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0.038832	<urn:uuid:1c1bb694-1b78-4a44-8bff-654be3a189f8>	en	0.921893	• geographic.org • \|SEARCH\| • Geography • Climate • Maps • Flags • Countries . Feedback • Glossary Of Geography . S * T * U * V * W * X * Y * Z Absolute Humidity Accessibility Resource A naturally occurring landscape feature that facilitates interaction between places. Acid Rain Air Mass Height of an object in the atmosphere above sea level. Alluvial Soils Before the war; in the United States, belonging to the period immediately prior to the Civil War (1861-1865). A hard coal containing little volatile matter. A bound collection of maps. Base Level The ability to use either one of two languages, especially when speaking. Biological Diversity A soft coal that, when heated, yields considerable volatile matter. Boll Weevil A small, greyish beetle of the southeastern United States with destructive larvae that hatch in and damage cotton bolls. Break-in-Bulk Point Commonly, a transfer point on a transport route where the mode of transport (or type of carrier) changes and where large-volume shipments are reduced in size. For example, goods may be unloaded from a ship and transferred to trucks at an ocean port. Carrying Capacity The number of people that an area can support given the quality of the natural environment and the level of technology of the population. A person who draws or makes maps or charts. A dense, impenetrable thicket of shrubs or dwarf trees. Climax Vegetation Bearing cones; from the conifer family. Continental Climate Continental Divide The quality or state of being a continent. Core Area The portion of a country that contains its economic, political, intellectual, and cultural focus. It is often the center of creativity and change (see Hearth). Crop-lien System A farm financing scheme whereby money is loaned at the beginning of a growing season to pay for farming operations, with the subsequent harvest used as collateral for the loan. Culture Hearth The area from which the culture of a group diffused (see Hearth). Cut-and-Sew Industry The manufacture of basic ready-to-wear clothing. Such facilities usually have a small fixed investment in the manufacturing facility. Deciduous Forest Forests in which the trees lose their leaves each year. De Facto Segregation Degree Day Deviation of one degree temperature for one day from an arbitrary standard, usually the long-term average temperature for a place. De Jure Segregation The spatial and social separation of populations that occurs as a consequence of legal measures. The systematic analysis of population. Discriminatory Shipping Rates A transportation charge levied in a manner that is inequitable to some shippers, primarily because of those shippers' location. Dry Farming Economies of Agglomeration Economies of Scale Emergent Coastline A tract or territory enclosed within another state or country. A boulder that has been carried from its source by a glacier and deposited as the glacier melted. Thus, the boulder is often of a different rock type from surrounding types. The broad lower course of a river that is encroached on by the sea and affected by the tides. The water lost from an area through the combined effects of evaporation from the ground surface and transpiration from the vegetation. Exotic Stream Extended Family A family that includes three or more generations. Normally, that would include grandparents, their sons or daughters, and their children, as opposed to a "nuclear family," which is only a married couple and their offspring. A region or district that lies outside a city and usually beyond its suburbs. Fall Line The physiographic border between the piedmont and coastal plain regions. The name derives from the river rapids and falls that occur as the water flows from hard rocks of the higher piedmont onto the softer rocks of the coastal plain. Fault Block Mountain A mountain mass created either by the uplift of land between faults or the subsidence of land outside the faults. Fault Zone A fracture in the Earth's crust along which movement has occurred. The movement may be in any direction and involve material on either or both sides of the fracture. A "fault zone" is an area of numerous fractures. Feral Animal A wild or untamed animal, especially one having reverted to such a state from domestication. Fish Ladder A series of shallow steps down which water is allowed to flow; designed to permit salmon to circumvent artificial barriers such as power dams as the salmon swim upstream to spawn. The characteristic of a place that follows from its interconnections with more than one other place. When interaction within a region comes together at a place (i.e., when the movement focuses on that location), the place is said to possess "focality." Functional Diversity The characteristic of a place where a variety of different activities (economic, political, social) occur; most often associated with urban places. Originally, the section of a European city to which Jews were restricted. Today, commonly defined as a section of a city occupied by members of a minority group who live there because of social restrictions on their residential choice. Glacial Till The mass of rocks and finely ground material carried by a glacier, then deposited when the ice melted. Creates an unstratified material of varying composition. Having been covered with a glacier or subject to glacial epochs. Great Circle Route The shortest distance between two places on the Earth's surface. The route follows a line described by the intersection of the surface with an imaginary plane passing through the Earth's center. Growing Season The period from the average date of the last frost (in the United States, this occurs in the spring) to the first frost in the fall. Heavy Industry Manufacturing activities engaged in the conversion of large volumes of raw materials and partially processed materials into products of higher value; hallmarks of this form of industry are considerable capital investment in large machinery, heavy energy consumption, and final products of relatively low value per unit weight (see Light Industry). Half of the Earth, usually conceived as resulting from the division of the globe into two equal parts'north and south or east and west. The area tributary to a place and linked to that place through lines of exchange, or interaction. A distinct layer of soil encountered in vertical section. Partially decomposed organic soil material. The study of the surface waters of the Earth. The growing of plants, especially vegetables, in water containing essential mineral nutrients rather than in soil. international date line Ice Age A time of widespread glaciation (see Pleistocene). Igneous Rock Rock formed when molten (melted) materials harden. Indentured Labor Work performed according to a binding contract between two parties. During the early colonial period in America, this often involved long periods of time and a total work commitment. A plant that yields a blue vat dye. Inertia Costs of Location Either of an island, or suggestive of the isolated condition of an island. Intervening Opportunity Intracoastal Waterway System A waterway channel, maintained through dredging and sheltered for the most part by a series of linear offshore islands, that extends from New York City to Florida's southern tip and from Brownsville, Texas, to the eastern end of Florida's panhandle. A line on a map connecting points that receive equal precipitation. The right and power to apply the law; the territorial range of legal authority or control. A vine, native to China and Japan but imported into the United States; originally planted for decoration, for forage, or as a ground cover to control erosion. It now grows wild in many parts of the southeastern United States. Lacustrine Plain A nearly level land area that was formed as a lake bed. A measure of distance north or south of the equator. One degree of latitude equals approximately 110 kilometers (69 miles). Life Cycle Stage Light Industry Manufacturing activities that use moderate amounts of partially processed materials to produce items of relatively high value per unit weight (see Heavy Industry). A low-grade brownish coal of relatively poor heat-generating capacity. A measure of distance east and west of a line drawn between the North and South Poles and passing through the Royal Observatory at Greenwich, England. Maritime Climate Mediterranean Climate A climate characterized by moist, mild winters and hot, dry summers. A spiny deep-rooted leguminous tree or shrub that forms extensive thickets in the southwestern United States. Metamorphic Rock Metes and Bounds Metropolitan Coalescence An isolated hill or mountain of resistant rock rising above an eroded lowland. The ability to use more than one language when speaking or writing (see Bilingual). This term often refers to the presence of more than two populations of significant size within a single political unit, each group speaking a different language as their primary language. Municipal Waste Unwanted by-products of modern life generated by people living in an urban area. Nodal Region New England The northeastern United States. Nuclear Family See Extended Family. Open Range A cattle- or sheep-ranching area characterized by a general absence of fences. Orographic Rainfall Precipitation that results when moist air is lifted over a topographic barrier such as a mountain range. Rocky and sandy surface material deposited by meltwater that flowed from a glacier. A line of bold cliffs. A narrow projection of a larger territory (as a state). A permanently frozen layer of soil. Physiographic Region Physical geography. Lying or formed at the base of mountains; in the United States, an area in the southern states at the base of the Blue Ridge Mountains. Plural Society Plate Tectonics Platted Land Land that has been divided into surveyed lots. Precambrian Rock The oldest rocks, generally more than 600 million years old. A military post (Spanish). prime meridian Primary Product A product that is important as a raw material in developed economies; a product consumed in its primary (i.e., unprocessed) state (see Staple Product). Primary Sector A type of Indian village constructed by some tribes in the southwestern United States. A large community dwelling, divided into many rooms, up to five stories high, and usually made of adobe. Also, a Spanish word for town or village. Quaternary Sector That portion of a region's economy devoted to informational and idea-generating activities (e.g., basic research, universities and colleges, and news media). Rail Gauge The distance between the two rails of a railroad. An area having some characteristic or characteristics that distinguish it from other areas. A territory of interest to people and for which one or more distinctive traits are used as the basis for its identity. Anything that is both naturally occurring and of use to humans. Riparian Rights Located on or inhabiting the banks or the area near a river or lake. Also "escarpment." A steep cliff or steep slope, formed either as a result of faulting or by the erosion of inclined rock strata. The North American descendants of Protestants from Scotland who migrated to northern Ireland in the 1600s. sea level The ocean surface. Secondary Sector Second Home Sedimentary Rock A form of agricultural tenancy in which the tenant pays for use of the land with a predetermined share of his crop rather than with a cash rent. A broad area of very old rocks above sea level. Usually characterized by thin, poor soils and low population densities. Fodder (livestock feed) prepared by storing and fermenting green forage plants in a silo. Usually a tall, cylindrical structure in which fodder (animal feed) is stored; may be a pit dug for the same purpose. Crater formed when the roof of a cavern collapses; usually found in areas of limestone rock. Features of a place related to the immediate environment on which the place is located (e.g., terrain, soil, subsurface, geology, ground water). SMSA - Standard Metropolitan Statistical Area Capable of being dissolved; in this case, the characteristic of soil minerals that leads them to be carried away in solution by water (see Leaching). Space Economy The locational pattern of economic activities and their interconnecting linkages. Spatial Complementarity Spatial Interaction Movement between locationally separate places. Staple Product A product that becomes a major component in trade because it is in steady demand; thus, a product that is basic to the economies of one or more major consuming populations (see Primary Product). Sustainable Yield The amount of a naturally self-reproducing community, such as trees or fish, that can be harvested without diminishing the ability of the community to sustain itself. Temperature Inversion A specific area or portion of the Earth's surface; not to be confused with region. Tertiary Sector That portion of a region's economy devoted to service activities (e.g., transportation, retail and wholesale operations, insurance). The minimum-sized market for an economic activity. The activity will not be successful until it can reach a population larger than this threshold size. Time difference and Time Zones Consequently, different areas of the world ("time zones") start and end their counting of the daily hours sooner or later than others. Township and Range The rectangular system of land subdivision of much of the agriculturally settled United States west of the Appalachian Mountains; established by the Land Ordinance of 1785. Tree Line Either the latitudinal or elevational limit of normal tree growth. Beyond this limit, closer to the poles or at higher or lower elevations, climatic conditions are too severe for such growth. Technically, the area between the Tropic of Cancer (21-1/2 N latitude) and the Tropic of Capricorn (21-1/2 S latitude), characterized by the absence of a cold season. Often used to describe any area possessing what is considered to be a hot, humid climate. A treeless plain characteristic of the arctic and subarctic regions. A condition among a labor force such that a portion of the labor force could be eliminated without reducing the total output. Some individuals are working less than they are able or want to, or they are engaged in tasks that are not entirely productive. Economically, a situation in which an increase in the size of the labor force will result in an increase in per worker productivity. Uniform Region A territory with one or more features present throughout and absent or unimportant elsewhere. Water Table Zoning The public regulation of land and building use to control the character of a place. 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0.034317	<urn:uuid:c39a2e14-3815-4928-95c0-a0f33c98119b>	en	0.974457	Recent Posts Each gospel records one instance in which Jesus was beaten just before His crucifixion, but [more] God did not present His entire revelation at once. This fact can be grasped almost [more] The Scriptures teach us to pray for the things that God has promised. We often [more] Since reading a highly recommended secular parenting book earlier this summer out of curiosity, I've [more] Sometimes things that look alike are actually quite different. One mushroom cooks up into a [more] Discussion about Christian rap with Shai Linne: What Defines Rap? (Rebuttal) This entry is part 13 of 19 in the series "Discussion about Christian Rap with Shai Linne" Scott-thumb-300x300Thanks, Shai. I think this helps to move the conversation to the central issues and clarifies some things that I think are important to this discussion. Your answer confirmed my own observation and study over the past several years, namely, that particular kinds of rhythmic accompaniment is a key element of what distinguishes rap from other poetic forms. Now here’s why I wanted to move this direction: In your answer to my last question, you suggested that what made rap well-suited to Christian subjects was its high word count and aesthetic elements like internal rhyme and complex structure. All of these characteristics are, of course, admirable, but you have now acknowledged the very point I made in my last rebuttal: these characteristics don’t define rap. They could just as easily describe a sonnet or my example poem. No one who objects to rap does so on the basis of its high word count and internal rhyme. Rather, those who question the fittingness of rap to Christian sentiments do so, at least partially, on the basis of the element you identified as the essence of rap: specific kinds of rhythmic accompaniment, which they believe reflect behavior ill-fitted to God’s holy truth. Your explanation and interaction with the examples given reveals the centrality of the beat for rap. The example I gave was deliberately read to deemphasize a regular rhythm in favor of natural syllabic stress. And you’re correct, that poem does not have a regular poetic meter or rhythm. But neither does most of the rap lyrics I’ve studied. Take this passage for example: At first we snubbed Him, Now His vessels of mercy love Him. Your highest thought is infinitely unworthy of Him. Beyond vocabulary His actions vary, His wrath is scary All His adversaries are imaginary. There is no regular pattern of meter of rhythm to this passage (it switches freely between iambs and anapaests), as is true of many rap lyrics (and my example). So in order to fit the lyrics to a steady drum beat, you have to adjust your cadence to align the strong and weak syllables. This is something that takes an impressive amount of skill and memorization, and also one of the reasons that rap isn’t a corporate form. I say all this to emphasize the fact that what makes rap what it is has little to do with the lyrics themselves and more with particular performance characteristics that define rap. Even with a mashup that uses classical music, there’s always a hip hop beat added. Now here’s the point: when you remove particular elements that are essential to the form—in this case the beat—the message changes. Back to your performance of “Spread his Fame.” You may have written it as a rap, you may have a hip-hop beat in mind as you perform, and every one listening may assume an underlying hip-hop beat as well, but when you remove the accompaniment and change your vocal tone (because “it can distract us from the most important thing“), what you are expressing changes. In other words, there is a significant difference between what the following two videos communicate in how the performances shape the propositional content of the lyrics: Same words, same performer, same intent, two very different performances with two different products. And that’s what I am primarily concerned about: how do particular styles of music and performance shape God’s truth? Are they presenting that truth in appropriate ways, or to they trivialize and demean the truth? And so this brings us back to my previous question: what makes lyrics performed over a hip-hop beat particularly fitting for communicating God’s holy truth? Thanks for your rebuttal, Scott. Let me address a few of your points. After quoting a few lines from my song “Spread His Fame”, you said: “There is no regular pattern of meter of rhythm to this passage…This is something that takes an impressive amount of skill and memorization, and also one of the reasons that rap isn’t a corporate form.” In Hip-hop generally speaking, the regular pattern isn’t in the words, at least not in the same way as in hymns. The beat is what’s constant, and the rapper has freedom for rhythmic variation in the writing. There is much more freedom in Hip-hop than in other poetic forms, which allows for the increased word count that I’ve argued is one of the things that makes some styles of Hip-hop particularly useful for communicating certain Biblical truths. As far as it not being a corporate form, I disagree. I’ve been to many rap concerts where thousands of people knew every single word to the songs. The skill and memorization needed to repeat every lyric of the songs wasn’t a barrier at all- at least not for people who spoke the “language” of that cultural context. You gave examples of my doing the same song in different ways. You followed that by saying: “Same words, same performer, same intent, two very different performances with two different products.” Of course the performances were different. The song was re-contextualized for different settings. One of the settings was cross-cultural, with many in attendance who lacked familiarity with the genre of Hip-hop. There were people in that congregation who were 70-plus years old and had never heard Hip-hop music or interacted with anyone from Hip-hop culture. But they loved the Lord Jesus and could say “Amen” when I referred to Christ as the beautiful and blessed Son and bragged about His supremacy. I sought to serve them by removing any obstacle that would prevent them from engaging with the truth I was communicating and by making the lyrics as understandable as possible. If my cadence or the beat would prevent the crowd from understanding me, I’d make drastic adjustments if necessary. I have no problem doing that for the sake of the gospel. That’s simply an application of the principle communicated in 1 Cor. 14:16-17. By contrast, in the performance with the beat behind it, it was a Hip-hop crowd. They didn’t need me to “translate”, as it were. Because they were cultural insiders, I could easily communicate with them in our common understood “dialect”. Scott, we’re in agreement that the manner in which music is communicated can both affect how it’s received as well as “shape the propositional content of the lyrics”, as you say. I have a background in theater. One of the great things about watching different productions of the same play is that you’re getting the same script with a completely different take on it. The same words coming out of the mouths of different actors (or even the same actors on a different night) can take on a completely different meaning, depending on how they perform them. This is also true with music. It’s one of the reasons why people write new tunes for traditional hymn texts. Consider the following four versions of the hymn “Come Ye Sinners”. Version 1 Version 2 Version 3 Version 4 Same lyrics, same author, four very different performances with four different products. I see that as a good thing, because different musical expressions can help bring out nuances in the lyrics that others may not do as well. If I’m reading you correctly, where we differ is that you would ascribe inherent moral value to the music apart from the words and I would not. It seems like you’re saying that version 4 above may be holy and version 2 might be unholy, based on the musical elements that accompany the lyrics. I see no biblical warrant for that kind of thinking. As to your question about why Hip-hop is appropriate, my answer remains the same. As far as music by Christians is concerned, the biblical stress is on content, not style. So the main question to ask of Christian music in any genre is whether or not the lyrics conform to the truth of God’s Word. All other considerations are secondary. Series NavigationPreviousNext Scott Aniol About Scott Aniol 144 Responses to Discussion about Christian rap with Shai Linne: What Defines Rap? (Rebuttal) 1. Steven says: Actually version 4 and 2 would be unholy and 1 and 3 would be holy if I had to guess for Scott’s position. 2. Wayne says: Every popular music form today has African roots and/or influences. Whatever channel you select on the radio; it comes from or is heavily influenced by Africa. Jazz – Africa Blues – Africa Bluegrass – Africa Rock and Roll (metal/punk/pop) – Africa Country – Africa Rap – Africa Some have said that because they argue against Christian Metal or Contemporary Christian Music, they are above any racial/cultural bias. This is simply not the case. Metal is a direct descendant of Rock, which is a direct descendant of Africa. CCM is just a reflection of popular music (which all comes from or is influenced by African music). I see racial/cultural biases in my own life. We all deal with these issues. Cultural assimilations are hard to see and break out of. It is easy to think the way we were raised and do things is right and others are wrong. The Gospel and the Scriptures are the only objective standard that frees us from our subjective cultural assimilations. Below are some quotes from simple Wikipedia searches. Ethnomusicologist Gerhard Kubik traces the roots of many of the elements that were to develop into the blues back to the African continent, the “cradle of the blues”. African American work songs were an important precursor to the modern blues; these included the songs sung by laborers like stevedores and roustabouts, and the field hollers and “shouts” of slaves. Characteristics of blues music were present prior to the creation of the modern blues, and are common to most styles of African American music. The earliest blues-like music was a “functional expression, rendered in a call-and-response style without accompaniment or harmony and unbounded by the formality of any particular musical structure”. The roots of bluegrass reach back to the music brought to America by immigrants in the early 1600s, including dance music and ballads from Ireland, Scotland and England, as well as African American gospel music and blues. In fact, slaves from Africa brought the design idea for the banjo–an instrument now integral to the bluegrass sound. Black musicians infused characteristics of the blues to the mix, and in a development that was key to shaping the bluegrass sound. As the rise of rock and roll music is often credited as having begun with 1940s American blues, and with so many genres having branched off from rock – the myriad subgenres of heavy metal, punk rock, pop music and many more – it can be argued that African music has been at the root of a very significant portion of all recent popular or vernacular music. 3. Reuben says: I disagree with Shai here, and think he makes an erroneous argument. He keeps assuming that there is no inherent morality or inherent communication in music, but that lyrics are the main thing. Music is a super language, brother Shai, and it is in grave error to deny that. 4. Rick says: Reuben, what did Shai’s music in the second video communicate that was sinful? I’m not talking about causing emotions, I’m asking what it communicated that was sinful. That is the crux of the argument. Neither Scott nor anyone else has shown that yet. Until someone can specifically point to something that is sinful in the music, there will be a great many that say that music is not inherently moral/immoral apart from lyrics. Did Shai’s adding music change the message of the song? No, as Shai said it was simply “re-contexualized for different settings.” We get it that it is not what trips your trigger (it’s not really my thing either), but what is it that is sinful about the music itself? That is what has been and still is missing from Scott’s analysis. 5. Wayne says: “And that’s what I am primarily concerned about: how do particular styles of music and performance shape God’s truth? Are they presenting that truth in appropriate ways, or do they trivialize and demean the truth?” Answer: music forms from, or heavily influence from, Africa trivialize and demean the truth. (see previous post on music forms from or heavily influenced from Africa) 6. Wayne says: For those of you that have been following all the conversations of Scott and Shai and the corresponding post from the cheap seats: Question: How can Rachmaninov’s Piano Concerto #2 be presented as some sort of “gold standard” for figure skaters despite obvious questionable cultural assimilations? Answer: It is not from Africa Question: How can Gioachino Rossini’s William Tell Overture be presented as an example of an example of music that does not promote swaying seductively despite obvious questionable cultural assimilations? Answer: It is not from Africa Question: How can Chinese guzheng music be presented as holy (under any reasonable definition of the word) when it is birth from pagans and promotes pagan worship? Answer: It is not from Africa 7. Wayne says: I don’t have a real well worked out theology on common grace. I guess it could be debated and I could learn a lot more about than I know now. But, I am wondering if this is one of the best cases for common grace I have seen in a while. The natural man, apart from the redeeming work of God, normally moves from community to isolation. C.S. Lewis’ description of the “grey town” in The Great Divorce is a good illustration of this. Here, in the birth place of Country music, (The South – which is also credited for the birthplace of Jazz, Blues and as an influence on Rock and Roll), a place that is some-sort of an epicenter (for lack of better word) for cultural war in America, we see cultures that should be separating, coming together. On the other hand in discussing the inherent sinfulness of African music, we see Christians, who should be “in Christ” and moving from isolation to community, separating. The end of the Christian story is glorified community, not moving toward isolation. 8. Wayne says: And I guess this is as good of a time as any to round out all my thoughts on this. I am losing faith on the benefits of this discussion. I plan to sign off while reserving the right to jump back in. What is different about music? The bible never addresses any of the standards of music that are being debated. Yes, there are hundreds of laws and directions and instructions describing many areas of life and worship. While many of these areas are what we would consider cultural, we have no comments on or objective standards of music. Music is there from the beginning and takes center stage in many stories. Abraham was a pagan. He came from a pagan culture. Israel was the smallest of all nations. They had no influence on their neighbor’s culture (including music). Are we saying that for thousands of years, no one (Israelite, pagan, or Christian) played any sinful music remotely resembling our discussion while God was revealing himself and his standards in Scripture? We know that the cultures around Israel (OT) and the Church (NT) were just as sinful as our worst today. Is it reasonable to assume no one (stiff-necked Israelite, pagan or rebellious Christian) never abused music in any of the standards we are discussing? What is different about music? Please, will some expert on music and/or the law and/or something please help me understand? 9. Martin says: All the African irony aside, what puzzles me is that Shai seems to put those four examples of ‘Come Ye Sinners’ on one and the same level. That an artist of his calibre does not understand that this is nonsensical surprises me – I would have assumed he would have thought about these things more deeply. Not believing in the sinfulness of music, neither do I believe all music is created equal, nor that all music can be used equally well to express the same ideas and feelings. So to return to the theme of ‘religious affections’ as represented in music, I would suggest the following brief critique for the four versions: Version 1: Probably the most ‘neutral’ representation of the lyrics with the original music, and without instrumentation – just some choir accompaniment (may be a synthesizer or simply a reverb effect). It can be understood clearly and communicates the original lyrical intent well as far as I can hear. There is some intensity and urgency while attempting to represent the beauty of what God is like and what He offers the sinner. Of course the singing is artistic and draws attention to the performer. I guess I would simply prefer it to be sung by a congregation, rather than by a single interpreter. Version 2: Indelible Grace has butchered the hymn by putting it to a country sound. The casual and laid-back, entertaining sound is unfit for the profound lyrics that call to repentance. As such, the music takes away the urgency and intent of the lyrics. It becomes a tiger without teeth. The form here changes the meaning of the lyrics completely and makes them of none effect by using a feel-good sound that is unsuitable to convey any sense of awe or a realization of the importance of what the lyrics are trying to say to the sinner. A call to repentance is thus turned into pure entertainment. Version 3: The choral performance is artistically well done and sounds impressive, yet the effect of the polyphony stresses the artistic aspect of the arrangement to the detriment of its content. Although the content can still be understood it is less clear than in Version 1 or when we would sing it ourselves. As such, this version also takes away from the original intent. Maybe polyphony would be better in a hymn that seeks to glorify God than in one that seeks to call sinners to repentance. Version 4: The soft-rock form not only debilitates but I would say annihilates the lyrical intent. Not only are the lyrics harder to understand (especially those sung by the female voice), they are also subdued and overpowered by the strong musical impact of this arrangement. The music conveys a sense of elation, flying, or maybe standing on a high mountain looking down – an exhilaration that works directly on the senses and although beautiful, leads the listener away from the lyrics that become secondary to what else goes on. The song becomes a building of sound addressed to the senses rather than a message to the sinner. It is a bad choice to convey the lyrics artistically well. So these are CERTAINLY NOT simply four ways of expressing the same truth from a different angle. Really, there is ONE truth in the lyrics and the music will either emphasize this truth, debilitate, or possibly, negate it (or drown it). This takes me to Scott’s examples of Shai’s song the second of which is indeed very different from the first, which is part of a corporate worship setting. On the first, I would say that Shai’s talent is impressive but that I would not want to teach this way even if I could. It puts him and his skill in the center, rather than emphasizing the message. And the way he speaks, being assertive and ‘bragging’ may be well-intended but does not convey the right affections to God – rather, it boasts without providing a strong foundation. It then becomes superficial because it merely creates a momentary feeling of pride as a rallying call does but does not provide the substance to maintain this attitude. Maybe it would work to re-emphasize a sermon around the same theme. The second example is indeed very different from the first, and does not appear to be in a worship setting but a concert. I disagree stongly this is simply a different dialect but otherwise means the same thing. Or let me reword: this combination of music and words does not communicate the intent/meaning of the lyrics equally well. So Scott is right on this one: the second example does not convey even the feelings the first does, given it sounds more like he wants to say as many words per second as he can rather than trying to convey how awesome God is. If you want to convey that, you need to look for a completely different way of doing so. It should be one that is not as repetitive and in a frenzy as this one and also one that directs the listener away from the performer towards God. This is a textbook example for bad art (sorry – but Gal 4:16). And I know Shai can do much better! To end, the main question to ask of Christian music in any genre is NOT (despite Shai’s assertion) ONLY whether or not the lyrics conform to the truth of God’s Word. All other considerations are NOT secondary, given certain styles can make the content secondary to the music, or change the content so that it no longer achieves the intended goal. 10. Kenton says: It seems like this really has to do with two things, and the “holy/unholy” language is simply obscuring these main points. Scott seems to object to hip-hop on two grounds: 1) it cannot be utilized in all congregational settings, and 2) it does not reflect a reverential posture. This seems to be the two primary issues, and so I think perhaps instead of holy/unholy, sacred/secular better reflects this discussion. While holy and sacred mean roughly the same thing, sacred also carries the connotation of being fitting or appropriate in a worship setting, more than holy. Scott’s position is understandable, but I do think this comes down to cultural preference; hip-hop is generally not something that can be followed in many congregational settings (due to age, culture, etc.). Hence, in wisdom Shai’s mode of delivery changed. However, the inappropriateness of hip-hop in the former setting did not exclude its appropriateness in the latter setting, a setting that arguably had a different reverential tone (different, but no less reverent). In the former video, Shai’s mode of delivery reflected the culturally-determined tone of reverence. The latter video was no less reverent, no less passionate. Hence, it was no less holy, though perhaps it does not fit into the European categories of sacred music. 11. Martin says: Sorry, can’t concur. The second one has no reverence whatsoever. This is what I meant with previous comments on sub-cultures: you cannot redefine what reverence means in the larger (Western) culture by baptizing whatever you wish as ‘reverent’ in your sub-culture, calling it a dialect. This simply won’t fly. Reverence is not reverence just because you say so. It’s possibly culturally determined, but not sub-culturally. In Western culture, what Shai did in the second video is not to be confounded with reverence. Please! 12. Rajesh says: I have read through all your comments on this post and many others. You do not have the biblical data straight. You say, “Israel was the smallest of all nations. They had no influence on their neighbor’s culture (including music).” What you are not factoring into your assessment is that Israel was the only people who knew the true God. Abraham came to know the true God and also met Melchizedek, who a godly king and priest of the most High God. Abraham was not merely at the mercy of the pagan culture all around him. Also, at various times in their history, the Israelites ruled over a much larger area than they do today. The Israelites had a tremendous influence on all the nations wherever they went. Moreover, people from all over the ancient world came to hear the wisdom that God gave to Solomon. There is no reason to exclude divinely given wisdom about music from what they learned from Solomon. The Bible has plenty to say about people producing sinful music, both by pagans and His own people. Exodus 32 records singing by demon-influenced people who were engaging in syncretistic worship of Yahweh that included idolatrous eating, drinking, and playing, including immorality and wicked dancing. These people were so wickedly out of control that even their enemies were ashamed of them. In the middle of this profoundly sordid account, the Holy Spirit provides a two-verse record specifically about how their singing sounded to two leaders of God’s people from a distance. It is ludicrous to say that in the middle of all the other evil that they were doing, their singing was still neutral or even godly. These demon-influenced people were certainly not filled with the Spirit, so we know that their singing in their feast to the Lord was not acceptable to Him. Many other passages speak of people producing ungodly music, including Ps. 69:12; Eccl. 7:5; Isaiah 5:11-12; 23:15-16; Amos 5:23; 6:5; Daniel 3 and others. It simply is not true that the Bible does not have anything to say about people producing ungodly music. 13. Nick says: While Come Ye Sinners does call sinners to come to Jesus, and hence to repentance, the emphasis is not on sin/wrath, but rather on God’s bounty for the wretched. Scripture calls sinners two ways: offering a gift, or offering punishment if sinners do not heed the call. Jonathan Edwards is well known to do the latter, and we do need to do the latter. But I don’t read that in Come Ye Sinners as an emphasis. It rather seems to be coming from someone who experienced Jesus’ sweet love and wants to offer it. Which is perhaps what Indelible Grace was thinking by putting the song to that tune. As for your impression of Shai’s second example… this goes back to what I told you yesterday. You hear different things than what I hear on that song (and others). It seems to me Shai wanted to enjoy how awesome God is in that setting — to brag about Him. Don’t know why that would be OK without music, but wrong with music. I agree with Shai the music can help communicate different nuances in the lyrics, depending on: (a) different music, and (b) different audiences. The latter part (b) is what you missed in your assessment of Shai’s concert performance. You are not the intended audience, as he clearly indicated. This is why, for the first example, he said “If my cadence or the beat would prevent the crowd from understanding me, I’d make drastic adjustments if necessary”. Great example of why this discussion will not reach an agreement. But I am learning from it, that’s why I have stayed around to read for this long (even after being called a liar and more subtly a postmodern). God bless, 14. Martin says: Nick, upon reading all the lyrics of ‘Come Ye Sinners’ I can confirm that repentance IS the topic of this hymn. Yes, it’s an invitation, not a threat, yet the theme does not lend itself to country (for the reasons I laid out above). Yes, the second example, I submit, is objectively inappropriate. You disagree, and I agree we have not come far enough to agree. But we need to get there, as I mentioned yesterday. I did not miss ‘the latter part’ but clearly engaged with this assertion by stating that sub-cultural definitions cannot trump cultural definitions. I take this as a given but of course, if you have some counter-examples… Being called a postmodern isn’t an insult these days, is it? 15. Martin, please explain to me how Shai’s posture wasn’t reverent at all? I saw nothing but lifting up the name of Christ and I never saw him try to give glory to himself so please show me how Hip-Hop as a whole and Shai’s posture wasn’t in reverence for God. 16. I am honestly confused as to why Shai’s posture in the second performance wasn’t showing reverence for God 17. Doug Merrill says: I am honestly confused as to how anyone thinks Shai’s performance in the video is anything close to reverent – especially when you observe the gyrating, semi-grinding motions that he engages in (:30 – :37). Is that how we approach a holy God? By engaging in movement that simulates sexual intercourse? Call me crazy, but for some reason, I don’t think Isaiah was shucking and jiving when he said, “Here am I, Lord. Send me.” 18. Martin says: Kelsey, would you speak to the President of the USA or the Queen anyhow similar to what Shai was doing there if you wanted to show respect and reverence to their functions? I don’t think so. Even if you think about writing a play where someone sings to a king reverently, you won’t use a rap song – it’s the wrong choice artistically. What Shai does in that video may be good entertainment for rap fans but it’s not considered reverent in Western culture (and I’m quite sure, also not in Eastern culture, btw). I don’t mean to judge his motives or intent here but am speaking about the outward image he’s projecting. So even if he wants to be reverent, he isn’t by cultural standards. 19. Nick says: Martin, Where did Shai addresses God in those lyrics? I thought he was addressing people. Perhaps you think you must always be solemn when talking to people about God. In which case I suppose the only proper place to teach about God is at church, and not in everyday life…. Which sounds very R2K’ish to me. Scott’s habit of quoting R2K proponents has not been lost on me, and I’m starting to wonder… 20. Martin says: The beauty is that this is about a specific song with specific lyrics. I do NOT say that you need to be solemn when talking about God. What I AM saying is that when you talk about God’s holiness and the Saviour who reigns, the beautiful and blessed Son etc. – that requires music and posture fit for the purpose. Even that is too generalized: really, the exact lyrics Shai uses have a specific meaning and require music fit for them to support this meaning. Video 2 does not provide such fitness. 21. Nick says: Do you believe it is proper for a construction worker, while he is working and dirty, or for a person who cleans, while he cleans up poop, to talk to his coworkers about God’s holiness? Is that unfitting? Will God be offended by it? I’m not pulling your leg with these questions. The questions are deliberate. It is likely this is another example of where philosophy is impacting application. Do you know who John Frame is? You may want to read his view on the regulative principle: You can also search for Scott’s response in this website, which is instructive. For the record, I’ve been influenced by Frame in many areas of my thinking. If we had to always talk about God as if His full glory were in front of us, we would not be singing or preaching standing at church. We would not talk to Him like if he were some puny president. We would be lying on the floor with our faces stuck to the ground. Nothing less than that would do. But we are not required to do that in Scripture – hence we can stand and sit, and even have our children with us. 22. Nick says: I meant laying on the floor face down… Not “lying”… 23. grantrhooper says: first of all doug….excuse my grammar. its late. second off, only you see sexual intercourse in those movements. if that isn’t a biased assessment, then i’m sure you frequently accuse the mailman of doing the same, with the way he sort of “shimmys” his way to your mailbox. come on bro. unacceptable. ignorant. and borderline promiscuous to make that suggestion. why are you reading sexuality into something where it isnt there. very inappropriate and accusatory towards a brother. in fact, shai is not approaching God here and this isnt corporate worship. he is speaking of the truth of God. but he is not approaching him. if shai is engaged in worship, based only on the fact that he is speaking of God….then you are also engaged in the same act right now (as you are speaking of God) and I would argue that the sad thing is that you do not realize that in this regard you have been much more irreverent. No shai is not intending on simulating sexual movements. “intent doesn’t matter.” fine…. he also, LITERALLY, PHYSICALLY is not making sexual movements. But you have spoken coarsely, ignorantly, and with irreverence …while speaking of God ( with an audience, same as shai ). By your own standards you have failed. Thankfully, I don’t believe them to be biblical standards. Just your standards. Sorry for my “tone.” I don’t intend on being mean-spirited… but I do take your comments seriously. 24. grantrhooper says: @ doug (continued) I think I understand it all now. You, and him, and everyone else on the one side of this thing just don’t understand “redeemed.” Anything that can be traced back to sinful behavior is bad, according to you. It’s quite sad really. Not only is it sad, but I believe it is a mark of an immature believer. You said a simple side to side movement was wrong, in a sexual way… and yet when you threw your hand out in front of your face, in frustration, and said “the heck with it,” while trying to build a shed in your backyard… or when you woke up and stretched, i could say “that looked like a punch. That resembled a violent motion associated with murder.” I’m sure I could watch you for a day and find “sexual movements” if I had a sick mind. That may be sexual to you… but not only is it not sexual to me….it simply not sexual, in the literal objective sense. the irony is that everything can be traced back to sin. If you really believe christian rap is wrong, all instrumentals are wrong. period. and you know what? im not some liberal…. i dont like the way music is used in worship. so im actually open to the argument that instrumentals are distracting and therefore wrong…but lets be consistent. This author doesnt like rap, but probably listens to CCM which i would argue is much more irreverent, not just with its corny music, but worse off, with the words. This sounds like “thinking themselves to be wise they became fools,” arguing about instrumentals all while ignoring the words. He used that weird Asian music as an example of morally good music and YET IT WAS ASSOCIATED WITH A PAGAN RELIGION!!!! IT WAS THE DEFINITION OF UNHOLY! All dancing can be associated back to sin. Dancing, we can all agree, is very common among demonic and pagan parties and rituals…. and yet, we see dancing for God as being common for worship. Certainly Hollywood is satanic. So I hope the writer of this doesnt have a television, or go to movies EVER. Or else it would prove he is a hypocrite, limited by bias, who says your cultural nuances are bad, but his are acceptable. He prolly has watched a movie in the last year, and may say that some movies are redemptive…BUT ALL OF HOLLYWOOD WAS BIRTHED IN SIN, UNQUESTIONABLY. Therefore by his logic, not just some of this artform of film is bad….all would be bad. I’m pretty sure the internet would be bad too. Heck, maybe even typing. I’m gonna go sit in the corner now, not sleep, not eat, not type, and certainly not dare play any music or accidentally move my hips in a way that could be deemed suggestive…. or maybe I’ll just eat drink and sleep to the glory of God, with thanks. 25. grantrhooper says: @martin….thanks for that distinction on what you meant by reverence in western culture. i understand now, and think its a good point, even though im on the other side of the argument. 26. Martin, I would have to agree with Nick here, you can’t possibly judge Shai’s posture and not judge your own or anyone else’s posture when speaking about the Lord. If we treated God as if He revealed himself to us in full glory then we wouldn’t even be upright speaking about him or speaking to him, we would have our faces and knees to the ground in reverence. Since we don’t always do that, why are we looking to much into Shai’s posture? and Doug, to be honest, you’re taking it a little too far with the “sexual” movements in Shai’s movements. I honestly never saw any of that until you pointed it out. Those movements are what rappers do when they rap. I don’t know why but it doesn’t have any intrinsic meaning or value. It’s actually unintentional and if you pointed it out to Shai and ask him about it he probably would tell you that he never even noticed he was making those movements. It’s the same when a singer is swaying or moving their hands when singing or when a instrumentalist moves to melody of their music. Should we consider their movements sinful and irreverent as well? 27. David Barnhart says: @Martin — While I would agree with you that all of the musical examples in this article, both Scott’s and Shai’s, show a different level of fitness for the purpose, I wonder if your oft-used examples of the President or the Queen are really apropos, or if they simply demonstrate our own American cultural thinking and how we may (mis)apply it to how we should behave before God. Since American culture comes out of the British (very reserved) culture, we have certain ideas how human leaders are to be respected. However, in applying these ideas to God, I wonder if we don’t make two errors: 1. God is really not the same as any human leader, and 2. God has already given us multiple examples how humans act in response to him, and they aren’t really equivalent to the current way of thinking you express in your example. We see reactions to God in scripture that range from falling on one’s face to the ground, to dancing, to leaping, to rolling on the ground in sackcloth and ashes, to lifting holy hands, to shouting in praise, to great public wailing, and probably others I’m not thinking of. In our way of thinking, pretty much none of these would be appropriate for the President or the Queen, so I wonder how much use those two personages really are for the purpose of determining how we should act toward God, publicly or privately. In other words, is reverence and respect always (or even mostly) equal to solemnity and reservedness? Many of us would like to think so, but I don’t believe that way of thinking has the right of it when the object of our actions is God and not a human. My musical choices definitely seem much more like yours and Scott’s than the country, rock or hip-hop examples, but I am curious how much of that is due to training, upbringing, and the sub-culture surrounding me, rather than because of what is actually true and right. I certainly don’t think Scott has proved his case, and argument-wise, though I believe there is some objective beauty and that music can never be “neutral,” I seem to have more in common with the those arguing that music is not evil of itself, but I still think something important is being overlooked by both sides — I just don’t happen to know what that is, or if it is something we can even truly know. 28. Martin says: Quite some activity last night – since I live on the eastern part of the continent, I usually sleep while you’re all typing :-) The Queen example is meant as a lower limit when comparing our attitude towards God – and surely a good example as to what our culture deems reverent. Interestingly, many who meet the Queen are first instructed on etiquette and manners since good behaviour in the presence of dignities can no longer be presupposed. So I don’t consider musical training an impediment but in my mind, it is the only way to ever come to agreement on this topic, as on others that are not always defined by simple rules, such as ethics. Of course we have access to His throne and whether our clothes are ripped or dirty does not matter (unless, however, we mean to represent Him in corporate worship or such occasions where dress is taken as a sign of respect). The worker witnessing to his colleagues is a different category, however. What his occupation is, is irrelevant but still needs to use language that is adequate to what he is saying. If he were to curse and use dirty language to try and express ideas about God’s holiness, that would be inadequate and might even negate what he intends to communicate. I have read Frame’s book ‘Worship in Spirit and Truth’ but am not sure why you (Nick) bring up the regulatory principle again since I did not refer to it nor appeal to it. Obviously. But has anyone here made such a groundless claim? I meant to explain this in my previous post, i.e. I was not generalizing in my assessment but I was ‘specializing’ – i.e. I suggested that Shai’s rap does not support the propositional content of the lyrics he is singing. I mean THESE SPECIFIC LYRICS, not ANY lyrics about God – generalizing from what I wrote will necessarily lead to wrong conclusions. If we are talking about a song with a different subject, we need to start from scratch since the things I wrote may no longer apply. But if you talk about the attributes and holiness of God, yes, you should accompany that with music that is unequivocally related to reverence in the larger culture you’re working in. 29. Nick says: My point with Frame’s view was that worship is for all of life. From that perspective, reverence takes far more flexibility in its meaning that you seem to give it. I don’t see your point about Shai’s specific lyrics. It is talking about God. I don’t see why talking about one of God’s attributes versus another has anything to do with the “degree of reverence” (for lack of a better term). At any rate, like I said before, I don’t think we are going to agree on this one (or a lot of other things related to this subject). To you it is irreverent, and I believe you. Obviously to Shai it isn’t. 30. Nick says: BTW, I don’t equate music with dirty language. Perhaps that’s our difference. If you had said music is irreverent because it is not solemn enough, then I would reply as I have replied already. If you say the music is irreverent because it is like dirty language — well, there is no excuse for dirty language in any area of life. So to me that’s like saying the music is inherently sinful, which I don’t believe it is. At any rate, I give you the last word. I don’t want to go on and on with these points… 31. Martin says: Nick, I meant to imply that form (musical style) is important, just as there is form in HOW we speak. I was giving our imaginary worked a lot of credit here; he may be used to speaking such language and if he’s a new Christian, he may not have learned yet to avoid it fully. This may take away from the impact of what he’s saying but I didn’t mean to equate that to sin. What I am arguing, and have for the last weeks, is appropriateness of musical form to go with specific lyrics. Using profane language would also be inappropriate for witnessing. Shai’s rap (#2) may be appropriate if he’s angry with God and wants to vent some of this. I do not see that we always have to be reverent when speaking of God, even if this may be so when we talk about Him during worship. Outside worship, other contexts can be thought of that do not require a reverent attitude. For example, we could discuss about God in a group in a normal tone without trying to be reverent or irreverent. A theological talk about the aseity of God may not have to be reverent; it just needs to be factual and sober. Rather than expanding the meaning of reverence to all kinds of life situations, I would prefer to keep a narrow definition and simply say reverence is not always required. Finally, we could discuss whether Shai was irreverent but I don’t see that he was intentionally reverent, as would be appropriate for the lyrics he used. There is cultural consensus around this, even if we can disagree on some details. I refer back to my film music example from an earlier post. We understand quite well what music conveys and there is a film music industry that uses this consensus to enhance the power of visual images and spoken words by appropriate music. The existence of the term ‘appropriate’ in this context and that such an industry can operate successfully proves there are universals in musical meaning. 32. Doug Merrill says: Kelsey, I mostly agree with you when you say, “Those movements are what rappers do when they rap…if you pointed it out to Shai and ask him about it he probably would tell you that he never even noticed he was making those movements.” Rock, Hip-hop, and other pop performers do these movements, because that is what the beat suggests that they do – wittingly or unwittingly. It is conducive to it. It just naturally fits. It seems that we’ve lost a bit of perspective and history here. Why did pastors and others (regenerate and unregenerate) consider Elvis Presley and his performances vulgar? Because of the suggestive hip movements. From Look magazine in 1956: “But Presley is mostly nightmare. On-stage, his gyrations, his nose wiping, his leers are vulgar. When asked about the sex element in his act, he answers without blinking his big brown eyes: “Ah don’t see anything wrong with it. Ah just act the way ah feel.” It just came natural to him. Why? Because the music naturally supported it. It was conducive to it – just like the music was conducive to Shai’s movement. Are we really going to look at the history of pop music and deny that one of its inherent attributes is its sexuality? Why are music videos, VH-1, MTV, etc. so popular and ubiquitous and why are many of them suggestive at best and pornographic at worst? Because the music supports it. It naturally fits – it makes sense. Music videos aren’t a case of someone producing a video and then finding music that fits. They are recordings to which someone choreographs the video. Suggestive/sensual/sexual videos are paired with suggestive/sensual/sexual music. I’m at a loss when I see/hear/read people who are in complete denial of this. This is basic stuff. The world has no problem admitting the link. They just disagree with what level is appropriate; hence the Miley Cyrus “twerking” controversy. Was it appropriate? No. Why did she do it? Because it fit the song. The music (not necessarily the words) communicated lust and unbridled sexuality – her actions and the resultant video were simply along for the ride. 33. Rick says: That’s about like saying the fork made me fat! They cannot stand in front of a holy God and say “the music made me do it!” The reason they are suggestive and pornographic is because the people are in need of a Savior!! No one can seriously compare Shai’s music to what you are talking about. 34. Thank you Rick, We cannot say “the music made me do it” because that pretty much removes any accountability for our actions. When we stand before God, He will hold us accountable for our actions. I’m a rapper and also listen to Christian Hip-Hop regularly. Most of my music is slow, calm, and reflective but every once and a while I’ll listen to a Christian rap song that’s a little bit more upbeat and the lyrics are centered around rejoicing in Christ. Does it make me want to dance and rejoice in the Lord? Yes. Is there anything wrong with dancing and rejoicing in the Lord? Absolutely not, we are told in Scripture to rejoice. Does the music suggest that I should start bumpin’ and gridin’? No, the song is talking about the goodness of Christ, why would I start doing that?. The music doesn’t make me or anyone else do anything, it’s a choice to dance in a provocative way. The reason why Miley Cyrus, Nicki Minaj, and any other female twerk to Hip-Hop music is not because the music made them do it or that the music suggested that they needed to twerk to it in order to be in sync with what the instrumental was communicating. They themselves chose to twerk to that music. Like Rick said, they are suggestive and pornographic because they are in need of a Savior just like the rest of us are. as a side-note to add to what you said about Miley Cyrus’ twerking controversy. If you’re referring to what she did on stage at MTV’s VMA awards with Robin Thicke, then I would have to say that the instrumental in and of itself did not communicate lust and unbridled sexuality. The song she twerked to was Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines.” I’ve heard the song in it’s entirety and the lyrics mainly communicated lust, not the instrumental. 35. Alan says: I don’t expect anyone here to admit anything about music that they don’t. I would be amazed if someone did. I’m not saying it couldn’t happen — just very highly unlikely. There are some out there who will be persuaded, but I don’t think it will in the comment section and that’s probably not what this is about. I watched both videos, the two different versions, above of Shai Linne’s rapping. First, by his own admission, he changed up what he did for the audience, not for God. The audience was sovereign in the choice of style. Worship, on the other hand, recognizes who God is and gives Him what He wants. Shai Linne recognized who his audience was and gave it what it wanted — complete opposite of worship — and at a root level, where the problem is. Now, in answer to that, he might say that the style is irrelevant to God. God doesn’t care how the music is communicated, the relativistic, neutrality of beauty, so if its your preference, your taste, all the better. The music means nothing, which is, of course, why it is so non-controversial. Second, people here say that in version two he’s dancing around out of rejoicing. If that’s the case, then why does his hand move and his hips move to the rhythm of the percussion? How does hip thrusting relate to rejoicing? Some might say hip-thrusting is too strong language, but it’s what I see at 1:50 and on for awhile. Now, again, I understand a type of percussion that encourages hip movement — so do secular rockers and rappers. They just don’t have a problem admitting it, because they don’t see this hip thrusting to the beat as being wrong. They are just hips, which are neutral. And it is just movement, which is neutral. His hips are moving to the beat, to the rhythm of the percussion, but that is just spontaneous rejoicing like when David entered Jerusalem with entrance of the ark of the covenant. The music has nothing to do with the hip movement. Does God want hip movement to the rhythm of percussion? Is that quality acceptable to God? Is that worship? Is that respectful to God? Are those movements in fitting with the God of the Bible? Are they ordinate affections? Are they physical? In what way? I know I’m not going to recognize this as worship. I know I’m not going to see it as arising from something spiritual, from truth about God. Wayne would say that this is because of something to do with Africa. The people are filled with latent racism. Race, last time I checked, relates to skin color. The race charge might scare people in this culture, because no one wants to be called a racist, or be thought to be a racist. I’m going to say that Wayne is pretty preoccupied with race, obsessing about race in a way that he can’t see anything without seeing skin color in it. I feel sorry for him. It’s a horrible way to have to live, not befitting of biblical Christianity. If I was going to go deep in theorizing about history, I would say it goes back to the tower of Babel, and spread out from there. Some worshiped the true God. Most worshiped and served the creature. When you look at Corinth (in Greece), the mystery religion borrowed ecstasy, a physical condition, to fool people about a false state of spirituality. That still works today. 36. Quick question, for those of you who feel like Shai’s posture was irreverent towards God, how do you feel about this rapper, Eshon Burgundy’s posture? This is an honest question and I’m just curious as to what some of you would say. Although it is a short video. 37. Doug Merrill says: Are you seriously denying that the process of making a music video starts with the music and that the producers of said music video work to produce a product that fits the music? I completely understand that these people are in complete bondage to sin and in need of a Savior, which is precisely why they use suggestive/sensual/sexual visuals to accompany suggestive/sensual/sexual audio. Your charge that I’m accusing the music of making people sin is a red herring. You’re not engaging the argument. The argument is that certain music is conducive to certain actions, because the music is communicating the exact same behavior. It fits. It’s the reason that marching bands don’t bump and grind while they’re playing Semper Fidelis (of course, now having said that, someone is going to find an obscure reference to some marching band boogying while playing a march straight and present that as conclusive evidence that march music is conducive to lewd behavior, all the while ignoring the mountains of evidence that shows how rock, hip-hop and their derivatives fit the patterns of sensual behavior). It’s why pop musicians shimmy, thrust, bump, grind, twerk. It’s why classical opera singers (and I’m no fan of opera) don’t as a whole…even though the opera (or portions of it) may include lewd subject material. Is pornography only visual? Or can it be communicated audibly? The Scriptures address what we let in via the ear-gate much more than what we let in via the eye-gate. Is your position (and the position of others like-minded) really that music can’t communicate anger, rage, sensuality, lust, etc? 38. Doug Merrill says: Kelsey, I viewed the video and I don’t have a problem with his posture or body movement. I listened to it and couldn’t understand quite a bit of what he said, but other than that, no issues. 39. Jesse B. says: I have been following this discussion all along and have been in agreement with Scott. There is one distinction, though, that has not been made. It seems to be assumed that worship IS music and that music IS worship. Worship is in the heart. IF, in our hearts, we view God with a right understanding of his attributes and of his truth, our expressions will rightly reflect those attributes and truth and so when others see our outward worship, they will be seeing a testimony of who God is. 40. Rick says: Doug, not engaging your argument? I was engaging your argument and it most definitely was not a red herring. Saying the fork made me fat is exactly like your argument that the music made me twerk! And no, I do not think that music can communicate in the manner that puts sinful lusts in your mind and heart. It takes context in order to do that. I ask once again to do what we thought Scott was going to do….take one of Shai’s songs and tell us what elements of the music make it sinful. If you can’t identify what is sin then I question your accusations. You accuse me of using a red herring, but isn’t that what you are doing when you talk about Miley twerking when we are having a discussion about Shai’s music? You show your ignorance when you say his music causes sexual thrusting….absolutely preposterous and ridiculous. The culture of rap and hip/hop is so foreign to you. I had the great pleasure of attending Passion 2014 this weekend….just walked back in from the final service. I feel pretty certain that every bit of the music there was something that you would classify as something that would promote sexual movements. I had this conversation in mind the whole weekend and did not see one person doing this…not one!! There was more sincere praise of God in those services than I have seen in 100 services that are “hymn/piano/organ only and don’t even think about doing anything different.” No sex or any such nonsense. Just 20,000 people singing about God’s grace and mercy on a sinful people…terrible stuff! It is a very serious thing for you to accuse a fellow Christian of sin, yet there hasn’t been one shred of evidence that the music itself is sinful. You have talked about Miley twerking and somehow that is supposed to be the same as Shai’s music. If you don’t like it, that is not a problem. But to force your preferences on someone else and tell them that they are sinning if they don’t agree is simply wrong (and there is only one group accusing someone of sinning). 41. glenda says: thank you, jesse b. i agree. i have also been following this discussion and have yet to see this point made: worship has nothing to do with the music style we chose; it has all to do with how we live. in this Scriptures, there are examples of people worshiping God and it wasn’t talking about music. men fell on their faces, prostrate. I’ve read an article worthy of reading on the website: guided by truth. in it, it entails what worship really is. The following paragraph is from that website. “proskuneo; To worship, do obeisance, show respect, fall or prostate before…In the NT, generally, to do reverence or homage to someone, usually be kneeling or prostrating oneself before him…Of God, used in an absolute sense…meaning he worshiped leaning upon the top of his staff…with the words expressing prostration.” 42. glenda says: also saying “shucking” and “jiving” is ridiculous because that didn’t happen in the video. these two different cultures will never understand each other and it’s sickening to see it go on like this with these insane comments. no one is addressing the real issue here: WORSHIP IS NOT MUSIC! WORSHIP IS NOT A STYLE! WORSHIP IS OUR WAY OF LIVING OUR LIVES BEFORE GOD. maybe if i wrote in all caps, i’ll be recognized. 43. Doug Merrill says: Rick, saying that certain music is conducive to certain actions is very different than saying that the music causes the actions. I’m not sure why this is confusing to you, but somehow you’re totally missing the point. 44. Doug Merrill says: One more thing…I never made the argument that the music made anyone do anything, twerk or otherwise. Saying that I did is dishonest at best and is changing the argument to suit one’s needs. That’s a red herring. 45. Rick says: Doug, lots of music that you would deem to be good music can also be conducive to certain actions as well. I could take the tune to When I Survey the Wondrous Cross, play it on the piano and make it conducive to sensuality with the right words and the right environment. Operatic pieces have been played in movies in very sensual scenes. It’s not the music that is conducive to certain actions but our hearts. Hope you have a blessed Lord’s day! 46. Rajesh says: If you change the words and environment but play the same tune, you have not made the tune conducive to sensuality; you have made the resulting song and its performance sensual because of the sensuality of the words and of the environment. 47. Doug, May I ask why you didn’t have a problem with his posture or movements? 48. Jesse B. says: Glenda…..its not even that musical STYLE is worship. Worship is a response to God from the heart. However, a persons outward expression, whether it be music, dress, or overall behavior is a reflection of what is going on in their heart, their view of what they think about who God is and what that person sees as a right way to approach a Holy God. 49. glenda says: i agree but to a certain degree. if music didn’t exist, wouldn’t our lives be the number one way to worship God? i believe our outward expression of worship has nothing to do with music and that is why i am so confused about this debate. 50. glenda says: Music doesn’t define worship 51. Jesse B. says: Right, as believers are told in Romans 12:1-2. But because it is a simple reality that people choose to express themselves (nevermind worship) with dress, overall behavior, language, and music……that expression needs to be done according to how God has said in His word….and everyone expresses their view in their own way, not according to how God has said. When it comes to expressing worship, and in light of the age we live in today, it is vitally important to make sure that our views, expressions, and lives line up with what scripture says, in order to be the most Christ like testimony we can. Also, the only manual we have on how to worship God, is the Bible. All of our preconcieved ideas need to be put aside so that God can be glorified. When our preferences or ideas are throw into the mix, the testimony of Christ is diminished. 52. Agreed, all of our outward expressions must line-up with what the Bible says glorifies God but can anyone please give me a thorough and biblical look at how expressing oneself with Hip-Hop music is sinful? Can someone please show me how an instrumental in and of itself can be intrinsically sinful? No one has yet to sufficiently answer this question. Rick has asked this on previous posts but no answer as well 53. Jesse B. says: It’s similar to the English language. Everyone has the same individual letters to write with. I have and “e” so I write “love”. Someone else has the same “e” yet they write “hate”. It is obvious the two different thoughts that each person has. Music NOTES are that building block and the NOTES have no moral attachments. The way that the NOTES are put together are what creates the moral attachments. EXAMPLE: I don’t know the age of anyone on here, but the song Happy Birthday is quite innocuous and non offensive. No one will even fault the writer for the lyrics he chose. There is a video of Marylin Monroe singing Happy Birthday to president JFK. She sung the same lyrics, and with the same melody. The WAY that she was performing the sing was undeniably sensual. Any guy that sees that video, will agree, I believe. There is no way that she ONLY meant Happy Birthday. Of course, there is music that is fitting for the lyrics, but the lyrics and the music aren’t the only element that has to line up. The WAY it is sung conveys a message too. 54. Jesse B. says: Each and every song can be debated, and that would probably be an unending debate since everyone has a different preference and view on things. But music that is intended to be used to express what is in the heart ( and not only the messages of the music, lyrics, and performance need to match), but the truth of who God is needs to be conveyed in a right and accurate way according to His word. 55. Jesse B. says: …music that is used to express heartfelt worship..* is what I meant 56. Okay and Hip-Hop music(in it’s lyrics, instrumental, and how it is performed) cannot be used to express heartfelt worship? I honestly beg to differ because I’ve been able to worship the Lord at a Reach Records (Christian Hip-Hop Record label) Unashamed concert. The music, lyrics and performance were of no distraction to me and anyone else who was worshiping the Lord at the conference. But if I’m wrong please show me how Hip-Hop music (lyrics, instrumental and how it is performed) cannot be used to express heartfelt worship and what music style should be and can be used to express heartfelt worship 57. Rajesh says: According to Ephesians 5:18-19, music that pleases God is the result of Spirit-filling. God commands every righteous person to worship Him musically (Ps. 33:1-5). Someday, all the world will worship Him musically (Ps. 96:1; 98:4-6). Music is an absolutely essential aspect of human worship of the true and living God. 58. Rajesh says: I am not aware that anyone has said that any instrument is sinful in and of itself. What music humans produce with an instrument may or may not be sinful, but the instrument itself is not intrinsically sinful. 59. Jesse B. says: I’m not saying it can’t. What I am saying is that is an accurate expression of how that believer chooses to approach a Holy God. (BTW…don’t think I am trying to judge anyone’s motives……only God knows a persons motives) All I am saying is that the expression that we choose to use for representing our view of who God is and how to worship Him, needs to be matched up to scripture. EXAMPLE: In Leviticus 10:1-2 is the account of Nadab and Abihu. Upon approaching God for worship, they offered Him “strange fire”, a way to express their worship to God which I’m sure they saw as beautiful and right. However, the Lord “…commanded them not” to approach Him in this way and of course we see in verse 2, the drastic consequences for this approach. An earlier example: in Genesis 4:2-5, are the sacrifices of Cain and Abel. Verse 2 tells us that Abel was a keeper of the sheep and Cain, a tiller of the ground. At the end of this passage, the Lord had respect unto Abel’s offering, but not Cain’s. There was a certain way to approach the Lord and Cain did not follow that instruction. Hebrews clues us in on the reason WHY Abel’s offering was accepted and “…a more excellent sacrifice. .” It is the heart attitude? of any offering or worship, that the Lord is concerned about. Also, just another verse simply noting this fact is 1 Samuel 16:7 “For yhe Lord seeth NOT as man seeth…the Lord looketh on the heart.” Hip Hop and rap are not appropiate expressions of worship to the Lord because it is not condoned in Scripture and that is what this discussion by Scott and Shai is about. As for the heart of Hip Hop artists or rappers, I can’t judge that and don’t intend to. Only God knows the heart. Also, I hope I don’t seem like im “yelling” I use all caps to emphasize the word, not to “yell” 60. Rajesh says: According to 1 John 3:12, Cain was “of that wicked one,” which shows that he never was a believer, and “his own works were evil.” 61. Jesse B. says: Not only are they not condoned in Scripture, but they are inappropiate for a host of other reasons. Don’t take that wrong either…..rap and hip hop are not directly in Scripture (Scripture doesn’t say “thou shalt not use rap or hip hop”) but some of the musical elements/foundations used in rap and hip hop are derived from forbidden principles found in Scripture. 62. Jesse B. says: Thanks for adding that piont to make my point more concrete. :-) 63. Jesse B, I follow you’re point and can agree that there most definitely a specific way we are to approach a Holy God but I want to bring up something you said: “but some of the musical elements/foundations used in rap and hip-hop are derived from forbidden principles found in Scripture” Can you please expound upon that statement? I never said that an instrument is inherently sinful, I meant can someone please show me how, as Jesse B put it, “the musical elements/foundations used in rap and hip-hop are derived from forbidden principles found in scripture?” How do the elements/foundations in rap music make the musical art form inherently sinful? I know this is why Shai and Scott are having this discussion but to be honest this discussion seems to be on a rabbit trail and has lost it’s main focus. 64. Rajesh says: Scripture testifies of itself that God has inspired it that we might “be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works” (2 Tim. 3:16-17). Because music that is acceptable to God is an essential good work for believers, a genuine belief in the sufficiency of Scripture demands that we believe that the Bible gives us the essential information that we need to produce music that pleases God. Do you believe in the sufficiency of Scripture? If you do, your task is to study all that the Bible teaches about music, worship, and other subjects to see what God teaches us. When you do such a study, you discover that God has not given us specific details about musical elements that go into making music that is acceptable to God. His not giving us that information means that there are other considerations that He knows are more important than such musical details, and heeding those considerations takes care of such details. So, I believe that asking people to explain to you what musical specifics make certain types of music wrong is not the right place to start for knowing what music pleases God and what music does not. Rather, we must first receive larger principles that God gives us such as not being conformed to the world, not walking in the counsel of the godly, not learning the way of the heathen, and not having any fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. 65. Jesse B. says: Thank you Rajesh. That is where I was headed. Very well put. In the last paragraph, you say “not walking in the counsel of the godly”……I believe you mean ungodly. :-) I was also going to address 2 Corinthians 6:17 “Wherefore come out from among them and be ye separate…” I find it very hard to make a distinction between what a secular looke like and a what a christian concert looks like. Simply looking a picture of the 2 concerts, is simply undistorted. Part of the believers testimony before the world is too be distinctly different from the world and its ways. Im sure you may know believers that do not drink (or maybe you yourself had to decline an invite to the bar) and have had co workers ask them if they want to go get a drink, yet as a believer they wont. That alone is a testimony for Christ. God is a Holy God and1 Peter 1:15-16 is a command to be Holy because God is Holy. This is only possible through the diligent study of God’s Word (the transforming of our minds in Romans 12:2) because in 2 Peter 1:3 he has “…given us all things that pertain to life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him…” when we know how to approach sucha Holy God, as Rajesh said above, taking heed to those truths will take care of the smaller issues. I strive to make that distinction as clear as possible. Choosing to express the way we view God needs to be right and accurate to who God is and what he has said and when and if, by the Lord’s gracious power, done rightly and accurately, our testimony WILL be different simply because of the nature of who God is. 66. Jesse B. says: I just noticed all the typos and spelling errors and missed words….sorry….my tablet must be acting up. 67. Thank you Rajesh for your comment, I appreciate it. I do agree that we are to test what God says in the Scriptures for ourselves. I’ve constantly looked at the Scriptures mentioned in this comment section and in the prior posts from Scott arguing that rap music in inherently sinful and cannot be used to worship the Lord. I’ve been studying even before that because this argument is not new but is simply evidence of believers beating a dead horse. I do agree that the larger principles that you mentioned above such as not being conformed to the world, not walking in the counsel of the ungodly, not learning the way of the heathen, and not having fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness are the principles that we must judge rap music made by Christians against. However, I wholehearted disagree that rap music is inherently sinful and cannot be used by Christians to worship God and preach the glories of Christ. From looking and studying these principles in Scripture I see nothing wrong with using rap music for the glory of God. If there is something that I missed I’d be willing to forfeit my position and accept correction. Until then, I will continue to use the gift that God gave me to write poetry in a rhythmical form to reach people who speak the language of rap and show them Christ. 68. Rajesh says: Oops, yes, I did mean to say, “not walking in the counsel of the ungodly” instead of what I wrote. Thanks for catching my careless error! Here is a fuller treatment of the key consideration of not having any fellowship with the works of darkness in relation to music: 70. Rajesh says: I appreciate your openness to learning from Scripture. I believe that Scripture makes clear that the view that all music without words is inherently neutral is false. In addition to the link that I posted in my previous reply to Jesse, here are two other articles for you to consider carefully: 71. Jesse B. says: I have a few blogs and for wome reason, I can not paste the link below. One is on worship and one of various Bible studies. Here they are. 72. Jesse B. says: Some* not wome… 73. One last thing, I want to use this song by Lecrae called “Tell The World” I saw this song performed live in concert and saw a sweet worshipful song unto the Lord. The song itself has a tone of gratitude and humility. It also has a rejoicing tone to it. Lecrae is addressing the Lord and showing his gratitude for saving him and now wants to be a “billboard” for Christ sharing the love of Christ. Lyrically and musically this song presents a heart attitude of reverence for God and a desire to take on the cause of Christ. Here is the song itself and the live performance so that you all can test his posture and see if it is either irreverent or reverent (keep in mind that Lecrae is also address the people at this conference in this video) If this song is inherently sinful simply because it is Hip-Hop and the musical foundation of Hip-Hop is evil and ungodly, please show me lyrically, musically and biblically. I’ve tested this song to everything I know in regards to the underlying principles set in Scripture concerning how we should judge music and still have not found any error. If I am wrong, please show me. 74. Or how about this song from Lecrae called Background. Same concept as the last one in regards to humility and reverence for God. Here’s the song and live performance as well. Again If this is sinful or his posture is sinful please show me. 75. glenda says: this will clear up what i am saying about worship. please read the following section from an article titled “praise vs worship” the website is enjoy!!! “There is a difference between Praising the Lord and Worshiping Him. Lets take the subject of Praise: Ps 9:11 Ps 33:2 Praise the Lord with harp, sing unto him with the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings. Is 42:12 Heb 13:15 By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, this is, the fruit of our lips, giving thanks to his name. According to the above, Praise consists of song, music, words, and we are to do this consistently, even when it is a sacrifice. At times, when we’re having a rough time it can indeed be difficult to rejoice in what is taking place. But as we study the word of God, we know that everything is happening for a reason and that reason is for our growth and the Lord’s glory! (Rom 8:28) According to the Word of God, the Lord inhabits the praises of His children. Ps 22:3 But thou art holy, o holy that inhabitest the praises of Israel. Wow what a promise! When we offer praises to the Lord, His spirit fills each word and His power goes forth. See this next verse: 2 Chr 20:22 These armies being stopped by the Lord, are pointing us in the direction of the enemy as he sets traps for us. As we praise the Lord we will walk in His power and protection. Lets take a look at Worship: 1 Chr 16:29 Give unto the Lord the glory due unto his name: bring an offering, and come before him: worship the Lord our maker. Ps 95:6 Ps 96:9 According to this, worship is not singing and such; but it is an action taken in acknowledging the Lord as our LORD. According to the Greek dictionary: Praise (aineo) to speak in praise of, to praise. Praise (humneo) “to sing, to laud, sing to the praise of” Praise (exomologeo) “will I give praise”; “I will confess”. Worship (proskuneo) “to make obeisance, do reverence to” used as of an act of homage or reverence to God. Worship (latreuo) “to serve, to render religious service or homage”; to worship (by the Spirit of God) “to worship (God in Spirit). Worship goes beyond praise; it is an act of bowing down and honoring the Lord God. Worship is also an act, for example in our daily work: we serve others as a way of worshiping the Lord. Our very life should be an act of worship.” it speaks for itself…rajesh. the Scriptures you cited all said “praise” not worship 76. Jesse B. says: As was said earlier, Scripture does not mention rap specifically, but there are elemental principles in the Bible that are forbidden. In my previous comment, I mention 2 Cor. 6:17. If a believer truely desires to change THEIR view in exchange of what the Bible says……the doctrine of seperation (and there are many other verses, not just that one) would be enough for changing their music preference. The only prefernce that I am concerned pabout is the Lord’s. In that same comment, I mention holiness, as found in 1 Peter 1:15-16. Another verse that specifically speaks of holy worship Psalms 29:2. Other priciples, again no specific genre is mentioned, are found in: Ex. 32:17 – Music can sound like the noise of war Psalm 69:12 – the song of the drunkards Eccl. 7:5 – the song of fools Lam. 3:14 – the song of derision Job 35:13 – the song of vanity (the context is talking about a song starting in verse 10) Isaiah 23:15-16 – the song of an harlot There is a difference made in the Bible between these and the songs of the temple in Amos 8:3 and the songs of the Lord In 2 Chron. 29:27 it is up to the believer to discern which of todays genre falls into these catorgories, but it is clear what genre fits where. 77. Jesse B. says: For more clarification in the elemental principles I referred to, from Scott’s view, (which is also Biblical) go to and then “resources” then listen to his Theology of Worship messages. I listened to them last week and they confirmed what I had concluded in my studies, although I did learn a lot as well. BTW, I agree with Rajesh and am thankful that you want to search out the Scriptures. 78. Rick says: I think we are talking semantics here, but either way I believe you are proving my point that it is not the music that is inherently sinful. So take one of Shai’s songs and tell us what the music itself says that is either moral or immoral. In other words, tell us how the notes were put together in a sinful manner. I know you won’t be able to do that so your argument kind of breaks down when put into practice. The big problem with your theory is that we can actually read and understand words. Music is somewhat more relative in that someone will hear anger in rap when others in that culture would think that is a ridiculous thought! You attempted to illustrate your theory by pointing to Marilyn Monroe singing happy birthday. However, it isn’t the music that was wrong but it was Marilyn Monroe’s performance that was wrong. If it actually was the music that was sensual, I could sing that exact same song and JFK would have still seen it as sensual….don’t think that would be the case though!!! Jesse B. said: “Hip Hop and rap are not appropiate expressions of worship to the Lord because it is not condoned in Scripture and that is what this discussion by Scott and Shai is about.” Surely you don’t mean that something must be specifically condoned in Scripture in order for it to be an appropriate expression of worship. So what style of music is condoned in Scripture? Please tell us what musical elements in rap and hip/hop are derived from forbidden principles in Scripture. Please be specific. Don’t assume that those of us on this side of the issue haven’t done exactly the study you are talking about. I for one have and I noticed what you did, that “God has not given us specific details about musical elements that go into making music that is acceptable to God.” I am certain that we agree on the “other considerations that He knows are more important than such musical details….” However, we differ on the application of those other considerations. I am firmly convinced that the differences in application boil down to one thing….differences in culture (which essentially means different preferences). Have any of you attempted to understand that culture? Have you listened to any more than a snippet of these songs? Rap is not my thing but I purchased Shai’s Attributes of God album…..I’m blown away by the depth of those songs. I have no doubt that God is certainly honored by what Shai is doing. Others here may not be so certain, but it is a serious thing for anyone to accuse him of sinning when you can’t even say how his music is sinful! That verse (nor does the passage it is referencing in Isaiah) isn’t speaking about the way we look. This passage has been distorted by so many (think Amish). There are many more unsaved and sinning people in the world wearing suits than there are wearing jeans a tshirt and sporting dreadlocks. Should we stop wearing suits (actually I’m all for doing away with suits!!!)? We should be separate in that we should not partake in the sin in which they are partaking. The Corinthians were allowing false teachers in and were in some cases worshipping idols with unbelievers. Furthermore, they had allowed a person to remain in the church that was in an incestuous relationship. These are the things Paul was concerned about in the Corinthian church. It wasn’t that he was concerned that they looked like the Corinthians!! He was concerned that they were partaking in the sin of the Corinthians. I haven’t ever been to one of Shai’s concerts, but I have been to multiple concerts that I’m sure wouldn’t be on your approved list of music. There is a marked difference between these concerts and secular concerts. I was at Passion 2014 this past weekend and there is no way an unbeliever would have equated their music with the music of the unredeemed! I would imagine Shai’s concerts would likewise be just as “different.” 79. Rajesh says: You said, “WORSHIP IS NOT MUSIC! WORSHIP IS NOT A STYLE! WORSHIP IS OUR WAY OF LIVING OUR LIVES BEFORE GOD.” So, when a person plays music to relax or sings while doing chores, is that not part of his way of living his life before God? On what grounds, do you exclude a person’s musical activities from being part of his “way of living [his] life before God”? I am not following your reasoning about this point. 80. Rajesh says: I do not think that we are just talking semantics. If somebody takes “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross” and keeps all the words the same but plays it as a death metal song, I would say what he is playing is wrong in spite of the words being good. Concerning culture, the Bible is very clear that there were many cultures that God’s people were not to learn anything from, so Scripture does not support a view that cultural differences are merely and necessarily only differences in preferences. 81. Rick says: Rajesh, we are still missing what elements of even death metal are inherently sinful. I don’t like it, in fact I despise it but I fail to see where Scripture points to a style of music as sinful. I agree that Scripture does point to some cultures that Christians should not mimic due to their sinfulness. However, Revelation 7 talks about people from every tribe, peoples, and languages that will be standing in front of the throne praising God. I don’t think it is insignificant that John points out these differences. They look and speak differently and I’m sure they also have different mannerisms and methods. Everyone in heaven doesn’t turn into a white, suburban living, western music listening people. The culture I am talking about is even less distinct than the one Revelation 7 mentions. Also, didn’t the Jews historically consider themselves better than the Gentiles and found them despicable in many ways? Didn’t Paul have to fight this tension in the church…and even with Peter? I agree that Scripture doesn’t say that “cultural differences are merely and necessarily only differences in preferences.” However, it certainly doesn’t state that the cultural differences are all sinful either. Rather, more times than not it will say to get over your preconceived issues (think Peter/Paul issue, eating meat, etc.) and get along with your brother. Rajesh, I haven’t said it before, but I really appreciate your candor in these discussions! It is refreshing. 82. Rajesh says: You are welcome. Thanks for the feedback. If we were living in a world that only consisted of people, God, and good angels, this discussion would be far different. As it is, Scripture makes plain that believers have a whole horde of evil supernatural enemies who are our true enemies. When sinful humans tell us repeatedly that they have crafted specific styles of music for specifically evil purposes, the believer must take what they say at face value. When many of them also say that their music is ultimately sourced in supernatural evil influences upon them, we must not dismiss what they say. Believers are not obligated to explain in detail why the evil practices of evil people are evil, especially when those very people tell you that they have not even come up with what they are doing–they have been moved by something outside of them to produce the music that they have. So, based on clear biblical teaching, believers who want to use things produced by wicked people influenced by fallen spirits have the burden of proof of explaining why what these people say and do is not evil when they themselves say that it is. Such believers must also explain why we are free to disobey what God unambiguously commands us to do in such cases: “Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness” (Eph. 5:11). In case you might not have seen this link earlier, here’s an article that I wrote recently that fleshes all these ideas out: About Revelation 7:9, Scott has already addressed that recently. He pointed out that all these people are identically dressed: “clothed in white robes.” Furthermore, Scripture shows us what happens to people’s ways when God truly saves them: the demoniac was instantly transformed from being a wild man who ran around naked and repeatedly mutilated himself to being a man who was “sitting, and clothed, and in his right mind” (Mark 5:15). There are many testimonies of people who were openly evil before salvation whose lives were transformed, including their moving completely out of rock music. Although I was not outwardly living wickedly in that way before I was saved, I, too, was transformed when God saved me and moved me from immersion in rock and other music to immersion in godly music about which there is no question whether it is acceptable to God or not. Moreover, Scripture is not silent concerning styles of music that are sinful: So, I believe that we have very good reasons to reject various styles of music that have ungodly sources. 83. glenda says: so we must all stop and drop our traditions on how we praise God in our services. we must kick out pianos, keyboards, electric guitars, and other instruments we use as modern day musicians. we must pick up lyres, tambourines (which keeps a beat), and lutes. horns are also acceptable. God has told us in the Scriptures that these are acceptable instruments to praise Him with, but all i hear is opinions of what should be heard in services. who are we to say that hip hop should or should not be in a service? who are we to judge these people? if we really want to get Biblical, how about we do our services acappella? The hip hop artists fit this passage to a tee: “In the New Testament, music is a means of teaching God’s word and used in thanksgiving (Ephesians 5:18f; Colossians 3:16). ” 84. glenda says: since we have examples of using certain types of instruments in services in the Scripture, if none of you who are saying it is wrong are using these instruments, you are just as guilty as the hip hop artists are. there are examples of clapping and dancing as well. and as far as gesturing goes, there were no inappropriate gesturing in any video i have seen of these brothers; they are expressing themselves with their hands. we are instructed to clap our hands and we can lift our hands. 