September 29, 2011
The concept known as the law of the instrument, Maslow’s hammer, or a golden hammer is an over-reliance on a familiar tool; as psychologist Abraham Maslow said in 1966, ‘It is tempting, if the only tool you have is a hammer, to treat everything as if it were a nail.’ The sentiment that people look for cure-alls, and over-use familiar tools, is likely traditional; see panacea. Likewise, the use of a hammer and nail as imagery are likely as old as hammers and nails, or even the use of rocks as tools, which the hammer evokes.
The hammer and nail metaphor may not be original to Kaplan or Maslow, and has been attributed to Mark Twain, though there is no documentation of this origin in Twain’s published writings. Under the name of ‘Baruch’s Observation,’ it is also been attributed to Bernard M. Baruch, a stock market speculator and author. Continue reading →
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September 28, 2011
From the late 1860s until the 1970s, several American cities had ugly laws making it illegal for persons with ‘unsightly or disgusting’ disabilities to appear in public. Some of these laws were called Unsightly Beggar Ordinances. The goal of these laws was seemingly to preserve the quality of life for the community, similar in spirit to current homeowners association regulations and by-laws: ‘No person who is diseased, maimed, mutilated or in any way deformed so as to be an unsightly or disgusting object or improper person to be allowed in or on the public ways or other public places in this city, or shall therein or thereon expose himself to public view, under a penalty of not less than one dollar nor more than fifty dollars for each offense.’
Many states’ ugly laws were not repealed until the mid 1970s. Omaha repealed its Ugly Law in 1967. Columbus withdrew its in 1972. Chicago was the last to repeal its Ugly Law as late as 1974. The recantation of Ugly Laws were tied to the passing of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 where certain rights were granted to people with disabilities: ‘Individuals with disabilities are a discrete and insular minority who have been faced with restrictions and limitations, subjected to a history of purposeful unequal treatment, and relegated to a position of political powerlessness in our society, based on characteristics that are beyond the control of such individuals and resulting from stereotypic assumptions not truly indicative of the individual ability of such individuals to participate in, and contribute to, society.’
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September 28, 2011
The Statue of Responsibility is a proposed structure to be built on the West Coast of the United States. The prototype, sculpted by project artist Gary Lee Price, consists of a pair of clasped hands oriented vertically, symbolizing the responsibility that comes with liberty. The person who suggested the statue was scholar Viktor Frankl in his book ‘Man’s Search for Meaning.’ He recommended ‘that the Statue of Liberty on the East Coast should be supplemented by a Statue of Responsibility on the West Coast.’ His thought was that ‘Freedom, however, is not the last word. Freedom is only part of the story and half of the truth. Freedom is but the negative aspect of the whole phenomenon whose positive aspect is responsibleness. In fact, freedom is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness.’
The project is being managed by the non-profit foundation. The project has progressed slowly, but in 2010, the Utah state legislature unanimously declared their support for the project and declared Utah (Mr. Price’s home state) the Birthplace of the Statue of Responsibility. The statue foundation would like to build it in one of five cities: Long Beach, San Diego, Los Angeles, San Francisco, or Seattle.
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September 28, 2011
Morphing is a special effect in motion pictures and animations that changes (or morphs) one image into another through a seamless transition. Most often it is used to depict one person turning into another through technological means or as part of a fantasy or surreal sequence. Traditionally such a depiction would be achieved through cross-fading techniques on film. Since the early 1990s, this has been replaced by computer software to create more realistic transitions.
Though the 1986 movie ‘The Golden Child’ implemented very crude morphing effects from animal to human and back, the first movie to employ detailed morphing was ‘Willow,’ in 1988. A similar process was used a year later in ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade’ to create Walter Donovan’s gruesome demise. Both effects were created by Industrial Light and Magic using grid warping techniques developed by Tom Brigham and Doug Smythe.
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September 27, 2011
The concept of multiple discovery is the hypothesis that most scientific discoveries and inventions are made independently and more or less simultaneously by multiple scientists and inventors. The concept of multiple discovery opposes a traditional view—the ‘heroic theory’ of invention and discovery. When Nobel laureates are announced annually—especially in physics, chemistry, physiology-or-medicine, and economics—increasingly, in the given field, rather than just a single laureate, there are two or the maximally-permissible three, who often have independently made the same discovery.
Commonly cited examples of multiple independent discovery are the 17th-century independent formulation of calculus by Isaac Newton, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz and others, described by British historian A. Rupert Hall; the 18th-century discovery of oxygen by Carl Wilhelm Scheele, Joseph Priestley, Antoine Lavoisier and others; and the theory of evolution of species, independently advanced in the 19th century by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace.
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September 27, 2011
Stigler’s law of eponymy [uh-pon-uh-mee] is a process proposed by University of Chicago statistics professor Stephen Stigler in his 1980 publication of the same name. In its simplest and strongest form it says: ‘No scientific discovery is named after its original discoverer.’ Stigler named the sociologist Robert K. Merton as the discoverer of ‘Stigler’s law,’ consciously making ‘Stigler’s law’ exemplify Stigler’s law.
