June and July 2021, approximately 4000 posts denying the Holocaust were taken down from Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, telegram and other social media platforms. The same year, the BBC reported that whilst artificial intelligence is meant to track down hatred, incitement to violence and racism including Holocaust denial on social media, In 2021, they only had a 20 percent success rate. Furthermore, around 80 percent of the antisemitic content which includes holocaust denial is left on social media, to be read, reread and shared to a global growing audience. This results in a growing number of holocaust deniers who simply read this content and believe it.
As social media transforms our lives and allows us to have friends from all over the world, the ability of those who deny or distort the facts of the Holocaust increases. Recent initiatives taken by some social media platforms such as TikTok have included a redirect to learn about the Holocaust when one searches for antisemitic content. However, the amount of denial and hatred online is rising and it is no longer surprising to be met with tweets along the lines of "Hitler was right" or "the Holocaust was a hoax" which are not automatically reported despite going against the guidelines of social media pages.
A few years ago I spent time working with Holocaust survivors, escorting them to talk to groups from all over the world. Those two years changed my life, they made me realize that in a world full of darkness you need a bright shining light, and in a world of shining lights you need them to outshine the darkness. Therefore, I am not enough, the families of survivors are not enough. We need you to use your voice, to help create a better, brighter future and be those overpowering shining lights. Together and only together can we ensure that never again – is now.
Alyssa was born in Manchester England before making Aliyah. She served two years doing national service at Yad Vashem where she realized her responsibility to spread the stories of survivors and be a voice for Holocaust education and remembrance in the future. Alyssa is currently in the final year studying Government at Reichman University where she is an Argov fellow and has a Holocaust Education page on Instagram - @mymissiontoremember


text:
Dracula, the Time Disrupter
By Glen Whitman
Count Dracula possessed many supernatural powers, including telepathy, hypnosis, shapeshifting, and weather control. But he also possessed the less frequently recognized power of time confusion. Dracula caused his victims to lose track of time, to mix up times and dates, and to abandon precise statements of time in favor of such vague terms as noon, midnight, sunrise, and sunset — all of which hindered their ability to resist his evil plans.
As Hollis Robbins argues in her chapter in Economics of the Undead, "Killing Time: Dracula and Social Discoordination" (excerpted here), Count Dracula arrived in London at a key point in economic history. In 1897, Europe had only recent undertaken a shift in timekeeping standards, from the Julian to the Gregorian calendar and from local time to Standard Time. Notably, Dracula hailed from a region of Europe known for resisting the new timekeeping standards. Austria-Hungary and Turkey, on either side of Transylvania, had voted against the 1884 resolution that established Standard Time and the 24-hour day starting at midnight. And Eastern Orthodox countries — notably Romania, including Transylvania — did not adopt the Gregorian calendar until 1918. Dracula's power of time confusion is connected, both literally and figuratively, to his place of origin. By disrupting perceptions of time, Dracula poses a threat to economic health. As Robbins puts it:
Britain's economic prosperity in the nineteenth century was largely dependent on the adoption of international standards such as Greenwich Mean Time and the universal day, which ensured smooth coordination for trade, legal transactions, railroad travel, and mail delivery. Dracula, whose powers are governed by the sun and the moon rather than clocks and calendars, works to destabilize social coordination.
This concern with social coordination appears more recently in Matthew Yglesias's recent article at Vox, wherein he makes the case for eliminating time zones and replacing them with Universal Time — that is, having the entire world operate according to a single clock, presumably Greenwich Mean Time. Yglesias hastens to say that people would still live their lives in a manner that makes sense given the local position of the sun; only the names that people call their hours would change:
All of which is to say that within a given time zone, the point of a common time is not to force everyone to do everything at the same time. It's to allow us to communicate unambiguously with each other about when we are doing things.
If the whole world used a single GMT-based time, schedules would still vary. In general most people would sleep when it's dark out and work when it's light out. So at 23:00, most of London would be at home or in bed and most of Los Angeles would be at the office. … The difference from today is that if you were putting together a London-LA conference call at 21:00 there'd be only one possible interpretation of the proposal. A flight that leaves New York at 14:00 and lands in Paris at 20:00 is a six-hour flight, with no need to keep track of time zones. If your appointment is in El Paso at 11:30 you don't need to remember that it's in a different time zone than the rest of Texas.
In other words, the argument for replacing Standard Time with Universal Time is that it helps people to better coordinate their behavior — which was also the argument for replacing local time with Standard Time in the 1800s. Yglesias is essentially saying that the people of the world didn't go far enough back then, and that it's time to take the universalization of timekeeping conventions to its logical extreme.
