http://www.guardian.co.uk/film/2009/sep/06/steven-russell-elizabeth-day-jim-carrey
Please read this comment after you read the article for more details on the case:
On the one hand, the life imprisonment sentence (and especially its isolation conditions) seems clearly far too harsh and disproportionate. Does this man really represent a danger for the society? Facts are that he never hurted anybody (only endangered himself).
On the other hand, this man, a smart and exceptionally skilled liar, chameleon has strong impetus.. By having no limits, he lost control of himself, self-destruction, even indirect, could lead to a potential danger...And even if he is character is charming in the movie, he managed to steal a great deal of money completely illegally.
Far too clever for the police probably, the "system" just decided to suppress the problem at its roots with drastic solution: jail for life and restricted human contacts.
Has the administration proven here the of lack its justice system's inventiveness? Isn't it possible to create solutions that are not so severe for individuals? Isn't the prize a little bit too high to pay?
28 Mar 2012
Roman edge of modernity
Saturnalia was an ancient Roman festival in honor of the deity Saturn originally held December 17 and later expanded with unofficial festivities through December 23. The holiday was celebrated with a sacrifice at the Temple of Saturn in the Roman Forum and a public banquet, followed by private gift-giving, continual partying, and a carnival atmosphere thttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Man_pilos_Louvre_MNE1330.jpghat overturnedRoman social norms: gambling was permitted, and masters provided table service for their slaves. The poet Catullus called it "the best of days."
In Roman mythology, Saturn was an agricultural deity who reigned over the world in the Golden Age, when humans enjoyed the spontaneous bounty of the earth without labor in a state of social egalitarianism. The revelries of Saturnalia were supposed to reflect the conditions of the lost mythical age, not all of them desirable. The Greek equivalent was the Kronia.
[...]
The toga, the characteristic garment of the male Roman citizen, was set aside in favor of the Greek synthesis, colourful "dinner clothes" otherwise considered in poor taste for daytime wear. Romans of citizen status normally went about bare-headed, but for the Saturnalia donned the pilleus, the conical felt cap that was the usual mark of a freedman. Slaves, who ordinarily were not entitled to wear the pilleus, wore it as well, so that everyone was "pilleated" without distinction.
The participation of freeborn Roman women is implied by sources that name gifts for women, but their presence at banquets may have depended on the custom of their time; from the late Republic onward, women mingled socially with men more freely than they had in earlier times. Female entertainers were certainly present at some otherwise all-male gatherings.
Role-playing was implicit in the Saturnalia's status reversals, and there are hints of mask-wearing or "guising". No theatrical events are mentioned in connection with the festivities, but the classicist Erich Segal saw Roman comedy, with its cast of impudent, free-wheeling slaves and libertine seniors, as imbued with the Saturnalian spirit.
Gambling and dice-playing, normally prohibited or at least frowned upon, were permitted for all, even slaves. Coins and nuts were the stakes. On the Calendar of Philocalus, the Saturnalia is represented by a man wearing a fur-trimmed coat next to a table with dice, and a caption reading "Now you have license, slave, to game with your master."Rampant overeating and drunkenness became the rule, and a sober person the exception.
Seneca looked forward to the holiday, if somewhat tentatively, in a letter to a friend:
Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia#cite_note-16
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Man_pilos_Louvre_MNE1330.jpg
In Roman mythology, Saturn was an agricultural deity who reigned over the world in the Golden Age, when humans enjoyed the spontaneous bounty of the earth without labor in a state of social egalitarianism. The revelries of Saturnalia were supposed to reflect the conditions of the lost mythical age, not all of them desirable. The Greek equivalent was the Kronia.
[...]
Saturnalia is the best-known of several festivals in the Greco-Roman world characterized by role reversals and behavioral license. Slaves were treated to a banquet of the kind usually enjoyed by their masters. Ancient sources differ on the circumstances: some suggest that master and slave dined together, while others indicate that the slaves feasted first, or that the masters actually served the food. The practice may have varied over time,and in any case slaves would still have prepared the meal.
Saturnalian license also permitted slaves to enjoy a pretense of disrespect for their masters, and exempted them from punishment. It was a time for free speech: the Augustan poet Horace calls it "December liberty."In two satires set during the Saturnalia, Horace has a slave offer sharp criticism to his master.But everyone knew that the leveling of the social hierarchy was temporary and had limits; no social norms were ultimately threatened, because the holiday would end.The toga, the characteristic garment of the male Roman citizen, was set aside in favor of the Greek synthesis, colourful "dinner clothes" otherwise considered in poor taste for daytime wear. Romans of citizen status normally went about bare-headed, but for the Saturnalia donned the pilleus, the conical felt cap that was the usual mark of a freedman. Slaves, who ordinarily were not entitled to wear the pilleus, wore it as well, so that everyone was "pilleated" without distinction.