85. Rick says: Actually no, the burden of proof is on you. If you accuse us of sinning, then you must show how we are sinning. I agree that those people you are talking about may be producing music in order to sin. However, Shai is not doing those songs. He isn’t performing in the manner that they perform and he certainly isn’t singing their lyrics. The premise of this whole argument at the beginning was as Scott said….music can be sinful apart from the lyrics. I have searched Scripture and do not see this as a viable argument from Scripture. So if you do and you say we are sinning, then it is your burden to prove that it is sin. So take one of Shai’s songs and tell us what elements of the music are sinful. Concerning Revelation 7, I do understand that they were dressed the same and singing the same song. However, John found it necessary to point out their differences. They were certainly different when they were on earth. Truthfully though, that wasn’t even the type of culture I was first addressing. When I say that it boils down to one culture not understanding another, it can be as simple as one church having old hymns only and one church having old hymns and some newer hymns…and they might even be on screen. These two churches have different cultures and there are probably some that snub their noses at the other church because they believe what they are doing is wrong. This happens all the time yet there is nothing wrong with either one. It is just that the older hymn only people are so engrained in their culture that anything slightly different is foreign to them. Unfortunately, some people view a different culture as wrong when it is simply a different way. Scripture dictates sin, not our feelings. Yes, I agree that lives change and people are transformed when they are saved. I recently read Curtis “Voice” Allen’s book entitled “Does God Listen to Rap?” He gives his testimony at the beginning of the book. He was a rapper that was heavily involved in all the wrong things. When he was saved, his life changed and he started using his talent for God by spreading His message through rap/hip/hop. The music radically changes and there isn’t an unregenerate person that would say Shai’s or Allen’s music is the same as what they had been doing. Perhaps it isn’t the change you require, but I would imagine they are more concerned with what God requires. Concerning styles of music…I read the article which you posted. However, Scripture is still very silent about what the style sounds like! I agree that the song of a harlot, drunkard, and a fool is wrong. You can’t tell me that Shai’s music is ever going to be confused with the songs of any of these. If you say it is then you must have been listening to something else. They would never sing what he sings. I’m sure you are saying that his music sounds like theirs. So how do I identify what the song of a harlot, drunkard, and a fool sounds like apart from lyrics and the environment of these people? There is no way you can because Scripture doesn’t have a headphone jack in the side of it so you can listen to the music. Now you can certainly identify their songs with the lyrics and the environment, but once again, how you equate that with Shai’s songs are beyond me. It doesn’t come out of Scripture. 86. Rick is right, if you say a group of people are sinning you must show us how we are sinning. He and I have been asking for someone to take one of Shai Linne’s songs and tell us what elements of his music is inherently sinful. I’ve even posted two Lecrae songs so that we’re not just focusing on Shai Linne but another Christian rap artist, yet I haven’t seen anyone comment and tell me how the musical elements of those two songs are inherently sinful. To be honest, I question the validity and Scriptural basis for arguing that music without lyrics is inherently sinful. Yes the Bible talks about the song of a harlot, drunkard, and fool but like Rick said you can only identify what those songs sound like based on the lyrics and the context in which the song is sung in. If there is a musicological way to identify what the song of a harlot, drunkard, and fool sounds like apart for it’s lyrics and context please show us. 87. Aaron says: With all due respect and love to brother Shai, and not in the least bit questioning his intentions or motives, I believe it is utterly ridiculous to speak of hip hop in terms of “language”. It is NOT a “language”. And comparing hip hop to a “culture” is erroneous. It is NOT a culture. No one filling out an important government or career form writes “hip hop” in the ethnicity, race or native language line. No one is born into a “hip hop” family (the same way one is born into a Jewish, Mexican or Italian family) where the primary language spoken is “rap”. There are no “hip hop” towns or communities in the same manner as there are Chinatowns or Little Tokyos. (And no, predominantly African-American communities don’t count, as not everyone there is a hip hop fan…in fact, many black people extremely dislike hip hop because of its encouraging racial stereotypes and criminal behavior). Hip hop is neither a culture nor a language. It is a subculture within Western culture. And here in Western culture, the last time I checked, the primary language spoken is English. When speaking to an avid hip hop fan, I don’t need a translator. We can understand each other just fine. I don’t need to use words like “dope” and “tight” (which have horribly wicked and perverted origins) to be understood by him. And neither do I have to even play his music for him to listen to me. I’ve been evangelizing for years on the streets, and NOT ONCE has a person been turned away because I don’t like the same music he does, or belong to the same subculture as him. The Gospel is the power of God to salvation; it is the foolishness of preaching that saves, one does not need to resort to gimmicks to be heard and to be effective. Hence, Shai’s arguments are wrong and his use of 1 Cor.14:16-17 is an entire misapplication of the passage. He could have at least used 1 Cor.9 to support giving up one’s liberties in order to not be a stumbling block to others. 88. Rick says: noun \ˈkəl-chər\ It is simply a group of people that think alike or have the same “ways of life.” Don’t make it difficult, Aaron. You are absolutely correct though that you can speak English and don’t have to play music to reach or teach any of the people in that culture (or subculture as you said). No one is saying any different. In fact, unless I’m mistaken I don’t believe anyone even said anything about using Shai’s music for evangelizing. In my opinion, his music is actually better as a teaching tool for people that are already Christians. 89. Aaron says: In response to Kelsey Ogbewe, I would say that Lecrae’s video “Background” looks hypocritical. Throughout the video, he claims to want Christ to be the center of attention, and himself to be merely in the “background”…but the whole video is centered on Lecrae. He is center-stage, the lights flashing around him, attention entirely focused on him, the giant screen filming him as he raps. This is an excellent example of how the great majority of Christian contemporary music claims to represent and point to Christ while doing the very opposite. Often in these concerts (where many people come to hear the artists themselves and not to meet/worship God), the artist will apparently point to Jesus repeatedly and very enthusiastically, and may say something like, “Behold the Lamb of God!” But what often comes across is not “Behold the Lamb of God!” but, rather, “LOOK AT ME SAYING, ‘Behold the Lamb of God!'”. Performance, attitude, mannerisms, rhythms, tone, props, lights, etc. are all important factors that must be examined in a worship song. Shai Linne even admitted that these things can be a distraction. We must take these things into account when discerning whether a particular song is really Christ-centered or not. It’s not just about the lyrics. 90. Martin says: I have to concur with Aaaron – and thought he same when I saw the video. Of course this problem is not specific to hip hop but to most popular music where one or a group of artists are center stage. The audience will automatically look to the start more than to what he sings about, even if they may resonate with the intent. The form of a concert will always put the limelight on the performer. No way out of that, really. 91. Lotus says: Aaron, would you same that what you pointed out regarding the concert experience can also be said about the conference experience where the focus is on the speakers? These speakers are usually popular preachers, pastors and scholars who “may say something like, ‘Behold the Lamb of God!'” 92. Martin says: Good point, Lotus. There definitely is a celebrity culture among Christians as well in terms of putting certain popular preachers on a pedestal. Guess that’s what Paul was preaching against when people claimed, I am of Apollos etc. I see the difference in that this is BY DESIGN in popular music but happens against intentions in a preaching context. What we should recognize is that there sadly is a strong influence on Christianity from celebrity culture that we should work against. 93. Jesse B. says: I understand everyone’s frustration, trust me. But one benefit from these discussions is to point fellow believers to the Word of God. Every aspect can be debated til we blue in the face. the issue is not so much with the music, although that is a big issue, and in response to Kelsey…..I believe Scott is getting to the actual music part. But the issue is more of the heart, and with doctrines that are so clearly explained in Scripture. Also, when those doctrines, and what the Bible says about music, and a host of other issues are compared in the whole context of Jeremiah 17:9 stating that our hearts are decietfully wicked and so OUR views (though we might think they are Biblical) need to be examined according to the Bible, realizing a believer needs to be in constant for wisdom from God (James 1:5) and humility ( 1 Peter 5:6-8) (By the way, I picked Jer. 17:9 out but there are verses all throughout scripture stating the bent towatds sin that our flesh has) In regards to the music itself, here is a link to a great resource– Please don’t take this as me saying in a nice way to “look for yourself”, because I know I dont have all the answers but God does and I am simply trying to point others to God. 94. Aaron, I think you’re going way too far by calling his posture hypocritical. What about Pastors, teachers, etc? They are preaching the Word of God saying “Behold, the Lamb of God” while standing in front of an audience, sometimes with lights around them (take a look at Passion 2013 when John Piper preached, it’s the same conference and venue that those two Lecrae songs were in). What about worship leaders? Aren’t they in front of people saying “Behold, the Lamb of God.” Also, are you 100% certain that people go to concerts to just hear the artist themselves and not to worship God and be in fellowship with fellow believers? I’m not sure it’s a good thing to make such a blanket statement like that. That may be true for some but may not be true for others. To say that Lecrae’s posture is hypocritical is an unfair assessment. To say that Lecrae’s posture is hypocritical because he was center stage, the lights were focused on him, he was standing before an audience, and the camera was focused on him makes absolutely no sense at all. Like I mentioned earlier, John Piper spoke at this exact same conference and venue that Lecrae’s performance was in. Aaron, if I used you’re same reasoning I would have to say that John Piper’s posture was hypocritical as well because he was center stage, the lights were focused on him, he was standing in front of an audience, and the camera was focused on him all while saying “Behold the Lamb of God!” 95. Martin says: Kelsey, the difference is that Piper did not perform in the sense that Lecrae or any other artist does. Preaching is not (or at least, should not be) a performance – otherwise we’re left the realm of orthopraxy. The fact that performers also tend to preach (or interject calls for worship or give short pep-talks referring to biblical themes in-between songs) is simply what all artists do to put on a good show and should not be confused with actual preaching. I can see a clear difference between the two. A preacher is not an artist. 96. Rajesh says: You say, “Shai is not doing those songs. He isn’t performing in the manner that they perform and he certainly isn’t singing their lyrics.” The people that I’m referring to aren’t talking about their lyrics or manner of performance. They talk about their instrumental music itself as what they have designed and used to promote their wicked ends. You say that you do not see from Scripture that the position that music can be sinful apart from the lyrics is a viable position. You then say that we have to analyze Shai’s songs and explain what elements of the music are sinful. First Samuel 16:14-23 shows that music without lyrics is not neutral. David’s instrumental music expelled an evil spirit from Saul that was afflicting him. The whole emphasis of the inspired depiction of that account focuses explicitly on the playing of a musical instrument and there is no mention of any singing. David’s instrumental music was not neutral; it was a powerful force for spiritual good! This passage also shows that the whole discussion of music from a strictly human standpoint is sorely lacking. David’s instrumental music had a powerful effect on an evil spirit, and we are at war with evil spirits continuously. Many rock musicians have testified in various ways that their music is sourced in evil supernatural influences upon them. Christians have no business going near any such demonically sourced music that was designed so that the instrumental aspects of the music itself would promote evil. Believing what Scripture teaches about the infernal activities of evil spirits, we are obligated from Scripture to reject such instrumental music (Eph. 5:11). I reject the insistent demand for musicological explanations when Scripture plainly shows that instrumental music has effects in the spiritual realm on both man and other spirit beings. God has not explained to us how such things work in the spiritual realm, and I believe that such knowledge is either entirely incomprehensible to humans (John 3:8) or it is an aspect of the workings of God’s universe about which He has withheld information from us for His own inscrutable purposes (Deut. 29:29). 97. Rick says: Thanks for your reply Rajesh. Concerning the I Samuel passage, there are several issues with your assessment. First, no one disputes that music can affect your emotions…it can and most certainly does. In fact, even paint can affect your emotions. I worked for a man in high school that painted his entire restaurant orange because a psychologist did a study saying that color makes people happy and encourages them to buy more. Is paint moral as well? Anyway, music is emotional. However, the fallacy is when you begin to assign morality to the emotions. A good example of the issue is when you (or others here) see the music behind rap as expressing anger when that is not what most in that culture feel when they hear the same music. If music communicated in a definitive manner to where there was no question as to the meaning (like words do) then you would have a point. But let’s assume you are correct…tell me what the music behind one of Shai’s songs communicates that is sinful (BTW, several people have said Scott will get to this…if you cannot identify what elements of the music apart from lyrics make it sinful, isn’t that a problem?). Second, no one has any idea what David was playing. This is where the logical leap comes into play. People on your side of the musical issue point to this passage and say exactly what you said, that music is moral. Then there is a massive logical leap where they start assuming that David was playing music that they have in their current church service. The fact is that we don’t have the first clue what he was playing or how he was playing it. So in order to use this passage as an argument about music, you would have to be able to point to know what he was playing….for all we know, he may have been rapping. Third, since we don’t know what he was playing, I have to ask if this same exact thing has ever happened to me when I have been deeply troubled. If so, what was I listening to at the time? I can tell you that I have experienced times when I wrongfully over-worry about many things. This has happened very recently and music is a tremendous tool to pick me back out of that mire that I roll around in. The music I listen to would certainly be on your “no way” list. So I can attest that music is a tremendous tool to get me focused back on God and uplift my spirits. If the music I listen to does the same thing as what happened in I Samuel yet you say it is sinful, then there is a problem somewhere. If the style of music is that sinful and is that important, don’t you think God would have given us a means of identifying it? Fourth, I have always viewed this argument from the I Samual chapter as bordering on idolatry. What or whom has the power to expel evil spirits? God or His Word has that power. Are we really ready to assign music that kind of power? You rightfully state that “we are at war with evil spirits continuously.” I’m assuming you had Ephesians 6:12 in mind: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” This is the passage about the whole armor of God with which we do battle against this spiritual wickedness. We don’t put on the breastplate of piano playing or the helmet of hymns. That is the kind of power you are assigning to music. Only God and His truth, righteousness, salvation, etc. can quench those fiery darts. As I said, this whole argument really borders on idolatry when we lift our preferences of music up and set them equal with the power of God…and yes that can go both ways!!!! I understand that you “reject the insistent demand for musicological explanations….” I know my constant asking is getting annoying but I am hoping someone will see the issue. That issue is that people are saying that the music can be sinful in and of itself apart from the lyrics. Then they make a logical leap assuming that their music is the one that is NOT sinful (even though Scripture doesn’t tell you what music). Then they cannot even tell you why a particular arranging of notes becomes sinful versus arranging them another way, but their music is certainly not sinful. So in order to solve this, you could simply point out the musicological explanations and show us where Scripture points this out. We agree that the whole context (lyrics plus environment plus actions plus music) can be sinful. I even agree that your music (apart from the lyrics) is not sinful in and of itself. The difference is that you (and others) are saying a particular type of music apart from the lyrics can be sinful. All we are saying is please tell us how to identify such music and show us from Scripture how those elements are sinful. 98. Martin says: Thanks Rick for reiterating the call for musicology, despite Rajesh claiming we will never know… I’ve been busy the better part of the day collating an essay on this issue: It’s too long to simply post here, which is why I put it on my own blog. You could comment there but I’d prefer you do it here so we stay within our little community. It was hard to find anything pertaining to hip hop but after some searching I found a good essay that I based my evaluation on – needless to say, I don’t conclude it’s sinful but am sure I stepped on many peoples’ (everyone’s?) toes anyways. I am not dogmatic about what I wrote but this is what I can see with the light I have. If there is someone who can shed more light on some areas, be my guest. I didn’t expect to find what I found especially on Lecrae – I did not discuss Shai much but it’s anyways not my goal to discuss artists but rather, HHH as an art. … and sorry for interrupting the great interaction above! 99. Rajesh says: Your vehement response is telling about your approach to Scripture. The Holy Spirit inspired this passage for our profit for doctrine, etc. (2 Tim. 3:16-17). He inspired the passage to read exactly the way that He wanted it to. This passage is not about primarily about human emotions, so your first paragraph is beside the point. Your second paragraph is irrelevant to establishing a crucial biblical truth: music without words is not neutral. Your third paragraph is also irrelevant because this passage has an explicit focus on how the instrumental music of a godly man who had the Spirit on him delivered a man from spiritual affliction caused by an evil spirit, not just emotional trouble. Your fourth paragraph is revealing about your overall theology. God gave us this passage for our good and His glory. A theology that does not account for all that God has given us in Scripture is a defective theology. God is the One who has shown us what He did through the instrumental music ministry of a man whom He anointed with the Spirit. If God had wanted to support your theology, the passage would have read that David came and sang the word of God to Saul, and God delivered him from the evil spirit through David’s singing of the words of God. The text, however, does not read that way. The text indisputably emphasizes the instrumental music produced by a man whom God anointed with the Spirit and how that instrumental music delivered another man from affliction caused by an evil spirit. A sound theology must take this passage and passages such as Ephesians 6 and account for them all. To say that accounting for the explicit teaching of this passage is bordering on idolatry is a ludicrous assessment. On the contrary, those who refuse to take the passage seriously precisely as God has framed the account are the ones whose approach to Scripture is lacking. Furthermore, this is not the only passage that shows the powerful moral effects of instrumental music. Second Kings 3:15 shows that the instrumental playing of a minstrel brought the hand of God on a man of God: 2 Kings 3:15 “But now bring me a minstrel. And it came to pass, when the minstrel played, that the hand of the LORD came upon him.” You can try to make this again about emotion, but there is no evidence in the text that this passage is about the emotions of Elisha. God responded powerfully and positively to the instrumental music ministered to this man of God and put His hand on him. In conclusion, your response has not offered anything that changes the force of 1 Samuel 16:14-23 (and other passages such as 2 Kings 3:15) for establishing that music without words is not neutral and instrumental music is not just about human emotions. 100. Aaron says: Rick said, No, actually hip hop is not a culture in the strict anthropological sense of the term, used to refer to groups with common ancestry that share common practices and values. It is more accurately referred to as a “subculture”. But no need to tangle ourselves in an etymological debate. Regarless of your point of view of the term in question, we can both agree that hip hop certainly is NOT an ethnic culture, which was actually what I was trying to get across. More than once (in this debate and in other debates) Shai has compared hip hop to an ethnic culture and ethnic languages. Sorry, but the comparison completely fails, for the reasons already given. 101. Martin, I agree preaching is not the same as a performance. But I do have a problem with what you said. You said “the fact that performers also tend to preach (or interject calls for worship or give short pep-talks referring to biblical themes in-between songs) is simply what all artists do to put on a good show and should not be confused with actual preaching.” Might I ask how do you know that these artists truly aren’t trying to preach the Gospel and why can we not take what they’re doing as actual preaching? To say that their referring to biblical themes in between songs is simply what all artists do to put on a good show is an unfair generalization as well. I think you’re statement assumes the motives of a whole group of people. Also, Aaron’s reasoning was that Lecrae’s posture was hypocritical because he was in the spotlight, the camera was focused on him, he was center stage, he was in front of an audience of people all the while he was saying “Behold the Lamb of God!” John Piper had the same thing happening to him which is why I asked, shouldn’t we consider his posture as hypocritical? Aaron’s reasoning was not that Lecrae’s posture was hypocritical because he’s an artist and performing a song is different from preaching therefore preachers are not hypocritical. But let’s take some of the worship leaders at this conference as another example. Shouldn’t their posture be considered hypocritical as well? What they’re doing could be considered performance even though the intent is to point people to worship Christ. 102. Martin says: There is always that danger, Kelsey, but a worship leader usually does not remain in the spotlight; he leads the worship and during that time, the ‘spotlight’ should be on the congregation. Yes, I see the comments about preaching in-between was a shot from the hip; what I meant was that the images are alike: a Christian artist may talk about God in-between songs and another may talk about something else, crack a joke, or even tell a sad story. Outwardly, it looks similar and in substance, both are a show people pay to come and see. So since it’s part of entertainment, there’s a big difference to preaching, as far as I can see. I did not mean to assume anything about the performers’ motives. 103. Rick says: Rajesh, I certainly did not intend to send a vehement response. If it came across that way I sincerely apologize. I am not at home right now but will come back later with a couple comments. Once again, please accept my apologies if I was wrong. I would encourage you though to go deal with my comments rather than just saying they are irrelevant. 104. Rajesh says: No problem, Rick. I understand where you were going with your comments and will give them careful thought. 105. Rick says: Let me start by once again apologizing for my prior post if it came across as vehement. That was not my intent at all. In fact, I have been thrilled that we have been able to discuss these things without getting upset with each other and I hope that continues. Let me first address Martin’s post. Thanks for doing that research. I haven’t read it yet but certainly will. I want to continue addressing Rajesh’s comments right now though while it is fresh on my mind (plus it is already 12:34 in the morning and I have to work tomorrow!!). Rajesh, I would like to start by going back to I Samuel and addressing some more points on this passage. I will then go back to your post. The thing I love about these discussions is that it should drive us back to Scripture. So I went back and studied the passage out some more and I’m even more convinced that utilizing this passage as an argument for the morality of music is fallacious…and I believe I’m in good company. Since I am sure that many reading all of this may just dismiss what I have to say (since we have been going back and forth so much and they may be tiring of my questions), I consulted a couple commentaries on this passage to see if I was off-base. In other words, I wanted to see if commentators agree that music is moral and that David was playing moral music which caused the evil spirit to go away. I also wanted to see if they believed the point of the passage was to teach us about music. If not, what is the point of the passage because as you said, all Scripture is profitable? I certainly believe that even if you didn’t believe so from my prior post. Anyway, I’m going to quote some commentators so that you are hearing from someone other than me. I encourage you to go read the full context to make sure I’m not just “proof texting” from commentaries (admittedly, I read the commentaries on this particular text and not the entire context of the full passages or books). I read both Matthew Henry and John Gill on this passage. I’d go to others but it is late!!! It is interesting that Matthew Henry essentially thinks it was a silly idea for Saul’s attendants to go get David to play rather than going to get Samuel the prophet. Henry states: Henry then goes on to where he has an opportunity to address the morality of music or whether the music simply affects our emotions. He states: It doesn’t appear that he is stating that some music is moral and some is immoral. He seems to intimate that it affects your emotions to calm the spirits. In fact, he says that it has a greater influence on some than others and more explicitly states that “Music cannot work upon the devil.” So I gather the following from Matthew Henry: 1) he believes music affects the emotions to cheer us up, and does not appear to assign morality (or immorality) to music 2) he does not believe music has any effect on the devil or spirits 3) Saul would have been much better off if he had reconciled to God rather than listening to music. John Gill notes that the word “evil” in front of spirit is not in the original Hebrew: “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul,…. See 1Sa_16:14 though the word evil is not in the text here; wherefore Abarbinel thinks that this here was the Spirit of God, which stirred up in him thoughts of divine things, put him in mind of what God had said, that he had rejected him from being king, and had rent the kingdom from him; and this filled him with grief and trouble, and he became melancholy:” I will say that I personally believe that it was an evil spirit because of I Samuel 18 (I’ll get to that in a minute). It is interesting though that Gill keeps using the word melancholy (sad and pensive) when referring to Saul’s fits. Concerning the effects of music on Saul, Gill states: “music being a means of cheering the spirits, and removing melancholy and gloomy apprehensions of things, and so of restoring to better health of body and disposition of mind; and that music has such an effect on the bodies and minds of men is certain from observation and experience in all ages. Music has been found to be medicine to various diseases, not only for the curing of the bite of vipers, and of the tarantula, but for easing the pains of the sciatica, and for helping persons labouring under the disorders of the frenzy (k); and Pythagoras used to compose the mind, and remove the perturbations of it, by the use of the harp (l), the thing here advised to.” He believes music cheers you up (emotions) and I agree as well. He however does not assign any morality (or immorality) to music. Similar to Henry, he believes it has an effect on us such that it can cheer us when we are melancholy. It is interesting though that both Henry and Gill state that Josephus says that David accompanied the playing of music with the singing of hymns and psalms. True or not, we cannot know for certain. If I had to bet on it, I would imagine David was singing along. I continued reading in I Samuel and came across something even more interesting that I didn’t even think about before. In I Samuel 18, we have the same scene as we do in chapter 16. Saul is once again plagued by the spirit (this time “evil” does seem to be in the Hebrew) and David is playing for him again. However, there is a very different outcome…this time Saul throws his spear at David and tries to kill him. This has to make you ask what this shows about the music. If we believe chapter 16 is a passage that is intended to teach us about music then you would seem to need to believe the same thing about chapter 18. Was David playing immoral music in chapter 18? We certainly do not know what he was playing so I don’t think we can make that assumption. The better assumption is that he was playing something similar to what he had played in chapter 16. In other words, why would we say that music was the powerful thing that ran the spirit off in chapter 16 but now it has lost its power….that wouldn’t seem to make sense if it is not about emotions but about the sinfulness or holiness of music. It just brings up a lot of questions, and I think problems, with arguing for the morality of music from this passage. So what do Henry and Gill believes is the point of chapter 16? What can we learn from this chapter? Is it providentially placed here for us to learn about music or does it have another purpose? Both Henry and Gill mention that David was providentially brought to the palace to increase his fame and credit at court. In other words, it was preparation for when he would become king. I heard a message this past weekend about the fact that it was 20 years from the time that David was anointed and the time he sat on the throne. This passage seems to be telling us about how God was preparing David. Could it have a dual meaning? Sure, but based on what I have studied and what I’ve read from commentators as well, I don’t think there was any intent in I Samuel to teach us about what music we should and should not use and listen to. Now, concerning your post, I’ll try to somehow address your points and encourage you to think about a few points from my prior post. You summarily dismissed my first paragraph because you said the passage is not about human emotions. Gill and Henry seem to believe so and I concur. So how do you address my questions in the first paragraph? The color of orange seems to have somewhat of the same effect as music has on our spirits. Is paint moral? How do you explain how some see anger in music where others don’t? You also dismissed my second paragraph as well because you state music without words is not neutral. But I think my second paragraph had a very important question. Since we don’t know what David was playing, how is it that you determine your music is moral and how do we know what other music isn’t? That is why I say it is a logical leap because there is a missing link between your assertion of music being moral and what music is moral. My third paragraph was declared to be irrelevant as well because you state that the music was what delivered him from the evil spirit. Both Gill and Henry seem to disagree so I feel like I’m in pretty good company. If you concur (and I understand that you may not), how do you explain that some people can listen to music such as Shai’s and have their spirits lifted? I do believe music can affect your emotions (I would think you agree with that) but I don’t believe it has the power over sin and darkness that is being assigned to it on this thread. Concerning my fourth paragraph, it sounds as if you believe that I think I Samuel is worthless. That couldn’t be further from the truth. However, I may misunderstand. My point in the paragraph was that I believe we assign way more power to music than the passage intends. Why wouldn’t the disciples have just played music for the people when they weren’t able to cast out demons in the New Testament? Why don’t we just play music instead of evangelizing since it is that powerful? I mean, if it can drive the devil and demons away then we simply don’t need Scripture or even God! I know that is NOT what you are saying, however that is exactly where this argument can go if we believe even music apart from lyrics has power over the devil. God has given us weapons for this war we are in but I’m certainly not going to attack the devil with a tune. I would imagine you may have thought the idolatry comment was the vehement part. However, assigning that kind of power to music essentially scoots God out of the way and places music in His place since it obviously has power over the devil. That is why I said this argument can sometimes border on idolatry. You then go on and seem to misunderstand what I was saying (or maybe I misstated). You seem to think that I was saying David came and sang to Saul and that is what helped Saul. I don’t think I mentioned anything about David singing until this post when I stated that Gill and Henry both said that Josephus stated that David was singing. My point in my prior post was that David’s playing, to put it simply, cheered Saul up and brought him out of his doldrums. Henry and Gill seem to agree. Can our mindset allow Satan to attack us and can simply getting our mind off us those things that drag us down actually lift us up? I think so. I honestly don’t really know how it worked in that passage but I am in good company when I say that I do not believe the music had the power over the evil spirit. If it did, then why didn’t it work 2 chapters later? You continue by stating that I refuse to take the passage seriously. I assure you that I do. I have studied this passage on multiple occasions. I have read multiple books that hold the same position you do and they all seem to state what you are stating about I Samuel. That has only driven me back to the passage. I simply don’t believe God intended for this to be a teaching on the morality of music (see above for the reasons to that). It is way too late for me to dig into your reference of II Kings 3. Without even looking at it though, you still have a missing link. Once again, let’s assume your assessment of II Kings is true and it proves the morality of music…how do you make the connection between this teaching and your music that you deem to be morally good? In other words, how do we identify that music (remember that the argument is that music apart from lyrics can be inherently sinful)? In conclusion (finally), I still do not see that Scripture teaches the morality of music apart from the lyrics. Even if it did, you are still missing how to identify morally good music and what music is sinful. There is a logical leap from “the Bible says music can be sinful” to “my music is not sinful.” I don’t believe you actually can identify that music and I don’t believe Scott can either. I’ll illustrate what I mean….I went to the same school where you went to seminary. Of course, BJ has very strict rules on music. However, you can’t even get a consensus from the faculty about what music is good and what isn’t. We had our dorm supervisor ok certain music yet the dean of men said it was wrong music. If the opinion of what music is good and what music is bad varies among those that agree on the morality of music, then there must be a real problem since we can’t identify what music is sinful and what music is moral. (I only use BJ as an example as this same issue exists among many, maybe all, people that hold that music is moral). If you made it this far, thank you for your patience! 106. Rajesh says: Thanks for your comments and interaction. I, too, have to work this morning, so I cannot possibly respond to all that you have said. Although I have profited many times previously from Henry and Gill, for various reasons, I think that there are deficiencies in their works. If they did not think about the relevance of 1 Samuel 16 to the morality of music issues, it may very well stem from the fact that the view that music is neutral/amoral is a recent formulation and was not something that they faced in their day. I understand that larger things than music are going on in the passage, including God’s beginning to exalt David, etc. At the same time, the Spirit framed the passage with an explicit emphasis on instrumental music that must not be minimized. By far, David is the most important sacred musician mentioned in Scripture, and the importance of his music on this occasion is on that basis additionally not an incidental aspect of that passage. I am very aware of the concerns that you have with my understanding of the passage, especially about how to apply it to our circumstances. Nonetheless, I refuse to allow issues about application misinform basic exegesis and exposition of the passage. We can discuss modern relevance after establishing the basic force of the passage. Briefly, as you know, man is much more than an emotional being. When an evil spirit afflicts a man, there is no reason to limit the affliction to merely an emotional effect. Saul was afflicted in multiple ways, including emotionally, mentally, physically, and spiritually. I do not think that I asserted that the music acted independently of the work of God. What I am saying is that God used David’s music to relieve Saul of affliction caused by an evil spirit. Whether or not David sang to Saul, the Spirit chose to highlight David’s playing and did not mention singing. The Spirit did so for a reason, and we must account for why He did so. Concerning what happened on later occasions, I have addressed that here (, so I will refer you to that article. I’ll respond more later, as time allows. 107. Martin says: Great post Nick – admire your patience in going through this all (as well as Rajesh’s persistence). I wanted to take this opportunity to point you to a helpful resource on your, say, incredulity that there are universals in musical meaning. It’s a 4-hour lecture by Ken Myers: Now I realize I already put something on your plate, as did Rajesh, so if you want to cut it short, just listen to Part 3 of the series, where he gets into the nitty-gritty of form and content. 108. Martin says: As I was reading Rajesh’s explanation, I was thinking of two situations here: 1) David’s music was moral and it was through the music that the evil spirit was made to leave (Rajesh’s assertion). 2) David’s playing was obviously moral (since it is activity) but the music was neutral (Neil’s assertion). God used David in this instance and confirmed His anointing on David by commanding the spirit to leave as David played. The music itself thus had no real power apart from the special intervention of God during David’s play, meant to confirm that God was with him over and above King Saul. Based on the fact that the evil spirit reoccurs in both 1.Sam 18 and 19, it seems logical to assume that Saul’s state has something to do with the spirit’s activity each time, i.e. his state of mind was indeed caused by the spirit. Granting that, as Rajesh explains, there were events in-between that further confirmed God’s anointing on David (and increased Saul’s anger and jealousy), this cannot fully account for the fact that the music no longer had the desired effect on these occasions. The way I see it, the same thing is happening each time: God wants Saul to see that He has chosen David and wants Saul to accept that decision, and repent and be saved. Yet, each time Saul refuses to repent. Instead, he hardens himself. I can’t help drawing a parallel to Pharaoh and the ten plagues here: God repeatedly gave Pharaoh room for repentance but as he refused, things got tougher and Pharaoh’s heart hardened more and more. The same seems to be happening to Saul in 1. Samuel. If that is so, the three instances in chapters 16, 18 and 19 are really no different: each time, God wants to bring Saul to accept that David is His anointed. As Saul refuses, God piles up more evidence, which is replicated by Saul hardening more each time, culminating in the javelin incidents and then his persecution of David with his entire army. Given the music did NOT work on the spirit in the other two incidences although the latter is clearly mentioned as the cause of Saul’s spiritual state, it seems obvious that God removed Saul’s opportunity to repent and allowed him to harden his heart more and more. The power to liberate was therefore not in the music but in God’s sovereign decision to set Saul free in David’s presence. There is then no need to see David’s music as moral. Since there are no other instances of music being used this way in the Bible (as Neil already pointed out), the scales clearly tilt against the idea that there was some property inherent in the music that helped Saul against the spirit. It was a unique situation caused by God, not the music. 109. Martin, The last couple of sentences in you’re last response actually answered the questions I’ve had about using the event with David and Saul in 1 Samuel as biblical evidence that music can inherently sinful or inherently good. Even though I never asked the question, thank you for answering it for me. I’m not sure if you yourself hold to this thought process but if you do it is something you and I both can agree on. I’ve always thought that the evil spirit left Saul not because of something that was in the music David played but because God decided to relieve Saul of that evil spirit when in the presence of David. Also, I was confused because it seemed like people were creating a theology of music that articulated that music has inherently sinful or inherently righteous qualities based upon that one instance in Scripture. It confused me because there aren’t any other instances of this happening and I thought that it was just a unique situation caused by God, sort of like when Peter’s shadow in the book of Acts healed people. There isn’t a doctrine or theology that I know of that’s rooted in Scripture and states that our shadows can heal people of sickness. It was just a unique event caused by God, not the shadow itself. Overall, I guess my next question is, since it seems like the instances with David and Saul in 1 Samuel cannot be used as biblical proof that music is inherently sinful or inherently good, is there any other passages that would do a better job? Also, Martin thank you for responding to my last comment. I definitely understand that there’s a difference between preaching and a music performance. I also understand that you did not mean to assume someone’s personal motives, no offense was taken there. The only reason why I brought up Lecrae’s performance was that I wanted to compare what people had to say about his posture and Shai’s posture. I simply did not understand why some were saying that Shai’s posture was sinful. After posting the two Lecrae videos and hearing Aaron’s opinion, I now do not understand why Lecrae’s posture was hypocritical. I posted another video before Lecrae’s performances of another Christian rapper named Eshon Burgundy and asked about his posture. Someone had commented saying that his posture was completely okay, yet he had the spotlight on him, the camera was focused on him, he was in front of an audience all the while saying “Behold, the Lamb of God!” So overall, I’m just confused. 110. Rick says: Martin, I still haven’t had a chance to go through your info on your blog that you posted but will certainly get to it. I wanted to say that your assessment of I Samuel was very clear and well put. Kudos to you! I also wanted to say that I appreciate Kelsey. I don’t know if any of you have clicked on his name and gone to his blog, but he is only 18 years old! He is wise beyond his years, and if holy hip hop creates a thinker like him, then I am all for it! Kudos to you as well! 111. Thanks Rick, I appreciate the shout out! I know I’ve got a lot of growing to do but praise God He’s continuing to grow me in wisdom. 112. Rajesh says: Martin, Rick, and Kelsey, I am preparing a thoroughly researched and carefully presented explanation of why the interpretation that Martin presented (1/22 1:03 pm) and Rick and Kelsey have commended is not sound. I may have it ready late this evening; if not, it may be tomorrow afternoon or evening before I will have enough time to finish it. 113. Rick says: Martin, I read through your article and have made a lot of comments concerning specific points. It will take me a while to put that into a clear response. I do want to say though that I believe you mischaracterized Lecrae greatly, so I’m glad you linked to your sources where possible. The article where most of the quotes came from will give you a much different view of him if you read the entire thing. You reference to him saying he doesn’t want to be associated with the title of Christian. Lecrae actually said: “I remember when Eminem, I forgot the song [“My Dad’s Gone Crazy”], but he was like, “I’d rather be a *********** [expletive] gospel rapper.” I remember how that resonates through the culture. Like, “Man, that scene is wack.” The craft is frowned upon and it seems wack. So, for me, it’s more the presupposition of what that is and I don’t wanna be associated.” So he doesn’t want to be seen as the world understands (presupposes) a Christian. In reading the entire article, he doesn’t shy away from being a Christian and makes no bones about it. Here are a couple paragraphs of the article for better context: I don’t expect everyone to agree with the way he goes about this, but he certainly isn’t trying to get away from the title of Christian. Also, part of your article talked about Jesus’ call to freely give what we have received…in other words, he shouldn’t sell his music if he is trying to evangelize. There are issues with this assertion outside of the application to Lecrae but for now I’ll just address Lecrae. In asking him about the release of Church Clothes, he said: “I didn’t want them to have to one, pay for the music to experience it or test it out….” I don’t know the manner in which he released it, but apparently you could go listen to it without a payment going to him. There are certainly points of the article where many will disagree with his methods, but I think he was mischaracterized in your article. Please don’t mistake this as an accusation that you intentionally did this, but the context certainly clears up some of the many questions I had as I read your article. In addition, I believe it refutes some of the points you made. I would encourage everyone to go read the article to get the full context: 114. Martin says: Thanks for the time to read the article and comment on it, Rick. I’d be pleased to get any other feedback you may be able to give, especially on the core section about semiotics. To respond to the above, I can assure you that I DID read the entire interview with Lecrae. I certainly did not mean to say that Lecrae no longer wants to be (or be called) a Christian. What I DID mean to say, however, is that he does not want his music to be called HHH or Christian or gospel rap. This is actually confirmed by what your wrote above, given he now says he is looking at other topics than only traditionally or openly Christian ones. As such, he is crossing over to the mainstream of rap, leaving the HHH arena. I actually greet this move as a good decision, and this will now allow him to have much more fitting lyrics for the songs he writes. I think U2 think just like him – they make commercial, high-quality popular art that is finding good reception among both Christians and non-Christians. There is no talk of evangelization there. They simply take up issues in their songs that they think are relevant. Great! Then they go on and do good with the pile of money they are making. Fantastic! I wish Lecrae all the best and hope he can follow their lead. My point was, however, that this means we can no longer speak of HHH since there no longer is a separate category of ‘Christianized’ rap. So the entire argument that has been made repeatedly in this discussion, i.e. that the lyrics sanctify the music, falls apart (of course I think this is a moot argument since there is nothing to sanctify anyways). Yet, if Lecrae’s music becomes just ‘good art’ then it will be indistinguishable from other ‘good art’ in the hip hop scene, and the idea that it does NOT express the values and worldview of that community will be impossible to defend. From his other comments I tried to show that his worldview is indeed either worldly or at best, that of an immature Christian. About the ‘freely give’ comment, I had seen this remark about him giving away music for free, which is why I wrote it the way I did: “Some artists may give away some of their music for free but still, they live off sales to both the converted and the unconverted if evangelism is their aim.” 115. Rajesh says: [In keeping with what I said earlier, I’m posting this response on Friday night around 11pm (ET). But, I am not sure when you will see it.] You wrote, You have wrongly analyzed the passage. Had Saul had any idea that David was God’s anointed through David’s ministry recorded to him in 16:14-23, Saul would have tried to kill him long before what we read of his trying to do so in 18:11. In fact, we read that Saul “loved him greatly” at this point. So, you misread the passages when you say, “there were events in-between that further confirmed God’s anointing on David (and increased Saul’s anger and jealousy).” Saul’s anger and jealousy were not increased by the intervening events (from 1 Samuel 16:23 to 1 Sam. 18:10) because there is no evidence that he had any anger or jealousy toward David prior to 18:8ff. Furthermore, five more problems with your handling of this passage show further that your analysis is not sound. 1. David is the premier sacred musician mentioned in Scripture. First Samuel 16:14-23 is not just an account of how God began to exalt David as His anointed future ruler over His people Israel; God was also commencing David’s special ministry of music for the glory of God. In fact, in the inspired record of his last words (2 Sam. 23:1-7), David refers to himself as “the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel” (2 Sam. 23:1). In David’s own mind, his role as the sweet musician of God’s people was a singularly important aspect of his own self-conception. First Samuel 16:14-23 records the commencing of that special role, and David’s playing the harp was no minor facet of this account. Numerous passages confirm that his being a sacred instrumentalist was a crucial part of his contribution to the cause of Yahweh. Furthermore, your interpretation does not explain why God acted only when David played; why didn’t God do it through David’s merely arriving in the presence of Saul or through his praying or through his singing or through his speaking the words of God to Saul instead of his playing the harp? Your interpretation also does not account for the strong emphasis on David’s being skilled as a harpist to bring about the relief from spiritual affliction (16:16, 17, 18). In fact, Saul’s response to his servant’s suggestion is to command them to bring him “a man who can play well” (16:17). Holladay’s Hebrew Lexicon says about the verb forms used here: “d) w. inf. or fin. vb. = adv.: w. nagg¢n play beautifully Is 2316, l®nagg¢n 1S 1617;” If his music was only incidental to what happened, why does the Spirit record a repeated emphasis on his skillfulness at playing music? 2. Your interpretation does not account for the confident expectation of Saul’s servants concerning what would relieve Saul of his spirit-caused affliction. Somehow, they had certainty that harp music ministered by a skillful harpist would do so (1 Sam. 16:16). If what happened on this occasion was a unique working of God only minimally related to David’s playing music, and had never happened before in Israel’s history, the servants’ confidence is left unexplained. The text does not have even a hint that they were merely throwing out some off-the-cuff suggestion of something they thought might somehow work. We do not read that they said something like this: “Sire, an evil spirit is afflicting thee. Perhaps, thou shouldest try sending for a skillful harp player. Who knows, maybe listening to harp music might help. It’s worth giving a shot, your Majesty. Thou hast nothing to lose by trying it.” No, Saul’s servants were confident that he would be relieved of his affliction by hearing instrumental harp music played by a skillful musician. They were confident because they knew that others had previously experienced hearing such harp music and being relieved by it from such demonically caused affliction. 3. You have wrongly understood this passage as recording a one-time exceptional event: (Martin- “three instances in chapters 16, 18, 19” [meaning that chapter 16 records a single instance]; Kelsey – “it was just a unique event caused by God”). You may have gotten this incorrect understanding from reading the KJV in a sense that it was not intended to be taken: “And it came to pass, when the evil spirit from God was upon Saul, that David took an harp, and played with his hand: so Saul was refreshed, and was well, and the evil spirit departed from him.” a) A careful examination of the Hebrew text of 1 Sam. 16:23 shows that this verse is not recording a unique event that happened only once. The Hebrew text has a beyth preposition with an infinitive construct (Bi\|h•yôt) preceded by a waw perfect verb and followed by three more waw perfect forms, which signify that the actions were repeated each time that the evil spirit came upon Saul. b) Many major modern translations reflect correctly the Hebrew grammar and syntax in this verse by rendering the beyth preposition rightly as “whenever”: “So it came about whenever the evil spirit from God came to Saul” (NAU); “So whenever the spirit from God would come upon Saul (NET); “Whenever the spirit from God came upon Saul” (NIV); “And so it was, whenever the spirit from God was upon Saul (NKJ); see also the ESV and CSB. Each of these modern versions correctly translates the verse as communicating that whenever the evil spirit would come on Saul, David would take the harp . . . and the evil spirit would depart. c) The Septuagint, an early Greek translation of the Hebrew text, confirms the proper understanding that the verse records multiple occasions when David’s playing delivered Saul from demonic affliction. It has a contemporaneous time present infinitive (en tō einai) followed by four imperfect indicative verbs (elambanen, epsallen, anepsuchen, aphistato), which signifies ongoing action either on a continuous basis or on a repetitive basis. Because we know thus that the spirit was repeatedly departing from him (its continuously departing would make no sense), we know that all the verbs are signifying repetitive action on multiple occasions. d) This interpretation and translation is explicitly and conclusively confirmed by 1 Samuel 18:10, which shows that David had played to relieve Saul on numerous other times prior to the instance recorded in that verse: 1Sa 18:10 And it came to pass on the morrow, that the evil spirit from God came upon Saul, and he prophesied in the midst of the house: and David played with his hand, as at other times: and there was a javelin in Saul’s hand. The Hebrew text confirms that David was ministering to Saul on an ongoing basis with his harp to relieve him of that affliction (keyom beyom). Many modern translations pick this up: NAU 1Sa 18:10 while David was playing the harp with his hand, as usual; NIV 1Sa 18:10 while David was playing the harp, as he usually did; NKJ 1Sa 18:10 So David played music with his hand, as at other times; ESV 1Sa 18:10 while David was playing the lyre, as he did day by day. CSB 1Sa 18:10 David was playing the harp as usual. The Reina Valera, a Spanish translation that predates the KJV, also confirms this reading: R60 1Sa 18:10 David tocaba con su mano como los otros días; and this modern Spanish translation of the Hebrew text does the same: LBA 1Sa 18:10 mientras David tocaba el arpa con su mano como de costumbre. Based on the Hebrew and Greek texts of both 1 Sam. 16:23 and 18:10, it is clear that 1 Sam. 16:23 is not recording a one-time unique deliverance of Saul by David’s playing his harp on that first occasion. You have wrongly assessed what took place on this occasion as a special working of God only minimally related to the music in the sense of the music being an incidental feature of the sovereign one-time working of God to deliver Saul from his affliction caused by an evil spirit. The Holy Spirit has framed this account in such a way that the explicit emphasis is on David’s playing the harp as the means by which Saul was delivered repeatedly from his affliction. Scripture thus shows that David played the harp to relieve Saul on many occasions, and the evil spirit departed on each occasion as a result of God’s use of David’s Spirit-empowered music. 4. The latter accounts that supposedly show the ineffectuality of the music to deliver Saul do not show that it never was the music in the first place. Just as the preaching of the Word does not profit all its hearers but only profits those who have ears to hear, so Saul’s radically changed disposition toward David prevented him from receiving the benefit of the music, as he had enjoyed before. I have personally experienced on more than occasion when someone has ministered musically so that their music blessed many other people, but it did not bless me because there was an unresolved issue between the person(s) ministering the music and me. The same has also been true regarding the preaching and teaching of the Word of God. In both settings, it was not that the music or the ministry of the Word lacked effectuality on those occasions—the differing outcome was due to the problem that I had with those who were ministering to me. 5. The text provides no evidence that God removed Saul’s opportunity to repent, as Martin asserts. Rather, Saul hardened himself against David and God and thereby forfeited the spiritual benefit that he would have received (had he had a right mindset toward David and God) from the music produced by a Spirit-empowered man of God. In conclusion, 1 Samuel 16:14-23 certainly stresses that it was God’s use of David’s skillful playing of the harp on multiple occasions to deliver him from horrible affliction caused by an evil spirit. David’s instrumental music was thus a powerful force for spiritual good—it was not neutral. 116. Rick says: Martin, I’m finally getting back with you! I’m not so much going to try and make this a cohesive post with an overall thought pattern, rather I’m just going to put some comments down concerning some of your points. I’ll just go straight through it in order and comment. In your introduction, you state how semiotics is an emerging discipline. I believe Rajesh said something similar in another post as well. I have to wonder why this is a new discipline. Admittedly, I know very little about it. The question that came up upon reading your comment and thinking back to Rajesh’s is, if music has been around since Adam why are we just now figuring out that there are elements in music that are sinful. If music can be sinful apart from lyrics, are we to believe that music just started being moral/immoral in the last 50 years? There was discussion about the song of a harlot and of fools and of drunkards. You would think this wouldn’t be a new discipline if music has been around forever. Do we see anyone in history looking at semiotics (even if they didn’t call it that) and detailing out elements of music that are inherently sinful? If we don’t see that in the years before the advent of rock and roll then I have to wonder why. You state how semiotics is not an exact science since people cannot agree 100% on associating specific musical compositions with certain emotions. First thing that pops out here is the word “emotions.” This is what most of us are saying that music deals with ….the emotions. In other words, it can express happiness, sadness, anger, etc. If you want to call that communication, that is fine but it has to do with the emotions and not any specific communication as in talking. Secondly, I agree that you will never get people to agree 100% on what emotion music is expressing. What is anger to one person is not to another. One may see sensual elements when another doesn’t. This isn’t due to any deficiency in one person over another or any lack of training but is affected by the person’s environment and culture. If they can’t nail down a specific communication (even in emotions, much less explicit communications) in music then how can we say there are specific elements that are sinful? You later stated, “The other problem with discussing HHH is that people identify with their music preferences. This is the case with all popular music, and discussing the appropriateness of music therefore becomes almost impossible since any such attempt is taken as a personal attack on someone’s tastes.” This is not always the case and is, in fact, not my case. I’m asserting that Hip Hop is not inherently sinful apart from lyrics. However, hip hop is not my musical preference. I have actually started listening to it because of the incredible lyrics by people like Shai Linne, but I do not enjoy the hip hop side of it and would much rather listen to Chris Tomlin singing these lyrics than Shai Linne! I also grew up in the culture that see music as inherently moral/immoral and am the music director at a church that is nearly hymn only. So my background and preferences are not hip hop yet I’m asserting that hip hop is not inherently evil….I do this based off of what I see in Scripture (or perhaps I should say don’t see in Scripture). Now, getting to the semiotics, you quoted Stougaard from page 67. I could not help but notice how many times the word “feeling” was used in this paragraph…I counted 8 times. Webster defines feeling as an emotional state or reaction. I agree that music can affect our emotions. However, the emotion that is affected is determined by our preconceptions and our culture. In other words, I don’t believe that you can say a specific element universally expresses a specific emotion. That is clearly evident by the multitude of reactions to Scott’s analysis of Shai’s song in his latest post. Furthermore, these elements and the emotions they affect are not inherently sinful. As we have discussed at length in multiple threads, anger is not necessarily wrong and happiness is not necessarily right either. You referenced a laid-back attitude. I may not fully understand what you mean by that, but I don’t see that as sinful either in the way in which it is expressed in the article. I may not understand what is meant though. However, what Stougaard sees as “laid-back” is not going to be universally seen as “laid-back” to everyone else. You comment on the speed at which some rap and hip hop communicate and state that “it is obvious that the speed is not conducive to communication.” I wouldn’t make such a statement. It may not be conducive to you and I but I am amazed at what is grasped by those that listen to it all the time. During the summer, we take our kids to work in a camp for a week. I heard some of the guys at this camp rapping some of these fast sections from some of the artists in HHH. I was amazed at how they could get those lyrics in. They also knew what the lyrics were saying. So it may not be conducive to communicating with those unfamiliar with the genre but that is not universal. Also, as I have listened to some of Shai’s songs, I have found that hearing what he says is actually easier than some of the songs that I normally listen to simply because it is more of a talking than a singing. However, when he is moving quickly as in the song you linked to, it also makes me want to get the lyrics and see what he is saying, which just drives me further into the awesome lyrics. I’ll end this paragraph by saying also that communicating in the speed they do is not sinful either, so I’m wondering why this is even an issue. In this same section much is said about focusing on the individual and individual ideas. I agree that this is wrong. The real question is whether this is applicable to HHH. I think this is erroneously applied (not necessarily by you but in the comments) to guys like Shai simply because he is not in a suit standing behind a pulpit when he sings. In other words, someone holding a mic, walking around on stage and rapping is so foreign to many people and they erroneously say that the performer is looking to glorify himself. The same accusations have been lobbed at those in CCM. I just do not see that in the artists at the concerts I have been to. I’m sure there are some, but we can’t take a problem with a subset and apply it wholeheartedly to an entirely different subset. In reference to the prior paragraph, you stated: “When communicating messaging focused on the Gospel of Christ, the individual should not be in the foreground but rather, the message and the listener, in order to maximize the clarity of what is communicated. The individual needs to step back and let the message take over.” Tell me how this is accomplished. It was said in one of the comments that Lecrae was at center stage, under the lights, on screen, and the attention was on him. Isn’t this what happens when someone gets up in church to sing a “special?” They get up, grab a mic (or stand in front of one), go center stage where the spotlights will be on them, and everyone’s focus on them. Could it be that the “focus on me” attitude is simply coming from the eye of the beholder instead of from the attitude of those on stage? I’d rather give a Christian brother the benefit of the doubt. Concerning the assertion that hip hop is exclusionary. Sure, a Christian shouldn’t be exclusionary to the extent that they are not in the world spreading seed. I’m trying to wrap my head around this one though. It is almost circular or a little warped reasoning to me. We shouldn’t be exclusionary and we should go into the whole world to preach the Gospel, yet we shouldn’t use a genre that may be able to get to those people that are exclusionary in the first place. Now I am not one that thinks music is a good evangelistic tool. But those that are saved that have been in that culture can certainly be disciple much easier with music they understand and relate to. In addition, I just don’t understand how a genre of music would identify me as exclusionary if I listen to it. Kind of a weird point to me but I may not fully understand either. Further down you said, “Whereas compelling is conducive to gospel-centered messaging, aggressiveness or laid-backness is not, as was already noted . More interesting are the other terms used here, such as poking, dissing, or boasting – maybe better terms to use for hip hop in general than aggressiveness, since clearly not all HHH songs sound aggressive.” I disagree. Aggressiveness can be very conducive to Gospel-centered messaging depending on the subject matter of the song. For example, one of Shai’s songs talks about the jealousy of God and the beginning gives the analogy of a man finding his wife cheating on him and the anger he experiences. Aggressiveness in this song helps communicate the adultery God sees when we put anything else in front of Him. Likewise, doesn’t an aggressive style fit with God being just? Regardless, even if music alone were able to communicate aggressiveness, is aggressiveness sinful? This last question is the crux of the matter. We can talk all day about the appropriateness of emotions in music but it really boils down to whether that emotion is sinful or not. “Again, anything that sounds like boasting or dissing is not a good choice for Christian music . We need to look for other styles that would project ideas such as grave, intense, urgent , or maybe glorious, depending on what the lyrics are.” What does boasting or dissing sound like in music? We are discussing music apart from lyrics and whether it can be sinful or not. I don’t know how you would express boasting or dissing without lyrics. And once again, boasting or dissing is not necessarily wrong….it depends on the object. If I boast in Christ, that is a good thing. If I diss on the devil, that is a good thing. If it is boasting in myself or dissing on someone else then it is not good but I still don’t know how you do that without lyrics. Concerning syncretism, I just don’t see this as much of an argument to anyone that has listened to HHH. You essentially admit this when you say, “Whereas nobody would assume this is also the case for HHH, the question remains whether consumers of HHH can fully shed this original association.” It sounds like the argument says that the two styles of music sound alike so people will associate bad things with HHH. Any associational issues (which I think is not as big of an issue in reality), in my opinion, go away when they hear the lyrics. Anyone immersed in secular hip hop sees an immediate difference as soon as they listen to HHH. There is no question that it is different. Of course this is my opinion but it is an informed decision based on conversations with others. “Crae and co. deliver music with a message without coming off preachy.“ I can fully understand this. You can preach without being preachy. We’ve talked about the world’s perceptions of Christians. They see us as holding our big fat family Bibles ready to hit them over the head because they are not like us. Like it or not, they see guys like the “pastor” in NC that wanted to throw all the homosexuals into an electric fence and drop some food to them once in a while until they die out. Yes, they view us as preachy and don’t want to hear the message. You definitely can preach to them without being preachy. The method of doing this is probably different for everyone. So the edgy/cool music (you reference those terms in your paragraph) can be used as long as there is nothing inherently wrong with it and the lyrics and performance are compatible with Scripture (I know that is the debatable part). I see Paul as doing this in a manner of speaking. He referenced philosophers when speaking to others. He spoke in their centers where they met to discuss philosophy. It’s not a 1:1 comparison but he did try to relate to them in a manner in which they would understand. Once again, I am not one that thinks music is a good evangelization tool (it can work though), but I do see it as a tremendous edification tool for those that are saved and had been immersed in that culture. I understand though that many others have a different opinion. So please feel free to do it a different way. We need multiple ways of evangelizing and discipling since everyone is different and relates differently. Your conclusion had some really, and I mean really, broad-brushing statements that I won’t comment on other than pointing some of them out. “This being the case, HHH can justly be called bad art. This does not take away from the intent of the artists but does speak to their artistic training and lack of cultural and musical understanding.” “Certainly, many HHH artists are very talented, yet what they produce is juvenile art that speaks to a public that is either composed of juveniles or of those who prefer to remain juvenile.” “There is a risk that either HHH will not be understood as distinctly Christian by the surrounding culture or that Christians immersed in this subculture will adopt the ideas of the larger pagan community, thus leaving orthodoxy and drifting away from a sound biblical worldview and lifestyle.” To conclude (finally), semiotics seemed to only point out the emotions inherent in music. As I had stated in another post, there are emotions inherent in the color of paint for your restaurant but neither one can communicate explicitly. It cannot communicate in a manner that is inherently sinful or holy….it only affects the emotions (remember how much he used the word feel or feelings?). Semiotics also pointed to the culture surrounding hip hop and assumed the personality of secular hip hop (for lack of a better term) would be inherent in HHH (don’t like that term either!). I don’t see that happening. I feel like that analysis is coming from a bunch of older white guys that don’t understand the genre and have listened to a 10 second snippet of one song and are declaring themselves experts (sound familiar?). HHH is viewed as different than worldly hip hop. Lecrae illustrated this well in one of the articles you quoted. In it he said, “what’s funny is that in the Grammy’s, Christian music is the only music that is categorized off of content.” He is also being criticized for trying to get non-Christians to listen to his music. Doesn’t that imply that non-Christians see something different about him and his music? To summarize, it still has not been shown that there is something in music that is inherently moral/immoral. Secondly, the world views HHH as something different….why are we arguing differently? I do appreciate your thoughtful analysis and certainly see how you can come to a different conclusion than I do. However, I just don’t see any of this (semiotics) meshing with Scripture. Scripture does not address inherent evil in music nor do principles point to inherent evil. No one is able to point to an element of music and tell us how to identify music that is evil which would have to happen in order for us to keep from sinning in this manner. I’m sure I will be lambasted in a post or two with examples of where we draw the line on other items such as modesty and art, however there isn’t any question whether we should dress modestly or whether we should look at wicked things. However, realize that not all of us simply want to listen to whatever we want just so we can thumb our noses at everyone else. I truly want God to be pleased with my life and everything in it. I see this as an issue that has harmed many people because of the straining at gnats that creates rules that are not in Scripture. I understand it is done with every good intention by someone that also wants to please God with every fiber of their being. I don’t question your intention or Scott’s, but I believe this is a very harmful thing. Thank you for your patience with me and please understand my heart in this. We are fellow Christians seeking the same thing…hopefully it just drives us back into Scripture and study. 117. Rajesh says: I am confident that I have not made any comments concerning semiotics in relation to music. I am not sure what you are referring to about my previous comments. You also say, Music did not just start being moral/immoral in the last 50 years. Until the CCM crowd came along, everyone said that music was either moral or immoral. It was the CCM crowd who fabricated the false view that music without lyrics is neutral, and they did it to justify their using instrumental music that even many in the world, including many of the producers of rock music themselves, said was evil. 118. Martin says: Rick, thanks for your engagement with my essay (which is about as long :-) but I was really surprised that you wrote it as if it was a reply to Scott and not to me. Since the very beginning of this discussion in early December, I have consistently held and defended the position that music is amoral – though not neutral in an artistic sense. I do not discuss morality in my essay, so I don’t know why you keep referring to that throughout your post as if it were central to what I wrote? I clearly stated I don’t think HHH is sinful at the end, so how is it possible you argue against that as if I did? I’m truly lost for words. 119. Martin says: Than you Rajesh – your detailed reply certainly deserves an answer. I think some of your points are very worthwhile, yet the question is what an overall appreciation of 1.Sam 16-18 etc. should result in. As to the charge that Saul would have killed David immediately, I think this does not take into account the gradual deterioration of Saul’s spiritual health. That he is getting worse over time transpires from the story, and indicates to me that he may have reacted differently earlier than later. We do not know at which point Saul knew that David has been anointed king by Samuel. I would agree with you that it is plausible that Saul did NOT know about this in chapter 16. Later, we see the deep friendship between David and Jonathan, where it is likely that Jonathan knew fairly early about this issue, but (in contrast to Saul) accepted it as of God. It is also possible that the issue was known by others than only Samuel and David’s brothers after some time. As a conclusion, I would suggest that Saul knew somewhere in-between chapter 16 and 18, with 18:8 being the last possible time that he knew. We should also note that Saul still ‘loved’ David even after 18:8 but it was a love-hate relationship. Sometimes, he would still recognize his love for David for a moment, but it would never last. Note, however, that I was talking about chapters 16, 18, and 19. Admittedly, I should have left 16 out but I think there is a progression from 18 to 19 at least, and beyond that as well. I still think the parallel to Pharaoh in Egypt has something to it, simply because there are so many instances where Saul could and should have repented: when he first had the spiritual trouble, then when he realized David (the one who was anointed to replace him) was a blessing to him (showing God’s grace even in the midst of judgment), when Jonathan embraced God’s verdict that also included his own right of succession, and then when David spared Saul’s life even though Saul kept persecuting him. Time after time, he failed and hardened his heart more – until the final judgment came. My main point was that God wanted to show His anointing on David, and He did so increasingly (the music that helped Saul, his victories in war, his friendship with Saul’s son, and his forgiving attitude even when he could have taken it out on Saul). I see a gradual increase here as well, or at least a demonstration of how God was with David in several different respects. To your other points: 1) & 2) I see David’s music ministry as secondary to the account about is ascent to kingship in 1.Samuel. That it is also very important is no question, yet it is not central to the account we are discussing. Be that as it may, you also wrote that BOTH aspects can be found here, so the fact that his music ministry is also important doesn’t negate the fact that we are dealing with how he was prepared for his kingship through his experiences at Saul’s court apart from the musical aspects. Now you are emphasizing something special about David’s music ministry and that its morality had a positive effect but I am not accepting that it was a healing ministry or that his music was effecting Saul’s temporary relief through some inherent morality or any magic powers in this music. Let’s analyze 16:16 in this respect: I see three possibilities here as to why Saul’s councillors called for David: As Rick already pointed out to you, there is no agreement among commentators with your thesis that the music itself had any direct power over the evil spirit. If morality drives away demons, they could have simply read out the Pentateuch, for example (to expand on the other examples you provided, which seem to work against your argument, not in favour). Many believe that music is spiritual, acting on body, mind, and the human spirit simultaneously. So it is the fact that music is used to soothe the soul, not that it is inherently moral. b) Consequently, it could have been a common belief that music was a means to alleviate spiritual afflictions. David Guzik writes, “In the past, Saul received the Spirit of the LORD in the presence of music (1 Samuel 10:10). Perhaps this is an effort to recreate that experience.” This, however, does not prove that the music has moral qualities. Rather, it seems to be aligned with today’s music therapy where music is consciously used to help with certain psychological ailments. We may all do this at home sometimes to enhance mood or create a specific atmosphere. It is also used in malls etc. to create a certain ambiance meant to make us feel better (and buy more stuff). So Scripture signifies that music has such a function, which is confirmed by modern research. Does that make it moral? If so, how? c) It could have been a prophecy, in the sense of them being used by God to indicate by which means Saul would find relief from his spiritual affliction. This would fit my original assertion that this was a one-time event orchestrated by God. Now in light of the above, I’d be inclined to give up this option. There is more than one instance in the Bible where music is used to catalyze positive spiritual events – we might include the music that was played at the inauguration of the temple later one as another example. Yet, we should also note that these were all occasions where the Holy Spirit acted, not where a demon spirit was to be driven away. So even if there were precedents, Saul’s advisors would have to have extrapolated here, maybe hoping that music would bring about a positive effect apart from God’s Spirit. We certainly don’t think we can conjure up the Holy Spirit with music, but music can be a powerful means to express right affections and maybe even to prepare or align hearts this way. Yet, we should not discount God’s sovereign intervention completely: surely, God was arranging this all = Saul’s affliction, the proposed remedy, and that David would be called to provide it. Technically, the proposed remedy may well NOT have worked, but God made sure it did (as in ‘medicus curat, Deus sanat’). Of course David would not have player music that represented immorality. But there is no need here to invoke any inherent morality to explain a soothing effect on Saul by music; we can still observe that today and it’s even put to commercial or other professional use. 3) You are reading more into my initial post than I meant to express. Yes, I fully agree with you (and was aware of the fact) that David played regularly. When speaking about a unique event, I meant that this is the only passage in the Scriptures where music is used to drive away demons. Doctrine should be based on more than one reference, and I would submit that this occasion with David and Saul is a single reference, even if we are told David played many times. As a consequence, I hesitate to deduct from that that ‘righteous’ music has power to drive away demons. 4) If the effect is one of relationship and not of musical quality, does your analogy about preaching not also imply that bad preaching can have a powerful effect if only the listener is disposed to hearing and God’s spirit anoints the message to him, however imperfectly it may have been delivered? But then you are putting the emphasis on God’s sovereign working again, and not on the skill of the speaker/musician, or the means of delivery. Does that not make your argument weaker? 5) Certainly, David’s playing was morally good activity – this was never debated. It worked on several occasions but over time, Saul hardened himself more and more against God and also started to hat David as he realized David would take over his throne. I agree that Saul was given more occasions to repent even after this one, but as Pharaoh, he would not listen to the Spirit’s call and things got worse over time. As you wrote, it may have been his antagonism to David that made the playing inefficacious, or the demonic influence over Saul increased over time as God allowed this to happen due to Saul resisting the Spirit. There is no need, however, to invoke moral qualities in the music itself to explain any of this. 1. Samuel deals with David’s election and training to become a King, it tells us about how God dealt with Saul, giving him many opportunities to repent, and it also shows something of David’s music ministry. It does not, however, show that music is moral and that this accounts for its effect on demon-afflicted people. 120. Rajesh says: Thanks for getting back to me about this discussion. Rather than responding to the specifics of what you have written most recently, I think that it is more important for me to challenge your basic approach to Scripture. You write, “Doctrine should be based on more than one reference.” This statement is in direct contradiction to what the apostle Paul says, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine . . .” (2 Tim. 3:16). Paul does not say, “All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine if the teaching of the passage is repeated by at least one other reference . . .” Until you accept this fundamental truth, you will never come to a right position on the music issue. Furthermore, because you exalt philosophy and logic above Scripture repeatedly, your understanding of divine truth will always fall far short because what God says is the ultimate authority in every matter, whether it lines up with one’s philosophy and logic or not. Your philosophical position that the production of music as an action is always either moral or immoral but music as the product of an action is always neutral is fallacious. In order to maintain your position, you have to read Scripture repeatedly through the lens that whenever something negative is said in Scripture about human music, the problem is always somewhere other than the music itself. How does Scripture itself teach you that this is true? If Scripture does not say this anywhere, and it certainly does not, what is your scriptural basis for holding this position? Although I do have several things to present in response to your latest comments about 1 Samuel 16-19 and its relevance for the music debates, it seems to me that continuing that discussion will be pointless until these bigger issues are addressed first. 121. Martin says: “This is the third time I am coming to you. In the mouth of two or three witnesses shall every word be established.” 2.Cor 13:1 “the Lord is a God of knowledge.” 1.Sam 2:3 And I liked this one: “The well-known prologue to John’s Gospel may be paraphrased, “In the beginning was Logic, and Logic was with God, and Logic was God…. In logic was life and the life was the light of men.” Since man is created in God’s image, logic is also part of how we can understand God and the things of His creation. God never tells us to follow blind faith based on some literalistic interpretation of the Bible. He would rather have us use our God-given faculties to apply reason to what He is trying to convey in His Word. You’re right, if you don’t think reason should be applied in interpreting Scripture, we’re at an insurmountable impasse. 122. Rajesh says: So, was Paul contradicting himself when he wrote 2 Tim. 3:16-17 after he had already written 2 Cor. 13:1? In context, 2 Cor. 13:1 is not teaching about what establishes doctrine for us. The NT had not even been fully written when Paul wrote 2 Cor. 13:1. If what you say that verse means is actually what it means, then any new revelation in the books of the Bible that were written after 2 Corinthians that was not already supported by at least one other passage in the Scripture that was already extant could not have been profitable for doctrine because that teaching would have been only found in one passage. There is no way 2 Cor. 13:1 was ever intended to be used the way that you are using it. Of course, I think reason must be applied to interpreting Scripture, but it must be subjected thoroughly to what Scripture says first. Do you have a scriptural basis for holding that music as the product of an action is always neutral? If so, what is it? Otherwise, when Scripture speaks negatively about human music production, there is no a priori basis to say that the people’s lyrics were bad, their motives were bad, the context was bad, the music overall was bad, but the instrumental music was neutral. 123. Martin says: Rajesh, of course Paul is referring to Deu 19:15, which was a law for criminal cases. The context is the sin found in one of their members’ life. Yet, many a Bible expositor has taken this rule as a prudent foundation for establishing doctrine as well. We’d do well to follow their example. Just taking an isolated scripture is not enough to establish doctrine; it needs to be in line with the rest of Scripture and based on more than just one incident to be sure it has wider validity. This is a principle based on Scripture, not a literal command in the Bible as to how we must interpret it. In terms of your second question, my scriptural basis would be the brazen serpent, which was initially ‘good’ but then ‘bad’ because it was turned into an idol. If the serpent was morally determined as good, why did it have to be destroyed? This example shows the morality of a thing depends on circumstance and their uses, not the thing itself. Logically, the thing then is neutral and only received moral significance through a positive or negative use. I argued that music in the strict sense of the word is a thing that can become part of human communication. As such, it is neutral until we can evaluate the morality of its use, which may be either moral or immoral, based on context. 124. Rick says: Haven’t been back on here in a few days, so I’m just seeing some of these posts. Rajesh, you didn’t say anything specifically about semiotics in particular but it was something about analyzing the elements of music as being a new discipline. It may have been on your website. I apologize if I misinterpreted. One thing you said does strike me though. You stated: “Until the CCM crowd came along, everyone said that music was either moral or immoral.” I have studied a lot of music history (particularly concerning hymns, where there have been a lot of controversy) and I have never run across anyone that said music could be moral or immoral. I’ve read multiple book from people that hold your stance as well and I don’t remember any historical examples being given. Can you give some examples from history where it was believed that the music itself apart from lyrics can be moral/immoral….not recent history since I believe this is a modern assertion? Martin, the end result of semiotics for Scott and the like is to take the “feeling” semiotics attempts to identify and make it into something that can be moral/immoral. Though you may not believe it is moral/immoral in and of itself (obviously I agree), that is the end result. Sorry if I assigned that belief to you, I shouldn’t have. BTW, I meant to reference a book that handles where you were going with your essay. I recently read “Does God Listen to Rap” by Curtis “Voice” Allen. He is the guy that caught a lot of grief, along with John Piper, for rapping in Piper’s church several years ago. In this book, he explains why he believes you can take hip hop, which came from sinful origins, and use it in a God-honoring way. 125. Rick says: Rajesh, I just read through your post, dated 1/24/14 at 10:08 pm, concerning further explanation of David playing the harp for Saul. Martin has handled it well so I won’t go any further with what I believe are deficiencies in your points, but let’s assume your analysis is spot-on. Can you explain how you get from David’s music to what music today has this kind of power? Apparently the music of hip/hop and rap are not this music but the music you both listen to and play is this type of music. So how are we to identify the music that David played and what music do we have today that fits this mold? 126. Rajesh says: Aside from whether you and I will ever agree on our music positions, which seems highly unlikely to me, I urge you not to misuse 2 Cor. 13:1 any more to teach something that it absolutely does not do. If you want a text that exemplifies (but does not mandate!) that a teaching in Scripture be stated in more than one place, 1 Timothy 5:18 is such a text. Paul cites both an OT passage and a NT passage as support for his teaching (5:17) about something that neither text is talking about directly in its context. This passage, however, also shows clearly that we must not dismiss even a single text in Scripture from having doctrinal value because Paul cites Deuteronomy 25:4, which is talking about not muzzling oxen! (This passage has important implications for how we are to approach the passages in Scripture about music, but I’ll save that for later.) Two clear examples from Jude show the grave danger of your approach to Scripture. Jude 9 provides inspired revelation about Satan disputing with Michael about the body of Moses, something about which we are not told anything about anywhere else in Scripture. It also teaches us how great respect even the archangel Michael displayed for Satan. Jude 14-15 provides revelation about Enoch, the first preacher in Scripture, and the vital message that he preached. We would never have known this information about him without this passage. The Spirit certainly inspired this text to profit us for doctrine in a number of ways, especially when we consider the issue of what message we are to proclaim if we are to please God in our walk with Him. I’ll get back to you about the brazen serpent at another time. 127. Rajesh says: Let me reply to your inquiry by asking you a series of questions: Are there any living beings today who know exactly what David’s instrumental music that God used to deliver Saul from demonic affliction sounded like? Are there any such beings who have a vested interested in defiling human worship as much as possible? Do we have any testimonies from humans who testify that they have been influenced by such beings to produce the kind of music that you favor? If we have such testimonies, what should the Christian response be to such testimonies? Answering these questions should make clear what approach I take to identifying what music that we have today is like David’s music and what music is not. 128. Rick says: Rajesh, I honestly do admire you for having a well thought out defense that you have gone to Scripture to develop. The problem I have with this step is that we are now letting people outside of the church determine what we do in the church. 129. Rick says: Thinking about this more, I wouldn’t think this would be your only criteria. Surely there is not someone that has given testimony to having been influenced by demons on every genre/style/etc. (other than what you use). Plus you then have issues about how to identify a particular song into a particular genre and whether someone’s testimony would apply. There would never be a concrete means of determining sinful music from holy music. Do you have other criteria? 130. Rajesh says: I do not see that heeding testimonies of people about demonic influence on them that led them to produce certain styles of music is “letting people outside of the church determine what we do in the church.” God commands us to have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness (Eph. 5:11). The Bible does not provide us with an exhaustive listing of what things are sinful (Gal. 5:21), and I find no reason not to heed testimonies from people who say that they have been influenced by demons to do the sinful things that they do. Furthermore, when other musicians (who play the same styles as those who say they have been influenced by demons) themselves say that what they have designed musically has been designed specifically to promote evil purposes, there is no reason to reject their testimonies. Based on such testimonies, I reject all rock music as well as other genres that share important characteristics with rock music. As far as other criteria is concerned, I do not have any specific new info for you that many other people, including Scott, have not already presented as reasons for rejecting many styles of music (sensuality, association, etc.). 131. Rick says: The trouble I’m having is that you make it sound pretty black and white, but there are a lot of grey areas that are not that simple (genres that split off of others yet sound different, genres where there is no testimony of demon influence, widely varying opinions among those that hold your same belief, etc.). For example, I know people that hold to the morality of music apart from lyrics that differ on whether bluegrass is moral or immoral. Applying your criteria, I would first need to see if the creators of bluegrass testify that they were influenced by demons when they first played bluegrass. The other criteria that you refer to has more to do with associational issues more so than the music itself being moral. So based on your criteria, I’m not sure how one would determine if the music is moral/immoral outside of testimony from those that started the genre saying they were influenced by demons. That’s why I asked if there were other criteria. 132. Rajesh says: I have looked over the brazen serpent passages and your position regarding what they teach. Here’s my assessment of the passages and your take on them. Two OT passages (Num. 21:8-9; 2 Kings 18:4) and one NT passage (John 3:14-15) inform us about the brazen serpent. There is no indication that God ever intended the serpent itself to have any ongoing function beyond the immediate setting for which it was made. God commanded the making of the serpent, so we know that making it was a good thing. When the Israelites later perpetually offered incense to it, did their doing so make the serpent a bad thing? You think that Hezekiah’s destroying the brazen serpent (2 Kings 18:4) shows that the serpent itself became a bad thing. A comparison with three other situations does not support your view. 1. The Philistines captured the Ark of the Covenant and put it in the temple of their god (1 Sam. 5:1-2). God punished them fiercely for doing so (1 Sam. 5:3-12). The Ark was eventually returned (1 Sam. 6), and there is no indication given that the Philistines’ misuse of the Ark as a tribute to their idol somehow made the Ark itself a bad thing. God did not direct His people to destroy the Ark because pagans had sinfully used it. 2. Many pagans and sinful Israelites have worshiped the sun, moon, and other heavenly bodies (Deut. 4:19; 17:3; 2 Kings 23:5, 11; Job 31:26-28; Jer. 8:2; Ezek. 8:16). God created these bodies for human good (Gen. 1:14-18; Matt. 5:45). God has thus far not decreed, however, that they be destroyed because sinful humans have perpetually made them the objects of sinful worship. Sinful worship of God-made heavenly objects has not changed these objects into evil objects. 