Ukrainian Christmas Eve

My apologies to anyone who is glad that the Christmas season is finally in the past; however, …

Orthodox and Eastern Rite Churches still use the Julian calendar for Ecclesiastic purposes; consequently, January 6 is Ukrainian Christmas Eve.

Paying due respects to a portion of my wife’s genetic makeup, I’m going to try — once more — to start a family tradition by presenting gifts from Svyatyi Mykolai* (Saint Nicolas) tonight.

Perhaps one of these years we’ll even have a traditional twelve dish Christmas Eve dinner (Sviaty Vechir*).  Afterward, we can take a songbook of Ukrainian carols outside and regale the neighbours with some koliadky.*

*There are various spellings for these words; apparently, Ukrainian pronunciations don’t necessarily translate perfectly into English.

 

Winter Solstice

Today, in the Northern Hemisphere, it is the Winter Solstice (also known as the December Solstice), which occurs when the sun reaches its most southerly declination of -23.5 degrees and the North Pole is tilted 23.5 degrees away from the sun.

All places above a latitude of 66.5 degrees north (Arctic Polar Circle) are now in darkness.

The winter solstice was traditionally a holy day: a sacred time in the annual cycle of life. There were many traditions (and several have survived in one form or another); among others, friends visited one another to exchange good-luck presents; temples were adorned with evergreen boughs, which symbolized life’s stability; large yule-logs were set ablaze in a great bonfire, minstrels played, and mead was consumed merrily (and profusely) about the fire; and children were honoured, because they bring luminosity, warmth, and exuberance into the darkest time of the year.

 

 

Dry Water

When I first saw a news article on ‘Dry Water,’ I was sure it was a joke (you know, just add water…). But I was wrong. The powdery substance known as dry water may be a greener, more efficient catalyst for the production of chemically manufactured commodities, provide a safer method to store and transport dangerous goods, and aid in the battle against global warming by absorbing large quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

Dry water is, in fact, 95% water, but is a dry powder (it looks a bit like powder snow). Every grain of powder is a water droplet enclosed inside an adapted silica (sand) coating. The silica shell prevents the individual water droplets from amalgamating into a liquid form and the dry water particles bind chemically with gases to form hydrates (for example, dry water absorbs more than three times the carbon dioxide as uncombined water and silica in the same amount of time; hence its promise as an agent to battle global warming).

Dry water was first discovered in 1968 —for potential use in cosmetics — and ‘rediscovered’ in 2006; since then, its list of possible applications has grown considerably.

Image source: American Chemical Society

 

Foldit: a beneficial computer game

Have you ever played a computer game that could benefit society?

Foldit (an example of  Network Science) is an online science puzzle game in which multiple players predict protein structures, and the information gathered from the game has potential uses in the fight against diseases.

Knowing the structure of a protein is crucial to insights into its mechanisms, as well as determining a methodology for drug targeting.

Even a small protein consisting of one hundred amino acids can fold into countless different geometries (some human proteins contain in the order of a thousand amino acids), and deciding which of the manifold structures is the best one is very difficult and time consuming, even when using computers. Foldit players (not, by any means, experts in the field) use spatial relation skills competitively to solve a puzzle and create the best protein. Solutions receiving the highest scores are given to biochemists who determine whether any solution is useable; and, incredibly, there have been positive results.

And there are other Network Science initiatives; for another example, at  http://phylo.cs.mcgill.ca/: according to the website, “Phylo is a challenging flash game in which every puzzle completed contributes to mapping diseases within human DNA.” I haven’t tried it yet, but plan to over the holidays…

All my thoughts about computer games being a waste of time and energy have just gone up in ever-changing, folded geometries of smoke…

 

Occupy Wall Street: a Dog’s Life

I just came by this awwwesome picture of a Hell’s Angels’ dog being frisked at one of the protest sites [picture credit: Occupy The Game]:

 

The Grey Cup 2011

The psychology of the sports fan (and I include myself in this category) has interested me since the ‘pep-rallies’ of my high school days.