All of which makes me wonder: What would Dracula have been like had he arrived 200 years later, in the year 2097?
In the mid-21st century, Yglesias's proposal gained traction, persuading much of the world to abandon time zones in favor of Universal Time. Yet a few intransigent nations have stubbornly clung to the old time zones, and their continuing recalcitrance creates the potential for confusion — confusion that a supernatural being might exploit to his advantage.
Our 21st-century Dracula hails from Finland, a country caught between modern Sweden (among the first adopters of Universal Time) and backwards Russia (which still uses the old time zones). When he goes on a whirlwind tour of the political and financial capitals of the world, he causes everyone he meets to forget about Universal Time. Some reset their clocks, watches, and computer settings to their old time zones. Others see existing clocks on Universal Time but unconsciously interpret them as the old time zones. The resulting discoordination leads to Y2K-like disasters, from stock market crashes to debt crises — or worse, collisions of orbiting satellites and lunar transport ships. And God only knows what happens to the unlucky tourists whose teleportation pods materialize them in the same destination at the same time…
2 Comments	| posted in Uncategorized
Zombie Preparedness: Transport Edition
My feed brings news of not one, but two varieties of post-apocalyptic transportation. First, 4WD Hardware, a purveyor of Jeep parts and accessories, is holding a contest to determine the optimal components of a "zombie slayer Jeep." Here's the video:
Second, motorized bicycle maker Motoped brings us the Motoped Survival Bike Black Ops edition — a solid effort to prove that "badass moped" isn't the oxymoron it sounds like: "The Motoped Survival Bike has a custom frame and gas tank, a rear rack and a gas can. Optional accessories include multitools, ropes, an axe and even a crossbow."
So which of these vehicles is the better bet for the zombie apocalypse? I think it's the moped, hands down. The Jeep will be useless if gasoline runs out during the end times, whereas the moped gives you the option of pedaling. Plus, the moped will be much more useful in maneuvering tight situations, riding through trees, going down stairs, and so forth. The Jeep offers more storage capacity, of course, but without gasoline it's just an immobile storage unit. In any case, during the apocalypse you should travel light: put less stuff in your backpack, more stuff in your head.
1 Comment	| posted in Uncategorized
What Can the Dead Teach the Living?
If the dead could speak, what would they say? The British Library (via io9) relays a Medieval tale of the undead, "The Three Living and the Three Dead":
The precise origins of the Three Living and the Three Dead are still somewhat mysterious, but there are many versions of the tale dating back to the 13th century, with the best-known coming from England and France. The basic version of the story goes like this: three young noblemen are out hunting when they suddenly come across three corpses, which are in varying states of decay, but nonetheless still animated. Unsurprisingly, the young men express shock and dismay at the sight, while the three corpses admonish them to consider the transience of life and to improve their behaviour before it is too late.
A couple of observations are in order here. First, although io9 characterizes this as a "zombie" story, these are not your usual mindless zombies. They appear capable of deep thought and reflection, and they also seem to lack any hunger for human flesh (unless those Medieval storytellers buried the lead in a serious way). Although zombies and vampires are the most commonly discussed varieties of undead (thus their representation in the subtitle of Economics of the Undead), any player of Dungeons & Dragons knows there are also liches, revenants, ghosts, mummies, ghouls, and many more. Perhaps "The Three Living and the Three Dead" deals with one of these other types.
Second, it's interesting that the undead would impart a lesson about the transience of life, as their very existence proves that a person may continue to exist in some form even after death. Apparently we are to believe that, despite their ability to think and their lack of hunger, these undead creatures have a terrible existence — perhaps a punishment by God for their sins. That would also explain why an awareness of life's transience shouldn't motivate you to gather ye rosebuds why ye may, but instead to adopt a less sinful lifestyle.
What lessons might be drawn by someone who doesn't share a Medieval Christian perspective? If becoming undead is seen as a threat — an awful future that is effectively the end of one's "true" life — then becoming aware of its possibility would presumably make you place more value on the present (in economist lingo, increase your discount rate). But if becoming undead is seen as a gift — as in many recent depictions of vampires, especially in the YA literature — then knowing about it would tend to make you place more value on the future (decrease your discount rate), in large part because it means your future could be a lot longer than previously expected.
For more on the impact of immortality on the rate of discount, see Fabien Medvecky's chapter, "Sinking Our Teeth into Public Policy Economics: A Taste of Immortality," in Economics of the Undead.
Leave a comment	| posted in Uncategorized
Vampire Dogs = Werewolves?