3. Nebuchadnezzar took the holy vessels from the house of God and put them in the house of his gods (cf. Ezra 1:7). It is likely that he did so as a tribute to his thinking that his gods gave him victory over the people and God of Israel. Later, his grandson Belshazzar commanded that the gold and silver vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had taken out of the temple in Jerusalem be brought so that he and others might use them to engage in a drunken idolatrous feast (Dan. 5:2-3). “They drank wine, and praised the gods of gold, and of silver, of brass, of iron, of wood, and of stone (Dan. 5:4). Clearly, Belshazzar used these holy vessel for idolatrous worship, and God judged him fiercely for doing so (Dan. 5:5-30; esp. 5:23). Did their using these vessels for idolatrous worship make the vessels evil things? At a later date, King Cyrus returned the holy vessels to Sheshbazzar, the prince of Judah (Ezra 1:7-11) and authorized that they be returned to the temple in Jerusalem and put in the house of God (Ezra 6:5). Even though, therefore, a wicked king had used these holy vessels for idolatrous worship, God did not demand that they be destroyed—in fact, they were returned to His house for proper use therein I conclude that this additional biblical data does not support your analysis and use of the accounts about the brazen serpent. 133. Martin says: Thanks Rajesh. “God commanded the making of the serpent, so we know that making it was a good thing.” We know making it was a good ACTIVITY. Of course not – which was my point. The serpent was destroyed not because it turned bad but because its USE by the Israelites had turned idolatrous. That’s why it was destroyed – to prevent any further abuse, not because its inherent qualities were changed. The case of the golden calf is somewhat different but only insofar as it was created with bad intent. Both artifacts were destroyed to prevent further misuse, not because they were inherently good or evil. A calf of gold is NOT evil, as we know from those used in the temple. The making of a golden calf for idolatrous purposes is, of course, evil. Tell me, how does the making of a golden calf (or a serpent, for that matter) determine moral qualities in that which was made? Is it God’s command? If so, are you saying that if I make a brazen serpent today without God’s explicit command, that serpent is morally bad? If I don’t know the intent with which something was made, how do I determine its moral quality? Is a hammer that was made in someone’s basement to commit a murder inherently evil and a hammer that was made in a factory to serve as a tool inherently good? If I only have the hammer, how can I tell the difference? Is alcohol a good thing (Eccl 10:19) or a bad thing (Prov 23:31)? Is honey morally good (Prov 24:13) or bad (Prov 27:25)? As you can see from these scriptures and the serpent example, it depends on its use, not intent or inherent qualities. If you say about alcohol, ‘it depends’ (on how much or on how you use it – e.g. for disinfection) then how could you also say it is either good or bad? Is a handgun morally good or bad? Is mercury (created by God but toxic) good or bad? Is bread good? What if it has fungus and is no longer good for consumption? Does it stay good or is it then bad? Were the locusts God sent over Egypt as a plague morally good or bad? Should fig trees that do not bear fruit outside the season (like the one Jesus cursed) be cut down because they are morally bad? Or if the tree was good, why was it cursed? If a church is rededicated to a mosque, does it remain morally good, and vice versa? Are plastic microbeads used in cosmetics morally good or bad ( Are nails made for crucifixions good or bad? If they are morally bad, what damage do I do if I use such nails in home construction? Are candles sold in Catholic churches good or bad? Please explain to me what it depends on when something is morally bad. You wrote we know the serpent was good because God commanded it to be made. So if I intentionally make music to accompany depraved lyrics (and communicate a corrupt message in rebellion to God), does this make such music morally bad? Logically, then, when I use the same music to accompany biblical lyrics, my intent is good, and hence, also the music? You seem to imply that the misuse of the serpent did not make it bad, so the only determinant that remains is the intent with which it was originally made. If this is so, a) we can ‘redeem’ anything as along as we have good intentions in making it and b) we cannot always know whether something is good or bad unless we know the original intent. Please help me understand your methodology to determine the moral qualities of a thing, based on at least some of the above examples. To also reply to your critique of the ‘two witnesses’, I want to say that I partly agree, but still partly disagree. Of course there are single verses that convey information, such as the ones you cited, and can and should be used for teaching. Yet, the fact that Moses body was raised cannot be used to construct a DOCTRINE that, for example, all famous people mentioned in the Bible were also raised already. For any such deduction, we would need more than a single scripture (actually, other scriptures will show that only a very limited number of people were raised already). To take another example, you probably won’t teach that Jesus was three days in hell based on 1.Pet 3:19 (as some have done). There are some isolated verses that are difficult to understand and it would be preposterous to preach doctrine based on those. Maybe I didn’t explain what I mean by ‘doctrine’: not that you cannot preach truth using a single verse but that you should not deduct a doctrine (a generalized teaching) from an isolated verse without support from other verses and the Bible in general. Again, I agree the two-witness principle is not explicit in the Bible as applied to exegesis but it seems darn good advice to take from a principle mandated for judicial proceedings. 134. Rajesh says: We’ve already gone around and around on the golden calf. Since you brought it up again, I will reiterate that the problem with the golden calf was not just that it was created with bad intent. The calf was also evil because it was created in direct disobedience to a known and specific command of God. (People can and do make many things with bad intent for which there is no specific prohibition from God.) It was also evil because it was an object made in imitation of the idols of Egypt. Furthermore, it was not used in just “ordinary” idolatry—the Israelites used it to engage in syncretistic worship of Yahweh in a feast to the Lord. Yes, a calf made of gold is not necessarily evil; if I know that certain idolaters make calves that have specific appearances, making a calf similar to those specific calves is illegitimate. Anything that God has created is morally good. God has directed bees to make honey; honey is morally good. Prov. 25:27 does not show that honey is morally bad; excessive consumption of honey does not make it bad—people misuse it when they do so. It is also important to keep in mind that the world that we now live in is not the world as God first created it. The effects of the Fall have changed the universe drastically; so, for example, there are plants that are no longer good for food for man (2 Kings 4:38-41). Concerning bread, God gave the Israelites manna from heaven, which certainly was good. Does the fact that the manna spoiled mean that it was never good in the first place? When it spoiled, it was not the manna as God first gave it. In your response, you did not interact with any of the counterexamples that I gave, such as the Ark and the holy vessels. These were all morally good things created specifically by people commanded by God and empowered by God to do so. Human misuse of them did not make them morally evil. Instrumental music is not like any of these other things that you mention. Instrumental music is the product of human action, and is therefore inherently moral or immoral. It is not just the act of producing the music that has morality; the music produced also is either moral or immoral. Furthermore, instrumental music is ordered sound that is a form of energy that also transmits information that enters into the heart of the hearer. The morality of instrumental music, therefore, cannot be assessed in the same way that the morality of other things is. About formulating doctrine from a single passage, I still think that you are wrong. God does not have to reiterate something multiple times for it to be profitable for doctrine. Holding that position contradicts what Paul explicitly says in 2 Tim. 3:15-17. For example, without First Corinthians 11:27-34, we would not have any information about God’s judging many believers who take the Lord’s Supper in an unworthy manner. This passage is the only passage in Scripture that specifically teaches us that God chastens believers in this manner. Paul even teaches that many believers died in Corinth because they took the Lord’s Supper unworthily. We must formulate doctrine from this passage to warn believers that they are susceptible to serious bodily consequences for such perversion of this ordinance. (I did not follow what you are saying about Moses. I see no indication that the passage in Jude has anything to do with Moses’ body being raised.) 135. Rajesh says: I’m not claiming that I have everything figured out about all kinds of music. What I’ve shared with you are some of the key elements of the approach that I take to the major issues with certain styles of Christian music used in church, such as CCM. Scott and others have provided many additional considerations that are valuable in discerning more broadly what music is acceptable to God and what music is not. May God continue to teach us all how to discern between good and evil in the realm of musical styles. 136. Martin says: I did not refer to the other examples because they are analogous to the first one; my arguments apply to those in the same way as to the one I addressed. So here is how I understand your methodology: 1) Anything God created is morally good. 2) All human activity is morally relevant, hence all human creations made through such activity are also moral or immoral (the logic of this statement is, however, anything but obvious). 3) Something that was created good and is subsequently spoiled was originally morally good but then no longer is. How do I apply this now? What about the plants which are no longer good for food? According to 3) they are immoral, right? What about alcohol? Alcohol is not created by God but by yeast, which God created with the ability to ferment sugars into alcohol. Does this then extend backwards, such that we can say alcohol is morally good (He directed bees to make honey and yeast to make alcohol)? Or is this a case of spoilage and therefore immoral? Then the handgun: say it’s created for self-defense. That is morally good, right? If it gets in the hands of a street gang to commit crimes, does it then remain good or become immoral? It seems not, since you also say honey remains good even if it is used in unhealthy quantities. What about the church built for worshiping God? I guess that would be morally good. If that is now ‘spoiled’ and becomes immoral through its use for non-Christian worship, how do you explain that some things can change their morality over time based on the situation? Or maybe you haven’t made your methodology clear enough. I would appreciate a step-by-step instruction so we can all see how to determine the morality of a man-made object. It appears the Catholic candles are also immoral, given they were made to assist the dead in purgatory. If I find such a candle at home, should I then bin it because it is immoral or can I rededicate it (e.g. by removing the red plastic casing) and then, after it is moralized (redeemed), use it for moral purposes? So, please also provide a clear methodology for judging the morality of music, as opposed to anything else (above). I believe one criterion would be whether the style used was originally created under demonic influence or for immoral purposes, correct? If that is so, also explain why such a criterion would apply. I believe Beethoven and Mozart were masons, but did they ‘invent’ any style or did they simply use a moral style to make music with immoral purposes? Or were their motivations pure and moral? It certainly was not lost on you that you are a lone ranger with respect to this position (that the morality of creative acts means products of such acts are either moral or immoral) – Scott does not argue that but instead claims that music is moral because it is human communication (action, not a thing). We seem to agree that MAKING music is action, as well as using it, but it is also a thing. 137. Rajesh says: Do you really need an explanation for why something created under demonic influence for immoral purposes would be evil? 138. Martin says: Yes, that would be helpful – plus said methodology. 139. Rajesh says: It seems absurd to me that you would be seriously asking why something created under demonic influence for immoral purposes would be evil. According to Scripture, demons are incorrigibly evil beings whose continuous aim is to destroy as many people as possible. Given that their aim is to defile whatever they can as much as they can, they undoubtedly lead humans whenever they can to sin in every way possible, including in their creative activities. When humans who have had such influence on them testify that the music that they have developed and played is sourced in demonic influences and that the music is demonic, there is no reason to deny the validity of their testimonies. 140. Martin says: Well Rajesh… are you seriously of the belief that an inanimate object that has no will or capacity to control anyone, can be immoral or moral? If you are talking about demonic influence, then it’s the demon who is immoral in his acts, not the object. Music certainly has a strong impact on humans, yet we can resist any such impact at will. But a thing can’t do anything and as such, must be considered amoral. But we’re going in circles… if you don’t have any methodology but only assertions, your ideas are of very limited value. 141. Rajesh says: As I said earlier, music is not the same as other objects because it is a form of energy that transmits information into the mind of the hearer and has effects on the hearer. So, even though music is not an animate object per se, it still is either moral or immoral depending on the effects that it has on the hearer. I reject your claim that people can resist any such impact of music at will. Your understanding of the effects of music does not account for how evil supernatural beings can influence humans without those humans having any knowledge of that influence. The Bible says that Satan moved David to sin against God by numbering the people. Since you talk so much about methodology and apparently know a lot of things that I do not, please give me detailed information step-by-step of how exactly Satan did this. Then also explain how Satan filled Ananias’ heart to lie to the Holy Spirit. Then also how Satan showed Jesus all the kingdoms of the world in an instant of time. I could go on, but I hope you get the point. You make confident assertions about things that you do not have the ability to know, such as how supernatural beings communicate and what their communication sounds like. Scripture records a time when the Father spoke to Jesus and people said that it thundered. Humans only heard a loud sound, but actually there was specific communication going on between divine Persons. Scripture has other examples that also point to a flaw in your theology of sound. Music is ordered sound and how that sound communicates to supernatural beings is something that your view is seriously lacking. I think you need to go back to the Bible and let it and not philosophy determine your methodology to understanding music. Scripture repeatedly talks about the sounds of musical instruments and not just the act of playing the instrument. A theology of music that only examines music as an action is deficient. 142. Martin says: Rajesh, you are contradicting yourself. Are you saying it is demons who communicate evilly or are you attributing evil powers to the music itself? If any music does have no effect on the hearer, is it then amoral? 143. Rajesh says: Martin, I’m not contradicting myself. Based on passages such as John 12:28-29, Acts 22:9, 1 Cor. 13:1, and others, we are to understand that supernatural beings communicate in languages that humans do not understand unless God allows them to understand. When people do not understand, all they hear are loud, indistinct sounds, which they describe as thunder. So, based on this reality and other considerations, what I’m saying is that supernatural evil beings influence humans to produce music that communicates evilly and has evil effects without the humans understanding how that music is affecting them for evil and communicating evil ideas in the supernatural realm. If you have not already seen it, here’s something that I wrote earlier that might be helpful: 144. Martin says: Kelsey, bumped into this today, and maybe it explains better than I could what the difference between preaching and ‘being on stage’ is: Quote: Powerful preaching and Rock stars – In the UK, a rite of passage for teenagers is the rock festival. These are three day rock concerts with headline bands and supporting bands, staying in tents – usually they are a mud bath (The Stone roses at Glastonbury 1995 who will ever forget). The Welsh 18th century equivalent was the communion season which would last for a weekend. People would walk 30/50 miles to come and hear these men. The biggest name in the land was Daniel Rowland and he would headline communions when he was around, and supporting him would be Harris, Williams (Pantycelyn), Jones (Llangan) and others. These men were the rock stars of their day (not that you would know that by the dust jacket). Preaching was rock n roll, though of course there’s more to it than that. These men were gifted preachers. To read some of their sermons, see their attention to how the truth was presented so that it would reach out and grab their hearers by the scruff of the neck is remarkable. The Spirit used their preaching to the conversion of literally thousands. Preaching is a means of grace and greatly to be treasured, but I wonder if there was too much emphasis on preaching, so that in some ways it became an event in and of itself. Preaching is a means of grace – it is not grace itself, and it is troubling when the preacher is elevated to a position of great popularity, even celebrity. The fault is not wholly with the men themselves, but there is still danger for us today, such as those churches where the preacher is in his own view and the view of the congregation the only one who really matters. We have celebrity preachers in the reformed world and are our conferences sometimes are in danger of being a little like rock concerts without the sex, drink and drugs. There is preaching on preaching, there are countless books being produced on preaching – Spirit empowered preaching, applicatory preaching, the preaching of… (you name the figure in church history and there’ll be a book on his preaching). We long for powerful preaching which shakes the self confidence out of people, sears consciences and breaks hearts but there’s a warning that we can even turn a means of grace into an idol. Leave a reply	http://religiousaffections.org/articles/articles-on-music/discussion-about-christian-rap-with-shai-linne-what-defines-rap-rebuttal/	dclm-gs1-080020000
0.078607	<urn:uuid:96cc53ca-2abf-4535-9f4e-6e4d111a8627>	en	0.820507	Home About Us the Rabbis Contact Us what's new on Revach Kiddush on Shabbos: Forgetting the Wine During your Bracha Achrona Parshas Naso: Kli Yakar - The Explosion of the Sotah's Stomach Kli Yakar - Isn't Shavuos The Day of Kabalas HaTorah? [view all questions in this category] Section: Questions Category: Halacha Halacha - Tznius Submitted by anonymous Answered by Rav Peretz Moncharsh Question: In the bedroom, at what level of getting undressed does one have to go under the covers? Answer: According to the minimal requirements of Halacha it is not necessary to cover ones self other than when removing the underwear. However Shulchan Aruch writes that it is an worthy midas chassidus to always be covered as one would in presence of a king. Mishna Berura explains that one should not even remove the socks and be barefoot if this is not the common manner of dress in his location. posted:2009-07-04 18:34:30 printable version email to a friend Send Your Comments Name optional Display my name? Yes No EMAIL optional Your email address is kept private. COMMENTS required Most Viewed Lists 1. "Zissen" Pesach 2. shaving body 3. Bracha for bANANAS 4. sprinkler on Shabbos clock 5. Obligation to stop giving? Last Viewed 1. Tznius 2. wind up toys 3. Listerine Breath Strips 4. Tevilas Keilim 5. Tzoraas HaBatim Good or Bad	http://revach.net/ask/article.php?id=1367	dclm-gs1-080030000
0.036863	<urn:uuid:ddfffe1f-1684-4434-9df4-7325a0e39ff4>	en	0.950931	Home Subscribe Services Support Us Print Version Email this article to a friend Chapter 2: Mishna 8: Part 1 Why did the Tanna choose the specific elements mentioned in the Mishna? There are many things about which it can be said that excess causes damage, and many others about which a surplus can lead to extra achievements!? Man is composed of a physical body created from the earth, and a soul that emanates from the heavens. The "distance" from the earth until the heaven is considered to be embodied in the number "ten." (See Sukkah 5a about Moshe and Eliyahu ascending to heaven. These lines of the Maharal are rooted in Kabbalah, and, as has been our practice, we will not elaborate on matters about which we lack understanding and access.) So there are ten distinct elements related to man's creation, five of which are material matters that are part of man's physical dimension, and five of which are spiritual matters that are part of man's transcendent dimension. There are ten major parts of man's body which parallel this division. The two eyes, the two ears and the tongue are considered the more spiritual parts of man. The two feet, the two hands and the sexual organ are the five that are closer to the physical side of man. (See the Gemara in Nedarim 32b for an elaboration of this. We will summarize the basic principle of this dichotomy as explained by the Maharal.) The activities of the eyes (sight) ears (hearing) and tongue (speech) do not need any physical contact with the material in order for them to function. Sight is a perception of things which are distant from man, and with which he has no tangible interaction. Hearing is also a perception of things with which man does not have direct contact, although it is not as abstract as sight. (Man needs to be closer to an object to hear it than to see it; sound waves travel more slowly, are more tangible and physically accessible, and more easily measurable than light waves/particles.) Speech is also an activity connected to the spiritual and intellectual dimension of man. The hands, feet and the sexual organ are connected to the more physical activities of man, and they are considered closer to the earth. We also find in the Ten Commandments that five of them are connected to the heaven and five are connected to the earth. The first five are activities which relate to G-d. [This includes "Honor your father and mother," whose honoring is equated with that of G-d, as we are taught in Kiddushin (30b). When a person honors their parents, G-d considers it as if He lived among them and also received honor.] The last five are activities between fellow human beings who dwell on the earth. This encompasses the entire human being whose spiritual side emanates from the heaven and whose body derives from the earth, with the distance between these two locations represented by the number ten. This human being, belonging to both the heaven and the earth is connected to five material elements of his existence and five spiritual elements of his existence. In each of the material elements, a surplus is actually destructive, where anything which deviates from the proper measure is in fact considered a deficiency. But in the non- material elements which are connected to the spiritual dimension, a surplus is a virtue. First we are taught about a surplus of something which represents the essence of man's physical body, meat (flesh). A surplus of meat causes an increase in worms. Worms represents disintegration and absence, for worms eat away at the meat until it doesn't exist. One who is attached to the physical dimension of his existence is subject to the disintegration that befalls all physical matter. The lesson of the Tanna is not limited specifically to worms eating meat, but refers to all deterioration that befalls material objects. A person who is overly connected to the physical dimension of existence (with the hope that this will ensure his existence) is subject to the inevitable deterioration that is the nature of all physical matter (leading to the opposite result of his intention). An embodiment of this principle is the lesson that "lust drives a person from the world" which will be elaborated upon in its place (Avoth Ch. 4, Mishna 28). After a person's own body, the next closest thing to which a person is an owner and has an attachment is ones material possessions. These are necessary for him to support himself in this world, and they precede creating an attachment with a spouse. About these material possessions we are taught that "a surplus of possessions causes an increase in worry," that here, too, the surplus actually causes a deficiency. A person involves himself in his protecting his possessions so that they should not be lost or destroyed. A surplus of these possessions makes it impossible for him to avoid this undesirable result, thus increasing his worry. This is in line with our principle that an excessive attachment to the material leads inescapably to greater deficiency. (In preparation for the next part of the Mishna, I recommend studying the Dvar Torah for Pesach which provides background information on the principle of gender differences. Our shiurim on Ch. 1, Mishna 5, especially parts 2 and 3, will also help in understanding what the Maharal writes in a very abbreviated form in this Mishna. ) View Complete List Nobody Ever Promised We'd Understand Rabbi Eliyahu Hoffmann - 5762 Reb Yosef Asher's Tune Rabbi Eliyahu Hoffmann - 5760 Moving Fast Into The Garden Rabbi Yochanan Zweig - 5772 To Rule Is Divine Rabbi Yochanan Zweig - 5770 To Sit in the Sukkah Rabbi Yehudah Prero - 5760 A Superior Primary Education Rabbi Label Lam - 5764 Frumster - Orthodox Jewish Dating The Four Species Rabbi Yehudah Prero - 5755 Miraculously the Streak Continues Rabbi Label Lam - 5775 Shabbos Bereishis -- Bridge Rabbi Eliyahu Hoffmann - 5767 Looking for a Chavrusah? The Nature of Human Behavior - 5773 A Happiness of Oneness Rabbi Yehudah Prero - 5758 A Springtime of the Spirit Rabbi Naftali Reich - 5767 > The Time of Our Happiness Rabbi Chaim Flom - 5768 Safely Carried on the Wings of Eagles Rabbi Pinchas Avruch - 5761 Know that you Know Nothing Shlomo Katz - 5755 Beauty Defined Rabbi Yehudah Prero - 5763 Project Genesis Home Torah Portion Jewish Law Learn the Basics Ask The Rabbi Knowledge Base About Us Contact Us Free Book on Geulah! Home Copyright Information	http://torah.org/learning/maharal/p2m8part1.html	dclm-gs1-080110000
0.021914	<urn:uuid:036f76d9-be9c-4e9a-86a9-939c3b6e3eb3>	en	0.94679	Bill Murchison Where to begin? Surely with the nature, the inner meaning, of the health care debacle. We best understand the March 21 catastrophe as a political coup d'etat -- a stroke meant to change America's perception of itself as a country of robust opportunity and individual freedom. On Sunday, the speaker of the House bludgeoned and bribed 219 Democrats to support her and the president's substitute conception of what the country is about. The United States of Pelosi and Obama is a society of ants industriously toiling in order to hand over to government most of their "unneeded" resources so that government, with its superior wisdom, might distribute those resources for "the larger good." Common sense and the polls show this view of America to be unattainable and undesirable. Yet the Obamacrats believe it with all their hearts. That is what disturbs and disrupts. The Obamacrats' low opinion of American intelligence and character destines us for a long, inglorious political/electoral battle to reverse the results of their coup -- to throw out not only the rascals but their handiwork. It won't be easy. We'd better recognize right now that we may succeed only in part. Sean Hannity FREE I have quoted before in this context the famous classical tag -- "Those whom the gods would destroy they first make mad." The saying takes on exquisite relevance following the coup. Two-hundred and nineteen of our duly elected representatives appear to have parted company with their mental gear, assuming they initially had any worth noticing. Certainly their moral compasses, if any, played them false. Anybody can commit a policy blunder -- believing one strategic course better than the alternatives. We all make mistakes of this character. The House's mistakes are of a much more mischievous sort. First, the Obamacrat coup leaders passed a bill they know good and well (unless they're thoroughly unhinged) to be pie in the sky: unaffordable without future tax increases and service cuts. Nor, as is generally agreed, does the bill do anything to restrain medical costs, which will grow inexorably as more clamor to receive more and more. How are we going to be able even to fund Medicare without substantial cutbacks and tax hikes, given general health care's new demand on resources? Bill Murchison ©Creators Syndicate ©Creators Syndicate	http://townhall.com/columnists/billmurchison/2010/03/23/democratic_coup_detat	dclm-gs1-080120000
0.030692	<urn:uuid:97407da9-c2f6-4bb6-ac3d-e4a5d0189f63>	en	0.949863	thomas e. dewy on Townhall Ken Blackwell - Wed Dec 5 Many of our friends continue to register shock at the election returns of last month. How can it be?, they ask. It’s not so hard to figure out, we reply. The first Romney bumper sticker that appeared last year bore a startling resemblance to another famous corporate logo. What were they thinking? The first bumper sticker for the President’s re-election said simply: “ObamaCares.” Brilliant. We are not saying that President Obama does actually care about “people like me.” But voters polled on that question chose Mr. Obama over Mitt Romney by a whopping 81-18 margin. That’s fatal in politics. ... more	http://townhall.com/tags/thomas-e--dewy/	dclm-gs1-080150000
0.07008	<urn:uuid:1375aa04-3cc7-44f5-b671-d620780020b9>	en	0.968572	kites premiere leicester square 3 this is the movie premiere of bollywood movie kites starring hritik roshan, this video there is a rakesh roshan producer of the movie.i was attending the show it was amazing exp. i rakesh roshan Suzanne’s last words to the Roshans while leaving home Despite living with her in-laws, Rakesh and Pinky Roshan for so long, Suzanne Khan has not been able to adjust with them. It came into forefront when one of the close members of the family revealed how Suzanne hurt the Roshan when she stormed out of the house with her two son, Hrehaan and Hridhaa Hrithik Roshan enjoys dinner with family Hrithik, sister Sunaina launch book on dad Rakesh Roshan	http://www.bollywoodmantra.com/video/kites-premiere-leicester-square-3/	dclm-gs1-080330000
0.921932	<urn:uuid:7c511aef-e74a-406f-8e79-6d2135e1c6d6>	en	0.833829	A 4.00kg box sit atop a 10kg box on a horizontal table. Thecoefficient of kinetic friction between the two boxes and betweenthe lower box and the table is 0.600, while the coefficient ofstatic friction between these same surface is o.800. A horizontalpull to the right is exerted on the lower box, and the boxes movetogether. calculate the friction force on the upper.Pull = 150.0N Get this answer with Chegg Study	http://www.chegg.com/homework-help/questions-and-answers/400kg-box-sit-atop-10kg-box-horizontal-table-thecoefficient-kinetic-friction-two-boxes-bet-q798103	dclm-gs1-080410000
1.000004	<urn:uuid:4b702ede-56f5-4de9-92d6-a742a344e053>	en	0.907733	Some types of gravity detector use interferometers to try todetect the slight motion in the earth that gravity waves wouldcauses. The motion in question would be little more than the widthof an atom. Why would microwaves be a poor light sources for suchdevice? Get this answer with Chegg Study	http://www.chegg.com/homework-help/questions-and-answers/types-gravity-detector-use-interferometers-try-todetect-slight-motion-earth-gravity-waves--q654583	dclm-gs1-080420000
0.018746	<urn:uuid:7e301b46-13b5-4fbe-b845-794e0072c834>	en	0.97292	Skip to main content Speculation abounds in upcoming high court vacancy • Story Highlights • Justice David Souter will be retiring at end of session • Souter has carved a mostly moderate-liberal position • Much speculation about nominating minority candidate to replace Souter • It has been more than three years since the latest justice took the bench By Bill Mears CNN Supreme Court Producer Decrease font Decrease font Enlarge font Enlarge font WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Constitution gives the president the exclusive power to nominate members of the Supreme Court. But it does not guarantee the political process will run smoothly for him or his nominee. Justice Clarence Thomas replaced Thurgood Marshall on the high court after a contentious confirmation process. Supreme Court Justice David Souter was nominated by President George H.W. Bush. In the 220 years since the U.S. Constitution took effect, only 110 people have sat on the Supreme Court, an average of exactly one new justice every two years. The president may select whomever he wants -- the Constitution provides no prequalifications -- but it is no surprise every justice either was a lawyer or held a law degree. The current court is the first time all nine members were federal appeals court judges just prior to their elevation to the high court. It has been more than three years since the latest justice took the bench, and a pent-up sense of anticipation has greeted President Obama's upcoming decision on a replacement for retiring Justice David Souter. It will be the first choice by a Democratic president in 15 years. In Washington, an unofficial parlor game of sorts has developed over who the next nominee will be. "You don't have the sense the White House is itching for a fight. To the contrary, they are trying to consult very widely," said Thomas Goldstein, a leading appellate attorney and co-founder of "But on the other hand they are not shying away from people that they are being warned off of. They feel comfortable that they have the votes to get any reasonable candidate confirmed and they are just looking for the person the president determined to be the best justice of the Supreme Court." When to leave: 'I'm getting old and coming apart' Sitting justices are rarely pleased by the constant speculation about their retirement. In a 2003 CNN interview, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor admitted the thought of retirement had crossed her mind. "I mean, I'm getting up there in age so, of course, I think about should I or should I not," she said. "I don't know when." But when pressed, O'Connor was abrupt. "I think that's enough, really. I just haven't made that decision." She retired two years later. The late Chief Justice William Rehnquist said in a television interview a few years ago, "traditionally, Republican appointees have tended to retire during Republican administrations." But often, age or ill health play the leading role in when a justice decides to step down, as was the case with two recent liberal lions of the court. Justice William Brennan was 84 when he resigned in 1990 after suffering a stroke, and Justice Thurgood Marshall was in declining health when he announced his 1991 retirement at age 82. Asked what was wrong with him, the feisty Marshall replied, "What's wrong with me? I'm old. I'm getting old and coming apart." So as with all government leaders, the health problems of the justices inevitably become public fodder. Rehnquist's cancer diagnosis a few days before the 2004 election prompted instant, intense political speculation. He died less than a year later, still in office. John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and O'Connor are all cancer survivors. O'Connor jokingly recalled what happened when she returned to the bench after medical treatment. "The worst was my public visibility, frankly. There was constant media converge: 'How does she look?' 'When is she gonna step down and give the president another vacancy on the court?' 'You know, she looks pale to me, I don't give her six months.' " The political calendar also plays a role. Justices have traditionally tended not to step down during presidential election years, to avoid making the replacement and the institution itself a campaign issue. The last time it happened was 1956, when Brennan was nominated by President Dwight Eisenhower, who hoped his choice of a northeastern Catholic would help win re-election votes from that important political constituency. The conservative Eisenhower later regretted the decision, as Brennan went on to establish an influential liberal legacy in his 34 years on the bench. The Senate's political makeup also plays a key factor. Democrats currently have a clear majority, and Obama's pick is expected to be confirmed rather easily, barring some unexpected personal or political controversy. "The process has become more partisan," said David Yalof, author of "Pursuit of Justices," a book about recent court selections. "In part that's because we've anticipated a vacancy, and because the political stakes, as usual, are so high." And finally, time of year can often make the confirmation process easier. Souter announced May 1 he would retire, five months before the next court term begins. Former Justices Byron White and Harry Blackmun stepped down in March and April respectively, to give President Bill Clinton ample time to find a nominee and win confirmation. But recent justices Potter Stewart, Warren Burger, Marshall and Brennan all stepped down in late June or early July, at the effective end of the court's term. That left only about three months to confirm a candidate before the start of the fall session. Factors of gender, race and age Diversity is not a word that describes the Supreme Court's makeup over most of its existence. Only two women justices have served, the first in 1981, and only two African-Americans, the first in 1967. No Hispanic- or Asian-Americans have been named, nor have any openly homosexual or disabled justices. Only about nine Catholics have served, and seven Jews. With the advent in the 1920s of open Senate hearings of court nominees, public and press scrutiny of the process grew. Tremendous social and political changes in the country were reflected in a slow push to diversify the court's makeup. Since then, seats unofficially have been routinely set aside for individuals of certain backgrounds. The first Jewish justice was Louis Brandeis, whose bitter 1916 confirmation was marked by underlying anti-Semitism. When Benjamin Cardozo joined him in 1932, a "Jewish seat" was established. Cardozo was replaced by Felix Frankfurter, who was replaced by Arthur Goldberg, who was replaced by Abe Fortas. Currently, two Jewish justices sit on the bench, Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer. A similar precedent was created when Marshall became the first person of color to sit on the court. When he retired, Clarence Thomas took Marshall's seat, although President George H.W. Bush considered a wide variety of candidates before settling on the Georgia native. Many legal experts say Obama could make his first court pick a Hispanic, thereby breaking new historical ground and securing political outreach to a vital constituency. But a far more pressing factor for the president with this pick will be gender diversity. Some political analysts think a Hispanic pick also could neutralize resistance from hard-core conservatives who would soften their attacks for fear of being labeled culturally insensitive. "There is only one thing that is essential for this pick, probably: That she be a woman," said Goldstein. "Beyond that, the candidate [being] Hispanic would certainly be a plus because it would add still more to the diversity of the Supreme Court. It would be historic in that sense but it's not going to be determinative." Ginsburg currently is the only woman on the high court. Age is another consideration. The oldest person named to the court was 65-year-old Horace Lurton in 1910. Relatively younger candidates -- those in their 40s or early 50s -- may receive greater consideration from the president, since they would be likely to spend more years on the bench and perhaps have a greater judicial impact. That impact would potentially enhance a presidential legacy. One conservative with another But such choices can backfire. Take the case of Earl Warren. He was California's governor and a rival of Eisenhower in the presidential primaries of 1952. Warren eventually dropped out of the race and threw his support to the retired general. As political payback and to court Western conservatives, Ike selected Warren as chief justice in 1953, despite Warren's lack of judicial experience. Conservatives in 1990 cheered the retirement of Brennan, a liberal thorn to them for three-and-a-half decades. The choice of Souter to replace Brennan came as a complete surprise. His legal record was sparse, and few knew where he stood on key issues. He was labeled the "stealth nominee" and there was bipartisan hand-wringing over what he would do on the bench. The country soon found out, as Souter has carved a mostly moderate-liberal position. That evolving centrist stance outraged conservatives, and they vow never to be caught off guard with another nominee. To that end, extensive, almost obsessive vetting of potential candidates has now become common. Groups of all political stripes compile massive dossiers, ready to use the information as political weapons. To "Souter" has come to mean to name a candidate without knowing much about him. Length of confirmation: Anything goes Democrats are in charge of the White House and Senate; they control the nomination process. But Republicans still retain power to influence events, and have at their disposal an old legislative maneuver, the filibuster, to delay a vote on any federal court nominees. But there is no indication the GOP leadership has the votes or the political stomach to launch such a fight now. The amount of time taken to prepare for and hold confirmation hearings has also become a political issue. Obama hopes to have the process completed and a full Senate vote on the nominee by the August 8 recess. Some Republicans, however, fear Democrats may try to speed up the process and hold hearings as early as possible, thereby blunting efforts by conservatives to rally opposition. Congressional sources suggested the hearings themselves could also be lengthy, a break with recent tradition. Seven of the past eight nominees spent around a week in hearings. The notable exception was Clarence Thomas. Thomas' initial hearings were partisan, and he avoided questions on his personal views on issues, especially abortion. The Judiciary Committee deadlocked over whether to confirm him, and sent his nomination to the full Senate without a recommendation. Two days before a vote, Anita Hill, a former co-worker of Thomas in the Reagan administration, accused him of sexual harassment. New hearings were scheduled, marked by graphic descriptions of what Hill called Thomas' advances, and his dramatic denials. He labeled the hearings "a high-tech lynching for an uppity black." They ended without resolving the matter, and Thomas was eventually confirmed. "How long the hearings last really depends on who the nominee is," said David Garrow, a Pulitzer Prize-winning historian and Supreme Court expert. "If he or she falls into what I call the 'Breyer category,' where nobody could find anything objectionable to say about this guy, hearings will be a breeze. If he falls into perhaps the 'Bork category,' anything goes." All About U.S. Supreme CourtThurgood MarshallDavid SouterBarack Obama • E-mail • Save • Print	http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/05/19/scotus.souter.vacancy/	dclm-gs1-080460000
0.078015	<urn:uuid:69628cf9-288f-411a-8a29-1a7287955a5a>	en	0.961077	Case Number 26031: Small Claims Court Twilight Time // 1993 // 105 Minutes // Rated PG Reviewed by Appellate Judge Patrick Bromley // July 29th, 2013 The Charge The Case I love horror movies. All kinds. Slashers, zombie movies, splatstick, gory monster movies. I love sleazy exploitation movies and cheap old black and white B-movies. I love action movies -- the more violent the better. I am well versed and very much in love with a lot of disreputable genre films. I also love Sleepless in Seattle. Love it. I am a complicated man. Nora Ephron's voice dominated the romantic comedy genre for the 10-year period between When Harry Met Sally (which she wrote but did not direct) and You've Got Mail in 1998. Though she made other movies during that period (Mixed Nuts, anyone?), but it is her three major romantic comedies for which she will be remembered. Sandwiched between When Harry Met Sally and You've Got Mail is 1993's Sleepless in Seattle, a sweet, gentle movie that features Ephron's usual flair for funny, literate dialogue and provides a great showcase for its two stars. Tom Hanks stars as Sam, a recently widowed father of a son, Jonah (Ross Malinger, Sudden Death), who moves them both to Seattle in the hopes of getting a new start. One night, Jonah dials a radio call-in show to talk about his dad's sadness, and Sam (known on the radio show as "Sleepless in Seattle") becomes something of a sensation among women who are moved by the love he still has for his late wife. One of those women is Annie (Meg Ryan, In the Cut), a reporter all the way on the other side of the country in Baltimore, engaged to be married to the ultra-vanilla Walter (Bill Pullman, Lost Highway). Annie finds herself more and more drawn to Sam, a guy who she's never met and who doesn't know she exists. Is it possible to fall in love with someone you don't even know? In addition to being one-third of Ephron's "romantic comedy" trilogy, it forms the middle chapter of another trilogy, too: the Tom Hanks/Meg Ryan trilogy. The two stars would reunite for Ephron in 1998 for You've Got Mail, perhaps a slightly lesser movie but one I enjoy more if only because the pair actually gets to share a lot of screen time. Coming before Sleepless in Seattle is Joe vs. the Volcano, the best Hanks/Ryan collaboration and a movie I love more than words can say. That leaves Sleepless as somehow the weakest of the three movies they made together; I suppose that it's a testament to the star power and chemistry of both actors that even as the "lesser" of three movies, it remains one of the better romantic comedies of the 1990s. Both are at their most likable here: Ryan dials back some of her adorableness (not easy for '90s Meg Ryan, who is more adorable than a baby bunny sleeping on top of a puppy dressed in people clothes) and finds sadness inside Annie that she never overplays. Hanks' sadness is much more on the surface, because of the plot, but he, too, chooses not to play the most obvious emotion and instead finds a guy who tries to get through his day with sarcasm and honesty. The relationship between Hanks and his son is one of the best things about the movie. They are honest with one another, and Hanks is willing to show both the frustration and joy that comes from being a parent. This was my first viewing of Sleepless in Seattle since having kids, and Ephron and Hanks get a lot of it right. The movie isn't about a father/son relationship, though (even though it is), but about Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan falling in love. Sold. One, please. My problem with Sleepless in Seattle has always been that it keeps the two stars apart for its entire running time, but that criticism is unfair because it knocks the movie for what it isn't more than for what it is. Even without Hanks and Ryan appearing together in every scene, the movie works; Ryan's scenes with Bill Pullman are great (Pullman is the unsung hero of this movie, funny in every scene) just as Hanks gets great actors to bounce off of: Rob Reiner, Victor Garber, Rita Wilson. Keeping the stars apart is risky but never annoying in this instance, because Ephron gives the characters plenty to do before they finally meet. When they do, the moment is earned. It's as rewarding as the movie hopes it is. Plus, Ephron seeds certain things throughout the film that actually reward multiple viewings; I've seen the movie half a dozen times, and this was the first time I noticed something pretty big. Here's a hint: pay attention to what Meg Ryan is doing the first time she hears the radio show. Even beneath all the "will they or won't they" stuff, Ephron has more on her mind than just romantic comedy tropes. Sleepless in Seattle is actually a sly critique of romantic comedies in the way that they deal with our inflated expectations of romantic love -- we have been sold a bill of goods, Ephron says, and it's affecting our ability to connect to one another. Yes, she essentially undercuts that message with the way she resolves the story ("movie" love wins out after all), but it's nice to see a romantic comedy with a sense of self-awareness and something to say. Even if it didn't land, the reflexivity at play is still an excuse to have a scene in which Tom Hanks and Victor Garber start bawling while recounting the finale of The Dirty Dozen. Sleepless in Seattle arrives in a limited edition Blu-ray courtesy of Twilight Time, a boutique label that has done their usual fine job with the film. The movie gets the standard 1080p HD upgrade, and while it's never been a flashy film, attention has been paid to doing right by Sven Nykvist's handsome photography. There is a general softness to everything by design, but the transfer handles it well and shows off the naturalistic color palette and location shooting well. The lossless audio track is also solid, always keeping the Ephron sisters' clever dialogue as its centerpiece but carefully weaving in the (often too obvious) musical cues. Like the movie, it's all just very nice. Twilight Time doesn't typically pack their releases with extras, so the fact that any have been included ought to please fans who at least will be able to get rid of their old DVDs once they upgrade. That's because those previously released bonus features have been ported over to the Blu-ray: there's a commentary with Nora and Delia Ephron (spotty but enjoyable enough), a music video for "When I Fall in Love," a 1993 featurette called "Love in the Movies" and the original theatrical trailer. The only new bonus feature is an isolated score option. It's actually a little confusing why Twilight Time was given the license for Sleepless in Seattle on Blu-ray, as they only issue 3,000 units of any given title. This seems like a movie that would sell well on the format. For whatever reason, copies will be (relatively) scarce, so don't hesitate to upgrade your DVD if you're as big a fan of the movie as I am. Or you could just wait for TNT to show it another dozen times in the coming months. However you opt to watch it, this is a movie worth revisiting. Good romantic comedies are so hard to get right. This one gets it right. The Verdict Not guilty. Scales of Justice Judgment: 85 Perp Profile Studio: Twilight Time Video Formats: * 1.85:1 Non-Anamorphic (1080p) Audio Formats: * DTS HD 5.1 Master Audio (English) * English (SDH) Running Time: 105 Minutes Release Year: 1993 MPAA Rating: Rated PG Distinguishing Marks * Commentary * Isolated Score * Featurette * Music Video * Trailer * IMDb	http://www.dvdverdict.com/printer/sleeplessinseattlebluray.php	dclm-gs1-080590000
0.277861	<urn:uuid:b8be87af-0f93-4eb4-a87f-35b7353b602d>	en	0.96757	iPhone 3GS: Apple's codename for tomorrow's unveiling? It's pretty much the eve of Apple's big WWDC press conference, and Daring Fireball's John Gruber is back at the eleventh hour to chime in some more on his previous (and perhaps well-informed) iPhone predictions. He sticks to his previous wagers -- twice the CPU speed, twice the RAM, a heavy emphasis on a new video camera (no word on if there's an additional front-facing one), and $199 / $299 for the 16GB and 32GB models, respectively -- but additionally chimes in that the new device's codename is... drumroll, please... the iPhone 3GS, which he surmises is probably going to be the final product name, as well. Kind of a yawner, if you ask us, but it'd sell like gangbusters no matter what it was called. As for that lowered-tiered iPhone, he's expecting it to be the current 3G model with a price drop to $99. Also on the table is iPhone tethering, which we already know was built into OS 3.0, likely for a fee chosen by each carrier. Teasing farther into the future, he suggests "Marble," codename for an OS X visual overhaul, and the tablet are very much real projects but that there's little to no chance it'll be at WWDC. No clue what the "S" stands for (speed, perhaps?), but at this point we're pretty much counting the minutes to tomorrow's keynote, and our clocks can't tick much faster.	http://www.engadget.com/2009/06/07/iphone-3gs-apples-codename-for-tomorrows-unveiling/	dclm-gs1-080650000
0.259204	<urn:uuid:a4208951-5469-45f0-afd8-4c3c9c4c8dca>	en	0.962568	Trouble Follows Add to Cart Categories: Children's Fiction/Romance Publisher: Harlequin/Kimani Press \| Date published: 12/01/2007 Life Is (Was ... Will Be?) Good.... Indigo Summer has everything she wants: a coveted spot on the high school dance squad, a hot boyfriend (the one and only Marcus Carter) and--her best friend, Jade, is moving back to Atlanta! But why does trouble always have to follow? Jade is suddenly getting too cozy with their good-looking history teacher. And instead of shooting hoops, Marcus is sitting in a courthouse, forced to prove his innocence for something he didn't do. Indigo is feeling the pressure--from the squad, from her friends, from her family. It's time to show everyone--and herself--that she's made of strong stuff.	http://www.ereader.com/servlet/mw?t=book&bi=53314&si=59	dclm-gs1-080690000
0.999339	<urn:uuid:69a14d82-93b4-4c92-b263-5989aac9a2de>	en	0.984283	What does it mean when your boyfriend calls you baby girl? my boyfriend calls me baby girl, what does that mean and why does he call me that? Most Helpful Guy • It means he listens to a lot of music of black origin, and is quite the urban type himself. If he gets famous he may refer to you as 'baby girl' in one of his rap songs too.	http://www.girlsaskguys.com/family-friends/q329205-what-does-mean-when-your-boyfriend-calls-you	dclm-gs1-080740000
0.055926	<urn:uuid:f2d1d27c-834e-48ea-85fa-c2edf1c69124>	en	0.957549	Huffpost Chicago More Ridiculous Proposals From City Council On Recycling Posted: Updated: Last week a couple of Chicago aldermen proposed fining suburbanites caught trying to recycle in the city. Aldermen Lona Lane and Virginia Rugai, of the 18th and 19th wards, say they're tired of hearing from constituents who drive to the city's recycling drop-off sites and find the bins spilling over. "A lot of times it's overflowing and it's because we don't get a pick-up, but I just figured if [suburban residents] don't use it, it would be better for us," Lane told Fran Spielman of the Sun-Times. Read the whole story at Chicago Reader	http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/15/more-ridiculous-proposals_n_612887.html	dclm-gs1-080780000
0.025179	<urn:uuid:10486f29-a062-4329-b908-f05895a7ba94>	en	0.963435	Long way to the finishing line Last July a senior executive of Southern Company confided that it had considered launching a bid for National Power only to conclude that it would be biting off more than it could chew, writes Michael Harrison. He was speaking the day after the Atlanta-based company had decided to limit its ambitions to a pounds 1.1bn takeover of South Western Electricity. Ten months on, size is apparently no longer a stumbling block. But if the pounds 7.5bn merger of Southern and National Power is to proceed then it will have to overcome a mountain of regulatory and political hurdles in Britain and the US. The regulatory obstacles on both sides of the Atlantic are onerous. Even if Southern does sell off a large minority stake in Sweb, the deal will raise objections from the electricity regulator, Professor Stephen Littlechild, and possibly the Office of Fair Trading, because of the vertical integration that would result. This might not necessarily mean an automatic referral to the Monopolies and Mergers Commission, which has already given the go-ahead for two electricity bids that would involve much greater vertical integration. However, the inevitable political uproar that would ensue, along with opposition from the consumer lobby, might oblige the Trade and Industry Secretary, Ian Lang, to pack the bid off to the MMC on vaguer public interest grounds. The Government also has an indefinite golden share in National Power which enables it to block any takeover of the company. The veto, which restricts a single investor to no more than 15 per cent of the generator, would have to be lifted. On the only previous occasion when a golden share was put to the test - in Ford's takeover of Jaguar - the Government chose not to use its right of veto. Given National Power's position as Britain's biggest electricity generator and holder of strategic fuel stocks, the issue of national interest could arise. But it seems unlikely that the Government would use this weapon. The only time in the last 20 years that the national interest has been invoked by ministers was when the Kuwaitis were instructed to reduce their shareholding in British Petroleum after its privatisation in the 1980s. So the regulatory morass in the UK, though daunting, is not insuperable.	http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/long-way-to-the-finishing-line-1305521.html	dclm-gs1-080810000
0.045767	<urn:uuid:77abe603-2f70-43a5-8af0-6f22a45f2ff8>	en	0.932733	As the year wraps up, investors are not taking the foot off the pedal when it comes to filing 13Ds. All the recent concerns about Chinese small caps did not prevent private equity firm Warburg Pincus from adding on to its sizable stake in China Biologic (Nasdaq:CBPO), a maker of plasma based pharmaceutical and other related products. Warburg owns over 6 million shares, or over 24%. (For related reading, see Digging Into 13D Disclosures.) Icahn's Newest Drama Carl Icahn is back in the middle of an activist tussle after his publicized attempt to seize control of consumer products company Clorox (NYSE:CLX) failed. This time, the situation involves trucking and defense products manufacturers Navistar (NYSE:NAV) and Oshkosh (NYSE:OSK). Icahn happens to be a large shareholder in both companies. Yet hedge fund Owl Creek Asset Management, which owns 8.5% of Navistar, has publicly expressed concern over the possibility that Icahn would want to combine Navistar and Oshkosh. Share prices in both companies have been hit hard over the past year as concerns about defense spending and the overall economy have caused investors to abandon the businesses. Navistar shares trade for around $37, down from a high of above $70, while OSK shares are down from a high of about $40 to roughly $22 today. Activist Investors With the year ending on a somewhat positive note economically, 2012 will likely be a fertile year for activist investors. Investors will want to keep an eye on what happens in this sphere of investing. In additions to Icahn's endeavors, investors will want to follow the fortunes of retailer JC Penny (NYSE:JCP) and Canadian Pacific Railway (NYSE:CP), two targets of activist Bill Ackman. JC Penny recently signed a deal with Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia (NYSE:MSO) while Canadian Pacific made two new appointments to its Board. Both companies are clearly embracing change and that is usually a positive sign for shareholders. The Bottom Line With Europe's woes still casting a cloud of uncertainty going into 2012, stocks embraced by activists can be fertile opportunities regardless of market performance. (To learn more, check out Activist Investors: A Good Or Bad Thing?) Related Articles 1. Mutual Funds & ETFs What Exactly Are Arbitrage Mutual Funds? 2. Investing News Ferrari’s IPO: Ready to Roll or Poor Timing? 3. Mutual Funds & ETFs Top Three Transportation ETFs These three transportation funds attract the majority of sector volume. 4. Stock Analysis 5 Cheap Dividend Stocks for a Bear Market 5. Stock Analysis The Biggest Risks of Investing in Amazon Stock 6. Investing How to Win More by Losing Less in Today’s Markets 7. Fundamental Analysis Use Options Data To Predict Stock Market Direction 8. Stock Analysis 2 Oil Stocks to Buy Right Now (PSX,TSO) Can these two oil stocks buck the trend? 9. Investing News What Alcoa’s (AA) Breakup Means for Investors 10. Stock Analysis Top 3 Stocks for the Coming Holiday Season 1. How do dividends affect retained earnings? 3. Why would a corporation issue convertible bonds? 4. How does additional paid in capital affect retained earnings? 5. What types of capital are not considered share capital? You May Also Like Trading Center You are using adblocking software so you'll never miss a feature!	http://www.investopedia.com/stock-analysis/2011/this-weeks-activist-filings-cp-jcp-nav-osk-cbpo1229.aspx	dclm-gs1-080880000
0.044343	<urn:uuid:42bb5ac7-67d3-4077-82fd-94f84fa028ee>	en	0.98715	Russian upset leaves Ireland two down at half-time In an upset that has the nation reeling at half time, Ireland is down two-nil to Russia in a first half that has seen the Russians dominate. To date Ireland have won their first two matches and are currently at the top of their own qualifying group. They won by one goal against Armenia away from home and then they defeated Andorra by three goals to one playing at home. But today, in a match that commentators predicted they'd win, they've hit a Russian minefield. First a free kick by Kerzhakov caused an upset as he scored from close range. Later a good ball that Kerzhakov cleverly steped over allowed Dzagoev to slide it home. At half-time even Republic of Ireland fans must reluctantly concede that Russia deserve their lead. Right now, we have to say, it's not looking good.	http://www.irishcentral.com/sports/russian-upset-leaves-ireland-two-down-at-half-time-104589619-238048141.html?fullsite=Y	dclm-gs1-080890000
0.468089	<urn:uuid:aae7d679-1b20-4c32-b1dc-fee2de166671>	en	0.660423	English Deutsch Italiano Espanol Francais Ludwika Paleta Desnuda en Propiedad Ajena You are streaming Ludwika Paleta Desnuda en Propiedad Ajena porn video from Pornhub sex channel. Free Ludwika Paleta Desnuda en Propiedad Ajena sex movie was added from Emo-Porn together with more porno videos. Find more actriz, mexicana, desnuda, cogiendo, latina porn on our biggest collection of free sex videos. Well organized porno movies are updated daily. Recommended Pornhub videos for you hard fuck porn movies video gallery Hentai video mobile vidio sex japan tube Son moms xnxxvideo house maid videos and liked porn tamil sex vedeo dawnload free amatuer porn Babhi and dever indian sex with women sex gang videos	http://www.kporno.com/ludwika-paleta-desnuda-en-propiedad-ajena	dclm-gs1-080950000
0.021244	<urn:uuid:7144c66d-98f0-4076-859f-3581a25aa0fb>	en	0.851134	Laddar spelare ... Jun 11 FREE SHOW!! Rockfeedback presents... FOL CHEN, HIND EAR + PLUG Med Fol Chen, Hind Ear och Plug på The Lexington Torsdag 11 juni 200920:00 The Lexington Tel.: +44.(0)20 7837 5371 Visa på kartan Rockfeedback has gone as far as california, brighton, and down the road in london (we spent a lot of money on the flight to california) to find you three of our favourite new bands, and because ‘three’ and ‘free’ sound the same, we thought we wouldn’t charge you any money for it either. free! like the london lite, a mother’s love, or nelson mandela FOL CHEN - Fiercely lighting up the blogosphere and going over something of a storm at SXSW this year, LA's mysterious, futuristically clothed and LIARS sporting membered five piece are over from the States plying their Prince-like dance filled proposition with a subtle, darker edge full of sparkling originality. It’s also a bit beat-based; krauty experimental rock too. HIND EAR - Brighton newbies Hind Ear, these technical wizards of a four-piece create a multi-armed, multi-voiced wall of rhythm and melody. Employing loops and layers of guitar, voices, drums, synths and samples, their sound cuts across multiple scales, from headphones to dancefloor. They remind us of the likes of Battles, Cornelius, Don Cabellero and our buddies Three Trapped Tigers. PLUG - This is a London based femme-duo who play minimalist post-punk with a nod to the likes of Delta 5, The Slits and other great underground titans of the late 70s/early 80s. Like them they possess a penchant for stripped-down punked-up sneaker-moving tunes. But of course this is the big ‘09, and PLUG very much put their own up-to-date DIY spin on things. Here’s where we’d put a ticket link but we can’t because it’s FREE. F*CKING FREE. Madness see more here - API Calls	http://www.last.fm/sv/event/1085440+FREE+SHOW!!+Rockfeedback+presents...+FOL+CHEN,+HIND+EAR+%252B+PLUG	dclm-gs1-080990000
0.028207	<urn:uuid:505143b1-3126-4261-b909-d698c632e1e6>	en	0.806068	Lyrics Depot is your source of lyrics to That's Me by C Murder. Please check back for more C Murder lyrics. That's Me Lyrics Artist: C Murder Album: C-P-3.Com [C-Murder Talking] That's(Fol')Me. That's Me. Ya Dig? That's Me nigga. Check it out. You know that nigga that be strutin' like a thug (That's Me) That nigga mean muggin' in them club (That's Me) You know that nigga, that just don't give a fuck (That's Me) I bring my dawgs wit me (dawgs wit me) I'm from that CP3 It's the 2G plus, and I'ma get my shine on And break it down like B12 and get my grind on I'd never leave you hangin, so gimme dap dawg I'd never play you close because I rap fol' And keep movin' on that green and I get fucked up I hope you niggas takin notes, so pay attention black I'm the thug of all thugs, now picture that repeat chorus and hook Stack yo chips, and make yo mail, brah From Rolodex to Memorex, to sex on the beach I disinfect niggas like bleach Wit my .45 auto on my dresser, I betcha I wet cha, if you try to step to me nigga Wit that chop, chop, chop, TRU Records on top Makin' CEO ends, in a Benz wit my friends Sippin Hen', straight up out the bottle my nogga Six deep, so don't you try to follow my nogga I fuck wit P, and a rowdy nigga like Silkk too That's my crew, forever nigga T-R-U repeat chorus and hook The most stuck up, chicks you met, we hit that It's Cut Boy time, so let a thug nigga shine You be like, maybe not 'C, or maybe so I'm straight up, I say yeah dawg or nigga hell no What I'm gon' do when I get outta jail? My mind on my money, stack chips, and make mail Uptown, Downtown, West Bound, I found all my rounds Wit that pound from them Deadly Soundz Locked down or free, lil daddy, That's Me repeat chorus and hook [C-Murder Talking] That's Me. Ya'll better ask sumbody. This aint no game (Computer voice) no comments yet C Murder Lyrics C Murder C-P-3.Com Lyrics More C Murder Music Lyrics: C Murder - Damned If They Murder Me Lyrics C Murder - Don't Make Me Lyrics C Murder - Dreams Lyrics C Murder - Get N Paid Lyrics C Murder - Only The Strong Survive Lyrics C Murder - Ride On Dem Bustas Lyrics C Murder - Survival of the Fittest Lyrics C Murder - Thug In Yo Life Lyrics	http://www.lyricsdepot.com/c-murder/thats-me.html	dclm-gs1-081030000
0.034198	<urn:uuid:4e3c22f5-66e3-4571-9770-feee06eb866f>	en	0.913044	Find better matches with our advanced matching system —% Match —% Enemy 61 Loveland, CO Woman Similar users I’m looking for • Men • Ages 52–63 • Near me • Who are single • For long-term dating My details Last online Online now! 5' 2" (1.57m) Body Type Two-year college Has kids and doesn’t want more Has dogs and Has cats My self-summary Write a little about yourself. Just a paragraph will do. Like most, I find it hard to..... toot my own horn. Basic good qualities..... I'm a good person, honest, warm, compassionate, affectionate, hard worker, family oriented, determined, independent, and oh so Looking for the right man to share life and experiences with. :-D Main profile photo taken 3/10/15. Oh, I'm wearing #30 in the second photo. Guess I'll add this up here....just because I'm older doesn't mean I'm stupid or so lonely that I'll fall for whatever the pathetic scammers are dishing out. Don't waste my time, you're too obvious and too easy to spot. This woman is looking for a real man! :) What I’m doing with my life Lately......working a lot and trying to survive like everyone else. But there's more to this life than just work ......The road is more pleasantly traveled with someone than alone. There is a difference between having a life and living it. I'm ready to live it with that someone special. I’m really good at Most things that I set my mind to The first things people usually notice about me I’m an empty essay… fill me out! My smile, I've been told Favorite books, movies, shows, music, and food Help your potential matches find common interests. I read a variety of books,.prefer mystery/suspense more. Same with movies, along with comedies, occasional chic flick.....not really into the gorey horror movies. Like almost all venues of music......rap not a real favorite, and food? Anything but seafood and/or real spicy. The six things I could never do without My kids Job, car, food, the I spend a lot of time thinking about Where you are and what's taking you soooo long to come into my life On a typical Friday night I am Could be just about anything......there's no set routine......that would be boring The most private thing I’m willing to admit I’m an empty essay… fill me out! Well, gosh, it's private..... You should message me if Offer a few tips to help matches win you over. You're a one woman man, .......if you're the one	http://www.okcupid.com/profile/waverunner4?cf=profile_similar	dclm-gs1-081190000
0.031317	<urn:uuid:0f8ca6f5-5611-49b2-98ea-c0e6660aa867>	en	0.936465	Roughly a year after the launch of GNOME 3, the project's developers on Wednesday unveiled GNOME 3.4, the second major update to the controversial desktop environment. "This new version of GNOME 3 combines six months of development effort, resulting in major new features, updated applications, and a raft of subtle refinements," wrote the project's developers in a press release announcing the new launch. 'A Major Step Forward' Numerous applications within GNOME have received key updates in this new release as well following the launch of "a major development drive, which is in the process of creating a new suite of modern and stylish GNOME 3 applications," the developers explained. Perhaps most notably, Epiphany--the GNOME Web browser--is now called Web, and has been given a brand-new interface. Significant performance improvements have also been made to the browser, the project team says, including faster browsing history. Myriad smaller changes and refinements to the software include updated interface components, a "much more polished" visual theme, better hardware support, a raft of bug fixes, and many other minor improvements. "This all adds up to a major step forward in the quality of the GNOME 3 user experience," the team says. 41,000 Changes Nearly 1,300 people contributed about 41,000 changes to GNOME since the release of version 3.2. A full explanation of all the many new tweaks can be found in the software's release notes. Still, there's no denying that GNOME 3 has taken many steps forward since its original release, including more options for tweaking it. If you want to give GNOME 3.4 a try, you can download it for free from the project site.	http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/opinion/desktop-pc/gnome-34-brings-bevy-of-big-changes-3348136/	dclm-gs1-081230000
0.039063	<urn:uuid:87ef8f34-bc50-47d7-b411-a55c406e642e>	en	0.693365	Round Ass Bikini Girls Archive for the "Girls In Bikinis" category Girls bikini Arab girls bikini sex ass, skeets fucking wearing ebony round, in bikinis game hot nude teen, huge asses great ruffled big tube, string beach stripping cute tall wallpaper busty black, phat japanies photos wrestling video asse fat chubby, college abused naturals hd masturbating mound of tiffany, tits brianna bragg assed fitness babe charley chase sucks, gay vip boob modles petite, jacuzzi pee piss joy pics. Tags Teen Girls Bikini 1. Previous Sexy Bi Amature Girls 2. Next Teen Farm Girls Naked Girls bikini related porn pics Most popular searches 1. Xxx Pussy Fingering 2. Japaness Girl Nude 3. Tan Line Babe Nude 4. Cori Atk 5. Beauty Female Natural Nude 6. Jodie Marsh Pussy Shots 7. Vorderman Blowjob Fakes 8. Lexi Belle Dp Gallery 9. Pics Naked Matures 10. Small Butt Tean Strip 11. Asian Girl Tiny Boobs 12. Holly Sampson Fucking 13. Nathalia Ruiz Fucking 14. Sexy Laura Naked Pics 15. Saggy Small Milf Tits 16. Petit Chick Belly Tatoo 17. Clothed Orgasm Tumblr 18. Horny Italian Females 19. Likes Fuck Hates Nut 20. Men Fucking Images 21. Milf Bottomless Beach 22. Skinny Blonde Bj Pics 23. Paki Aunti Ass Fucked 24. Russia Pinup Bigboobs 25. Gay Gloryhole Milking 26. Naked Chubby Girl Gif 27. Yoga Nude Free Videos 28. Porn Atk Hairy Simone 29. Devon Sawa Naked Butt 30. Hairy Erotic Amateurs	http://www.pornpicturesarchive.com/round-ass-bikini-girls.html	dclm-gs1-081260000
0.023958	<urn:uuid:d576f864-8fd0-44f5-8d92-9352c9e9ebc2>	en	0.966765	Matlock's System Rudolf Steiner, Author, Reginald Hill, Author Rudolf Steiner, Author, Reginald Hill, Author Severn House Publishers $26 (0p) ISBN 978-0-7278-4993-9 Reviewed on: 12/02/1996 Release date: 12/01/1996 Originally published in England in 1973 as The Heartclock, by Dick Morland, this speculative novel is an early departure from the Dalziel and Pascoe crime novels for which Hill (The Wood Beyond) has become well known. In a country wracked by overpopulation, a teetering economy is sustained by severely regulating the population. Matt Matlock was the original sponsor of the bill that became the ""Age Law,"" requiring all English citizens to have a device installed in their hearts that will kill them when they reach 75, the current EOL, ""Expectation of Life."" Now that Matlock has reached the age of 69, however, he's having more than a few second thoughts about his draconian solution. Apparently, so are some others in high places, and they're all eager to get Matlock on their side as a persuasive figurehead. Although the thin futuristic veneer provided by hovercars and radio-telephones can't disguise this novel as serious SF, its strengths echo those of Hill's much better mysteries: a convoluted plot and twisty intrigue, and a main character as independent and intelligent as he is determined to succeed. (Jan.) The Best Books, Emailed Every Week Tip Sheet!	http://www.publishersweekly.com/978-0-7278-4993-9	dclm-gs1-081270000
0.019665	<urn:uuid:17150ff2-8872-4480-8336-378f894f915f>	en	0.95409	jane l Member since 8/10/2013 • 4 total posts Recent comments from jane l For me, what causes the pain is the perpendicular edges of the aligner that dig into my mouth and tongue, not the attachments. Though you can file down and use wax, in 2 weeks you have to do it all over again. READ COMMENT I don't think it hurts but as soon as you do, you have all these little food particles (who knew) floating inside your retainer and you have to go run and brush your teeth so it really doesn't help to keep it in cause you have to take... READ COMMENT Thank you so much! The wax is great but a pain, so my husband suggested cloroseptic spray (for sore throats) which numbs the pain but is messy. My ortho just recommended using warm salt water 3x/day to help heal the sores. Also said... READ COMMENT	http://www.realself.com/user/429209	dclm-gs1-081320000
0.05379	<urn:uuid:e1edf017-1772-4ead-ac6a-92c70e6d05e0>	en	0.971883	Welcome to the Learning Center where parents receive support as they help their children learn to love reading through understanding and comprehending their fun popular chapter books. How the program works... Each book has been read and analyzed for questions that will help you know if your child is understanding the book they are reading. You can: 1. Ask your child the questions at the end of each chapter (which is best) 2. You can ask them questions after every few chapters of the book. 3. You can pick a few questions and ask them at the end of the book. Now, if your child isn't able to answer the questions, the book he's reading is probably too difficult for him to comprehend. If your child is whipping through the questions and can answer most of them easily, then they are definitely understanding what they're reading. This program is made to make your life as a parent easier. So you can print off the questions of each book or you can look us up on line. I would love to hear of any book suggestions you may have. I'm always reading, but if you have something you would like in particular, let me know. I'll try to meet your requests within a reasonable time.	http://www.risetoreading.com/about/	dclm-gs1-081330000
0.041356	<urn:uuid:6d291afe-1cb3-4e78-97fe-cd081434dee7>	en	0.985526	Back Home Button The Rush Limbaugh Show Excellence in Broadcasting RSS Icon Still Talking About the Bunker Shot RUSH: Steven (might be pronounced "Stefan") in Windsor, Connecticut. It's great to have you on the program, sir. Hello. CALLER: Hello? RUSH: Yeah, hi. CALLER: Rush, how are you? RUSH: Very good, sir. Thank you. CALLER: It's a pleasure to finally talk to you. RUSH: Thank you, sir, very much. RUSH: How do I like working with Haney? RUSH: Haney's been very helpful. CALLER: I think you're a great face to have on the Golf Channel. I'd like to see you there more often. RUSH: Well, let me tell you something: This is one of the reasons I got so frustrated with television. The most recent episode which was at Baker's Bay in the Bahamas? CALLER: Right. RUSH: I mean, it was a killer episode. It was a great, great episode. That episode was 22-1/2 minutes. That episode required 14-1/2 hours to put together, over three days. Now, it didn't require it. That's the amount of time it ended up taking. We coulda done it probably in much less time but it's just the way television works. CALLER: Right, right. RUSH: And I'm Mr. One-Take Spontaneity here -- CALLER: I hear you. RUSH: -- on radio, and television isn't that way. For example, you watch... I'll pick a show. Kathryn and I watched a show 'cause a relative had a cameo in it last night called Up From Wherever, and it was a volleyball scene, a bunch of kids playing volleyball on the beach in Hawaii. The scene took maybe a minute and a half, and they told me they were on that beach for 12 hours shooting that minute and a half. It's just the way TV is. I could never be an actor. I couldn't do it. I wouldn't last a week with all the hurry up and wait stuff, the retakes and all that. But Haney has been fun to work with. He's a delight. RUSH: Oh, yeah, that. CALLER: Oh, man what a shot. RUSH: Let me tell you about that. That was the 18th hole at Baker's Bay. That hole is 600 yards from the tee I used. The professional in that shot, Pat Perez, his tee was probably about 640 yards, a 35-mile-an-hour wind behind us. I hit a drive. My second shot was 260 yards in. So I must have hit a 300-plus-yard drive with the wind behind me. And I pull out a 4-wood and I hit that shot and I aimed a little bit too far right counting for the wind and I end up in that bunker, green-side bunker that you saw. Then Perez is 40 yards ahead of me on that tee shot, he's in a Fairway bunker, he pulls out a 6-iron, hits it 240 yards, his putt is so long he pulls out a range finder to see how long the putt is. The putt was 39 yards, so times three, almost 120 feet. So he thinks he's got this hole in the bag because I've got this long bunker shot and they're both telling me before they shoot, "Look, Rush, this is an impossible shot. Even pros don't like this shot, just try to get out, just do whatever you can to get outta here, just get the ball out of the bunker." So you saw the shot, it ends up 12 feet away, and they were stunned. They were going bonkers. Perez, Haney, they just couldn't believe it. I was happy as I could be. What they didn't show you was -- they may use this footage in another show -- Haney was so ecstatic he grabbed a camera crew and followed them into the bunker where he explained the technique and what you do to make that shot and how it happened. I guess they didn't have time to include that in the show itself. CALLER: I would have liked to have seen his face. RUSH: (laughing) They were convinced I'm gonna leave it in the trap a couple of times before I get out. They were convinced I was a typical amateur and was gonna get stuck in there. CALLER: Because that was one of your -- as I remember this, you had a lot of trouble getting out of bunkers and that was one of the things that he worked with you -- RUSH: Yeah. RUSH: Well, thank you. Thanks very much. It's all confidence, and I had none in the bunkers. I didn't know what I was doing. I had literally no confidence, and I found out why I was having trouble. He explained it to a T. It all had to do with swing plane and hitting way too far behind the ball and I don't have time here to tell you what the fixes were, but, as you could see from that shot, it worked. CALLER: Well, congratulations and keep up the good work. Rush 24/7 Audio/Video Listen to the Latest Show Watch the Latest Show Listen to the Latest Show Watch the Latest Show Most Popular EIB Features	http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2011/02/11/still_talking_about_the_bunker_shot	dclm-gs1-081370000
0.026167	<urn:uuid:02849de8-fb44-4b9d-9c04-fc6e047d2a39>	en	0.954634	Caroline Gilroy 1 Caroline Gilroy 2 Caroline Gilroy 3 A clever line of phonetically spelled wines designed by Caroline Gilroy: “I have designed a new range of Australian wines. The concept behind Vee-Noh! is pronunciation. I have worked in the hospitality industry for a few years and am always amused how people pronounce certain wines, often incorrectly. I believe I have developed a cheeky solution.” Source ::	http://www.seriousaboutwine.co.za/2009/11/vee-noh/?akst_action=share-this	dclm-gs1-081390000
0.143198	<urn:uuid:2af232b0-7b29-4735-a3a1-59734b1b1c30>	en	0.979292	PA News Feeds 60% say immigration is hurting UK One in six feels that immigration has brought benefit to the country, while 60% feel it has caused more disadvantages than advantages to Britain, with just 17% believing the opposite. A major concern was the economy, with 77% believing a dramatic reduction in immigration would reduce pressure on public services and welfare, making it easier for British people to find jobs. Just 23% felt it would harm the economy. A further 62% said their biggest concern about immigration was foreign nationals claiming benefits and using public services, while just over a third said they or a relative had been denied housing or other public services apparently because of competition from immigrants. But almost half - 49% - of those polled felt that immigrants often took on jobs that British people were unwilling to do. When questioned about the recent campaign by the Home Office which involves messages on advertising vans telling illegal immigrants to "Go home or face arrest", 79% of respondents supported the message, but just 17% felt the policy would work. In the report, which is released on Monday, Lord Ashcroft says the public have a poor view of politicians' understanding about their concerns. Writing in the Sunday Times, he said: "Many feel that over the past 15 years immigration has been allowed to happen on a scale we cannot cope with, and without public consent being sought or given. Whatever people's views of immigration itself, few think any recent government has had any real grasp of it, or that any of the parties does today.	http://www.standard.co.uk/panewsfeeds/60-say-immigration-is-hurting-uk-8793161.html	dclm-gs1-081420000
0.018962	<urn:uuid:e2f13745-5d72-4d76-80b8-84d730daf375>	en	0.931985	Edit Article Here are some tips for those that are new to waking to an alarm clock, or are worried about sleeping through an alarm. 1. 1 Pick an alarm device. Wind-up type alarm clocks with bells, clock radios, and even many cell phones and pagers can be set to play an alert that can wake even the deepest sleepers. 2. 2 Choose alarm type. Based on the device chosen above, it may be possible to select from 2 or more types of alarm signal. Many clock radios offer choice of a wake alarm consisting of a radio station broadcast (of the user's choice) or a simple buzzer. There may be two volume controls; one for the "sleep" mode and another for the "wake alarm" mode. Setting the wrong one could result in not hearing the wake alarm. It may also be possible to set two or more wake times. 3. 3 Set more than one device. If the device used for a wake alarm will only allow for a single alarm time, consider using a second device in the list above as a back up alarm source. This is a good practice should the first device fail to operate (due to power outage, defect, etc.). The device(s) should be self powered (as would be the case for a pager or cell phone) or have a battery back up to keep time in the event of a power failure. Set the second device to alert a minute or two before or after the main device. 4. 4 Test the settings. Set the alarm type, volume, etc. as desired, but set the alarm time to alert a minute or two in the future, instead of the wake time. Wait for the alarm time to start the alarm. Adjust volume, tuning, etc. settings as needed on all devices. Make sure those devices with multiple alarms are fully functional (make sure the second alarm alerts). 5. 5 Locate the device away from the bed. If afraid of shutting of the alarm and going back to sleep, try locating the device where it will be required to actually get out of bed to reset the alarm. Of course, this won't prevent climbing back into bed, but may help lessen the chances of that happening. 6. 6 Set the device(s) to the desired wake time(s). • Also, it is a good idea to have someone to wake you up in case you sleep through your alarm or the power goes out in the morning and your alarm does not go off. • Try some real-time dry runs. Performing the test alarm is great - it lets you know it is working, but trying it out under real world conditions is best. Evaluate how well the alarms work waking you on a day(s) before its needed. Test it for a weekend morning or other day before relying on it to wake you. • A device that is important may perform the wake function easier than a typical radio alarm. Consider a cellphone. Many people are very much aware of a ringing telephone, and a cellphone is no different. Look for an Alarm Clock setting or tool on the cellphone to see if can provide alerts based on the time of day. If using a cellphone that has ringtones, try setting the alarm to be the same ringtone of someone important - a child, spouse, boss, etc. • Don't forget the back up battery! If there is no "low battery" warning on the device(s), change the batteries at the same time as changing batteries in smoke detectors or when changing between Daylight Saving and Standard Time (about every six months). If your alarm clock runs on electricity from your home and has a "back-up battery" compartment...use it! (In case of the power going out when your sleeping then coming back on later in the night). This way, your clock will keep time until your power comes back on and your alarm will go off as normal. Article Info Categories: Improving Waking Up Thanks to all authors for creating a page that has been read 6,594 times. Did this article help you? Yes No an Author! Write an Article	http://www.wikihow.com/Wake-Up-With-an-Alarm-Clock	dclm-gs1-081570000
0.040217	<urn:uuid:84bdfb04-6283-4284-9abd-e586d783036a>	en	0.930784	Friday, Aug. 1 Mt. Hood Jazz Festival [JAZZ] This yearâs slimmed-down edition of the long-running Mt. Hood Jazz Festival kicks off with Friday nightâs free round robin featuring four local combos, each at a different restaurant on Main Avenue in downtown Gresham. Saturdayâs schedule begins around noon with a local all-star lineup featuring Javier Nero, John Nastos and other Portland jazz stalwarts, and continues with sets by Bobby Torres Ensemble and Billy Haynes before headliner Pete Christlieb and his wife, trombonist and former Motown session player Linda Small, join a trio of Portland jazzers. Best known for his classic single-take solo on Steely Danâs âDeacon Blues,â straight-ahead saxman Christlieb has been a mainstay of the L.A. studio scene for a half-century, including a long stint in Johnny Carsonâs Tonight Show band, variety shows, TV series and collaborations with legends from Louie Bellson to Chet Baker to Freddie Hubbard. BRETT CAMPBELL. 6 pm FridayNoon Saturday. $15-$20. Go to for details. The Great Horror Campout [SCARES] The Great Horror Campout is basically an outdoor, immersive, haunted-house experience you canât escape until the sun comes up. Activities include a scavenger hunt, âvoodoo ritualsâ and absolutely no sleep. So itâs kind of like regular summer camp, except with more people in rubber masks hiding behind trees. On private property in Beavercreek. 18+. [FESTIVAL] It's not just for hula-hooping hippies anymore! This is the least "rootsy" lineup the festival has put out yet, leaning heavily on of-the-moment indie acts like Mac DeMarco and the War on Drugs, but that only makes the experience even more unique. Where else can you see a band called Diarrhea Planet headline a barn? Pendarvis Farm, 16581 SE Hagen Road, Happy Valley. See for schedule and ticket information. All ages. Through Aug. 3. Burials, Exhausted Prayer, Aerial Ruin [SCORCHED EARTH] However complicated metal can be, Portland's Burials further confuse it all, combining the outer-reaches of '70s prog and varied strains of that darker, more sinister music. There's a clear Scandinavian influence, evidenced during "The Tide," a three-part suite and also the title of an album the band issued last year. As grand a statement as the disc was, Burials' 2009 self-titled album offers a more dynamic picture of the band, as songs like "Wizard Lock" open with a gambit befitting a more bucolic album—that is, until the double bass drum kicks in, intimating the impending blackness coming just a few moments later. DAVE CANTOR. The Know, 2026 NE Alberta St., 473-8729. 8:45 pm. $5. 21+. Oregon Burlesque Festival [PERFORMANCE] How has Oregon not had a burlesque festival until now? More than 50 peelers throw their clothes on the floor for the inaugural Oregon Burlesque Festival, produced by local burlesque veterans Tana the Tattooed Lady, Holly Dai and Ellie Darling. World traveller (and boxing fan) Lydia DeCarllo comes down from Vancouver, British Columbia, to headline the event Friday and Saturday. Burlesque legend September Rose makes an appearance, and balancer and foot archer Brittany Walsh shoots some arrows with her toes. Save your dollars for tipping and your breath for whistling. Thursday is at Funhouse Lounge (2432 SE 11th Ave., 841-6734), while Saturday and Sunday are at Dante's (350 W Burnside St., 226-6630). Multiple venues, details here. 9:30 pm Thursday, July 31 and 8 pm Friday-Saturday, Aug. 1-2. $10 Thursday, $15 Saturday-Sunday. $100-$120 tables. 21+. [AUTOTUNE-SMITH] Don't hate the player, hate the game. In this case, the game is AutoTune, and the player is T-Pain. In the mid-aughts, the Florida-born "rappa ternt sanga" seized upon the technology previously used to trick listeners into believing Britney Spears could actually hold a note and devised an entire persona out of it. Becoming a robotic, post-millennial Nate Dogg, the dude assisted on roughly 80 bajillion hit singles toward the end of the decade, while also churning out several club (and strip-club) staples under his own name, many of which still get played today. The downside, of course, was that every other commercial rapper and R&B singer in the world glommed onto what he was doing, despite not having one-tenth of his goofy charisma, making him the symbol of a trend that proved immensely grating once it became inescapable. But the best thing about being T-Pain is never having to apologize: Even after Jay-Z declared AutoTune dead in 2009, he just kept on keeping on, up to and including his latest single, "Drankin' Patna." Long may he run. MATTHEW SINGER. Roseland Theater, 8 NW 6th Ave., 224-2038. 8 pm. $25 general admission, $75 VIP. Saturday, Aug. 2 OBON Fest 2014 [JAPANESE] The notion of Obon is this: Each year, your ancestors' spirits come back to this world to pay a little house call. In Japanese culture, this is apparently encouraged rather than being terrifying as hell. The Oregon Buddhist Temple will host a celebration with yakiniku, yakitori, manju and chirashi sushi, plus a beer garden and an obon dance. Children are welcome. Oregon Buddhist Temple, 3720 SE 34th Ave. 3-9 pm. Rick Mitchell [JAZZ] When was the last time someone invited you out to hear some really great jazz? Exactly. But despite the genre slipping from the radar of mainstream pop culture, former Portlander and longtime music writer Rick Mitchell argues that jazz continues to thrive with innovative artists. His new book, Jazz In the New Millennium: Live and Well, profiles nearly 60 musicians from Roy Haynes to Esperanza Spalding. Music Millennium, 3158 E Burnside St., 231-8926. 3 pm. Free. Rogue Ales Bones and Brew [BEER] This is the 20th year of the Bones and Brew fest. Think how many generations of pig that amounts to. Rogue Ales Public House, 1339 NW Flanders St., 222-5910. Noon-9 pm Saturday, Noon-5 pm Sunday. $5 day pass. Yonatan Gat, The We Shared Milk, Don't, Selector Dub Narcotic [CULTURED GUITAR] Yonatan Gat is a melting pot of sound, blending Middle Eastern traditionalism with Afro-Cuban pace and his own American inventiveness. The composer and onetime Monotonix guitarist has teamed up with Portuguese percussionist Igor Domingues for his latest musical incarnation. In a single song, listeners are transported from cobblestone medieval villages to Latin nightclubs to smoky midwestern jazz clubs. It's the kind of half-drunk concept that usually sounds better in theory than in action, but Gat has pulled it off. The proof is in the dynamic pudding—in this case, the New York musician's latest EP, Iberian Passage. MARK STOCK. Mississippi Studios, 3939 N Mississippi Ave., 288-3895. 9 pm. $10. 21 . [SOUTH IN YOUR MOUTH] When first listening to a record by Louisiana rapper Kevin Gates, it's pretty easy to pinpoint what makes him one of the most exciting young talents in hip-hop: the voice. His booming, Southern-accented baritone alternates between a growl and a bark, depending on his mood. On his most recent mixtape, By Any Means, Gates is mainly going for aggression. The record is packed with heavy trap anthems and chest-puffing bravado. On "Keep Fucking With Me," he goes into extreme detail about what would happen if you got on his bad side, and it legitimately sounds like you don't want to be there. But it's in the moments when things slow down a bit that Gates really shows off his talents, such as on the introspective "Movie," where he uses his gravelly drawl to harmonize with the beat and croak out some heart-piercing notes. It's a reminder that, despite his menacing presence on the mic, this music thing is coming straight from his heart. I was reminded of that personally when I met him last year. After talking for a bit, Gates—a large, heavily tattooed figure—didn't just shake my hand, he hugged me. That's when I realized he's more than just a voice. REED JACKSON. Peter's Room, 8 NW 6th Ave., 971-230-0033. 8 pm Saturday, Aug. 2. $16. All ages. Sunday, August 3 The Flaming Lips, Radiation City [YOSHIMI BATTLES THE TIMBERS ARMY] Nothing screams, "Are you ready for some futbol?!" like sparkly capes, animal costumes, fake blood and confetti cannons. OK, so maybe alt-rock acid casualties the Flaming Lips are sort of a left-field choice to headline Major League Soccer's free All-Star Week concert, considering Kansas City had Macklemore last year. Then again, the experience of a Timbers game isn't all that far from that of a live Lips show, what with all the chain saws and Mexican wrestling masks and smoke bombs. And besides, the band does have an intimate relationship with Portland: Wayne Coyne saw a lot of our private parts up close when he came here to shoot the NSFW "Watching the Planets" video at Mount Tabor back in 2009. Though the group's fearless leader has gone off the deep end in recent years—even for him—and despite the darkness of its last two records, the Flaming Lips remain one of the great spectacles on the touring circuit today. You really can't beat that zero-dollar price tag, either. We suggest tailgating by finding a parking lot near Waterfront Park and blaring Zaireeka as loudly as possible. MATTHEW SINGER. Tom McCall Waterfront Park, Southwest Naito Parkway and Harrison Street. 5 pm. $0 cheap! Xiu Xiu, Circuit Des Yeux, Marisa Anderson [AVANT-GUARDIANS] Jamie Stewart's ever-shifting, ever-confrontational experimental art project returns, making up for dates canceled earlier this year due to the singer's throat ailment. Doug Fir Lounge, 830 E Burnside St., 231-9663. 9 pm. $10 advance, $12 day of show. 21 . Jordan Dykstra [MUSIC] Jordan Dykstra came to Portland after collegeâafter dropping out of college, to be precise. He left Azusa Pacific University, a private Christian campus in suburban L.A., where he was studying music theory, in 2007, to take a summer internship at Marriage Records, the local indie label that released early albums from Tune-Yards, Yacht and Dirty Projectors. âI learned more in that two months than I did in three years in class,â says the 29-year-old violist, who went on to become vice president of the label. Now, Dykstra is returning to Southern California and to school, studying composition and performance at CalArts. Heâs leaving behind a new album, Audition, a set of ambient string music inspired by the landscape surrounding the property in Bethany, Ore., where it was recorded. Holocene, 1001 SE Morrison St., with Davis Lee Hooker, Jason Traeger, Patrik Csak, Caspar Sonnet and DJ Honey O, on Sunday, Aug. 3. 8:30 pm. $6. 21+. The Three Sisters [THEATER] Portland Experimental Theatre Ensemble, responsible for some of the most adventurous work in town, presents a new translation of Chekhov's play about three upper-class sisters despairing at life in late 19th-century Moscow. Translator and director Stepan Simek has staged the drama as an intimate birthday party for sister Irina, with audience members—just 45 each night—serving almost as guests. Reed College Performing Arts Building, 3203 SE Woodstock Blvd., 555-1212. 7:30 pm. $15-$50. Through Aug. 17.	http://www.wweek.com/portland/blog-31961-willamette_weekend_15_things_to_do_and_see_in_port.html	dclm-gs1-081610000