The participation of freeborn Roman women is implied by sources that name gifts for women, but their presence at banquets may have depended on the custom of their time; from the late Republic onward, women mingled socially with men more freely than they had in earlier times. Female entertainers were certainly present at some otherwise all-male gatherings.
Role-playing was implicit in the Saturnalia's status reversals, and there are hints of mask-wearing or "guising". No theatrical events are mentioned in connection with the festivities, but the classicist Erich Segal saw Roman comedy, with its cast of impudent, free-wheeling slaves and libertine seniors, as imbued with the Saturnalian spirit.
Gambling and dice-playing, normally prohibited or at least frowned upon, were permitted for all, even slaves. Coins and nuts were the stakes. On the Calendar of Philocalus, the Saturnalia is represented by a man wearing a fur-trimmed coat next to a table with dice, and a caption reading "Now you have license, slave, to game with your master."Rampant overeating and drunkenness became the rule, and a sober person the exception.
Seneca looked forward to the holiday, if somewhat tentatively, in a letter to a friend:
It is now the month of December, when the greatest part of the city is in a bustle. Loose reins are given to public dissipation; everywhere you may hear the sound of great preparations, as if there were some real difference between the days devoted to Saturn and those for transacting business. … Were you here, I would willingly confer with you as to the plan of our conduct; whether we should eve in our usual way, or, to avoid singularity, both take a better supper and throw off the toga.Some Romans found it all a bit much. Pliny describes a secluded suite of rooms in his Laurentine villa which he used as a retreat "especially during the Saturnalia when the rest of the house is noisy with the licence of the holiday and festive cries. This way I don't hamper the games of my people and they don't hinder my work or studies."
Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturnalia#cite_note-16
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Man_pilos_Louvre_MNE1330.jpg
9 Mar 2012
Pink is not dead
The colour pink would not exist.
[...]
The colors are simply waves of light and we are seeing them anyways with our brain. But there is no wave that mixes red and violet, and pink is not hence a wave of light.
[...]
The blogger of American scientist Michael Moyer, does not agree with this point. He admits that pink does not exists, but only because in facts no colour exists really.
"The world is full of electromagnetic radiations, which proprieties are physical, as the wave's lenght or its intensity. But the colour is entirely in your head".
He developed the idea that the colour is not a property of the light or objects that reflects the light, but a "feeling that merges in our brain" by a process mysterious as well as fascinating (it has been recently discovered that it was possible for people to see some forbidden colors, colours impossible to see with the brain, such as green tinted with red or blue -yellow).
traduced from source: http://www.slate.fr/lien/51153/rose-existe-ou-pas
8 Mar 2012
Antimatter matters!
The moment where antihydrogen's atoms came out of the trap invented, by scientists of the CERN, to, in the end, disapear
[...]
"Why does something exists instead of nothing?" Indeed, according to the current state of our knowledges, nothing should be existing. After the Big Bang, it would seem that matter and antimatter have been existing in equal amount. Or in the presence of one and the other, the both entities annihiliate , that is to say nothing remains...nothing. Yet, it is not what has happend, by far! Though this original nihilist coexistence, and according to the facts that first the antimatter disappeared and second that the matter did remain alone. Knowing that the matter, constitues the visible universe for instance the cells of our body. The opposite should have happend. Why nature did favour the matter? Mystery...
[...]
Translated from source: http://blog.slate.fr/globule-et-telescope/2012/03/07/antimatiere-au-coeur-du-mystere/
Change starts by a seed
New plants are developping in Antarctic weakening the local flora.
[...]
According to the BBC, the austral lands are more and more visited by scientists and also tourists. Between 2007 and 2008, a team of searchers has inspected the equipment of 850 persons travelling into Antarctic, that is to say, less thant 2 % of the total visitors on this period. On average, each one of them carried 9.5 vegetal seeds under their shoes or on their backpack.
[...]
If the seeds could have grown, it is precisely because temperature has consistently raised, explain the scientists. The consequences of the global warming can be felt even at these latitudes. Associated with an increase of the human visits, this climatic phenomena is also at the origin of the proliferation of the "aliens" plants.
