January 24, 2011
The Antikythera [an-ti-ki-theer-uh] mechanism is an incredibly old mechanical calculator, often described as the first mechanical computer. It was discovered in 1901 in a shipwreck off the coast of Antikythera, Greece. The device was used to figure out the positions of stars in the sky. It was probably made in about 150-100 BC, and is now on display in the Bronze Collection of the National Archaeological Museum of Athens.
Its significance and complexity were not understood until decades after its discovery. The degree of mechanical sophistication is comparable to a 19th century Swiss clock. Technological artifacts of similar complexity and workmanship did not reappear until the 14th century, when mechanical astronomical clocks were built in Europe.
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January 24, 2011
Boomerang Generation is one of several terms applied to the current generation of young adults in Western culture. They are so named for the frequency with which they choose to cohabitate with their parents after a brief period of living on their own–thus boomeranging back to their place of origin. This cohabitation can take many forms, ranging from situations that mirror the high dependency of pre-adulthood to highly independent, separate-household arrangements. In as much as home-leaving practices differ by economic class, the term is most meaningfully applied to members of the middle class.
The 18th through 21st birthdays of this generation coincide with the economic downturn starting with the collapse of the stock market bubble in 2000. This led to rising unemployment until 2004, the same time this generation was entering the workforce after high school or college graduation. Additionally, in the new economy, where globalisation-induced phenomena like outsourcing have eliminated many jobs, real wages have fallen over the last twenty years, and a college degree no longer ensures job stability, this is the easiest, if not only, way for these young adults to maintain the middle class lifestyle they anticipated.
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January 24, 2011
A forest kindergarten is a type of preschool education for children between the ages of three and six that is held almost exclusively outdoors. Whatever the weather, children are encouraged to play, explore and learn in a forest or natural environment. The adult supervision is meant to assist rather than lead. It is also known as Waldkindergarten (in German), outdoor nursery, nature kindergarten, or nature preschool.
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January 24, 2011
Helicopter parent is a colloquial, early 21st-century term for a parent who pays extremely close attention to his or her child’s or children’s experiences and problems, particularly at educational institutions. The term was originally coined by Foster W. Cline, M.D. and Jim Fay in their 1990 book ‘Parenting with Love and Logic.’
Helicopter parents are so named because, like helicopters, they hover closely overhead, rarely out of reach, whether their children need them or not. They try to resolve their child’s problems, and try to stop them coming to harm by keeping them out of dangerous situations.
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January 24, 2011
An appetizing store, typically in reference to Jewish cuisine, is best understood as a store that sells ‘the foods one eats with bagels’ ‘Appetizing’ is used as a noun by itself to refer to these type of foods. Appetizing stores includes both dairy and ‘parve’ (neither dairy nor meat) food items such as lox (smoked salmon), whitefish, and cream cheese spreads. These foods are typically eaten for breakfast or lunch and, based on Jewish kashrut dietary laws, include no meat products (kosher fish products are not considered meat).
The simplest distinction is that an appetizing store is a place that sells fish and dairy products, whereas a delicatessen sells meats. It can also can be described as ‘appy table,’ ‘appetizing table,’ or just ‘appy’ (short for ‘appetizing’ in the way ‘deli’ is short for ‘delicatessen.’ The term is used typically among American Jews, especially those in the New York City area. Pareve and dairy restaurants in Toronto, Canada, also have ‘Appetizers’ as part of their name who are both Kosher and Kosher style.
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January 24, 2011
The term Large Group Awareness Training (LGAT) refers to self-help ‘training’ offered by certain groups sometimes linked with the human potential movement (a ‘new age’ philosophy founded in the 1960s) . The programs may involve several hundred people at a time for hours or days. It is common for the programs to feature an authoritarian demeanor by the trainer, and to cause physical strains on the participants from a long schedule followed by periods of release and encouragement.
By spending approximately half the time making a person feel bad and then suddenly reversing the feeling through effusive praise, the programs cause participants to experience a stress-reaction and an endorphin high. Over many hours and days the participants are physically exhausted, and made more susceptible to the trainer’s message, whether in the participants’ best interests or not. Examples of LGATs include: Lifespring, Erhard Seminars Training, The Forum, Newfield Consulting, Seres Naturales and Landmark Education.
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January 21, 2011
A ekranoplan, or ground effect vehicle (GEV), is a craft that attains level flight near the surface of the Earth, made possible by a cushion of high-pressure air created by the aerodynamic interaction between the wings and the surface known as ground effect. Also known as a wing-in-ground-effect (WIG) vehicle, flarecraft, sea skimmer, SkimMachine, or wing-in-surface-effect ship, a GEV can be seen as a transition between a hovercraft and an aircraft. However, the International Maritime Organization has classified the GEV as a ship.