0.512186	<urn:uuid:a2a3431a-1753-41ec-a7e8-92ea6dc3ac51>	en	0.883824	From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search For other uses, see Modulation (disambiguation). In telecommunications, modulation is the process of conveying a message signal, for example a digital bit stream or an analog audio signal, inside another signal that can be physically transmitted. Modulation of a sine waveform transforms a baseband message signal into a passband signal. A modulator is a device that performs modulation. A demodulator (sometimes detector or demod) is a device that performs demodulation, the inverse of modulation. A modem (from modulator–demodulator) can perform both operations. The aim of digital modulation is to transfer a digital bit stream over an analog bandpass channel, for example over the public switched telephone network (where a bandpass filter limits the frequency range to 300–3400 Hz) or over a limited radio frequency band. Analog and digital modulation facilitate frequency division multiplexing (FDM), where several low pass information signals are transferred simultaneously over the same shared physical medium, using separate passband channels (several different carrier frequencies). In music synthesizers, modulation may be used to synthesise waveforms with an extensive overtone spectrum using a small number of oscillators. In this case the carrier frequency is typically in the same order or much lower than the modulating waveform (see frequency modulation synthesis or ring modulation synthesis). Analog modulation methods[edit] List of common analog modulation techniques[edit] Common analog modulation techniques are: • Angle modulation, which is approximately constant envelope • Frequency modulation (FM) (here the frequency of the carrier signal is varied in accordance to the instantaneous amplitude of the modulating signal) • Phase modulation (PM) (here the phase shift of the carrier signal is varied in accordance with the instantaneous amplitude of the modulating signal) Digital modulation methods[edit] In digital modulation, an analog carrier signal is modulated by a discrete signal. Digital modulation methods can be considered as digital-to-analog conversion, and the corresponding demodulation or detection as analog-to-digital conversion. The changes in the carrier signal are chosen from a finite number of M alternative symbols (the modulation alphabet). Schematic of 4 baud (8 bit/s) data link containing arbitrarily chosen values. A simple example: A telephone line is designed for transferring audible sounds, for example tones, and not digital bits (zeros and ones). Computers may however communicate over a telephone line by means of modems, which are representing the digital bits by tones, called symbols. If there are four alternative symbols (corresponding to a musical instrument that can generate four different tones, one at a time), the first symbol may represent the bit sequence 00, the second 01, the third 10 and the fourth 11. If the modem plays a melody consisting of 1000 tones per second, the symbol rate is 1000 symbols/second, or baud. Since each tone (i.e., symbol) represents a message consisting of two digital bits in this example, the bit rate is twice the symbol rate, i.e. 2000 bits per second. This is similar to the technique used by dialup modems as opposed to DSL modems. According to one definition of digital signal,[citation needed] the modulated signal is a digital signal. According to another definition,[citation needed] the modulation is a form of digital-to-analog conversion. Most textbooks would consider digital modulation schemes as a form of digital transmission, synonymous to data transmission; very few would consider it as analog transmission. Fundamental digital modulation methods[edit] The most fundamental digital modulation techniques are based on keying: In QAM, an inphase signal (or I, with one example being a cosine waveform) and a quadrature phase signal (or Q, with an example being a sine wave) are amplitude modulated with a finite number of amplitudes, and then summed. It can be seen as a two-channel system, each channel using ASK. The resulting signal is equivalent to a combination of PSK and ASK. In all of the above methods, each of these phases, frequencies or amplitudes are assigned a unique pattern of binary bits. Usually, each phase, frequency or amplitude encodes an equal number of bits. This number of bits comprises the symbol that is represented by the particular phase, frequency or amplitude. If the alphabet consists of M = 2^N alternative symbols, each symbol represents a message consisting of N bits. If the symbol rate (also known as the baud rate) is f_{S} symbols/second (or baud), the data rate is N f_{S} bit/second. For example, with an alphabet consisting of 16 alternative symbols, each symbol represents 4 bits. Thus, the data rate is four times the baud rate. In the case of PSK, ASK or QAM, where the carrier frequency of the modulated signal is constant, the modulation alphabet is often conveniently represented on a constellation diagram, showing the amplitude of the I signal at the x-axis, and the amplitude of the Q signal at the y-axis, for each symbol. Modulator and detector principles of operation[edit] PSK and ASK, and sometimes also FSK, are often generated and detected using the principle of QAM. The I and Q signals can be combined into a complex-valued signal I+jQ (where j is the imaginary unit). The resulting so called equivalent lowpass signal or equivalent baseband signal is a complex-valued representation of the real-valued modulated physical signal (the so-called passband signal or RF signal). 1. Group the incoming data bits into codewords, one for each symbol that will be transmitted. 2. Map the codewords to attributes, for example amplitudes of the I and Q signals (the equivalent low pass signal), or frequency or phase values. 3. Adapt pulse shaping or some other filtering to limit the bandwidth and form the spectrum of the equivalent low pass signal, typically using digital signal processing. 4. Perform digital to analog conversion (DAC) of the I and Q signals (since today all of the above is normally achieved using digital signal processing, DSP). 5. Generate a high frequency sine carrier waveform, and perhaps also a cosine quadrature component. Carry out the modulation, for example by multiplying the sine and cosine waveform with the I and Q signals, resulting in the equivalent low pass signal being frequency shifted to the modulated passband signal or RF signal. Sometimes this is achieved using DSP technology, for example direct digital synthesis using a waveform table, instead of analog signal processing. In that case the above DAC step should be done after this step. 6. Amplification and analog bandpass filtering to avoid harmonic distortion and periodic spectrum. At the receiver side, the demodulator typically performs: 1. Bandpass filtering. 2. Automatic gain control, AGC (to compensate for attenuation, for example fading). 3. Frequency shifting of the RF signal to the equivalent baseband I and Q signals, or to an intermediate frequency (IF) signal, by multiplying the RF signal with a local oscillator sinewave and cosine wave frequency (see the superheterodyne receiver principle). 4. Sampling and analog-to-digital conversion (ADC) (sometimes before or instead of the above point, for example by means of undersampling). 5. Equalization filtering, for example a matched filter, compensation for multipath propagation, time spreading, phase distortion and frequency selective fading, to avoid intersymbol interference and symbol distortion. 6. Detection of the amplitudes of the I and Q signals, or the frequency or phase of the IF signal. 7. Quantization of the amplitudes, frequencies or phases to the nearest allowed symbol values. 8. Mapping of the quantized amplitudes, frequencies or phases to codewords (bit groups). 9. Parallel-to-serial conversion of the codewords into a bit stream. 10. Pass the resultant bit stream on for further processing such as removal of any error-correcting codes. As is common to all digital communication systems, the design of both the modulator and demodulator must be done simultaneously. Digital modulation schemes are possible because the transmitter-receiver pair have prior knowledge of how data is encoded and represented in the communications system. In all digital communication systems, both the modulator at the transmitter and the demodulator at the receiver are structured so that they perform inverse operations. Non-coherent modulation methods do not require a receiver reference clock signal that is phase synchronized with the sender carrier wave. In this case, modulation symbols (rather than bits, characters, or data packets) are asynchronously transferred. The opposite is coherent modulation. List of common digital modulation techniques[edit] The most common digital modulation techniques are: MSK and GMSK are particular cases of continuous phase modulation. Indeed, MSK is a particular case of the sub-family of CPM known as continuous-phase frequency-shift keying (CPFSK) which is defined by a rectangular frequency pulse (i.e. a linearly increasing phase pulse) of one symbol-time duration (total response signaling). OFDM is based on the idea of frequency-division multiplexing (FDM), but the multiplexed streams are all parts of a single original stream. The bit stream is split into several parallel data streams, each transferred over its own sub-carrier using some conventional digital modulation scheme. The modulated sub-carriers are summed to form an OFDM signal. This dividing and recombining helps with handling channel impairments. OFDM is considered as a modulation technique rather than a multiplex technique, since it transfers one bit stream over one communication channel using one sequence of so-called OFDM symbols. OFDM can be extended to multi-user channel access method in the orthogonal frequency-division multiple access (OFDMA) and multi-carrier code division multiple access (MC-CDMA) schemes, allowing several users to share the same physical medium by giving different sub-carriers or spreading codes to different users. Of the two kinds of RF power amplifier, switching amplifiers (Class D amplifiers) cost less and use less battery power than linear amplifiers of the same output power. However, they only work with relatively constant-amplitude-modulation signals such as angle modulation (FSK or PSK) and CDMA, but not with QAM and OFDM. Nevertheless, even though switching amplifiers are completely unsuitable for normal QAM constellations, often the QAM modulation principle are used to drive switching amplifiers with these FM and other waveforms, and sometimes QAM demodulators are used to receive the signals put out by these switching amplifiers. Automatic digital modulation recognition (ADMR)[edit] Automatic digital modulation recognition in intelligent communication systems is one of the most important issues in software defined radio and cognitive radio. According to incremental expanse of intelligent receivers, automatic modulation recognition becomes a challenging topic in telecommunication systems and computer engineering. Such systems have many civil and military applications. Moreover, blind recognition of modulation type is an important problem in commercial systems, especially in software defined radio. Usually in such systems, there are some extra information for system configuration, but considering blind approaches in intelligent receivers, we can reduce information overload and increase transmission performance.[1] Obviously, with no knowledge of the transmitted data and many unknown parameters at the receiver, such as the signal power, carrier frequency and phase offsets, timing information, etc., blind identification of the modulation is a difficult task. This becomes even more challenging in real-world scenarios with multipath fading, frequency-selective and time-varying channels.[2] There are two main approaches to automatic modulation recognition. The first approach uses likelihood-based methods to assign an input signal to a proper class. Another recent approach is based on feature extraction. Digital baseband modulation or line coding[edit] Main article: Line code The term digital baseband modulation (or digital baseband transmission) is synonymous to line codes. These are methods to transfer a digital bit stream over an analog baseband channel (a.k.a. lowpass channel) using a pulse train, i.e. a discrete number of signal levels, by directly modulating the voltage or current on a cable. Common examples are unipolar, non-return-to-zero (NRZ), Manchester and alternate mark inversion (AMI) codings.[3] Pulse modulation methods[edit] Pulse modulation schemes aim at transferring a narrowband analog signal over an analog baseband channel as a two-level signal by modulating a pulse wave. Some pulse modulation schemes also allow the narrowband analog signal to be transferred as a digital signal (i.e., as a quantized discrete-time signal) with a fixed bit rate, which can be transferred over an underlying digital transmission system, for example, some line code. These are not modulation schemes in the conventional sense since they are not channel coding schemes, but should be considered as source coding schemes, and in some cases analog-to-digital conversion techniques. Analog-over-analog methods Analog-over-digital methods Miscellaneous modulation techniques[edit] Further reading[edit] See also[edit] 1. ^ M. Hadi Valipour, M. Mehdi Homayounpour and M. Amin Mehralian, Automatic digital modulation recognition in presence of noise using SVM and PSO, in Proceedings of 2012 Sixth International Symposium on Telecommunications (IST), pp 378-382, Nov 2012, Tehran, Iran. 2. ^ Dobre, Octavia A., Ali Abdi, Yeheskel Bar-Ness, and Wei Su. Communications, IET 1, no. 2 (2007): 137-156. (2007). "Survey of automatic modulation classification techniques: classical approaches and new trends" (PDF). IET Communications: 137–156. 3. ^ Ke-Lin Du and M. N. S. Swamy (2010). Wireless Communication Systems: From RF Subsystems to 4G Enabling Technologies. Cambridge University Press. p. 188. ISBN 978-0-521-11403-5. Modem(Modulation and Demodulation) External links[edit]	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modulation	dclm-gs1-081690000
0.411317	<urn:uuid:3817416b-70cd-459c-b9b7-c562ae40bcfd>	en	0.907857	Oceanic crust From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search Colors indicate the age of oceanic lithosphere, wherein red indicates the youngest age, and blue indicates the oldest age. The lines represent tectonic plates. Oceanic crust is the part of Earth's lithosphere that surfaces in the ocean basins. Oceanic crust is primarily composed of mafic rocks, or sima, which is rich in iron and magnesium. It is thinner than continental crust, or sial, generally less than 10 kilometers thick; however it is denser, having a mean density of about 2.9 grams per cubic centimeter[1] as opposed to continental crust which has a density of about 2.7 grams per cubic centimeter.[2] Life cycle[edit] As the mantle rises it cools and melts, as the pressure decreases and it crosses the solidus. The amount of melt produced depends only on the temperature of the mantle as it rises. Hence most oceanic crust is the same thickness (7±1 km). Very slow spreading ridges (<1 cm·yr−1 half-rate) produce thinner crust (4–5 km thick) as the mantle has a chance to cool on upwelling and so it crosses the solidus and melts at lesser depth, thereby producing less melt and thinner crust. An example of this is the Gakkel Ridge under the Arctic Ocean. Thicker than average crust is found above plumes as the mantle is hotter and hence it crosses the solidus and melts at a greater depth, creating more melt and a thicker crust. An example of this is Iceland which has crust of thickness ~20 km.[5] Magnetic anomalies[edit] Main article: Seafloor spreading See also[edit] 1. ^ Rogers, N.; Blake, S.; Burton, K. An introduction to our dynamic planet. Cambridge University Press. p. 19. ISBN 978-0-521-49424-3. Retrieved January 2008. 2. ^ Cogley 1984 3. ^ D. R. Bowes (1989) The Encyclopedia of Igneous and Metamorphic Petrology, Van Nostrand Reinhold ISBN 0-442-20623-2 4. ^ Clare P. Marshall, Rhodes W. Fairbridge (1999) Encyclopedia of Geochemistry, Kluwer Academic Publishers ISBN 0-412-75500-9 5. ^ C.M.R. Fowler (2005) The Solid Earth (2nd Ed.), Cambridge University Press ISBN 0-521-89307-0 7. ^ Müller, R. Dietmar (April 2008). "Age, spreading rates, and spreading asymmetry of the world's ocean crust" (PDF). Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (American Geophysical Union) 9 (4). doi:10.1029/2007GC001743.	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oceanic_crust	dclm-gs1-081700000
0.021175	<urn:uuid:ccc00ff5-23a7-4c0e-9ec4-d6b1a0290834>	en	0.961588	Monthly Archives: January 2011 Is this Beit Midrash on a Razors Edge or in a Tower: Danny Landes in Tikkun As a 25th anniversary special, Tikkun magazine asked several people about tikkun today. One of them Rabbi Danny Landes who was in the very first issue of Tikkun writing on halakhic tikkun. Landes is an advocate of an egalitarian non-denominational beit midrash. Now, 25 years later he views his approach as a corrective for Orthodoxy that “drives the Orthodox sane.” He wants the classic beit midrash to be saved “from systemic parochialism, chosen irrelevancy, and sought-after faux elitism.” Yet, the same beit midrash must avoid liberal thinking that would severe it from the tradition. But is that true? Is an open beit midrash really just on a narrow ridge? It is severed from the Orthodox world of pesak and politics, and it is severed from the thinking of bestsellers such as Radical Judaism. Can one be non-denominational in Tikkun and quite denominational in Jewish Review of Books? Does this non-denominationalism have a location outside their walls? Is it an escape from the outside real-world Orthodoxy without changing the outside world? Is it Jewish Week Orthodoxy? If it has no egalitarian minyan then is it non-denominational ? If you claim you are the real and the truth but don’t go outside does it do a tikkun? Landes describes the process of learning as the exciting dynamic world of Chevruta study but doesn’t that approach fade as one spends years engaged in Talmud study. Landes describes how “the discussions get dizzier as firm ground vanishes, and funnier as study partners turn cartwheels in the air the closer their chavrutah comes to getting it.” But people trying to deal with contemporary issues memorize commentaries instead of doing argumentative cartwheels in thin air. Rather, they do CD-Rom searches of responsa. His vision of the hard-one argument is compelling if compared to “unapproachable and definitionally unassailable shmoos” but aren’t the Pardes videos commenting on world politics just that? So where is “this tikkun of the Jews, of the world, of our sacred Torah?” If “It’s a far cry from an ex cathedra shtender (lectern)” does it actually engage to perform a tikkun for the imagined demagogue? No real criticism here. Just some first thoughts and reactions. Passionate Midrash by Daniel Landes My tikkun practice is the care and feeding of, and participation in, an ever-changing yet eternal organism — the Pardes Beit Midrash. This noisy study hall for a diverse crowd of intense, wisecracking, basically brilliant Torah students is a threefold tikkun: it’s a traditional form that transforms students, allowing the secular to access the Tradition; the Reform to become literate; the Conservative, passionate; and the Neo-Hasidic to gain textual traction; and it drives the Orthodox sane. Yes, we drive them sane. Second, the Pardes Beit Midrash is transformational in that its participants quickly shed this silly, slimy lizard skin of denominationalism, being too busy learning to fill the time proclaiming. Finally, it transforms the classic Beit Midrash, saving it from systemic parochialism, chosen irrelevancy, and sought-after faux elitism. At its center are text and method. Text is Torah, especially the hard stuff: commentaries, Mishnah, Talmud, and Codes — untranslated and uncensored. The method is straight-on attack in chavrutah (learning in pairs), utilizing classic and new-fangled approaches. Two to three students sweat the small stuff in the context of others doing the same, until peshat, the illusive “plain” meaning, is nailed. Easier said. Given the multilayered dynamics, a text within a text with infinite regress/progress, a variety of moral issues which are taken seriously, and the chavrutah relations, the discussions get dizzier as firm ground vanishes, and funnier as study partners turn cartwheels in the air the closer their chavrutah comes to getting it. Interesting things happen. One makes the argument presented in the text, offering a logical explanation. Soon white-hot heat is generated as the resistant chavrutah turns from pleasing partner into implacable foe, as he or she breaks the argument — it’s wrong; nonsensical! Then, suddenly, mid-fight you discover that your chavrutah is actually correct; indeed, as you explain: more right than they know! And you prove it triumphantly! Inevitably the startled partner silently rethinks, turns around and rejects his own line of argument and argues ferociously for your first line of reasoning. The Great Switcheroo has been effected. Sides swap, positions permeate each other, and students and teachers switch roles. The discussion moves magically from peshat to meaning. And this volatile meaning — subject to dialectical ascents to the heights and perilous drops into the abyss — is hard-won and enlightening. It’s a far cry from an ex cathedra shtender (lectern) delivered from unapproachable and definitionally unassailable shmoos or from a clever “I had a thought” derived really not at all from any verse or source as ironically delivered in a Shabbat minyan. No, it’s hard-won, and I see it happen around me, every day. And then, once again, as a witness I believe that it’s not a slogan: this tikkun of the Jews, of the world, of our sacred Torah, is possible and actually present. Rabbi Daniel Landes is Rosh HaYeshiva of the Pardes Institute of Jewish Studies in Jerusalem. He wrote on Halakhic Tikkun in Tikkun magazine’s inaugural issue. Palliative Care Conversation I recently met an Orthodox palliative care nurse working on the West Coast who discussed the implications of her work. She discussed how various stages 4-5 cancers are already about choosing a good death rather than the power of doctors to keep one alive. Does one want to die from a narcotic shot after having lots of tubes inserted or does one want a non-invasive death? (We already discussed some of these issues here.) She claimed that 20% 25% of all cases would not get into a brain stem death or heart death situation if there was more palliative care. On the other hand, she said that the organs of those who die from aggressive cancers are never used for organ transplants, they always inform those who do transplants of the deaths and they are never chosen. (These are her statistics; I cannot verify them. I am neither doctor nor medical ethicist). She mentioned that Orthodox Jews are the biggest believers in the medical model that things can always be solved even when it is empirical that a stage 5 cancer cannot be helped. And that the Rabbis are playing doctor rather than chaplain. I was surprised when she discussed a Chabad seminar in medical ethics that she attended and she said it was great. It was given by a Chabad rabbi who is in the forefront of knowledge of palliative care. The rabbi discussed palliative care cancer patients as terefah and had a real empirical based category of goses. She compared this with the NY orthodox rabbis who have a 1965 image of medicine based on Dr Kildare who can solve everything. (For those too young to remember, Dr Kildare was a TV show in which the doctor always knew best and more medical treatments were always good things.) Now we live in a world where people tell the joke “why do they seal the coffin? To stop the doctors from continuing to administer the profitable chemotherapy.” The nurse compared the lack of knowledge of the Yeshivish and Centrist rabbis to this Chabad rabbi. She did not remember his name and I could not find it online in any combination of the words Chabad, medical, rabbi, seminar. I do want to know who it is and if Chabad is developing their own medical ethics. I had never heard that Chabad was getting into original medical ethics. If anyone knows, then let me know. She found this Chabad rabbi relevant with real categories of terefah and goses, which acknowledge that we all die. She compared this with the local rabbis who when consulted on end life care insist on painful procedures that bring no benefit. She told a story of an Orthodox woman who said “her husband was good so he cannot die. He did everything right he cannot die.” When I asked her how does she explain it, at first she would not answer the question and then only answered it with my repeat of the question. She said that the Orthodox (in this case referring to a Engaged Yeshivish or Centrist Orthodoxy) are more irrational than other patients. They have a complete dependence on a certain life, and the woman with the dying husband was dependent on husband. No contingency, no sense of end of life. Finally, she noted the increasing convergence with Catholics positions, for example that food and hydration is necessary. And both need more actual knowledge of the end process of each specific disease or end life situation. (See my prior post here on the convergence). Philo-palin, Hillel Halkin and the phrase Blood Libel Here is Halkin’s genealogy: Daniel Landes responds to Arthur Green’s response. Daniel Landes Responds: Ramhal as expressing 18th century Enlightenment values The Brothers Ashkenazi, by Israel Joshua Singer reprinted People tend to imagine Eastern European Hasidism as existing as some circle of modern new age spiirtualists sitting around discussing Kabbalah. A few years ago, Yohanan Petrovsky-Shtern wrote an excellent article arguing for a greater sense of history, folklore, and ordinary people in the study of Hasidism; he sharply argued that the star-struck study of Hasidism does not spend enough time in the study of earthly Hasidism. Turning to Polish Hasidism, in the era of Kotzk, Izbica, and Gur, those who are not historians can gain a sense of the era by reading the newly-reissued The Brothers Ashkenazi, by Israel Joshua Singer. Poland modernized with trains and factories between 1840-1860, and then was subject to Russian taxation after 1860. The Jews were almost all immigrants from other regions, litvaks, galitzianers, daitchers and entering the new era of productivity. Over time Jews settled in the suburbs of larger cities, Kotzk, Tomoshav, Alexsander, Gur. Singer presents older Hasidim as cruel factory owners who went to Hasidic courts, the younger Hasidic generation as raised in the seemliness of modern urban life-gambling, brothels, and fighting. And then the 20th century generation leaving Hasidism. Singer was no longer religious but was stuck in that felt that neither secularism or Hasidism had solutions. If one can see beyond Singer’s pro-labor bias and know that he is no longer Hasidic, then one gets a window into the later part of the era not available elsewhere. He preserves many details of ordinary life even if his plot development is biased. The book has a new introduction by ex-orthodox secularist Rebecca Goldstein, who notes the gender gap, the avarice, the regional differences and the fatalism.- available here and here. The book was first reviewed in the NYT and The Nation in 1936. Adam Kirsch, who is unfamiliar with the material, still offered at the Tablet these insights such as “Singer’s method in The Brothers Ashkenazi is to drop his protagonists into this bubbling cauldron and document the changes that result.” In 1936, two novels dominated the New York Times bestseller list. The first was Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, a panoramic, melodramatic historical novel that would shortly become a classic movie and that has never been out of print. The other was The Brothers Ashkenazi, by Israel Joshua Singer, which has never been made into a movie and has gone in and out of print periodically over the years. The novel’s vantage point on this crisis is the city of Lodz, sometimes called the Manchester of Poland. In the late 19th century, Lodz was transformed from a small village to an international capital of the textile industry—an industry dominated by Jewish manufacturers, merchants, and laborers. Singer captures this reckless, explosive growth in a cinematic sequence in the novel’s first pages: “Seemingly overnight the houses already standing sprouted additional stories, annexes, wings, extensions, ells, attics, and garrets to accommodate the flow of newcomers … like a torrent overflowing its banks, the Jews smashed down all barriers set up to exclude them.” Singer’s method in The Brothers Ashkenazi is to drop his protagonists into this bubbling cauldron and document the changes that result. The patriarch of the Ashkenazi dynasty, Abraham Hersh, gets rich as the chief salesman for the Gentile-owned manufacturing firm of Huntze. Just as he is an employee of capitalists rather than a capitalist himself, he seems to be in the new Lodz without being of it: He remains a traditional Hasid, spending as much time as possible at the court of his rebbe. He uses his wealth to do mitzvot like buying Passover supplies for the poor and ransoming Jewish prisoners. Finally, here is the real historical account as read by few readers of Kotzk and Izbitz from Urbanization, Capitalism, and Cosmopolitanism: Four Novels and a Film on Jews in the Polish City of Lódz Delphine Bechtel. Prooftexts. Bloomington: 2006. Vol. 26, Iss. 1/2; Lódz is a crossroad. The city was under the rule of the Russian Empire. At first, the cotton industry had been introduced there to serve the interests of the Russian market; production, however, was in the hands of Germans, Jews, and a number of Poles. The Jewish merchants mostly came from Russia. Remember the scene in the theater: when people hear that such and such has become bankrupt in Odessa, the breakdown is immediate in Lódz. The cotton itself was coming from Turkmenistan. But slowly, American cotton flooded the market, transiting through Hamburg. The situation of such a city has something fascinating. It is Metropolis, a cosmopolitan Metropolis.” Urban multiethnicity in Central and Eastern Europe has been a highly distincative feature of this region, although the phenomenon has only been rediscovered by academic researchers in the last two decades. Nonetheless, cities such as Prague, L’viv (Lemberg, Lwów), Chernivitsi (Czernowitz), Bratislava (Pressburg, Pozsony), or Gdaðsk (Danzig) have formed living examples of shared history and crossa cultural fertilization for centuries, though this feature has often gone unnoticed. Nazi ethnic cleansing and genocide, followed by years of officially monoethnic, Communist controlled states behind the Iron Curtain, had seemingly driven their multifarious past existences into oblivion. Lódz, located 120 km southwest of Warsaw and accurately dubbed “Polish Manchester,” was promoted by tsarist decree in 1820 from an obscure village with 767 inhabitants to a “factory city,” the center of the capitalist textile industry of the Polish Kingdom, soon to serve the vast Russian market. Most towns in east Central Europe developed in the Middle Ages through the combined skills of German craft workers and Jewish merchants, who often formed the core urban population while facing a predominantly Slavic peasantry. But in Lódz, this development was forced upon the city belatedly, in a programmatic and swift way that turned the city into an unquestionable symbol for hasty urbanization, rabid capitalism, and cosmopolitanism. German settlers, including skilled weavers and masters of cotton mills from Saxony or Bohemia, were encouraged to settle there, followed by Polish villagers as well as Jewish artisans and petty merchants. Each of these groups was lured into the “promised land” to provide mass, cheap labor. The town attracted newcomers like a magnet, and grew like a mushroom, on sand, swamp, and peat bog. This hasty foundation resulted in a gigantic population boom: the total number of inhabitants rose to 314,000 in 1897, and again to 506,100 in 1913. At the same time, the Jewish population rose from 259 in 1820 (representing 33.8 percent of the total) to 92,400 in 1897 (29.4 percent) and 171,900 in 1913 (34 percent). Joseph Weiler interviewed in NCR Weiler is the Orthodox Jewish attorney who recently defended the displaying of crosses before the European Court of Human Rights. See my prior blog post on the trial. It is a great interview. In a forthcoming book, he claims that Jews did indeed put Jesus to death as a false prophet based on Deut 13, thereby showed their loyalty to their covenant. Jews should take responsibility but not guilt for the crucifixion. I more then leery about the entire approach, and do not like the social implications at all, but I will wait to read the book. As noted in the comments at the source, it seems his Orthodoxy allows him to speak entirely from a religious perspective and not be concerned about the contingencies of history- specifically those Jews killed as Christ -killers. Here are some selections: Tackling taboos on Jews and Christians, the cross and deicide By John L Allen Jr Created Jan 21, 2011 Fascinating characters have always populated the landscape of Jewish-Catholic relations, but even in that milieu it’s tough to find a more intriguing personality these days than Joseph Weiler. A South-African born legal scholar and the son of a Latvian rabbi, Weiler is considered a leading expert on European constitutional law. From his perch at the NYU Law School, of all places, he edits the ultra-prestigious European Journal of International Law, and it would be easier to list the elite European universities from which he doesn’t hold honorary doctorates. We’re talking about a deeply faithful Orthodox Jew, the father of a large Jewish family in the Bronx which keeps kosher and strictly observes the Sabbath. Yet in 2003, Weiler published the best-selling book A Christian Europe, pleading for the European Union to embrace its Christian heritage. Sporting a kippah, Weiler also recently stood before the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights to defend Italy’s right to display the crucifix in public school classrooms. He took the case pro bono — arguing that forcing Italy to take down the cross would be a blow not against Christianity, but against pluralism. In a forthcoming book on the trial, he’ll try to persuade fellow Jews that their efforts over 2,000 years to reject the charge of deicide have been misplaced. In a sense that Weiler carefully unpacks, he says “the Jews” did indeed put Jesus to death, and they were doing exactly what the Lord expected. (His aim is to offer a reading of the trial that renders both Jewish and Christian responses consistent with Scripture — a project, he readily admits, destined to stir fierce reactions on both sides.) * * * When the original decision came out, I was shocked by the weakness and the perfunctory nature of the reasoning. I wrote an editorial in the European Journal of International Law, saying that no matter what position you take on the outcome, it’s an embarrassing decision. I was also contemptuous of the way the Italian government argued the case. They claimed that the cross is not a religious symbol, it’s a national symbol. Apart from being dishonest, that was bad strategy, because it was very easy for the chamber to say it’s obviously a religious symbol. What was your pitch? I said that one should go on the attack, arguing that removing the cross is actually illiberal. Allowing the cross is the liberal position, the pluralist position, because Europe has both a France and a Britain. France is an officially secular state, but in Britain the national anthem is “God Save the Queen” and the Queen is the head of the Church of England. Every picture of the Queen in a British classroom is both a national and a religious symbol. What reaction have you received from the Jewish world? I got an enormous amount of hate mail. I’ve had very harsh reactions, especially from the European Jewish community in Italy, France, Germany and elsewhere. How can the son of a “Lithuanian rabbi” do this? Very often they’ll say, you don’t know what the real church is like, let me tell you this story and that story. At bottom, the question was, ‘How can an observant Jew defend the cross?’ You don’t understand yourself to be defending Christianity but defending pluralism? That’s it. In my book A Christian Europe, I said that if the preamble to the European constitution had only made reference to the Christian roots of Europe, and not to the traditions of Athens and the French Revolution, I would have written in defense of the latter. People have asked me a million times how a practicing Jew can defend a reference to Christian roots in the European constitution, and I’ve said that I’m not a practicing Jew in this context. I’m a practicing constitutionalist. I’m a practicing pluralist. In the Biblical story, Jesus is defined as the most abject enemy of society. He’s the Osama bin Laden, the enemy who threatens the entire nation. Yet at the same time he’s the Son of God, he’s divinity. He is put on trial, and into our collective consciousness is written the imperative: ‘Nobody is so abject that he doesn’t deserve a trial, and nobody is so exalted that he can be excused from a trial.’ There’s a second element. For generations, people have protested the injustice of the trial. Rule number two, therefore, is that the trial has to be fair. We don’t accept kangaroo trials, we don’t accept perjury, and we don’t accept tampering with witnesses. What’s the second thesis? In my research I discovered there’s actually no theology of the trial, and that’s the heart of the matter. It’s an extraordinarily strange thing. The first verse says, ‘This is my law. You will not add to it and you will not detract from it, forever.’ Then it says that if one day a prophet or a dreamer should come to you giving ‘signs and wonders’ … that’s code in scripture for somebody sent by God. So, if a prophet giving signs and wonders comes along and says to stray away from God, not to follow his law, you have to know that I’m testing you. This is the theologically baffling part: I am putting you to the test, and you must resist. Even though it’s a prophet, even though it’s signs and wonders which means it comes from God, you must put this man to death. In the trial, God achieves two things in one stroke. It’s a trial of the Jews, to remind the Jews that they have their covenant and their salvation lies in it. It’s also a trial of Jesus, in which he dies innocently because in that way he expiates the sins of everybody else. His death is the way of redemption for the world. At the end of the day, according to this vision, everybody is following the path of God. What’s the third thesis? Why the shift of responsibility from the cross to the trial? That’s what the culture has done. It’s shifted the responsibility for the death of Jesus away from an execution by the Romans to a finding of guilt by the Jews. The reason in my view is not directly deicide. It is the steadfast rejection of Christ by the Jews, before and after the Crucifixion. It’s not easy to condemn a people who faithfully stick to a covenant whom God himself proclaimed as eternal, so deicide comes in handy. Basically it says that not everyone at the time of Jesus, and certainly nobody ever after, was complicit in what the Jewish leadership did. Therefore, because we don’t believe in collective punishment and collective guilt, “the Jews” should not be held responsible. The startling thing is that by absolving the Jews, [the bishops] were also absolving themselves. They also say, in the very same statement, that despite the fact we have held the Jews responsible for 2,000 years, and because of that so many Jews were put on the stake … hey guys, there’s no collective guilt, no collective responsibility, so don’t blame us either. That is one reason why I believe that John Paul II was one of the most impressive moral persons of our epoch. He never took that position. He said, ‘I’ve got something to say I’m sorry for.’ Not personally, of course … the man saved Jews during the Second World War. There are moving, moving stories. But representing the church, he said I’m not going to just rely on ‘no collective responsibility.’ There is something here to apologize for. In the book, I say that as a Jew I don’t want to be “absolved” either. We have to differentiate between guilt and responsibility. I want to be able to say, yes, we Jews put Christ to death, because that’s what the Lord required us to do. A good Christian-Jewish dialogue should not involve one side having to deny its core identity, which for Jews is the eternal covenant — Chukat Olam. I would say, if you just open the Talmud to the Sanhedrin tractate, it’s clear. Jesus came along and we put him to death, as we were required to do. The Romans are not even mentioned. The only difference between the Talmud and me is that they said Jesus was guilty of incitement, which is a reference to Deuteronomy 13, verse six onwards. That tractate is written at a time when the Talmud is the enemy of the church, and they don’t want to give Jesus the dignity of being a prophet sent by God. I will get it the most from that segment of the observant Jewish community where anything positive you have to say about Christianity is somehow anathema. Make no mistake — I am no ‘Jews for Christ.’ I abhor that. But even as an observant Jew, it is not for me to exclude any possible plan the Holy One, Blessed Be He, may have had for the rest of the nations. I think Christians will be either dismissive or will take it very, very seriously… I beg the reader of this interview to wait for the full text — it is nuanced, careful, and respectful. Read the Rest Here Conference on Jewish Lamdanut There is an annual conference at Van Leer on the philosophy of halakhah. This year they issued the call for papers earlier than usual. So far, they have had conferences on Yeshaya Leibowitz, Rav Soloveitchik, Philosophy of Halakhah, Ideology and Halakhah, Conservative Judaism an Halakhah, Halakhah as an Emotional Event, and now this one. It is an academic conference, so many of the papers from Centrists are not accepted. After one of the earlier conferences, a senior RIETS rabbi told said to me, in a somewhat relativist way, about why no one in NY cared about the conferences: “they talk to their friends and we talk to those we are comfortable to.” Before one of the early conferences, a known Centrist speaker wanted to determine who should speak based his list of acceptable Centrist speakers. Van Leer responded by saying “You make yourself stupid” and showed him the door. Which of the proposed list of questions are great questions? Which questions should be there? Joel Osteen will be in Israel- talks about Judaism The LA Jewish Journal has an exclusive interview with Pastor Joel Osteen about his upcoming pro-Israel performance at the Jerusalem Theater. Joel Osteen is one of the leading American preachers on TV every night. He preaches that God cares about you and wants you to have wealth, a better self, your dreams fulfilled, and a good life. Jews should take note that even though Osteen is an Evangelical, his views are almost Unitarian for their lack of doctrine or dogma. In addition, Joel Osteen is very popular in my Centrist Orthodox neighborhood; people watch him on TV and know his sermons. He generally uses Hebrew scripture in a narrative reading. If God has made promises to Abraham, then they apply to all believers out there. You too have been promised to be numerous, blessed, wealth and to have everything. His religion is so light and his message of prosperity so in tune with suburban Orthodoxy that he is a model rabbi. I hear more discussion of Osteen’s sermons than those of the local Rabbis. On the hand, he is condemned by the more doctrinal Christians as a false prophet, a phony, and a disbeliever. And he has been interviewed on national TV to defend his view from charges of opportunism. To show how far the current Evangelical gospel of prosperity has come, Osteen starts off his interview by saying that Jesus is basically a force within all of us, including Jews. He interprets God saves us as God has given us the potential to believe in ourselves and fulfill our goals. He likes the Jewish tradition and has given up eating pork, but not 100%. He even has respect for Hindu even thought they have different beliefs. He has a non-judgmental, non-patronizing, open and embracing attitude to other religions. Osteen states that he presents his Christians principles at each show so all who want to can accept them. But his Christian messages is pretty universal and without a sense of missionary urgency. The interview has his hallmark themes, including that God has a plan for everyone and if we trust in God he will help us with everything we ever wanted in life. When asked why Evangelicals are doing well, he answers that people do not want denominations or ideology; they want a hopeful positive life. “We all face difficulties in our health, our marriages, our finances, and our message is: God can help you in these areas. (I do think that certain parts of Orthodoxy are rapidly heading in this direction). Joel Osteen, Israel and the Jews: an exclusive Q&A By Rome’s Orthodox Chief Rabbi: Jews and Catholics Are Brothers Interview With Riccardo Di Segni By Giancarlo Giojelli (For background on Rabbi di Segni and his positions, see this prior post- be sure to scroll down in the prior post.) ROME, JAN. 18, 2011 The 22nd annual Jewish-Christian dialogue day was held in Italy on Monday. The religious leaders continued with a program that began in 2005 to focus on the Ten Commandments. The annual Jan. 17 event began in 1990 sponsored by the Italian bishops’ conference and Jewish leaders. This year, the discussion turned to the Commandment: Honor your father and your mother. For the occasion, ZENIT is publishing an Italian Radio and Television (RAI) interview with the chief rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni. Q: Then, what does it mean to be brothers? Do Christians and Jews have a common Father and Mother? Di Segni: The whole of humanity has a father and a mother in common if there is meaning in the story of the Bible that the whole of humanity derives from Adam and then from Noah, all of us must acknowledge we have a common predecessor so no one can say — our texts say this — he is superior to another, because we have a common origin. In this sense, the whole of humanity is brotherhood. Then there are three human groups linked more closely and undoubtedly the link that exists between Jews and Christians is a link of particular closeness, which can be represented under the image of brotherhood, with all the ups and downs that can exist in brotherhood. Q: The word dialogue can have a strong or weak meaning. There can be, let us say, a diplomatic dialogue, which does not affect life, and a dialogue that involves and changes the person. The relationship between man and God in the Bible is often a dramatic dialogue. Hence, what is the dialogue between Christians and Jews? Di Segni: I would say that it is a necessity that we cannot avoid, even if, as experience shows, it is a difficult experience because it must overcome a whole series of obstacles placed by history, by theology and by everyday life. The fact that it is difficult, however, must not exempt one from addressing it, having also a minimum of hope and a minimum of serenity that something good will come out of it. Q: You lived John Paul II’s visits to the synagogue and last year you received Benedict XVI. What do you make of those meetings? Di Segni: They were different visits. Different because of the time and the personality. The first was an epochal event, which marked a turn in history, symbolically. The second was an event of confirmation of a line. It is in these events … but the last was not an event in which everything went peacefully, there was a whole backdrop of controversies and I insisted much that in any case it take place because I believe that what it leaves is the sensation that beyond that which divides there are common elements and common obligations, above all the common obligation to walk together, which we cannot shun. Arriving at the synagogue, Benedict XVI paused before the stone that remembers the deported Roman Jews. Q: How do Italians who are in contact with other cultures, who live in other parts of the world, live the relationship between the great monotheistic religions? Di Segni: To go around the world is a great lesson to understand the differences. Today, Italy is free from provincialism, the human landscape we see walking through the streets of any Italian city is very changed from what it was 20 years ago. It is essential to know the differences to understand that humanity does not stop with someone who has a face like mine but that we must understand, above all, that there are these differences, and then learn to live together. Q: Is diversity a danger or a richness? Di Segni: Difference must be a richness. Q: The prophet Zechariah and also Isaiah, if I’m not mistaken, speaks of a day in which Jews and Gentiles will eat together on the feast of Sukkot, which recalls the pilgrimage in the desert. Is this common table only a utopia or a prophecy that in some way already operates in the present? Di Segni: Judaism lives from utopia and hence the fact that it is a utopia does not mean that it won’t take place but that instead it must take place and in our prayers we confirm the concept that nothing that has been said by the mouth of the prophets has failed and therefore sooner or later it must be fulfilled. In some way some little thing is happening but it is still a long way away. Q: The desert is still long? Di Segni: Yes. However, the situation of the desert could be an ideal situation. Full Version here. Hasidism and the Natural World Hasidism and “Nature”: Negation and Affirmation By Jay Michaelson tzimtzum / or (uncontracted light) gevurah / hesed elohim / YHVH hateva/immanent / transcendent what seems to be yesh / what seems to be ayin actually ayin / actually Yesh The Song of the Grass: Simple Devotionalism as Ecological Foundation? Read the rest here, I excerpted less than half. Peter Berger discovers Contemporary Judaism The famous sociologist Peter Berger is retired but still blogs about religious ideas that catch his eye. Berger, in his classic The Sacred Canopy (1967) explained how Eastern European immigrants to the US, lost their shtetl sacred canopy and thereby replaced their old faith with the pluralism of America. Now everyone as moderns is autonomous and makes decisions that create a personal functional sacred canopy. The major thing that one gets from the book is that we are all now conscious of our ability to choose and choose we must. Nothing is destiny or compelling us anymore. In this blog post, it seems that Berger has just discovered that post 1967 Judaism with its emphasis on Holocaust and Zionism as well as the renewed vigor of Orthodoxy uses the language of destiny, compelled by community and God, and not choice. I occasionally pick up The Jerusalem Post at the famous out-of-town newspaper kiosk on Harvard Square (for ongoing news about the Middle East I rely on its very informative sister publication The Jerusalem Report). In the current international edition my attention was immediately grabbed by a big advertisement on the very first page of the paper. The headline of the ad reads “Jews in America… Wake Up! Anti-Semitism is Raising its Ugly Head Once Again” There is an intrinsic tension between destiny and choice in that definition. In traditional Judaism to be a Jew is a destiny grounded in God’s covenant with the people of Israel – the individual does not choose to enter into this covenant, but is bound to it by the fact of birth. The Jews have not chosen God; He has chosen them. But as more and more Jews entered the mainstream of American society a world of choices opened up to them. Willy-nilly they became part of the turbulent pluralism of this society. Of course they could choose to belong to a traditional Jewish community that continued to affirm the destiny of belonging to the people of the Covenant – but, paradoxically, this affirmation of destiny is itself chosen, no longer to be taken for granted. The individual can certainly choose what kind of Judaism to affiliate with – America has produced the historically unparalleled phenomenon of a whole emporium of Jewish denominations (a profoundly American term). The individual can also choose to be a secular Jew, or choose any number of non-Jewish religious affiliations (not only Christian ones – a surprising number of American Buddhists are of Jewish origin), or for that matter choose to be religiously unaffiliated and ethnically vague. And all these choices are protected by law, understood as rights by the larger culture (“it’s a free country!”), and solemnly legitimated by the democratic ideology of the American republic. Jewish identity as destiny is also affirmed by reference to the Holocaust and to the state of Israel. There are problems with both references. While remembrance of the Holocaust can be seen as a moral duty (I agree with this), the very horror of these events can have the opposite effect – namely, the effect of wanting to have nothing to do with it. Ruth Wisse, who teaches Yiddish literature at Harvard, expressed her uneasiness with the spread of Holocaust studies in American academia by questioning whether young people should relate to Jewish history by focusing on its most terrible period. As to grounding Jewish identity in solidarity with the state of Israel, the taken-for-granted character of this identity will be most plausibly maintained to the degree that Israel conforms to the idealistic aspirations of the Zionist vision. Many American Jews have had difficulties with this vision in the decades since the triumphant Israeli victory in the 1967 war. It seems to me that the assertion, that anti-Semitism is inexorable and ubiquitous, occupies a strategic place in any effort to make Jewish identity a matter of destiny rather than choice. If even in America a recurrence of Nazi-like anti-Semitism is likely or unavoidable, Jewish identity is indeed a matter of destiny from which there is no escape. It is always perilous to anchor an identity in a definition of the situation which goes against the empirical realities. It seems to me that Jewish identity, whether understood in religious or ethnic terms, should not deny the choices made possible by American pluralism – and indeed should affirm the value of freedom by which these choices are legitimated. The long history of Judaism and of Jewish culture provides ample resources for making plausible a choice for Jewish identity. To see America today through the lens of Germany in the 1930s is a delusion – a thoroughly counter-productive one. Could this change? Of course it could. Every catastrophe is possible. But it would be extremely foolish to pretend that a possible catastrophe is now happening or is about to happen, and even more foolish to act on the pretense. Put differently, hypochondria is not a good method of health care. Quite a few years ago I was on a panel with a prominent American rabbi. I don’t recall what the panel was about. All I recall is a brief exchange I had with the rabbi. He said that he was telling his children that the Holocaust could happen in America. He turned to me and asked whether I thought that he was paranoid. I replied that, on the contrary, he was not paranoid enough. He could only imagine being killed because he is a Jew. Depending on circumstances, he might be killed because he is an American, or a bourgeois, or white. I did not add that he might well be doing psychological damage to his children. I don’t remember whether or how he responded. Read his entire post here. US Orthodoxy and fear of the arts Guest Columnist: US Orthodoxy and fear of the arts By JJ GROSS 14/01/2011 More Popular Culture, Two Books and SNL I just submitted my overdue Maharal paper from the 2009 conference and now continue on my examination of popular culture. and rock and roll Orthodoxy. 1] Rodney Clapp’s ‘Border Crossings affirms that and that forays into other areas of public culture (across “borders”) should be undertaken first and foremost as Christians. Popular culture has gone mainstream in the US and religion has been swept up into popular culture American evangelicals have got to stop being so rational and seemingly intellectual, it wont reach anyone. It assumes people we disagree with are “benighted or ill-intentioned.” He says the plan of identifying with American culture leaves no alternative if it fails. Clapp instead wants greater emphasis on community and worship and less on individual belief or individual practice. What about the future? Clapp wants greater involvement in culture but as religious people.What does a film or jazz piece teach? How does it help our journey? Any thoughts on the application of this to orthodoxy? It seems higher education as in Mada is opposed to Torah, but popular culture seems to be synthesized well with Torah. Can we make any of Torah as counter popular culture? Rodney Clapp’s ‘Border Crossings’ says that everything evangelicals think they know about American culture is wrong. For this baby boomer, it’s jarring, and a little unsettling, to see Jimi Hendrix’s “Voodoo Child, Part II” being used to sell a truck. Wasn’t rock and roll–at least the good stuff–supposed to be about maintaining a critical distance from corruptive influences such as the marketplace? American evangelicalism (specifically, the white suburban variety) is even more captive in this regard than is the music of Hendrix. Christians should work at being an alternative to the “technologically-oriented” and “consumer-based” mainstream culture. According to Clapp, evangelicals believe that Christian truths are “available to rationally able, well-intended individuals quite apart from any particular tradition or social context.” It may be hard to believe in our post-“Inherit the Wind” world, but evangelical faith is indeed dominated by a kind of rationalism, which says that the content of evangelical faith is expressed in propositions supposedly accessible to any “well-intended individual.” The Bible is a sort of instruction manual, albeit one sometimes more difficult to interpret than what comes with Ikea furniture. Clapp is saying that almost everything American evangelicals know about relating to their non-evangelical contemporaries is wrong, or at least outdated. Other Americans share neither their spiritual aspirations nor their moral reasoning. Sticking to the “foundationalist” script is not only unproductive, it’s counterproductive. Why? Because in addition to assuming something about your interlocutor that isn’t true, it “inclines us towards believing that those who disagree are necessarily benighted or ill-intentioned.” Evangelical faith places huge emphasis on the individual and the idea of a personal relationship with God. And the less said about liturgy, the better. With no real sense of what it means to be the church–what Christians call an ecclesiology–evangelicals depend on being American–and Americans being Christian–as their sole source of a corporate identity. Little wonder so much of the “religious right’s” rhetoric is characterized by fear and sense of crisis. There’s no plan “B.” Full review here. 2] Another Book on the topic- this one argues that youth leaders should strive for something deeper than entertainment. In Growing Souls Mark Yaconelli reaches beyond the tendency for youth pastors to make ministry to adolescents an exercise in entertainment. He believes both adolescents and those who work with them are longing for “deeper, more authentic forms of … discipleship” but that traditional approaches don’t cultivate this 3] Finally, I wish to discuss the SNL sketch from last night. The sketch opened and closed with a nice shot of Park East Synagogue. The sketch itself made fun of the 1980’s Bar Mizvah’s that were all Bar and no Torah. Garish Bar Mitzvah’s of entertainment, hiring Hollywood stars, sports figures, rock musicians, wild themes and high budgets. Nick Kroll, better known as the caveman of Geico commercials, helped produce a humorous documentary book on the topic a few years ago, Bar Mizvah Disco. 25 years later these bar mizvah’s seems not religious, garish and devoid of Torah and spirituality- everything that made people leave their suburban and predominately Conservative congregations. But at the same time, these events kept people in the synagogue, they served to show the relevance of Judaism.If people were into ostentatious wealth, then they found a way to keep it in the synagogue. The NYT wrote about the book in 2005: During this period, Mr. Neuman said, “the country clubs that used to not want to have us as members want us as members.” So the proud new members of the Cadillac-driving gentry began organizing religious ceremonies around “enduring American themes,” he continued..” “Part of the move to the suburbs is seen as a step to being more integrated with your non-Jewish neighbors,” Dr. Shandler said. “It’s not just a family celebration. It becomes a kind of mega birthday party. Parents are using this as a social occasion, so their business associates and neighbors get invited to the celebration. Now to what I really want to ask. Here is the SNL clip making fun of one of these Bar-Mitzvah. The father in the skit says that we do tis because we can afford it and to entertain the guests. Meaning that they see that Jews don’t have to be excluded, they can have everything in popular culture. How is this different than a Rock and Roll Shabbaton? In both there are rock performers instead of Torah. If you answer kiruv and getting people into shul, I can say the same thing about the 1980’s bar mitzvah. People wanted to be part of these suburban Jewish centers because it allowed to do the things that interested them. Both assumed that once in the door the rabbi would teach them more about Judaism. So what is the difference?	https://kavvanah.wordpress.com/2011/01/	dclm-gs1-081750000
0.178261	<urn:uuid:9b64bd52-d09b-417a-bba0-c59a34fe03b2>	en	0.986639	By Candle Light, I am Led A/N: Welp, this is it. The final chapter of this two-shot—though, I guess that's kinda obvious. Personally, I really liked writing this and I would continue it if I could, but with the ending I chose, it'd be an extremely difficult task. ...No,the main character doesn'tdie in this one, sheesh! Post Note: You may be wondering who exactly the romance is in this story is with, but I think I've dropped enough hints. :) A few more days passed, slowly, but I'm glad I took those days off. Though, it gave me the feeling of being in rehab—even though technically I am. The first day, I had to relearn all the basics, like hand coordination, walking, and object identification. I was surprised to find that without my sight, I had no idea where my own nose was! I mean, I know it's between my eyes, but in order to know that, you need to know where your ears are. Really, who can feel their ears? Then came walking, and I realized my ankle still hadn't fully recovered. As soon as I had stood, I begun to stumble back onto the bed; I had laughed, but they sounded extremely black—which I later translated as fear—and apologized profusely, saying it was their fault for they should've known that would happen. It had been swollen beyond recognition after the fight: all blue, black, red-ish like the skin of a zombie. After all, they added, you did sever an imperative ligament. It's a miracle you even have your foot following all the first aid we had administered. What? I tore my leg that had been peppered with mints? What? Then they told me with a giggle that it was something like a muscle; I was kinda close... So I tried standing again, with more care this time. My ankle was a bit weak, but if I could maintain my balancing act I would be successful. That in itself took a while to master before we moved on to actual walking. As if I wasn't bad enough with my vision, without it I was a complete disaster. They would help me balance while I learned where and where not to place my foot. The first couple of times I'd either step too far from myself and feel like a penguinist, or I'd step too close to myself and trip over my standing leg. Luckily, they were always there to catch me (...sorta). So once I got used to my own stride, walking was a breeze again... ...Until I ran into an end table. That was the first—painful—lesson about object identification: There is always something waiting to get in your way. They started out by placing a few varying objects in my hand and asked me if I could tell them what they were. The first one was smooth and spherical, so it had to be a ball. They took it from me, saying that it was actually a kirima; how was I supposed to know that? After that, they'd said, Now, I am only guessing on this, but I think emotions can act like condensed energy and vice versa. So, tell me what you see when I do this... Suddenly a swift flash of black appeared, resulting in a devastating blow. N-Nothing... what did you see? "Well, it was quick and black, almost like... a strike." I'd said, shrugging. "But what happened that caused you to say 'oops'? There was a jagged noise, but..." You're right. I struck the end table with anger. It, uh... did not hold up. My mouth hung slightly ajar, "You broke the end table?" I had exclaimed. That's not the point. When I did that, you saw black... That must mean black is associated with anger. I gave this a moment of thought. It sounded plausible, but looking back, I remembered that when I had discovered exactly what I was 'seeing' I had black surround me. I wasn't angry at the moment... "No," I'd said, "Well, maybe. When I told you what I was seeing, I saw black surrounding me. I definitely wasn't angry then." Hmm... Anger and fear are kinda the same thing, so that would make sense. I frowned, "They aren't, are they? ...How so?" The only reason you become angry is because you fear something might happen. For instance, in battle if somebody gets knocked out, we become angry at our adversary for we fear having anyone get injured. How about that? "Oh, yeah." After another day, they decide it's high time I get out of the house and back into the real world. Personally, I was elated to finally get back to something that was normal for me. They, however, were somewhat apprehensive. I never realized how hard it was talking step after step without crossing yourself and managing to keep your strides even until now. At least I have someone to guide me. Though I do feel like a bit more empathy for the klutz in our group—what was their name? Co... Col... Cole? Coleen? Oh, Lloyd! Thank goodness you're okay! Can you see? This voice is laced with yellow—concern—and almost suffocated by enormous blobs of pink. Pink, now what is pink? "Uum, kind of, but not really..." What's that supposed to mean? He asks with great gold. Gold, now seeing as it goes along with a question, it must be curiosity or something of the sort. Don't pester him too much! I wasn't! "Hey, have you made the pact with Origin, yet?" I inquire; it's a question that's been eating away at me for quite a while now. I don't want to be a burden and slow everyone down. The worlds can't wait for my little injury to heal, that's ridiculous! No, even if we wanted to, we couldn't. Origin wouldn't fight us without you in the party, says someone with a very tan nature, like me. So I guess tan and brown are kind of lax-ish. Some'n 'bout you being the secondary pact maker with Sh—shee... zhee uhzaa Summonah! They finish in a very odd way. Oh goddess, this is such a gimme if I could only remember the name...! "You won't even say each other's names around me? Come on, that's just not fair!" When you remember, we'll use them again. I run a hand through my hair in frustration, "But I'd remember them sooner if you'd just tell me!" Oh, brother… At least you haven't changed too drastically, Lloyd. That voice was kind of cold, but by no means uncaring. Reminds me of… Krraa… someone. Man, this is way harder than I thought… This brings up another question: "What exactly happened after I collapsed that day?" No one speaks for some time, there's a visible white aura surrounding and darting between them. White must be some sort of hesitancy, unwillingness, secrecy or something like that; it's annoying. "What happened?" Finally, the person next to me—the one who's been taking care of me—says in an unstable sky blue tone, We… that is, after you collapsed… carried you back to Meltokio and summoned for the doctor. He did all he could but… Well, while that was going on, we met back with Kratos at your house and he gave us the necessary ingredients to make the ring of the pact. He'd been collecting all materials to create it from around the world… Then the doctor called us back to Meltokio with news…Kratos followed us; he didn't know what'd happened, but thought you had merely collapsed from exhaustion. When they stopped, I urge them on. I need to know what happen, they shouldn't keep anything from me. "Go on, please," P-please, I-I'd rather not… "No, I have to know!" Not now, you don't! Another voice argues. They, too, are swarmed by white, black and navy—hesitancy, fear and… sorrow. "Why!" I blurt angrily. "What are you trying to hide from me? Honestly, I don't even know if you guys are real or not, I don't know what to believe anymore! The more you conceal from me, thinking it's for my benefit, just makes me even more confused… Reality is cruel, that's a well-known fact by all of us, but in a fantasy, everything's okay and nothing's muddled. I know I'm not crazy, I'm not, I'm not…" Still they're all overcome with hesitancy, except for a warm, shining red located in the deep center of the person next to me. Okay, they finally utter. The doctor had been doing intense treatment on you, along with our healers, for the first day with only little success. Even Tethe'alla's advancements in technology and medicine could prove no use in your situation. When we arrived, he had you veiled in black sheets. He told us the raw truth… that even if you did somehow miraculously awaken, you wouldn't be you, but just a lifeless shell. You—or rather, your body—would search and search for a another soul; in other words, you'd kill anything and everything in your path. They went on, Then, if you weren't to awaken, you'd just… be. You'd never live again, nor would you die, like an exsphere: the object of your greatest spite. We had the rest of the day to decide what to do, and decided it would be best if we… if we euthanized you. I don't know exactly what the word 'euthanize' means, but I can only assume… It was a… tough decision, but it had to be done. We proposed to do it at dawn of the next day so we could pay our respects and say farewell before… They pause, unwilling to admit. When dawn came, we gathered in the room, except for Kratos. We had figured he'd rather not see his son be put to death, so we carried on. Just as we were about to commence, he heard a gasp of pain coming from the other room. At once, you sprung to life, clutching your chest and breathing heavily as if you'd just been wounded. We watched helplessly as you seemed to struggle to cling to life, but little by little you calmed down. You kept mumbling, 'Don't kill me, please, don't kill me' in a frantic plea. Then, when Sebastian investigated the room adjacent to us, he came to us saying Kratos… Kratos had committed suicide by removing his exsphere and stabbing himself in the heart. The red shining within them grows substantially to engulf any sorrow they still carry as they add, He held a note in his hand, it said: 'Live long and succeed… my son,'. Everything is silent as I process this information. Kratos, my father, took his own life—he killed himself—so I could live? That's what he wanted to do from the start I suppose, but he had agreed with me! 'When you die, that's the end! There is no point in dying,' I had said, and he'd replied, 'And to think I had to have my son teach me such an obvious lesson,' I had vowed for no more sacrifices, and yet everyone is sacrificing themselves for me. It just doesn't make sense, everything's so surreal. But that's how I know this is all genuine. Kratos had made his decision not based on a life being over, but so one could continue. Mine. "Thank you… for telling me," I say slowly, "Now, let's go get Origin and end this once and for all." It's been a difficult journey, but we've all managed to pull through somehow. I don't know how everyone else managed, even with their sight and hearing, it was grating on their emotions. They stood by me, and I by them. Before this incident, there was no doubt that I was the leader of our group, a role to which I was predominantly ill-suited. With their help, I led them through thick and thin valiantly. All for one and one for all, even through heart throbbing betrayals and deaths. But then who would follow a blind leader? Still they trusted me to lead them, while I, too, needed to be led myself. Luckily, the goddess Martel blessed our cause and gave me a glimmer candle light to guide through the darkness. My hallowed flare: glowing with a center of yellow for her care and dedication to me even through the worst of crises, wrapped in a comforting layer of orange for her contentment. Above all else though, a warm red. Red for love. Someday, I'll remember her, I will overcome what has befallen me and when that happens, maybe—just maybe—life can continue as it was, and everything will be back to normal. Or maybe I won't remember. I guess I'll just have to meet them all over again.	https://www.fanfiction.net/s/2891085/2/By-Candle-Light-I-am-Led	dclm-gs1-081840000
0.058533	<urn:uuid:bd6c0457-3911-46a2-836d-010abd50b666>	en	0.984365	all 9 comments [–]katrionatronica 5 points6 points (1 child) From someone who is single by choice - INDEPENDANCE IS WONDERFUL! Pep talk time for you. Try and see it positively. Society always portrays being single as some lonesome state for those who can't achieve a relationship, but I love it and I wouldn't have it any other way. Being single is my selfish desire. My flat. Everything in it is exactly how I want it. That's my keyboard, it doesn't compete with anyone's guitar. That's my music on the stereo. The TV is on when I want it on, showing exactly what I want. Those are my photo posters on the wall from my holidays. Those are my dishes on the side not yet washed, not someone else's mess. I can use all the hot water. I love it. My diary, it's entirely mine! I decide what I want to do each night and weekend, and with whom, and no one else takes up any slots I want for myself. I can have a night off or a night out any time I like. I only have to see my own family and friends, so I have all the more time for them. I don't have to turn down a night out with friends for my boyfriend's mother's birthday, ever :-) My body is mine. It looks how I want it to look, I dress how I please, I usually shave but fuck it if I don't want to, my hair is short and boyish how I like it and not designed to impress anyone but me. I never wear heels. I sleep when I want to, sprawled out across the whole bed. I'm never short of cuddles, because I can cuddle whoever I want to, and I have plenty of friends volunteering for the privilege. Being single is a gift to yourself, it is an entirely selfish state of being where you have obligations to no one and can treat yourself as much as you want to. PAMPER YOURSELF NOW! That is an instruction. Watch your favourite films, cook your favourite food, have your favourite friends over for your favourite cocktails, buy some lovely things for your home to make it feel special and some lovely things for you to make yourself feel special. You're right, it's time to feel good about yourself, and for that not to be contingent on anyone but you. Atta girl, you can do it, now's the time to be good to you. You mention feeling abandoned. That's very different to being single, being single doesn't mean you've been abandoned at all. You can be single and very much loved and secure and trusting in the people around you. Have you had any experiences in the past of being abandoned that have left you afraid of it? What does your fear of being alone really stem from? Maybe you need to confront that fear in order to feel good about yourself without being validated by a partner. [–]chocolatineMod[S] 0 points1 point (0 children) Thanks Kat. I hear ya, we are just socialized to think that we need to be in a relationship or else there's something wrong with us. And it's not true. I spent most of my adolescent years feeling insecure and unattractive, and now I am just learning how to feel secure and confident without someone at my side - which will just make me appreciate them all the more when I do find someone again. I think I am slowly getting used to loving my own space. It's so tough, but I know it takes time. My first experience with heartbreak was falling for a girl in high school who said she had feelings for me too but kept going back and forth and eventually just said she couldn't be with me after all. That was my first experience with depression as well. It sure felt like abandonment at the time. I think that since a child, whenever I don't get attention in any form, I build it up to be this big loss and rejection, to the point where I crave love and reassurance as an adult. So obviously that makes it very hard to live alone and be single right now. But I am trying to tell myself it's for the best! hey there First of all, thank you for being a good human being and ending your relationship with respect. The reason you've implied for ending things is a really good one. I've been going through something that, although not exactly similar, have made me re-evaluate myself. Since I was 14, I always have been struggling with depression. I've never had a girlfriend, or even kissed a girl until I was 18. Then I met this socially awkward girl. For the first time I connected with someone and we lived a happy 6 years relationship. I realize now that we stayed together for so long because we were each others emotional and social crutches. When she started her job after getting her degree, she got all the friends she always said she didn't want and started spending more time with them than with me. And then she met another man. And you know what? It was the best thing that could have happened to me. I reconnected with my friends and family (she didn't really liked either and made it hard for me to spend some time with them). I've put on the table all those project I always postponed. And I'm finally learning to love myself. I'm finally battling my apathy and actively trying to get out of this rut I've been stuck in for years. Mind you, this break-up took my depression to new lows, but I'm finally seeking professional help. I think it's like a bad cold, you leave it be, thinking it'll go by itself. While if you had been to the doctor, it could have been efficiently treated. As for advice, I'd say start a project you think you could never do. One of those thing you see others do and think it would be impossible for you to do. You'll fail, again and again and again. But as long as you don't give up, you'll grow. Set your goals, never give up, never second guess yourself. Being depressed can some time make you feel as if you're your worst enemy, but you have to become your best friend. Do things you would like to do with your best friend. Thanks for your reply! It is reassuring to know that other people have gone through similar things and come out happier and healthier. I hope both you and I can continue to grow and love ourselves with time. And thanks for the advice, I will look into a project just for me :) [–]RedErin 2 points3 points (0 children) I am terrified of being single, being on my own, and feeling abandoned. Facing your fears is the best way to get over them. Fight your phobias. It's going to be hard.. loving yourself is hard. I'm trying to do that right now. I'm trying to get rid of my self pity and accept myself. It's a struggle with what I've been through, but it'll be worth it in the end. You need your friends right now -and your family if you are close to them. You need to just laugh and have fun. Be yourself. I know you are lonely and confused, but you need to take care of yourself first. You took the right step.. you just need to keep on staying strong. Honestly -I wish I could be as strong as you. I am so scared of being alone.. I love feeling needed, loved, and wanted... but my friends make me feel that way -and my beautiful daughter. Maybe not enough as I'd like.. but it still makes me smile. You are strong. You are brave. I can never really wait to fix myself and then date someone.. I guess I kind of like fixing myself with someone else.. while fixing them as well. It's turned into a bad habit. I'm sure you've made it clear to him why you left him.. I'm sure he accepts that and knows that you still care for him. You just need to keep working on you. Friends, family, hobbies... do anything you love.. do anything that brings you even a pinch of happiness. It'l make things better. I believe in you. You're already strong.. I know you can do this. Thanks for your response. It's a very scary step but I know we can get there. Loving yourself sounds so cheesy but it's so important and we're not really brought up to care about ourselves in the right way. I hope that with time I can learn to like myself and be alright with being alone. And alone doesn't ever really mean alone... like you said, you have wonderful friends and a daughter - cherish them. They are here to support you in this quest! Don't give up; you can still fix yourself with someone else too. It's all about finding a healthy balance and making time for yourself. [–]SkinyJim 0 points1 point (1 child) Wow, well done. That kind of thing would take a lot of courage. I know how hard that can be because I have considered it myself. Sorry I don't have any advice though, I'm still exploring other options to help myself get through my depression It was a very scary step to take, and I only hope that with time it will prove to have been the right one. We had a lot of emotional baggage and it was very difficult making progress on my own while still attached to him so much. but I really hope that one day we can try again. Thanks for your reply and good luck facing your demons too - it's challenging but we will get through it no matter what happens :)	https://www.reddit.com/r/getting_over_it/comments/13yxts/just_broke_up_with_my_boyfriend_of_two_years_in/	dclm-gs1-081900000
0.604445	<urn:uuid:bb1036af-331d-4d2b-9cd6-bfbcc7dacaec>	en	0.97875	Jets quarterback Tim Tebow. / Bill Kostroun, AP "We'll see what happens," Rex Ryan said Wednesday about Tim Tebow's future with the New York Jets. Given Tebow's lack of playing time and the fact that he was passed over by third-string quarterback Greg McElroy for Sunday's start, it's a safe bet that what happens involves Timmy and the Jets parting ways. But where would he end up? Is it possible Tebow would take his talents north to the Canadian Football League? Some have analyzed the move to the CFL as if it's a legitimate option, but others are quickly dismissive. Andrew Buckholtz of the CFL blog 55-Yard Line has an interesting take: Of course, it's highly unlikely Tebow would come north anyway. There's so much bizarre, ESPN-fueled hype about him (which has been parodied in literature and musicals) that it's quite probable some other NFL team will pick him up if New York lets him go. Even if they don't, another U.S. based league like the UFL or the AFL will make a run at him and offer him way more money (and a chance to start) than the CFL could. His game might be a better fit in those leagues, too; it certainly isn't suited for the CFL. That's why it's so bizarre that teams keep putting him on a negotiation list. Tebow likely isn't coming north, and he wouldn't be any good as a quarterback if he did. Most of it makes sense, but I can't say I agree with the last part -- if Adrian McPherson can start in the CFL, then surely Tim Tebow could too -- nor is it possible Tebow would go to the UFL or AFL before the CFL. The first two are rock bottom. The CFL is on the path to rock bottom. Tebow is struggling, but he's not there yet. This can be chalked up as a lost season. It's almost inconceivable that Tebow was backing up a quarterback who played as awful as Mark Sanchez and couldn't see any legitimate playing time. Say what you will about Tebow and his quarterbacking talents (or lack thereof), the way the Jets handled him is surprising. It's like they were cutting their nose to spite their face. But maybe the Jets not starting Tebow is the best thing to happen to his career. Let's say the critics are right: Tebow's success in Denver was a mirage, and he'll never make an impact on an NFL roster. If he started this year in New York and failed, wouldn't most have been forced to come to that conclusion? As it is, the only additional knock on Tebow is that a dysfunctional franchise couldn't find a place for him. He still has the aura of being a possible NFL success. Since he didn't prove otherwise this season, the dream can live on. As long as Tebow doesn't get on the field and prove otherwise, there's the hope that he'll find greatness. It's a play off the old saying, "better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt." Going to the CFL removes all doubt. Copyright 2015 Read the original story: Could Tim Tebow end up in the CFL? Join Our Team! Gannett Careers Things To Do See all Events Special Sections	http://archive.marshfieldnewsherald.com/usatoday/article/1779853?from=global	dclm-gs1-081970000
0.019547	<urn:uuid:98731da7-fd6f-4955-927a-172ff85bd391>	en	0.956403	How Cars Work: Fix your car with your iphone Review posted Mon 10 Sep '12 How Cars Work How Cars Work Info Visit If you were a car owner in Cuba you probably won't need this car education application for iOS. So few new cars make their way onto the market in this part of the world that Cubans learn from a very young age how to maintain their cars and keep them on the road. But for the young (and not so young) driver here there isn't that luxury. If something goes wrong with your car the first thing we do is to call our mechanic. But there are a whole bunch of simple things that you could fix yourself if your a little bit of knowledge. How Cars Work is a new car maintenance and education app gives you a basic understanding of how your car works with instructions of how to fix the simple things, if nothing else. This can save time in the shop and, more importantly, save you hefty repair costs. Too many teenagers are now passing their driving tests and driving on the road without any knowledge of how their car works. This lack of basic knowledge and understanding not only interferes with the process of learning to drive but also results in avoidable maintenance and repair costs. How Cars Work for iPhone helps you keep your car in top shape while at the same time saving you money. How Cars Work provides basic maintenance guides to get you through some of those simple things that may go wrong with your car. For a start we are talking tyre changing and checking your oil and spark plugs etc. Learning to regularly checking the fluids in your vehicle and knowing how to change a tyre can save drivers hundreds of dollars in garage fees not to mention time off the road. It’s also nice not to be stuck on the side of the road with a flat tyre. How Cars Work was developed by engineering students from the Universities of Leeds & Manchester and has been used by driving instructors to highlight key car mechanisms to new drivers. The app covers all the most important systems of the car including the engine, transmission, braking and steering systems and is regularly updated with new content and bug fixes. All hail to the engineering students of Leeds and Manchester for putting together this brilliant app for iOS that teaches users how cars work. It is aimed at the inexperienced new driver and makes it possible to pull over onto the side of the road, flip out your iPhone and get a walk through of how to change your tyre or oil or to check other possible answers to your problem. The alternative for most of us is a call to road service or your mechanic but quite often you can fix it on the spot saving time waiting for them to turn up and will save you a packet of cash at the end of the month when the bills arrive. How Cars Work is a great idea that is aimed at people of any level of experience and fills a serious gap in the market very well. Related apps	http://feedmyapp.com/review/fix-your-car-your-iphone/	dclm-gs1-082250000
0.654	<urn:uuid:efaf5a11-1ca7-4638-b277-62185ab2704d>	en	0.92063	Clementine will remember what Ellie said. Origional post: The two cutiest strong girl figures now get together. Awwwwww they are both so sweet... im not one to troll people but i feel like this could be used to really tick off some people the last of us the walking dead zombie games ellie clementine joel lee Clementine will remember what Ellie said Origional post: You need to login to view this link Views: 31599 Favorited: 60 Submitted: 07/07/2013 Share On Facebook submit to reddit +Favorite Subscribe to computerlife Anonymous comments allowed. User avatar #8 - moltenmuffin (07/08/2013) [-] Wait a second, is that the hoodie clementine uses when you take stuff from the car? #16 to #8 - xatekk (07/08/2013) [-] Its the shame hoodie alright. #37 to #16 - herpaderpasaur (07/08/2013) [-] Hell yeah TBFP Hell yeah TBFP #42 - drainbramage (07/08/2013) [-] MFW I only recently started playing The Walking Dead and accidentally saved Doug over Carley. User avatar #46 to #42 - shrinkzz (07/08/2013) [-] Same happened to me. I didn't realize i had to choose. :p So i played it again. User avatar #48 to #46 - drainbramage (07/08/2013) [-] I decided to just live with it, if I make a stupid decision, I'm going to punish myself for it, and lord knows how many stupid decisions I've made. User avatar #49 to #48 - shrinkzz (07/08/2013) [-] Well yeah, i finished it first, but i played it a second time to make other choices. User avatar #56 to #42 - diabolicgnome (07/08/2013) [-] User avatar #6 - fnordyy ONLINE (07/08/2013) [-] God i ***** loved The last of Us. Hate that it's over though User avatar #59 to #6 - mrnecro (07/08/2013) [-] I have heard that Naughty Dog is developing a s sequel User avatar #12 to #6 - supermegasherman (07/08/2013) [-] play it again #2 - dafuckisthisshit (07/08/2013) [-] User avatar #4 - LordZebedee (07/08/2013) [-] Clementine > Elliie #41 to #4 - JHDog (07/08/2013) [-] don't start this, really? User avatar #44 to #41 - drainbramage (07/08/2013) [-] Are you saying that there's actually debate? Ellie is cool and all, but Clementine is clearly better. #20 to #5 - tetroll (07/08/2013) [-] Thats not okay to do User avatar #17 to #5 - therealtjthemedic (07/08/2013) [-] I.. I just realized that they are all dead ALL of them jesus i need to get a drink #19 to #17 - xatekk (07/08/2013) [-] Kenny might not be dead. They never show his death in either scenario. So its plausible that he made it. Just saying. Highly unlikely. but possible. User avatar #38 to #19 - woodywoodlinson (07/08/2013) [-] It would be awesome if he did survive User avatar #31 to #19 - BmanX (07/08/2013) [-] That's my hope going into Season 2. User avatar #32 to #17 - iamannon (07/08/2013) [-] Christa and Omid User avatar #33 to #5 - animepsycchosecond (07/08/2013) [-] thank you for the new wallpaper User avatar #64 to #5 - udungoofedup ONLINE (07/08/2013) [-] Where's the girl, i forget her name, that got shot in the face on the freeway? Or is she not in it because she was a party pooper #14 to #5 - anon (07/08/2013) [-] this picture made me terribly sad #1 - floppyturd (07/08/2013) [-] Comment Picture User avatar #9 to #1 - zarcos (07/08/2013) [-] too small couldn't read User avatar #11 to #9 - niimajneb (07/08/2013) [-] "Man, how the hell would he even walk around with that thing?" #13 to #11 - maucorn User deleted account has deleted their comment [-] User avatar #15 to #13 - niimajneb (07/08/2013) [-] #67 to #1 - bkceallaigh (07/08/2013) [-] Nice thumbnail. Nice thumbnail. #34 - battletoadmaster (07/08/2013) [-] So everyone, did save ben or did you let em die? User avatar #43 to #34 - reddeadtroll (07/08/2013) [-] Dropped him. Never forgave him about the bandit thing. User avatar #52 to #34 - mcintoshapple (07/08/2013) [-] Let him fall. He was screwing up big time. User avatar #35 to #34 - woodywoodlinson (07/08/2013) [-] I saved him. He was a nice guy User avatar #51 to #34 - burtgasm (07/08/2013) [-] saved him User avatar #70 to #34 - damnusername (07/08/2013) [-] User avatar #57 to #34 - diabolicgnome (07/08/2013) [-] i saved him #36 to #34 - trandhal (07/08/2013) [-] Saved him. He was my favorite character. Made me so *** mad that he was destined to die. #61 - dickticklerluv ONLINE (07/08/2013) [-] You stole from the car, didn't you. You piece of User avatar #62 to #61 - mublerking (07/08/2013) [-] your gif, what is it from? User avatar #63 to #62 - dickticklerluv ONLINE (07/08/2013) [-] "The devil is a part timer" or in japanese "Hataraku Maou-sama!" User avatar #71 to #63 - ilcecchino (07/08/2013) [-] Can you give me a quick like rundown... The kid gets shot.. .and he has demon powers or something? User avatar #78 to #71 - dickticklerluv ONLINE (07/09/2013) [-] the dude that got shot is Satan from a parallel universe. Him and his servent fled from there and into another universe (pretty much like ours) to escape a battle where they almost got killed by this magical knight chic. In the new world, they can't really use there magic unless from certain conditions Satan gets a job at McRonalds and his buddy tries to find a way to get back to the other universe so they can conquer it. The knight chic also somehow gets to this universe to kill Satan but since she doesn't have magic she just kinda stalks him and his buddy so they don't do anything cray cray Later on in the series more people from the other unniverse travel to the normal universe and more goes down Really its a funny anime with action scenes sometimes but I enjoyed it User avatar #76 to #71 - animepsycchosecond (07/08/2013) [-] He's the Demon Lord, the one that shot him is Lucifer. He's trapped on earth and doesn't have much magic. He also works at McRonalds User avatar #72 to #71 - xrobinxx (07/08/2013) [-] It's the Demon king sooooo User avatar #77 to #72 - ilcecchino (07/08/2013) [-] ahh... and the basic plot? User avatar #66 to #63 - mublerking (07/08/2013) [-] thank you #65 - fluffyraptorr ONLINE (07/08/2013) [-] I love Clementine, I also cried like a bitch at the end of the game User avatar #69 to #65 - damnusername (07/08/2013) [-] you don't have a heart if you didn't cry at the end of that game. #18 - anon (07/08/2013) [-] pewdiepie...i was crying with him when Lee died. #21 to #18 - infernis has deleted their comment [-] User avatar #30 to #21 - jagenblitz (07/08/2013) [-] Dude come on. The last episode of The Walking Dead was released in November. If it was a spoiler for The Last of Us then that would be one thing, but even so I don't understand why you'd look at the comments when people are probably going to be discussing the games. User avatar #50 to #30 - shrinkzz (07/08/2013) [-] And that means everyone must have played it by now? NO, it doesn't. You do have a point about looking at the comments, though. User avatar #53 to #50 - jagenblitz (07/08/2013) [-] If someone cares that much about spoilers then yes, I would expect them to have already played it when it's been out for ~7 months. #58 to #53 - infernis has deleted their comment [-] User avatar #54 to #53 - shrinkzz (07/08/2013) [-] But what if he only recently heard about it? I hadn't heard of it untill months after the last episode came out. , even if i'd play it years from now i'd still hate the out of spoilers, but whatever. User avatar #60 to #54 - jagenblitz (07/08/2013) [-] Then that's your fault, to put it bluntly. Especially with a game that was this popular. User avatar #87 to #60 - shrinkzz (07/10/2013) [-] Not being up to date about all new games coming out is not some kind of mistake. It's too damn expensive to be up to date, imo. so i don't really like the word "fault" there. User avatar #88 to #87 - jagenblitz (07/11/2013) [-] What? How is it expensive to be up to date? IGN is free. Gamespot is free. Not hearing about a game this popular until months after it came out is indeed your fault. If you're talking about actually buying a game near release date (which you hadn't mentioned before) then that still falls under having the common sense to not click on content about said game. Expecting people to not post spoilers on content related to a game that came out months ago because someone might not have played it is stupid. User avatar #89 to #88 - shrinkzz (07/11/2013) [-] that word again... There nothing WRONG with not being up to date about games, i have better hobbies. User avatar #90 to #89 - jagenblitz (07/12/2013) [-] And if you miss a video game for months because of that, it's still your fault. Right or wrong is irrelevant, as is whether you like the word or not. This is hardly difficult to understand. #75 - TehFunnyMan (07/08/2013) [-] The Last of Us was okay game-wise. But I'll be damned if it didn't make me seriously care for Ellie by the end. User avatar #28 - austinmb User deleted account** (07/08/2013) [-] i think clem clem is more badass #3 - Triskiller (07/08/2013) [-] Shame on you Ellie, Clementine is awesome. #24 - anon (07/08/2013) [-] I want to see the porn where Ellie 'looks after her' #29 to #24 - anon (07/08/2013) [-] you and ever other neck beared obese faggot on this board User avatar #55 - sweetdickwilly (07/08/2013) [-] #39 - xchocolatethunderx (07/08/2013) [-] Don't you have to buy the next levels of the walking dead game? User avatar #45 to #39 - thedarkestrogue (07/08/2013) [-] yup. money grubbing whores. User avatar #47 to #45 - shrinkzz (07/08/2013) [-] I think it's worth every penny, never had any regrets buying it. User avatar #25 - benjamino (07/08/2013) [-] I can't wait to play both of these games. Being poor isn't very fun. #26 to #25 - delivering (07/08/2013) [-] Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirates life for me Yo Ho, Yo Ho! A pirate's life for me! User avatar #27 to #26 - benjamino (07/08/2013) [-] It feels wrong for games that look this great. If The Last of Us is half as good as everyone says it is worth paying for. User avatar #40 to #27 - theundone (07/08/2013) [-] Oh, oh it is. The best film ive ever played, I dont care if its like it though. Its so damn emersive. #23 - benjamino has deleted their comment [-] Friends (0)	http://funnyjunk.com/funny_pictures/4672553/Clementine+will+remember+what+Ellie+said/	dclm-gs1-082370000
0.203175	<urn:uuid:2d2b3e5e-5c46-453a-86c6-0792674fa2aa>	en	0.933896	AOL Jobs AOL Jobs AOL Jobs en-us Copyright 2015 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith Value-Based Leadership Is Important man looking towards the city. Getty Images gratitudehonestyinspirationleadershipmoralityLillian Lambert2011-12-16T09:00:00+00:00 Top 3 Traits Of High-Achieving Women helpful traits for career developmentIf you were asked the question: What three qualities supported you to get where you are in your career today? What would be your answer? That can be like looking for a needle in a haystack. Choosing only three factors, when there are likely many, can be tough. That's what I was asked to do as part of a presentation to a group of high-achieving women who participated in an extraordinary women leaders program at a local university. career advicecareer developmentcouragepersistenceresilienceLillian Lambert2011-10-13T15:01:00+00:00 attitudeCommitmentControlleadershipLillian Lambert2011-08-17T05:06:00+00:00 Like Oprah, Know When It's Time to Let Go Oprah For the last few days in May 2011, millions of people waited with great anticipation to see the final episodes of "The Oprah Winfrey Show." She had decided, after 25 years, to end her very popular daytime talk show to move on to other interests. Many questioned why she would leave a show that has had such success. OprahtransitioningLillian Lambert2011-06-16T15:34:00+00:00 Success Tips From Harvard's First African-American Female MBA African-American MBAA few years ago, I spoke at a conference of the African American Student Union, Harvard University. During the question and answer session a young man asked: "Why would someone with a Harvard MBA choose to go into the janitorial business instead of a more sophisticated profession?" After taking a deep breath I responded. "I admit there is nothing glamorous about my industry. You're right, it is not an industry where you will find many MBAs, much less a Harvard MBA. But I'll let you in on a secret: It's better to own the mop than to push the mop." African-American MBAFemale MBAHarvard MBAHBSLillian Lambert2011-05-19T16:10:00+00:00	http://jobs.aol.com/articles/bloggers/lillian-lambert/rss.xml	dclm-gs1-082470000