For example: Alzheimer’s disease, though named after Alois Alzheimer, had been previously described by at least half a dozen others before Alzheimer’s 1906 report which is often (wrongly) regarded as the first description of the disorder. Historical acclaim for discoveries is often allotted to persons of notoriety who bring attention to an idea that is not yet widely known, whether or not that person was its original inventor – theories may be named long after their discovery. Continue reading →
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September 27, 2011
An eponym [ep-uh-nim] is a word, usually a person’s name, that is used to name something else. One who is referred to as eponymous is someone who gives his or her name to something, e.g., John Schnatter, the eponymous owner of Papa John’s Pizza. A common nonstandard usage is that something eponymous is named after a particular person, e.g., Julian’s eponymous restaurant. In contemporary English, the term self-titled is often used to mean eponymous in the case of a work with the same name as the person or persons who created it (e.g., the song ‘Black Sabbath,’ from the album ‘Black Sabbath,’ by the band Black Sabbath).
In intellectual property law an eponym can refer to a genericized trademark or brand name, a form of metonymy (a figure of speech used in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept — e.g. ‘Kleenex’ for all tissues).
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September 27, 2011
Nazi chic refers to the approving use of Nazi-era style, imagery, and paraphernalia in clothing and popular culture, especially when used for taboo breaking or shock value rather than out of genuine nazist sympathies. Its use began in the mid-seventies with the emergence of the punk movement in London; during the Sex Pistols’ first television appearance a person of their entourage was seen wearing a swastika. Nazi chic was later appropriated by the fashion industry.
In the 1970s punk subculture, several items of clothing designed to shock and offend The Establishment became popular. Among these punk fashion items was a T-shirt displaying a Swastika, an upside-down crucifix and the word ‘DESTROY’– which was worn by Johnny Rotten, seen in the video for ‘Pretty Vacant.’ Rotten wore the swastika another time with a gesture that looked like a Nazi salute. Continue reading →
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September 27, 2011
Nazisploitation is a subgenre of exploitation film and sexploitation film that involves villainous Nazis committing criminal acts of a sexual nature often as camp or prison overseers in World War II settings. Most follow the standard women in prison formula, only relocated to a death camp or Nazi brothel, with an added emphasis on sadism, gore, and degradation.
The most infamous and influential title (and the one that set the standards of the genre) is perhaps ‘Ilsa, She Wolf of the SS’ (1974), a Canadian production. Its surprise success and sequels led European film makers, mostly in Italy, to produce dozens of similar films depicting Nazi atrocities. While the Ilsa series and Salon Kitty were profitable, the other films were mostly box-office flops and the genre all but vanished by the mid 1980s.
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September 27, 2011
Hypermiling is the act of driving using techniques that maximize fuel economy. Those who practice these techniques are referred to as ‘hypermilers.’ Hypermiling can be practiced in any vehicle regardless of its fuel economy. It gained popularity as a result of the rise in gasoline prices during the 2000s. Some hypermiling techniques are illegal in some jurisdictions because they are dangerous. Hypermiling has come under fire from several quarters due to claims of dangerous or unlawful behavior by some hypermilers, such as tailgating larger vehicles on freeways to save fuel by drafting. As a result, the Hypermiling Safety Foundation was formed in August 2008 to promote a safety and public awareness program, advocating legal fuel-saving techniques.
Hypermiling contests have been held on selected courses. The Maximum Fuel Economy contest was held in Indiana, where ‘world records’ for the Honda Insight (213 miles per gallon), Toyota Prius (136 miles per gallon) and the Ford Escape Hybrid (76 miles per gallon) were set. Contestants used techniques which included rolling through all stop signs and having the vehicle tires inflated well beyond recommended specifications. Another contest is the Tour to the Shore, held in New Jersey, which evaluates drivers of cars and trucks.
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September 27, 2011
Ryan Larkin (1943 – 2007) was a Canadian animator who rose to fame with the psychedelic 1969 Oscar-nominated short ‘Walking’ and the acclaimed ‘Street Musique’ (1972). In later years Ryan was plagued by a downward spiral of drug abuse, alcoholism and homelessness, but towards the end of his life found himself back in the limelight when a 14-minute computer-animated documentary on his life, ‘Ryan’ by fellow Canadian animator, Chris Landreth, won the Academy Award for Animated Short Film and screened to acclaim at film festivals around the world. ‘Alter Egos’ (2004), directed by Laurence Green, is a documentary about the making of ‘Ryan’ that includes interviews with both Larkin and Chris Landreth as well as with various people who knew Ryan at the peak of his success.
Larkin studied under Arthur Lismer (a member of the Group of Seven, Canadian landscape painters in the 1920s) before starting to work at the National Film Board (NFB) of Canada in the early 1960s. At the NFB, Larkin learned animation techniques from the ground-breaking and award-winning animator, Norman McLaren. Larkin made two acclaimed short animated films, ‘Syrinx’ (1965) and ‘Cityscape’ (1966), before going on to create ‘Walking’ (1969). ‘Walking’ was nominated for an Academy Award in 1970 in the category Best Short Subject, Cartoon, but lost to ‘It’s Tough to Be a Bird’ by director Ward Kimball (one of Disney’s ‘Nine Old Men’). He went on to direct the award-winning short ‘Street Music,’ which premiered in 1972 and would be his last project.
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September 26, 2011
Titanium rings are jewelry rings or bands which have been primarily constructed from titanium. The actual compositions of titanium can vary, such as ‘commercial pure’ (99.2% titanium) or ‘aircraft grade’ (90% titanium). Rings crafted from titanium are a modern phenomenon, becoming widely available on the market around the 1990s.
They offer several unique properties: they are biocompatible (hypoallergenic), lightweight, corrosion-resistant, and have the highest strength-to-weight ratio of any metal. Titanium was discovered in England in 1791 by William Gregor. Continue reading →
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