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January 21, 2011
Plastination is a technique used in anatomy to preserve bodies or body parts. The water and fat are replaced by certain plastics, yielding specimens that can be touched, do not smell or decay, and even retain most properties of the original sample. There are four steps in the standard process of plastination: fixation, dehydration, forced impregnation in a vacuum, and hardening. Water and lipid tissues are replaced by curable polymers. Curable polymers used by plastination include silicone, epoxy and polyester-copolymer.
Fixation simply means that the body is embalmed, usually in a formaldehyde solution, in order to halt decomposition. After any necessary dissections take place, the specimen is then placed in a bath of acetone. Under freezing conditions, the acetone draws out all the water and replaces it inside the cells. The specimen is then placed in a bath of liquid polymer, such as silicone rubber, polyester or epoxy resin. By creating a vacuum, the acetone is made to boil at a low temperature. As the acetone vaporizes and leaves the cells, it draws the liquid polymer in behind it, leaving a cell filled with liquid plastic. The plastic must then be cured with gas, heat, or ultraviolet light, in order to harden it.
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January 21, 2011
A fractal [frak-tl] is any equation or pattern, that when seen as an image, produces a picture, which can be zoomed into infinity and will still produce the same picture. The word fractal was made by Benoît Mandelbrot in 1975 from the Latin word fractus, which means ‘broken’ or ‘fractured.’ Some fractals exist only for artistic reasons, but others are very useful. Fractals are very efficient shapes for radio antennas and are used in computer chips to efficiently connect all the components.
A simple example is a tree that branches infinitely into smaller branches, and those branches into smaller branches and so on. Fractals are not only beautiful, but also have many practical applications. There are many types of fractals, made in a large variety of ways. There are also many natural examples of fractals in nature including trees, snowflakes, some vegetables and coastlines.
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January 21, 2011
Pantone is a corporation headquartered in Carlstadt, New Jersey, best known for its Pantone Matching System (PMS), a proprietary color space used in a variety of industries, primarily printing, though sometimes in the manufacture of colored paint, fabric, and plastics. The idea behind the PMS is to allow designers to ‘color match’ specific colors when a design enters production stage—regardless of the equipment used to produce the color.
The company provides Pantone Guides, which consist of a large number of small (approximately 6×2 inches or 15×5 cm) thin cardboard sheets, printed on one side with a series of related color swatches and then bound into a small ‘fan deck.’ Pantone recommends that PMS Color Guides be purchased annually as their inks become more yellow over time. Color variance also occurs within editions based on the paper stock used (coated, matte or uncoated), while interedition color variance occurs when there are changes to the specific paper stock used.
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January 21, 2011
A disco ball is a decorative object that reflects light directed at it in many directions, producing a complex display. Its surface consists of hundreds or thousands of mirrored facets, nearly all of approximately the same shape and size. Usually it is suspended from a device that causes it to rotate steadily on a vertical axis, and illuminated by spotlights. What are now sometimes called ‘disco balls’ were first widely used in nightclubs in the 1920s. They were already in existence and use before then, appearing in a description of a ballroom dance in 1897 in Boston. An early example can be seen in the nightclub sequence of ‘Berlin: Die Sinfonie der Großstadt,’ a German silent film from 1927.
Pink Floyd used a glitter ball on their 1987 and 1994 world tours. The glitter ball used on the 1987 tour was somewhat larger than normal but nowhere near as large as the glitter ball used on the 1994 tour. This particular glitter ball is one of the largest in the world at 16 feet in diameter. Madonna used a 2-ton glitter ball that was embellished by 2 million dollars’ worth of Swarovski crystals for her Confessions Tour in 2006. The world’s largest disco ball can be found on the promenade in Blackpool, United Kingdom; it weighs 4.5 tons and is 20 feet in diameter. With the emergence of infrared networks, glitter balls have found a new application, as a method of dispersing the infrared signals.
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January 21, 2011
A snow roller is a rare meteorological phenomenon in which large snowballs are formed naturally as chunks of snow are blown along the ground by wind, picking up material along the way. Unlike snowballs made by people, snow rollers are typically cylindrical in shape, and are often hollow since the inner layers, which are the first layers to form, are weak and thin compared to the outer layers and can easily be blown away, leaving what looks like a doughnut or Swiss roll.
Snow rollers have been seen to grow as large as two feet in diameter, but in order for them to form the ground must be covered by a layer of ice to which snow will not stick (it must be covered by wet, loose snow with a temperature near melting). The wind must be strong enough to move the snow rollers, but not strong enough to blow them too fast. Alternatively, gravity can move the snow rollers on steep hill.
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