0.03226	<urn:uuid:2959393d-09b7-4e56-82d1-289f9ddd4d07>	en	0.892595	Browse Subject Areas Click through the PLOS taxonomy to find articles in your field. For more information about PLOS Subject Areas, click here. A Modular Cloning System for Standardized Assembly of Multigene Constructs A Modular Cloning System for Standardized Assembly of Multigene Constructs • Ernst Weber, • Carola Engler, • Ramona Gruetzner, • Stefan Werner, • Sylvestre Marillonnet • Published: February 18, 2011 • DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0016765 • Featured in PLOS Collections The field of synthetic biology promises to revolutionize biotechnology through the design of organisms with novel phenotypes useful for medicine, agriculture and industry. However, a limiting factor is the ability of current methods to assemble complex DNA molecules encoding multiple genetic elements in various predefined arrangements. We present here a hierarchical modular cloning system that allows the creation at will and with high efficiency of any eukaryotic multigene construct, starting from libraries of defined and validated basic modules containing regulatory and coding sequences. This system is based on the ability of type IIS restriction enzymes to assemble multiple DNA fragments in a defined linear order. We constructed a 33 kb DNA molecule containing 11 transcription units made from 44 individual basic modules in only three successive cloning steps. This modular cloning (MoClo) system can be readily automated and will be extremely useful for applications such as gene stacking and metabolic engineering. Synthetic biology promises to revolutionize biotechnology by engineering organisms with novel phenotypes not found in nature. Applications include the microbial production of chemical precursors, novel antibiotics and biofuels [1], the creation of synthetic attenuated viruses for use as vaccines [2] and the engineering of a minimal free living cell [3]. An element essential for synthetic biology is the ability to physically assemble complex DNA molecules containing large numbers of natural or artificial genetic elements. Impressive progress has been achieved in the past few years with the development of methods that allow assembly of large pieces of DNA of up to the size of entire bacterial genomes [4], [5], [6], [7], [8]. The majority of these methods is based on the use of homologous recombination (both in vivo and in vitro), which provides independence from the presence of any restriction sites in the fragments to assemble. Generation of organisms with novel phenotypes will however not only require the ability to assemble large pieces of DNA, but will also need methods that allow generation of many construct variants for optimization of a desired phenotype. Indeed, since a desired phenotype cannot be predicted directly from gene sequences only, development of strains and optimization of phenotypes will require the ability to generate multiple combinations of various coding sequences as well as many variants of their regulatory sequences. Such optimization does not necessarily need to operate at genome scale, and in fact, work currently done for metabolic engineering already belongs to this type of effort. In this context, what is needed are methods that allow generation of constructs or construct libraries containing enough genes for pathway engineering, i.e. in the size range of 10 to 100 kb. Despite considerable work done in metabolic engineering in the past few years, methods currently used for construct assembly are still limiting, as most of the work is still performed using standard DNA construction techniques that require extensive planning and multiple cloning steps. To make such work more efficient, it is however useful to view DNA construction not just as a process for assembly of raw pieces of DNA, but rather as a process that allows assembly of discrete functional genetic elements. Since synthetic biology can be viewed as a form of engineering, it should be able to learn from existing mature technologies such as mechanical engineering. An essential factor for fast and reliable engineering of complex devices is standardization of their basic parts. In the case of synthetic biology, standardization would allow to reuse previously validated genetic elements from one application to the next, and allow the free exchange between different users. It should also allow the development of standardized construct assembly strategies that would help simplify the planning of cloning strategies and minimize the number of cloning steps required to obtain a desired construct. The first attempt to standardize DNA construction, NOMAD, was made 15 years ago [9]. The authors proposed that libraries of modules of defined structure could be built and shared by the community. NOMAD modules are flanked by sites for the restriction enzyme StyI, which make them compatible with a specifically designed destination vector. Modules can be combined together in any order, but are cloned sequentially one module at a time to form a composite module, which can then be further subcloned. A major step forward was the development of the BioBrick standard, which allows assembly of constructs from basic biologic parts such as promoter, ribosome binding site and terminator [10]. Assembly of two basic BioBrick parts results in a composite part that has the same structure as the basic parts in terms of flanking restriction sites (the basic and composite parts are idempotent). This feature allows the same procedure to be repeated again to obtain larger constructs. Since the first BioBrick standard, various standards and assembly protocols have been developed in order to optimize the sequence junctions between parts or make cloning more efficient [11], [12]. However, both NOMAD and the various BioBrick standards are limited in their ability to assemble multiple DNA fragments in a single step, and still rely on procedures that limit their potential for automation such as extraction of DNA fragments from gels or the requirement for the design of custom primers for specific constructs [13]. We present here a modular and hierarchical cloning system that allows any desired eukaryotic multigene construct to be assembled from sets of pre-made standardized genetic modules, including promoters, 5′ untranslated regions, signal peptides, coding sequences and terminators. This cloning system is based on the Golden Gate cloning technology, a method that allows highly efficient directional assembly of multiple DNA fragments in a single reaction [14]. In order to prove the general feasibility of this modular cloning system and to show its potential, a 33 kb construct encoding 11 transcription units (made from 44 individual basic modules) was generated in only three successive one-pot cloning steps. Technological background and general considerations The principle of Golden Gate cloning is based on the special ability of type IIS restriction enzymes to cleave outside of their recognition site [15]. When these recognition sites are placed to the far 5′ and 3′ end of any DNA fragment in inverse orientation, they are removed in the cleavage process, allowing two DNA fragments flanked by compatible sequence overhangs to be ligated seamlessly. Since type IIS restriction sites can be designed to create different overhangs, which are referred to as fusion sites from here on, directional assembly of multiple fragments is feasible [16]. For assembly, all DNA fragments can be simply provided as uncut plasmids, and are combined with the destination vector, T4 DNA ligase and the type IIS restriction enzyme in a single reaction mix. The use of restriction-ligation allows the assembly of multiple fragments with extremely high efficiency: we have shown earlier that up to 10 DNA fragments can be assembled with 95-100% of colonies obtained containing the expected construct [14]. We have now developed a general modular cloning strategy (MoClo) to allow the systematic assembly of complete eukaryotic transcription units and of multigene constructs from basic pre-made standardized modules (Fig. 1A). Five basic module types (level 0 modules) were defined that include promoters, 5′ untranslated regions, signal peptides, coding sequences, and terminators. To enable assembly with the Golden Gate technology, each level 0 module type is flanked by specific fusion sites (Fig. 1B). Fusion sites overlapping with coding sequences were chosen so as to minimize changes to encoded proteins: the fusion site at the start codon was chosen to be AATG, while the fusion site between the signal peptide and the coding sequence was chosen to be AGGT, with GGT encoding a glycine, which is a common amino acid in signal peptides at position -1 [17]. Since the four remaining fusion site sequences (GGAG, TACT, GCTT and CGCT) are all positioned in non-translated sequences, they were selected with the only requirements as to be unique and non-palindromic to guarantee efficient cloning. For cytosolic proteins, which do not contain a signal peptide, the coding sequence can be cloned as a module flanked by AATG and GCTT fusion sites (Fig. 1C); such module type replaces the two modules SP and CDS of secreted proteins in assembly reactions. Since all level 0 modules from the same type are flanked by identical fusion sites, they are freely interchangeable, allowing any desired transcription unit to be created by simply choosing the modules needed. An assembled transcription unit represents a module again, albeit one of a higher order (level 1 module), which can be directionally assembled into a multigene construct (level 2) (Fig. 1A). Figure 1. General overview of the hierarchical and modular cloning system. (A) Libraries of basic (level 0) modules contain cloned and sequenced genetic elements such as promoters (P), 5′ untranslated regions (U), signal peptides (SP), coding sequences (CDS) and terminators (T). Transcription units are assembled from selected level 0 modules using a one-pot one-step cloning reaction. Multigene constructs are then assembled in a second cloning step (and optionally further steps) from the transcription units. (B) Level 0 modules of different classes are flanked by compatible fusion sites. Each fusion site consists of 4 nucleotides of choice (boxed) flanked by a type IIS enzyme recognition site on the left or right side (vertical box drawn under the fusion site). (C) Examples of assembled transcription units for secreted or cytosolic proteins. The transcription unit for the cytolic protein was assembled from 4 modules rather than 5, using a CDS module cloned between fusion sites AATG and GCTT. Module generation: the level 0 and level 1 modules In order to allow efficient cloning of the level 0 modules, a set of level 0 destination vectors was created (Fig 2A). Beside level 0 destination vectors for the five standard elements (pL0-P, pL0-U, pL0-S, pL0-C and pL0-T) further variants were included to provide the possibility to clone two or more genetic elements as a single module, for example promoter and 5′ untranslated region can be cloned as a single module using destination vector pL0-PU (Fig. 2A). Also, for cytosolic proteins that do not have a signal peptide, the coding sequence is cloned in vector pL0-SC rather than in vector pL0-C. All level 0 destination vectors are based on a pUC19 backbone, confer spectinomycin resistance (SpR) and encode a lacZα fragment for blue/white selection. On both sides of the lacZα fragment two different type IIS recognition sequences - here BsaI and BpiI - are positioned in inverse orientation relative to each other, but creating the identical fusion site as exemplified by plasmid pL0-P in figure 3. This design allows cloning of the DNA fragment of interest efficiently via BpiI - removing the BpiI recognition sites and lacZα in the process - but provides the possibility to release the cloned fragment with BsaI creating the identical fusion sites it was cloned in. For cloning of level 0 modules, the designated sequences are PCR-amplified, adding the respective fusion site and a BpiI recognition site as part of the primers used for amplification, and cloned via a BpiI Golden Gate cloning reaction. Any internal type IIS recognition site for enzymes used in the MoClo system (BsaI, BpiI and later Esp3I) can be removed from the cloned fragment during this step by using primers overlapping but containing a single silent nucleotide mismatch in the recognition site (Fig. 2B). Figure 2. Level 0 destination vectors and principle for removal of internal sites from level 0 modules. (A) Level 0 destination vectors. Level 0 modules are made by amplification of selected sequences with primers adding flanking BpiI sites, and cloning of the amplified fragment (shown above the horizontal dotted line) via BpiI into the designated level 0 destination vectors (shown below). In addition to the 5 basic destination vectors, pL0-P, pL0-U, pL0-S, pL0-C and pL0-T, additional destination vectors allow cloning several genetic elements in one module. For example, plasmid pL0-SC can be used to clone sequences encoding cytosolic proteins, which do not contain a signal peptide. (B) Strategy for removing internal type IIS recognition sequences. Removal of a BsaI site in a fragment of interest is done by amplifying two fragments with primers pr1 and 2 and primers pr3 and 4. Primers pr2 and pr3 span the BsaI recognition site and introduce a single nucleotide mismatch (indicated by an arrow). As all primers have BpiI recognition sites in their 5′ extensions, the PCR fragments are cloned with a BpiI-based Golden Gate cloning reaction in the appropriate level 0 destination vector. Compatible sets of sequenced level 0 modules (for example promoter, 5′ untranslated region, signal peptide, CDS and terminator) are then assembled into a level 1 destination vector with a second Golden Gate reaction using the enzyme BsaI, leading to creation of a level 1 module, which contains a eukaryotic transcription unit (TU1, Fig. 3 and 4A). In contrast to the level 0 modules, the level 1 destination vectors confer ampicillin resistance, allowing efficient counter selection against level 0 module backbones. Similar to the level 0 destination vectors, a lacZα fragment is flanked on each side by two different type IIS recognition sites; however, here, the fusion sites defined by the two type IIS restriction enzymes are not identical (Fig. 3 and 4A). If, as for level 0 destination vectors, the cleavage sites of the two different type IIS enzymes (BsaI and BpiI) overlapped, all level 1 modules would be flanked by the same GGAG and CGCT fusion sites, making further directional cloning impossible. Therefore a series of 7 level 1 destination vectors was designed in which the BpiI restriction sites generate two fusion sites with new specificities for each plasmid (for example sites TGCC and GCAA for level 1 vector position 1, pL1F-1, Fig. 3, 4A and 5). These sites are compatible from one vector to the next so that multiple level 1 modules can be (again) directionally cloned into a level 2 destination vector. However, to avoid the construction and consideration of too many level 1 destination vectors, the spatial order of overhangs was designed to be circular instead of linear, as the first fusion site at position 1 (TGCC) is also the final site at position 7. So a level 1 module for position 1 can be reused later at a virtual position “8” (Fig. 4B). Due to this design, a maximum of 6 transcription units can be cloned in one step. A second set of level 1 destination vectors (pL1R-1 to 7, Fig. 5) was also created for cloning of transcription units in the reverse orientation using the same sets of level 0 modules. The combination of the two sets allow cloning of transcription units in either orientation at any position in level 2 constructs (Fig. 4B), giving the experimenter maximum freedom of design. Figure 3. Arrangement of type IIS restriction sites and fusion sites for all assembly levels. A detailed overview of the organization and orientation of the type IIS restriction sites and the fusion sites at the different levels of the MoClo system is shown. A PCR product containing a promoter flanked by BpiI recognition sites and promoter-specific fusion sites (highlighted with color) is cloned via BpiI into the level 0 destination vector pL0-P. The promoter fragment in the resulting level 0 module is still flanked by the same fusion sites, but can now be released with BsaI. The level 0 promoter module and the other level 0 modules required to form a complete transcription unit (not shown) are then assembled via BsaI into a level 1 destination vector. As the fusion sites created by BsaI and BpiI do not overlap, the assembled level 1 module (here TU1) is equipped with two level 1-specific fusion sites (TGCC and GCAA). The level 1 module TU1 and other level 1 modules of choice (TU2 and not shown) can then be assembled via BpiI into the final level 2 construct in which no type IIS recognition sites are left. n indicates that any nucleotide can be used. CRed, red color selectable marker; P, promoter module; TU, assembled transcription unit. Figure 4. Modular cloning strategy. (A) Constructs are assembled by mixing in one tube all module plasmids (or PCR fragments for level 0) and a destination vector together with the appropriate type IIS enzyme (indicated above the arrows) and ligase. ++ indicates that only one of several modules was drawn due to space limitation. Each fusion site is shown as a box indicating its 4 nucleotides; the two boxes below show which type IIS recognition sites flank the fusion sites on the left and/or right sides. P1-a/b, promoter fragment a or b; U, 5′ untranslated region; SP, signal peptide; CDS, coding sequence; T, terminator; CRed, red color selectable marker; LacZ, lacZα fragment, blue color selectable marker; L2E, end-linker 2; ApR, ampicillin resistance; KmR, kanamycin resistance; SpR, spectinomycin resistance. (B) General structure of level 2 constructs. Transcription units are located between the sequences GGAG and CGCT (remnants of fusion sites used for assembly of transcription units in forward orientation) or AGCG and CTCC (for transcription units cloned in reverse orientation). The number above the transcription units indicates the relative position of the transcription units in the final construct (indicates which of the 7 level 1 destination vectors shown in figure 5 was used for assembly of this transcription unit). The construct is terminated at the right end by an end-linker (EL) that joins the downstream fusion site of the last transcription unit (NNNN) with the downstream fusion site of the destination vector (GGGA). Figure 5. Vector set required for the MoClo system. All level 1 destination vectors (forward and reverse), level 2 destination vectors and the different end-linker sets are shown. Dotted arrows indicate the linear relationships between fusion sites in level 1 destination vectors. Compatible fusion sites are labeled with the same color. Design of multigene constructs: level 2 and end-linkers To provide flexibility in the design of multigene level 2 constructs, a set of seven level 2 destination vectors was made (Fig. 5). All level 2 destination vectors confer resistance to kanamycin and encode a red color selectable marker (CRed, containing an artificial bacterial operon responsible for canthaxanthin biosynthesis; see Material and Methods) which is flanked by two BpiI sites. The upstream fusion site of each level 2 destination vector is compatible with the upstream site of a corresponding level 1 module (for example TGCC in pL2-1). This design reduces the need for extensive recloning of the same transcription unit for different positions. For example, a level 1 module made for position 3 can easily be shifted to the relative first position when the level 2 destination vector pL2-3 is used, virtually deleting positions 1 and 2 (Fig. 5). The downstream fusion site, however, is unique to level 2 destination vectors (GGGA). The connection of the GGGA fusion site with the fusion site of the last assembled transcription unit in the DNA fragment is then realized by a set of end-linkers (pELE-n) (Fig. 5). Like the level 1 modules, the end-linker plasmids confer ampicillin resistance, and the end-linkers are flanked by BpiI sites. The desired multigene level 2 constructs are then assembled with BpiI from the chosen level 1 modules, a matching end-linker and a level 2 destination vector (Fig. 3 and 4A). The use of a basic end-linker (pELE-n), however, limits the maximal number of transcription units that can be cloned in a level 2 construct to six, because no type IIS restriction sites are left in the final construct, preventing further rounds of cloning (Level 2-1 construct; Fig. 4A). To provide an option for the addition of more transcription units, two additional end-linker sets were designed. These sets, pELB-n and pELR-n, provide two new type IIS recognition sites (BsaI for pELB-n and Esp3I for pELR-n) and a color selectable marker (lacZα fragment for pELB-n and CRed for pELR-n) to the assembled construct. The use of a pELB-n end-linker rather than a basic end-linker in the first round of assembly results into a level 2i (intermediate) construct (Level 2i-1; Fig. 4A), which contains, in addition to the cloned transcription units, two BsaI restriction sites for a next round of cloning and a lacZα fragment as selectable marker. The use of a pELR-n end-linker at the next step would lead to a level 2i-2 construct containing two Esp3I restriction sites and CRed selectable marker. The alternate use of end-linkers from the two sets pELB-n and pELR-n for successive cloning steps allows the process to be repeated indefinitely from the stand point of the cloning strategy (Fig. 6), but will ultimately be limited by construct size for transformation in standard bacterial hosts such as E. coli. Figure 6. The MoClo cloning principle can be repeated indefinitely. Every cloning step relies on three elements that are different from one level to the next: antibiotic selectable marker, type IIS enzyme(s), and color selectable marker. Cloning after level 2i-1 requires the simultaneous use of two type IIS enzymes: BpiI/BsaI or BpiI/Esp3I. Assembly of 11 transcription units in three steps To test the system, we cloned a number of level 0 modules, removing at the same time all internal interfering type IIS recognition sites from the cloned sequences. These include 11 ORFs representing a wide spectrum of biological functions like immunoglobulins (IgG1 heavy and light chain), structural viral proteins from BTV (Blue tongue virus) and PVX (Potato virus X), the silencing inhibitor p19, the bar resistance marker and GFP. Since the number of commonly used promoters and terminator sequences available for expression of heterologous proteins in plants is low (our laboratory uses plants as expression host), and to avoid repetitive sequences in the planned multigene construct, we also cloned several Arabidopsis thaliana promoter and terminator sequences from genes which show a high expression level in leaves [18]. A summary of all level 0 modules used in this study is presented in Table S1. Step one: Construction of level 1 modules. As a first step towards a construct encoding 11 transcription units, the level 0 modules were assembled into 11 artificial transcription units. Promoters and terminators were randomly assigned to ORFs without consideration for potential level of expression, since all constructs described next were made purely as an exercise to demonstrate the ability of the MoClo system to clone multigene constructs. The designated transcription units were also randomly assigned to one of the seven level 1 positions (Fig. 7A). In 11 independent cloning reactions, the level 0 modules were combined with the respective level 1 destination vectors, T4 DNA ligase and the restriction enzyme BsaI in a one-tube one-step reaction. The different antibiotic resistances of level 0 and level 1 destination vectors used in combination with the blue/white selection provide a convenient way to screen for correctly assembled level 1 modules. After transformation, the reactions were spread on plates containing ampicillin and X-Gal and the numbers of white and blue colonies were counted. The number of white colonies (expected for the correct constructs) varied from approximately 16,000 to 180,000, whereas a few blue colonies (<1%) were present in only two out of eleven reactions (constructs level 1 cL1-1 to cL1-11; Fig. 8A). Plasmid DNA from two white colonies from each reaction were analyzed by an analytical endonuclease cleavage with BpiI (which cleaves on both sides of the assembled transcription unit). All 22 tested plasmids contained a fragment of the expected size (not shown). Figure 7. Structure of the eleven level 1 modules (A) and the final level 2 construct cL2-13 (B). All transcription units were assembled from 5 plasmids: 4 level 0 modules (promoter, 5′ untranslated region, CDS, and terminator) and a destination vector. All proteins are cytosolic except the two from constructs cL1-8 and 9 which are secreted. For both of these, the coding sequence module already contained the signal peptide. LB, T-DNA left border; RB, T-DNA right border; Ω, tobacco mosaic virus 5′ untranslated region; genetic elements used are listed in Table S1. Figure 8. Cloning efficiency of level 1 and 2 constructs. (A) Assembled transcription units are schematically represented as boxes annotated with the name of the CDS they contain. Transcription units shown in grey were cloned in the previous step (in construct cL2-6). The respective cloning position of each transcription unit is indicated on the top. For level 2 constructs, the end-linker is shown as a circle. The number of colonies obtained per transformation is shown by color type, with the first number corresponding to the expected correct constructs (for cL2-6, wrong clones could be either red or green). (B) Plates from transformation of constructs for level 2-1 (cL2-2, cL2-4 and cL2-5) and level 2i-1 (cL2-6). Since level 2-1 cloning uses red/white selection, the correct constructs should be white, while colonies containing the original destination vector construct should be red. Level 2i-1 uses a blue/red selection, with colonies containing correct constructs expected to be blue, whereas incorrect ones can be red or green (contain both the canthaxanthin operon and the lacZα fragment). Step two: Assembly of up to six level 1 modules into a level 2 construct. As a next step, we analyzed how efficiently multiple level 1 modules could be assembled into a level 2 construct. Therefore, five BpiI-based Golden Gate cloning reactions were set up, including two to six level 1 modules, the appropriate end-linker (pELE-2 to pELE-6) and the level 2 destination vector (pL2-1) (constructs level 2 cL2-1 to cL2-5, Fig. 8A). The kanamycin resistance and the CRed color selection marker of the level 2 destination vector permits an effective counter-selection against the level 1 module plasmids and a red/white color selection for correctly assembled level 2 constructs. The number of white colonies obtained per transformation, which is a measure of cloning efficiency, decreased from approximately 33,000 (for two level 1 modules plus end-linker) to 150 (six level 1 modules plus end-linker), and the percentage of incorrect red colonies increased from 0.02% to 10% (Fig. 8A and B). Six white colonies were analyzed from each level 2 construct assembly by analytical endonuclease cleavage of plasmid DNA and all were correct (not shown). As shown above, the assembly of a 24 kb construct (cL2-5) encoding six transcription units can be done in a single one-step and one-tube reaction from level 1 modules. However the final level 2 constructs are in a “closed” status as no type IIS restriction sites are left, prohibiting the insertion of additional genes. In order to extend the number of transcription units beyond six, new type IIS recognition sites have to be incorporated into the level 2 constructs. Therefore constructs cL2-4 and cL2-5 were recreated, but using end-linkers pELB-5 and pELB-6 instead of pELE-5 and pELE-6. These new end-linkers provide two new BsaI restriction sites and a lacZα fragment to the final constructs cL2-6 and cL2-7. In contrast to the red/white selection used for pL2-4 and pL2-5, red/blue selection is used. In addition to correct blue and incorrect red colonies, dark green colonies were also obtained; these contain incorrect plasmids with both the CRed operon and a lacZα fragment (Fig. 7B). Although the efficiency dropped for the last construct, correct constructs were obtained for both reactions. The correctly assembled constructs were used for a further round of assembly. 3rd step: Assembly of the final 33 kb construct. Level 2i-1 plasmid cL2-6 was chosen as a destination vector for the introduction of up to six additional transcription units. In contrast to the previously described assembly steps, two type IIS restriction enzymes have to be used in the same mix. BsaI reopens the level 2i-1 backbone and provides defined fusion sites which are compatible with the level 1 modules released by BpiI. Since two type IIS restriction enzymes have to be used at the same time and since the level 2i-1 destination vector cL2-6 has already a size of 20 kb, we tested again the efficiency of the Golden Gate cloning. One to six additional modules were assembled with the appropriate end-linkers resulting in constructs cL2-8 to cL2-13. The cloning efficiency decreased with increasing number of incorporated modules (Fig. 8A). Interestingly, the rate with which the cloning efficiency drops is similar to the earlier analyzed set of level 2-1 plasmids (cL2-1 to cL2-5) despite the different destination vector size of 22 kb versus 4 kb. In case of the largest construct (cL2-13), no positive clone was identified. The cloning reaction was repeated using different Golden Gate cloning conditions with a program providing alternating cycles optimal for restriction and ligation. These conditions increased the total number of white colonies, and all six tested cL2-13* constructs were correct (the final construct is shown in Fig. 7B). To verify that the transcription units assembled with this system are functional, we tested expression of GFP from all level 2 constructs (pL2-1 to pL2-13). All were introduced into Agrobacterium tumefaciens and inoculated into Nicotiana benthamiana. As expected, GFP under control of a 35S promoter is expressed for all constructs (Fig. 9). Figure 9. Expression of GFP by level 2 constructs. Level 2 constructs in Agrobacterium tumefaciens were inoculated into N. benthamiana leaves. GFP expression was observed at 5 dpi under UV light. The number in parenthesis indicates the number of transcription units in each infiltrated construct. We have shown here that complex constructs containing many transcription units (here 11, consisting of 44 individual basic modules) can be assembled by a series of three one-pot Golden Gate cloning reactions. The construction principle exemplified in this work can theoretically be repeated indefinitely to add more transcription units, until the constructs become simply too large to be transformed or propagated in standard hosts such as E. coli. As outlined in figure 6, it is necessary to create a destination vector at each level 2 cloning step for further rounds of cloning (level 2i-2 to level 2i-3, etc…). This is done by the alternating use of end-linkers providing different type IIS restriction sites (for example Esp3I or BsaI) and allowing convenient color selection from blue to red and vice versa (Fig. 6). The expansion, for example, of the largest construct made in this study (cL2-13, level 2-2, 33 kb) would require its reconstruction, but with an end-linker that adds two Esp3I restriction sites to the construct (end-linker pELR-4, Fig. 5). One or more genes could then be added to this level 2i-2 destination vector using an Esp3I/BpiI Golden Gate cloning reaction (Fig. 6). Beside the construction of large and complex constructs encoding entire pathways, the high cloning efficiency also allows the creation of construct libraries. Instead of using one specific module for each component of a transcription unit, a module library can be used instead. In case a library of promoters is used, constructs obtained would contain a coding sequence under control of different promoters. Since nearly all constructs are correct, the library can be screened directly for optimal expression level for this particular gene, or be used for the next level of cloning in which several genes or again gene libraries are assembled. This application is of particular interest for the optimization of biochemical pathways for metabolic engineering where several genes not only have to be co-expressed, but also, their expression ratios have to be balanced to obtain optimal yield of the desired product. The advantages of using standardized modules do not lie exclusively in the ability to easily create complex constructs. Already, the simple definition of a general cloning standard will result in tremendous synergistic effects, since the validated modules or module libraries created by different scientific groups can be reused from the whole scientific community. An impressive example is the widely used standard proposed by the BioBrick foundation [10], [19]. Here, researchers from all over the world have already contributed thousands of compatible modules to a freely available module collection. In contrast to MoClo, Biobrick modules are flanked by standard type II restriction enzymes, and assembly of two BioBricks via restriction and ligation results in an idempotent new Biobrick module. However, the two modules are separated by a scar sequence, and the process is unsuitable for the assembly of multiple fragments in one step. The principle that a huge community contributes to a standardized system requires however that the standard shows some flexibility. Although the MoClo system described here is based on five basic modules, it is very versatile since each of these modules can be subdivided in smaller modules that would still be compatible with the existing ones. For example, a terminator can be split in two modules consisting of 3′ untranslated region and actual terminator sequences by definition of a new fusion site separating both modules. The transcription unit would be assembled with the two new modules replacing the original terminator. In case of more sophisticated cloning applications, like the shuffling of an ORF consisting of several protein modules, it may be favorable to define an entire new level. These level -1 modules have to follow the same principles as all other modules: a set of compatible overhangs, where the first and the last are compatible to the next level, a specific color selection and a specific antibiotic selection marker have to be defined. The data presented here show that all elements required for the design of a completely automated cloning system are now in place. Operations that are required for cloning using the MoClo system consist of preparation of plasmid DNA, liquid handling and incubation to perform restriction-ligation, plating of transformation on plates, picking of colonies, and digestion and analysis of plasmid DNA. The last step can even be replaced by DNA sequencing of a single colony, because the system is so efficient. A further advantage in terms of automation is that no sophisticated construction strategies are needed since the design is automatically defined by the number and the order of modules that a user wants to assemble. The cloning strategy can be easily and unambiguously determined by a simple computer program, which could also be directly linked to the automation robots that would make the construct. Materials and Methods Molecular biology reagents Restriction enzymes used in this study were purchased from New England Biolabs (Frankfurt, Germany) and Fermentas (St. Leon-Rot, Germany). T4 DNA ligase was purchased from Promega (Mannheim, Germany). Plasmid DNA preparations were made by using the NucleoSpin Plasmid Quick Pure kit (Macherey-Nagel, Dueren, Germany) following the manufacturer protocol. Plasmid DNA concentration was measured using a Nano Drop® Spectrophotometer ND-2000 (Peqlab, Erlangen, Germany). MoClo cloning protocol Restriction-ligations were set up by pipetting in one tube approximately 40 fmol (~100 ng of DNA for a 4 kb plasmid) of each DNA component (PCR product or plasmid), 10 U of the required restriction enzyme (BsaI or BpiI) and 10 U T4 DNA ligase (using high concentration ligase, 20 U/µl) in Promega ligation buffer in a final reaction volume of 20 µl. The reaction was incubated in a thermocycler for 5 hours at 37°C, 5 min at 50°C and 10 min at 80°C. The reaction mix was then added to 100 µl chemically competent DH10b cells, incubated for 15–30 min on ice and transformed by heat shock. 800 µl of liquid LB was then added to the transformation, and the cells were let to recover 45 min at 37°C. Different aliquots of the transformation were plated on LB plates containing the appropriate antibiotic. The number of colonies was counted for one or two selected plates (containing countable number of colonies), or from a section of the plates when very high number of colonies were obtained even for the lowest volume plated. The number of colonies was then extrapolated for the entire transformation. For level 2-2 cloning, two type IIS enzymes were required, BpiI and BsaI. The same protocol was used as described above except that 10 U and 2.5 U were used for the enzymes BpiI and BsaI, respectively. To optimize efficiency of the restriction-ligation for the final construct containing 11 transcription units (cL2-13*), a variation of this protocol was used as follows. The reaction mix was set up containing 20 U ligase, 5 U BpiI and 5 U BsaI, in a total reaction volume of 20 µl. The mix was incubated in a thermocycler with the following parameters: incubation for 2 minutes at 37°C, 5 minutes at 16°C, both steps repeated 45 times, followed by incubation for 5 minutes at 50°C and 10 minutes at 80°C. The reaction mix was transformed in E. coli chemically competent cells as described above. Cloning of the canthaxanthin biosynthesis operon A DNA fragment containing genes for canthaxanthin biosynthesis was made by PCR amplification of 4 genes from Pantoea ananatis that are necessary for biosynthesis of β-carotene (genes crtE, crtY, crtI and crtB) [20] and of one gene from Agrobacterium aurantiacum (crtW) necessary to convert β-carotene to canthaxanthin [21]. crtW is used in addition to the 4 Pantoea genes because the orange/red color of canthaxanthin is more visible on agar plates than the yellow color of β-carotene. The Pantoea ananatis strain was obtained from the DSMZ (cat. DSM 30080), and a fragment containing crtW was synthesized by Mr. Gene GmbH (Regensburg, Germany). An artificial operon containing crtE-W-Y-I-B under control of the P. ananatis native promoter was made by ligation of three fragments derived from PCR: fragment 1 containing the promoter and crtE was amplified from P. ananatis genomic DNA with primers 5′-ttt ggtctc a ggag ggtaccgcacggtctgccaa and 5′-ttt ggtctc a tcatgcagcatccttaactgacggcag, fragment 2 containing crtW was amplified from a synthetic DNA fragment (sequence identical to the native sequence) with primers 5′-ttt ggtctc a atgagcgcacatgccctgcc and 5′-ttt ggtctc a tcactcatgcggtgtcccccttggt, and fragment 3 containing crtY-I-B was amplified from P. ananatis DNA using primers 5′-ttt ggtctc a gtgacttaagtgggagcggctatg and 5′-ttt ggtctc a atgtagtcgctctttaacgatgag. The fragments were assembled by Golden Gate cloning in a target vector using BsaI. Two BpiI and one Esp3I site present in crtY were removed using primers containing silent mutations in the recognition sites. Supporting Information Table S1. Level 0 modules used in this study. We are thankful to Yuri Gleba for critical reading of this manuscript. Author Contributions Conceived and designed the experiments: SM. Performed the experiments: EW CE RG SW. Wrote the paper: EW SM. 2. 2. Wimmer E, Mueller S, Tumpey TM, Taubenberger JK (2009) Synthetic viruses: a new opportunity to understand and prevent viral disease. Nat Biotechnol 27: 1163–1172. 3. 3. Forster AC, Church GM (2006) Towards synthesis of a minimal cell. Mol Syst Biol 2: 45. 4. 4. Blake WJ, Chapman BA, Zindal A, Lee ME, Lippow SM, et al. (2010) Pairwise selection assembly for sequence-independent construction of long-length DNA. Nucleic Acids Res 38: 2594–2602. 5. 5. Itaya M, Fujita K, Kuroki A, Tsuge K (2008) Bottom-up genome assembly using the Bacillus subtilis genome vector. Nat Methods 5: 41–43. 6. 6. Benders GA, Noskov VN, Denisova EA, Lartigue C, Gibson DG, et al. (2010) Cloning whole bacterial genomes in yeast. Nucleic Acids Res 38: 2558–2569. 7. 7. Gibson DG, Young L, Chuang RY, Venter JC, Hutchison CA 3rd, et al. (2009) Enzymatic assembly of DNA molecules up to several hundred kilobases. Nat Methods 6: 343–345. 8. 8. Czar MJ, Anderson JC, Bader JS, Peccoud J (2009) Gene synthesis demystified. Trends Biotechnol 27: 63–72. 9. 9. Rebatchouk D, Daraselia N, Narita JO (1996) NOMAD: a versatile strategy for in vitro DNA manipulation applied to promoter analysis and vector design. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A 93: 10891–10896. 10. 10. Knight TF (2003) Idempotent Vector Design for Standard Assembly of BioBricks. MIT Synthetic Biology Working Group Technical Report. 13. 13. Sleight SC, Bartley BA, Lieviant JA, Sauro HM (2010) In-Fusion BioBrick assembly and re-engineering. Nucleic Acids Res 38: 2624–2636. 14. 14. Engler C, Gruetzner R, Kandzia R, Marillonnet S (2009) Golden gate shuffling: a one-pot DNA shuffling method based on type IIs restriction enzymes. PLoS One 4: e5553. 16. 16. Lebedenko EN, Birikh KR, Plutalov OV, Berlin Yu A (1991) Method of artificial DNA splicing by directed ligation (SDL). Nucleic Acids Res 19: 6757–6761. 18. 18. Laubinger S, Zeller G, Henz SR, Sachsenberg T, Widmer CK, et al. (2008) At-TAX: a whole genome tiling array resource for developmental expression analysis and transcript identification in Arabidopsis thaliana. Genome Biol 9: R112. 21. 21. Misawa N, Satomi Y, Kondo K, Yokoyama A, Kajiwara S, et al. (1995) Structure and functional analysis of a marine bacterial carotenoid biosynthesis gene cluster and astaxanthin biosynthetic pathway proposed at the gene level. J Bacteriol 177: 6575–6584.	http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0016765	dclm-gs1-082480000
0.028444	<urn:uuid:5eb3bed5-6318-4660-9033-061595e5f934>	en	0.874832	10 Space Landmarks We'd Like to Visit TARDIS remote control toy And we're off. What will be the first stop on our tour of outer space? © Mike Blake/Reuters/Corbis 10 Space Landmarks We'd Like to Visit Care for a little space-based sightseeing? Feel the need to study abroad -- really, really abroad? Well, fling away your Fodor's and toss your TripAdvisor, because we have the only guided tour you'll need -- a foray into the final frontier so ambitious it will make the Voyager probes' Grand Tours look like daytrips. Of course, zipping off to distant planets, moons and stars isn't as simple as thumbing a ride with a Vogon or booking passage with a Corellian smuggler and his Wookiee copilot. We'll have to break a few laws of time and space. There's a good reason Carl Sagan's landmark series, "Cosmos," resorted to a Spaceship of the Imagination: His destinations were mostly unspeakably dangerous or unreachably distant. And then there's the problem of time: Because light obeys a speed limit, our pictures of stellar objects are actually images of the past. By the time we reach them, they might have changed or ceased to exist. Fortunately, we recently found an indestructible, time-traveling ship in a box of TARDIS Flakes (part of a past or future nutritious breakfast). It comes complete with scanners that detect all spectra, so we're guaranteed not to miss sights better seen in ultraviolet, infrared or X-ray. So, without further ado (and as another space-time traveler would say) ... allons-y! moon footprint Image courtesy NASA 10: The Moon: Sea of Tranquility Olympus Mons You just can't tell from that shot of Olympus Mons how very sprawling the Martian volcano is. You have to see it to believe it. © Corbis 9: Mars: The Tharsis Bulge Choosing a land feature that sprawls across a quarter of Mars might seem like cheating, but it's our list, so we make the rules. Sure, we could have chosen Olympus Mons, a shield volcano the size of Arizona and three times the height of Mount Everest, but how would exploring that monster be any easier? Or, continuing eastward past its three smaller sisters in the Tharsis Montes group -- which range from 210-270 miles (350-450 kilometers) across and rise 9 miles (15 kilometers) above their surroundings -- we could shoot down the Valles Marineris. Longer than the United States is wide, the grandest canyon of all girdles one-fifth of the planet, running more than 2,500 miles (4,000 kilometers). Indeed, its 120-mile (200-kilometer) width and 4.3-mile (7-kilometer) depth make our Grand Canyon look like a side gulley [sources: Miller; NASA; NASA]. But wait, we hear you say into your subspace communicator, doesn't this constitute a series of landmarks? Not according to some theories about the region's history, which argue that the Tharsis formation is actually one gigantic volcano (based on a broader definition that includes underlying tectonics and magma flows). Under this model, even the titanic Olympus Mons is but a wart on the face of the solar system's vastest volcano [source: Fazekas]. Jupiter's Great Red Spot Mosaic of Jupiter's Great Red Spot, as seen by Voyager 1 Image courtesy NASA, JPL 8: Jupiter: The Great Red Spot(s) If you were looking for one landmark to distinguish our solar system -- sort of a "turn left at the burned-out Chuck E. Cheese" on an astronomical scale -- you could do far worse than Jupiter's Great Red Spot (GRS) -- or rather, spots. In 2000, the Hubble Space Telescope witnessed a second spot, nicknamed "Red Jr.," arise from the collision of three smaller spots. In 2008, Hubble spotted a third [sources: Daniels; Phillips]. The fact is, these cyclonal beauty marks whirl about the faces of the other gas giants, too, and possibly on their close cousins, the cool, starlike bodies called brown dwarfs. They just tend to come and go. And that's what makes Jupiter's two-to-three-Earth-wide anticyclone so special: Depending on whom you ask, it's been spinning for at least 136 years, and possibly longer than 349. Why the age gap? We know today's GRS was described by American astronomer Carr Walter Pritchett in 1878, but some believe it's the same "permanent spot" observed by Italian astronomer Gian Domenico Cassini in 1665 [sources: Encyclopaedia Britannica; Clavin; Daniels]. As for scenic overlooks, we recommend keeping your distance, both to take it all in and to avoid its 250-mph (400-kph) peripheral winds [source: Encyclopaedia Britannica]. Europa geyser Artist's concept of one of Europa's water vapor plumes, which seem as though they could very well put Earth's geysers to shame. Image courtesy NASA/ESA/K. Retherford/SWRI 7: Europa: Come for the Geysers, Stay for the Submarine Rides Yellowstone National Park's Old Faithful is a superheated squirt gun compared to the geysers found on Jupiter's fourth-largest moon, Europa. Roughly the size of Earth's moon, its jets spew water more than 125 miles (201 kilometers) high when squeezed by the gravitational tidal forces of the gas giant and its major satellites [sources: Daniels; Lemonick]. Europa's icy surface makes it cue-ball smooth compared to Jupiter's other Galilean satellites (the four largest of Jupiter's 50-67 moons). Still, its icy surface possesses an exotic beauty traced out in veiny fractures across its crisscrossed shell. These cracks hint at the moon's possible structure, which scientists believe consists of a mile-thick icy covering overlaying a subsurface ocean. The same gravitational forces that drive Europa's geyser activity could provide enough energy to keep water from freezing solid, even on a moon half a billion miles from the sun. The plumes could also erupt from smaller lakes or ponds trapped in the ice [sources: Cook et al.; Daniels; Lemonick; NASA]. Europa's liquid saltwater ocean, which could reach 100 miles deep, explains why we recommend this moon's fountains over the ice-and-dust geysers of Saturn's Enceladus; outside of Earth, it alone offers a chance to dive a submarine into waters potentially populated by extraterrestrial life [sources: Cook et al.; Daniels; Lemonick]. Image courtesy NASA/JPL/SSI 6: Titan: Lounging by the Lake, Dancing in the Methane Rain How about this for Eris' slogan? Cold and lonely but conveniently located. Image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech 5: Eris: Making Trouble Between the Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud Take a trip to the wrong side of the tracks -- and, by tracks, we mean the Kuiper Belt, the doughnut-shaped ring of icy worlds and short-period comets circling beyond Neptune's orbit. Out there drifts the troublemaker, a gleaming dwarf planet so cold (minus 359 to minus 405 F, or minus 217 C to minus 243 C) that its thin atmosphere freezes, falls and glazes it like a moon-sized doughnut hole. Namesake of the Greek goddess of discord, Eris earned its official label from its role in Pluto's rancorous demotion from planetary status. The discovery of additional planets past Neptune -- particularly Eris, which then seemed larger than Pluto, but might be smaller -- convinced astronomers that the ninth world should be reclassified as a dwarf planet. Its sole moon is named for Eris' daughter, Dysnomia, goddess of lawlessness [source: NASA]. Eris is too distant to see well, but we know it reflects light as brightly as newly fallen snow and takes 557 years to orbit the sun. As the solar system's most distant dwarf planet, it's second only to Pluto as a Kuiper Belt staging ground, and makes a better jumping-off point for the Oort cloud -- the shell of long-period comets and icy bodies located around 5,000-100,000 astronomical units (AU) from the sun. Both merit a trip: Visiting them is like traveling back in time to the solar system's earliest days [sources: Martin; NASA]. nomad planet Image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech 4: PSO J318.5-22: Rogue Planet Gliese 581g Image courtesy Lynette Cook 3: Gliese 581g: A Little Taste of Home (or at Least Habitability) NGC 604 Like fireworks, but better. 2: NGC 604: A Mother of a Stellar Nursery Supermassive black hole This illustration shows a galaxy with a supermassive black hole at its core. (The black hole is also shooting out radio waves.) Image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech 1: NGC 1277's Supermassive Black Hole How better to top off the ultimate space-time sightseeing trip than with a slow plunge into a realm where time and space get tied into the physics equivalent of balloon animals? We're referring, of course, to a black hole -- a supermassive one. Go big or go home, right? Sure, but there's a better reason: In a smaller black hole, your trip would zip by in an eyeblink; even assuming you could survive its steeper 1-million-G taffy-pull of tidal forces, you would hit the singularity just 0.0001 seconds after flashing across the event horizon. Conversely, in supermassive black holes, the event horizon's gravity "slope" is much gentler -- less than one Earth gravity -- and the trip lasts entire seconds. So welcome to the most monstrous black hole yet found, the 17-billion-solar-mass monster that dominates the galaxy NGC 1277 [sources: Crockett; Hamilton]. As you fall on your slow curve, the starfield takes on the colorful whorls of soap bubbles. Space-time tricks your binocular vision, twisting and jumbling light. Finally, just before known physics takes a permanent powder, the universe crushes down into a halo of blue light, bookended above and below by spectral redshifts [source: Hamilton]. After that, who knows? You're in a ship that defies physics, in a region of space that breaks its laws. Anything is possible, so bring a clean change of underwear and, wherever you end up, start your own list of places to see. We're counting on you. Lots More Information Author's Note: 10 Space Landmarks We'd Like to Visit When compiling a list so close to my heart, the hardest part is settling on only 10 destinations. Had I had more space, I might have recommended visiting the crater-cutting cliff of Mercury's Beagle Rupes, or seeing what destruction Venus' temperatures and pressures have wrought on the Venera probes. Moon-wise, I'd have dispatched you to Jupiter's Ganymede, which is so large (three-quarters the size of Mars) that it would be considered a planet if it orbited the sun; pizza-faced, volcanic Io; the ridges of Saturn's Iapetus; or Neptune's moon, Triton, a nitrogen-frosted cantaloupe orbiting at 157 degrees to the orbital plane, which one day might go to pieces and grant its planet even grander rings than Saturn. More exotic delights beckoned beyond the solar system, including Hoag's Object, a strange ring galaxy, and its thematic counterpart, the "Eye of Sauron" created by a luminous ring orbiting the star Fomalhaut. There was the pink planet, GJ 504b, or the blacker-than-pitch planet, TrES-2b, or the hellscapes of KIC 12557548 b, Kepler-36c or HD 189773b. In the end, space is too amazing and terrifying to be contained in one list, so I hope some of you reading this will view it as a jumping-off point for your own adventure. At risk of being called corny, I'll close with the following thought: The Ship of the Imagination is all fueled-up. What's on your itinerary? Related ArticlesSources • Boyle, Alan. "Astronomers Say They've Spotted Lonesome Planet Without a Sun." NBC News. Oct. 9, 2013. (Feb. 16, 2014) http://www.nbcnews.com/science/space/astronomers-say-theyve-spotted-lonesome-planet-without-sun-f8C11366309 • Clavin, Whitney. "Stormy Stars? NASA's Spitzer Probes Weather on Brown Dwarfs." NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Jan. 7, 2014. (Feb. 13, 2014) http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-005 • Cook, Jia-Rui C., et al. "Hubble Space Telescope Sees Evidence of Water Vapor Venting off Jupiter Moon." NASA. Dec. 12, 2013. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-europa-water-vapor/ • Crockett, Christopher. "Are Galaxies Playing Catch with Black Holes?" Scientific American. July 18, 2013. (Feb. 14, 2014) http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/galaxies-playing-catch-with-black-holes/ • Daniels, Patricia. "The New Solar System: Ice Worlds, Moons, and Planets Redefined." National Geographic Publishing. 2009. Encyclopaedia Britannica. "Great Red Spot." (Feb. 13, 2014) http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/243638/Great-Red-Spot • Fazekas, Andrew. "New Biggest Volcano in the Solar System?" National Geographic News. Dec. 3, 2010. (Feb. 19, 2014) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/12/101203-science-space-biggest-volcano-solar-system-mars/ • Ghafoor, Nadeem, et al. "Wind-driven Surface Waves on Titan." Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets. Vol. 105, no. E5. Page 12,077. May 25, 2000. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://cepsar.open.ac.uk/pers/j.c.zarnecki/pics/d43584.pdf • Grossman, Lisa. "Seasonal Methane Rain Discovered on Titan." Wired. March 17, 2011. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/03/titan-april-showers/ • Hamilton, Andrew. Professor, Department of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences, University of Colorado at Boulder. Personal correspondence. Feb. 10, 2012. • Lemonick, Michael. "H2Whoa! Hubble Telescope Finds Geysers of Water on Jupiter's Moon Europa." Time. Dec. 12, 2013. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://science.time.com/2013/12/12/h2whoa-hubble-telescope-finds-geysers-of-water-on-jupiters-moon-of-europa/ • Liu, Michael C., et al. "The Extremely Red, Young L Dwarf PSO J318−22: A Free-Floating Planetary-Mass Analog to Directly Imaged Young Gas-Giant Planets." The Astrophysical Journal Letters. In Press. (Feb. 20, 2014) http://arxiv.org/pdf/1310.0457v2.pdf • Lorenz, R. D. "Raindrops on Titan." Advances in Space Research. Vol. 15, no. 3. Page 317. 1995. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi= • Lovett, Richard. "Saturn Moon Has Ice Volcano -- and Maybe Life?" National Geographic. Dec. 15, 2010. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2010/12/101215-saturn-moon-titan-ice-volcano-nasa-science-pictures/ • Martin, Elizabeth. "A Dictionary of Science (Oxford Paperback Reference)." 4th Ed. Oxford University Press. 2003. • Miller, Ron. "Seven Wonders of the Rocky Planets and Their Moons." Twenty First Century Books. 2011. • Mosher, Dave. "'Nomad' Planets More Common Than Thought, May Orbit Black Holes." National Geographic. Feb. 24, 2012. (Feb. 20, 2014) http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2012/02/120224-rogue-nomad-planets-stars-black-holes-space-science/ • NASA. "Apollo 11 Mission." Lunar and Planetary Institute. (Feb. 14, 2014) http://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_11/landing_site/ • NASA. "Eris: Overview." (Feb. 16, 2014) https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Dwa_Eris • NASA. "Giant Stellar Nursery." (Feb. 14, 2014) http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2409.html • NASA. "Globular Cluster." NASA/IPAC Extragalactic Database. Aug. 9, 2005. (Feb. 14, 2014) http://ned.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/Glossary/Glossary_G.html • NASA. "Jupiter." (Feb. 19, 2014) https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=Jupiter • NASA. "Kuiper Belt & Oort Cloud: Overview." (Feb. 16, 2014) http://solarsystem.nasa.gov/planets/profile.cfm?Object=KBOs • NASA. "Mars Atlas: Olympus Mons." (Feb. 19, 2014) http://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/gallery/atlas/olympus-mons.html • NASA. "NGC 604: Giant Stellar Nursery." Nov. 2, 2002. (Feb. 14, 2014) http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap021102.html • NASA. "See Beautiful Ontario Lacus." July 15, 2010. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kK4n5l7bHSw • NASA. "The Earth-like Planet Gliese 581g." (Feb. 16, 2014) http://spacemath.gsfc.nasa.gov/weekly/7Page40.pdf • NASA. "Volcanoes on Mars: Tharsis Montes." Lunar and Planetary Institute. (Feb. 19, 2014) http://www.lpi.usra.edu/publications/slidesets/mvolcan/slide_4.html • Phillips, Tony. "Free-Floating Planets May Be More Common Than Stars." NASA Science News. May 18, 2011. (Feb. 16, 2014) http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2011/18may_orphanplanets/ • Phillips, Tony. "Jupiter's New Red Spot." NASA Science News. March 3, 2006. (Feb. 12, 2014) http://science1.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2006/02mar_redjr/ • Rincon, Paul. "Thousand-year Wait for Titan's Methane Rain." BBC News. March 22, 2012. (Feb. 17, 2014) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17454005 • Torres, Abel Mendez. "Five Potential Habitable Exoplanets Now." Planetary Habitability Laboratory at University of Puerto Rico, Arecibo. Aug. 1, 2012. (Feb. 16, 2014) http://phl.upr.edu/press-releases/fivepotentialhabitableexoplanetsnow	http://science.howstuffworks.com/10-space-landmarks.htm/printable	dclm-gs1-082670000
0.768893	<urn:uuid:ca0857fe-38f3-4513-80f3-9e1fbc0af42f>	en	0.96244	Become a fan of Slashdot on Facebook Forgot your password? Comment Re:Issue is more complicated (Score 1) 522 It's not a binary between "coddling" (by which I assume you mean making sure no one's feelings ever get hurt) and "being a relentless fucking asshole." It's possible to strike a balance. There are points where the people you are coddling will still think you're a fucking asshole, if that's what you mean. The happy medium where you are neither coddling people nor having them consider you a fucking asshole... that doesn't exist. Comment Re:incomplete sentence... (Score 3, Informative) 76 There is some uncertainty about the extinction of North American megafauna. Human migrations to North America tended to occur during climate change, so which was the cause and with the effect of human migration and of extinction is a fascinating question. The destruction of the Nazca native American civilization due to overfarming and damming of rivers for agricultural control, coupled with unexpected floods, is very convincing. Comment Re:Issue is more complicated (Score 1) 522 So I'm waiting for someone at a major corporation that does substantial open source development to file a hostile work environment suit against their company if they are required to do kernel submissions. That would quickly result in a change in attitude if a major contributor decided that it was potentially litigiously expensive to contribute. By what mechanism? None of these corporations controls Linus; Linus cannot be (successfully) sued for contributing to a hostile work environment somewhere else. If some corporation doesn't want to contribute, they won't get what they want in the kernel; Linux and Linus will weather it just fine. Comment Re: Issue is more complicated (Score 1) 522 And by "civil" you mean a work environment where if you say anything even vaguely critical you get jumped on for "tone", an argument you can win only if your social standing and/or position within a corporate hierarchy is sufficiently higher than the person you are criticizing. Geeks, typically being low ranked both socially and within corporate hierarchies, tend to lose all the time in such an environment; it's no wonder they refuse to create it on their own. What Sharp misses is that in this particular environment, those she criticizes have far more social standing and position than she does, so she cannot win this way. Comment Re:will they "cost no more to" buy? (Score 1) 180 Well it's down to 55c/ kWh over an entire year. Over 11 years it's actually cheaper than electricity. Assuming 50% utilization and a 25 year service life (rated, real world is expected to be 30) they are in fact both cheaper than grid electricity and by quite a bit! Especially if you are living on an island. Which about a billion humans are right now. Comment Re:Issue is more complicated (Score 1) 522 Yes, that's fine, and then all but the assholes will leave and you'll end up with a really toxic environment. That's not something to be proud of and more importantly, I think it's a long-term recipe for failure. Nope, that's when the assholes finally get some work done because they can say what they mean rather than spending all their time trying to walk the nonexistent line between "hurt feelings" and "not getting your point across" Comment Is that a misstatement? (Score 1) 2 I remembered the rule being that adding programmers (or any other workers in any field) to a late project slows it down even more because the new workers require training from the old workers, which lowers the productivity of the old workers. It also increases the bureaucracy, adding layers of management and further dividing the work, which requires more managers to handle the increased communication load, making coordination harder. In short, it's a very intuitive rule, and only about adding workers to a late project. Comment Re:Issue is more complicated (Score 1) 522 Maybe you appreciate being called a fuckwad by other men, but I don't. I don't appreciate it if it is unwarranted, but I have acted like dick and before (everyone has at one point or another) and I have appreciated it when someone bluntly let me know. Comment Re:Issue is more complicated (Score 0) 522 Why should you not lose in any group of humans if you are not willing to go along with power dynamics? You can either try to find a group that does not contain humans or you can figure out how to work with it. You call them out and make whatever happens work for you as best you can. For those that think power dynamics only applies to men, HA!	http://slashdot.org/~N-Wing/firehose	dclm-gs1-082710000
0.029264	<urn:uuid:960d49d4-75c8-4c60-ba9a-8a25d01861fc>	en	0.959137	Please create an account to participate in the Slashdot moderation system Forgot your password? Comment Re:That's a billion people (Score 1) 126 Since GA is based off of Urchin, I assume that they are using something close to it. Urchin works off of a server's access logs. Primarily, it tries to set a cookie that is then used for tracking. The standard practice is to modify the access logs to include that tracking token in the log entry. If no cookie can be set, then it approximates a session based on source IP, user-agent, referrer, time between requests, etc. I would imagine that most people are being counted multiple times, thus inflating the number considerably. Comment What are the intention? (Score 2) 61 Some companies get patents for defensive purposes to ensure no one else patents it and uses it against them. I had a serious knee-jerk reaction when my employer sent out an email advertising our patent program. The explanation I got was that we weren't going to be patenting stuff to keep others from doing those things, but to patent them before others do so that we can't be sued. Facebook could be doing just that. In that same email, I was told that the company despises the state of IP and have active lobbying efforts to change things. I felt much better about my employer after hearing all of that. Comment Re:I'm not giving them my data! (Score 3, Insightful) 396 It sounds like you're not the type of person that is the target of most managed solutions. Cloud products aren't right for everyone and certainly not for every application. Cloud solutions won't ever take the place of bare-metal hardware for folks that need it. I am an operations admin for a cloud product and I have no problem telling customers when their stuff just isn't the right fit for our product. But, what's not right for you, doesn't make it wrong for everyone else. Comment Stop being a douche (Score 5, Insightful) 539 As someone that works in support for a hosting provider, you're the type of customer that irritates me the most. While they shouldn't be rebooting your box to get root access without your consent, you should at least help them help you. Give them an account with limited sudo access to view your logs. If that won't do, then provide them with the necessary logs. If that's not good enough, don't expect support and move your stuff to some place that doesn't provide the level of support you're paying for. GNU is Not Unix Submission Joomla! GPL Compliance Issues Sparks Upheaval-> jascat writes: "An article at highlights the recent flap with developers of closed-source extensions to the Joomla! Content Management System after Open Source Matters, Inc., the organization created by the Joomla! developers to serve as protector of Joomla! and copyright owner, announced that such extensions violate the GPL. Link to Original Source Submission PS3 Cell Processors Making Their Mark in F@H Shadyman writes: "PS3s are dominating the Folding@Home scoreboards. According to Engadget, "Cell processors have more than tripled the project's power even though they only account for around 13% of the total machines grinding away at any given time." If you have a PS3, join in the Sunday Night Foldathon! Check out the whole story at Engadget." Submission Scanning Ajax for XSS Entry Points The Courts Submission GPL click-through licenses? Submission Search for New Autism Genes Tech Toys Dominate Toy Fair 2007 48 Edis Krad writes "An CNN Money article previews the Hot Toys for 2007 from this past week's Toy Fair. The article is a great place to start looking through the hundreds of new products that were on display at the annual industry event. Among those featured in the article, I was particularly impressed with the Video Journal (blogging for kids?), the virtual bicycle (apparently, riding a real bicycle isn't cool enough anymore), and last but not least, the robotic parrot, that oddly reminds me of the replicant owl in Blade Runner. For more details on tech toys at the event, IEEE Spectrum has a rundown on the nerdier toys available. Artificial snow and a pre-assembled Mentos/Coke kit were two of that journalist's favorites. For different perspectives Forbes has a look at the toy business as it stands since last week, and Wired's Luddite column crabs that kids have too many techie toys nowadays. Dagnabit." Submission New bill that will curb outrageous cell phone tax ziggz writes: "If you have a cell phone, then you are probably aware that you are paying much more each month than the calling plan you signed up for. Why? Greedy Uncle Sam is hitting you up with double digit taxes. Everyone is required to pay a 6.05% federal tax plus all kinds of various trumped up state taxes. Baltimore, for example, simply decided to add a $3.50 additional tax to their residents' bills in 2005. A USA today article breaks down the total taxes you are paying by state, most averaging 15% or more. States have gotten so ridiculous in hiding taxes on your cell phone bill that Congress has finally stepped up by introducing the Cell Phone Tax Freedom Act of 2007. You can also have emails sent to your congressmen."	http://slashdot.org/~jascat	dclm-gs1-082740000
0.95277	<urn:uuid:935f8465-743c-43b4-b825-3c7163e1b1b9>	en	0.821005	Sign up × I get this error message when trying to access a hash with user inputted variables: "undefined method `index' for nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)" This should illustrate my problem a little better... once the string "n" is stored in a variable that variable can't access the hash anymore and returns nil. Why? [6] pry(main)> line = "n" => "n" [7] pry(main)> subway[:line] => nil [8] pry(main)> subway[:"n"] => ["timessquare", "34th", "28th", "23rd", "unionsquare", "8th"] [9] pry(main)> line => "n" This is the .rb file l = ["8th", "6th", "unionsquare","3rd","1st"] six = ["grandcentral","33rd","28th","23rd","unionsquare","astorplace"] subway = {:n=>n, :l=> l, :six=>six} puts "Where would you like to go?" destination = gets.strip.chomp.downcase.delete(" ") puts "What line is that on?" endline = gets.strip.chomp.downcase.delete(" ") puts "What station will you be departing from?" location = gets.strip.chomp.downcase.delete(" ") puts "What line is that on?" startline = gets.strip.chomp.downcase.delete(" ") if startline == endline puts (startline.index(destination)-startline.index(location)).abs puts "You have #{(subway[:startline].index(location) - subway[:startline].index("unionsquare")).abs} stops until transfer" puts "After you have #{(subway[:endline].index(destination) - subway[:endline]index("unionsquare")).abs} until your destination" share\|improve this question 1 Answer 1 up vote 1 down vote accepted you simply need to convert line to a symbol: subway[line.to_sym] share\|improve this answer Your Answer	http://stackoverflow.com/questions/15725957/accessing-hash-keys-with-user-inputted-variables-nomethoderror/15725972	dclm-gs1-082790000
0.030831	<urn:uuid:fdfed1a2-d2d9-4c0c-862f-5a64e9cd7560>	en	0.93812	Archive for gas drilling Watchdog: Energy companies use diesel in fracking without permits what the frack sign Via The What the frack? Via the Los Angeles Times, Diesel is used in fracking without permits, report says: The watchdog group's review of industry and federal data from 2010 to 2014, released Wednesday, found 351 wells in 12 states that used diesel in fracking. [...] The EPA said it was reviewing the integrity project's report. Oh em gee, the GOP is right! It's all so clear now. What we need is less oversight. Quickie: Surprise! Fracking a risk to drinking water, per research quickie15 better sizeToday's Quickie: Via the Los Angeles Times, a study of fracking in Wyoming came up with this: Mmm, mmm, mmmm! What better to quench a health enthusiast's thirst after a strenuous workout than a nice, big, refreshing glass of carcinogens and neurotoxins ? Radioactive waste a toxic byproduct of fracking, drilling in N. Dakota headdesk radioactive waste fracking Back in May I wrote, Hey Big Oil "pro-lifers": Fossil fuels may be killing babies! Today's Los Angeles Times has an extensive report about how, in North Dakota, fracking may very well be producing radioactive waste. Again, "pro-lifers," the question is: What do you value more, life or profits? Did I mention that oil drilling and fracking are producing radioactive waste? So you know how Republicans despise oversight? Because, freedom! Don'tcha wonder if they ever consider their fellow Americans' freedom to keep breathing? Especially those self-proclaimed right-to-lifers. It's hard to fathom that they are actually this okay with exposure to deadly toxins as long as their corporate gods make a buck. Am I repeating myself? I tend to do that when I'm livid. And appalled. And sickened. But I'm not sickened in a way that will potentially kill me. No, that's reserved for the victims of Fracking, Inc. in North Dakota, the second-largest oil-producing state, right after Texas. Did I mention that North Dakota doesn't have an environmental protection agency? Did I mention that New Mexico GOP Gov. Susana Martinez weakened her state's rules on hazardous waste last year? Did I mention that the EPA is not providing adequate oversight? That would be the Environmental PROTECTION Agency. Did I mention that my head is throbbing from banging it on my desk? Via the L.A. Times must-read story: To many local and tribal officials, environmentalists and some industry managers in North Dakota, the dumping of the socks [filters clotted with radioactive dirt] and the proliferation of other waste shows the government falling short in safeguarding the environment against oil field pollution. There's that "leaving it to the states" beast raising its ugly head again. Republican-run states have done so well with the Affordable Care Act and voting rights. What could possibly go wrong? Well, for one thing, North Dakota situating "slop pits" of poison over "known aquifers" could be a teeny tiny problem. Some of the people quoted in the article requested anonymity because they were afraid of repercussions-- like, you know, getting fired-- for trying to point out things like waste management failures, fear of carcinogens in groundwater, exemptions for radioactive elements being classified as hazardous waste, and for putting frackin' lives in danger. Things like that. And then there's-- ta-daa!-- Congress: bangheadSee: "Not a skit! Our actual Congress! Gaaa!" Not a skit, our actual Congress, gaa! Maddow louisiana coastline destroyed by big oil The Los Angeles Times has the story: Oops. My bad. Amanda Grossi Los Angeles The writer is a field manager for Environment California. Jenny Wilder Apple Valley	http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/tag/gas-drilling/	dclm-gs1-082820000
0.034793	<urn:uuid:544e8e1f-4a2b-4085-9bd3-16aca560d08f>	en	0.967648	1. Inhalt 2. Navigation 3. Weitere Inhalte 4. Metanavigation 5. Suche 6. Choose from 30 Languages Opinion: Draghi plays risky game The ECB uses all measures to get the eurozone out of its stagnation. It lowers interest rates to almost zero percent and ventures into uncharted territory. A risky game with an uncertain outcome, says Henrik Böhme. Mario Draghi takes the gloves off. A little more than two years ago, he announced that the ECB will do anything to save the euro. Those words were enough at the time to tame financial market speculation against Europe's single currency. The announcement also eased worries about some of the eurozone's problem children such as Portugal, Spain and Greece. The bloc's economic growth, however, hasn't picked up as hoped. Fears of a deflationary spiral have augmented, and Europe's biggest economy, Germany, has run out of steam, while France and Italy do far too little to reform their economies. Europe's monetary authorities, therefore, had to act. ECB President Mario Draghi has so far excelled primarily in making announcements. He cut interest rates close to zero percent, thus shooting off the most important weapon in his arsenal. That move, however, has failed to shope up the eurozone's fragile recovery. Furthermore, the decision to impose a penalty rate on banks for parking their liquidity with the ECB instead of lending it as credit to companies fizzled out. Against this backdrop, the new rate cut is only symbolic and won't change the eurozone's economic trajectory. Quite the contrary, it exacerbates the risks to savers, who want meaningful returns on their savings, but will continue to feel they are being robbed of their private assets. Deutsche Welle Henrik Böhme Chefredaktion GLOBAL Wirtschaft Henrik Böhme, DW's Business Department Then, a few weeks ago, Draghi broke the final taboo, publicly condoning a weaker euro. Central bankers normally are reluctant to converse about exchange rates. But what's normal in times of crisis, and as the euro has weakened against the US dollar it has helped the eurozone's ailing economies to sell their goods cheaper on world markets. This alone, however, won't be enough for the eurozone to regain competitiveness and economic growth. The ECB President, therefore, is now forced to launch the next phase of monetary efforts - a program of central bank purchases of asset-backed securities and covered bonds. This move is expected to restart generous credit lending by banks, the risks associated with it are, however, shifted to the central bank. The program, as has transpired, could amount to 500 billion euros over three years. Nevertheless, the problem in such bundled transactions is that the risks can be wonderfully packaged. They were one of the triggers of the 2007-08 financial crisis, which caused the great recession. These packages have a reputation of exacerbating economic crises and regulators, therefore, have to examine very closely what assets are being packed. What we are currently seeing is the ECB's last gasp to bring Europe out of its economic paralysis. The eurozone's monetary authority has only one lever remaining at their disposal. It is the hotly debated large scale purchases of government bonds, which effectively means financing governments by printing new money. We are not at that stage yet. But the currency area's political leaders have to understand at least now that the ECB is no longer in a position to play the role of firefighter. Structural reforms are immediately needed, particularly in the bigger economies such as France and Italy. The ECB has bought politicians some time, but the ball is now in their courts.	http://www.dw.com/en/opinion-draghi-plays-risky-game/a-17902822?maca=en-rss-en-bus-2091-rdf	dclm-gs1-083420000
0.034633	<urn:uuid:897903b0-23e3-4fcc-9724-c2e051a9cd4e>	en	0.872688	(0) items Essentials of Corporate Finance + Self Study CD-ROM + PowerWeb Author(s): Ross, Stephen A.; Westerfield, Randolph; Jordan, Bradford D. ISBN: 9780072848847 / Hardcover / 2/10/2003 Marketplace Disclaimer:	http://www.ecampus.com/marketplace/9780072848847	dclm-gs1-083430000
0.978962	<urn:uuid:e8f94086-9279-4aff-bb3b-978bb3336bc7>	en	0.983278	Why do older people ask these questions over and over? Do you have a boyfriend? (Answer: No). You are so pretty. I can't believe you're not married. When are you going to get married? (Answer: ?). I don't understand and it drives me crazy. Yes I know I'm 25, almost 26. I dress up the way that I do because I like to dress up. I've been doing that since... Show More Most Helpful Guy • Older people are just obnoxious sometimes. They are not in our generation and don't understand the hardships.. they think that things would go the same way as it went back then to them.. you either have to take it or express that you would like to keep this topic away from the conversation. • Thank you for the Most helpful opinion	http://www.girlsaskguys.com/flirting/q768270-why-do-older-people-ask-these-questions-over-and	dclm-gs1-083600000
0.020962	<urn:uuid:93a710e9-b259-485d-9c36-1f80a8f74ea2>	en	0.926023	Next: , Up: Top [Contents][Index] 1 Introduction In the past, if you were a source code package developer and wanted to take advantage of the power of shared libraries, you needed to write custom support code for each platform on which your package ran. You also had to design a configuration interface so that the package installer could choose what sort of libraries were built. GNU Libtool’s consistent interface is reassuring… users don’t need to read obscure documentation to have their favorite source package build shared libraries. They just run your package configure script (or equivalent), and libtool does all the dirty work. libhello could be a shared library, a static library, or both… whatever is available on the host system, as long as libtool has been ported to it. Next: , Up: Top [Contents][Index]	http://www.gnu.org/software/libtool/manual/html_node/Introduction.html	dclm-gs1-083620000
0.024526	<urn:uuid:3781f834-f652-42a1-b877-170cf978e9c7>	en	0.96894	Close Lobsters: Firestation Towers: 1986-1989 Track List Album Notes As one of the groups featured on the legendary C86 cassette release by the NME, Scotland's Close Lobsters' place in the history of indie pop was already cemented. Their contribution, "Firestation Towers," was one of the set's highlights and featured all the things that made them special. The skittering and breezily melodic guitars, the uptempo pulse of the rhythm section, Andrew Burnett's inscrutable lyrics, and the solid craft of their songwriting are all present. Over the course of several singles and two really solid album, Close Lobsters operated outside the realm of mass popularity, but listening to Firestation Towers: 1986-1989, Fire's 2015 collection of their complete recorded works, it's clear that the lack of heaping amounts of popularity wasn't their fault at all. The disc of singles (which was previously released as Forever Until Victory! The Singles Collection in 2009) has a bunch of songs that sound like hits, especially "Let's Make Some Plans" and the sprightly "In Spite of These Times." Maybe their songs are less immediate than, say, the Smiths, but the hooks are skyscraper tall and the energy is always infectious. The two albums included here, 1987's Foxheads Stalk This Land and 1988's Headache Rhetoric, are both solid to excellent indie pop collections with plenty of jangle, plenty of mild angst, and a brilliantly shiny sound. Foxheads comes out ahead by just a touch thanks to slightly stronger songs and a looser production style, but really it's a toss-up. The three discs together tell the story of a band that may not have received the same accolades over the years as some of its contemporaries, but which deserves them all the same. Mid- to late-'80s guitar pop doesn't get much better than this, and Fire has done a great favor to both original fans of Close Lobsters and those who might discover the band's charms here for the first time. ~ Tim Sendra There are currently no reviews, be the first one! Login or Create an Account to write a review	http://www.hbdirect.com/album_detail.php?pid=3001212	dclm-gs1-083670000
0.451766	<urn:uuid:abf892b7-e33c-4c00-80b8-8e16037893d0>	en	0.718068	English Deutsch Italiano Espanol Francais diosa masturbandose You are streaming diosa masturbandose porn video from Pornhub sex channel. Free diosa masturbandose sex movie was added from CamFuze together with more porno videos. Find more diosa, masturbandose porn on our biggest collection of free sex videos. Well organized porno movies are updated daily. Recommended Pornhub videos for you bangladesh bulu pornos kostenlos indian wife shared with homo friend shyam videopublikxxx com gb xxxdesi vidos school indan download free real amateur sexs video movie erohot net search asin mofosexfighe videos wootee sex com blonde mommy katrina kelley reamed real deep tollywoodsex images xxxtubeporns com movie tubidy mbi freepornvideo com for nokia college xxx movies and pictures	http://www.kporno.com/diosa-masturbandose	dclm-gs1-083820000
0.032671	<urn:uuid:83202c6a-5212-4d33-8db6-7dfc298c5437>	en	0.944896	Caracas, July 29 IANS \| 1 year ago Hailing him as a "prophet who came to change our history", Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro Monday presided over a ceremony in Chavez's hometown of Sabaneta and said the celebrations were an honour to ratify huge commitments that millions made to Chavez, Xinhua reported. Maduro said that the legacy of Chavez's Bolivarian Revolution would continue to ensure peace, prosperity and welfare in Latin America. The Bolivarian Revolution was launched to implement popular democracy, economic independence and an end to political corruption in Venezuela. Maduro condemned the US government for its attempt to overthrow the Bolivarian revolutionary project. "Nothing and nobody are going to blackmail us, our conduct is in favour of our independence. We'll never forget the ideals Commander Chavez taught us, we are heirs of his struggle," Maduro said. Chavez governed Venezuela from 1999 until his death March 5, 2013, after a two-year battle with cancer. Meanwhile, President of Bolivia Evo Morales urged the Venezuelan people to unite as one and to consolidate the Bolivarian Revolution. Similarly, Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega stressed the historic significance of Hugo Chavez as a catalyst for the Latin American and Caribbean integration currently felt in the region. Head of state of El Salvador, Salvador Sanchez Ceren, said Chavez's ideals would continue to guide the destinies of Latin America and the Caribbean nations through the joint efforts of the Venezuelan president and its people. Across the country, people marked the day with book readings, concerts and other activities. (Posted on 29-07-2014) Share This Page: Free Yearly Horoscope: Select your zodiac sign	http://www.newkerala.com/news/2014/fullnews-85900.html	dclm-gs1-083910000
0.073358	<urn:uuid:2143dbae-b467-4c63-bc20-5a132a57b922>	en	0.879824	Pretty Little Liars fashion: Single Fright Female Slowly but surely ABC Family is becoming the teen pregnancy channel. What once was a bevy of family friendly teen programming has slowly morphed into the “let’s glorify underage pregnancies.” I’m no prude. I know kids are having sex. I just wish the programming was a little more realistic. Starting with the cold hard facts: not everyone who gets pregnant ends up with abs like Shailene Woodley and Ezra’s babymomma Maggie. Believe. Me. Looking for more Pretty Little Liars fashion posts? Check out these past Pretty Little Liars outfits and click for more posts about Pretty Little Liars style Aria’s blue wedge Halogen Aria’s cut out dress, Anthropologie Aria’s elephant belt, Anthropologie Aria’s peplum dress Emily’s front tie yellow tee Hanna’s Racoon Tank Maggie’s lace top Spencer’s pink chevron dress Spencer’s lace dress Hanna’s colorblock dres 10 thoughts on “Pretty Little Liars fashion: Single Fright Female 1. Anonymous Thanks as always for your excellent coverage of Pretty Little Liars. Hannah's dress is the Yumi Kim 'Do the Twist Dress' 2. Anonymous What about Hanna's multi shade blue dress 3. Mary A. What about Hannah's blue dress that she wore in the store? And Emily's purple dress? Thanks! 4. Anonymous Can you identify the adorable dress that evil Ali was wearing in the flashback on the street? 5. Anonymous Hanna's dress is actually available at Bloomingdales, its a maxi dress! It's the Yumi Kim Leigh Maxi, so if you search it you will be able to find it! 6. Anonymous And how about Emily's black pants she wore with the yellow top? 7. Anonymous Could you find Ali's pink dress when she got out of the car in the flashback?! I believe it was silk and had a pattern :) 8. Anonymous The brief moment we saw Emily in the Burgandy dress… Wow… I have never wanted one so badly! Can you PLEASE identify? 9. Anonymous Emily's black pants are Zara 10. Mary A. Ali's pink/polka dot dress please! So cute :) Leave a Reply Your email address will not be published.	http://www.possessionista.com/2012/08/pretty-little-liars-fashion-single-fright-female.html	dclm-gs1-084000000
0.817173	<urn:uuid:29965271-cb05-426b-afd9-259b51dfe939>	en	0.918579	Global Politics Geo answer Today's Geo Quiz asks for the name of a former count. .SU stands for the Soviet Union. Despite efforts to pull the plug on the Internet country code, an estimated 80-thousand websites still use it. Global Politics Legal trouble for Google in Italy	http://www.pri.org/tags/digital?qt-latest_content=1	dclm-gs1-084030000
0.024882	<urn:uuid:d628e6eb-4eee-419d-9eba-8513f787705d>	en	0.958375	Unlimited Digital Access. $1 for 4 weeks. So the next day, a French tourist threw a fishing line into the water and finally reeled in a tuna. Crouching on the deck of the boat, sunburned and sweaty, we cut the fish into pieces and ate it raw with tiny calamansi limes. (It was — and I don’t say this lightly — one of the best meals of my life.) OK, so it wasn’t quite “Lord of the Flies” or “Survivor.” But we were very far from Manhattan. Asia’s ‘final frontier’ But even more breathtaking than Palawan itself are the tiny, sparsely inhabited islands sprinkled across the South China Sea between Palawan and the northern island of Coron. And the only way to see those is by boat. Tao Expeditions’ multiday trips appeal to travelers who want to drop off the grid and indulge in a temporary Robinson Crusoe fantasy on remote tropical islands without a single resort or restaurant in sight. (“We do not guarantee that you will have a nice relaxing time. Barking dogs. Crowing Roosters. Mosquito bites. Jellyfish stings,” the Tao website declares. “We love it.”) “If you break your leg, get used to it, because there’s no hospital,” we were warned in a pre-trip briefing. The prospect of five days without Internet was alarming. I’m 26. I Google, Facebook, email and tweet in the same insatiable way that I drink water and breathe air. Painlessly unplugged The transformative influence of the Philippines works quickly. Within hours of our setting sail, a new bikini became my skin, and I stopped caring (honestly!) what might be happening online. Life on the boat quickly settled into a languid routine of snorkeling, eating, relaxing on the wooden deck and exploring tiny islands. Every evening, we set up camp on a beach and spent the night talking, singing or reading by torchlight. On the fourth day, we stopped at a small island village to discover that a festival was being held that afternoon. While the other tourists stayed near the beach, I wandered off. I wove between small thatched houses until a tiny smiling girl appeared. Like a magical rabbit from a fantasy novel, she beckoned me to follow her. I did. Untamed tourists My hair, which I normally straighten, had relaxed back into its natural mess of tangled curls. My skin had turned into a Picasso-like maze of tan lines, sunburns, inexplicable bruises and long scratches from where I’d swum into a cliff. My body looked like a map of the Philippines. I loved it.	http://www.seattletimes.com/travel/totally-unplugged-in-a-philippine-archipelago/	dclm-gs1-084130000
0.023259	<urn:uuid:41d94797-cffa-4362-829a-fa7e80a35ad8>	en	0.972272	Browsing: nys senate Contrary to what Tom Hanks would have us believe, there is, indeed, crying in baseball. With the possible exception of those who have the misfortune of never having watched Gary Carter play baseball, there were few people last week who were not deeply saddened by the heartbreaking passing from inoperable brain cancer of the famously…	http://www.sheepsheadbites.com/tag/nys-senate/	dclm-gs1-084150000
0.032092	<urn:uuid:a4602595-c31a-42e8-892e-f18c890e5564>	en	0.925783	Edit Article Instead of tossing away your old, unwanted belts, give them a new lease of life by recycling them into a bracelet, or more. These make excellent, stylish bracelets and they're perfect for giving away as gifts. 1. 1 Use an old belt. Wrap the belt around your wrist and measure it. Mark a line where you will cut it - it should be the size of your wrist plus some additional room. If making for a gift, guess as accurately as you can, or measure your friend's wrist. 2. 2 Cut the bracelet. Always cut more space rather than less, as you can always whittle it down if needed. Make sure you leave the buckle on. 3. 3 Poke a hole near the end of the belt at the opposite end of the buckle. 4. 4 Decorate with duct tape and/or pictures. Other decorative elements might include marker drawings, stamp prints, costume gems, etc. Printed out clip-art pictures of animals are a favorite. Try burning or laser-engraving into the belt to make cool effects. 5. 5 Use up the remaining parts of the belt. Although the rest of the belt lacks the buckle, you can make more bracelets and thread yarn or other strong threads through small holes to draw together the bracelet. • you could extend it into a choker! Things You'll Need • Old belt • Duct tape, pictures, printed-out cartoons or any decorative items, etc. • Knife • Leather hole punch if making extra bracelets, and yarn for threading Article Info Categories: Bracelet Projects Thanks to all authors for creating a page that has been read 10,256 times. Did this article help you? Yes No an Author! Write an Article	http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Bracelet-from-an-Old-Belt	dclm-gs1-084450000
0.018832	<urn:uuid:9bbfc998-630b-488a-a114-8367308e0e30>	en	0.942225	Co-operative living arrangements From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Jump to: navigation, search Co-operative living arrangements occur when three or more biologically unrelated people choose to live together and share a common residential structure. Typically, in these co-ops, several people occupy a single dwelling unit, such as a large house, with each person (or couple) having a private area, including a bedroom and, often, a bathroom. In addition, the common areas of the dwelling usually include a shared kitchen, dining room and living room plus, at times, recreation or outdoor spaces. The residents of the shared dwelling generally establish some agreements as to what contributions, in terms of time and money, are required from each person. Commonly, the total expenses of maintaining the dwelling, such as rent/mortgage payments, utilities, repairs, etc., are allocated on a per capita basis to each resident. At times, it may be agreed that some residents can provide labor, such as housecleaning or yard care services, in lieu of financial contributions. In addition to agreements dealing with the allocation of basic household expenses, co-op residents often develop arrangements regarding daily activities, such as food acquisition, meal preparation and clean-up. Frequently, residents will choose to eat at least some meals (e.g., dinners) together in the common dining room. Plans are usually agreed upon specifying duties for each member of the co-op. A common model is to have some sort of rotation in which each resident takes a regular turn in cooking meals for everyone. Co-operative living arrangements may be developed for many other aspects of life in the shared dwelling. Social/recreational activities, use of common areas, and admission of new residents are topics for which agreements among the co-op members are commonly made. Generally, there is some established process in which members meet, discuss issues/proposals, and reach some decision as to what the policy of the co-op should be. Since most co-op residential groups tend to be egalitarian in nature, the decision making process is often consensual, with a preference for obtaining agreement from everyone before implementation begins. Members of a co-op living unit tend to have shared values, often based on similar demographics (e.g., all may be university students, retirees, etc.,). As a result of common interests, living arrangements for the group are often easier to establish and maintain than would be the case if the residents were more diverse in terms of age, socioeconomic status, etc. Disagreements over arrangements inevitably occur, however, and most co-op living groups find it necessary to have some sort of conflict-resolution process available when agreement cannot be reached. Policies and procedures[edit] For most people, co-op living entails some restrictions on personal freedoms in order to accommodate to the needs and rights of others. Playing loud music in the living room may not be a problem if one is living alone in one's own home but it could be a concern in a co-op residence if others want to have quiet time there. The primary way the wishes of the group get expressed is in the co-op living arrangements that are agreed upon. Members essentially contract to abide by these "house rules" for everyone's benefit. Agreed-upon arrangements are sometimes informal and based on tacit understanding by the members. Alternatively, arrangements may be codified more formally, into a kind of "policies and procedures" manual, with sign-off agreement required by all members. Most co-op living groups find it necessary to have at least some kind of documentation, such as schedules showing who is to do what, and when. Written statements of operational guidelines are also helpful to inform prospective new members of what is expected of them. Many city, state and local governments will have restrictions/requirements for changes in land use. Be sure to check with your local governing authorities to make sure you meet all necessary requirements in opening your home to rentals. Positives, negatives and challenges[edit] Although the limitations on individual freedom of expression may be perceived as a downside, the trade-off for co-op living members is the enhanced social interaction and support that can be realized in the shared residence. The arrangements themselves create a social structure that often promotes cohesion and bonding among the co-op residents. Joining with housemates in shared meals, clean-up crews, party-planning, etc., can provide interactive opportunities not available to those living independently. Some co-operative living situations emerge more or less spontaneously. Others are carefully planned with a specific vision in mind. Co-op living units are often created by a core group of people who want to form a kind of voluntary or intentional family in a shared living environment. Start-up decisions must be made regarding how to allocate personal space, what activities to share, what form of tenancy or ownership to adopt, etc. Coping with restrictive local regulations or opposition from neighbors may be issues. A common challenge is to fill vacancies with new members who have prosocial values, interests and abilities which are compatible with the existing group. Co-operative living is a kind of alternative lifestyle. It represents an option different in significant ways from the traditional model of independent living in which single individuals or couples live alone, each in a fully self-contained dwelling unit. One of the primary motives prompting people to explore the co-op living alternative is the perceived loneliness, isolation and disconnection from others experienced in the nuclear family and by many who live alone, even in a coupled relationship. By creating a family of choice and sharing a residential unit with that intentional ohana, individuals and couples hope to develop a home base of support and social security. Related concepts[edit] Although co-op living arrangements can exist at any size, those involving larger groups are often referred to as intentional communities. Co-op living arrangements are generally thought of as occurring within a single dwelling unit, shared by all. Other group-living alternatives, such as cohousing or ecovillages, typically involve multiple dwelling units with some shared structures also.[1][2] Collective housing is another arrangement where members might live in one dwelling, but they pool certain resources such as groceries and utilities to simplify daily chores. A commune may be seen as a special type of co-op living arrangement in which there is often less personal space and more communal ownership of property. Co-op living arrangements need not be based on any specific ideology or purpose other than to share the social and economic benefits of living together with others who are supportive and compatible. See also[edit] 1. ^ "What Is Cohousing?". Bothell, WA: The Cohousing Association of the United States. Retrieved August 4, 2010. Cohousing is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their own neighborhoods. Cohousing residents are consciously committed to living as a community. The physical design encourages both social contact and individual space. 2. ^ Global Ecovillage Network. "What is an Ecovillage?". Moffat, CO: Global Ecovillage Network. Retrieved August 5, 2010. Ecovillages are urban or rural communities of people, who strive to integrate a supportive social environment with a low-impact way of life. To achieve this, they integrate various aspects of ecological design, permaculture, ecological building, green production, alternative energy, community building practices, and much more. • Scott-Hanson, C.; Scott-Hanson, K. (2005). The Cohousing Handbook: Building a Place for Community (2nd ed.). Philadelphia, Pa: New Society. OCLC 57392728. • Yeoman, Barry (February 7, 2006). "Rethinking the Commune". AARP: The Magazine (Washington, DC: AARP) (March/April 2006). Retrieved August 2, 2010. • Zablocki, B. D. (1980). Alienation and Charisma: A Study of Contemporary American Communes. New York: The Free Press. ISBN 0-02-935780-2. OCLC 469664018. External links[edit] • Communities (magazine). Roth, Chris, ed. Communities (Rutledge, MO: Fellowship for Intentional Community). ISSN 0199-9346. OCLC 3130385 Retrieved August 5, 2010. Since 1972, Communities has been the primary resource for information, issues, and ideas about intentional communities in North America - from urban co-ops to cohousing groups to ecovillages to rural communes. Communities now also focuses on creating and enhancing community in the workplace, in nonprofit or activist organizations, and in neighborhoods, with enhanced coverage of international communities as well Missing or empty \|title= (help) • "Communal Studies Association Home Page". Amana, IA: Communal Studies Association (CSA). Retrieved August 5, 2010. Communal Studies: Dedicated to the Understanding and Study of Intentional, Contemporary, Historic and 'Utopian' Communities Some pictorial examples of cohousing Duwamish Cohousing (formerly Ciel Cohousing), West Seattle, Seattle, Washington. Cohousing community illustrating greenspace preservation, tightly clustered housing, and parking on periphery. (Sunward Cohousing, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 2003)	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Co-operative_living_arrangements	dclm-gs1-084560000