Sports fans live vicariously through their team, players, or a specific athlete (admiration/identification is generated when an athlete exhibits uncommon abilities, or when the team’s harmonized tactics work to perfection). Spectator sports are, at a basic level, a form of entertainment to be enjoyed as a leisure activity. Watching one’s favorite team is an escapist endeavor, yielding opposing aspects of anxiety and exhilaration, thereby providing the fan with a sense of accomplishment just by watching an event and enabling the fan to enthusiastically proclaim “we won!”

But enough of the preamble…

The B.C. Lions won the 99^th Grey Cup Yesterday!

We Won!

 

A Home for Occupy Vancouver protesters?

I’d like to propose a new home for the Occupy Vancouver protesters…aboard the Attessa IV superyacht, an icon for the decadence of the 1%.

The Attissa IV was in Vancouver shipyards for a rebuild that gave the yacht a completely new, modern exterior, and an additional 30 feet in length. There’s lots of space on-board (100.6 meters (~110 yards) in length… a (Canadian) football field), and I’m pretty sure it’s still around Vancouver somewhere…

The before and after rebuild photos (found here):

 

Robot face

A group at the Institute for Cognitive Systems (ICS) at TU München, and the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST, in Japan), has produced a talking robot face; a Mask-bot, which is able to instantaneously create — from a photograph — a video projection onto a 3-D surface. The mask is projected from the rear, apparently making it more realistic than other attempts. It also works in daylight, utilizes  a complex array of mechanical parts to make it flexible, and is custom-built to specifications.

Video conferencing is an ideal application.

The Mask-bot shifts its ‘head’ and raises its eyebrows as you speak to it, as if it understands what you’re saying (so far, the creators believe, it does not).

Photo credit: TU München

 

Don’t throw out the baby with the bath water…

I just viewed some images from the ‘clean-up’ of Occupy Wall Street. Why is it that humans cannot meet, communicate, and resolve differences without resorting to violence? I assume other cities will be watching the outcome of this particular solution to the Occupy problem and will soon follow suit (I’m waiting for the shoe to drop in Vancouver). I hope there is not an escalation of violent confrontation.

I’ve heard many opinions of the Occupy protests, but the one I appreciate the most is pay attention to the message, not the tactics.

I am convinced that there is enough wealth in the world to solve many of humanity’s problems, and the inequity in the distribution of wealth is something that must be addressed. A small percentage of the planet’s population controls the majority of the money (hence, power): the 99% movement is about positive social change.

I admit that I’m a dreamer, but it would be far more pleasant if the people who shaped our world were less concerned with economic growth and more concerned with social consciousness…

 

Occupy Vancouver Missing The Mark…

It seems to me that the Occupy Vancouver demonstration has lost sight of its goals (if it ever had a vision) and has alienated the people who should be on their side.

The 99% was about a rethinking of the distribution of wealth, but the draft demands of the Occupy Vancouver group are all over the map and have diluted the message to the point of ridiculousness (I agree with most of the points within their ‘demands’, but projects that attempt to boil the ocean are doomed to fail). They have lost the audience who could have helped with the original problem.

The demands set forth in their draft include Economic Demands (e.g.: “We demand that the banks be nationalized…”), Political Demands (including one connected with conspiracy theory: “We demand an independent investigation into 9/11 which will examine all evidence including that which would support a false-flag explanation.”), Societal Demands (e.g.: “We demand that all botanical drugs be distributed like coffee beans.”), and Environmental Demands (e.g.: “We demand that the nuclear industry be phased out.”).

You cannot demand the world and expect to be taken seriously.

The protesters have also declared that they do not respect the authority of police, firemen, and elected officials, yet the protesters have no problems using lawyers in a court of law.

And, during a  meeting regarding the ‘tent city’ of protesters in Vancouver, protesters barged in, yelled and screamed over the voices of anybody who talked (if their opinion differed from the protesters), and complained when question time ran out (mostly due to the protesters waste of time and energy).

The protesters are led by people who enjoy confrontation. There is no benefit to be gained from the actions of anarchy: organization and workable solutions are required.

I hope the original ideology can be regained and a movement evolves with leadership that uses equanimity and maturity to guide passion.