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POPSAncient Chinese Bells The importance of that discovery grows when we realize that it took the West a thousand years to develop the cathedral bell, and we didn't have it until the middle ages. Bells are very hard to make, yet China had these remarkably sophisticated Zhong bells during the Golden Age of Athens. The bells produce a rich tone, they take far less bronze to get it than a cathedral bell, and then they deliver two sounds for the cost of one. It's easy to look right at something that's very sophisticated without seeing the sophistication. It took us eighty years to catch on to these remarkable, but unassuming, bells. The best inventions are like that. In the best inventions, elegance masquerades as simplicity.
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POPSSeeing in four dimensions The videos are all available free at www.dimensions-math.org. The videos go on to show how we can visualize imaginary numbers geometrically, how fractal patterns emerge in the Mandelbrot set and Julia sets, and how beautiful and complex shapes can be built up from circles.
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POPSPalin Pledges Allegiance to AIPAC--Stamped "Approved"
From "Alaska First", and by-passing "America First", Palin goes straight to "Israel First". By consequence and definition then she can no longer be considered a "reformer". Like McCain, Obama, Pelosi, Hillary, and every other former 2008 candidate, the ultimate test of worthiness is not the American people but to the overbearing Lobby of a foreign government that sets the course of foreign policy in alliance with the neoconservatives--ensuring a continuance of the phony "war on terrorism"--to "make the world safe for Democracy" through wars for "regime change". How quickly Washington transforms everyone, even from the remotest states, by coercing conformity to global democratic agenda and blind allegiance to Israel through the muscle of The Lobby. This trumps all other considerations, is the hallmark of foreign policy (and why wars never cease), which also in turn has consequences on the economy (high gas prices, national debt, value of money) and domestic policy as well.
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POPSBeautiful Observatory of Kielder Visit sites. It looks like a friendly resource for all sarlovers. They have camps in spring. The Kielder Forest in beautiful Northumbria is a great place to enjoy an outdoor holiday.
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POPSFilm Reveals CIA's 'Most Secret Place on Earth'
This film's analysis sets it apart from other books and documentaries on the subject, most of which justify the conflict, lauding the CIA operatives and their Air America pilots as heroes. The reality, as Alfred McCoy says towards the end of the film, was very different. "We destroyed a whole civilisation, we wiped it off the map. We incinerated, atomised human remains in this air war and what happened in the end? We lost." The covert nature of the conflict meant that U.S. forces were able to ignore virtually all the rules of engagement operating in Vietnam. Every building was a potential target and the civilian toll was huge. The situation grew worse in 1970 when U.S. President Nixon authorised massive B-52 bombing strikes on Laos, which remained classified information until many years later. American planes dropped an average of one planeload of bombs on targets in Laos every eight minutes, 24 hours a day for nine years, making it the most heavily bombed country on earth
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POPSThousands of Georgians Demand Russian Troops Leave
U.S. Destroyer, Laden With Relief And Cruise Missiles, in Port On Sunday, a U.S. Navy warship carrying humanitarian aid for Georgia anchored in the southern Georgian port of Batumi. It was the first of five American ships scheduled to arrive this week with supplies. The McFaul is loaded with 72 pallets of humanitarian aid, and is also outfitted with an array of weaponry, including Tomahawk cruise missiles. U.S. Air Force flights that have brought in more than 1 million pounds of humanitarian relief. “There are very specific requirements for Russian withdrawal. Putting up permanent facilities and checkpoints are inconsistent with the agreement. We are in contact with the various parties to obtain clarification,” White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe said. French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s office said he had pressed Russian President Dmitry Medvedev during a phone conversation Saturday to quickly remove Russian troops from an axis between the Georgian towns of Poti an
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POPSSwitching it up: How memory deals with a change in plans The answer is "both," according to researchers at The Johns Hopkins University, who have learned that two different areas of the brain are responsible for the way human beings handle complex sets of "if-then" rules. "This discovery may eventually lead to enhanced understanding of psychiatric diseases such as schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder and attention deficit disorder, all conditions in which a person's ability to remember and change such rules is impaired," "This indicates that different parts of our brains store different kinds of memories and information," Courtney said. That, she said, "provides clues about how the human brain accomplishes complex, goal-directed behaviors that require remembering and changing abstract rules, an ability that is disrupted in many mental illnesses."
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POPSHow to Start War with Russia--101 (Lesson from the Neoconservatives) Bush Implements Neocon Lesson: Have Condi go to all the satellite states and sign missile placement deals about 100 miles from Russia, then sit back and watch Russia "invade or attack its neighbor" to disarm the threat. Meanwhile, this is precisely what the US was provoked by from Russia in the Cuban Missile Crisis! Purpose? This is part of the neoconservative plan for "global hegemony" which Bush is now implementing just prior to leaving office, ensuring sparked conflict into the next presidency (which would also help McCain, although Obama is a CFR shill too), setting a continuation of the neocon agenda for another four to eight years. Early in his pResidency Bush met with Putin in blue jeans at his Texas ranch. Now he will stab him in the back as he leaves office. This is normal if one reviews US foreign policy since the 20th century and sets the stage for WWIII based upon dangerous absolute Alliances, as Condi refers to with Poland "as much as if it was a US territory"
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POPSFor peace, justice, and life on Earth, fresh ways of seeing arise, and ancient ways return. Eco-philosopher Joanna Macy, Ph.D., is a scholar of Buddhism, general systems theory, and deep ecology. A respected voice in movements for peace, justice, and ecology, she interweaves her scholarship with four decades of activism. She has created a ground-breaking theoretical framework for personal and social change, as well as a powerful workshop methodology for its application.
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POPSMichael Phelps Is Off To A Roaring Start, Wins Gold, Sets World Record Phelps' victory in a world-record time of 4 minutes 3.84 seconds was thoroughly convincing -- and quite possibly utterly demoralizing to those audacious enough to think they can stop him. Second to Laszlo Cseh of Hungary after the first 50 meters and second to Lochte at the 150-meter mark, Phelps sliced through the water with unmatched power to take the lead halfway through the four-stroke race. Popping up from the water while the crowd roared and fans waved American flags, Phelps pointed the index fingers of each hand skyward, beads of water sliding off his back, and then pumped his left fist. His face was wet, possibly from water and possibly from a few stray tears. It was impossible to tell the difference. The roar intensified as he climbed out of the pool and crossed the deck, swirls of red, white and blue in the hands of fans from every nation and both Presidents Bush, current and former.
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POPSReactivating Forgotten Languages: How to Catch Up Vis-Ed (www.vis-ed.com) compiles its sets of flashcards from word frequency lists and includes sample phrases for usage. I begin flashcards after three or four days in-country. The sooner you decide to reactivate languages when needed, instead of maintaining them for an unspecified time in the future, the more leisure time you will have and the less diluted your language abilities will be when you need them. Don't fear losing languages if you've attained real fluency. They're just in temporary storage with the covers pulled over them.
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