0.018966	<urn:uuid:0c1d7ff0-66c1-42d4-8180-684308fd5c61>	en	0.979701	Lisagor: Relating to others It is important to address a person’s flaws head on, but with compassion I have been making a concerted effort the past few years to accept my life as it is, both good and bad, instead of obsessing about how I wish it would be. In the past, I spent considerable energy trying to reach an elusive "there," meaning everything "good" — a promotion, a successful software delivery, a more pleasant boss or a little more money. It was almost impossible to enjoy my life when I was so busy waiting for something better to happen. Speaking of elusive, I have also tried to work on how I relate to other people, especially business associates who give me grief. Many people I know have a tendency to label a manager who does something "bad" as being a bad person or something even more harsh. But as long as we judge others to the extreme, expecting them to behave perfectly, there will never really be an effective organization, much less a more peaceful world. When I get upset with someone for something they have done or said, I try to reflect on that specific behavior instead of declaring the individual a lost cause. By awakening my compassion for that person as a fellow human, I am able to communicate my concern without going into attack mode. It often means getting to know someone at a deeper level than the size of their office or how they behave during meetings. This approach was very effective with one of my clients. Her demanding management style was preventing her staff from feeling free to express their opinions. In meetings, they would fight over who got to sit at the end of the conference table farthest from her and her verbal barbs. Finally, when her behavior started to upset me, too, I realized I needed to talk to her. First, I accepted that her behavior was the problem, not her as a person. I also accepted that I could lose a valuable client as a result of broaching this subject with her. But I decided that it was more important to try to speak out against what I perceived to be unacceptable behavior than to swallow the pain out of fear of retribution. After I had an honest discussion with her, she actually thanked me for pointing out why her actions were inconsistent with her desired company culture. And instead of canceling my contract, the next day she invited my wife and me to dinner. This breakthrough was made possible only by transforming my initial negative, general judgment into a meaningful and respectful dialogue. I try to remember that everyone has a unique contribution to make. This increases my appreciation of family, friends, associates and myself. As an added benefit, my happiness today doesn't have to depend on some elusive tomorrow. This column is adapted from Lisagor's book "Romancing the Buddha," which will be published in May by Middleway Press. He founded Celerity Works in 1999 to help information technology executives accelerate and manage business growth. He lives on Bainbridge Island, Wash., and can be reached at The 2015 Federal 100 Reader comments Please type the letters/numbers you see above More from 1105 Public Sector Media Group	https://fcw.com/Articles/2005/04/04/Lisagor-Relating-to-others.aspx	dclm-gs1-084600000
0.518184	<urn:uuid:44132dde-43b6-40aa-8fde-ee0005e2f07c>	en	0.949045	Sign up for Grabien Breaking News Alerts Rep. Steve Israel: It's Tougher To Run as a Republican in 2014 than as a Democrat 'It is a tough climate, but it's going to be much tougher to be a Republican running on the budget they just produced' JANSING: "You spoke this week at the National Press Club. You did call this a tough climate for Democrats. How tough is it right now?" ISRAEL: "Well it is a tough climate, but it's going to be much tougher to be a Republican running on the budget they just produced, which stacks the deck for the special interests and turns their backs on the middle class. So I'll give you an example: if you are a middle class voter in any one of the districts that we're competing in, you get a $2,000 tax increase under this House Republican budget. if you're a millionaire anywhere in America, you get a $200,000 tax cut. That's a defining issue. Those priorities are all wrong, and we're going to run on our priorities to invest in the middle class and expand the economy, versus their priorities, which is to protect the special interest on the expense of the middle class." JANSING: "Let's talk about their strategy and how you plan to answer it. And start with the ObamaCare enthusiasm gap. Here's what Politico's analysis is. Quote, 'in races across the country, Democrats and their supporters are tailoring campaign ads in a way that distances the candidates from the health law's problems, casts them as potential saviors and warns of dire consequences if Republicans are back in charge.' That includes Ann Kirkpatrick, obviously a congresswoman from Arizona. You see the Senators, Mary Landrieu, Mark Begich, Mark Warner. Given that climate and given how strongly and for so long the Republicans have gone after ObamaCare, clearly, when you look at the polls to some success, is the best answer for most people just to talk about ObamaCare as little as possible?" ISRAEL: "No, the best answer is to talk about how we can fix and improve the Affordable Care Act where it can be fixed and improved. Look, 60 --" JANSING: "Would you agree that's a more nuanced and difficult argument to make?" ISRAEL: "No. There are two things we need to do. First, You know, Politico cites data and poll. I'll tell you what polling tells us, 60 percent of voters want to either keep, fix, or improve the Affordable Care Act, 22 percent favor repeal. That's number one. Number two, when people realize what repeal means -- and we're going on offense on this -- when voters realize that what the Republicans want to do is repeal the whole thing so that if you're a woman and you have breast cancer, you lose your insurance again. If you're a senior, you pay an additional $1,200 for your prescription drugs. If you're a student, you get kicked off your parent's health insurance. When people understand exactly what Republican repeal means they are more angry with Republican repeal. So we're going on offense on those issues, and we're going to continue to stay on offense on this Republican budget which completely devastates the middle class." Related links Video files View: Per page: Sort by: Date Summary Rank Loading search results... Audio files Loading search results... Similar stories	https://grabien.com/story.php?id=7115	dclm-gs1-084620000
0.035986	<urn:uuid:00b94d73-d153-479a-b124-74ef0aa9f75c>	en	0.947235	Chicago Sun-Times The scoop from Washington Sweet blog special: Behind the Clinton/Obama YouTube ad: The mysterious "ParkRidge47." Who are you? \| 1 Comment Read Sifry's article at Sifty writes: This from "ParkRidge47" in response to Sifry e-mail earlier this month..... "Thank you for your interest in the video. It has been amazing to watch it explode on the viral scene. At one point it was the #3 most watched video on YouTube and is at 108,000 views and growing. Considering Hillary Clinton's biggest video has only received 12,000 views on YouTube, I'd say the grassroots has won the first round. The idea was simple and so was the execution. Make a bold statement about the Democratic primary race by culture jacking a famous commercial and replacing as few images as possible. For some people it doesn't register, but for people familiar with the ad and the race it has obviously struck a chord. 1 Comment Thank you for welcoming me. Montreal, March 22, 1995 President William Jefferson Clinton President of the United States of America The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue N.W. Washington, DC 20500 Mister President: "Uphold Democracy" operation is truly a beautiful historical moment. With underdeveloped tools - a camera and a few films - I have tried, in denounce Newton's Theory of Colors. have written the enclosed book entitled Haiti, Let There Be Light! I hope represent! Please believe me: your courageous commitment to facilitate the of your swearing-in ceremony, I wished to send you my book, Haďti, Que La Lumičre Soit!, which questions Newton's Theory of Colors. I did not do so, of my book, I contented myself with dreaming - dreaming that on one of your Mrs. Clinton and your daughter Chelsea. You were reading Haďti, Que La Lumičre Soit! I imagined you carefully examining certain passages of that work in its English version, which is now in preparation - typed by a missing matter, darkness in space, "black holes" - in a word: the invisible Valleys", which contained the following passage: House since Thomas Jefferson. Nixon could not run a tape recorder. Johnson could not fully figure out his alarm wrist watch. speculation that they might provide answers to what holds the Universe the President of a star-spangled republic to choose between "Star Peace" and "Star War". As to the former President's inclination toward Einstein's certain laws of the Cosmos to politics and diplomacy. Consider the "Tunnel Effect", the way that energy escapes from black holes. me think about Aristide - both of them are well at ease in both the Western one difference: the Haitians follow Aristide everywhere, like a comet's tail. If Aristide is considered as a "Black Sun", then the Haitians are "space refugees". "Yes, Haiti! We are pulled down to earth. Democracy. the exodus of the Boat People. with the Law of Probabilities, whether we think about Planck or "What business did the Haitians have in that "boat"?" of the "Black Sun"?" Let there be light! Que la lumičre soit! Black holes, black sun, tunnel effect, Aristide effect, boat people, space refugees, Carl Sagan, Jimmy Carter. six of one and half a dozen of the other." There is loud laughter in the Oval Room. Bill a ri Bill laughed Hillary a ri Hillary laughed Chelsea a ri aussi Chelsea laughed too Humor is American, Mr. President, and so are dreams. Let my book "Haïti! Que La Lumière Soit!" be the "dark matter", arguing in favor of the development of the Black world - visible and invisible! propelled by the energy of invisible and concentrated dark matter, like black holes. A mini black hole of an avant-garde design whose motor sequence light, and scientifically controlled reversibility of the phenomenon. What a new synthesis, but also what a liberation! Synthesis and analysis are two wings of the same bird - contracted and This would be the natural and constructive counterpart of Newton's Theory of with its camera. where law and order are transcendent, just as in democracy. like an inevitable and immeasurable energy, has practically absorbed me, allowing me to express myself. On October 4, 1994, in the General Assembly of the United Nations, a voice echoed the power of your leadership. In new words, on March 31, 1995, that same voice will repeat: "Even now, with the peaceful launching of the operation "UPHOLD DEMOCRACY" on 19 September last year, a tropical smile has shed light upon the faces of those who espouse and love peace - Peacemakers, Peacekeepers, and Peacelovers. Together, President Clinton and we have managed to open up a "tunnel" of hope after so much suffering." That testimony by President Aristide at the U.N. emphasizes the magnitude of the efforts needed to bring about such a happy conclusion. Your present trip to Haiti is the strongest confirmation of that sequence of well as in the life of the Haitian people Development Initiative (S.D.I.) at the dawn of the "Star Peace". Glaze Storm The Right Honorable Lucien Bouchard Prime Minister of Quebec Building Hydro-Québec 75, boulevard René Lévesque Ouest Montréal (Québec) H2Z 1A4 Dear Mr. Prime Minister: Each of us should express solidarity, according to his means. Why did that happened to me, in such a way, like an ice storm, camera in hand, in full darkness? - " the taboo arises as a negative categorical imperative," affirms Roger Caillois. It is not saying little. Especially when it is a question of adequately correcting the theory of Newton on light and colors. Presently, why should we take the result instead of the cause? Objectively and in a pragmatic way, by a new synthesis; consequently, what a liberation ! At the threshold of the third millennium, let light live, invisible by synthesis, visible by analysis. Energetic formula with a unique character ! A winning formula ! In Québec ! By Hydro-Québec ! Is it still broad daylight in the shadow of the black sun? Yours truly, 96 percent of cosmos puzzles astronomers Friday, June 20, 2003 Posted: 1629 GMT (12:29 AM HKT) Luminous matter accounts for only about 0.4 percent of the universe. Story Tools WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Earth, moon, sun and all visible stars in the sky make up less than one percent of the universe. Almost all the rest is dark matter and dark energy, unknown forces that puzzle astronomers. Observations in recent years have changed the basic understanding of how the universe evolved and have emphasized for astronomers how little is known about the major forces and substances that shaped our world. Astronomers now know that luminous matter -- stars, planets and hot gas -- account for only about 0.4 percent of the universe. Nonluminous components, such as black holes and intergalactic gas, make up 3.6 percent. The rest is either dark matter, about 23 percent, or dark energy, about 73 percent. Dark matter, sometimes called "cold dark matter," has been known for some time. Only recently have researchers come to understand the pivotal role it played in the formation of stars, planets and even people. "We owe our very existence to dark matter," said Paul Steinhardt, a physicist at Princeton University and a co-author of a review on dark matter appearing this week in the journal Science. Steinhardt said it is believed that following the Big Bang, the theoretical beginning of the universe, dark matter caused particles to clump together. That set up the gravitation processes that led to the formation of stars and galaxies. Those stars, in turn, created the basic chemicals, such as carbon and iron, that were fundamental to the evolution of life. "Dark matter dominated the formation of structure in the early universe," Steinhardt said. "For the first few billion years dark matter contained most of the mass of the universe. You can think of ordinary matter as a froth on an ocean of dark matter. The dark matter clumps and the ordinary matter falls into it. That led to the formation of the stars and galaxies." Without dark matter, "there would be virtually no structures in the universe," he said. The nature of dark matter is unknown. It cannot be seen or detected directly. Astronomers know it is there because of its effect on celestial objects than can be seen and measured. But the most dominating force of all in the universe is called dark energy, a recently proven power that astronomers say is causing the galaxies in the universe to separate at a faster and faster speed. It is the force that is causing the universe to expand at an accelerating rate. Robert P. Kirshner, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, said the presence of dark energy was proved only five years ago when astronomers studying very distant exploding stars discovered they were moving away at a constant acceleration. It was a stunning discovery that has since been proved by other observations. Kirshner said it is clear now that dark matter and dark energy engaged in a gravitational tug of war that, eventually, dark energy won. Following the Big Bang some 14 billion years ago, matter in the universe streaked outward. It formed galaxies, thinned out and then began to slow down. "Dark matter was trying to slow things down and dark energy was trying to speed it up," said Kirshner, the author of a review article on dark energy in Science. "We think dark matter was winning for the first seven billion years, but then universe went from slowing down to speeding up. ... Dark energy took over." Kirshner said astronomers do not really understand dark energy. Albert Einstein first proposed a form of the idea, but discarded it later. Now, researchers know it exists, but its exact form and nature are mysterious, although it is thought to be related to gravity. "What this is pointing to is a deep mystery at the heart of physics," said Kirshner. "We don't understand gravity in the same way we understand other forces." He said there are virtually no experiments on Earth that would explore the nature of dark energy. It can only be studied across vast stellar distances by observing the motion of objects extremely far away, a skill that has been possible only in recent decades with the development of very powerful telescopes. "Dark energy will cause the universe to expanded faster and faster and eventually, over time, we will see less and less of it," Kirshner said. Over millions of years, familiar stars and nearby galaxies will disappear from view and the sky, now choked with stars, will slowly darken. "The piece of the universe that we can see will get lonelier and lonelier," he said. ( Leave a comment Get the Sweet widget More widgets Lynn Sweet Stay in touch About this Entry This page contains a single entry by Lynn Sweet published on March 20, 2007 4:47 PM. Sweet blog special: Obama's Harvard pals high dollar fundraiser. UPDATE. Dodd funder. was the previous entry in this blog. Bush: Will "correct" fired U.S. attorney problem. Transcript. is the next entry in this blog.	http://blogs.suntimes.com/sweet/2007/03/sweet_blog_special_behind_the.html	dclm-gs1-084820000
0.02575	<urn:uuid:1625cf84-1d0d-4534-b168-596045bb5ce3>	en	0.964412	New Arrivals - Fiction Sending a scathing email to his family members after becoming convinced he will die within days, a proud Greek immigrant garners laughter and scorn from his recipients, who are dismayed when he promptly disappears. "Fleeing the social conformity required by the Communist government, he wanders deep into the regions of the Qiang, Miago, and Yi peoples located on the fringes of Han Chinese civilization and discovers a plethora of different traditions, history, legends, folk songs, and landscapes. Slowly, with the help of memory, imagination, and sensory experience, he reconstructs his personal past"--Jacket. Embarking on an ill-conceived Alaskan cruise, septuagenarian Harriet reunites with her estranged daughter and confronts pivotal events from her life surrounding the true character of her husband, who died two years earlier. Combining a sensational story of a man's physical and moral decline through alcohol, a study of marital breakdown, a disquisition on the care and upbringing of children, and a hard-hitting critique of the position of women in Victorian society, this passionate tale of betrayal is set within a stern moral framework tempered by Anne Bronte's optimistic belief in universal redemption. It tells the story of the estranged wife of a dissolute rake, desperate to protect her son from his destructive influence, in full flight from a shocking world of debauchery and cruelty. Drawing on her first-hand experiences with her brother Branwell, Bronte's novel scandalized contemporary readers and still retains its power to shock today. The new introduction by Josephine McDonagh sheds light on the intellectual and cultural context of the novel, its complex narrative structure, and the contemporary moral and medical debates about alcohol and the body with which the novel engages. Based on the authoritative Clarendon text, the book has an improved chronology, an up-to-date bibliography, and many informative notes. - Publisher. "Dark, witty, and suspenseful, this literary crime thriller reminiscent of The Dinner and The Silent Wife follows a famous author whose wife, the brains behind his success, meets an untimely death, leaving him to deal with the consequences. "Evil is a matter of opinion..." On the surface, Henry Hayden seems like someone you could like, or even admire. A famous bestselling author who appears a modest everyman. A loving, devoted husband even though he could have any woman he desires. A generous friend and coworker. But Henry Hayden is a construction, a mask. His past is a secret, his methods more so. No one besides him and his wife know that she is the actual writer of the novels that made him famous. For most of Henry's life, it hasn't been a problem. But when his hidden-in-plain-sight mistress becomes pregnant and his carefully constructed facade is about to crumble, he tries to find a permanent solution, only to make a terrible mistake. Now not only are the police after Henry, but his past, which he has painstakingly kept hidden, threatens to catch up with him as well. Henry is an ingenious man and he works out an ingenious plan. He weaves lies, truths, and half-truths into a story that might help him survive. But bit by bit the noose still tightens. Smart, sardonic, and compulsively readable, here is the story of a man whose cunning allows him to evade the consequences of his every action, even when he's standing on the edge of the abyss"-- Provided by publisher. Devout, moralizing Grace lives with her sisters and upright parents in 1970s Idaho, with the family showing only the expected little cracks until Grace returns home from a missionary trip to Mexico and announces that she is pregnant with a child she claims to be God's. She's promptly sent with sister Jory to live on the town's border, where they create their own family while awaiting the momentous birth. When a writer becomes obsessed with a photograph of a young girl in Eastern Europe fleeing a fiery explosion, her husband enlists a group of artist friends to bring the girl to the United States. A collection of stories that delve deeply into love, loss, the decisions we make for ourselves, and the decisions we make for others. In post-Katrina Louisiana, a young man and his new girlfriend search for the mother of his son. In Palo Alto, a programmer whose wife has a rare disease finds solace in a digital simulacrum of the recently assassinated President. In contemporary Berlin, a former Stasi agent ponders his past. A woman with cancer rages against the idea of her family without her. In the title story, Johnson returns to his signature subject of North Korea, depicting two defectors from Pyongyang trying to adapt to their new lives in Seoul, while one cannot forget the woman he left behind. A U.S. Air Force test pilot passes up the chance to become an astronaut after his wife gets pregnant against all odds, and as fatherhood consumes him, a sudden tragedy puts his instincts as a father and as a pilot to the test. From the bestselling master of the high-voltage international thriller comes a must-read for every fan of vintage Ludlum. A scientist receives an offer he can't refuse--two million dollars for a geological survey of Jamaica's dark interior. But when British Intelligence gets wind of his mission, they let him in on a little secret--the last survey team never came back. Alex McAuliff has received an offer he can't refuse: two million dollars for a geological survey of Jamaica's dark interior. All Dunstone, Limited, requires is his time, his expertise, and his absolute secrecy. No one--not even McAuliff's handpicked team--can know of Dunstone's involvement. But British Intelligence is aware of the deal and they've let Alex in on a secret of their own: the last survey team Dunstone dispatched to Jamaica vanished without a trace. Now it's too late to turn back. Alex already knows about Dunstone...which means he knows too much. From the moment he lands in Jamaica, Alex is a marked man. But who wants him dead? Dunstone? A rival company? Or British Intelligence? Here in an island paradise where even a beautiful woman might be a spy, every move could be his last, and his only clue to survival is a single mysterious word: Halidon. "When we first meet U., the narrator of Satin Island, he is sitting in the airport at Turin, caught in a delay caused by a rogue airplane. Like everyone else in the waiting area, he is sifting through airport pages on his laptop, and then through news sites, social pages, corridors of trivia...until he happens to stumble on information about an image on a famous shroud in Turin. The image itself isn't even visible on the shroud; it only emerged when some amateur photographer looked at the negative of a shot he'd taken and saw the figure--Christ's body supine after crucifixion. Only in the negative: the negative became a positive. A few decades later when the shroud was radiocarbon dated, it turned out to come from no later than the mid-thirteenth century. But that didn't trouble the believers. Things like that never do. A "corporate ethnographer," U. is tasked with writing the Great Report. Yet at every turn, U. finds himself overwhelmed by the ubiquity of data, lost in a buffer zone and wandering through a crowd of apparitions. Meanwhile, Madison, the woman he is seeing, becomes increasingly elusive, much like the particulars in the case of the recent, highly-publicized parachutist's death, with which U. is obsessed. He also develops a perverse interest in oil spills, spending great amounts of time watching loops of clean up videos. As U. begins to wonder if perhaps the Great Report will remain a shapeless, oozing plasma, his senses are reawakened by an ominous dream of an apocalyptic cityscape. Satin Island is a novel that captures the way we experience the world today, our efforts to find meaning, to stay awake, and discern the narratives we think of as our lives"-- Provided by publisher. Surviving an illness that kept her hospitalized for months, Stella Sweeney discovers that a successful book has been published about her case that compels her to relocate to New York and pursue a career as a self-help memoirist. "Shirley Jackson is one of the most important American writers of the last hundred years. Since her death in 1965, her place in the landscape of twentieth-century fiction has grown only more exalted. As we approach the centenary of her birth comes this astonishing compilation of fifty-six pieces--more than forty of which have never been published before. Two of Jackson's children co-edited this volume, culling through the vast archives of their mother's papers at the Library of Congress, selecting only the very best for inclusion"--Page [2] of cover. This is about more than geographical location of Maine, and certainly is not a picture postcard of the coastal state. Some characters have arrived by accident, others are trying to get out. The collection opens, closes, and is interlaced with stories that focus on Jocelyn, a wryly disaffected teenager living with her aunt and uncle while attending summer school. As in life, the narratives of other characters interrupt Jocelyn's, sometimes challenging, sometimes embellishing her view.	http://jefferson.lib.co.us/books-movies-music/new-arrivals/fiction?page=1&qt-tabbed_header_searchbox=1	dclm-gs1-084940000
0.018415	<urn:uuid:bb75580a-b85e-455e-8437-e3eda93d0a65>	en	0.867598	How can I find / look up my iPhone serial number? How can I find / look up my iPhone serial number? You can easily find your iPhone serial number (S/N), International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI) number, and identifier or ICCID. Follow these steps to get this information: If your iPhone is functioning properly: 1. Navigate to Settings -> General -> About 2. Scroll down 3. The Serial Number, IMEI and ICCID are listed along with other information. If your iPhone will not turn on or boot properly: Your serial number and IMEI are both printed on the barcode label that's affixed to your iPhone packaging. If you don't have your iPhone packaging: 1. Run iTunes on your computer 2. Hold down the Control key and on the menu bar of the Mac click iTunes -> About iTunes. For Windows click Help -> About iTunes. 3. When your iPhone serial number (S/N) and IMEI appear in the dialog box press the space bar to stop scrolling. Thanks for you good information this work There were times I lost the phone, sometimes my phone is stolen, once I managed to find the IMEI on the phone using the service: genuinely fine, keep up writing.	http://www.iphonefaq.org/archives/97925	dclm-gs1-085320000
0.081874	<urn:uuid:ce132c95-1d3c-47d4-abb0-47b542eef04d>	en	0.97039	In his UN speech, Russian President Vladimir Putin blames the United States. He centred on the theme of “a world where egotism reigns supreme”. He highlighted the United States’ ‘hubris’, which according to him, Washington controls in the unipolar world. He said post Cold War, the world became more dangerous because of the lack of balance of power between regions. He said: “You want to ask the people who created this situation: ‘Do you at least understand what you’ve done?’ But I fear that the question would just hang in the air, because after all, they have not turned their back on policies based on self-certainty, a sense of superiority and impunity.” Islamic State Is US’ Fault Putin blamed Middle East Chaos and the IS’ rise on the United States because it repeated the mistakes of the Soviet Union. When the Soviets tried to export their development model, it had utterly failed due to cultural nuances and territorial disadvantages. Many found it strange Putin would even highlight sovereignty when it had annexed Crimea from Ukraine with an undercover military operation. But Putin believes Russia’s actions were to safeguard Central Asia and former Soviet territories from the influences of the west. The Entire World Is Waiting For His Speech Russian media followed Putin everywhere as he gave his speech. One Russian channel devoted nine hours of programming to his speech. Many covered his landing in the United States. With increased activity of Muslim extremists all over the Middle East, Christianity is doomed in the Middle East. ISIS, the extremist militant group that took Mosul last June, has set it at the mercy of its blade. Christian homes are marked for death, with the extremists manipulating the water supply of the area. Their self-styled caliphate intends to conquer most of the Middle East with Iraq and Syria its first targets. It had executed Christians or had forced them to convert to Islam. Christians who are exiled hold no possessions and may be shot at the back after they are released. ISIS strategies include cutting off the water and food supply in most towns. Refugees escape in cars with numbers of 10 to 15 each vehicle. The towns they mark under their name as their property. Many Christians are afraid that their society will vanish in the Middle East. The different Christian doctrines, which include Assyrians, Chaldeans or Syriacs, are at risk of being phased out of the area. Should the governments of the world not take action, the Middle East will fall into the hands of Jihadists, who may precisely launch attacks against neighbours at any time. 27. May 2015 · Write a comment · Categories: News According to the Syrian Air Force, it has killed an approximate 140 members of the Islamic State after delivering air strikes against a military base held by the militant group north of Syria. Military sources believe that the raid on Tabqa Air Base in Raqqa had wounded dozens of Islamic State fighters. Huge numbers of Regime soldiers died defending the air base. Eventfully it had fallen to ISIS’ hands on August 2014. Meanwhile, worldwide concern over the Palmyra ruins of Syria could breathe as Syrian Antiquities Chief Maamoun Abdulkarim confirms the militants have not yet touched the world heritage site. Poland, assisting in the provision of welfare for refugees, aims to re-settle 60 Christian families from Syria. According to Polish Prime Minister Ewa Kopacz, they will start with 60 families and then a bigger number soon. The United Kingdom and Russia have agreed to begin talks to finally end the civil war in Syria and focus on containing the threat of ISIS. Both sides agreed that the Syrian Opposition is the key to easing the civil war and ultimately ending the rise of the Islamic State. The Shia Houthi rebels who had ousted President Abdrabbuh Mansour Hadi had seized Taiz, which is Yemen’s third largest city Getting closer to the southern port city of Aden, the United Nations had warned that the Houthi rebels could induce a civil war in the country. Hadi’s Foreign Minister Riad Yassin said that the Gulf Cooperation Council must intervene to stop the chaos consuming the country. He also asked the United Nations and GCC to establish a no-fly zone against the rebel warplanes who had bombed Aden over the weekend. The GCC and Sunni-controlled Saudi Arabia, alarmed at the development, said the Houthis were a proxy for their regional rival, Shia-majority Iran. Meanwhile, Saudi had said it could take steps to protect Hadi. Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal said that if the issue cannot be resolved peacefully Saudi will take action to secure the region from rebel aggression. “I don’t think any side could win a civil war. No side can win a civil war – the only way forward is negotiation, which implies concession from all sides, which implies also, a compromise.” US and UK forces are withdrawing their forces due to the situation. However, they have marked that Islamic State militants have made their presence known in Yemen. An IS affiliate had said that the IS used suicide attacks that left 29 dead in Lahj, north of Aden. After two Japanese nationals, Kenji Goto Jogo and Haruna Yukawa, had been named as the next executed in the name of Islamic State’s (IS) demands, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s diplomatic leadership is strongly questioned by analysts. According to’s Eric Johnston, the Japanese Prime Minister’s Middle East policies are being questioned. His own brand of personal diplomacy may spell doom or glory for the country. Johnston highlighted that the Japanese Prime Minister has a choice in supporting the United States and Arab countries that Japan is a valuable ally that could become an independent broker who retains its honesty in the international arena. Meanwhile, the IS is demanding that Japan pay $200 million be paid in total for the lives of the two Japanese nationals. In their latest video, “Jihadi John” had the two Japanese nationals on their knees and demanded that Japan pay $100m for each of the hostages within three days. “To the prime minister of Japan, although you are 8,500km from the Islamic State, you willingly have volunteered to take part in this crusade,” he says. In the Middle East, Abe said the lives of the two hostages were of “top priority”. However, he hasn’t made it clear if Japan would pay the ransom. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Russia will continue to support Syria in suppressing the Islamic State (IS) from invading the state. Moscow and Damascus agree that “terrorism” is the main threat to stability. Lavrov said the statement after his meeting with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moualem. Moualem had talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin. He has resolved to develop ties with Syria and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Meanwhile, US Special Operations freed eight hostages held by the Al-Qaeda militants in Yemen, according to a US Senior Official. The Official added that no American hostages were rescued. He did not elaborate on the report. According to Yemen officials, the operation began in a deserted area called Hagr al-Saiaar. Local tribes offer protection for al-Qaeda troops in the area near the Saudi border. US drone strikes continue to target suspected IS militants in Yemen and monitor battles between al-Qaeda and Shiite rebels. Drone strikes on Islamic State targets in Iraq and Syria hit 17 targets. Operation Inherent Resolve had destroyed four staging areas and six fighting positions. Islamic State units have been hit according to US central command. Meanwhile, allied forces destroyed vehicles and buildings with air strikes. Reluctantly, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan allowed 200 Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga fighters to join their Kobane Kurdish comrades to defend the strategic town. According to Kurdistan Presidential Chief of Staff Fuad Hussein, a small group of Peshmerga fighters will be in Kobane within days. Kobane has been locked between Islamic State (IS) fighters and Kobane Kurdish fighters who intend to defend the strategic town. If the IS conquers the town, it could easily establish its operations against Turkey, Iraq and Syria. However, Erdogan still considers the Kurds as “terrorists.” The Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is considered by Turkey, the US and NATO as a terrorist group. However, feeling the implications IS can bring to Turkey, he is left without a choice. Meanwhile, one out of 27 US air drops for the Kobane fighters have landed into the hands of the Islamic State. The Pentagon has verified a video showing the opening and dismantling of a supply drop revealing a cache of grenades and old and new small arms.US air strikes had destroyed other caches that had missed their landing spots. Erdogan also considers the supply drop as “wrong.” He said that in the long run, the PKK could use the US weaponry against Turkey in declaring their autonomy within the region. An al-Qaeda emir had called upon ISIS to stop the execution of Alan Henning, to whom the rival terrorist group said had “genuinely helped muslims” during his aid mission with an Islamic charity from the United Kingdom. The al-Qaeda, notorious for their September 11, 2001 attack in the United States, found that the execution of an innocent taxi-driver and aid volunteer was taking things too far. The emir, or local commander, of the Jahbat al-Nusra, an al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, had visited ISIS commanders in Iraq. According to a journalist who interviewed him, the emir said that ISIS’ actions were “wrong under Islamic law” and “counter-productive.” US film-maker and reporter from Syria Bilal Abdul Kareem said that any group of any influence, including the al-Qaeda, had appealed to ISIS to release Alan Henning since December of the previous year. Alan Henning was the only non-Muslim in the Islamic charity group from the United Kingdom. The organisation uses old ambulances to transport medical supplies to al-Dana. He was abducted last year. The al-Dana emir had talked to ISIS about releasing Henning a few days during his abduction, but he was removed from prison and never seen by the emir again. According to International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation in King’s College Professor Peter Neumann, the al-Qaeda and ISIS share similar roots. However, the al-Qaeda has strategies that will help them gain allies in the region, to which the ISIS are quickly losing theirs, including potential recruits, with consistent beheadings and senseless violent activities. 19. August 2014 · Write a comment · Categories: News · Tags: , , , US President Barack Obama had hailed the re-capture of the Mosul dam by Iraqi Kurds and the Iraq military as a major advance towards finding an end to the invasion of the Islamic State, formerly known as ISIS. The US military prioritises the safety of the dam on the Tigris River as it can endanger the American Embassy personnel in Baghdad. Providing air support and arms to assist the Kurdish Peshmerga forces fighting against the Islamic State, the joint efforts of Iraq, US and Kurdistan had made significant gains in northern Iraq. Meanwhile, Canada has offered $5million (£2.9m) in humanitarian aid and two military cargo planes to help ship weapons to the Peshmerga forces. The UK also announced its participation in the battle against ISIS. It has committed £13m for aid assistance and non-combat air support and surveillance. The ISIS are an al-Qaeda splinter group operating independently as they broke away from Syrian rebels fighting against the Syrian regime. These groups, hardened by battles in Syria, had taken over several Iraqi towns and imposed harsh Sharia law. They had executed defenceless soldiers and had exiled or executed Christians and Shiite Muslims in regions they invaded. Iraqi military and Kurdish Peshmerga had found the dam isolated upon arrival. However, teams did not enter at once as they anticipated proximity explosives had been planted around the entire area. Around 170 bombs had been dismantled around the dam so far. In the previous week, Kurdish Members of Party had withdrawn themselves from Iraq’s Central Government after Iraqi President Nouri Al-Maliki accused the Kurds of helping extremists for personal Reasons. Kurdistan’s Foreign Minister had asked Al-Maliki to step down from office and said that Iraq needed a new, more effective leadership. The United States Congress said that they viewed Al-Maliki’s policies as highly-sectarian, which drove the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, the militant group threatening Iraq’s government, to gain power and sympathy among Iraqis. Al-Maliki once accused the Kurds of “stealing” Iraq’s wealth. During the era of Saddam Hussein, Kurdistan had been excluded from the oil trade. Today, it has cut deals with Exxon Mobil, Shell and Chevron. Kurdistan has one of the nine largest oil reserves in the world. The feud between Iraq’s government and the semi-autonomous region of Kurdistan became worse because of this. Al-Maliki had called on the world to stop the possible division of Iraq as the Kurdish opposition and the Sunni militants continue to apply pressure against Iraq. Al-Maliki pointed out that division will also split people and resources. He also warned Middle Eastern Nations that the division of Iraq could spread towards their countries.	http://www.kurdmedya.com/	dclm-gs1-085340000
0.021819	<urn:uuid:4dc1048d-fbf9-4468-ac84-70df43f8965b>	en	0.987277	Amazing Story 2. Chapter 2 Rating 0.5/5 Word Count 557 Review this Chapter Hello little eggs, this is Madison. Currently, I do not know who to kill next...Anyways, here's the story: I did not know what to do next; no one was coming to our Friday night parties, and I was really getting mad. I thought that I had friends, but turns out, I do not have any friends. I am a hopeless, friendless loser and I shall never, ever, ever, ever, ever have a friend again. Life sucked. Life sucks, I kept telling myself. "I hate life," I said to random strangers I saw in the street. "So do I," they repeated back to me. At least I wasn't the only one who wanted to kill myself. From then on, whenever I went out on the street and told people that I hated life, and whenever they responded back saying that they hated life too, I decided to get their phone numbers so that I could call them. Why would I want to call them, you may be asking. Well, about a month later, I had around 300 phone numbers of people who hated life. I called them all up, and I told them about a death party that I was going to host, since apparently those Friday night parties weren't going so well. The death party was on May 23rd, the perfect day to die. I call it "Death Day," which makes sense, don't you think? Anyways, so, Death Day came, and I decorated my house in black, and I put up very discouraging signs up around my house saying, "You only had one life anyways" and things like that. It helped set the mood, so that anyone hesitant of killing themselves, would read the signs and be convinced to die. Almost everyone showed up and we came inside for a bit. We drank water which I dyed black, and we ate dogs. Not hot dogs, dogs. Alive dogs. I captured a few fat, juicy dogs the day before, so I had them ahead of time. Everyone enjoyed the delicious dogs, and we head out to go to the Death Place. I had been to the Death Place many time with Edward, and everytime I had tried to seriously injure him, because apparently "vampires can only die by werewolves." As we arrived, everyone was cheering (probably the last time they would ever be happy). We approached the cliff very fast. Some people even ran, because they were so excited, and they fell off the edge before we could do the ceremony. The ceremony was just when I spoke to them about how it was such a good thing that we were doing this, because we were making a difference in the world, because no one liked us anyways. I counted down, ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one... We jumped. Everyone. No one chickened out. As I watched the ground slowly approach me, I randomly thought about how much I hated those Cullens'. The ground came faster and faster, and eventually, we hit it. We hit is so hard. I landed on the ground. I saw my arms five feet away from me. My leg was right next to me, but it was glistening in the sun. I picked up my leg, and found a computer chip. I took the computer chip out of my leg, and I realized something. I'm not real.	http://www.twilightarchives.com/read/2669/2	dclm-gs1-085570000
0.176334	<urn:uuid:5028a992-5413-4d01-8546-283b71e1ce74>	en	0.876895	ECC and Digital Postage Marks - Part 2 PDF Print E-mail Elliptic Curve Pintsov Vanstone Signatures This issue of Code and Cipher focuses on Elliptic Curve Cryptography applied to address specific industry needs. The use of ECC-based signature schemes in the postal industry is not new. Because the size of the digital signature affects the overall size of the DPM, ECC-based signatures provide an extremely small, yet highly secure option. In the “Performance Criteria for Information-based Indicia and Security Architecture for Open IBI Postage Evidencing Systems” (2001), the USPS defines support for the use of ECDSA to generate the digital signatures for DPM. A typical ECDSA signature is a 40 byte appendix added to a signed message. By comparison, the cryptographic overhead of an equivalent DPM using RSA would add 128 bytes. As shown in figure 1, this would take up most of the space on the envelope on a small piece of mail, so a small signature becomes very important. An even smaller alternative is the Elliptic Curve Pintsov Vanstone Signature (ECPVS) scheme. ECPVS is a signature scheme that provides partial message recovery. At the same security level and elliptic curve, an ECPVS signature can add as little as 20 bytes to the original message length, which is a six times smaller than RSA and makes ECPVS more efficient. ECPVS is also unique because all or part of the message can be embedded in and recovered from the signature. This partial message recovery makes ECPVS ideal for use with digital postal marks. Certain data elements, such as the date and the postage amount, are able to be read by humans, while other data elements, such as the address of the sender or a confirmation of the recipient’s address, are restricted to being read only by machines. Furthermore, if the terminal's signature verification key is secret, rather than public, then the hidden part of the message is difficult to obtain, even by machine. Another feature specific to ECPVS is the ability to adjust the level of security, depending on the requirements. In ECPVS, the length of the recovered part of the message is not tied to any other parameters of the scheme. Redundancy, the duplication added to an encrypted message, is one of these parameters. The amount of redundancy in a message determines the level of security. Only ECPVS enables tradeoffs between security level and bandwidth availability: if very short signatures are required due to bandwidth constraints, the amount of redundancy added by padding can be lowered, thereby decreasing the size of the signature component e, with a controlled impact on the security offered by the scheme. How ECPVS works Using ECPVS, a plain text message (PD) is essentially split into two parts: parts C and V. Part C represents data elements that require confidentiality protection, such as the sender information, value of a serial piece count, or the value of the ascending register. These can be recovered during the verification process from the signature and allow for proof of deposit and mail tracing. Part V contains data elements presented in the plaintext within the DPM, such as the date, the sender’s and recipient’s postal codes, or the amount of the postage. Both C and V are signed. The ECPVS uses a fixed elliptic curve with a generator G of order n. Terminal A has public key QA and identity A. To generate a signature, the mailer terminal A begins by generating a random positive integer k < n. The terminal then takes the mailing information and performs a number of computations in order to encrypt the message. First, it calculates a point R on the curve (R = kG), to be used as a key for the transformation of C. This elliptic curve point R is then used in a bijective transformation (TR)— typically a symmetric encryption algorithm—to destroy any algebraic structure C might have, with the result being e. The secrecy of e is based on the difficulty of the discrete log problem and on the randomness of k. The variable d is calculated using a hash function H, the encrypted message part e, and the identity of the mailer’s terminal IA, as follows: d = H (e \|\| I A \|\| V). Finally, s (the other part of the signature pair), is calculated using d, k, and a, which is the private key of the terminal A as follows: s= a d + k (mod n). The signature pair (s, e) is then put into the DPM together with the portion V of the plain text PD. To verify the DPM of an incoming mail piece, a postage verifier on the other end of the postal process parses the DPM into IA, the signature (s,e), and the verification data V. Using these and the public key of terminal A, the postage verifier recovers C and subjects it to a redundancy test. If the redundancy check fails, the DPM is rejected; if the redundancy check passes, the plaintext message is recovered. ECPVS in the Real World Pitney Bowes, a global provider of informed mail and messaging management, introduced digital mailing systems in 2002 that use ECPVS to provide security for the digital postage marks. ECPVS is also being adopted into a number of standards, including I EEE P1363a, ANSI X9.92, and ISO 9796-3. The relative benefits of ECPVS (size, flexibility and efficiency) also make it ideal for use in applications beyond the postal service such as cheque imaging and verification, or to sign short 1-byte messages (i.e. yes/no, buy/hold/sell, etc.) For more information For more information about ECPVS, Certicom has posted two white papers. Postal Revenue Collection in the Digital Age (PDF), and Formal Security Proofs for a Signature Scheme with Partial Message Recovery (PDF). Payday Advance In OrlandoPayday Loans IndianaViagra 100mgPayday Loans in Taylor ArizonaGoogleNews	https://www.certicom.com/index.php/ecc-and-digital-postage-marks-part-2	dclm-gs1-085700000
0.042608	<urn:uuid:f86301e3-dc6a-46ee-802e-d70bbfa2919e>	en	0.979195	Skip to main content About your Search callum. good morning to you. good morning everybody at home. first lady michelle obama headlines the democratic national convention last night. it was a big night for her. she stood in front of a crowd of faithfuls and basically said that the president needs another four years to finish the job. >> i see the concern in his eyes and i hear the determination in his voice as he tells me, you won't believe what these folks are going through, michelle. it's not right. we've got to keep working to fix this. we have so much more to do. [cheers and applause] [shouting]. bill: so already now we have reaction from the romney team saying in part, quote on the first night of president obama's convention not a single speaker uttered the words americans are better off now than they were four years ago. our country deserves real solutions an a plan to turn our economy around, end quote. bob cusack, managing editor of "the hill." let's get to romney's comment first. the speech last night, how did it play? >> bill i was in the arena. it played very well. brought down the house t was genuine. at the same time ve , michelle obama making her way to the stage to check things out. she will be the big speaker for democrats tomorrow night. some thought she could be getting eclipses by bill clinton but that is neither here or there. officially, this convention has not kicked off. but it does so tomorrow in light of the labor day holiday, but labor will be a big issue not only for michelle obama but her husband. also, the issue of jobs. today is a market holiday, the last big holiday before everyone goes back-to-school and for a lot of people they recognize this time of the year as the start of a new year. psyche psychologically i can see that. and ahead of the national association of manufacturers. jay, that is the issue, right? labor and jobs and progress. >>guest: all about jobs. everyone is talking about jobs and manufacturing. when i talk to manufacturers from around the country they express a lost concern and uncertainty about the future, the abyss we are ready to face at the end end of this year causes great concern both this administration and previous administration. >>neil: you do not take sides. such as fist lady michelle obama and former president bill clinton. challenger will spend the week preparing for debates with president obama that of course is governor romney. those debates are scheduled for it. back to you. >> thank you so much kelly. it is time to brew on this at the as the democratic national convention gets underway the debate centering on one question. are you bert oe better off toda you were four years ago? >> we are getter off in the sense that when this president took office the quarter before he took office was the worst quarter this country had eek nomcally since the great depression and we are in a different place 29 straight months of job growth, 4.5 million private sector jobs. are we where we need to be? no. for three-days they never offered anybody a plausible alternative. he spoke 45 minutes and never offered any real ideas for how to move the economy forward for how to lift the middle class and i think his convention was a terrible failure. >> romney campaign issuing this statement in response to those comments quote on the same day the obama campaign conc michelle obama and distinguished speakers cor cory booker, jimmy carter, charlie crist and white house chief of staff rahm emanuel and kathleen seb bell why yous sebe the queen city in the spotlight. they say as much as $200 million will be pumped into the economy here at a time when you need it. 7 weeks worth of work putting in high-tech screens so the convention bb streamed live over the internet. it will be translated into spanish. all those who have an interest in what the democrats have to say here in charlotte will be able to follow it live almost anyway they want. >> world will be able to see one of the great gems of the city. i know it is gearing up in another way, security. >> that is absolutely correct. we have seen tightening up of security. we have seen police on the beat barricades going up and no parking signs as well. people have been asked to be patient recognizing that with such a high profile vip event coming into the city it will take a little longer to get around. we are guaranteed there are unseen security measures as well. we are told federal state and local law e . this has huge political implications as it comes after first lady michelle obama speaks to the dnc. there is a huge economic warning signal being made here. number one, $16 trillion worth of debt which means we owe more than our economy produces in any one year. our debt is bigger than our economy. secondly, we're now going to be paying close to $10 billion a week in interest alone. about a half trillion a year. 10 billion a week. up from nine billion last year. and about a quarter of that interest will be paid to foreigners. it will go out of the country. japan, china, britain, they're the three major holders of our debt. they all get about a quarter of all of this interest that is flowing and it will flow out of the country. so political impact, and a big economic danger signal too, martha. martha: we know, it was a huge focus of the rnc last week in tampa. big debt clock that loomed over the proceedings there. you simply don't hear much though about the debt from president obama. do you expect we'll hear hear anything about it at all this week? >> very little because it is a big of fell flat on the heels of michelle obama's speech but, of course, david axelrod and campaign aides have done the same thing saying they didn't think they were going to get much of a bounce out of the convention anyway. on the heels of these two conventions, we are nowhere different than where we were before the convention, very even going into the debates. we'll have a very level playing field on october 3rd. >> heather: president obama was given a heads-up as to what this jobs report would be prior to his speech which is normal. he knew it was coming. he is campaigning today in florida, a state with the highest elderly population and unemployment rate of 8.8%. there is four key battleground states where the unemployment elevated above the national average. we mentioned florida, in nevada, 12%, north carolina, where they had the dnc. 9.9%. michigan, 9%. 735 delegates up for grabs among those states. how does the obama campaign win them over with job reports like friday's? >> what they are doing is running a very specific state by state campaign. so when you talk about michigan, presiden -z and beyonce. michelle was hoping beyoncÉ will sing all the single ladies why obama was worried biden would that same fund raiser. president obama said beyonce is the best role model. and later on michelle that was the couch was the best place for obama to sleep . ♪ ♪ no i don't understand. ♪ ♪ ♪ >> steve: the post office can't balance the books. increase the number of sales pitches. armed officers dropping from chappers and taking terrorist in custody it was not real. it was a nypd drill. college students enrolled in the nypd cadet core were the hostages. only a drill. >> gretchen: thank you, brian. democrats are claiming that president obama is the best candidate for women voters? >> president obama has walked with america's women and helped women in this country fight for equal pay, for equal work. and he believes that women are more than capable of making our own choices about our bodies and our health care. that's what my husband stands for. >> so they claim republicans are waging a war on women. whoo do women actually think? joining me co-author of the book. liberty, no war on women. sabrina schaffer. >> thanks for having me. >> gretchen: it seems they were trying to fi coordinated. >> steve: michelle, clearly romney's statement was devastating to the president of the united states where he said, you know, you can't have the embassy sending out these apology notes because it was devastating to obama because now the main stream media is screaming bloody murder. >> yeah, that's right. and just to take this more bigger picture, you've got this petty, partisan, sniping left dog media and they cannot see the bigger picture here. and provide the proper context in reporting on what's going on in the middle east now. here they are all fixated on terry jones, they're falling for the propaganda of these islamic imperialists when it has nothing to do with this obscure internet video, clips of which have been floating around since june. the providence of which is still under question. and they report it anyway as if that's what's really going on here when there is a larger pretext going on and manufacturing. the fact that they still call these protests when these are violent attacks that have been happening. >> brian: when the coptic christians were having their chur	http://archive.org/details/tv?time=201209&q=michelle%20obama&fq=topic:%22london%22&fq=channel:%22FOXNEWS%22	dclm-gs1-085840000
0.023043	<urn:uuid:e14ea3eb-37a0-47e4-96fa-41594ab51029>	en	0.962724	Skip to main content About your Search WFDC (Univision) 1 English 12 un estudiante indocumentado "trabajamos muy duro en la escuela y el no puede trabajar, se ha graduado de negocio dos titulos de negocio." brian guitierrez/estudiante indocumentado "quiero sacar mi mba, masters en bussiness administracion, quiero ayudar a la comunidad y ayudar a mi familia y quiero vivir mi vida." muchos de ellos estan a la espera de sus documentos gracias a la accion diferida que otorgo el presidente pero dicen que no les resuelve el problema. veronica gomez/estudiante indocumentada "queremos el dream act, paso el deferred action pero esto es solo por dos anos, necesitamos algo mas permanente queremos que nuestros padres, nuestros tios que la gente que no esta elegible para el dream act que tambien tengan una chance..." claudia uceda/washington, d.c. el lunes estos jovenes iran al congreso para hablar con congresistas y entregarles mas de 60 mil firmas, en washington claudia uceda univision." ... el ... el servicio de inmigracion y aduanas recuerda a las personas afectadas por el huracan sandy, sobre ciertos beneficios o de socorro que estan disponibles par live from senator john mccain and lindsay graham on this show yesterday. >> for them to go after the u.n. ambassador who had nothing to do with benghazi, and was simply making a presentation based on intelligence that she had received and to besmirch her reputation is outrageous. >> and in a moment that felt much more 2008 than 2012, senator john mccain took to the senate floor telling the president that he's responsible for benghazi. the senator doubling down on the "today show" this morning. >> i'm not taking anybody on. we owe it to their families. we owe to its to other americans. for the president of the united states for two weeks to deny that that was the case is a coverup or incompetence. either one of the two. >> joining me now is capitol hill correspondent kelly o'donnell. what are you hearing about the exact focus of the meeting? some are beginning certain briefings yesterday. >> well, thomas, there's an effort here to try to separate out what has been a complicated and troubling society of facts with respect to what happened with general petraeus and leaving the cia. all of t that the president might be nominating susan rice, our u.n. ambassador to be his next secretary of state. and the most unlikely love couple of all in d.c., john mccain and lindsey graham got together to -- well, to say a lot of ignorant stuff. let's begin with john mccain's clip if we can. dan, this is john mccain on -- john mccain by the way who voted to approve condoleezza rice as secretary of state. talking about susan rice. here's the clip. >> susan rice should have known better and if she didn't know better, she's not qualified. she should have known better. i would do everything in my power to block her from being the united states secretary of state. she has proven that she either doesn't understand or she is not willing to accept evidence on its face. >> john: that was the man who thought sarah palin was qualified to be president talking about someone who doesn't understand. now not to be outdone senator lindsey graham, the most interesting of all southern republicans i would say came out a few hours later and t for u.n. ambassador then was a recess appointee. no way the president will nominate a secretary of state as a recess appointee. you cannot with credible lead diplomacy over the world. we'll have a debate tomorrow. there is a debate in the general assembly of the united nations on palestinian statehood. it is symbolic but now france is going along with the rest of the general assembly, the united states and israel and a few others will probably stand alone against this gesture considered a very important move by the sort of weakened fatah branch of the palestinians after what happened with gaza and hamas and susan rice has to represent the united states. and there's got to be a lot of weakening of her position. >> wow, a lot going on. obviously the fiscal cliff as well. the president is sitting down with a dozen chief executeties today to talk about this. some of them were prominent supporters of mitt romney. and then the president is going to try and sell his budget plan going to a toy factory. speaking of -- >> that's where i'd go. >> speaking of the budget, coming up, former treasurer 'll have to stay tuned for john kerry. and also, u.n. ambassador susan rice, who got into some trouble over libya and with what happened with libya. that's also in question. those are the two, top candidates. but we have to wait and see how the issues play out. >> in the meantime, the libya issue has been overhanging this election. allegations of a, quote, massive cover-up, by senator john mccain, about this administration's real refusal to put to rest this issue, before voting day. >> they didn't want to talk about it. everybody tried to pin them down on that. they did not want to talk about it. i think a lot of those questions will probably get cleared up with an investigation that's now going on. and there will probably be hearings, as well. >> and iran's huge. what we're going to do to that country and how we're going to handle that ongoing threat. >> iran is huge. you heard the israelis say there's only a small amount of time, maybe several months, before they could strike iran. i think president obama, what you see now, is president obama doing everything he can to avoid war there. >> talked about how the support of the latino community gave to president obama was really a un precedented. we would have to go back to 1996 to see that kind of strong support for one party. if we think back to 1996, what was going on was prop 187 in california, which so alienated latinos and drove them to the democratic party. president clinton was against prop 187. when latinos organized and participated in the process, they supported the democratic candidate. i think that there is -- unless the republican party comprehensively looks at what the latino community -- disavows such positions as the arizona immigration law or alabama, laws supporting things -- issues such as self-deportation -- self-deportation is a great example of the volumes and principles -- of the american values and principles we were talking about. the idea that we would make the life of an individual and family so miserable that the person would, on his or her own, decide to remove themselves from the country where they are at, where they have found refuge. that is not american values. that is heartless and cruel. th to turkey, lebanon and jordan. the u.n. the number of people needing help could hit 400 million by the independent of the year -- by the end of the year. >>> secretary of state, hillary clinton, talked about chris stevens last night in washington. >> chris stevens was an inspiration to all who served with him and knew him during his life. >> chris stevens was post hume mewously awarded -- post hume muously -- post homoucsly awarded -- posthomously awarded and there is his sister accepting it for him right there. >>> a husband and wife rushed to the hospital. thousand their car was smashed in the east bay. >>> welcome back. amazon is selling wine in washington, d.c. and 12 states including right here in california. amazon has more than 1,000 waynes available. they range in price from less than ten bucks a bottle to more than 100. shipping will cost $10 for up to six bottles. >>> priceline has negotiated a deal. it's a big one, for itself. the company will buy kayak software corporation for $1.8 billion. you will be able to compare prices on hundreds of different sites. the deal s . host: here is an interesting article. if all or on twitter says, what about the u.n. watchers that have been followed with threats of arrest? who are they and what are they here? -- why are they here? guest: they have come to elections in the last 20 years and moderate them. to be clear in terms of what they actually do the polls now, they are not trying to intervene in anything that is going on. they are observers. they are watching what is happening. they are taking notes. i actually got to see their observer form on saturday. at the end of the election, they come up with a report to talk about how the election went, how the system operated. it is something that happens all over the world. my view, it is really bad form for the attorney-general from texas, and also the secretary of state from iowa, who basically say we will arrest these observers as they come out and see our with elections. the truth of the matter is, we should be transparent about this process and willing to let people see how our elections run. host: from fox news, greta van susteren said, the election is none of th 149. thes in a -- nasdaq is up and s&p un11 will let's bring you up to date-- >>> let's bring you up to date on other top stories. president obama is in chicago watching election results from there. and mitt romney is making two campaign stops in ojaio and pennsylvania -- ohio and pennsylvania before heading to boston where his headquarters is based. this morning governor jerry brown cast his ballot in favor of prop 30. his tax plan to fund education. now if it is passed it would temporarily increase the sales tax and increase income tax on people who earn more than 250,000 dollars a year. if rejected, billions of dollars in trigger cuts would take effect. >>> and residents throughout the bay area are getting their i voted stickers this morning a lot them are dropping off their ballots others are waiting in line. ktvu janine de la vega is in a polling location in san jose. good morning. >> reporter: good morning. as people head to work they are stopping here at the registrar's office. we have seen car after car come through the parking lot to drop off their ballot here to election wo was un-american. there are a lot of people in ohio that think it was very much an american, pro-american vote and they're going to reward brown for that >> let's go back to our ohio line. jim is an independent. you're on with congressman tim ryan. >> good morning, congressman ryan. i was raised in akron, left goodyear to teach in 1976. now i live in stark county and i drive a jeep and i'm a supporter of senator brown and our president. and i met you at an sb-5 rally back last year. i was very sorry, of course john boccieri, who i think you know pretty well, is no longer serving us but i hope he'll be back. in line with that, the redistricting issue too in ohio. i wish yud speak a little bit to the pathology of how these districts are being gerrymandered and -- specifically in -- an issue two in ohio. >> we're supporting issue two, i'm supporting issue two which creates a citizen panel to redraw the congressional districts and the legislative districts. >> is that on the ballot as well? >> it's on the ballot as well. it takes the pen out of the hands of politicians, both democrat	http://archive.org/details/tv?time=201211&q=un&fq=topic:%22d.c.%22&fq=topic:%22mitt+romney%22	dclm-gs1-085850000
0.043789	<urn:uuid:2ab69a3e-e135-45e0-93bc-39f13bda2eec>	en	0.934634	Sign up × I want remote desktop access to a Windows 7 Home Premium machine, but Home Premium does not have RDP server support. What are my options to set up a VNC server on Windows for best remote desktop experience from Ubuntu? share\|improve this question 2 Answers 2 up vote 2 down vote accepted There are many different types of VNC available for Windows. Your best bet is to look for ones that work on all O/S's and use that one. The two I can think of off the top of my head are TightVNC and RealVNC. Give those a try and see what happens. RealVNC: TightVNC: Personally I preferred using UltraVNC (back when Windows was my default system), however I had issues with it a few years back when I was slowly starting to make Ubuntu my default system... It didn't like me trying to access it from Ubuntu back then. Not sure if this is still the case, but you could give that a go too. share\|improve this answer I am reviewing this as part of askubuntu clean up. I would add another option, FreeNX. FreeNX is the (Linux) open source server/client for the NX server Install the NX server on windows, use the FreeNX client on Ubuntu. FreeNX has the advantages of 1. Much better performance. 2. Increased security (NX connections are encrypted). share\|improve this answer Your Answer	http://askubuntu.com/questions/62734/vnc-with-windows-7	dclm-gs1-085980000
0.770266	<urn:uuid:a224dc77-ed38-4e10-a136-0c490f91b4d3>	en	0.959975	How to survive Tokyo's subway sandwich Story highlights • 24 million passengers use the Tokyo rail and subway network every day • Rush hour periods can be overwhelming and exhausting experiences for the uninitiated • CNN speaks to freelance writer and Tokyo resident, Sandra Barron on how to traverse the Tokyo subway Japan is known the world over for its supreme train network. In the capital Tokyo, nearly half of all commuters travel by train, heavily outweighing other modes of transport like cycling, buses and private transport. Of the 48% of people who use the public rail network, 22% use the city's vast subway network. Sandra Barron is an American freelance writer who has lived in Tokyo for the last five years. Having spent the previous 10 years in New York, she is a seasoned subway rider. But nothing could have prepared her for the congested world of the Tokyo subway. Subway sandwich "The peak rush hour is really unbelievable. I've only been a few times and I've really made an effort to avoid it ever since because it is really crowded. It's like a cattle cart," Barron told CNN. "It's just bodies squished as tightly as you can be into a small space. You can see people whose feet aren't touching the ground sometimes because they are wedged in so tightly," she laughs. Barron recalls a subway journey early into her stay in Tokyo. "It was just streamed with people ... I basically couldn't get on the first couple trains with my bag. I finally got on and if you aren't paying attention and you are on the wrong side of the train, you might not be able to get out." 'Pushy' staff On both the rail and subway lines, train operators employ "oshiya" (or "pushers"). Barron says: "It's funny because "pusher" sounds really aggressive but they wear uniforms, white gloves and they have hats. It's like if you had a big laundry basket that overflows and you have to push the clothes down to close the lid. That's what they do. High-tech rail maintains traditions High-tech rail maintains traditions High-tech rail maintains traditions High-tech rail maintains traditions 02:48 Rail safety paramount in quake-hit Japan Rail safety paramount in quake-hit Japan Rail safety paramount in quake-hit Japan Rail safety paramount in quake-hit Japan 02:36 How efficient is Japanese rail? How efficient is Japanese rail? How efficient is Japanese rail? How efficient is Japanese rail? 03:20 Tokyo's seven minute miracle Tokyo's seven minute miracle Tokyo's seven minute miracle Tokyo's seven minute miracle 02:20 Infographic: The railway capital of the world "They make sure everybody gets in and doesn't get caught in the doors." The subway line operators have also introduced women-only carriages to help women commute more safely through the city. The designated train cars are usually recognizable by signs in the carriage and on the platform and were brought in to combat "chikan" ("groping"). Subway snoozers Another familiar sight on the Tokyo subway is sleeping commuters. "A lot of people have a long commute -- an hour, two hours. Also, a lot of people stay out late drinking and they start early and have long hours at work," she says. "There is a tolerance that if the person next to you falls asleep and their head kind of lands on your shoulder, people just put up with it. That happens a lot," she adds. "People don't like it, they don't cuddle with them or anything but it's kind of accepted that that happens." Watch: Car vs. Train race to Tokyo The Tokyo subway ends its daily service between midnight and one o'clock, depending on the line. "Oh God! You get a mad dash and all the conductors are platform attendants with megaphones reminding people: 'This is the last train, it is leaving now' ... It's literally like a wave of people running for the train," says Barron. For those unfortunate few that either miss their last train or fall asleep on the platform, there are a few options to pass the time before the first train begins in the early hours. "They can stay at a capsule hotel, there are the manga cafes that are like internet cafes but you can stay the night in a little cubical," Barron says. "People sometimes go to fast food restaurants and wait it out because things start running again about 4.30 in the morning." When asked which subway network she prefers -- Tokyo or New York -- Barron can't quite decide. "Compared to New York, [Tokyo] is really efficient, really orderly, really clean ... Gosh, it's like which of your children do you love more." More: Japan rail quiz -- How will you fare? Barron's top tips for stress-free subway rides 1. Buy a Suica card A prepaid travel card that allows you to touch in and out at the stations. You can buy paper tickets but prepaid cards are easier and less time consuming. 2. Pay attention to your exit Train stations can be huge terminals covering large areas of the local suburb with overwhelming crowds. Make sure you know where you are trying to get before you arrive at the station and keep an eye on the signs. 3. Follow the charts Barron points out that each station has signs on the platform showing you which car you should ride depending on connecting lines. Use these to make your journey easier without missing your stop. 4. Be aware of your surroundings Consider how people are acting and behave accordingly. Remember you don't have to be the noisy foreigner. 5. Use an app or website Barron suggests Hyperdia or Jorudan as a good route finder.	http://edition.cnn.com/2012/10/26/world/asia/tokyo-travel-subway/index.html	dclm-gs1-086210000
0.42388	<urn:uuid:b97450f3-d0b5-4c6a-86f4-1a6f580b1ca0>	en	0.784125	text-icu- Bindings to the ICU library Commonly used functions for Unicode, implemented as bindings to the International Components for Unicode (ICU) libraries. This module contains only the most commonly used types and functions. Other modules in this package expose richer interfaces. Data representation The Haskell Text type is implemented as an array in the Haskell heap. This means that its location is not pinned; it may be copied during a garbage collection pass. ICU, on the other hand, works with strings that are allocated in the normal system heap and have a fixed address. To accommodate this need, these bindings use the functions from Data.Text.Foreign to copy data between the Haskell heap and the system heap. The copied strings are still managed automatically, but the need to duplicate data does add some performance and memory overhead. data LocaleName Source The name of a locale. The root locale. For a description of resource bundles and the root resource, see http://userguide.icu-project.org/locale/resources. Locale String A specific locale. The program's current locale. Boundary analysis Text boundary analysis is the process of locating linguistic boundaries while formatting and handling text. Examples of this process include: • Locating appropriate points to word-wrap text to fit within specific margins while displaying or printing. • Counting characters, words, sentences, or paragraphs. • Making a list of the unique words in a document. • Figuring out if a given range of text contains only whole words. • Capitalizing the first letter of each word. • Locating a particular unit of the text (For example, finding the third word in the document). The Breaker type was designed to support these kinds of tasks. For the impure boundary analysis API (which is richer, but less easy to use than the pure API), see the Data.Text.ICU.Break module. The impure API supports some uses that may be less efficient via the pure API, including: • Locating the beginning of a word that the user has selected. • Determining how far to move the text cursor when the user hits an arrow key (Some characters require more than one position in the text store and some characters in the text store do not display at all). data Breaker a Source A boundary analyser. data Break a Source A break in a string. Eq a => Eq (Break a) Show a => Show (Break a) brkPrefix :: Break a -> TextSource Prefix of the current break. brkBreak :: Break a -> TextSource Text of the current break. brkSuffix :: Break a -> TextSource Suffix of the current break. brkStatus :: Break a -> aSource Status of the current break (only meaningful if Line or Word). data Line Source Line break status. A soft line break is a position at which a line break is acceptable, but not required. data Word Source Word break status. A "word" that does not fit into another category. Includes spaces and most punctuation. A word that appears to be a number. A word containing letters, excluding hiragana, katakana or ideographic characters. A word containing kana characters. A word containing ideographic characters. breakCharacter :: LocaleName -> Breaker ()Source Break a string on character boundaries. Character boundary analysis identifies the boundaries of Extended Grapheme Clusters, which are groupings of codepoints that should be treated as character-like units for many text operations. Please see Unicode Standard Annex #29, Unicode Text Segmentation, http://www.unicode.org/reports/tr29/ for additional information on grapheme clusters and guidelines on their use. breakLine :: LocaleName -> Breaker LineSource Break a string on line boundaries. Line boundary analysis determines where a text string can be broken when line wrapping. The mechanism correctly handles punctuation and hyphenated words. breakSentence :: LocaleName -> Breaker ()Source Break a string on sentence boundaries. Sentence boundary analysis allows selection with correct interpretation of periods within numbers and abbreviations, and trailing punctuation marks such as quotation marks and parentheses. breakWord :: LocaleName -> Breaker WordSource Break a string on word boundaries. Word boundary analysis is used by search and replace functions, as well as within text editing applications that allow the user to select words with a double click. Word selection provides correct interpretation of punctuation marks within and following words. Characters that are not part of a word, such as symbols or punctuation marks, have word breaks on both sides. breaks :: Breaker a -> Text -> [Break a]Source Return a list of all breaks in a string, from left to right. breaksRight :: Breaker a -> Text -> [Break a]Source Return a list of all breaks in a string, from right to left. Case mapping :: Bool Whether to include or exclude mappings for dotted and dotless I and i that are marked with I in CaseFolding.txt. -> Text -> Text Case-fold the characters in a string. Case folding is locale independent and not context sensitive, but there is an option for treating the letter I specially for Turkic languages. The result may be longer or shorter than the original. toLower :: LocaleName -> Text -> TextSource Lowercase the characters in a string. Casing is locale dependent and context sensitive. The result may be longer or shorter than the original. toUpper :: LocaleName -> Text -> TextSource Uppercase the characters in a string. data CharIterator Source A type that supports efficient iteration over Unicode characters. As an example of where this may be useful, a function using this type may be able to iterate over a UTF-8 ByteString directly, rather than first copying and converting it to an intermediate form. This type also allows e.g. comparison between Text and ByteString, with minimal overhead. fromString :: String -> CharIteratorSource Construct a CharIterator from a Unicode string. fromText :: Text -> CharIteratorSource Construct a CharIterator from a Unicode string. fromUtf8 :: ByteString -> CharIteratorSource Construct a CharIterator from a Unicode string encoded as a UTF-8 ByteString. data NormalizationMode Source Normalization modes. No decomposition/composition. Canonical decomposition. Compatibility decomposition. Canonical decomposition followed by canonical composition. Compatibility decomposition followed by canonical composition. "Fast C or D" form. normalize :: NormalizationMode -> Text -> TextSource Normalize a string according the specified normalization mode. quickCheck :: NormalizationMode -> Text -> Maybe BoolSource Perform an efficient check on a string, to quickly determine if the string is in a particular normalization form. A Nothing result indicates that a definite answer could not be determined quickly, and a more thorough check is required, e.g. with isNormalized. The user may have to convert the string to its normalized form and compare the results. A result of Just True or Just False indicates that the string definitely is, or is not, in the given normalization form. isNormalized :: NormalizationMode -> Text -> BoolSource Indicate whether a string is in a given normalization form. Unlike quickCheck, this function returns a definitive result. For NFD, NFKD, and FCD normalization forms, both functions work in exactly the same ways. For NFC and NFKC forms, where quickCheck may return Nothing, this function will perform further tests to arrive at a definitive result. String comparison Normalization-sensitive string comparison data CompareOption Source Options to compare. The caller knows that both strings fulfill the FCD conditions. If not set, compare will quickCheck for FCD and normalize if necessary. Compare strings case-insensitively using case folding, instead of case-sensitively. If set, then the following case folding options are used. When case folding, exclude the special I character. For use with Turkic (Turkish/Azerbaijani) text data. compare :: [CompareOption] -> Text -> Text -> OrderingSource Compare two strings for canonical equivalence. Further options include case-insensitive comparison and code point order (as opposed to code unit order). Canonical equivalence between two strings is defined as their normalized forms (NFD or NFC) being identical. This function compares strings incrementally instead of normalizing (and optionally case-folding) both strings entirely, improving performance significantly. Bulk normalization is only necessary if the strings do not fulfill the FCD conditions. Only in this case, and only if the strings are relatively long, is memory allocated temporarily. For FCD strings and short non-FCD strings there is no memory allocation. Locale-sensitive string collation For the impure collation API (which is richer, but less easy to use than the pure API), see the Data.Text.ICU.Collate module. data Collator Source String collator type. Collators are considered equal if they will sort strings identically. collator :: LocaleName -> CollatorSource Create an immutable Collator for comparing strings. If Root is passed as the locale, UCA collation rules will be used. collate :: Collator -> Text -> Text -> OrderingSource Compare two strings. collateIter :: Collator -> CharIterator -> CharIterator -> OrderingSource Compare two CharIterators. If either iterator was constructed from a ByteString, it does not need to be copied or converted beforehand, so this function can be quite cheap. sortKey :: Collator -> Text -> ByteStringSource Create a key for sorting the Text using the given Collator. The result of comparing two ByteStrings that have been transformed with sortKey will be the same as the result of collate on the two untransformed Texts. uca :: CollatorSource A Collator that uses the Unicode Collation Algorithm (UCA). Regular expressions data MatchOption Source Options for controlling matching behaviour. Enable case insensitive matching. Allow comments and white space within patterns. If set, '.' matches line terminators. Otherwise '.' matching stops at line end. If set, treat the entire pattern as a literal string. Metacharacters or escape sequences in the input sequence will be given no special meaning. The option CaseInsensitive retains its meanings on matching when used in conjunction with this option. Other options become superfluous. Control behaviour of '$' and '^'. If set, recognize line terminators within string, Otherwise, match only at start and end of input string. Haskell-only line endings. When this mode is enabled, only '\n' is recognized as a line ending in the behavior of '.', '^', and '$'. Unicode word boundaries. If set, '\\b' uses the Unicode TR 29 definition of word boundaries. Warning: Unicode word boundaries are quite different from traditional regular expression word boundaries. See http://unicode.org/reports/tr29/#Word_Boundaries. Throw an error on unrecognized backslash escapes. If set, fail with an error on patterns that contain backslash-escaped ASCII letters without a known special meaning. If this flag is not set, these escaped letters represent themselves. WorkLimit Int Set a processing limit for match operations. Some patterns, when matching certain strings, can run in exponential time. For practical purposes, the match operation may appear to be in an infinite loop. When a limit is set a match operation will fail with an error if the limit is exceeded. The units of the limit are steps of the match engine. Correspondence with actual processor time will depend on the speed of the processor and the details of the specific pattern, but will typically be on the order of milliseconds. By default, the matching time is not limited. StackLimit Int Set the amount of heap storage avaliable for use by the match backtracking stack. ICU uses a backtracking regular expression engine, with the backtrack stack maintained on the heap. This function sets the limit to the amount of memory that can be used for this purpose. A backtracking stack overflow will result in an error from the match operation that caused it. A limit is desirable because a malicious or poorly designed pattern can use excessive memory, potentially crashing the process. A limit is enabled by default. data ParseError Source Detailed information about parsing errors. Used by ICU parsing engines that parse long rules, patterns, or programs, where the text being parsed is long enough that more information than an ICUError is needed to localize the error. data Match Source A match for a regular expression. data Regex Source A compiled regular expression. Regex values are usually constructed using the regex or regex' functions. This type is also an instance of IsString, so if you have the OverloadedStrings language extension enabled, you can construct a Regex by simply writing the pattern in quotes (though this does not allow you to specify any Options). class Regular r Source A typeclass for functions common to both Match and Regex types. regex :: [MatchOption] -> Text -> RegexSource Compile a regular expression with the given options. This function throws a ParseError if the pattern is invalid, so it is best for use when the pattern is statically known. regex' :: [MatchOption] -> Text -> Either ParseError RegexSource Compile a regular expression with the given options. This is safest to use when the pattern is constructed at run time. pattern :: Regular r => r -> TextSource Return the source form of the pattern used to construct this regular expression or match. find :: Regex -> Text -> Maybe MatchSource Find the first match for the regular expression in the given text. findAll :: Regex -> Text -> [Match]Source Lazily find all matches for the regular expression in the given text. Match groups Capturing groups are numbered starting from zero. Group zero is always the entire matching text. Groups greater than zero contain the text matching each capturing group in a regular expression. groupCount :: Regular r => r -> IntSource Return the number of capturing groups in this regular expression or match's pattern. unfold :: (Int -> Match -> Maybe Text) -> Match -> [Text]Source A combinator for returning a list of all capturing groups on a Match. span :: Match -> TextSource Return the span of text between the end of the previous match and the beginning of the current match. group :: Int -> Match -> Maybe TextSource Return the nth capturing group in a match, or Nothing if n is out of bounds. prefix :: Int -> Match -> Maybe TextSource Return the prefix of the nth capturing group in a match (the text from the start of the string to the start of the match), or Nothing if n is out of bounds. suffix :: Int -> Match -> Maybe TextSource Return the suffix of the nth capturing group in a match (the text from the end of the match to the end of the string), or Nothing if n is out of bounds.	http://hackage.haskell.org/package/text-icu-0.6.3.4/docs/Data-Text-ICU.html	dclm-gs1-086420000
0.057627	<urn:uuid:78c1ea61-c5da-468c-9365-782ee06d2d18>	en	0.972576	What if you woke up in a different person's body every single day? A tries to stay in touch with Rhiannon, which is difficult when A is different person each day. Eventually A tells Rhiannon the truth about his or her existence. From there, the book focuses on the young couple's struggles to establish a relationship, when A is never sure who he or she will be tomorrow. A's experiences as all these different people could have been nothing more than vignettes, but A's love for Rhiannon and desire to see her again is in the background of each of these lives, complicating everything A does. There are plenty of signs that the book could have turned into a more run-of-the-mill thriller about a unique supernatural being discovering its race or some other ridiculous plot. Luckily, Levithan stuck to the love story. He also uses the first person — thus avoiding the unfortunate "he or she" that I've used above. The book has an overall dreamy, fantastic quality that fits A's wise beyond his or her years personality. While many of the daily episodes and interactions are very grounded, together they add up to something poetic. A's life is, necessarily, deeply internal and this is reflected in the language. One of the things I loved about the book was it defies easy labels just as much as A does. It's a contemporary YA romance, but it's also not just a romance book. It's a fantasy book, in that there is no technology or rational scientific explanation for A's existence or ability to move between bodies, but it's not like any other fantasy books. It's like a science-fiction book, to the extent that it's about big difficult-to-answer questions, explored through an incredible narrative, but again there's no tech or science. It's just a unique lovely book about young love and identity, wrapped up in the impossible. This isn't necessarily Levithan's first venture into speculative fiction — his poetic novel Boy Meets Boy takes place in what could only be described as an alternate or near future universe in which the school's popular, quarterback is also a drag queen — but he is better known for his co-authoring of realistic teen fiction like the aforementioned Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist. He was also involved in editing The Hunger Games. In fact, he's probably the busiest person in YA fiction. Aside from writing and editing, he also organizes readings and teaches in the Writing for Children program at The New School (where, full disclosure, I had him as a professor).	http://io9.com/5942624/what-if-you-woke-up-in-a-different-persons-body-every-single-day?tag=book-review	dclm-gs1-086520000
0.033802	<urn:uuid:e7ac9619-0b19-4f09-ab78-e7dbbff45ae8>	en	0.92674	A few interesting apps for the Kindle aimed at kids The Kindle holds a lot of promise in that it might be able to get a lot more kids interested in reading. One of the things that might help with that are apps aimed at kids. Whether it’s small fun games like Hangman for Kids ($1.99, rated 4.5 stars on 11 reviews), or education oriented apps like the two released this week – apps for kids help the Kindle be a better device/ereader for kids. This week we saw the arrival of two very interesting apps aimed solely at kids – 1. Flash Cards: Basic Math for Kids by Digi Ronin Games. Price: $2.99. Genre: Kindle Apps, Kindle Apps for Kids, Math, Flash Cards. This is an app that lets kids exercise their basic math skills – addition, subtraction, multiplication, division. It’s a cool idea and it’s interesting to think that kids can address 2 out of the 3 R’s with the Kindle now. Well, it’s a start – with a few more apps like this, they definitely will be able to. Flash Cards: Basic Math for Kids helps your child learn basic arithmetic by giving them practice doing addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. There are five difficulty levels designed around common arithmetic learning concepts that progress from single digit operations with no regrouping to double digit problems with regrouping. There are three different modes of play 2. Flash Cards: Fractions for Kids by Digi Ronin Games. Price: $2.99. Genre: Kindle Apps for Kids, Fractions, Flash Cards. This app covers fractions. Flash Cards: Fractions helps your child learn about fractions by giving them practice doing conversions from fractions to decimals and percentages, and converting from percentages and decimal values back to fractions.There are four difficulty levels designed around common fraction usage. These are both very good, solid additions to the Kindle Store. Perhaps at some point of time the creators will try out $1 and reduce the friction for people wanting to try out the apps. Random thoughts on the Trachtenberg System of Speed Math and Vedic Maths I’ve always wanted to make an app that was a combination of Vedic Maths and Trachtenberg’s System of Math. If a few more apps like these come out, that might be enough motivation to do this. Wouldn’t even mind if Digi Ronin or someone else made an app – would even consult with them if they needed the help. Here are a few simple math tricks. 1) Vedic Math – Squaring Numbers that end in 5 If the number is of the form x5, where x could be 2 or something larger like 11, simply take x and multiply it by x+1. Then append 25 to the end of it. Example: 75. 75 = 7 appended to 5. Take apart the 7 and multiply it by 7+1. 78 = 56. Then just append 25 at the end of it to get 5625. Example 2: 125. 125 = 12 appended to 5. Take apart the 12 and multiply it by 12+1. 1213 = 156. Then just append the 25 at the end of it to get 15625. 2) Trachtenberg system of Math – Multiplying by 11 Courtesy Jim Loy’s Trachtenberg System of Math page (though buying the book is the best option). To multiply by 11 go left to right and add each digit to the one to the right of it. Also, write down the left-most digit first and the right-most digit last and append them at the two ends. So abcd by 11 = a appended to (a+b) appended to (b+c) appended to (c+d) appended to d. Example: 4253 by 11 That’s 4 appended to 6 appended to 7 appended to 8 appended to 3. Answer = 46783. Example 2: 77834 by 11 That’s 7 appended to 14 appended to 15 appended to 11 appended to 7 appended to 4. Here we have carries which we treat just like we would in normal addition. We add those in and we get 856174. It’s a bit crazy just how easy this is. Would you rather have a kid memorize the tables for 11 or would you rather let kids learn this simple rule and multiply absolutely any number by 11? People wouldn’t really be scared of Math if they knew all the secrets and things that make math super straightforward. A little on the history of Trachtenberg Speed Math and on Vedic Math Trachtenberg thought up the Trachtenberg Speed System of Math in a concentration camp. That’s just bad ass. That’s something Chuck Norris would be proud of. It’s an entire system of math that turns people into math geniuses. Yet, 50+ years after it’s been invented, we’d rather have people grow up thinking they suck at mathematics and are stupid because of it. It does take some work to get it – However, look at the multiplication by 11 rule above. Isn’t that a thousand times more elegant than having kids stumble around for a calculator? Also, once you try out the rule a few times you can write out the answer quicker than you could key the digits into a calculator. Practice the Multiply by 11 rule a bit and then take 5346547 x 11 and try it out yourself. Vedic Maths is based on ancient Indian books, the Vedas. The multiplication by 5 rule is one example. Vedic Maths has been studied quite a bit and has gotten a lot more coverage than the Trachtenberg system, but they are both relatively obscure. There aren’t very many super easy introductions to Vedic Math. However, this Vedic Mathematics book is a decent introduction. It’s written by the gentleman who figured out that the Vedas had this math system hidden in them. It’s difficult to read but very rewarding. Could we combine Vedic Math with Trachtenberg’s System of Math? The blueprint for a great math app would be something that combined all the key principles from Vedic Maths with the structure of Trachtenberg’s System of Math. The current approach is to play up the ‘mental math’ aspect which is a pity. It’s as if someone got gifted a rocket that can fly to the moon and he’s using it as an advertising blimp. The real point of it should be to replace how math is taught. Why not teach Trachtenberg Math and Vedic Math as the foundation? If we treat these two incredibly powerful approaches to mathematics as party tricks it misses the whole point. Of course, it’s easy to be cynical about why really powerful stuff like this gets left out of education. Who would want every single student (or perhaps 80% of students) to start thinking they were math geniuses and intelligent. That would make things awfully inconvenient for people who wanted to sell them variable rate mortgages or, for that matter, non-voting stock in Internet companies that don’t make any profits. Get every new post delivered to your Inbox. Join 9,518 other followers	http://ireaderreview.com/tag/kindle-kids/	dclm-gs1-086530000