Sometimes, I find an article that just tests my ability to analyze it, through an economic lens or any other. Like this one from the Philippines:
SIBALE ISLAND, Romblon—Eleven days before a new appearance of the super moon on August 10, "vampire" dogs attacked and killed on Wednesday seven goats, sucking its [sic] blood and taking out its [sic] heart and liver, a senior official said.
Mayor Lemuel Cipriano said the dogs, which some residents claimed were werewolves, attacked the herd of Ervin Ignacio, a farmer-fisherman, in Sitio Sinanrigan in Barangay Calabasahan.
"The goats were drained of blood. The predators took only the livers and hearts. The rest of the body were [sic] intact," Cipriano said.
Couple of things to note here: (1) The seeming uncertainty about whether there's one predator (singular) or many (plural). I chalk this up to poor English skills. (2) The dispute as to whether the predators are vampire dogs or werewolves. This could be a promising premise for the next supernatural cult TV show: when a dog becomes a vampire, that's how we get werewolves! But does this kind of werewolf take human form? As I recall from my Dungeons & Dragons days, there's actually a fine distinction here: a human who turns into a wolf is a werewolf, whereas a wolf that (partially) turns into a human is a wolfwere.
Another passage of note:
Romblon Gov. Eduardo Fiormalo has issued a "shoot-on-sight" against the suspected werewolves. Residents armed with bamboo spears and bolos patrol their neighborhood at night, but the animals have been elusive.
That's right: bamboos spears and bolos. This really is the premise of a supernatural cult TV show.
Finally, there is actually an economic aspect to all of this:
The Department of Agriculture has announced it would replace the goats killed, but residents have become reluctant to herd goats because it attract [sic] the vampires and they could be the next victims.
"Who knows, if these unknown killers consumed all our goats, and they go hungry, we can be their next victims," said Nelia Yap, the municipal agriculturist.
What do you think? Should the government be subsidizing the raising of goats, which may be the source of a negative externality (attracting vampire dogs)? Usually, economists recommend that activities with negative externalities be taxed.
Zombie Survival, Short-Term vs. Long-Term
My Google Alert for "zombie" brings me a seemingly endless stream of news about so-called "zombie survival camps." They have them in Iowa, California, New Jersey, Oregon, Canada, Japan, and I'm sure many other locations as well. (Given the similarity of the language, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that many of these are run by a single organization.)
While preparedness is surely a good thing, I wonder if these camps are really teaching people what they need to know. Here's a representative description, from the California camp linked above:
Stanislaus County Safety Officer David Becker … will present tips instrumental to surviving a potential zombie apocalypse before allowing the teenagers to assemble safety kits themselves. From water bottles to glow sticks, surgical masks to hand wipes, teenagers will choose life saving tools to keep on hand in the case that an unexpected disaster should strike. While the approach is light hearted, at the core of the library's mission is a serious message about the importance of preparation and communication prior to a catastrophe.
And here's a description from the camp in New Jersey:
We teach you everything you need to know to survive the apocalypse, including:
Find and create a safe environment and shelter
Train in self-defense and melee weapons
Handle and use a crossbow
Use firearms-handgun, shotgun and rifle (live ammo)
Stay healthy now and then
Build and lead your team
Collect, prepare and store your supplies
Build the perfect Bug-Out-Bag
Notice a pattern? Virtually all of the skills taught are essentially short-term survival skills: what to pack in your to-go bag, how to use weapons, etc. These skills are fine for getting you through the first few weeks. But as Jim Dow argues in Chapter 3 of Economics of the Undead, "Packing for the Zombie Apocalypse," you also have to think long-term. Eventually, your duct tape, ammunition, glow sticks, and hand wipes will run out. If civilization has collapsed in the meantime, you need to think about how you'll support yourself in the post-apocalyptic economy.
There's nothing wrong with packing stuff, but as Jim argues, what matters more in the long run is what you've packed in your head. Do you have a skill that you can use to engage in trade with the other survivors? It's unrealistic to think you can be totally self-sufficient, which means you'll need something to offer others that they will value. Do you know how to build a still and distill alcohol (as Jim suggests)? Manufacture new shot gun shells or crossbow bolts? Turn bread mold into penicillin? You probably can't learn to do all of these things at a two-week survival camp, but learning just a couple could dramatically improve your odds of prospering (relatively speaking) in the aftermath.
Tontines: How Vampires Really Got Rich?