[...]
Traduced by source: http://www.slate.fr/lien/51087/especes-vegetales-envahissent-antarctique
Image: http://www.peacham.com/antarctica/images/P1140363.JPG
7 Mar 2012
Relax and feel the power of the unconscious
According to a study lead by Michael Pham of the Columbia University: we should trust our emotions.
Asking to his students to make predictions about different topics (including sports and political results, even forecast!) the searcher has noticed that the predictions were consistently more correct when they were based on feelings, emotions. He calls this phenomena " the effect of emotional oracle".
For the results to be convincing, the subject has to have at least a small amount of knowledge of the theme he is about to make predictions. Indeed, if the unconscious brain is quicker and able to link the information than the conscious brain, it is necessary that it has this information.
The speed of the unconscious brain is a issue raised by neurosciences since some years now, and its qualities are an obviousness.
"When we slow down in front of an obstacle while drinving a car, hopefully this is not a conscient action. The time to take the decision consciously, we already would have been hit!" stated Marc Jeannerod, director of the Institute for cognitive sciences, interviewed in an article of the CNRS's paper.
And for him to continue:
"To be conscious takes time! Hence, the unconscious assume an importance within our unsuspected behaviour. Much more that a simple support for our conscience, it would have a predominant impact in all of the cognitive evolution: 90% of our mental operation would be unconscient!".
Summerized and translated from : http://www.slate.fr/lien/51075/emotions-neurosciences-confiance
5 Mar 2012
Music and science
Extracts:
[...]
What explains the magic of Adele's song? Though personal experience and culture play into individual reactions, researchers have found that certain features of music are consistently associated with producing strong emotions in listeners. Combined with heartfelt lyrics and a powerhouse voice, these structures can send reward signals to our brains that rival any other pleasure.
Twenty years ago, the British psychologist John Sloboda conducted a simple experiment. He asked music lovers to identify passages of songs that reliably set off a physical reaction, such as tears or goose bumps. Participants identified 20 tear-triggering passages, and when Dr. Sloboda analyzed their properties, a trend emerged: 18 contained a musical device called an "appoggiatura."
An appoggiatura is a type of ornamental note that clashes with the melody just enough to create a dissonant sound. "This generates tension in the listener," said Martin Guhn, a psychologist at the University of British Columbia who co-wrote a 2007 study on the subject. "When the notes return to the anticipated melody, the tension resolves, and it feels good."
[...]
Source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203646004577213010291701378.html?mod=djemITP_h
3 Mar 2012
Incredibile- Incroyable- Incredivel- Amazing!!!!
Extracts:
[...]
The famous 19th-century German archeologist Heinrich Schliemann (1822-1890), who pursued a life-long dream of excavating the remains of Homeric Troy, no doubt had a genius for language. Within the space of two years, he taught himself fluent Dutch, English, French, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, and later went on to learn seven more, including both modern and ancient Greek.
[...]
"In order to acquire quickly the Greek vocabulary," Schliemann wrote, "I procured a modern Greek translation of 'Paul et Virginie' [a French novel; Schliemann already knew French], and read it through, comparing every word with its equivalent in the French original. When I had finished this task I knew at least one half the Greek words the book contained; and after repeating the operation I knew them all, or nearly so, without having lost a single minute by being obliged to use a dictionary. Of the Greek grammar I learned only the declensions and the verbs, and never lost my precious time in studying its rules; for as I saw that boys, after being troubled and tormented for eight years and more in school with the tedious rules of grammar, can nevertheless none of them write a letter in ancient Greek without making hundreds of atrocious blunders, I thought the method pursued by the schoolmasters must be altogether wrong... I learned ancient Greek as I would have learned a living language."
This reminds me somehow of the Rosetta stone
To bad it is not working for arabic, chinese,or japanese...
One friend of mine's excellent idea is to do the same method with a nice song.
To bad it is not working for arabic, chinese,or japanese...
One friend of mine's excellent idea is to do the same method with a nice song.
Sources: http://www.language-learning-tips.com/17_Schliemanns_method.htm
http://www.google.fr/imgres?um=1&hl=fr&client=firefox-a&sa=N&rls=org.mozilla:en-GB:official&biw=1280&bih=921&tbm=isch&tbnid=jMX0Y2y5rq67sM:&imgrefurl=http://lancelot.pecquet.org/history/rosetta-stone/%3Flang%3Dfr&docid=G-Nt9ytyPpxi-M&imgurl=http://lancelot.pecquet.org/img/history/rosette.gif&w=1562&h=1982&ei=b89ST_KcO-jS0QXCo7nTCw&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=627&vpy=175&dur=479&hovh=253&hovw=199&tx=133&ty=165&sig=102264774011963203133&page=1&tbnh=173&tbnw=136&start=0&ndsp=26&ved=1t:429,r:3,s:0
1 Mar 2012
Narwahl: the origin of the unicorn's myth?