0.080859	<urn:uuid:20940191-eef1-4680-8312-24394b8be51a>	en	0.887247	Lotus Celebrates 60 Years Of Simple, Lightweight Cars With A Diamond-Trimmed Lotus Europa It's been 60 years of Lotus »9/12/08 12:40pm9/12/08 12:40pm, and in that time the British cottage automaker has produced a bevy of light, tossable cars that capture the essence of spirited driving. For that reason, we'll give them a bit of a break with their . That's right, this is a fully-loaded Europa with leather stripped off the most… Defying Stereotypes, Lotus Europa Proves Rock-Solid On Heroic Cross-Country Trek Everyone was pretty impressed by the Aston Martins driving from Panama to Alaska, but we must assume that rally was loaded with top-flight mechanics equipped with the correct tools. How would you feel about buying a Lotus Europa in San Francisco, hopping in, and driving straight to Alabama- across mountains and desert… »7/23/08 2:00pm7/23/08 2:00pm Welcome To Burnaby, Where The Europas And Beats Roam Free We saw the Chuck D-centric Olds 98 in Toronto a couple weeks back, and now the Canadian contingent is back with a whole bunch of seriously rare machines for our enjoyment. Donkeyassman has spotted a Lotus Europa, Lotus Elan, Chevy Chevelle, Mazda Eunos, and a pair of Honda Beats in the city of Burnaby, B.C. So put on… »4/29/08 3:00pm4/29/08 3:00pm Lotus Europa SE Revealed; Shows Off Pretty Smile, 222 Horsepower There's no doubt the late-model Lotus Europa is a touring car with neither the punch nor the tautness of an Exige or Elise. But if you've got more than a slice of salami to transport, the Europa is your bastard. Here in Geneva, the company introduced a more upscale model, the SE (you go, 1984 naming conventions, you).… »3/05/08 5:50am3/05/08 5:50am Inside Line Questions the New Europa's Blackness, Er, Lotusness What happens when Lotus develops a Proton exotic and then has it handed back to itself? The answer, unfortunately, is not Tesla. Nor is it Exige. Or Elise. Or even submarine Esprit. If the Inside Line-types ensconced in the Edmunds compound are to be believed, the new Europa S fits into a no-man's land that isn't… »10/17/06 9:00am10/17/06 9:00am Brats, Vin, Spaghetti, Four-Bangers and Low-Calorie Mash: Vintage Lotus Adverts We love Lotus. We love the odd designs, we love the sheer randomness of the cars and their penchant for finding obscure words that begin with the letter E. (Seriously, who thought "Eclat" was a good name for a car? It sounds like a bowel dysfunction.) We love the Seven because it's like a well-endwed featherweight… »8/30/06 3:00pm8/30/06 3:00pm	http://jalopnik.com/tag/europa	dclm-gs1-086570000
0.02056	<urn:uuid:8666160e-aa94-4e29-91d1-a3f6ecaa71dd>	en	0.931301	Republic of Burundi Location: Central Africa. Bordering nations--Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda. Area: 27,830 sq. km. (10,747 sq. mi.); about the size of Maryland. Cities: Capital--Bujumbura (pop. 300,000). Other cities--Cibitoke, Muyinga, Ngozi, Bubanza, Gitega, Bururi. Climate: Equatorial; high plateau with considerable altitude variation (772 m to 2,670 m above sea level); average annual temperature varies with altitude from 23 to 17 degrees centigrade (73 to 63 degrees Fahrenheit) but is generally moderate as the average altitude is about 1,700 m (5,600 ft.); average annual rainfall is about 150 cm (59 in.); two wet seasons (February to May and September to November), and two dry seasons (June to August and December to January). Terrain: Hilly, rising from 780 meters (2,600 ft.) at the Shore of Lake Tanganyika to mountains more than 2,700 meters (9,000 ft.) above sea level. Nationality: Noun and adjective--Burundian(s). Population (2008): 8,691,005. Annual growth rate (2008): 3.443%. Ethnic groups: Hutu (Bantu) 85%; Tutsi (Hamitic) 14%; Twa (Pygmy) 1.0%. Religions: Christian 67% (Roman Catholic 62%, Protestant 5%), indigenous beliefs 23%, Muslim 10%. Languages: Kirundi (official), French (official), Swahili (along Lake Tanganyika and in the Bujumbura area), English. Education: Years compulsory--6. Attendance--84.05% male, 62.8% female. Literacy: 59.3% of total population over the age of 15 can read and write. Health (2007): Life expectancy--total population 51.71 years; male 50.86 years; female 52.6 years. Infant mortality rate--60.77/1,000. Type: Republic. Democratically elected, post-transition government established August 26, 2005. Independence: July 1, 1962 (from Belgium). Constitution: A transitional constitution was adopted October 18, 2001. The parliament adopted a post-transition constitution on September 17, 2004, which was approved in a nationwide referendum held February 28, 2005. Branches: Executive--President, First Vice President in charge of political and administrative affairs, Second Vice President in charge of social and economic affairs, 26-member Council of Ministers. Legislative--A 100-member directly elected National Assembly plus additional deputies appointed as necessary (currently 18 appointed) to ensure an ethnic and gender composition of 60% Hutu, 40% Tutsi, 30% female, and 3 Batwa members. A 54-member Senate (3 seats reserved for former presidents; 3 seats reserved for the ethnic Twa minority; 2 Senators, one Hutu and one Tutsi, from each of the 16 provinces plus the city of Bujumbura appointed by an electoral college comprised of members of locally elected communal and provincial councils; 14 Senators appointed by the president according to the president's own criteria. Women must comprise 30% of the Senate.) Judicial--constitutional and subsidiary courts. Administrative subdivisions: 17 provinces including Bujumbura, 117 communes. Political parties: Multi-party system consisting of 21 registered political parties, of which CNDD (the National Council for the Defense of Democracy, Hutu), FRODEBU (the Front for Democracy in Burundi, predominantly Hutu with some Tutsi membership), and UPRONA (the National Unity and Progress Party, predominantly Tutsi with some Hutu membership) are national, mainstream parties. Other Tutsi and Hutu opposition parties and groups include, among others, PARENA (the Party for National Redress, Tutsi), ABASA (the Burundi African Alliance for the Salvation, Tutsi), PRP (the People's Reconciliation Party, Tutsi), FNL (the National Forces of Liberation, Hutu) and FROLINA/FAP (the Front for the National Liberation of Burundi/Popular Armed Forces, Hutu). Suffrage: Universal adult. GDP (2008): $1.097 billion. Real growth rate (2008): 4.5%. Per capita GDP (2008): $138. Population below poverty line (2000): 68%. Inflation rate (2008): 24.4%. Central government budget (2006 est.): Revenues--$239.9 million; expenditures--$297 million, including capital expenditures. Agriculture (2007 est., 34% of GDP): Coffee, cotton, tea, corn, sorghum, sweet potatoes, bananas, manioc (tapioca), beef, milk, hides. Arable land--35.57% (2005 est.). Industry (2007 est., 21% of GDP): Types--beverage production, coffee and tea processing, cigarette production, sugar refining, pharmaceuticals, light food processing, textiles, chemicals (insecticides), public works construction, consumer goods, assembly of imported components, light consumer goods such as blankets, shoes, soap. Services (2007 est.): 45% of GDP. Mining: Commercial quantities of alluvial gold, nickel, phosphates, rare earth, vanadium and other; peat mining. Trade (2006 est.): Exports--$55.68 million f.o.b.: coffee (50% of export earnings), tea, sugar, cotton fabrics, hides. Major markets--U.K., Germany, Benelux, Switzerland. Imports--$207.3 million f.o.b.: food, beverages, tobacco, chemicals, road vehicles, petroleum products. Major suppliers--Benelux, France, Germany, Saudi Arabia, Japan. Total external debt (2003 est.): $1.2 billion. Burundi's civil war officially ended in 2006 under a South Africa-brokered cease-fire agreement with the last of Burundi's rebel groups. Today the government is focused on rebuilding its infrastructure and reestablishing external relations with its regional neighbors. In accordance with the new electoral calendar, the Burundian people voted in Commune Council direct elections on June 3, 2005 and National Assembly direct elections on July 4, 2005. An electoral college of commune and provincial councils indirectly elected Senate members on July 29, 2005. Legislative elections are scheduled to take place in 2010. A joint session of the parliament elected Pierre Nkurunziza as President of Burundi on August 19, 2005 in a vote of 151 to 9 with one abstention, establishing the post-transition Hutu majority government. Finally, the Burundian people established Colline (hill) councils through direct elections on September 23, 2005. Nkurunziza maintains the presidency and is eligible for reelection for a second term in 2010. In September 2006, the last remaining rebel group in Burundi, the FNL, signed a peace agreement. Implementation obstacles and spurts of violence from the group slowed the process. In May 2008, the leaders of the FNL returned to Burundi to address the impasse and negotiate with the Government of Burundi. The two entities agreed upon a durable solution December 4, 2008. They are currently working toward implementing that agreement. While the FNL has effectively changed its name from its ethnic derivative, “Palipehutu-FNL”, to “FNL”, their agreement to disarm and demobilize remaining combatants is ongoing. The government agreed to integrate the FNL into the Burundian political system by allowing it to register and act as a full-fledged political party and assume leadership positions. As of May 31, 2009 FNL had been registered as a political party. While South Africa remains the key mediator in the ongoing peace process, there has been a consolidation of efforts in Burundi. The Partnership for Peace in Burundi (PPB) is a collective of the Political Directorate (South Africa, Tanzania, UN), Great Lakes Special Envoys, UN Integrated Office in Burundi (BINUB), and the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR). The PPB is the responsible mechanism for moving forward with political integration for the FNL and the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration process for FNL ex-combatants. Principal Government Officials President--Pierre Nkurunziza First Vice President--Yves Sahinguvu Second Vice President--Gabriel Ntisezerana Speaker of the National Assembly--Pie Ntavyohanyuma President of the Senate--Gervais Rufyikiri Minister of Defense--Germain Niyoyankana Minister of External Relations and Cooperation--Augustin Nsanze Minister of Interior and Communal Development--Venant Kamana Minister of Public Security--Alain Bunyoni Ambassador to the United States--Celestin Niyongabo Burundi is heavily dependent on bilateral and multilateral aid, with external debt totaling $1.4 billion in 2004. International Monetary Fund (IMF) structural adjustment programs in Burundi were suspended following the outbreak of violence in 1993; the IMF re-engaged Burundi in 2002 and 2003 with post-conflict credits, and in 2004 approved a $104 million Poverty Reduction and Growth Facility loan. The World Bank is preparing a Transition Support Strategy, and has identified key areas for potential growth, including the productivity of traditional crops and the introduction of new exports, light manufactures, industrial mining, and services. Both the IMF and the World Bank assisted the Burundians in preparing a Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, released in February 2007. More than 81% of Burundians live below the poverty line. Serious economic problems include the state's role in the economy, the question of governmental transparency, and debt reduction. In January 2009, the IMF and the World Bank decided that Burundi satisfied the requirements toward reaching its completion point under the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries Initiative (HIPC) and waived $424 million in debt. Based on Burundi's successful transition from war to peace and the establishment of a democratically-elected government in Burundi in September 2005, the United States Government lifted all sanctions on assistance to Burundi on October 18, 2005. Burundi also became eligible for trade benefits under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) in December 2005, but no Burundian industries have yet taken advantage of AGOA benefits. Burundi's relations with its neighbors have often been affected by security concerns. The Great Lakes is home to a number of illegal armed groups, including the Burundian FNL (previously the Palipehutu-FNL), which is involved in the process of disarming and demobilizing, which is not without complication. Hundreds of thousands of Burundian refugees have at various times crossed into Rwanda, Tanzania, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. These Burundians fled to neighboring countries during the civil war, hundreds of thousands of whom sought refuge in Tanzania. Most refugees have returned or opted to settle permanently in countries of asylum. Burundi maintains close relations with all neighbors in the Great Lakes region, including Rwanda, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In reaffirming Burundi's commitment to regional peacekeeping and allegiance to the African Union, the government recently deployed troops to quell the ongoing crisis in Somalia. The United States supported the Arusha peace process, providing financial support through our assessed contributions to a UN peacekeeping force established in 2004. Burundi is also a member of the Tripartite Plus Commission, which convenes member countries of the Great Lakes region in an effort to end the threat of armed groups and foster stability. Principal U.S. Officials Ambassador--Patricia Newton Moller Deputy Chief of Mission--JoAnne Wagner Political Officers--Carson Relitz-Rocker Economic Officer--Mark Carr Management Officer--Anthony Kleiber Consular Officer--Jaclyn Cole-Adkins Regional Security Officer--Christopher Bakken General Service Officer--Chelsea Bakken The U.S. Embassy is located at Avenue des Etats-Unis (Boite Postale 1720), Bujumbura (tel. [257] 222234-54). [This is a mobile copy of Burundi (06/09)] Short URL:	http://m.state.gov/md125402.htm	dclm-gs1-086770000
0.018204	<urn:uuid:669ffb5b-8675-46a8-aaba-c102fe24604a>	en	0.94341	Windsor's Mansellmania memoires - part two Windsor's Mansellmania memoires - part two It's 20 years since Nigel Mansell stood on top of his home grand prix podium for the fourth time, sending what seemed like the whole of Britain into delirious frenzy. Peter Windsor was at the centre of it all on race day and recalls it in part two of his exclusive for AUTOSPORT It's the summer of 1992, when the whole of Britain it seemed, adored Formula 1, or at least its runaway world championship leader Nigel Mansell. The Williams man had won six of the season's first eight races and was overwhelming favourite both to take his first world title and to win the British Grand Prix for the second time on the spin. Mansellmania was at fever pitch come race day at Silverstone and the sun was blazing - the atmosphere electric. Respected F1 journalist Peter Windsor was the Williams team's manager at the time, and in the second part of our special exclusive, AUTOSPORT goes back in time with him to relive his experiences at the centre of this extraordinary moment in British racing history, 20 years on. To continue reading this feature... from just $1.50 per week • Explore every F1 stat in the world’s best motorsport database Pay as you go Read this feature right now for just	http://plus.autosport.com/premium/feature/4578/windsor-mansellmania-memoires--part-two/	dclm-gs1-087070000
0.055856	<urn:uuid:dbfc323b-df1e-4ace-8e26-a5cae2768710>	en	0.949588	Checked content Related subjects: Mammals Background Information The articles in this Schools selection have been arranged by curriculum topic thanks to SOS Children volunteers. SOS Children has looked after children in Africa for forty years. Can you help their work in Africa? Western Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla) Scientific classification Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Mammalia Order: Primates Family: Hominidae Subfamily: Homininae Tribe: Gorillini Genus: Gorilla I. Geoffroy, 1852 Type species Troglodytes gorilla Savage, 1847 Gorilla gorilla Gorilla beringei distribution of Gorilla Gorillas, the largest of the living primates, are ground-dwelling herbivores that inhabit the forests of Africa. Gorillas are divided into two species and (still under debate as of 2008) either four or five subspecies. The DNA of gorillas is 97%–98% identical to that of a human, and they are the next closest living relatives to humans after the two chimpanzee species. Gorillas live in tropical or subtropical forests. Although their range covers a small percentage of Africa, gorillas cover a wide range of elevations. The Mountain Gorilla inhabits the Albertine Rift montane cloud forests of the Virunga Volcanoes, ranging in altitude from 2225 to 4267 m (7300-14000 ft). Lowland Gorillas live in dense forests and lowland swamps and marshes as low as sea level. The American physician and missionary Thomas Staughton Savage first described the Western Gorilla (he called it Troglodytes gorilla) in 1847 from specimens obtained in Liberia. The name was derived from the Greek word Gorillai (a "tribe of hairy women") described by Hanno the Navigator, a Carthaginian navigator and possible visitor (circa 480 BC) to the area that later became Sierra Leone. Western Lowland Gorilla Until recently there were considered to be three gorilla species: the Western Lowland Gorilla, the Eastern Lowland Gorilla and the Mountain Gorilla. There is now agreement that there are two species with two subspecies each. More recently it has been claimed that a third subspecies exists in one of the species. Primatologists continue to explore the relationships between various gorilla populations. The species and subspecies listed here are the ones upon which most scientists agree. • Genus Gorilla • Western Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla) • Western Lowland Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) • Cross River Gorilla (Gorilla gorilla diehli) • Eastern Gorilla (Gorilla beringei) • Mountain Gorilla (Gorilla beringei beringei) • Eastern Lowland Gorilla (Gorilla beringei graueri) The proposed third subspecies of Gorilla beringei, which has not yet received a trinomen, is the Bwindi population of the Mountain Gorilla, sometimes called the Bwindi Gorilla. Physical characteristics Gorilla knucklewalking, Cincinnati Zoo Gorillas move around by knuckle-walking. Adult males range in height from 165-175 cm (5 ft 5 in – 5 ft 9 in), and in weight from 140–204.5 kg (310–450 lb). Adult females are often half the size of a silverback, averaging about 140 cm (4 ft 7 in) tall and 100 kg (220 lb). Occasionally, a silverback of over 183 cm (6 ft) and 225 kg (500 lb) has been recorded in the wild. However, obese gorillas in captivity have reached a weight of 270 kg (600 lb). Gorillas have a facial structure which is described as mandibular prognathism, that is, their mandible protrudes farther out than the maxilla. The Eastern Gorilla is more darkly colored than the Western Gorilla, with the Mountain Gorilla being the darkest of all. The Mountain Gorilla also has the thickest hair. The Western Lowland Gorilla can be brown or grayish with a reddish forehead. In addition, gorillas that live in lowland forests are more slender and agile than the more bulky Mountain Gorilla. Almost all gorillas share the same blood type (B) and, like humans, have individual finger prints. Group life A silverback gorilla A silverback is an adult male gorilla, typically more than 12 years of age and named for the distinctive patch of silver hair on his back. A silverback gorilla has large canine teeth that come with maturity. Black backs are sexually mature males of up to 11 years of age. Silverbacks are the strong, dominant troop leaders. Each typically leads a troop ( group size ranges from 5 to 30) and is in the centre of the troop's attention, making all the decisions, mediating conflicts, determining the movements of the group, leading the others to feeding sites and taking responsibility for the safety and well-being of the troop. Younger males called blackbacks may serve as backup protection. Males will slowly begin to leave their original troop when they are about 11 years old, traveling alone or with a group of other males for 2–5 years before being able to attract females to form a new group and start breeding. While infant gorillas normally stay with their mother for 3–4 years, silverbacks will care for weaned young orphans, though never to the extent of carrying the little gorillas. Gorilla with young, Bronx Zoo If challenged by a younger or even by an outsider male, a silverback will scream, beat his chest, break branches, bare his teeth, then charge forward. Sometimes a younger male in the group can take over leadership from an old male. If the leader is killed by disease, accident, fighting or poachers, the group will split up, as the animals disperse to look for a new protective male. Very occasionally, a group might be taken over in its entirety by another male. There is a strong risk that the new male may kill the infants of the dead silverback. Food and foraging Gorillas are herbivores, eating fruits, leaves, and shoots. Further they are classified as foliovores. Much like other animals that feed on plants and shoots, they sometimes ingest small insects also. Gorilla spend most of the day eating. Their large sagittal crest and long canines allow them to crush hard plants like bamboo. Lowland gorillas feed mainly on fruit while Mountain gorillas feed mostly on herbs, stems and roots. Reproduction and lifespan Gestation is 8½ months. There are typically 3 to 4 years between births. Infants stay with their mothers for 3–4 years. Females mature at 10–12 years (earlier in captivity); males at 11–13 years. Lifespan is between 30–50 years, although there have been exceptions. For example the Dallas Zoo's Jenny is still alive at age 55. Recently, gorillas have been observed engaging in face-to-face sex, a trait that was once considered unique to humans and the Bonobo. A female gorilla exhibiting tool use by using a tree trunk as a support whilst fishing. Skeleton of a gorilla Gorillas are closely related to humans and are considered highly intelligent. A few individuals in captivity, such as Koko, have been taught a subset of sign language (see animal language for a discussion). Tool use In September 2005, a two and a half year old gorilla in the Republic of Congo was discovered using rocks to smash open palm nuts inside a game sanctuary. While this was the first such observation for a gorilla, over forty years previously chimpanzees had been seen using tools in the wild, famously 'fishing' for termites. It is a common tale among native peoples that gorillas have used rocks and sticks to thwart predators, even rebuking large mammals. Great apes are endowed with a semi-precision grip, and certainly have been able to use both simple tools and even weapons, by improvising a club from a convenient fallen branch. The word "gorilla" comes from the history of Hanno the Navigator, a Carthaginian explorer on an expedition on the west African coast. They encountered "a savage people, the greater part of whom were women, whose bodies were hairy, and whom our interpreters called Gorillae" . The word was then later used as the species name, though it is unknown whether what these ancient Carthaginians encountered were truly gorillas, another species of ape or monkeys, or humans. American physician and missionary Thomas Staughton Savage obtained the first specimens (the skull and other bones) during his time in Liberia in Africa. The first scientific writings about describing gorillas date back to the publication of an article in 1847 in Proceedings of the Boston Society of Natural History, where Troglodytes gorilla is described, now known as the Western Gorilla. Other species of gorilla are described in the next couple of years. Explorer Paul du Chaillu was the first westerner to see a live gorilla during his travel through western equatorial Africa from 1856 to 1859. He brought dead specimens to England in 1861 . The first systematic study was not conducted until the 1920s, when Carl Akeley of the American Museum of Natural History traveled to Africa to hunt for an animal to be shot and stuffed. On his first trip he was accompanied by his friends Mary Bradley, a famous mystery writer, and her husband. After their trip, Mary Bradley wrote On the Gorilla Trail. She later became an advocate for the conservation of gorillas and wrote several more books (mainly for children). In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Robert Yerkes and his wife Ava helped further the study of gorillas when they sent Harold Bigham to Africa. Yerkes also wrote a book in 1929 about the great apes. After WWII, George Schaller was one of the first researchers to go into the field and study primates. In 1959, he conducted a systematic study of the Mountain Gorilla in the wild and published his work. Years later, at the behest of Louis Leakey and the National Geographic, Dian Fossey conducted a much longer and more comprehensive study of the Mountain Gorilla. It was not until she published her work that many misconceptions and myths about gorillas were finally disproved, including the myth that gorillas are violent. Both species of gorilla are endangered, and have been subject to intense poaching for a long time. Threats to gorilla survival include habitat destruction and the bushmeat trade. In 2004 a population of several hundred gorillas in the Odzala National Park, Republic of Congo was essentially wiped out by the Ebola virus. A 2006 study published in Science concluded that more than 5,000 gorillas may have died in recent outbreaks of the Ebola virus in central Africa. The researchers indicated that in conjunction with commercial hunting of these apes creates "a recipe for rapid ecological extinction". Conservation efforts include the Great Ape Survival Project, a partnership between the United Nations Environment Programme and the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and also an international treaty, the Agreement on the Conservation of Gorillas and Their Habitats, concluded under UNEP-administered Convention on Migratory Species. The Gorilla Agreement is the first legally-binding instrument exclusively targeting Gorilla conservation and comes into effect on 1 June 2008. Retrieved from ""	http://schools-wikipedia.org/wp/g/Gorilla.htm	dclm-gs1-087160000
0.121474	<urn:uuid:37a5721f-3f26-452b-b980-93feaa8864bf>	en	0.960439	Forgot your password? Comment DisableGWX (Score 2, Insightful) 288 First off, If there's no reason not to upgrade other than FUD, then they should update. 7 only has a little more than 4 years left and is already in extended support and windows 8/8.1 interface is crap vs 10. If they're worried about being spied on stay with a Local account and don't setup a Microsoft account. It will only take the same telemetry that they've been doing since the customer experience program in vista, which you can then turn off. That being said MS shouldn't have started downloading the OS on PC's without explicit reservations but even that can be disabled. Easiest method to disable windows 10 from updating is to use the DisableGWX Policy setting. This site's Method 3 will walk you through setting the registry key. Microsoft Also has some other blocking methods as well. If you just want security patches from that point forward go to windows update settings and uncheck "give me Recommended updates the same way I receive important updates" Comment Re:/facepalm (Score 0) 426 This is getting out of hand. Every day I see one of these privacy articles and they all say basically the same thing. It's reminding me of the Hysteria with Smart Meters. I just got one last week and searching about them online I found tons of sites telling me how it's going to give me Cancer, Hack my Router, Kill my Plants, Keep me up at night and Burn my house down. I guess I'll have to make another story counter like the one I had to make for the Firefox .NET Plugin but i'm afraid i'll have 30 articles in it by the end of this month at this rate. Comment Re:Sounds like an ad (Score 1) 316 I'm actually surprised Mail merge didn't doom OpenOffice/LibreOffice from the start. In office it's roughly a 6 step process to set one up using the mail merge wizard. in LibreOffice, depending on what kind of merge, is at least twice as many steps, with each step much more involved than the office steps. Also it uses LibreOffice's Database, which is fine, but it needs Java, Which I avoid like the plague. I just wish that LibreOffice would adopt a wizard like system for the more complex features it has with the option to skip the wizard for more power user options. It would make my job a lot easier in the training dept. Comment Okidata Hands Down. (Score 1) 223 Oki Makes some of the most open printers I've seen. Many of their laser printers still support older dot matrix standards (which just about every OS supports) as well as more modern standards like PCL and Postscript. You will pay more for them, but there isn't a printer manufacture out there with more open standards, and their Tech Support in the off chance you have an issue with the printer is second to no one. If your OS support any Oki at any age, it will print as long as it knows what port to print to, Especially parallel and LAN. Hell, I've used 15 year old Okipage 8C drivers on modern Oki color lasers, Dot Maxtix DOS drivers on Monochrome lasers, Hell, I used an HP 4000 Driver on a Oki B430dn when the 4000 failed at a critical time and they still printed no problem. I can't vouch for the latest printers, since I haven't touched an Oki since my last job, but Oki was the best decision I made there. We had B430DN's all over the place and they would outlast anything in their price class. We had multiple 430DN's with cycles over 120000 pages with virtually no issues. New aftermarket toner carts were as low as $20 for 5000-7000 imprints. The only issue I had with them was their drum, which had a 20000 Page cycle, and you had to buy an original drum at $150 since the referbs were junk and would grind up at 7000, although the printers new were as low as $130 so we just buy a new printer and you could usually reset the drum in maintenance mode so you could get another 20000-40000 out of it before it would artifact. Even with the drum costs in play at the recommended intervals the cost per page was ridiculously low vs anything in the same price class. Comment Windows update bug (Score 1) 517 There is a Windows update bug that will cause svchost to eat 1gb of ram everytime it does a Windows update check. The workaround is to disable automatic updates and update manually, but that's not a good solution. The other fix is to upgrade to 10 in a month, since it doesn't have this bug. Comment Re:Logic need not apply (Score 1) 222 Like I said in the previous article, Proof aside, If Russia or China had access to the file store, they've cracked it by now. A Large government (with virtually unlimited funding) will crack any commodity encryption scheme. Considering that it's years of your Adversaries Espionage data, It's priceless in the espionage world and spending millions of dollars on a decryption operation would be worth every penny. It wouldn't surprise me in the least that the KGB pulled a Bletchley Park-esque operation to decrypt the files and have been successful. Comment Re:so... (Score 2) 351 Doubtful. They don't pay enough. Apparently, the Mozilla foundation is in money trouble. They're baking ads in the new tab page. They switch to Yahoo cause Google won't pay them anymore. They "partner" with Telefonica to add Hello to Firefox, now they're "partners" with Pocket. I'm guessing Firefox 39 will add Superfish integration to give me a more personalized web experience and justify it because it's already installed on millions of PC's. Comment Re:How about driverless engines anyway? (Score 1) 294 Trains are complex machines. Most of the time, they work flawlessly, but things can go wrong fast. Broken knuckles between Cars. Car Derailments, Cars, (Ignoring the warning signals, Crossing the tracks, getting hit) Tornado, ETC. Youtube them if you don't believe me. A human in the cockpit is going to assess those situations much faster than an automated system can in many of these situations. You want to stop trains from speeding? screw the cameras, Put GPS in the engine (if they don't have them already), map the speeds of the rails to the GPS and don't let the train go over the speed limit the GPS (or Dead Reckoning if it's in a tunnel) says you should be going. Its been in Semis for years and it would take next to nothing to modify that system for Train engines with no change to the rail infrastructure. Comment Re:Hell No Hillary (Score 5, Informative) 676 Totally Agree here. You have to be Nuts and Stupid to vote for Hillary in 2016. Especially if you're a democrat voting in a primary. She is easily one of the most corrupt politicians I've seen in recent memory. Hell, just looking at Wikipedia alone gives me these entries and I've probably missed a couple of them: Whitewater Controversy FBI Files Controversy Travel Office Controversy Cattle Futures Controversy Email Server Controversy The last one is the straw breaker. She knowingly hosted her Email on purpose so that she had full control over what people can see or not see regarding federal government correspondence. Her wiping the box when it was under investigation is no different to what Nixon did with the audio tapes and should disqualify her right there. There are better presidential candidates out there. Hell, there are better potential democrat candidates out there. Comment Re:List 'em in the summary, slashdot. (Score 2) 113 So basically, all of the names make it look like it's an Adware firm. Awesome. Is this really news to the security community at this point? I've been saying that Adware is a virus for almost a decade now and they're finally starting to see it? Does this mean that the AV Firms (MS, Mcafee, Norton, ETC) are finally going to get tough on adware infections? Something tells me no. I'll believe it when Conduit, Dealio, Wajam and the like get flagged my more than 1/2 of the AV Vendors out there. Talent does what it can. Genius does what it must. You do what you get paid to do.	http://slashdot.org/~Deathlizard/tags/duh	dclm-gs1-087200000
0.050256	<urn:uuid:2471202d-0a25-45c6-825b-275d9562d08a>	en	0.958189	Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed Forgot your password? Comment Re:tit for tat (Score 1) 202 Yeah. Still perhaps the right thing to do at a moment in history where corporations are quickly annihilating what's left of democracy and state of right. For a case in point: does your representative know what's being negotiated "in your name" in some obscure international treaty (be it TTIP, CETA, TPP or whatever the current abomination is called)? Likely he doesn't know. Which should be reason enough to reject the treaty come ratification time. But somehow I doubt that my (or your) representative has the balls to say "NO". Comment Re:Another Side Effect (Score 1) 202 Because the USA are more willing to collect? IMHO US fines are not too high, other countries' fines are too low. If a company can make billions of profits by breaking the law and is fined only a fraction of those billions, it is the rational choice to continue doing so. Only if the fines become higher than the illcit gains, we can expect them to have an effect. This said, the EU is slowly waking up. A few years ago and after long forbearance, they finally fined Microsoft for their anti-competitive behavior in a way that (presumably) hurt. Comment Government vs. courts -it's not the same (Score 1) 202 Shortly after the data protection rules in the EU were enacted, the EU Commission agreed to a shady compromise to avoid problems for the internet industry. This compromise is known as the Safe Harbour deal from 2000. Today, the European Court of Justice is hearing a case where this practice is in dispute, and it may end with the Safe Harbour deal being ruled invalid. It would not be the first case where a law or international contract is found illegal after the fact. Comment National Security letters as part of the problem (Score 1) 202 Since it has become public knowledge that US authorities can demand the "protected" data at any time, even from subsidiaries abroad, the value of any certification or demonstration is questionable. That alone could end up making the Safe Harbor rules unusable for US companies, regardless of FTC enforcement. Depending on the EU court's ultimate decision of course. Comment Re:The US needs a serious spanking (Score 1) 202 Well, if I understand the case correctly, the ratification may end up being invalid. As analogy, imagine the US ratifies a treaty and the SCOTUS finds it unconstitutional afterwards. I guess the US constitution would win over the ratification too. And BTW, I can fully imagine that the EU was sloppy in the ratification process. Comment Re:The US needs a serious spanking (Score 5, Informative) 202 The EU is trying to dictate the law to companies that are doing business in Europe, not against the US government or congress. Which every country does on its territory. Note that the case is against Facebook, not the US government. Some of these companies happen to be US companies. Who may be in a bind soon, as the European Court of Justice is likely to invalidate the Safe Harbor Agreement, as it usually follows the advice of its general attorney. If that happens, said US companies are no longer allowed to store data of EU citizens outside the EU, but at the same time they may be told by the US via national security letter to hand over those data. If both the US and the EU stay adamant, companies like Facebook may have to choose between doing business in the US or in Europe. Comment Re:Sheesh (Score 1) 143 Well, GP was not talking about keeping control of stuff customers think they bought, but about the increased risk of that stuff being unavailable through technical difficulties. And I think he is right. Downloading only what you need for a certain device I can see working. But keeping even part of that stuff on the Cloud and downloading it "on demand" is a recipe for trouble. Connection failures happen, you know. Comment Re:Don't train them in the current systems (Score 2) 158 If this place is anything like a couple of them I've seen before though? They likely decided to become primarily a "Linux shop" in the first place because they were unwilling to spend much on I.T. -- and somewhere along the line, staff deployed Linux as a way to keep old/obsolete hardware functional. This may be a valid approach if there are no Windows-only applications that are not easily replaced. But that is something you need to find out as soon as possible. IMHO that will make the difference between being able to switch to Linux in the short run and looking at a long transition period. For the City of Munich, switching to Linux took several years because they had lots of old applications on Windows for which there were no Linux equivalents. Comment Re:graphical Harvard museum effort not available (Score 1) 72 When the American Museum of Natural History in New York redid the fourth floor exhibits about dinosaurs, they chose to arrange the specimens in a tree-like structure representing their phylogeny (well, subject to the constraint that it's basically a big loop with a few bumps and nooks and crannies.) At the time (this was the late 1990s,) it was controversial because most museums grouped specimens by function (carnivores, herbivores, etc.) instead of by their evolutionary path. In fact, the AMNH welcoming film to the dinosaur floor (the Meryl Streep-narrated one) really does quite a nice job explaining the tree and the museum visitor's path through the tree as they walk the halls. Comment Re:graphical Harvard museum effort not available (Score 1) 72 It's really too bad that the fabulous museum exhibit display Deep Tree isn't more broadly available. . Aha, happy to be mistaken and outdated on this one- I looked and found that now there is a web page via NOVA with a good interesting subset of the data. It's nicely done and at the DeepTree link at this link. Comment graphical Harvard museum effort not available (Score 2) 72 It's really too bad that the fabulous museum exhibit display Deep Tree isn't more broadly available. There is a lovely display, with graphical interface, which is just enchanting to wander through much of the tree of life. It does a great job conveying the scale of the diversity of life and the boggling number of species, and it's aimed at the general public. It has nice pinch/zoom/etc. touch-screen functionality on a table-sized display. Unfortunately, for years, there was exactly one place on earth where you could play with it: at the Harvard Natural History Museum. And unless you are there at a particularly empty time, you will have to squeeze a fair number of kids out of the way to actually play with it for more than about two minutes. Now, things have improved a bit and it looks like there are a grand total of four museums that have the exhibit. (You should visit if there is one near you, try to avoid a time when school field trips are likely to be there!) The development was supported by a $2.3 million US National Science Foundation grant so public money was used to develop it, and it seems feasible to implement it or at least a scaled-down version of it on what are now much more common multi-touch displays like tablets or at least be available on the web, but as far as I can tell, it's been years since the grant and still the only place you can use it is in these four museums. I see this as a missed opportunity for a dramatic broader impact on understanding evolution and the scale of the diversity of life. Comment Re:Now that's just evil (Score 1) 515 Well, count me among the shitters then :-) I'm staying on Win 7 for now, and this will only change if I can get a Win 10 Enterprise from "unofficial sources" or Microsoft relents with the spying. If not, I might completely switch to Linux in 2020 when extended support for Win 7 runs out. It may be inferior for gaming, but I'm approaching 50 and the urge to kill pixelated monsters is diminishing with age. For any other purpose, I'm quite happy with Linux. Comment Re: Potential, or likelihood? (Score 1) 317 Well, Microsoft had a Windows XP and a Windows 7 in between those bad releases. Otherwise, Windows market share might have suffered a lot more. Now it will be interesting to see if Windows 10 can be one of the good versions. But even if not, Microsoft can survive thanks to Windows 7 until Windows 11 comes out. Displacing a succesful Windows version is very hard, to the point where a lot of people still run XP (even if I doubt the wisdom of that...). Comment No moral obligations either way (Score 1) 351 On one hand, I acknowledge that a website owner may run the site as he sees fit. Which includes ads to earn some money On the other hand, I don't feel obliged to pay attention to the ads or even let them onto my computer. So I don't have any qualms about using software like NoScript. In everyday use, I tend to allow non-obtrusive ads that don't bog down my computer too much. The bogging down is noticeable at times BTW. I'm sometimes on a measly 2MBit/s connection with an older PC, and then the bandwidth and CPU demands of ads can be significant. At other times, loading websites goes slooowly because some ad server cannot keep up with the load (often I've blocked that site specifically since).	http://slashdot.org/~Lonewolf666/firehose	dclm-gs1-087220000
0.019882	<urn:uuid:a160c119-5efe-4538-a74a-937e3f94d877>	en	0.962774	Follow Slashdot blog updates by subscribing to our blog RSS feed Forgot your password? Comment Re:Top Publishers To Post News Stories Directly To (Score 1) 50 You only think you were never on facebook. They have photos of you, they know who you know and where you've been just from the content other people post on there (facial recognition in photos etc.) Also, every time you say a "like" button on an outside website, that image is often hosted on facebooks server, so they know which websites you are visiting and what sort of articles you like to read. Unless you have a plugin like Ghostery they are already tracking you. Comment One Media Company For All (Score 1) 50 This will give facebook alot of control over which articles people see. I hope that people don't base their opinions only what they read on facebook. I hope people continue to look outside facebook for news. If not then zuckerberg could become too powerful. What happens if a news company reports negatively about facebook? Do they get dropped? Comment Re:I'd defer to whatever the man who died wished (Score 1) 645 Most of the video is explaining the "reasoning" behind his murder. Fox News did not need to show the part where the terrorists try to excuse their actions. As far as I'm concerened this is a recruiting video and fox news give them free webhosting for it. Comment Re:what a contest (Score 1) 307 You're doing it wrong. I never had any perfomance issues when I used to use Atom netbooks. You need to tweak the OS a bit to get usable performance. Oh and Windows 8 is alot faster than 7, so it's better to install that and add classic start to get the start menu back as well as disable the completely unneccesary visual affects. Windows XP perforrms good on netbooks, probably better than anything else, but due to security issues that is no longer an option. Not everyone can affor modern hardware, especially in poorer countries, but people want to be able to run a modern OS. The best option to get the balance is to have sofware that is efficient and cant take advantage of different hardware types. Comment A different GUI sounds good to me (Score 1) 307 My PI 1 is nice as a mini server. I have with apache/mysql etc running good for collecting data from PLC. However, I have never been happy with the GUI's on offer. Maybe Windows will offer a semi-decent GUI as opposed to the half-baked Linux GUIs that are capable of running on a PI.	http://slashdot.org/~johnsie	dclm-gs1-087250000
0.021414	<urn:uuid:5d5764d9-96be-4be5-aa33-32f71a53afbd>	en	0.816251	Top Definition two or more girls ingaged in scratching, punching, biting, box kicking, hair pulling, clothes ripping, and all the other brutal ways girls hurt each other. Usually very amusing to watch and film. BOB: Yo, did you see those girls titties flyin every where when they ripped each others shirts off in that bitch fight? ROB:Ohh Yaaaa, i got it on film too! av Fry_Bag420 13 november 2007 Same as catfight. Bitches, women, girl-fight, Sexy girls fighting: bitchathon 2 bitches have a bitch fight, girl-fight bitchathon, av suburbangurl84 10 september 2012 A fight between two people. Usually intense. Same thing as a bishfight, but spelt with the normal spelling. Can be physical or verbal. Maddy: Hey Steph, did you see that huge bitchfight between Nikki and Michelle? It lasted for all of lunch! They were really mad... Steph: No, I didn't! Dang, I should have been there. Would have been funny. :P But I guess I'd feel sorry for whoever was on the raw end of the stick. Major de-rep points. Half the school wouldn't talk to her again! av Nisky 6 november 2007 A reason for men to get popcorn James: Bitch fight! av PowerPie 25 januari 2015 when 2 ppl that arent liked fight for attention whit dude_ remember jen and nancy? black dude_no why? whit dude_they bout to bitchfight! black dude_so... av Vadiva 12 september 2005 Gratis daglig E-post E-posten är sänd från Vi kommer aldrig spamma dig.	http://sv.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bitch+fight	dclm-gs1-087340000
0.023137	<urn:uuid:eb4882d2-1606-412f-b5d5-d1a0f0f8118f>	en	0.777883	a stealer of meat, particularly ham Grandson:good golly gee willakers flipidy dipidy doo grandpa my hamburger's gone Grandpa:I think it was that there "Hamburglar" boy av gank of america 16 mars 2007 Top Definition " oh no, the hamburglar stole my hamburger again!" av hellboy 12 oktober 2003 av Ryan 14 augusti 2005 To take advantage of someone, from behind, while said person is vomiting. "I Hamburglared Bonnie while she had the flu." av scala5k 23 januari 2005 someone that comes along and jacks your burger. damn that hamburglar just owned me. av sputtleface 8 april 2003 someone who is a fatass and steals other people's food (especially a hamburger or cheeseburger) because he or she is too fat and/or lazy to make or buy their own god damn food. and when you ask this person if they stole your food, they have that guilty look on their face as they pretend to ignore you. WAY TO MAKE IT OBVIOUS! Fuck you Sandy, you fucking hamburglar. av Trampy Tina 24 oktober 2006 one who strikes terror in the hearts of villagers in India by stealing their cows (which most natives of India deem as sacred). Punjabi: Where are all the cows in Majaraji village? Jugdeev: Oh! No! Hamburglar come to village and steal all our cows. av People Skills 16 juni 2004 Robble, robble,robble robble robble robble robble robble robble robble robble robble robble.....robble! robble! Robble.....robble. Robble robble robble robble robble! Robbles robble robble? Robble robble robble. Robble Hamburglar,"Robble robble robble robble?" Oh Robble! av Chris Sorto 28 januari 2008 Gratis daglig E-post	http://sv.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=hamburglar&defid=2311505	dclm-gs1-087350000
0.047692	<urn:uuid:9253ba59-58ee-4e8e-a0b6-e89974429c3a>	en	0.946411	The Cult of Nikola Tesla Nikola Tesla Brian Dunning attempts to separate the facts from the fictions of Nikola Tesla’s life: It was his ultimate plan, but the farthest he ever got was the partial construction of his famous tower at Wardenclyffe which was intended for wireless communication across the Atlantic. His worldwide wireless power system was theoretical only, employing the Schumann-Tesla resonance to charge the Earth’s ionosphere such that a simple handheld coil could receive electrical power for free anywhere, and everywhere, in the world. Tesla’s idea was innovative, but innovative idea it remained, as debts mounted and the tower was dismantled before it ever got to be used. Now that the nature of the ionosphere is much better understood, physicists now consider Tesla’s concept unworkable, and no attempts to test it have ever worked. All sorts of conspiracy theories exist, for example that the HAARP research facility in Alaska is secretly a test of Tesla’s worldwide power grid, or some sort of superweapon based on it. The profound differences between these systems become clear upon doing even the most basic of research. Full Story: Skeptoid: The Cult of Nikola Tesla (Available as both a podcast and an article) Want to Do Your Own Space Research Project? ArduSat Wants to Help ArduSat is a (funded) Kickstarter project that aims to launch an Arduino based satellite into space that will run experiments designed by people like you. The idea is that, since it will use open source hardware, you’ll be able to design your own research experiments and submit them to the ArduSat team. They’ll test your experiment and, if everything seems legit, upload your experiment to the satellite, collect data and send it back to you to do whatever you’d like. Here are some possible applications of ArduSat from the Kickstarter page: SCIENCE: Meteor Hunter – Small meteors that strike the atmosphere every day created trails of ionized gas in the atmosphere in the upper atmosphere. Write an experiment to try and detect meteor impacts, by listening for radio stations beyond the horizon, reflected by the meteor trails! ENGINEERING: Your Eye in the Sky – Try writing an app that would synchronize the output of a head mounted-gyro to the steering system on the satellite. If you’re feeling really ambitious, try downlinking the attitude vector in real-time to watch the satellite follow your head – you could even tie-in your head-steering to our program that takes pictures! (Talk to Joel if you’re interested in this experiment!) ENGINEERING: Point-and-shoot – The following settings can be set on the camera: “exposure, gamma, gain, white balance, color matrix, windowing”. Try designing an algorithm that fine-tunes the settings to take even better pictures or more artistic pictures! ENTERTAINMENT: Geiger Counter Bingo – Write an app that transmits a message with a random number and letter every time a particle hits the satellite with enough energy. Have a ‘bingo from space’ game between HAM radio amateurs. ENTERTAINMENT: Photography Competition – See who among your friends can snap the coolest/most interesting picture from space. The eye of a hurricane, sunrise over the Indian ocean, even aurora from space – see what marvels you can capture! Take Pictures from Space The satellite is not just for scientific purposes; ambitious photographers and artists will be able to steer the satellite cameras take pictures on-demand of the Earth, the Moon, or the stars. Especially from the Artist community we expect to see some spectacular private space pictures so we all can marvel at the beauty of Earth from above. The Military-Maker Complex: DARPA Infiltrates the Hackerspace Movement In a two part essay Fiacre O’Duinn explains why DARPA’s partnership with MAKE magazine to fund 1,000 makerlabs in U.S high schools is antithetical to the maker movement and wonders whether it’s a line in the sand that will divide the movement: While the MENTOR program involves cooperation, this is done so as part of challenge competitions, in which teams compete against each other for cash prizes. This seems in stark contrast to how maker culture has developed to date. Why is competition necessary? If the goal is truly for education using the hacker/maker model, can learning and exploration not take place merely for pleasure, in a completely open environment, or must it be reduced to yet another lesson in the need to hoard and compete for resources and information? Third, why has the field of study in these makerspaces narrowed only to STEM topics? What happened to the transdisiplinary focus of hacker/maker communities that make them so innovative? Where are the arts? Where are wearables, knitivism, DIY molecular gastronomy? Why do the challenges involve working on unmanned air vehicles or robots, projects that are of interest to DARPA for their military applications? Shouldn’t we encourage STEAM rather than STEM? Could it be that regardless of their educational potential, these topics have no possible military application? With such a narrow focus, one could ask which culture will win the day, maker or military? Finally, why are the full details of the Make proposal and specifics of the agreement with DARPA not being made public? Because in dealing with the military, lack of transparency is simply a matter of course. This works well for the military but why is it necessary for a community project involving children? Why was a “Secret” clearance level needed to work on designing modules for the program, according to this job advertisement? This lack of transparency also leaves other questions unanswered. For example, as the program expands to over 1000 schools, will military personnel be brought in to teach? This last question brings me to issues of recruitment, STEM education and the military. The biggest issue of all may be the use of the the MENTOR program as a military recruitment vehicle. Make, DARPA and the line in the sand, #1 Make, DARPA and the line in the sand, #2 I’ve long opposed military recruitment programs in schools, but what might the benefits of such a program be? I’ve been thinking lately that in these times of austerity, and given the general difficulty in getting public funding for education and social programs in the U.S even when we’re not in a recession, tying social programs to hawkish programs like defense and law enforcement may be the only way to go. In his “State of the World” in 2009, Bruce Sterling suggested taking a national defense position on climate change: If I wanted to be politically effective, rather than visionary, I’d disguise myself as a right-wing Green, probably some kind of hunting-shooting NASCAR “conservationist,” and I’d infiltrate the Republicans this year. […] So we publicly recognize the climate crisis: just as if we suddenly discovered it ourselves. And we don’t downplay the climate crisis: we OVERPLAY the crisis. “Then we blame the crisis on foreigners. We’re not liberal weak sisters ‘negotiating Kyoto agreements.’ We’re assembling a Coalition of the Willing tp threaten polluters. “We’re certainly not bowing the knee to the damn Chinese — they own our Treasury, unfortunately, but we completely change the terms of that debate. When the Chinese open a coal mine and threaten the world’s children with asthma, we will take out that threat with a cruise missile! That’s our new negotiating position on the climate crisis: we’re the military, macho hard line. Would it work? Would it be worth selling out the rest of your values for? I don’t know, but also consider the sorry state of jobs in the country. On the one hand, Newt Gingrich’s moon base idea was justified as a defense measure, but it was widely seen as a proposal as a jobs program for NASA’s home state. Maybe a moon base was too wild an idea, but could something like sci-fi work? Remember, the interstate highway system in the U.S. was actually called the Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways and was justified as a defense measure. If we want a jobs program to rebuild or crumbling infrastructure, it seems like we could do a lot worse than call it a homeland security program. So given the sorry state of STEM education, and the expense of setting up hackerspaces and the absolutely dismal state of public libraries (which many suggest turning into hacker spaces), is it time to consider letting DARPA build hackerspaces for the kids, even if it means letting in military recruiters and having the kids focused on making weapons? I can see the pragmatic benefit, but I still just can’t justify it. As Fiarce points out, the program is just too antithetical to the maker spirit. And although as many have pointed out DARPA has funded all sorts of research over the years, including the creation of the Internet, the MENTOR program will specifically include a competition for designing weaponized vehicles for military use. DARPA may do some good work too, but having kids design weapons for the military crosses a line for me. So will it split the community? Someone with more knowledge of the history of the computer hacking movement and how the NSA and other defense agencies tried to hijack it might have more insight than me. But it seems that if the maker movement has any momentum of its own, then this shouldn’t be fatal to it. Those who want to collaborate openly and make things other than war planes, and those attracted to the militaristic elements of the DARPA program will go there. Hopefully the maker movement will be able to sustain both strands, much like the computer hacker movement managed to sustain an open source movement. See also: 3 BIG questions (and lots of smaller ones) about DARPA & Make Changing Perceptions of Science and Technology in the 19th Century Jess Nevins shares an excerpt from Hawthorne’s Mad Scientists: Earlier, “technology” had meant something more accessible to the average man. Elements of Technology, a book published in 1829 by Harvard professor Jacob Bigelow, was essentially a recipe book, more like the “do-it-yourself” manuals of modern counterculture than an MIT textbook. By most accounts, Bigelow, whose job at Harvard was to bridge the gap between Yankee inventors and collegiate research scientists, was the first to use “technology” in its modern sense…. Jess Nevins: Changing perceptions of science and technology in the 19th century Cyberculture History: A Virtual Reality Concept from the 15th Century Giovanni Fontana's Castle of Shadows In 1420 Venetian engineer Giovanni Fontana created a proposal for the Castle of Shadows. From BLDG Blog: Philippe Codognet describes the 15th-century machine as “a room with walls made of folded translucent parchments lighted from behind, creating therefore an environment of moving images. Fontana also designed some kind of magic lantern to project on walls life-size images of devils or beasts.” Codognet goes on to suggest that the device is an early ancestor of today’s CAVE systems, or virtual reality rooms—an immersive, candlelit cinema of moving screens and flickering images. Full sized image at BLDG Blog (Thanks Bill!) What would you call a genre speculative fiction based around this period? Venetianpunk? Dymaxion Car Reproduced Norman Foster and his Dymaxion Car The Dymaxion car reconstruction project mentioned here previously has been completed. For better or worse, it was just rebuilt as a one-off art project. Until the end of the month, you’ll be able to see it at the Ivorypress Art+Books gallery in Madrid. Guardian: Norman Foster’s back-to-front car (Thanks Bill!) Infrastructure Still Crumbling – So What Do We Do About It? crumbling bridge The American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) has released its 2009 Report Card for American Infrastructure, and the results are grim. The association gave the most powerful nation in the world an overall grade of D, and stated that it would take a five-year investment of $2.2 trillion to bring the U.S. up to par with the rest of its class—the world’s major postindustrial nations. The Architect’s Newspaper: State of Disrepair (via Brainsturbator) What exactly can be done about it, other than spending massive amounts of public funds and ratcheting up an already astronomical deficit? The obvious libertarian answer I can think of is: sell off all private infrastructure and issue tax refunds for it. Let the private companies who purchase it deal with it. At this point it doesn’t seem like that’s any worse an option than letting it all rot. Certainly there’d be a lot of questions regarding access to essential infrastructure. And if, say, the entire interstate highway system were privatized I’m sure that would open things up to all sorts of highly entertaining anti-competitive actions on the part of its owners. But I have to admit I sort of relish the idea of seeing how tea partiers feel about paying road tolls (and seeing how self-righteous non-motorists, the type who think it’s unfair that they’re taxed for roads they supposedly don’t use, react to increased food costs). And hell, it might actually cause megacorporations that currently avoid paying much in taxes actually have to shell out something for the roads they use. But even if there was the political will, could that even happen? Are there companies out there that would be willing to buy up all our roads, bridges, and other public infrastructure? Would it be profitable to maintain? And what about existing private infrastructure? According to The Architect’s Newspaper, over 85% of levees are privately owned and they still got a D from the ASCE. How much of the infrastructure ASCE evaluated is privately owned to start with? What other other options are on the table? A government-backed scrip for infrastructure work? Even if we’re at 20-25% real unemployment, I’m not sure that’s bad enough to get modern Americans to work on infrastructure projects for scrip and for small businesses to honor it. But I could be wrong. What about revolution? It’s always a possibility, but it also seems far from happening. I have been thinking though that if there were to be a revolution in the the States, it would have to start with seizing infrastructure, which is our real “means of production.” What else can be done? Flickr search for “crumbling infrastructure” Photo by Michelle Soulier / CC Indian engineer ‘builds’ new glaciers to stop global warming Chewang Norphel, 76, has “built” 12 new glaciers already and is racing to create five more before he dies. By then he hopes he will have trained enough new “icemen” to continue his work and save the world’s “third icecap” from being transformed into rivers. […] By diverting meltwater through a network of pipes into artificial lakes in the shaded side of mountain valleys, he says he has created new glaciers. […] So far, Mr Norphel’s glaciers have been able to each store up to one million cubic feet of ice, which in turn can irrigate 200 hectares of farm land. For farmers, that can make the difference between crop failure and a bumper crop of more than 1,000 tons of wheat. Telegraph: Indian engineer ‘builds’ new glaciers to stop global warming (via Ecofriend via Atom Jack) First electric wind turbine powered grid in 1941 Wired has an article on the first electric wind turbine, which actually helped power Vermont in the 40s: The turbine ran through hundreds of hours of testing up to 1943, often pumping power onto the Central Vermont Public Service Corporation’s electrical grid. The project’s engineers were sure that, technically, the machine worked. The Smith-Putnam wind turbine stood as a testament to the power of human — and American — ingenuity. A decade before, Soviet engineers had built the world’s largest wind turbine, a 100-kilowatt machine. Now the Yanks had constructed their own, 10 times more powerful. Time concluded its article on the project with a hopeful half-prediction, “New England ranges may someday rival Holland as a land of windmills.” This was, after all, merely the prototype for whole lines of turbines that would be more resistant to German bombs than a centralized coal plant. Unluckily, a bearing broke in 1943, and the war prevented its replacement until 1945. With the war waning, the wind machine got back up and running in the spring of that year. And that’s when disaster struck. Wired: Electric Turbines Get First Wind Panel Urges Engineering Be Added to Curriculum Engineering studies, or lessons on how products are designed and built, have the potential to bolster student engagement and understanding in math and science, despite the topic’s relatively modest and undefined presence in the nation’s schools. That’s the conclusion, outlined in a study unveiled today, of an expert committee charged with evaluating the status of engineering lessons in K-12 schools and judging their effectiveness. Education Week: Panel Urges Engineering Be Added to Curriculum (via Appropedia) © 2015 Technoccult Theme by Anders NorenUp ↑	http://technoccult.net/archives/category/engineering/	dclm-gs1-087370000
0.725589	<urn:uuid:b5fb9c29-268c-4034-98fd-48e29df4b8f6>	en	0.945285	A Gas Chamber would be any room or facility where the victim will suffocate to death or be asphyxiated. An actual equivalent to the Gas Chamber might be used, a room where [[DeadlyGas noxious or poisonous gas]] is being fed through the ventilation system. Or, it could be a room with a vacuum sucking all the air out, or people could just be [[AlmostOutOfOxygen left in a sealed room]] to eventually choke on their own carbon dioxide. Serious NightmareFuel, with the extra horror of being TruthInTelevision for several million people during [[UsefulNotes/WorldWarTwo The Holocaust.]] A villain contemplating using one has usually crossed the MoralEventHorizon of villainy. [[folder: Anime ]] * ''Anime/SaberRiderAndTheStarSheriffs'' had an episode in which Sabre Rider went to the Outworld and confronted the main baddie, who proceeded to suck the oxygen out of the room, as he himself didn't need it. * This is what happens to [[spoiler: Hinamizawa's population under the "Disaster of Hinamizawa" natural disaster coverup]] in ''VisualNovel/HigurashiWhenTheyCry''. * In ''Anime/MobileSuitGundamWing'', [[TheLancer Duo]] and [[ArrogantKungFuGuy Wufei]] are trapped in a little cell along with [[MadScientist Professor G]]. The amount of air is limited (they are in space, after all), and Professor G says something along the lines of "If anyone wants to die, they should do so, and save some oxygen for the rest of us!" * In an early chapter of the Manga/LupinIII manga, a guard said Lupin would be heading to the GasChamber. [[SympatheticInspectorAntagonist Inspector Zenigata]] knows that the method of execution at this particular joint is the electric chair and any guard would've known that. He has just enough time to figure out the guard is actually Lupin in disguise before Lupin [[XanatosBackfire uses this knowledge against him]] and he sets off to rescue the guard Lupin sent to be electrocuted in his place. This story was adapted into the Anime/LupinIIIGreenJacket episode [[Recap/LupinIIIS1E4 "One Chance to Breakout"]]. [[folder: Comic Books ]] * ''{{Tintin}} in America'' had bandits drop Tintin into one through a TrapDoor, before dropping his corpse in the Michigan. In the comic, they [[DeusExMachina unintentionally used the wrong gas]] (a soporific) instead; in the animated version, there is no mention made of the soporific being a mistake ([[MakeItLookLikeAnAccident a drowning looks more "accidental"]]), and Tintin is rescued from the Lake by Snowy instead. * In ''Comicbook/ThePunisherCircleOfBlood'', Punisher is dropped through a TrapDoor into Trust's brainwashing chamber, and sedative gas is there to greet him. However, he easily escapes since he was dropped in with his gear, and the room was built with defenseless targets for "reidentification therapy" in mind. [[folder:Fan Fic]] * In the ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible'' fanfic ''[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/9565191/1/An-Old-Foe-Returns An Old Foe Returns]]'', Mastermind attempts to test his formula that would diminish humanity's mental capacities on Kim and Ron through this manner. It's only through quick thinking and creativity that they escape. [[folder: Film ]] * ''Film/SawII'' had a gas '''house'''. * ''Franchise/StarWars Episode I: Film/ThePhantomMenace'' features at the beginning the Nemoidan Trade Federation trying to gas the ambassador Jedi (or heavily-armed religious fanatics, depending on your perspective). * ''Film/IWantToLive!'' [[spoiler: Barbara is executed inside a gas chamber.]] * The unseen BigBad of ''[[Franchise/PoliceAcademy Police Academy 6]]'' pulls this on Lassard when he reaches the meeting room, and Lassard is a little surprised he'd use such an old one: -->'''Lassard:''' Oh, ''come on''! Poison gas?? -->'''Villain:''' Yes, melodramatic I know, but effective. [[folder: Literature ]] * The original ''Literature/SherlockHolmes'' short stories: The "Devil's Foot" had a character place the title root--an obscure poison from Africa--into an oil lamp. The lamp was then lit, releasing the poison into the air and causing death and brain damage to the killer's victims. [[spoiler:The murderer is later killed in the same way himself.]] This one nearly killed Holmes and Watson when Holmes (in a rare moment of holding the IdiotBall) experimented with the root to see if it's the culprit. In "The Adventure of the Greek Interpreter", the baddies attempt to kill their victim with charcoal gas. * Another murderer used the poisoned candle M.O. in Creator/EdgarAllanPoe's ''The Imp of the Perverse''. * The poisoned candle trick shows up again in the Literature/{{Discworld}} novel ''Discworld/FeetOfClay''. * ''[[Literature/DreamPark The Barsoom Project]]'' has a sealed room with a window air conditioner which runs backwards to suck the air out. * In Creator/RobertEHoward's Franchise/ConanTheBarbarian story "Literature/RoguesInTheHouse", a glass wall falls down in a room, and the dust of the gray lotus is used, which drives them murderously insane. * The vacuum version is used in ''Literature/InHeroYearsImDead'' involving a memorabilia room that the heroes are trapped in. * The Creator/RaymondChandler short story "Nevada Gas" uses the well-sealed backseat of a limousine. [[folder: Live Action TV ]] * ''Series/ThePrisoner'' episode "The Girl Who Was Death" had a room filled with poison-releasing candles that would explode if extinguished. [[spoiler:The Prisoner escaped - this trap, at least - by placing all of the candles against the outer door and blowing them out with bellows.]] * A ''Franchise/SherlockHolmes'' mystery ("The Case of the Exhumed Client", with Ronald Howard as Holmes; one of the many mysteries specially created for one of the many TV series) involved a person who died from a candle he didn't know was poisoned. [[spoiler:Holmes flushed out the murderer by closing everyone in a small room and lighting the candle. The murderer, preferring a blown cover to death, broke the window.]] * One of the urban legends busted by Series/{{Mythbusters}} involves a man who, after a particularly starchy dinner, falls asleep in a small unventilated room and asphyxiates on his own flatulence. * In an episode of ''Series/{{Angel}}'', an angry client tries to kill Gwen and Angel with a modified elevator and poison gas. Luckily, vampires don't need to breathe. * ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'' had Angel rescuing Giles, Willow and Buffy from the high school basement, where they were locked in with the gas turned on by an angry invisible girl. * In the ''Series/StargateSG1'' episode "Dominion," Daniel gets caught in a room that is accidentally being flooded with toxic gas. Despite trying to breathe through his clothing, he inhales the gas for several minutes before the leak is shut off, but he seems to suffer no side effects whatsoever. * In ''Series/{{Farscape}}'' the Scarrans use a chamber flooding with paralytic gas. On learning he's trapped in one John yells, "Staleek, this is very unoriginal!" * One stunt on ''FearFactor'' involved enduring a sealed chamber that filled with CS gas longer than anyone else. * ''{{CSI NY}}'' -the taxicab killer turned his cab into a mobile one of these. * One episode of ''Series/MidnightCaller'' had Jack Killian interviewing a condemned man before his execution via gas chamber. * An episode of ''Series/ThePretender'' had Jarod as a prison guard, trying to clear a man before he can be executed via gas chamber. He gets the real killer to talk by locking him in the gas chamber during a practice run, then releasing gas (it wasn't really poisonous, but the baddie didn't know that) until the guy confessed. * ''Series/{{Batman}}'' had a cliffhanger were Batman and Robin were tied up in a room while the Penguin's mooks sucked all the air out using a "Giant Reversing Bellows". [[folder: Roleplay]] * In ''Roleplay/DinoAttackRPG'', the entire XERRD Fortress became a facility-wide version of this trope once the DeadlyGas defense system was activated. [[folder: Tabletop Games ]] * In the 1E [[TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons AD&D]] module ''The Hidden Shrine of Tamoanchan'', the entire ''dungeon'' is this trope, at least until the [=PCs=] manage to open up some blocked ventilation passages. [[folder: Video Game ]] * The videogame adaptation of ''VideoGame/TheThing'' has a scene where the protagonist is lured into a room quickly being filled with poison gas. The message left on a computer screen in the room is a nice touch: -->Breathe deep, Blake. Breathe deep and die. * ''VideoGame/StarFoxAdventures'' had such a room: you had to [[BlockPuzzle push blocks around]] while a special meter started emptying. This troper has never seen whether an empty meter means your life gauge starts emptying, or whether you got a failure cutscene, or whether you lost a life, but when you succeeded, the door would open, letting good air in[[spoiler:, and also dropping the bars holding the Queen [=CloudRunner=] captive]]. * ''VideoGame/{{Portal}}'' ends with [[spoiler:[=GLaDOS=] attempting to flood the final battle area with a deadly neurotoxin after Chell destroys her [[RestrainingBolt morality core]]. She's quite nasty about it too, taunting Chell about her impending death from the deadly neurotoxin (along with jabs of a more personal nature.)]] * ''[[VideoGame/{{Onimusha}} Onimusha 3]]'' had a gas chamber trap where you had to unlock the door by completing a "simon says" minigame before you succumb to the fumes. * ''VideoGame/KnightsOfTheOldRepublic II'' features the Jekk'Jekk Tarr, a bar for aliens on Nar Shaddaa where the atmosphere is toxic to humans. It also had the HK-50 unit turn the entire dormitory section of the Peragus mining facility into one of these by sabotage. Both games let ''you'' use computer terminals to release poison gas on enemies as opposed to fighting them directly. * ''VideoGame/MetalGearSolid'' does this for a few spots if you get caught and one room where it will happen as a part of a storyline. In each case, gas fills the room and you quickly lose oxygen, but having an O2 mask equipped will slow it down. In two of these cases, there is no way to escape, and in the first, you don't even have the O2 mask. There is one room where gas is already there and you're forced to go through. Said area also has electrified floors, just in case, apparently. * The original ''VideoGame/MetalGear'' and ''VideoGame/MetalGear2SolidSnake'' also had gas-filled rooms that you had to traverse. * Tifa of ''VideoGame/FinalFantasyVII'' gets tossed into a gas chamber for a public execution midway through the game, and has to pick up the conveniently dropped key to her shackles with her feet to escape. Unlike other segments in the game, there is no time limit on this sequence - no matter how long you struggle, Tifa cannot be killed. * MetalWolfChaos turns the entire city of Chicago into one big GasChamber for our hero. He needs to destroy the antitoxin canisters and seal the generators before the toxin level reaches lethal levels. * ''VideoGame/{{Doom}} 3'': An entire level is made into one of these, and you have to find the ventilation switch. --> '''[[spoiler:Dr. Betruger]]''': There's nothing left for you but a slow death as your lungs fill with toxic gases. * In the original ''VideoGame/PerfectDark'', you must flee a room flooded with nerve gas during your escape from {{Area 51}}. * In ''VideoGame/TheElderScrollsIVOblivion'', several [[RuinsForRuinsSake Ayleid ruins]] contain an interesting variation on this: step into an empty portion of a large room, and walls will slam down, temporarily trapping you while the room is pumped with gas. There are also rooms that simply have vents that always emit toxic gas. * The original ''VideoGame/ResidentEvil'' had a couple of poison gas {{death trap}}s that activated if you did a puzzle wrong. In ''VideoGame/ResidentEvilCodeVeronica'', a gas leak [[BrokenBridge blocks your progress]], and you have to find a way to activate the ventilation system to clear it. * In ''VideoGame/TheJourneymanProject'', the NORAD VI installation is flooded with sleeping gas, requiring you to obtain an oxygen mask before you go there. * There are three rooms in ''VideoGame/BatmanArkhamAsylum'' that end up getting filled with Smilex, forcing Batman to find a way to activate the ventilation system to purge the gas. * Parodied in ''VideoGame/BarkleyShutUpAndJamGaiden'', where at one point your party is trapped inside a cabin which is slowly filled with sugar substance[[note]]Sugar is treated as deadly in this game. The fact that diabetes is a status effect speaks for itself.[[/note]]. [[spoiler:The trap fails.]] * ''VideoGame/{{Prototype}}'' has it in the form of Bloodtox, a gas harmless to anyone not infected by the virus. Alex, a man made up entirely of infected material, discovered this fact when it was announced to a room full of soldiers he had infiltrated, that they had been exposed to the gas for the last ten minutes. His disguise didn't last long. * ''VideoGame/RatchetAndClankUpYourArsenal'' invokes this with an entire arena, requiring you to beat all the enemies before Ratchet succumbs. It's just sleeping gas, but it works by [[FridgeHorror depleting your health bar.]] * There's a whole level dedicated to this in ''VideoGame/DeadSpace''. Standing too close to one of the Wheezers for too long will cause Isaac to die. Also, Isaac sometimes has to go out into the vacuum of space. * In ''VideoGame/DinoCrisis'' there is a scientist trapped in a room filled with gas. You need to resolve a puzzle to neutralize the gas and open the door. If you're successful, the dying scientist gives you a key you need to advance. After that, if you search at his corpse, you find an extra key that you can use to get some goods. You can kill the scientist by accident, or [[VideogameCrueltyPotential on purpose]], flooding the room with letal gas, but doing that, you only get the first key. After getting the key, you get ambushed by a velociraptor. You must survive a [[PressXToNotDie button-mashing event]] to escape from the room, leaving the dinosaur trapped. After that, you can kill the raptor using the computer to fill the room again with gas, poisoning him. * ''TheSuffering'' takes place in a haunted Maryland prison. One of the characters is the former executioner, Hermes T. Haight. Hermes enjoyed his work, and his favorite method of execution was the gas chamber. He altered the gas to retain it's color and odor, so that he could watch the prisoner's reactions as the chamber was flooded. Eventually, he became so obsessed with the gas, that he decided he needed to experience for himself. In the game, Hermes returns as a gaseous ghost who's always breathing in his own fumes. Late in the game he becomes a boss who tries to kill you with his gas, and you need to find ways to block the sources of it before taking care of him. * At one point in ''VideoGame/{{BioShock\|1}}'', Andrew Ryan kills [[spoiler:Julie Langford]] by sealing the door to [[spoiler:her]] lab and flooding the room with poison. * In ''VideoGame/{{Gradius}} V'', the first-half of stage 6 has lots of this. You may shoot the DeadlyGas produced by them, before you getting into them and getting destroyed. * One sidequest in ''VideoGame/{{Fallout 3}}'''s ''Point Lookout'' {{expansion pack}} leads you into a radioactive gas trap. * ''VideoGame/RiseOfTheTriad'' has a few levels with touchplates which when triggered flood the area with poisonous green gas. Hope you either found a gas mask before you triggered it, or at least manage to find one before all your health is gone. ** One of the quit messages reads "Press Y to release the cyanide gas." and is accompanied by an appropriate sound effect. * ''VideoGame/FalloutNewVegas: Dead Money'' takes place in a ghost town covered in a toxic red gas cloud. On both normal and Hardcore modes, there are concentrated clouds that drain health rapidly, while on Hardcore, you slowly lose health throughout the general outdoor area. * In ''VideoGame/KZManager'' [[VillainProtagonist you]] must send there your [[POWCamp inmates]] so thet the "lesser races" be [[FinalSolution exterminated]]. [[folder: Web Original ]] * In ''LookToTheWest'', gas chambers called "phlogisticateurs" are employed by the alternate French Revolutionaries to execute the more prominent enemies of the Republic, including King Louis himself. They are invented due to the work of Antoine Lavoisier, [[MyGodWhatHaveIDone who takes his own life]] upon realising this. They use carbon dioxide and are not very efficient, only being used for particularly cinematic cases - most of the time the Revolutionaries use the Chirugeon, the in-timeline name for our guillotine. In a twist, the phlogisticateur technology later becomes used to create test greenhouses that allow the widespread cultivation of cinchona trees, meaning a ready supply of quinine to combat malaria in Africa. This is intended to be a similar case to the fact that in our own history, chemotherapy drugs came about as a result of research into poison gas in UsefulNotes/WW1. * An improvised version is done in the WebAnimation/{{Mastermind}} series. The Mastermind locks his minions in the same room as him and [[{{Fartillery}} orders a burrito]]. [[folder: Western Animation ]] * ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' had villain Clock King trap Batman inside a bank vault with a vacuum pump that was rapidly sucking in the available air. (Clock King is GenreSavvy enough to point out that he knows Batman [[CrazyPrepared would carry a gas mask with him]], so he's opted to just remove ''everything''). It's also [[TimeBomb wired to blow]] if it's picked up to try and prevent Bats from fiddling with it. * In ''SupermanTheAnimatedSeries'', the episode "The Late Mr. Kent" reveals that Metropolis uses this in administering the death sentence. As a result, [[RuleOfDrama after the killswitch is thrown, Superman still has a few seconds to swoop in and save a falsely-accused man.]] * ''CaptainPlanetAndThePlaneteers'': Though the DrowningPit and SealedRoomInTheMiddleOfNowhere also made an appearance or two, the most popular DeathTrap hands down for the Planeteers was a room slowly filling up with poisonous vapors. Makes sense from the villains' point of view, since the protagonists' rings stop working if the area is heavily contaminated with environmental pollutants. Otherwise, they could just call the [[WebAnimation/ZeroPunctuation blue man in his underpants]] to get them out... [[folder: Real Life ]] * In the United States, this was once a common method for executions, mostly in the West. It has since fallen out of favor, and is currently allowed as an alternate method of execution in only six states. The last person to be executed by asphyxiation was German national Walter [=LeGrand=] in Arizona in 1999. The federal courts declared this method as unconstitutional "cruel and unusual punishment", unless chosen specifically by the inmate. Today, the executions are made with lethal injection. (In 2014, when prisons were faced with a shortage of sodium thiopental due to the EU export ban, several states attempted to revive the gas chamber. As of this writing, they've not succeeded.) * UsefulNotes/NaziGermany used two main types of this. There were the well known death camp "showers" where people were sent into fake bathhouses and gassed to death. In some places, such as Auschwitz, they used Zyklon B gas, a cyanide-based pesticide. At Treblinka, where the Jews of Warsaw and other parts of Poland were annihilated, they used carbon monoxide. Less well known and not used much were trucks where the people were loaded into the back, airtight doors shut and the truck exhaust pumped in. These were not economically practical and were discontinued. [[Literature/GotzAndMeyer The latter]] as well as the former have shown up in fiction. * Schrodinger's Cat is a thought experiment in quantum physics, that imagines a cat is locked in a box with a flask of poison gas, and a radiation-detector that will break the flask if a radioactive atom emits a particle. * Finnish Army uses gas chambers to train the recruits to use gas masks. The recruits are taken to a sealed airtight building, the sergeant sets off a tear gas charge, and the recruits are to put on their gas masks. Nobody is allowed to enter out until the gas has dissipated. * Similar training had been performed in Eastern Bloc armies throughout the UsefulNotes/ColdWar: a large field tent had been used for the chamber, the recruits inside were to put on their masks at the instructor's signal and at the same time the instructor would set off the tear gas charge. Things would go nasty if the filters on some masks had been previously damaged, which often happened. That's why a tent was used, to roll up the fabric sides and release quickly those unfortunate recruits to open air. * At [[UsefulNotes/YanksWithTanks US military basic training]] recruits must go through the "Confidence Chamber", where the recruit's division goes into a room, the instructor sets off a tear gas capsule and the recruit must take off their mask and recite whatever the instructor tells them too. [[SarcasmMode Oh joy]]. * The US Air Force and US Army do this same thing as part of NBC training. They will only let you out of the chamber if you [[TheStoic manage not to panic.]] The idea, of course, is to show you that A) Your chemical warfare gear ''will'' protect you if you are wearing it, and B) Show you why you want to make sure you wear it when needed. * There is also the need to be sure [[FridgeBrilliance a future sailor or airman confronted with a messy, smoky and incendiary malfunction of the ship or plane]] will stay calm and proceed to do the needed repairs instead of panicking. * Mandatory prep for a trip on NASA's Vomit Comet, the KC-135 weightlessness simulator, involves being put in a room that the oxygen is lowered in, then being required to remove your oxygen mask and answer math questions to see how your brain holds up. It's to help prepare people for what could happen if the thing loses pressure at 30k feet. It was even required for the cast of the movie ''Film/{{Apollo 13}}'' before their trips. * Herman Mudgett, better known as H. H. Holmes, had one of these built into his hotel in Chicago in the 1890s. Numerous people ended up killed in there, as Holmes became perhaps the first SerialKiller on American soil. * Sadly, too many of these are still used in animal shelters, though it's hoped new laws will stop the practice.	http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/folderizer.php?target=Main.GasChamber	dclm-gs1-087500000
0.08114	<urn:uuid:d6ded639-fe05-47e7-ae0f-1d7c984fbe78>	en	0.871865	Sign up × Short version: What is the most secure way to allow Java 7 to run on (with?) SELinux? Long version: Sorry in advance if I use incorrect terminology. I'm really just a Java developer with a meager smattering of Linux skills. I just installed Java 7 on CentOS release 5.3 (Final) that is apparently has Security Enhanced Linux. After the install was complete (which I "installed" by unzipping the tar.gz file from Oracle in /usr/java/jdk/jdk1.7.0_25), I ran java -version and got this error: Error: dl failure on line 864 Error: failed /usr/java/jdk1.7.0_25/jre/lib/i386/server/, because /usr/java/jdk1.7.0_25/jre/lib/i386/server/ cannot restore segment prot after reloc: Permission denied` I found a few articles stating this can be due to SELinux and to try setenforce 0 and see if the problem goes away. I ran that command and Java worked. But these same articles say that leaving setenforce 0 on an Internet connected host is dangerous, and my host is connected to the Internet. There are other articles that suggest this next approach, but also say it can be dangerous, so I haven't tried it yet. chcon -t textrel_shlib_t /usr/jre1.7.0_10/lib/i386/client/ the above command the path at the end of the command is replaced with the path of my JDK. What I can't find is something "official" (which can mean many things) on how to run Java 7 on (with?) SELinux safely. Does anyone have any information for me? Edit: I discovered an article that referred to editing /etc/selinux/config. I have set as shown in the sample below. This allows Java to run but I assume I now have some security holes. # This file controls the state of SELinux on the system. # SELINUX= can take one of these three values: # enforcing - SELinux security policy is enforced. # permissive - SELinux prints warnings instead of enforcing. # disabled - SELinux is fully disabled. # targeted - Only targeted network daemons are protected. # strict - Full SELinux protection. share\|improve this question The chcon solution looks reasonable. The last solution isn't much different than setenforce 0. – jordanm Aug 2 '13 at 15:06 Can you just install it in your home directory instead? – Thorbjørn Ravn Andersen Aug 6 '13 at 9:55 @ThorbjørnRavnAndersen: Well, I suppose I could, but it runs as a daemon, a Tomcat server to be more specific, and somehow it feels a little sloppy to have a Tomcat server running from my home directory. – John Fitzpatrick Aug 6 '13 at 20:37 1 Answer 1 1. Clean up the current installation 2. Download the RPM file ( yum -y localinstall /path/to/downloaded-java.rpm rest will be taken care. share\|improve this answer Thanks. Can you elaborate on "Clean up the current installation"? Do you mean remove what I installed? – John Fitzpatrick Aug 6 '13 at 20:34 Yes, that's right! Remove your current Oracle Java installation. Please follow "Self-extracting file uninstall" – user44441 Aug 7 '13 at 11:21 Your Answer	http://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/85304/what-is-the-safe-way-to-allow-java-7-to-run-on-selinux	dclm-gs1-087580000
0.021951	<urn:uuid:2cc82003-80ae-4ece-b14b-c1db489bd6e3>	en	0.945719	Book Now phone icon +1 770 693 0299 \| NEW HENNA TINTING, COME GET IT DONE!! Here is a list of the frequent answered questions. If your question is not listed here, we would love to answer it. You can just contact us with your questions and we will answer them as soon as we can. To get in touch with us just click here Where did the term Brazilian Waxing come from? As the name suggests, brazilian waxing originated from Brazil for women who wanted to wear the new thong bikinis. Brazilian wax became famous when it was introduced into the US when a hair removal salon called J. Sisters International Salon was opened in 1987. J. Sisters International Salon was opened in Manhattan, New York by seven Brazilian sisters Jocely, Jonice, Joyce, Janea, Jussara, Juracy and Judseia Padilha. However, the waxing of the genital areas is not new. Waxing of the genital areas has been prevalent for centuries in Ancient Greece, Rome, Egypt, Arabia, Turkey and Persia. Historically, the waxes were sugar-based and made with lemon. Should I expect it to be a painful experience? This truly depends on your pain threshold. Any pain felt is temporary and some feel it more than others. It is a momentary pain when the hair is pulled but subsides right after. When the hairs are pulled, the pain is quick, temporary and generally does not linger. We are not medical doctors so we cannot recommend taking anything but most people will take their favorite pain reliever. It is advised not to take aspirin as it thins the blood. What should I do to prepare for my brazilian? Bacteria around your anal area can be spread to open pores resulting in an infection. For your safety and for sanitary reasons it is important to be impeccably clean in your rectal and genital areas before a brazilian. Do not tan or spend time out in the sun up to 72 hours prior to waxing. Tanning draws blood up to the surface and the skin is sensitive so lifting, peeling and bleeding can occur. Please do not apply any creams or lotions to your genitals the day of service as wax will not adhere to lotions, oils or creams. What Is A Brazilian Wax? Bikini in action Brazilian wax refers to hair removal from the entire pubic region, front and back. This is a very effective procedure because it removes hair completely from the root. It’s getting more popular to attain clean and sexy skin. In this process the entire pubic area can be waxed or some women prefer to live a small area above the Pubic area. Before Your Brazilian Wax! RELAX and TRUST us! We do this all the time. Let the hair grow ¼ to ½ an inch. The wax needs something to hold onto! DO make a date to exfoliate… prep the area with a sugar scrub exfoliating (but be very gentle!) up until the day before your wax to help prevent ingrown hairs. Make sure you shower the day of your wax to help prevent infection. DO NOT apply any creams or lotions beforehand; you’ll get better results if your skin is dry. After Your Brazilian Wax! In order to keep your Brazilian the best condition it’s important to regularly get waxed. Make your next appointment for no longer than 4 weeks. Avoid shaving in between. Apply an after waxing body treatment. We LOVE “Get the Bump out of Here.” It is safe, soothing and prevents ingrown hair! Avoid the sun immediately after waxing areas. Avoid heavy exercise for at least 5 hours after waxing. Avoid tight clothing after wax. Routine waxing helps the skin get accustomed to the procedure and minimize irritation. The more you get waxed the easier it is, also less painful and there is less hair growth after their first few waxes. What’s the difference between hard and soft wax? (Read: which hurts less?) Well, hard wax is amazing on coarse hair and in sensitive areas because as it cools and hardens it grabs the hair and lifts up off of the skin, so when it is removed it only grabs the hair and doesn’t pull on the skin. Most people find it to be far less painful. It can only be applied in small sections or it will break, so it is not efficient to use on larger areas of the body (like legs). Soft wax is applied and removed with some form of cloth. It is great at grabbing finer hairs and works much better on large areas of the body. It cannot be reapplied to the same spot more than once because it removes more layers of dead skin than hard wax. Also, hard wax leaves no sticky residue, so it is easier to clean up than soft wax. What’s the longest amount of time you recommend people go between waxes? I recommend coming in every three to six weeks for regular waxing appointments. A person can wait longer than six weeks, but they run the risk that the waxing experience will be more uncomfortable for them. Are you worried that lasers will take over? Seems less and less people are waxing these days? I have no immediate concern about that. They have not perfected the art of hair removal with lasers yet and it is rare that someone gets a perfect result. Getting laser hair removal is time-consuming, painful and expensive. Someday the technology will probably affect my business, but I haven’t had that problem yet. I do recommend a couple laser treatments to clients with a lot of hair and serious ingrown hair problems. It makes their regular waxing services much easier for them. Will it make my hair grow back thicker? Absolutely not. Waxing does not cause you to grow more hair follicles. In fact, if you become a regular waxer, you will notice that your hair will become quite sparse and not as course. Will it make my hair grow back darker? Let me ask you this….does your hair grow back darker when you cut it? No. Neither will your depilitated hair. Waxing will not change the pigment of your hair. Will waxing change the pigmentation of my skin? No, it will not cause hyperpigmentation (dark spots) on your skin, however, if you spend time in the sun after waxing, you can burn, which can result in sun damage and dark spots later on. If your skin is tan or you’ve applied sunless tanner, it will strip your tan. Remember, waxing will exfoliate your skin. The wax sticks to your skin and removes the topmost layer so you may experience some lightening if you have a dark tan from sun or sunless tanning products. Will I get ingrown hairs? It’s possible. Waxing removes the entire hair, root and all, from the follicle. Your skin naturally hardens and thickens over the area it was waxed so it is important to keep that area gently exfoliated. Use a gentle scrub in that area about 3 days after waxing and continue to exfoliate 1 to 2 times a week thereafter. Remember, I said gentle! Also, use a mixture of tea tree and lavender oil. Both are antimicrobial and antibacterial and will prevent irritation. Try to wear loose fitting clothes for a few days after to give your skin a chance to breathe and reduce moisture. The bikini, lip and underarms are where we tend to perspire. Perspiration and moisture cause bacteria to grow. Once that area has been waxed, the follicle is wide open to this bacteria creeping in.	http://waxingmania.com/faq/	dclm-gs1-087620000