In a previous post as well as a chapter in the book, Jim asks how vampires came to be so rich. The obvious answer is compound interest, although Jim observes that it's not as simple as it may sound. Kent McKeever of Columbia Law School emailed to draw our attention to another aspect of undead finance: tontines. In a tontine, multiple members agree to make contributions to a fund, which pays out an annuity to the living members. As members die off, the size of the annuity increases for the remaining members. In an academic paper, McKeever argues that the tontine, morbid as it may sound, could actually be a worthwhile investment vehicle:
The tontine, with its underlying premise that the living participants benefit from the death of their fellows, does not deserve its shadowy reputation. It had some success in its original purpose, as a means of government fund raising. It was most successful as a means of private development and investment from around 1780 through the 1850's. However, it was used as a gimmick in the selling of life insurance and as a cover for outright fraud in the latter part of the 19th Century. It was also subject to attack from writers who found the notion of gambling on other people's deaths unseemly. The tontine developed an aura of shadiness, and was eventually abandoned. If re-developed as a form of insurance for the long-lived, it may be worth rehabilitation as an investment tool.
However, as McKeever notes in his email, the existence of undead investors could wreak havoc on the administration of tontines. This suggests to me a possible alternate history of how vampires became rich: by taking part in tontines with unsuspecting human partners.
The Economics of Cross-the-Grave Romance
(cross-posted at the Volokh Conspiracy)
Bella and Edward. Buffy and Angel. Buffy and Spike. Sookie and Bill. Sookie and Eric. Elena and Stefan. Elena and Damon. It seems you can't crack a book, flip on the TV, or walk down a dark alley these days without finding a human girl and a vampire boy making googly eyes at each other.
— Chapter 1 of Economics of the Undead
It's no secret that the recent vampire craze is driven, in large part, by a female fan base. The final installment of the Twilight film series drew a 79% female audience (and that's not even considering how many male viewers only went at the behest of their wives and girlfriends). Similarly, female viewers of the Vampire Diaries outnumber male ones by about a two-to-one. Not coincidentally, the past 20 years of vampire stories have sharply moved away from the vampire as repulsive villain and toward the vampire as romantic hero.
In editing Economics of the Undead, I realized that our book needed something to offer this particular audience. And I knew what exactly it should be: relationship advice.
Surprising as it may sound, economics actually has quite a lot to say about romantic partnerships, starting with Gary Becker's famous 1973 article on marriage markets. Moreover, bringing economics to bear on cross-the-grave romance allowed me to explore some concepts neglected by the rest of the book. The relevant models aren't ones you learn in your typical Econ 101 course — I personally didn't learn about them until grad school — yet they are significant enough to have nabbed their creators Nobel prizes in Economics in both 2010 and 2011.
In "Human Girls and Vampire Boys, Part 1: Looking for Mr. Goodbite," I draw on the "search-matching" literature to analyze the process of seeking and finding a vampire mate. The search-matching approach, pioneered by Diamond, Mortensen, and Pissarides (2010 Nobelists), applies in markets characterized by substantial heterogeneity, such as skilled labor markets, housing markets, and (yes) mating markets. As I put it in the chapter:
Finding a romantic partner isn't like going to the grocery store and picking out one of a hundred identical bags of rice. Vampire boys differ from each other in age, beauty, wealth, psychotic tendencies, and so on. Human girls differ substantially as well. The quality of the mate matters, to both sides. To complicate matters further, not every couple is a "good fit"; we all know perfectly nice couples who just don't belong together, however much they try. So the quality of the match matters as well.
In markets like these, you must engage in a search over time. With each potential partner you meet, you must decide whether to settle down or keep searching. For human girls seeking vampire boys, the cost of search can be quite high, as you may have to visit unpleasant places like cemeteries, dark alleyways, and <shudder> local high schools. And the longer it takes to settle down, the more time you have to spend by your lonesome self. So you don't want to keep search indefinitely looking for your one-and-only soulless mate. But how do you know when to stop searching?
Economic theory has the answer. A general result of search-matching models is that your best strategy is to decide upon a "reservation level." In a job search, for instance, you would calculate a reservation wage; you would accept any wage offer meeting or exceeding it, and refuse any offer below it. In the mating context, you would decide upon your "reservation level of romantic satisfaction." You would then accept any vampire who met or exceeded that level of satisfaction, and reject anyone else. A variety of factors should affect your optimal reservation level, including the number of vampires in your area, how many other human girls are in the market, how patient you are, and how content you are living by yourself… but if you want to know more, you'll need to read the chapter.