The narwhal, or narwhale, Monodon monoceros, is a medium-sized toothed whale that lives year-round in the Arctic. One of two living species of whale in the Monodontidae family, along with the beluga whale, the narwhal males are distinguished by a characteristic long, straight, helical tusk extending from their upper left jaw.
[...]
The most broadly accepted theory for the role of the tusk is as a secondary sexual characteristic, similar to the mane of a lion or the tail feathers of a peacock.This hypothesis was notably discussed and defended at length by Charles Darwin, in The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871). It may help determine social rank, maintain dominance hierarchies, or help young males develop skills necessary for performance in adult sexual roles. Narwhals have rarely been observed using their tusk for fighting, other aggressive behavior or for breaking sea ice in their Arctic habitat.
[...]
Narwhal have been found to be one of the most vulnerable arctic marine mammals to climate change. The study quantified the vulnerabilities of 11 year-round Arctic sea mammals. Narwhals that have been brought into captivity tend to die of unnatural causes.
sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narwhal
http://compendiumofawesome.wordpress.com/2010/09/02/narwhal/
http://www.google.fr/imgres?q=narwhal&um=1&hl=fr&sa=N&biw=1280&bih=890&tbm=isch&tbnid=2w47N6HtL7FvZM:&imgrefurl=http://priceofoil.org/2008/05/14/climate-change-threatens-narwhal/&docid=YMZacDcZUgZeqM&imgurl=http://priceofoil.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/narwhal1.jpg&w=450&h=305&ei=EYxQT7vmD6Ol0AXfjLH7Cw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=270&sig=116982973140745087471&page=1&tbnh=164&tbnw=219&start=0&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:0&tx=135&ty=92
[...]
The most broadly accepted theory for the role of the tusk is as a secondary sexual characteristic, similar to the mane of a lion or the tail feathers of a peacock.This hypothesis was notably discussed and defended at length by Charles Darwin, in The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex (1871). It may help determine social rank, maintain dominance hierarchies, or help young males develop skills necessary for performance in adult sexual roles. Narwhals have rarely been observed using their tusk for fighting, other aggressive behavior or for breaking sea ice in their Arctic habitat.
[...]
Narwhal have been found to be one of the most vulnerable arctic marine mammals to climate change. The study quantified the vulnerabilities of 11 year-round Arctic sea mammals. Narwhals that have been brought into captivity tend to die of unnatural causes.
sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narwhal
http://compendiumofawesome.wordpress.com/2010/09/02/narwhal/
http://www.google.fr/imgres?q=narwhal&um=1&hl=fr&sa=N&biw=1280&bih=890&tbm=isch&tbnid=2w47N6HtL7FvZM:&imgrefurl=http://priceofoil.org/2008/05/14/climate-change-threatens-narwhal/&docid=YMZacDcZUgZeqM&imgurl=http://priceofoil.org/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/narwhal1.jpg&w=450&h=305&ei=EYxQT7vmD6Ol0AXfjLH7Cw&zoom=1&iact=rc&dur=270&sig=116982973140745087471&page=1&tbnh=164&tbnw=219&start=0&ndsp=20&ved=1t:429,r:8,s:0&tx=135&ty=92
what if ...
" An earth and a humanity in balance, would be a population of 100 to 500 millions of people, but educated and capabale of self-subistence. The ageing of the population is not the problem. It is a terrible thing to say, but to stabilize the world population, we should lose 350.000 persons a day. It is an horrible thing to say, but not saying anything is even worse".
translated from: http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacques-Yves_Cousteau
“There must be millions of people all over the world who never get any love letters . . . I could be their leader.”
Extract
Michele Pershonok is in charge of the dietary program of the Nasa and tries to explain the phenomenon of impoverishment of the sense of taste for astronauts that she called the "Charlie Brown's stage" refering to the popular hero cartoon, Snoopy.
"We called that the Charlie Brown stage because the astronauts's face become very round in microgravity. Round because they retain a part of the fluids in their heads, they have the permanent fealing to have a cold, to be congested or to have lost the olfactory sense".
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