0.021539	<urn:uuid:3069d4d2-1cab-46e7-90c6-ee6b3f52bcd2>	en	0.951058	Beautiful banners are coming to every article and you can help! Check out our guidelines and learn how to create your own! From Wikitravel Central Europe : Slovakia Jump to: navigation, search Slovakia Banner.jpg Trenčín with Trenčín Castle Slovakia in its region.svg Flag of Slovakia.svg Quick Facts Capital Bratislava Government parliamentary democracy Currency Euro Area 49,035 sq km Population 5,439,448 (July 2006 est.) Language Slovak (official), Hungarian, Ukrainian Electricity 230V/50Hz (European plug type E) Country code +421 Internet TLD .sk Time Zone UTC +1 There are numerous mineral and thermal springs in Slovakia, and around some of these world-famous spas have been built that offer great curative therapies or just simple relaxation. You can also chill out, swim and sunbathe at the shores of several local lakes and pools or try AquaCity water park if you are feeling more adventurous. In particular, Bratislava boasts a lively nightlife as well and is a popular partying destination. The area that is present-day Slovakia has been settled since early Paleolithic era. Before the inward migration of Slavs and Huns, the most important cultures were the Celts, Germanic tribes (Quadi) and partially also the Roman Empire which had its limes (border) established right on Danube River and sometimes raided the north, deep into the modern Slovak territory. To this day, artifacts and evidence of the presence of these cultures can be found. The Slavic tribes, that invaded the area in the 6th century created a succession of influential kingdoms here. During this era, lasting until the early 10th century when the Great Moravian Empire disintegrated and disappeared under the onslaught of the Magyar tribes, local Slavs adopted Christianity – initially that of Eastern (Byzantine) rite but finally in the Western (Catholic) form. Since 10th century region of present Slovakia became a part of the Kingdom of Hungary which situation subsequently lasted for a thousand years. During medieval times many fort castles have been built, ruins of some of which remain to this day. In 1526 throne of Hungary was acquired by the German-Austrian House of Habsburg and since this year Hungary – including Slovakia – has shared its fate with Austrian and Bohemian (Czech) lands. This personal union gradually evolved into the Austrian Empire (1804), after 1867 transformed into a dual state: the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. This "Danubian Monarchy", lasting until 1918, was a multinational state with many cultures and languages living together which had a great influence on the shaping of the entire region and forms a common cultural history shared by many Central European nations. Castle in Levice Similarly to other European nations, Slovaks also experienced their own "national awakening" during the 19th century. From year 1848 onward Slovak intellectuals and politicians repeatedly have raised demands for autonomy but without positive result. Slovak-Hungarian tensions were finally solved after WWI when Slovaks broke up Hungarian supremacy and joined the closely related Czechs to form new Czechoslovak Republic (1918). During WWII, Czechoslovakia briefly split, with the Czechs being occupied (Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia) by the Nazis while Slovaks forming their own war state (Slovak Republic), close ally of Nazi Germany. Following the chaos of World War II, restored Czechoslovakia became a communist country (1948) within Soviet-ruled Eastern Block. An attempt (led by politician of Slovak origin) to create more liberal "socialism with human face", the so-called Prague Spring, was crushed in August 1968 by Soviet-led Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia. The only remaining result of that liberal era was federalization of Czechoslovakia, i.e. creating of the Slovak Socialistic Republic formed in contemporary borders. Soviet influence collapsed in 1989 and Czechoslovakia once again became free. But newly acquired political freedom also brought a new rise of nationalism and quarrels between the two parts of the federation. For many years overshadowed by their north-western Czech neighbors, political representatives of Slovaks decided to strike out on their own. The Slovaks and the Czechs agreed to separate peacefully on 1 January 1993 and Slovakia (Slovak Republic) became a country in its own right. This dissolution is known as Velvet Divorce. Nevertheless, both countries remain close culturally and after 1998 there is a high level of political and economical cooperation. Holidays and Festivals[edit] Slovakia is a predominantly Catholic Country, so major Christian holidays are observed, as well as some other holidays. Unless indicated otherwise, these days are public holidays and banks and most amenities and shops will be closed. However, big shopping malls are usually closed only around Christmas and Easter. • Ephiphany - 6th of January - Celebrates the arrival of the Three Magi into Bethlehem. Shops and banks are closed. Throughout Slovakia, kraslice are prepared, which are egg shells adorned with ornaments and painted over with colours. These, along with sweets and money are given to boys, who visit friends' and neighbours' houses, where it is their job to make sure the women will be healthy and prosperous the following year by spraying them with water or perfume and beating them with a willow wand adorned with ribbons. It is called oblievacka and sibacka. It tends to involve copious amounts of alcohol, food and wet T-shirts, and is not taken seriously by anyone. In recent years it became less popular. No matter what gender you are, do not wear clothes you like when venturing outside on Easter Monday as you might have water thrown or perfume sprayed at you (even if you're a guy, since you might get splashed as a side-effect). If you want to protest, make sure to do so in waterproof clothing. • St. Cyril and Methodius Day - 5 July- arrival of the first Christian missionaries to Slovakia (863 AD). Religious as well as political celebrations. • St Nicolaus' Day - 6 December - This is not a national holiday, but is seen as a start of the Christmas period. Traditionally, St Nicolaus leaves some sweets (if the child was good) or coal/onion (if the child misbehaved that year) in their shoe overnight (surprisingly enough, most children get sweets, not onion). Celebrations are held in towns, where someone dressed as St Nicolaus (think Santa Claus) and his helpers angels/devils help him distribute sweets among crowds of eager kids. Christmas markets open and Christmas lights are turned on. Traditional Christmas cookies Map of Slovakia with regions colour-coded Western Slovakia the capital city, the Danube and other river valleys Central Slovakia medieval mining, national parks Eastern Slovakia mountain ranges with fairy tale castles • Banská Štiavnica — a picturesque medieval mining town • Nitra — the oldest town in Slovakia [3] Other destinations[edit] Vysoké Tatry • Bojnice — the most visited castle in Slovakia, almost intact with beautifully preserved interiors. [5] • High Tatras — is the biggest national park in Slovakia and a centre winter sports and hiking.[6] • Nízke Tatry — Low Tatras National Park [8] • Slovak Karst • Slovak Paradise National ParkSlovenský Raj consists of deep ravines and canyons created by the water cascading in waterfalls through the limestone. • Spiš Castle — one of the biggest castles in Europe, UNESCO listed.[10] • Vlkolínec — UNESCO heritage list village, preserving the character of a traditional Carpathian village[11] Get in[edit] Slovakia is a member of the Schengen Agreement. By car[edit] From the Czech Republic[edit] Drivers entering Slovakia from the Czech Republic using the D2 motorway from Prague have to buy a toll sticker at the nearest rest area after the border (provided you don't already have one). The short stretch between the border itself and the nearest rest area is toll-free. See information about motorway toll below in the "Get around" section. From Austria[edit] Sadly, drivers entering Slovakia using the motorway from Vienna require a toll sticker for approx. 3km-long stretch of the motorway between the Austrian border and the first interchange in Slovakia (Jarovce). Afterwards, the sticker is no longer required, since motorways within the capital are toll-free. If you only intend to visit Bratislava, buying a Slovak toll sticker for such a short stretch of motorway would be a waste of money. Instead, exit the motorway on the last exit in Austria (Kittsee) and continue through the village of Berg using the old road into Slovakia. Buying a toll sticker makes sense only if you plan to drive on the motorways further into Slovakia. From Hungary[edit] • Into Bratislava: Similarly, drivers entering Slovakia using the motorway from Budapest to Bratislava have to buy a toll sticker right at the border, since it is required for approx. 10km-long stretch of the motorway between the Hungarian border and the first interchange in Slovakia (Jarovce). Afterwards, the sticker is no longer required, since motorways within the capital are toll-free. If you only intend to visit Bratislava, exit the motorway on the last exit in Hungary (Rajka), just before the border, and continue to Bratislava using the old road. Buying a toll sticker makes sense only if you plan to drive on the motorways further into Slovakia. • Into Košice: The short stretch of the R4 expressway between the Tornyosnémeti-Milhosť border crossing and the city of Košice is a toll road. If you only intend to visit Košice or don't plan to drive on the Slovak motorways, avoid the toll by using the old road through the village of Seňa. From Ukraine[edit] Border checks are still part of life when entering from Ukraine. There are two road border crossings from Ukraine: (Malyj Bereznyj-Ubľa and Uzhhorod-Vyšné Nemecké). The former is for cars (not trucks), pedestrians and cyclists, and the latter is for motorized traffic only (including heavy trucks). Always expect long waiting times at this border crossing. Both crossings are open round the clock. By train[edit] From The Czech Republic[edit] If you want greater flexibility or cannot buy in advance over the Internet, you can get a significant discount at a railway station if you buy a return ticket called CityStar. Such international return ticket is valid for one month (source) on any train operated by ČD (Czech Railways) and ZSSK (Slovak Railway Company) and cannot be bought over the Internet at all. From Germany[edit] From Austria[edit] There are currently two railway routes from Vienna Hauptbahnhof station to Bratislava, terminating at different stations - one at Bratislava hlavná stanica (Main station) via Marchegg and the other at Bratislava-Petržalka station via Bruck an der Leitha and Kittsee. Each route has hourly regional trains. You can use EURegio ticket for €15 – a return ticket valid 16 days, common for both routes. Travel time: 1 hour. From Poland[edit] There is an overnight through car from Warszawa to Bratislava via Czech territory. Direct train connection from Poland is very poor; a bus is a better alternative. There are only few local trains between Žilina (SK) and Zwardoń (PL). There's no international passenger traffic at Nowy SączPrešov and SanokMedzilaborce lines. From Hungary[edit] From Ukraine and Russia[edit] It is much more cheaper to buy Ukrainian or Russian ticket only to the Ukrainian border station Chop, then buy a ticket from Chop to the first Slovak station Čierna nad Tisou, and then buy a Slovak domestic ticket at conductor (€1.50 surcharge). But then you have no berth reservation for the Slovak section and you have to change to seat car in Chop. By bus[edit] On foot, by bicycle[edit] Since the implementation of the Schengen Agreement (2007), hikers are allowed to cross the internal Schengen borders everywhere. This is especially important to hikers in the High Tatras, entering from Poland. There's a pontoon ferry accessible to cars and pedestrians between Angern an der March, Austria and Záhorská Ves, which operates from 5 AM to 10 PM. Toll is €1 for pedestrians (over 15) and cyclists alike. This border crossing is only important to local commuters and recreational cyclists along the Morava river. There are two more cross-border bridges on the Morava river suitable for cyclists. One is the recently built Cyklomost slobody (English: Bicycle Bridge of Freedom, German: Fahrradbrücke der Freiheit) between Schlosshof, Austria and Devínska Nová Ves, a suburb of Bratislava. As the name implies, this bridge is for pedestrians and cyclists only. Another bridge lies further to the north between the villages of Hohenau an der March, Austria and Moravský Svätý Ján. This one is also open for cars (under 7.5 metric tonnes). However, absolutely no traffic is allowed on this bridge between midnight and 5 AM, as a wildlife conservation measure. Sadly, the cross-border bridge between Dürnkrut, Austria and Gajary, still depicted on roadmaps by the Austrian publisher Freytag & Berndt does not exist since 1945! For those entering from Ukraine, there is also a pedestrian-and-cyclists-only border crossing between the small villages of Mali Selmentsi and Veľké Slemence (48.511086 N, 22.154059 E), open only at daytime between 8 AM and 8 PM and only for citizens of the European Economic Area and Ukraine. Holders of different passports will be rejected! This border crossing is of no particular importance to tourists; its main advantage is the absence of queues, which are ubiquitous at border crossings for cars, especially at those on major routes. Instead of waiting several hours, you can get to the other side in a matter of minutes through this border crossing. Conversely, the biggest road border crossing from Ukraine (Uzhhorod-Vyšné Nemecké) is open for motorized traffic only! No pedestrians and cyclists are allowed. The easiest workaround is to find someone who'll get you across the border in their car. Even if you have a bicycle, you'll surely quickly find someone willing to help. Alternately, you can make a detour to the south, to the pedestrian border crossing described in the previous paragraph, or to the north to a border crossing Mali Bereznyj-Ubľa, which is open for all nationalities and round the clock. By plane[edit] Bratislava has its own airport, mostly used by low-cost airlines. Ryanair operates flights to Bratislava from various European cities, inluding London, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Liverpool, Dublin, Rome (Ciampino), Milan (Bergamo), Barcelona (Girona), Brussels (Charleroi), and a few others. These flights can be quite cheap, so if you are arriving from outside Europe, you might end up saving a lot of money by flying to a bigger airport and then connecting to Bratislava. Norwegian Air Shuttle operates flights from Copenhagen and Oslo, and there are also flights to Moscow and Tel Aviv with UTAir and Sun d'or Airlines respectively. Local airline Danube Wings operates flights to Košice. The alternative is the Airport, in Vienna, Austria, which lies just 50 km (30 mi) to the West from Bratislava and serves major airlines, including long-haul and intercontinental flights. Buses leave for Bratislava twice an hour (2 different companies), going from Vienna Airport straight to the city center or to the main bus station in Bratislava. Alternatively, you can take a taxi which will cost around €70. Buses take about an hour, taxis about half that. If you plan to visit only the eastern half of the country (which also includes the High Tatras), an alternative is to fly to the Košice airport, the second largest airport in Slovakia, which has scheduled flights from Vienna, Prague and London. Košice lies only about 1.5h by train from the High Tatras (compared to 4.5 hours from Bratislava). Poprad, a town right underneath the slopes of the High Tatras, also has an international airport of its own, but it is mainly used by charter flights and private jets. Scheduled flights to and from Poprad are infrequent and expensive. The Sliač airport in the central Slovakia currently has no scheduled flights at all. Other options include airports in Prague and Budapest, with both cities about 4 hours away from Bratislava by public transport. There are also direct flights operated between Prague and Košice, in conjunction with flights to Prague providing the most convenient access by plane to the Eastern part of the country. Get around[edit] Train from Bratislava to Košice underneath the High Tatras By train[edit] Train is by far the best option to travel across Slovakia, provided you don't have a private vehicle. Frequent long-haul trains connect all important cities, but there are less local trains, even at main lines. For local transport a bus is generally a better alternative. Trains are fairly priced, with the prices competitive with buses, and cheap by Western standards. For regular tickets, pricing depends only on the distance traveled, and most trains do not require a reservation (and thus do not sell out, though you may have to stand if it is crowded). They are reliable, but delay-prone: it is not usual for a typical run from Kosice to Bratislava to accumulate a delay of more than 30 minutes by the time it reaches Bratislava, so do not plan close connections. Trains are also very safe, but watch out for pickpockets at major stations and steer clear of money scams. Also, sporadic robberies occur to sleeping passengers traveling the overnight long-liners. In Slovakia, the highest class of train is the InterCity service (category "IC"), offering Western-style comfort in all cars. IC trains link Bratislava, Žilina, The High Tatras and Košice and have compulsory reservations. These have fewest stops and can save you from the crowds: ordinary long-distance trains (in which reservation is only optional) do get crowded, usually on Fridays and Sundays or around holidays. Unlike other trains in Slovakia, the price for InterCity tickets changes over time; the sooner you buy, the cheaper (and vice versa). Pricing is available in a PDF online. Ordinary long-distance fast trains, called Rychlik (category "R") trains, stop in most major cities along the main Bratislava - Zilina - Kosice route, with several other branches also serving other parts of Slovakia. These trains typically carry a wide variety of cars offering various quality levels on the same train. If you find yourself unhappy with the comfort of the car you are seated in, it may be worth a walk through the train to see what else is available. Most seating is in 6-person compartments, though most trains also carry one or two cars with open seats. These open seating cars are typically the most modern and offer good air conditioning, power ports, and sometimes free wifi. The compartment cars vary in quality, from heavily worn old-style bench seating with no air conditioning to newly renovated cars with air conditioning and power outlets. Because reservations on these trains cost only 1 Euro, and they can sometimes be crowded, it is often a good idea to purchase a seat reservation. When looking for your reserved seat, look on the doors of each car for the car number, and then look for the slips of paper beside each seat indicating the reservation. If you do not have a reservation, you may sit in any open seat that does not have a reservation card near its seat number, or a card that indicates that it is not reserved for that portion of the trip. Travelling in the 1st class is generally not a good idea, since the price difference is great and the difference in the quality of service is negligible. If you're afraid of the train getting crowded, buy a reservation instead of a 1st class ticket. First class train car can also be packed at peak times and there's a good chance of you having to stand in the aisle (just like you'd have to in the 2nd class), even though you paid almost twice as much money. Riding a EuroCity (EC) train does not require a reservation, but a special surcharge (€1.50) has to be paid when travelling on a domestic ticket (international tickets are exempt from this surcharge). Two EC lines pass through Slovakia: Prague - Žilina - Košice and Prague - Bratislava - Budapest. If you buy an ordinary domestic ticket from, say, Košice to Žilina and don't explicitly specify you'd like to ride an EC train, it won't include the EC surcharge. Fortunately, it's not a big deal if you're caught on an EC train without the surcharge, since you can pay it on board to the conductor, with no extra fine. Many of these long-distance trains typically carry a Restaurant Car, which offers a good selection of food and drinks at prices that are very reasonable and comparable to similar food in a regular restaurant. Some trains will offer a full restaurant with sit-down service and table-cloths, while others will be more of a bistro-car type setting, but all will offer some variety of main dishes, snacks, and desserts. Spending an afternoon enjoying a meal or a drink in the restaurant car can be a great way to take in the High Tatras during that part of the route. Major stations sell international tickets, seat/couchette/sleeper reservations and accept payments by card. Same is true for smaller stations where cross-border traffic is expected, such as the station Devínska Nová Ves (on the border with Austria), and for several stations of the Tatra Electric Railway, which is targeted primarily at tourists. Smaller stations (served only by local commuter trains), which only sell domestic tickets, do not sell reservations and do not accept payments by card. Tatra Electric Railway (TEŽ) Two types of tickets can be used on the Tatra Electric Railway: (1.) ordinary Slovak train tickets, featuring a "From:" and "To:" stations and valid only on a given date. These tickets can be bought at every Slovak railway station. (2.) Zonal tickets (looking like public transport tickets), which can be used on any day and for any single journey (of a specified length). These tickets can only be bought at stations and newspaper stalls around the High Tatras. There is no difference in price, the only difference is flexibility. Both types of tickets have to be validated in a stamping machine inside a TEŽ train immediately after boarding. Trains of the Tatra Electric Railway have no conductors and no ticket selling machines, but since October 2013, train drivers sell day tickets (€4) as a last resort for passengers who cannot obtain a ticket otherwise. Single tickets cannot be bought from train drivers, only outside the train. Passengers are occasionally controlled by plain-clothed ticket inspectors; fine for riding without a valid ticket is €30. More information and fare system here. Starting July 2014, SMS ticket can also be used on the TEŽ network. To take advantage of these, however, a Slovak mobile number is required. It is therefore out of question for short-term visitors. As usual, you should buy a ticket at a station, before boarding a train. If you don't, you can buy a ticket from a train conductor, with a €1.50 surcharge. Of course, if there's no cash desk at a station or it is closed, you can buy a ticket from the conductor with no extra surcharge. Conductors do not sell international tickets. The only exception are tickets called Malý pohraničný styk ("Small cross-border interchange"), which are valid in regional trains only, and only around 40 km from the border. If you're caught without a ticket in an international train leaving Slovakia, the Slovak conductor will ask you to buy a ticket to the border crossing point. Tickets can also be bought over the Internet at SlovakRail. Domestic tickets bought online are now (since 2013) valid for any train or a combination of trains on a given date, same as tickets bought at a station. There is a very limited offer of outgoing international tickets on the SlovakRail website, so normally the only option is to buy international tickets at a station. Since 2014 there are two private train operators in Slovakia: RegioJet operates fast trains between Bratislava - Kosice (usable for reaching High Tatras), fast trains Czech Republic - Zilina - Kosice and local trains Bratislava - Dunajska streda. Tickets are not integrated with the national railway and can be bought online or at some stations. LeoExpres operates fast trains Czech Republic - Zilina - Kosice. Tickets also not integrated and available online. CAVEAT: The SlovakRail's website underwent some major changes in the last months of 2013 and is now rather unusable. Until they fix all the bugs, buying tickets online remains an "Alice in Wonderland"-esque experience. Buttons not working, forms resetting themselves, etc. Your mileage may vary, but in case of problems simply buy your ticket at a station. By bus[edit] By car[edit] Wearing seat belts in cars and vans is compulsory and children aged 11 or younger or lower than 150cm must be placed on the rear seat or on the passenger seat in a proper child seat (of course with the airbag disabled, in case the child seat is rear-facing). Headlights must be switched on when driving at all times, regardless of weather conditions or whether it is a night or day, so switch them on. This is not necessary if your car is equipped with daytime running lamps [15], which are sufficient at daytime. Fines for traffic offences are now much higher than in the neighbouring Austria, especially for speeding. Sadly enough, a western car registration plate can still attract more attention from police officers, so it's another good reason to abide the law. If you intend to drive on the motorways please note that vehicles under 3.5 tonnes must show a mandatory sticker (vignette) covering road toll, in the upper right corner on the car's windshield. The vignette can be purchased from most petrol stations and is valid for 10 days (€10), for a month (€14) or longer (yearly vignette is valid from 1st of January until 31st of January next year, €50). Vignette consists of two parts - sticker that is placed on your windshield and a control coupon where you are required to write your license plate number. If stopped by police on the motorway (quite rare) you have to show this coupon as well. Please note that that the vignette is compulsory on all motorways from the point of entry, and if you are caught without one you will be subject to a hefty fine. If you are renting a car, it most likely is included in the rental, but remember to check or inquire when renting/booking. The motorway bypass around Bratislava (starting on D2 near Lamac and ending on D1 near Zlate Piesky) can be used legally without having the sticker. A separate toll sticker (same price like that for a car, but looking different) is required for any kind of trailer. [16] Always attach it to the windshield of your car (so that you will have two stickers next to each other), not on the trailer itself. This regulation is different than those of most neighbouring countries, where trailers do not require an extra toll sticker. Keep in mind that trains and buses in Slovakia are cheap for Westerners, and (apart from extremely rural areas where people are generally less wary of hitchhikers) it might take a while for someone to pick you up. Therefore, hitchhiking can only be recommended if it's your hobby, not primarily as a means to save money. You can find some offers if you travel from Slovakia and into Slovakia as well on specialized web pages. The biggest hitchhikers page in Slovakia is There you can find offers in English, German, French, Polish, Czech and Hungarian language and it is free. On foot[edit] Hiking signpost in High Tatras There is a long tradition of hiking and mountain walking in Slovakia, and it is an extremely popular sport. The Slovaks have always lived in a close relationship with the nature, and during the Communist period, when travelling abroad was severely restricted, hiking became a national pastime. Most people you meet will have gone on a hike at least once in their life, and many do so regularly, and can give you advice about the most interesting local trails. The trail network is also very well maintained. The quality and efficiency of the sign-posting system is unique in European (and probably World) context. Every route is marked and signposted, different trails being given a different colour. There are four colours used - red, blue, green and yellow. Longest and most strenuous trails are usually marked red, and it is possible to traverse from north-eastern Dukla Pass all the way to the west (Bradlo, near Bratislava) along the Slovak National Uprising Heroes trail (750km) along one such red-marked path. However, the trails are numerous, suitable for various levels of fitness, and many lead through beautiful scenery. In towns, you will usually see a signpost, with arrows pointing in different directions, marking the colour of the path and the average walking times to the nearest set of destinations. All you need to do is to follow the colour, there will be a mark every hundred metres or so, and consists of a 10-cm-by-10-cm square three-section mark where the edges are white and the chosen path's colour in the middle. It is also possible (and highly recommended) to purchase hiking maps of smaller slovak regions. These are based on sets of former military maps, have a very good resolution (1:50000 or 1:25000) and can be purchased from most kiosks, information centres and bookstores for bargain price of between €1.50-2.50. These are published by the Slovak Tourist Club (KST), which maintains all the trails, and show all the marked trails in the area, including the average walking times, which makes route planning very easy and efficient. If you want to plan your hike before you can use a great online map on or The latter one features also bicycle trails and covers also the entire Czech Republic. In mountain areas, you should also buy an insurance for mountains. Emergency rescue service is not covered by normal travel insurance. It costs about 0.50 EUR / day and can be bought in hotels, online ( Mountain rescue service ) or using SMS. By Bicycle[edit] Travelling around by bicycle is arguably the best way to see and enjoy most of this beautiful country. There are caveats, though. Stick to secondary roads with low traffic, as drivers may show little sympathy to cyclists. You can plan your journey using the maps of, which show both official (dark violet) and recommended (light violet) trails. Second, road bikes and their riders might suffer on minor Slovak roads of inferior quality. A touring bike is a better alternative. Wearing a safety helmet is required for cyclists of all ages riding on public roads outside built-up areas, and for children under 15 also within built-up areas. Don't hesitate to complement your journey by taking a train through uninteresting or dangerous sections. A single bicycle ticket costs €1.50 (regardless of the distance) and a day ticket costs €2.50. Almost all trains in Slovakia transport bicycles without hassles, except for InterCity and EuroCity trains, in which a bike either requires a prior reservation (€2.50) or they do not take bikes at all. Day tickets for bikes are not valid in IC an EC trains. Unfortunately, low-floor trains are a rare occurrence in Slovakia (and so far only on regional lines), so be prepared to hoist your bike high up to put it inside the train. Moreover, many railway employees still view cyclists as a nuisance and can be quite unwelcoming. For further cycling tips, check the "Do" section. Slovak is written using the same Roman characters that English uses (with some added accents or diacritics), so Western travellers won't have any trouble reading signs and maps. While some words are tongue twisters, the knowledge of the alphabet including the letters with diacritics will go a long way, as the pronunciation is almost always the same for each letter in every word. Standard Slovak is spoken with stress always on the first syllable (but it may be on the penultimate syllable in some dialects in the east). See[edit][add listing] High Tatras • Vlkolínec, a hamlet high in the mountains, where time stopped in the 19th century [18] • Countless wooden churches in northern and north-eastern Slovakia [19] • Medieval mining towns of Kremnica and Banská Štiavnica Ochtinska Aragonite Cave Buy[edit][add listing] Eat[edit][add listing] Slovak food[edit] Bryndzove Halusky A thick fried slice of cheese served with French fries and a salad is also a common Slovak dish[21]. It is served in most restaurants, and worth trying out, especially the local variety made from smoked cheese ('udeny syr'/'ostiepok') or 'hermelin' (local cheese similar to Camembert). This is not considered a substitute for meat. For more information visit[22]Slovensko. International Cuisine[edit] International fast food establishments can be found in Slovakia as anywhere else in the world, McDonald's can be found in many bigger and smaller cities, KFC and Subway can only be found in larger cities (mostly in big shopping malls). Burger King used to have a single restaurant in Bratislava, but it closed in 2012. Please note that when these fast-food chains arrived shortly after the Velvet Revolution of 1989, they marketed themselves as a cool and trendy dining option for the higher-income people (unlike the USA, where it is more common for lower income classes to eat in McDonald's) and their food is still priced at premium compared to other options of eating out in Slovakia. A full meal (soup/starter + main course) in a cheaper restaurant will cost 1-1.5x the price of a meal combo in McDonald's and might prove a better value. Still, these establishments are reasonably popular, especially with the younger generation. If your plan is to save money by eating fast food, look for restaurants and stalls not affiliated with any international brand. In Bratislava, there is also local fast food named Richman, which is sold in stalls mainly at Šafárikovo námestie [23] and some other locations in the city centre. It is a kebab-like food (meat, vegetables and sauces in a bun), with processed meat or sausages instead of typical kebab meat. Drink[edit][add listing] Non-alcoholic drinks[edit] Alcoholic Beverages[edit] For beers, there are a great variety of excellent local brews that are similar in style and quality to Czech beers (which are also widely available), and beer is mostly the local drink of choice. Try out the Zlatý Bažant, Smädný Mních, Topvar and Šariš. Šariš is also available in a dark version that is thicker and heavier on your stomach. If the local tastes do not satisfy, "Western" beers are sold in the bigger restaurants and pubs. As elsewhere, small local breweries are gaining popularity among beer enthusiasts. One of the best known brands is the Kaltenecker. Especially in the biggest towns and touristy regions, many pubs now offer a range of beers from small breweries, also from the Czech Republic. Do[edit][add listing] The medieval mining town of Banská Štiavnica • Slovakia is also a paradise for cycling enthusiasts. Mountain bikers will especially love networks of legal MTB trails in the following mountain ranges: Malé Karpaty, Veľká Fatra and Štiavnické vrchy, among many others. Less adventurous cyclists can also enjoy paved roads of varying quality (off-limits to cars) in Malé Karpaty, Levočské vrchy and Nízke Tatry (the latter range also features some strenuous climbs), or cycle on the levees along the Danube, Morava and Váh rivers. Sadly, the Slovak Paradise National Park restricts almost all cycling activities on its territory. Road cycling is popular, too, just keep in mind that many Slovak secondary roads are in bad shape. Don't look for the same level of comfort as provided by roads in the Alpine countries. Excellent maps (also downloadable for offline use in your smartphone - for a fee) can be found here: • Visit one of the traditional Carpathian wooden churches [25], they're unique to the region. These might not be readily accessible without a car, however. Domica Cave in Slovak Karst Cultural Events[edit] • International Film Festival Artfilm [26] - Yearly in June/July in Trenčianske Teplice and Trenčín. • International Film Festival Cinematik [27] - Yearly in early September in Piešťany. Young and relatively small film festival. Accreditation for the whole festival is less than €7. • International Film Festival Bratislava [28] - forever in December. Music Events[edit] • Pohoda Music Festival [31] - one of the biggest Slovak music festivals. Annualy in mid-July on an airfield near Trenčín. If it's too boring for you and you'd welcome some water slides and fun, try water parks in Bešeňová, Liptovský Mikuláš, Poprad, Turčianske Teplice, Oravice, Senec and Dunajská Streda. Significantly cheaper are classical open-air pools, some of the best are in Veľký Meder and Štúrovo. Sleep[edit][add listing] There is a wide rangeof accommodation available in Slovakia. These range from [33] AquaCity, based in Poprad, through to budget priced rooms [34] in rental chalets. When hiking, official maintained mountain cabins offer cheap accommodation for hikers on trails in all of the national parks and many of the protected landscape areas. They have a limited number of beds (if any) and generally limited capacity, so for the more frequented places during the high season an advance booking might be necessary and is recommended. If you don't manage to book a bed, you might be allowed to still stay overnight, sleeping on the floor in designated areas. Either way, you will probably want to bring your own sleeping bag. The facilities, due to the location, are limited, but there will be a shared toilet and possibly a shower. There's usually a kitchen that serves several hearty hot dishes and a number of drinks at pretty reasonable prices. For more information about prices and contact for mountain cabins in High Tatras see here. Several mountain ranges (not the High Tatras) also feature unstaffed shelter huts (Slovak: útulňa), where you can legally sleep for free. Don't look for comfort, however. The following is a typical example: [35] Pitching a tent in a national park or a protected landscape area is illegal, but several national parks have officially designated places where you can pitch a tent for a single night (provided you don't leave any mess, of course). Unfortunately, this doesn't include the High Tatras, where the only legal option to sleep during a multi-day trek is in a mountain chalet. If you do pitch a tent in a national park outside of a designated area, there is always a possibility you'll be woken up by a park warden, demanding a fine. This is especially true in the Tatra Mountains and Low Tatra Mountains. Pitching a tent outside national parks and protected landscape areas is in the legal grey area. Under Slovak law, you always require prior consent from the owner of the land to camp on it. Anyway, this rule is not enforced and you'll be okay if you only stay one night on any place, steer clear of private houses and commercial buildings and leave reasonably soon in the morning. If you do plan to stay longer and with a larger group of people, you'll need an official permit, of course. Another option is to sleep in one of numerous camping grounds in Slovakia. (non-exhaustive list): Name Region Location Address Camping Bojnice Bojnice Kopálková Silvia ATC Zlaté Piesky Bratislava Senecká cesta 2 Autocamping Bystrina Demänovská Dolina Tília kemp Gäceľ Dolný Kubín Gäceľská cesta Camping Kamzík Donovaly Autocamping Margita a Ilona Levice-Kalinciakovo Autokemp Levočská Dolina Levoca Autocamping Oravice Liesek Autocamping Turiec s.r.o. Martin Kolóna Hviezda c. 92 Autocamping Slnava II Piestany Autocamping Lodenica Piestany Autocamping Tajov Tajov Eurocamp FICC Tatranská Lomnica Intercamp Tatranec Tatranská Lomnica Vysoke Tatry 202 Autocamping Na Ostrove Trencin Autocamping Trusalová Turany Autocamping Varín Varin Autocamping Vavrisovo Vavrisovo • Camping and Glamping Slovakia, Plachtinské lazy 1, 991 25 Horné Plachtince, Plachtinské lazy 1, 991 25 Horné Plachtince, [36]. A beautiful rural camp site, surrounded by nature. Luxury tents are available to rent or you can pitch your own tent or caravan. (48.241936,19.249947) edit The most important universities in Slovakia include: At the secondary schooling level, there are several bilingual schools in Slovakia. The International Baccalaureate program with international recognition and transferability that is taught entirely in English can be studied at Gymnazium Jura Hronca and The British International School in Bratislava. • [39] - The first state language school in Bratislava Video to help you learn about Slovakia can be found at High Tatras TV [40]. Stay safe[edit] Slovakia is generally safe, even by European standards, and as a visitor you are unlikely to encounter any problems whatsoever. Violent crime is especially uncommon, and Slovakia sees less violent crime per capita than many European countries. Pickpockets are an issue, even though much smaller than in the popular destinations of Western Europe. However, the biggest fear for a traveler is most probably the roads. Stay healthy[edit] The High Tatras might not be the biggest or the most tallest mountain range, but some trails feature strenuous climbs, rocky terrain, and the weather may prove unpredictable. Indeed, the mountains of Slovakia claim several lives every year, also in the summer. Take proper gear, do not overestimate your abilities, and use common sense. Never venture off the marked hiking trails in the national parks (unless you're a skilled mountain climber and with a proper permit)! It is foolish, as well as illegal. In wooded areas, where chances of injury are lower, hiking off the marked trail carries a heightened risk of encoutering a bear. Bears know where the hiking trails are and avoid them at all costs. See the above section for tips, should you run across one. The international calling code for Slovakia is +421. All foreign embassies are located in Bratislava, in the old town part of the city. A list of embassies in Slovakia with contact information can be found on the country's web site [41] If your home country does not have an embassy in Slovakia, the nearest embassy can probably be found in Vienna in Austria, which is readily accessible by train, bus or car from Bratislava. Destination Docents In other languages other sites	http://wikitravel.org/en/Slovakia	dclm-gs1-087650000
0.05597	<urn:uuid:4ec6e12b-4df5-41ee-8270-c034d6f51af1>	en	0.969978	The remarkable story of the terrorist attack on India's largest city, told through the eyes of the victims and the gunmen who committed the atrocity. Terror in Mumbai Reporter: Dan Reed Broadcast: 03/08/2009 It was the 26th November 2008 when ten heavily armed gunmen took over a fishing boat in the Arabian Sea and headed for the city of Mumbai on the west coast of India. An hour later their killing spree began. Their first target was the Leopold Cafe where they killed 11 people. From there they planted bombs inside taxis as the moved across the city. Terror in Mumbai follows the young men every step of the way using telephone calls made between the raid's masterminds in Pakistan and the gunmen in Mumbai. Those calls combine with the testimony of the captured terrorist Ajmal Kasab, to create an extra-ordinary chronology of the attacks. The calls reveal how the young men are continually reminded they must kill as many people as possible, making sure that whatever happens they must not be taken alive. Ajmal Kasab, speaking from his hospital bed tells how he and another man attacked the city's train station slaughtering more than 50 people. The program then hears from the train station survivors who tell how the gunmen coldly cut down innocent people one after another. A young boy describes how six of his family are killed around him. The security forces admit they were overwhelmed and underprepared. Some hid rather than be killed. Others tried to use weapons that would not work and were slaughtered. As the film progresses the relationship between the attackers and their controllers at the other end of the phone comes into clearer focus. At times the young men appear utterly ruthless, at other times they break away from their conditioning and register their wonder at the hotel they have taken over. They talk of computers and expensive furniture as if in a wonderland. As the film progresses the terrorists are told to kill as many people as they can in the Taj Hotel, and then to start a fire. The purpose? To let the world know a symbol of India and the decadent west is being destroyed. As the phone calls continue it becomes clear the young men are not always willing to kill on command. In one chilling episode one gunman is told to kill a hostage. He stalls for time. Then an hour later he is ordered to shoot. A gunshot is heard. The calls do not just document the slaughter of innocent people. As Indian commandos close in on the gunmen inside a Jewish school the phone taps record the last moments of the siege and the gunfight between the opposing sides. One gunman says how he is hit, in the leg and the arm. "Do not be taken alive" he is told. When Lashkar- e-Taiba decided to attack the city of Mumbai they wanted to carry out an attack that would horrify the world. This is the story of that attack from the inside. Terror in Mumbai goes to air on Four Corners Monday 3rd August at 8.30 pm on ABC 1. It is repeated on 4th August at 11.35 pm. Find out more about the November 2008 terror attacks in Mumbai with a selection of related articles and other background information. Have your say in the Four Corners guestbook. Tip Offs If you have information relevant to this story, we'd like to hear about it.	http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2009/s2642355.htm	dclm-gs1-087720000
0.022018	<urn:uuid:8a1d09f7-2ac9-4343-ad79-8c48b37a0f32>	en	0.92718	Dismiss Notice Subscribe to BeerAdvocate magazine? Subscribe now → Lion Stout - Ceylon / Lion Brewery Limited Not Rated. Lion StoutLion Stout Educational use only; do not reuse. very good 878 Reviews (Read More) Reviews: 878 Hads: 1,533 Avg: 3.94 pDev: 15.48% Wants: 64 Gots: 96 \| FT: 0 Brewed by: Ceylon / Lion Brewery Limited visit their website Sri Lanka Style \| ABV Foreign / Export Stout \| 8.80% ABV Availability: Year-round Notes & Commercial Description: Beer added by: BeerAdvocate on 07-28-2001 View: Beers (4) \| Events Beer: Reviews & Ratings Reviews: 878 \| Hads: 1,533 Photo of andrenaline 3.67/5 rDev -6.9% A random score from the local LCBO... A - Pours pitch black with a thumb of big bubbled cola looking head which quickly dissipates leaving no real lacing. S - Burnt grains, dark cocoa and sugary sweetness with a lingering malted milk finish. T - Dark cocoa, burnt toast, leafy greens, hint of burnt sugar sweetness and a touch of ABV heat. Finishes with the dark cocoa and ABV sweetness lingering. M - Medium bodied, surprisingly sweet and finishes wet with a touch of heat. O - Heavy of the burnt characteristics, but tasty nonetheless. The ABV is surprisingly well hidden, making it quite drinkable. I would buy this again and certainly wouldn't pass up the opportunity to drink it if the option were available. 718 characters Photo of sweemzander 3/5 rDev -23.9% 12oz can poured into a snifter. (A)- Pours almost pitch black in color. Some tan froth and lacing. (S)- A raisin heavy roasted maltiness; almost smoky on the finish. (T)- Again, quite heavy on the raisin with subtle molasses combined with an almost smoky but roasted malt profile. (M)- A smooth carbonation level. A good malty balance that is a bit on the lighter side but plenty of flavor. (O)- An easy drinking stout with smooth and mellow carbonation. Surprised this came in cans. 488 characters Photo of soju6 3.87/5 rDev -1.8% A: Pours a black color with a cramy head that fades to nice lacing. S: Aroma of roasted malt, chocolate bit of coffee and dark fruit. T: taste of roasted malt , chocolate and dark fruit. Nice bitterness and c clean finish. F: Full body, rich creamy texture, very well balanced. It’s been years since I have had this but it still as enjoyable as ever. O: Good beer the relax with at the end of the day. Well worth checking out. 435 characters Photo of Beric 3.92/5 rDev -0.5% Serving: 12oz can into tulip glass Served: 3 June 13 Appearance: Incredibly dark. Thick. Pours with a magnificent four finger head that takes a long time to dissipate. Great lacing as the head slowly collapses to a small coating of light brown, frothy bubbles. Smell: Smells rich and roasty. Dark, dark bitter chocolate and dark roasted coffee notes seem to jump out through the black thickness. Taste: The dark, bitter chocolate and roasted coffee seems to really come out in the taste. Unfortunately, I'm also getting some metallic notes from the can, forcing the overall rating down lower than what it should be. Really smooth and goes down easy. You can kind of feel the 8.8% on the very very back end, long after a sip, but the high ABV is masked well by the pleasently complex flavor. Mouthfeel: Smooth and creamy. Thick, just like a foreign extra stout should be. Overall: Wow, a great beer, especially when you consider it comes from and island off the coast of India. 981 characters Photo of maketheheartglad 4.85/5 rDev +23.1% A - It's black with a chocolate milk head. S - It's smells like dark fruit and rum. T - It tatses like dried fruit, particularly prunes (which i like) and rum at the end. M - It feels thick. O - I love it. It is the best stout I've had so far. Sure I've had Guinness . I didn't enjoy Duck-Rabbit's milk stout. I liked North Coast's Old Rasputin, but I like this even more than the others it seems like I can tastes more things. Perhaps the flavors I perceive and enjoy will change in the future. 499 characters Photo of TokyoCO 4.27/5 rDev +8.4% Picked up a bottle in Japan, poured into a goblet. A: Dark black with slight amber on the edges. Large head! S: Sweet malts, milk chocolate, dark fruits. Quite a robust smell. T: Starts off creamy and sweet, fruits are present. More bitter malts and slight chocolate/coffee taste is present in the middle. Ends with bitter chocolate and slight alcohol burn. M: Creamy but not overly heavy. O: This is good! No one taste is overwhelming as it is well balanced. Not as strong coffee and chocolate as a lot of stouts but the sweet malts and fruit are great. Definitely a sipper! 581 characters Photo of GarthDanielson 3.93/5 rDev -0.3% Poured from a bottle into a shaker pint, the beer is a dark, jet black coloring with a thick, dense, light tan head that starts a solid inch and a half, and settles into a filmy coating as you drink. Aromas of coffee, charcoal, bittersweet chocolate, and a hint of molasses. Very balanced aromas of savory and bitter, with highlights of smoke. Flavors of roast and nut on the forward tongue, with a milk chocolate backbone accented by charcoal and smoke. Very smooth flavors that are layered by subtle bitter and camp smoke characteristics. The beer remains smooth and fairly light in mouth, despite the rich and stereotypically heavy flavors. Roasted and smoky aftertaste, with a smooth, slightly dry finish. Very balanced and easily drinkable stout. 751 characters Photo of Oakenator 4.27/5 rDev +8.4% Pours a full black color with no opacity. Very thick head at pour relaxes to around the rim with a very healthy spotted lace on the glass. Aroma is dark, sweet malts with some dark chocolate presence and a hint of black licorice. Flavor is dominated by the dark malts - sweet up front with a mellowed backend. 309 characters Photo of spoony 4.03/5 rDev +2.3% From a 330 ml bottle (with a code that I can't decipher) into a snifter. A-The brew pours heavily, but produces a tall (two-plus fingers) head of brown head. The head drops steadily into a hummocky cap. The beer is nearly black and opaque. Good looking stuff. S-The smell is all dark, roasty malts. It is chocolatey and sweet up front, with a decent dose of sweet, dark fruit (dates and prunes) on the tail end. Some licorice flavor, as well. T-The taste is more complex than the smell. There is still cocoa, licorice, sweet dark fruit, and just a hint of hop bitterness. The malts really dominate here in all of their dark, sweet, roasted glory. The booze creeps up on you; by the end of the glass, the alcohol is noticeably warm on the palate (in a good way) and more fragrant. M-A little thin, with mild to moderate carbonation. Drinkable for the style and ABV. O-I was not sure what to expect here, but I enjoyed this brew. One of my favorite aspects was that it was devoid of coffee/whiskey/brett/barrel-aged gimmickry, but still managed to produce a pretty full-flavored stout. This is not Parabola, and it isn't trying to be, but I sort of like that. 1,162 characters Photo of wowbagger 3.59/5 rDev -8.9% Super thick head, dark like a dirty carpet. Beer isn't black, but it's about the darkest brown I've seen, Smell is yeasty and oaky, slightly sweet. Some sour coffee notes. On the first sip, I'm getting a ton of coffee and some earthiness, none of the oak I smelled. Some chocolate further on. It's velvety and smooth. Well-balanced but not terribly complicated. Overall, I would recommend this one. 401 characters Photo of silverking 4.16/5 rDev +5.6% A- It's pretty mush pitch black with a dark tan head. Head retention is poor. The ring of foam that remains leaves nice lacing down the sides of the glass S- IT smells roasted, almost to the point of being smokey. notes of coffee, cocoa, ad caramel are first noticed in large quantities. Upon further inspection, dark fruits can be found. T- Dark roasted coffee and caramel. A little smokey. The finish shows notes of dark cocoa and dark fruits, figs, black cherry. M- Medium bodied with low amounts of gentle cabonation. O- A big surprise from Sri Lanka. 559 characters Photo of monkbrewed 3.81/5 rDev -3.3% This is a chocolately beer overall, however it's that classic roasted chocolate malt with no real no real chocolate chocolate flavor so you're deceived. It has a good mouthfeel and has good focus of qualities, but lingers in too specific of a range to be considered a classic. Don't let this review fool you, it's a significant achievement from a region of the world that doesn't have a history in this style of beer. It was a Sri Lankan student of mine who recommended this to me and almost concurrently, I discovered it on on my own. Great beer from the south pacific. If you like Youngs Chocolate Stout you will like this as a dialed-back derivation. 653 characters Photo of jmdrpi 3.88/5 rDev -1.5% 330mL bottle. there is a bottle code, but no clear date. almost black in color, with thin khaki colored head. smell is a combination of roasty espresso notes and dark fruit- black cherry, plum. nice. the taste starts with bittersweet chocolate, and then finishes roasty and acidic. thicker bodied with lower carbonation. works well, pretty smooth drinking. overall - a solid beer, good example of the style 410 characters Photo of wvsabbath 3.97/5 rDev +0.8% Serving Type - 22oz bottle 1,279 characters Photo of TwelveOunces 4.25/5 rDev +7.9% 11.2 oz can poured into a snifter A- Pours very motor oil black with a one finger of a frothy tan colored head. Decent head retention. S- Roasty. A slight espresso and caramel note to it. Dry and woody. A slight dark fruit. T- A light roastyness up front. A ton of caramel notes to this beer. It has a bunch of burnt caramel flavors that last the whole way down. A slight smokeyness and char character to this beer. Almost like a smore. This beer has a Slight dark fruit and fruity ester to it. A bit of a sugary caramelized raisin or fig. M- A good feel to this beer. A roasty and dry finish. High carbonation. O- I have nothing bad to say about this beer. It is better out of a glass then the can. A big, solid stout. 725 characters Photo of MaximalC 3.57/5 rDev -9.4% Pours opaque and nearly black, with a modest mocha head that soon recedes into a veil of patchy froth. Aroma is mild, smelling of brown sugar and Saaz-like hops. The taste is bolder than the aroma would suggest, with a roasty molasses flavor, raisins, and far more alcohol than would typically manifest on the front end, even for a beer with a rather high ABV such as this. A stickiness lingers on the lips after sipping. The hop presence, while not especially strong, doesn't seem to meld very well with the malt, lending something of a two-faced dynamic to the flavor profile. Even the finish is conflicted, with a rather enjoyable roasted coffee aftertaste being subjugated by an artificial, metallic flavor that I'm more used to encountering in Baltic porters. This could almost pass for a Baltic porter if I didn't know any better. Acetaldehyde is also noticeable. The mouthfeel has fairly nice body and texture and is on par for the style, making it one of this beer's stronger suits. While this stout affords bold flavor and nice body, there is little in the way of synergy holding it together, and the alcohol becomes overbearing as the beer warms, making sipping a near necessity. Not a bad stout, but a bit too all-over-the-place for my tastes. 1,255 characters Photo of flyingpig 4.23/5 rDev +7.4% 330ml bottle from The Cave, Glasgow: Deep, mahogany brown on closer inspection. It is topped with a foamy, light brown coloured head about half a centimetre tall which manages to hold very well indeed, particularly for the strength of the beer; it barely budges other than a very slight initial reduction of no more than a millimetre. Rich malts to begin along with a strong, dark chocolate aroma that is also quite rich and hints at some sweetness along with some sugar and a bit of cocoa. There is some darker fruits present, notably cherries and there is also some roasted malts and a faint amount of alcohol towards the end. A nice mix of cherries and various other darker fruits. There is also a good blend of rich malts, chocolate and sweet, roasted malts that are pretty well balanced and seem to work well together. I also seemed to taste a slightly milky flavour somewhere near the middle and some slight bitterness right at the end. Medium in body, slightly tangy and with a nice fruity character. There is medium to high carbonation and a nice amount of alcohol lingering in the background too. Quite an unusually fruity stout but a very nice one nonetheless with a lot going on, especially with the depth of character in the smell. This one is certainly up there with the best stouts I have tried to date. 1,322 characters Photo of ThisWangsChung 3.15/5 rDev -20.1% 11.2 oz bottle into a pint glass. A: Pours a very dark red color with nice opacity. The head is a huge, foaming three finger khaki color that descends to one finger after a while. Plenty of lacing is left behind, as well. S: Big, massive, hugely sweet chocolate. Some dark fruits, as well. Actually, come to think about it, there's a minor whiff of sour cherries - infection, perhaps? We shall see. I still enjoy the aroma greatly, but that foamy head should have been a giveaway. T: The flavor takes on more of a roasted barley and coffee bean tone, especially at first, while waves of chocolaty sweet and - unfortunately - tart cherries seemingly via an onsetting infection. After a while, the tartness takes center stage. Some herbal hop flavors also try to pop up in the finish, as well. So what we have here is a lightly soured stout, and it kind of works. Not perfectly by any means, but there's enough sweetness here to keep it in check. M: Quite light in its loafers with wimpy carbonation. There's actually an esophageal burn and a bit of stomach turning which completely tanks the mouthfeel score for me. On the palate proper, it's not particularly dry, but nicely bittersweet'n'sour; whatever the blue hell that's supposed to mean. O: Infected - it just has to be. But thank Odin it's a minor infection that actually gives it a pleasant twist, instead of twisting my mouth sideways and dissolving my tongue. This clearly isn't the final product as it's intended to be - thankfully I have a penchant for a good Flemish-style ale along side my stout tooth, so I still think it's quite okay. If you're bottle has "123881841" on it, just be wary. 1,659 characters Photo of KajII 3.56/5 rDev -9.6% [Suggested Glassware: Snifter] The pour was a murky pitch black with an average (1-2 finger) chocolate shake brown creamy head that was mostly diminishing, down to a thin film and medium collar that pretty much lasted throughout and had good sticky lacing. The aroma was of a roasted dark malt, mild resin hops and a leathery yeast with notes of chocolate, dried dark fruit (prunes) and a nice mild alcohol tinge. The taste was very malty and just a tad sweet with a hint of chocolate early on, then progressed with a mild bitterness, a touch of dark fruit and a bold coffee note towards the finish. The flavor hung on for a decent duration after the swallow with a smooth choco-coffee taste and a mild alcohol warming sensation at the end. Mouthfeel was medium in body with a thin oily texture and a medium carbonation. Overall this was a nice a roasty brew, although I did find it to be just a little thin for a stout it did possess very nice taste and a great drinkability... 1,026 characters Photo of peensteen 3.85/5 rDev -2.3% Basically pitch black in colour, finger of tan head, good retention, solid lace as well. Smell is of dark chocolate, coffee and a huge roasted malt bill, bits of dark fruit come and go, milk chocolate as it warmed up. Taste is fairly roasted up front with milk chocolate, moderate sweetness, mild bitterness as well as some coffee and dark fruit in the finish. Medium carbonation, medium full body, nice full creamy feel here. Nice stuff and quite drinkable overall, certainly got my $2.05 worth on this one. 508 characters Photo of pjohnston007 2.31/5 rDev -41.4% Poured it and then sat down to drink it while reading the reviews on here. Noticed the first swig full of flavor and inviting. It was all downhill from there. It started getting sickly sweet or something offensive. I'm not sure if it was the mouthfeel or the flavors. Before a gag reflex set in, I rushed to the sink and poured the glass and what remained in the bottle down the sink. I switched to a Sam Adams Winter Lager but that would not enough to cleanse my palate. There's a reason a large bottle of this is only $3.50. Stay away. 537 characters Photo of superspak 3.68/5 rDev -6.6% 330 ml bottle into tulip glass, bottled on 6/9/2011. Pours pitch black color with a nice 2 finger dense mocha head with fantastic retention, that reduces to a nice cap that lingers. Some nice soapy lacing clings to the glass. Aromas of raisin, apple, dark chocolate, roasted malt, caramel, molasses, herbal, light char, coffee, and earthiness. Nice aromas with good strength and balance; quite a bit on the fruity side. Taste of big dark chocolate, roasted malt, char, caramel, raisin, molasses, apple, light coffee, herbal, and earthiness. Fair amount of herbal bitterness on the finish; with lingering notes of dark chocolate, roasted malt, caramel, molasses, light fruit, and herbal on the finish for a good bit. Good balance of roasted flavors with light herbal hoppiness; slight amount of cloying flavors on the finish. Medium carbonation and medium-full body; with a creamy, chalky, and slick mouthfeel that is good. Alcohol is very well hidden with only a small warming present on the finish. Overall this is a good foreign stout. Some nice robust roasted flavors with good complexity; quite smooth to sip on. A bit cloying at times, but is a nice sipper. 1,162 characters Photo of BossHogg 4.45/5 rDev +12.9% A: Dark brown, with brown foam. Looks like dark chocolate, or coffee. S: Smells of roasted cocoa, nuts, and perhaps a little malty. T: I taste the cocoa and caramel, but my taste buts keep getting some roasted nuts in there as well. An odd, but delicious combination of bitter and sweet. That 8.8% ABV isn't even noticable. M: Not very heavily carbonated. Silky O: This isn't a beer you drink 4-5 of. This beer is heavy and mind blowingly delicious. Once I stop trying beers, I imagine I'll come back to this one a few times. 525 characters Photo of CMUbrew 2.32/5 rDev -41.1% 11.2 oz bottle into a snifter A: Pours very black, and looks fairly viscous. About a finger an a half of brown head which dissipates somewhat quickly. Looks like a nice stout. S: Here's where the trouble starts. Smell is quite strange. Somewhere between skunky and slightly sour. Highly grainy. Not good. T: Grainy, with a bad lactic sourness in there. Pretty weak roasted flavor. Some dark fruit, dates. Crappy, highly tannic coffee on the finish. M: Might not have been bad here if it wasn't for the high astringency. O: Not pleasant. Drainpour. Big disappointment. Pricepoint is the only reason behind the 2.5 here. Really sad I bought two bottles. 659 characters Photo of thierrynantes 3.95/5 rDev +0.3% Beer bottle (33 cl.) purchased from La Cave de l'inattendu, and tasted in 2012. Appearance : black color, with tan foamy head. Smell : sweet malty with roasted aromas. Taste & mouthfeel : roasted flavors with intense dark chocolate finish. Drinkability : a good beer in the style Foreign Stout. 295 characters Lion Stout from Ceylon / Lion Brewery Limited 88 out of 100 based on 878 ratings.	http://www.beeradvocate.com/beer/profile/389/1115/?view=beer&sort=latest&start=75	dclm-gs1-087940000
0.035103	<urn:uuid:20ec0b5d-52b8-4471-b461-ca5e7e29e74d>	en	0.938347	information superhighway Internet-type global network of computers that, potentially, will connect most of world's individuals, firms, and organizations. It is envisioned to provide very high speed access to information in all forms (text, graphics, audio, video) via a telephone or wireless connection. The term was first used in 1985 by the 45th US Vice President (1993-2001) Al Gore (born 1948) in an American context where every citizen is aimed to be so connected. Use this term in a sentence • With the proper employee connections we have on certain website forums, we can potentially have the power of a information superhighway at our disposal. 5 people found this helpful • You need to be able to use the information superhighway for all that it is worth if you want to be able to keep up. 9 people found this helpful • It was the information superhighway and people could gain access to all kinds of new information that they could not in the past. 2 people found this helpful Show more usage examples... Related Videos Popular 'Data Management, Communications, & Networks' Terms Have a question about this term? Ask for help in the	http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/information-superhighway.html	dclm-gs1-088020000
0.121366	<urn:uuid:2828922b-35db-4167-ba27-6b05e44b6ec2>	en	0.938698	Tag Archives: Irving Kirsch How FDA and Big Pharma mislead millions into taking dangerous anti-depressants Here in the States, where pharmaceuticals are advertised in newspapers and magazines, radio, and especially TV, anyone seeing happy actors proclaiming how and an anti-depressant changed their lives can almost demand that drug from even a primary care physician, and usually get it. A limited hangout is intelligence spook speak for letting out just enough information to appease investigations or grass roots suspicions. But only part of the picture is revealed, not the whole big picture…CBS did not reveal the horrible side effects from anti-depressants and psychotropic drugs. They did interview a British medical official who was part of a UK commission that banned anti-depressant use on mild to moderately depressed patients.Even Medscape lists these side effects from SSRI and SNRI anti-depressants: Abnormal bleeding, hepatitis, headache, hyponatrenia (potentially deadly low sodium), toxic epidermal necrolysis (potentially deadly skin death), impotence, abnormal sensations, mania and suicide. “These are the studies that show no benefit of the antidepressant over the placebo. What they did was they took more successful studies – they published most of them – and they took their unsuccessful studies, and they didn’t publish that…. If they were mildly or moderately depressed, you don’t see a difference at all. The only place where you get a clinically meaningful difference is at these very extreme levels of depression,” Irving Kirsch tells 60 Minutes. Harvard Expert Ties Mental Illness “Epidemic” to Big Pharma’s Agenda For any mental illness or passing mood swing that may trouble a person, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders — better known as the DSM — has a label and a code. Recurring bad dreams? That may be a Nightmare Disorder, or 307.47. Narcolepsy uses the same digits in a different order: 347.00. Fancy feather ticklers? That sounds like Fetishism, or 302.81. Then there’s the ultimate catch-all for vague sadness or uneasiness, General Anxiety Disorder, or 300.02. That’s a label almost everyone can lay claim to.Drug companies are particularly eager to win over faculty psychiatrists at prestigious academic medical centers. Called “key opinion leaders” (KOLs) by the industry, these are the people who through their writing and teaching influence how mental illness will be diagnosed and treated. They also publish much of the clinical research on drugs and, most importantly, largely determine the content of the DSM. In a sense, they are the best sales force the industry could have, and are worth every cent spent on them. Of the 170 contributors to the current version of the DSM (the DSM-IV-TR), almost all of whom would be described as KOLs, ninety-five had financial ties to drug companies, including all of the contributors to the sections on mood disorders and schizophrenia. America conned: Psycho pharma drug pushing empire under fire Is America truly stricken with widespread mental illness? Do tens of millions need mind-altering drugs? A recent flurry of media articles lead readers to a realization that Big Pharma and the “mental health” industry have deceived Americans on a grand scale. Dr. Angell’s review has sparked a host of other journalists to applaud her and fuel the fire. An article in Forbes even concludes, “psychopharma is looking like an idea whose time has passed.” The Small Group of Thoughtful, Committed Citizens Has Been Drugged Movements for justice have historically been driven by a small percentage of any population. One percent of Americans nonviolently occupying Washington, D.C., could make Cairo and Madison and Madrid look like warm-up acts. It is certainly true that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens is the only thing that ever has changed the world for the better. So, what happens if a society picks out a significant slice of its population, one including many thoughtful and committed citizens, and drugs them?	http://www.cchrint.org/tag/irving-kirsch/	dclm-gs1-088050000
0.021903	<urn:uuid:edd43a51-cedf-434b-8a2b-bbe9dd12de9a>	en	0.901762	Skip Navigation Consistent and Inconsistent Linear Systems Systems with parallel or intersecting lines Atoms Practice Practice Consistent and Inconsistent Linear Systems Practice Now Who Done It? Have you ever wondered how police use eyewitness statements to solve crimes? After interviewing several witnesses, it might at first seem impossible to find out “whodunit,” but if investigators think of the collection of statements as a system of equations, they can start to put together the pieces of the puzzle. Why It Matters If one witness says the bad guy has black hair and is a man, while another one insists the criminal is female and blond, their statements are inconsistent. Based on these two statements, no conviction can be made. If two eyewitnesses both say that the criminal is an elderly gentleman with gray hair, a conviction still can’t be made. That’s because these are dependent statements. To make a conviction, an officer of the law needs two independent statements that are consistent with each other. For instance, “The bank robber was middle-aged man with a red beard,” and “The man who held up the bank was had a tattoo on his left arm.” This same principle applies to system of equations: whether the equations are consistent, inconsistent, dependent, or independent will determine the number of solutions. Take a look at what happens when inconsistent statements are given in court: Explore More Watch the video below to learn more about how forensic scientists use witness testimony to solve crimes. Image Attributions Please wait... Please wait... Original text	http://www.ck12.org/algebra/Consistent-and-Inconsistent-Linear-Systems/rwa/Who-Done-It/r1/	dclm-gs1-088090000
0.113591	<urn:uuid:3183a783-fff3-4322-9938-3469181a842c>	en	0.983892	FRASIER star Kelsey Grammer is disgusted with his plush new home - because he finds it too big. The Virgin Islands-born actor and his wife Camille have opted to move from their original two-bedroom home in Malibu, California, to a 1,765 square metre (19,000 square foot) seven bedroom abode because they have a second child due in September (04). But Grammer admits he's far from impressed with his grand new home. He says, "I hate the new house! It's a big house. It's big and it's obnoxious and it's ostentatious. "We have to move because we have the new child coming. We can't add on a bedroom. We only have a two-bedroom house in Malibu so we had to buy that for the new kid. "What happens is you have to staff the house properly. They have to have someplace to sleep. We have a nanny. The problem is, actually, I feel like I'm too middle-class for all this stuff. It just feels weird to me. But I'll be okay. I could have worse problems." 27/04/2004 21:25	http://www.contactmusic.com/kelsey-grammer/news/grammer-hates-grand-new-home	dclm-gs1-088210000
0.085447	<urn:uuid:6a7df917-62b4-4d20-a462-210a92dbdd98>	en	0.960309	Comments about ‘Sen. Orrin Hatch says gay marriage inevitable but religious rights being lost’ Return to article » Published: Wednesday, May 28 2014 5:50 p.m. MDT • Oldest first • Newest first • Most recommended Tranquility, UT "But yes, the laws of this country ought to reflect the majority, especially when having been voted upon, including the laws that regulate business and commerce (also including the associated definition of marriage)." So, should Arkansas be able to vote to disallow Mormons the right to marry? or to do business? Keep in mind that LGBTs make up 3-5% of the population. While Mormons make up 0.2%. Under our Constitution, people have rights. And the majority can't vote on those rights, however much they would like. The Supreme Court has found 14 times since 1888 that marriage is one of those rights protected by the equal protection clause. And judge, after judge, after judge has found that that continues to be the case. We cannot vote away a group's rights without compelling secular reasons to do so. And so far, the anti-gay groups have failed to provide any good reasons whatsoever. Phoenix, AZ Bob K "Many who believe in God do not believe he created your Gay sons and daughters to be 2nd or 3rd class citizens..." God created men and women with imperfections and foibles that He asks be overcome. Same sex attraction seems to be one such imperfection. "...not able to marry who they love." Sounds like you favor a variety of marriage combinations such as polygamy, incest, etc. "So, please Mr. Senator, name 1 religious right that was lost with Judge Shelby's ruling?" The Shelby ruling will be the eventual downfall of marriage. If the SSM push succeeds, all other types of marriages must be approved to avoid the claim of discrimination. Therefore, marriage will become undefined and worthless. Jeff in NC: "...states can keep all their rights, but the fed gov't should continue to protect the rights a state tries to deprive unreasonably to a small minority of its citizens." What rights? If marriage, all citizens have the right to marry... provided they meet certain State requirements such as: not currently married, not closely related, not children, not same sex, etc. Apo, AE @Ernest Bass-- You answered your own question. Religious people who believe the Old Testament teachings that homosexuality is an abomination are being labeled by people such as you as being bigoted. Attitudes such as yours are removing religious freedoms from believers by using such hateful language toward those who are practicing their right to believe that homosexuality is a sin. The whole gay movement is one of bullying anyone who disagrees with them by using hateful words to describe anyone who disagrees with them. That's sick. Eventually you'll likely win in this anything goes society. The next step is the mind control of our children when the gay movement insists on teaching it's "normality" in the schools. The issue of same sex marriage goes far beyond the church and courtrooms. This is about redefining an entire belief system. Parker, AZ I think it is wonderful that same sex couples can now marry and live their chosen lives out in the open and not as second class citizens. Now I hope they will support atheists who are more discriminated against, more hated, and the very least represented in public office in this country. Tranquility, UT But they are still free to hold their beliefs. Freedom doesn't include the right not to be criticized for your beliefs, just the freedom to hold, teach and preach them. The KKK considers itself a "Christian organization." And they hold their beliefs in white superiority to be god given. They are free to believe such, free to teach it, and recruit others who feel the same. That doesn't make them any less racist. It just makes them "racists for god." Cleveland , OH @SignsoftheTimes: "Religious people who believe the Old Testament teachings that homosexuality is an abomination are being labeled by people such as you as being bigoted." so… You have the religious freedom to call me an abomination. If I point out that that attitude seems to be bigoted, then I am taking away your religious rights. Is that correct? You can call names, but responding to your name-calling is discrimination? Pointing out your name calling and saying it's not acceptable in public is oppression? Just want to make sure I understand the rules. Phoenix, AZ "No one will force you into a homosexual marriage against your will." Schools are already required to teach impressionable kids that homosexuality is normal. If that ain't force, I don't know what is. "The idea that traditional marriage is under attack is ludicrous." Marriage is under attack. If/when SSM is OK'd all other types of marriage combinations will have to be approved to avoid unconstitutional discrimination. Then it's good-bye marriage. "I notice that no gays have gone after a Muslim baker to get a gay wedding cake." Why would the author of the dark side want to interfere with two very well working parts of the plan? "First of all, Hatch needs to pick a position. His politician-style waffling is sickening." Politicians rarely if ever take positions... Avoids the change of getting pinned down on an issue. "with all due respect to the Senator, I don't see how my religious rights are being degraded." That condition is down the road. If/when SSM is OK'd churches will not be able to discriminate by denying marriages as a church ritual. And that would include Hatch's church. Brigham City, UT Those for equality under the Constitution need to be out there promoting polygamy next; I want to see Senators Schumer, Biden, and all the others promoting this next, if they are consistent. Phoenix, AZ "And yes, polygamous marriage ought to be allowed between consenting adults." What about incestuous marriages. What about child/adult marriages. And what about you and a group of your fiends, both male and female, all tying the same knot with each other? Maybe toss a pet and a favorite tree inro the mix. And why did you throw in 'consenting adults?' Is that not discrimination against children? I think you'll find that the best set-up for marriage to preserve it from eventual obliteration is to limit it to one man/woman. "Now if the government were to force any church, the LDS church, for example to marry gay couples in its temples, that would be an gigantic infringement on religious rights." You can count on that very thing happening with legalized SSM. There's your First Amendment religious rights down the drain. Rocket Science: "If SSM is inevitable these questions are relevant: Will churches maintain tax exempt status if they do not conform?" NO! There goes your freedom of religion. "Will public schools teach that SSM is the same as traditional marriage..." It's currently a requirement in alotta schools. San Diego, CA As long as opponents persist in talking about pets and trees they won't be take seriously, as they shouldn't be. Laws dealing with most rights refer to adults, as in the case of the right to own guns, and the right to vote. Consenting adults are necessary for marriage. No children, no pets, no trees. No forced marriage. Now polygamy in my opinion should be legal as long as the details of taxation and divorce can be worked out. Marriage of close relatives is sticky as long as they can breed. Petersburg, AK The idea that it is inevitable but wrong, when viewed alongside the other changes to our government in just my lifetime, let alone Orin's, reminds me of the news reports where somebody continues to live with their dead spouse's corpse. When the things that made America great (having Christian morality and the natural law as the highest law of the land), when those things are stripped off, all we have left is an empty lifeless corpse. Stable thought These comments are always fascinating to me. I noticed comments that note the next great social debate " can I not marry any one (including multiples ) that I love" are largely being ignored by my progressive friends. Oh the hypocrisy! Seattle, WA @Stable thought A lot of people have already responded in these Deseret News comments explaining exactly why the slippery slope argument is invalid and unconvincing. You will notice that none of the lawyers arguing against same-sex marriages are relying on the slippery slope argument and the dozens of judges who have now confirmed that same-sex marriage is a legal right recognize that it will not cause marriage to slip into ruin. If you are really concerned of same-sex marriage inevitably leading to the legalization of marriages to multiple partners or non-consenting partners, I encourage you to spend some time reading about the topic. I think you will find the opinions of legal scholars and the actual results in places where SSM has been legal for a long time very reassuring. Stable thought @ Tiago......Non consenting? The future of the definition of marriage is now in flux and will be tested in the courts, it shall interesting. Salt Lake City, UT "Those for equality under the Constitution need to be out there promoting polygamy next" That's as logical as if I were to expect you to support bans on interracial marriage because you don't support same-sex marriage. These are separate issues. to comment About comments	http://www.deseretnews.com/user/comments/865604073/Sen-Orrin-Hatch-says-gay-marriage-inevitable-but-religious-rights-being-lost.html?pg=7	dclm-gs1-088310000
0.65551	<urn:uuid:2185643d-6187-4723-96c9-296248b7d9b6>	en	0.976691	Show Your Working Introversion is outing everything about Darwinia+. Emails, design docs, the lot. Chris Delay explains. You could never criticise the guys at Introversion for not sharing their views of the world. From swearing at the mainstream industry during their Independent Games Festival acceptance speech, to Chris Delay's detailed and heartrending posts about exactly how bad their 2008 turned out to be, they have always been impressively open about what they've been thinking while making their chain of splendid independent games. But as they work on Darwinia+, the Xbox Live Arcade version of that IGF Grand Prize winner (also incorporating last year's Multiwinia), they've gone a step further, and taken to open development. They've posted everything from emails to design documents to Microsoft feedback reports and, well, just go and look at the treasure trove. For anyone with the slightest interest in how games are made, it's invaluable. What provoked them to do this? It's an oblique form of marketing for an ever-oblique game. "Anything Darwinia-related is incredibly difficult trying to promote," Delay tells Eurogamer. "It's incredibly strange-looking. It's never done well in adverts or screenshots. They don't really work. With Multiwinia, we spent more than we ever did before and did a whole load of videos which tried to simplify and explain the game. We tried to do a portal style video. Because Portal's not an immediately graspable idea when you just look at pictures. We tried to take a leaf out of Valve's book and do that... and weren't really that successful or garnered any attention. "Coming around to Darwinia+, the question came up. 'What on earth are we going to do?' Darwinia's already out. Multiwinia's already out. The game's already released. How is this not just 'those games again on Xbox'? How are we going to get people interested?" How indeed. "We thought, 'How about we publish every email we ever did with Microsoft, right back to the start?'" This rapidly grew to become the whole open development concept. Darwinian Wicker Man cosplay is always popular, except with the people who get burnt alive. "Xbox development is really closed," says Delay. "You can't get anyone to say anything about anything. Let's turn that around and open it up. Publish all the emails, publish our reports and design documents, publish what it's like to work with a company that's four orders or magnitude larger than ours. Sometimes, there were issues dealing with a big company like Microsoft. You only tend to hear about it... well, you either get stony silence or every now and then a developer will be let loose from the asylum and will suddenly rant. And that's all you get." In other words, when a developer breaks silence, they've done so because they're at their most furiously bitter. This isn't an accurate portrait. "And it's not a rational opinion," says Delay. "They'd probably look back on that and think that it doesn't reflect their opinion at all - it reflects how they felt on the day. But that's on the record now. So forever 'Jeff Minter hates Microsoft' or whatever. He said that once, and was very bitter because the game hadn't sold that well. But when Multiwinia hadn't sold that well, we did all kinds of things, many of which remained within the walls of Introversion. Some of it leaked out, because you can't help it. It's not a sterile, purely business business, making games." Since it could be so revealing, it does beg the question of what Microsoft would make of one of their developers wanting to do a kiss and tell even when they're still kissing. "We thought we'd ask them, and we'd ask different people at Microsoft, to compare all the negative responses we got. To see who was the least negative and start work on them..." says Delay, "but they liked the idea." Comments (22)	http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/show-your-working-interview	dclm-gs1-088480000
0.024386	<urn:uuid:0c904842-f32f-448b-afc5-7f28f001357b>	en	0.934573	Bellefontaine Examiner Switch to desktop Go For the Food: Athens, Ohio, diner a must-taste ATHENS, Ohio (AP) — There's a reason there is almost always a wait at the Court Street Diner here. The menu is heavy on simple favorites: thick slabs of meatloaf, fries piled so high they tumble off the plates, creamy whipped milkshakes. It's classic American fare that doesn't take too much imagination to create or explaining to appreciate. But it's done so well, it doesn't much matter. The diner, popular with students from nearby Ohio University and local residents alike, isn't the place for those counting calories. The omelets are made with four eggs, ranch dressing is an option for the burgers, and the grilled cheese sandwich comes as a double-decker, thank you very much. That's before the desserts. Three-layer chocolate cake slathered with icing, mint ice cream pie and fudge brownies served hot with ice cream are just a few of the options. This is not a restaurant acquainted with moderation. The polished silver diner sits in the middle of an area known as Uptown, where Court Street is made of the same red brick found throughout the university just two blocks away. If there is a wait — and there usually is — plenty of nearby shops can keep visitors busy exploring the quirky college town. The menu focuses on greasy spoon-style offerings and does not try to reinvent diner favorites or modernize anything. This is not high-brow food or a reinterpretation of what mom made. Ketchup and mustard are on the table in plastic squeeze bottles and the napkins are paper. While deciding on an entree, order a made-from-scratch cinnamon roll for the table to share. The hulking pastries are served warm and laden with buttercream icing. It doesn't matter if the sun has set; these breakfast treats are an indulgence worth having any time of day. Breakfast is served all day, inviting guests to try what the Court Street Diner calls Huevos Locos: a bed of hash browns piled with scrambled eggs, onions, ham, jalapenos, red and green peppers, all of which then is topped with cheddar cheese and salsa. It's intimidating when it arrives on the table. A lunch favorite is the patty melt. The beef burger piled high with sauteed onions and melted yellow American cheese is served on grilled marbled rye. It's a throwback for sure, but one that goes well with the salty fries and pickle spears on the side. For dinner? Grab the juicy meatloaf, piled atop mashed potatoes, of course. Served in a portion large enough to share, the slab of the diner specialty manages to stay moist without being greasy, and the edges have a nice crunch. Since the meal already has blown your caloric budget, you might as well order a strawberry shake served in its blending tin and topped with whipped cream from a can. Located a little more than an hour outside Columbus, the college town in the foothills of southeast Ohio is home to plenty of other dining options, as well. Around the corner from the Court Street Diner, Zoe's serves dishes based on seasonal produce and local farms. The lemon risotto on a recent visit was bright and fresh and can be topped with whatever fresh seafood the chef eyes. Up the block, Stephen's on Court is a bit more upscale, but still in keeping with this town's chill vibe. For those looking for a snack, Donkey Coffee and Espresso, tucked on a side street just off Court, has hand-crafted drinks and a rotating selection of baked goods and pastries. Live music is a frequent — and free — source of entertainment in the rear room. Closer to campus, Jackie O's BrewPub and the next-door Public House offer bar snacks such as fried cheese curds, kettle chips and pizzas, as well as Celtic music and open stage nights. The real draw, though, is the rotating list of house-made beers. The Razz Wheat, a raspberry wheat ale, is sweet without being syrupy. The Tongue Thai'd is a spicy version of an IPA that has plenty of bite. And the Black Betty, a raspberry and vanilla porter, is a terrific after-dinner option. If anyone can handle anything else after that meatloaf, of course. If You Go: COURT STREET DINER: 18 N. Court St., Athens, Ohio, 740-594-8700 ZOE'S: 24 1/2 E. State St., Athens, Ohio, 740-592-4443 STEPHEN'S ON COURT: 66 N. Court St., Athens, Ohio, 740-594-7132 DONKEY COFFEE AND ESPRESSO: 17 1/2 W. Washington St., Athens, Ohio, 740-594-7353 JACKIE O'S: 22 W. Union St., Athens, Ohio, 740-592-9686 Share this post Submit to FacebookSubmit to Google BookmarksSubmit to TwitterSubmit to LinkedIn	http://www.examiner.org/newsx/ohio-news/36235-go-for-the-food-athens-ohio-diner-a-must-taste	dclm-gs1-088490000
0.025088	<urn:uuid:b3bb81fd-6632-447e-84e8-2f03530bf40e>	en	0.824647	Skip site navigation (1)Skip section navigation (2) FreeBSD Man Pages Man Page or Keyword Search: Man Architecture Apropos Keyword Search (all sections) Output format home \| help MD5(1) FreeBSD General Commands Manual MD5(1) md5, sha1, sha256, sha512, rmd160 -- calculate a message-digest finger- print (checksum) for a file The md5, sha1, sha256, sha512 and rmd160 utilities take as input a mes- sage of arbitrary length and produce as output a ``fingerprint'' or ``message digest'' of the input. It is conjectured that it is computa- tionally infeasible to produce two messages having the same message digest, or to produce any message having a given prespecified target mes- sage digest. The MD5, SHA-1, SHA-256, SHA-512 and RIPEMD-160 algorithms are intended for digital signature applications, where a large file must MD5 has been completely broken as far as finding collisions is concerned, and should not be relied upon to produce unique outputs. This also means that MD5 should not be used as part of a cryptographic signature scheme. At the current time (2014-05-17) there is no publicly known method to ``reverse'' MD5, i.e., to find an input given a hash value. SHA-1 currently (2014-05-17) has no known collisions, but an attack has been found which is faster than a brute-force search, placing the secu- rity of SHA-1 in doubt. It is recommended that all new applications use SHA-256 instead of one of the other hash functions. -c string -s string Print a checksum of the given string. Does nothing when combined with the -ptx options. -t Run a built-in time trial. -x Run a built-in test script. The md5, sha1, sha256, sha512 and rmd160 utilities exit 0 on success, 1 if at least one of the input files could not be read, and 2 if at least one file does not have the same hash as the -c option. cksum(1), md5(3), ripemd(3), sha(3), sha256(3), sha512(3) dedicated hash functions. Secure Hash Standard (SHS): The RIPEMD-160 page: Data Security. FreeBSD 10.2 May 17, 2014 FreeBSD 10.2 Want to link to this manual page? Use this URL: home \| help	http://www.freebsd.org/cgi/man.cgi?query=sha256&sektion=1	dclm-gs1-088580000
0.022003	<urn:uuid:f930ad67-de68-49f7-b89c-b4b896b8518a>	en	0.982612	Military trials threaten Egypt's democracy An Egyptian army general lectures anti-government demonstrators while touring Tahrir Square on February 5, 2011 in Cairo, Egypt. The army had been widely viewed as an ally of the revolution but that perception quickly faded once the army took power.</p>  CAIRO — Through three decades of iron-fisted rule, Hosni Mubarak suspended the rights of 2,000 civilians and ordered them to face military tribunals in a campaign to crush the Islamist opposition that threatened his rule.  The military courts, which were empowered by Egypt’s so-called Emergency Law, were seen as a violation of the Egyptian constitution and of international law and their use ignited a firestorm of criticism by human rights activists around the world.  Now in the aftermath of demonstrations against such human rights abuses that led to the toppling of Mubarak in February, Egypt’s ruling military council has hauled 12,000 civilians before similar military tribunals — six times the number under Mubarak in just 10 months, according to a report by Egypt’s leading human rights organization.  So it’s understandable that human rights activists in Egypt and abroad are asking what has really changed, and whether the ‘January 25 Revolution’ has ushered in a military coup that is far surpassing the Mubarak regime’s erosion of civil rights. On the eve of the November 28 election, a mounting anger directed against the military has triggered more protests and more violent crackdowns in and around Tahrir Square.  And the role of the military in a new Egypt is now perhaps the central question in the upcoming series of parliamentary elections and the process of adopting a new constitution.  “We thought it was a transitional period and the change is happening. We found out that the transition hasn’t even begun,” said Hossam Bahgat, director of the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, which led independent investigations into violations committed by the military and police.  A leading presidential candidate Ayman Nour found that out the hard way. After a conviction on trumped-up charges related to signatures on petitions for his party which challenged Mubarak in the 2005 election, Nour lost his appeal on October 16. Now calling for a more independent judiciary, Nour has vowed to continue his political career even though a prison sentence hangs over his head. “The use of military trials and emergency law is a threat to the fairness and transparency of the upcoming elections and unfortunately the military is using the same Mubarak policies we revolted against,” said Nour. And throughout the nine months since Mubarak was toppled, the arrests of civilian protesters who are forced to face military tribunals is continuing at an aggressive pace.   One political activist was arrested by military police on October 18 for taking part in the Black Circle Campaign sponsored by April 6 Youth Movement to highlight members of Mubarak’s National Democratic Party who are still running for the upcoming elections. Ali El Halabi was arrested for painting graffiti, taken before military tribunal and awaits sentencing.  Mubarak’s military trials were used to crush an Islamist opposition and were only heard in cases of terrorism. Judgement was swift, there was no real process for appeal and sentences ranged between lengthy jail terms and death sentences.  SCAF has now broadened the use of military trials, putting civilians in front of the tribunals for unlawful gathering and a long list of charges like weapons possession, violating military facilities and attacking military personnel. Sentences are shorter,but affect many more civilians and their families.  General Hassan el Rowini, Commander of the Central Military and member of the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces indicated in June 2011 that military prosecutions are justified “because Egypt is ruled by the military, it is a military jurisdiction.”  After months of pressure by human rights activists and organization, the military softened its tone, but activists say its actions remain largely unchanged.  “Now they only apply military laws in cases of violations against the military, such as protesting in front of the military court or prison,” said Ragia Omran, lawyer and top officer of the “No Military Trials” movement, which produced the finding that more than 12,000 civilians have been brought before military tribunals since February 11 when the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces (SCAF) took power. “In other words, they are applying military laws on protesters and opinion holders.”  “Yes they are accepting appeals and less people are standing military trials,” she added. “But it remains a great violation to civil and human rights, even if it’s used against criminals.”  Despite the military’s decreasing use of military law to prosecute civilians, around 9,000 people remain in different prisons across Egypt serving military terms they were handed in the months following the revolution.  Members of “No Military Trials,” reported that hundreds of protesters were charged with violating military forces that were dispersing protests. They faced speedy trials which human rights activists say denied them due process and they received sentences of between 3 to 5 years in jail.  Abul Maati Ahmed, a 21-year-old martial arts champion was protesting with the rest of his family on Tahrir Square starting January 25. On February 3, he was arrested coming into the square and taken to the nearby Egyptian Museum, which was used by the security forces as a processing center for those arrested.  “We never knew where he was, his brother saw the officers arrest him but we never knew where they took him after,” said Ahmed Abu Arab, father of Abul Maati.  “We filed to the Military Prosecutor and we were informed on February 18 that he was sentenced to 5 years for assaulting the military,” said Abu Arab, the father.  Ahmed Abu Arab visited his son for the first time on February 20. At that time, the father learned that his son didn’t even know that he had been sentenced.  “He told us that he was never taken to court, he never saw a judge, he was shocked when we told him that he was sentenced to 5 years,” said Abu Arab.  Activists against military trials condemned the military prosecutors for the lack of proper and thorough investigations into the cases.  “Some of the trials took three days in total, from arrest and sentence, it is absolutely illegitimate,” said Omran of the “No Military Trials” movement.  Despite accepting some appeals, Omran points out that compensating those who are acquitted in their retrial was never a subject of discussion.  “They arrested my son and tortured him, they destroyed his life by their injustice. He is now a smoker in jail instead of a Kung Fu champion,” said Abu Arab.  “We called for a civil state during the ‘January 25 Revolution,’ said Omran. “And if we accept military trials we might as well accept the military in power for long years.” This story is presented by The GroundTruth Project.	http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/middle-east/egypt/111123/military-trials-threaten-egypts-democracy	dclm-gs1-088630000

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