In "Human Girls and Vampire Boys, Part 2: 'Til Death Do Us Part," I draw on the field of organizational economics, especially the work of 2009 Nobelist Oliver Williamson, to analyze what happens after you've settled down with the undead man of your dreams. At that point, the relevant question is when to stay together and when to break up. As Williamson observed in the context of other long-term partnerships, such as employers-and-employees or firms-and-input-suppliers, something changes in the process of creating a relationship: you start to create relationship-specific assets. Again, quoting myself:
When you're looking for a new mate, you're shopping on a competitive market: you have many options, as do your potential partners. But as soon as you settle down, something changes. You start to make investments in your relationship — and, hopefully, so does he. You gain knowledge of each other's tastes and quirks, like how you love sparkly clean fangs and he prefers type A blood. You develop routines that allow you to coordinate your schedules, which can be particularly hard when one of you sleeps in the daytime. And you create memories that are special just to you, like that time you faced down an army of bigoted anti-human vampires side by side. If you move in together, your new home will require a substantial investment in packing, decorating, coffin installation, and so on. Children, too, are an investment you make together. (There is some doubt as to whether human-vampire offspring are possible, but I take Twilight: Breaking Dawn—Part 2 as the definitive statement on the matter.) If you ever broke up, some of these assets that you've created together would become worthless, and others would lose much of their value. If you want to keep them as they are, you're locked into bargaining with just one person. The situation is no longer competitive—it's a monopoly. And because the same problem affects both partners, it's a bilateral monopoly.
This shift from competition to bilateral monopoly, which Williamson dubbed the Fundamental Transformation, affects business situations as well. Take, for instance, the casting of the Twilight movie series. Before the first movie was made, the producers were buying on a competitive market, since many young actors and actresses would have been happy to take the roles of Edward and Bella. But after Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart took those roles, something changed. For the subsequent movies, the producers had to negotiate exclusively with the actors they'd already chosen, as any threat of substituting different actors would surely have angered the fan base and threatened sales. As a result, the actors (both lead and supporting) were in a position to play hardball for better pay — which they did.
The Twilight casting story demonstrates Williamson's most important insight about the Fundamental Transformation: that it opens a wider range for bargaining over the terms of the agreement. On a competitive market, it's much easier for either party to refuse the deal. But after some time has passed, it gets a lot harder to walk away. For that reason, one or both members of the partnership may try to change the terms of the relationship after the fact, just as the Twilight cast members did. This phenomenon is known as post-contractual opportunism.
For instance, what happens when that cute vampire boy who seemed to be vegetarian suddenly "relapses," succumbing to his bloodlust and feeding on innocent victims (a scenario played out in both Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the Vampire Diaries)? If he had behaved that way when they first met, the human girl would surely have spurned his advances. But in the context of an ongoing relationship, the human girl feels obligated to help him through the rough patch, rather than dumping him and losing everything they've built together.
Students of economics might wonder if a version of the sunk-cost fallacy is at work here. Aren't rational people supposed to ignore costs they've already incurred and can't get back? But that's simplistic Econ 101 thinking. Yes, it's true that unrecoverable costs should be ignored. However, what those costs have bought you — the relationship-specific assets of your partnership — continue to be relevant. For that reason, it can be perfectly rational for people to tolerate behavior within a relationship that would have been sufficient reason to reject a new partner out of hand.
And yet, as we know, relationships can, should, and do end – as we have seen in the case of Buffy and Angel, Sookie and Bill, and other cross-the-grave romances. So how do you know when to put a stake in it? Here, too, economics offers some answers, but once again I'll leave those for readers of the book.
You might be asking yourself at this point whether I'm being serious. And the answer is… sort of. Obviously, the vampire part of the discussion above is fictional, and much of the presentation is tongue-in-cheek But the application of search-matching and organizational economics to romance? No, I'm not joking. I'm not saying you need slide rules and spreadsheets to optimize your love life, but I do think the conceptual apparatus here is fundamentally right. It's just true that finding a life partner is a search, with all the characteristics (costliness, randomness, etc.) specified in the search-matching model. And the recommended strategy is also correct: you have to decide what "bar" a potential partner must clear in order for you to settle down. As advice columnist and non-economist Dan Savage puts it, it's silly to demand a partner who's perfect in every respect; you have to find someone who's good enough and then "round them up to the One." Similarly, it's just true that committing to a romantic partnership changes things in ways that create incentives to stay together, even when problems arise (as they inevitably will), and that's what makes many stay-together-or-break-up decisions so difficult.
In this case, as in many others, the economic way of thinking is vindicated. And that is the larger lesson of Economics of the Undead: the context may be fanciful or dead serious, but the principles of economics still apply.
Estimating Returns for Very-Long-Term Investors (and Vampires)
By James Dow
As Glen will discuss in his Friday post, the women in books and movies these days all seem to want to date vampires. Of course, not any vampire, but a rich vampire, and there seem to be a lot of them around. What is the secret of how those vampires got so rich? In my chapter "Investing Secrets of the Undead" I'll show you how to turn a $1,000 investment into a lifetime of wealth that will allow you and your family to…oops, sorry, wrong audience. Actually, in the chapter I use vampires in the media to illustrate some important academic principles of financial analysis as it relates to investing.
The first and obvious answer to why vampires are so rich is that vampires live (so to speak) a long time and so are in the position to take advantage of the power of compounding. Compounding does matter, but there's more to investing than that.
In the chapter, I talk about various ways in which time interacts with risk for long-term investors, such as why time diversification does not work the way many people think it does, how mean reversion potentially offers opportunities for long-term investors, and the non-financial problems that might be associated with vampires delaying their consumption until the distant future. For this post, I want to briefly discuss one particular issue: how survivorship bias can affect the use of historical data when forecasting long-term investment returns.
There have been many studies looking at US stock returns in the post-war era. However, an investor with a very long investment horizon might be interested in how stocks have performed over the last 100 years in a variety of different countries. During that period, stocks have actually done quite well and a sophisticated vampire might decide to take advantage of that. As I describe it in the chapter:
Before I answer, let me tell you another story from a lesser-known piece of vampire fiction. Baron Federov was a minor aristocrat in the court of Alexander I of Russia in the early 1800's. Known mostly for various bits of scandal related to the wife of a fellow noble, he lived a life of genteel poverty. However, his life radically changed one night when he was visited by Count Vardalok, who drank his blood and left him for dead. Accidentally, some of the Count's blood dripped down the Baron's throat, and so Federov woke that night as a vampire. Now, the Baron was a practical man and understood compound interest. Selling off what possessions he had, he invested in several promising Moscow properties and businesses, making a will that gave his assets to a "future descendant." He faked his own death as a human and then hid away in a crypt, confidently planning to return many years hence to claim his inheritance and live the rest of his time in prosperity.
In 1917 he awoke to claim his riches. Unfortunately for the Baron, this also happened to be the time of the Russian Revolution, and he awoke not to the riches that compounding promised, but instead to see all his property taken away in the communist revolution. Penniless, he wandered the streets and was staked the next night by a patrolling revolutionary guard.
Okay, that isn't a real story, but it illustrates an important point. It's said that history is written by the winners, and that's true for investing stories as well. Nobody is going to tell you about the money they lost playing the stock market. Because of that, you get a distorted idea about how likely it is for you to win. In the study that came up with our 7% average return, all the countries in the survey were winners. They were around in 1900 and they're around today. If they weren't, they couldn't be included in the study.
The name for this problem is survivorship bias and it results in return numbers that are too optimistic because poor performers (in this case, stock markets and economies that fail) are excluded. The problem of survivorship bias is well understood and adjusted for in the best stock return databases, but this is often not done with unusual or specialty asset return data. Investors beware.
Economic Recovery after the Zombie Apocalypse
Most zombie preparation guides focus on helping you survive the first few weeks with the idea that sooner or later the authorities will defeat the zombie menace and order will be restored. However, what we know from the literature (e.g. Dawn of the Dead and The Walking Dead) is that it's quite possible that the zombies will do enough damage to knock society back to a more primitive social structure. Several chapters of the book, including one of my own, address the question of how people might begin to rebuild the economy after the apocalypse. (Spoiler alert: I'll be referencing parts of World War Z and The Walking Dead, so stop here if you don't want to know. Although, if you care that much, why haven't you seen them already?)
Before we can face the zombies, we need to step back a bit and consider a basic principle of economic organization. Economies are built around connections between people, either through "hierarchical" organizations such as firms (or armies or families) or alternatively through market systems which are decentralized and built around organized systems of exchange. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages. Hierarchies can be efficient since there is less time spent in negotiation; however, as the size of the organization gets larger, it's harder for the person in command to have the specialized expertise needed to make the right decisions at each level. Markets, while seeming inefficient, allow economies to scale up in size which implies more specialization and so greater productivity.
We see both sides of this in the zombie war described in the book World War Z. The anti-zombie forces are finally organized under a centralized command, which allows quick decisions to be made on how to fight the zombies. On the other hand, it is often the people who are directly engaged in battle rather than the people at the top who are most effective in discovering new forms of weaponry and fighting techniques. Fortunately for the humans, the army command recognizes their efficacy, but if they did not, there would have been no alternate channel for the developers to offer their innovations.
The weapon that is the turning point in the war is a new exploding anti-zombie ammunition built in a factory in Hawaii, which is safe from zombies. Unfortunately, the development of this ammunition seems problematic in the environment of World War Z. To make something so sophisticated would require expertise in chemistry, machinery, mining, logistics and a variety of skills that would be spread across the globe in a modern economy. But in a world overrun by zombies, the specialization and trade that these markets would require would become impossible. As the zombies advance and global markets collapse, the things an economy could produce would become less and less sophisticated. I expect World War Z is offering us far too optimistic an outcome.
A more likely vision of the new world is given by The Walking Dead, where society has broken down and survivors clump together in small communities such as Woodbury, which is ruled by the authoritarian "Governor". This world would be built around production in small, local hierarchical organizations such as communities and extended families rather than around long distance trade which would suffer from insufficient support for modern transportation technology and the risk of being eaten (Brian Hollar has a nice chapter in our book that discusses precisely the issues of specialization and trade in a world full of zombies).
However, one might think it would be easy to revert back to normal once the zombies are gone; after all, we know how modern technology works and what a functional economy looks like, so it should just be a matter of reproducing what we know. On the other hand, the countries of the developing world know the same things too, and yet many of them still fail to move forward.
The typical Econ 101 model of development makes things too simple. It states that poor countries just need to save and as they build up their capital they'll become rich countries (and yes, sometimes it even happens that way). However, a more sophisticated version of this model says that this only works if there is an effective legal system that identifies and protects property rights.
But this just pushes the question back one step: how does political and legal order come about? It often seems that a certain level of economic development is needed before you can have reliable and unbiased systems of property rights. But it also seems that you need those systems in place before true economic development can occur. This could either result in a positive feedback loop where small advances along one dimension promote development along the other or in stagnation where neither gets started because of the lack of the other. The older name for economics, political economy, reminds us that the long-run nature of the economy is not only based on competing firms but also on competing centers of power. How do you move from a dictatorial leader who keeps a community together in the face of the zombie hordes to a system of distributed property rights and neutral arbiters of disputes? Would the leader realize he would need to give up control, or would society have to relive 200 years of revolutionary history to move forward? Personally, I'm not an optimist about either zombies or humans, so I'm not planning for a quick recovery.
The Ethics and Economics of Vampire Re-ensoulment
io9 contributor Greta Christina, after re-watching the second season of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, raises serious questions about the ethics of vampire-slaying. SPOILER: At the end of Season 2, Buffy's friend Willow casts a spell that successfully "re-ensouls" the vampire Angel, thereby rendering him no longer dangerous to humanity. Christina wonders whether vampire-slaying is still ethically acceptable when another means of stopping vampires is available. As she puts it, "Why don't they just keep doing the re-ensoulment spell — on all vampires? Or at least, on all the vampires that they can?"
In the course of defending her position that re-ensoulment is morally superior to vampire slaying, Christina responds to an ecological concern: "Vampires are immortal: they can be killed, but if they're not staked or decapitated or exposed to sunlight, they seem to live forever. So if every vampire on the planet were re-ensouled, there would be a whole lot of living creatures (well, not living, but you know what I mean), requiring a certain amount of blood, who would pretty much never die. Would that… put too much strain on the planet's resources?" And here Christina steps from philosophical into economic territory. Her response is, in essence, to deny that vampires will be numerous enough to constitute a substantial burden. Assuming a prey-to-predator ratio of about 2000 to 1, her policy would only result in another 3.5 million beings on the planet; "If we can feed the cities of Los Angeles or New York, surely we can feed that many vampires."
This defense is fine as far as it goes, but I'd like to go further. Why presume that having more humans or human-like beings on the planet is even a problem at all? The ecological concern seems to borrow from the perspective of doomsayers like Paul Ehrlich, who have been beating the population-bomb drum for decades. And for decades, the doomsayers have been proven wrong. In 1968, Ehrlich predicted mass starvation by the 1970s or 1980s. Didn't happen. Since then, Ehrlich has continued to move the goal posts, but his predictions have stubbornly refused to come true. Instead, the world has witnessed a massive reduction in poverty. Between 1990 and 2010, the percentage of the world population living in extreme poverty fell from 43% to 21%, even while the world population rose by almost a third.
Of course, poverty and starvation are not the only measures of the burden of humanoids on the planet, and there are certainly some respects in which conditions seem to have worsened. But poverty and starvation strike me as a darn good place to start, and on that measure — the measure chosen by doomsayers like Ehrlich — we seem to be doing quite well. For that reason, I think we ought to lean more heavily on the perspective of economist Julian Simon (he of the famous bet with Erlich). Simon argued that having more humans on the planet could actually be a good thing — a source of positive externalities — because the human mind is the "ultimate resource," a generator of new ideas that can improve our lives by seeing new resources where there were none before. Given that vampire minds are just altered (evolved?) human minds, they too are part of this ultimate resource.
Having more people — and, I would add, vampires — means more opportunities for specialization and trade. As Darwyyn Deyo and David T. Mitchell argue in Chapter 11 of Economics of the Undead, the gains from trade between humans and the undead could be substantial. Although Deyo and Mitchell focus on the principle of comparative advantage, it's possible that the gains from innovation could be even greater. Vampires are certainly no less intelligent and creative than humans, and their very long lives and peculiar experiences might give them a perspective that leads to surprising insights — especially once they can come out of the shadows and cooperate with humans in a public manner. The option of ensouled vampirism also means our best scientific minds could stick around for longer. Thomas Edison registered almost 2000 U.S. patents during his 84 years on the planet; imagine how many more advances he could have made if given another 84 years.
One last point. Isn't it problematic that vampires drink blood, and they would therefore be dependent on the human population for sustenance? Again, I think the answer is no. None of us are perfectly self-sufficient. How many of us grow our own food? We are all dependent on a massive web of human cooperation to provide us with food, shelter, clothing, and most everything else we need. In this sense, vampires' dependence on human blood is just a special case of everyone's shared dependence on everyone else. The key issue for sustainability is not requiring self-sufficiency, but assuring that most people and vampires contribute enough to productivity to pay for the services that others provide them. By establishing a legal market in human blood, as suggested by Enrique Guerra-Pujol in Chapter 12, we could go a long way toward creating an incentive for vampires (especially re-ensouled ones) to eschew violence in favor of remunerative work in the combined vampire-human economy, to the benefit of both the living and the dead.


text:
Aenni Hartung, eigentlich Anna Maria Catharina Hartung, (* 31. Mai 1891 in Düsseldorf; † 23. Juli 1983 in Andernach) war eine deutsche Malerin.

Leben
Hartung war die Tochter des Koblenzer Malers Heinrich Hartung III. und Schwester von Heinrich Hartung IV. Sie besuchte in Koblenz die Ursulinenschule und erlernte die Malerei bei ihrem Vater und bei Franz Molitor. Von 1913 bis 1914 studierte sie an der Kunstakademie Düsseldorf bei Professor Willy Spatz, Mitglied der Düsseldorfer Malerschule. Von 1916 bis 1917 besuchte sie die Kunstgewerbeschule in Koblenz. Ihr Interesse galt der Landschaftsmalerei, Veduten sowie Motiven in und um Koblenz. 1921 erhielt Aenni Hartung eine Auszeichnung für den Entwurf zum Koblenzer Notgeld.

Werke
 Balduinbrücke Koblenz, Aquarell ca. 1925
 Kastorkirche Koblenz
 Am Plan Koblenz
 Koblenz, Weissergasse
 Schängelbrunnen Koblenz

Literatur
Hans Joachim Bodenbach: Emil van Hauth, in: Begegnungen mit Eifelmalern - Eine Familiengeschichte -, in: Neues Trierisches Jahrbuch 2000, N. F., 40. Band, Trier 2000, S. 247–268 mit 18 Abb. und Farbtafel IV. (Auch Sonderdrucke). Mit Gemälden/Zeichnungen folgender Maler: Aenni Härtung/Koblenz (1 Abb. s/w.), Kavenmoser/Koblenz (?)/(1 Abb. s/w.), Pitt Kreuzberg/Schalkenmehren (1 Farbt., und 3 Abb. s/w.), Jean Möhren / Elberfeld (1 Abb. s/w), Dr. Hans Roth/Koblenz (1 Abb. s/w.), Fritz Schönhagen/Koblenz (?) (1 Abb. s/w.), E. v. Hauth/Mayen (S. 249–254, mit 4 Abb. Nr. 3–6, s/w.), Otto von Wille/Düsseldorf (2 Abb. s/w.).

Quellen
 Lebenslauf und Beschreibung der Bilder

Weblinks

Zeitgenössischer Künstler
Landschaftsmaler
Maler (Düsseldorf)
Maler (Koblenz)
Deutscher
Geboren 1891
Gestorben 1983
Frau