Dec 23, 2014

On This Day - Dec. 23

1970 CE - The North Tower of the World Trade Center in Manhattan, New York, New York is topped out at 1,368 feet (417 m), making it the tallest building in the world. 




Photo of the Day
Archaeological remains of Hurvat Itri, near Beit Shemesh, Israel, destroyed by the Roman army during the Bar Kokhba Revolt, 132 - 136 CE.

In the News

Quote of the Day
"I renounce war for its consequences, for the lies it lives on and propagates, for the undying hatred it arouses, for the dictatorships it puts in place of democracy, for the starvation that stalks after it. I renounce war, and never again, directly or indirectly, will I sanction or support another". --Harry Emerson Fosdick

Song of the Day

Film of the Day

Wiki of the Day
Decompression sickness (DCS; also known as divers' disease, the bends or caisson disease) describes a condition arising from dissolved gases coming out of solution into bubbles inside the body on depressurisation. DCS most commonly refers to problems arising from underwater diving decompression but may be experienced in other depressurisation events such as working in a caisson, flying in unpressurised aircraft, and extra-vehicular activity from spacecraft.
Since bubbles can form in or migrate to any part of the body, DCS can produce many symptoms, and its effects may vary from joint pain and rashes to paralysis and death. Individual susceptibility can vary from day to day, and different individuals under the same conditions may be affected differently or not at all. The classification of types of DCS by its symptoms has evolved since its original description over a hundred years ago.
Exposure to DCS on diving can be managed through proper decompression procedures and contracting it is now uncommon. Its potential severity has driven much research to prevent it and divers universally use dive tables or dive computers to limit their exposure and to control their ascent speed. If DCS is contracted, it is treated by hyperbaric oxygen therapy in a recompression chamber. If treated early, there is a significantly higher chance of successful recovery.


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Dec 22, 2014

On This Day - Dec. 22

1808 CE - Ludwig van Beethoven conducts and performs the premiere of his Fifth Symphony, Sixth Symphony, Fourth Piano Concerto and Choral Fantasy at the Theater an der Wien, in Vienna, Austria.

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In the News

Quote of the Day
"Our peace and prosperity can never be taken for granted and must constantly be tended, so that never again do we have cause to build monuments to our fallen youth". --Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom




Song of the Day
Artist - Shuggie Otis




Film of the Day
Starring - Buster Keaton, Marceline Day




Wiki of the Day
The Moskstraumen or Moskenstraumen is a system of tidal eddies and whirlpools, one of the strongest in the world,[1] that forms at the Lofoten archipelago, Norway, in the Norwegian Sea. It is located between the Lofoten Point (Norwegian: Lofotodden) of Moskenesøya (Moskenesmunicipality) and Værøy, at the small island of Mosken.[2][3] Moskstraumen is unusual in that it occurs in the open sea whereas most other whirlpools are observed in confined straits or rivers. It originates from a combination of several factors, the dominant being the strong semi-diurnal tides and peculiar shape of the seabed, with a shallow ridge between the Moskenesøya and Værøy islands which amplifies and whirls the tidal currents.
The Moskstraumen has been featured in many historical accounts, generally exaggerated. It is also popularly known as maelstrom – a Nordic word for a strong whirlpool which originates from the Dutch combination of malen (to grind) and stroom (stream). This term was introduced into the English language by Edgar Allan Poe in 1841, through his short story "A Descent into the Maelström". Poe provides an alternate name for the whirlpool with the line: “We Norwegians call it the Moskoestrom, from the island of Moskoe in the midway.” 


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Dec 21, 2014

On This Day - Dec. 21

2012 CE - Mayan Doomsday passes and the world remains intact. 




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In the News

Quote of the Day
"I started writing hits the day I sold my piano". --Michael Cretu 




Song of the Day

Film of the Day
Director - Robert Redford




Wiki of the Day
Aelius Galenus or Claudius Galenus (/ɡəˈliːnəs/;[1] Greek: Κλαύδιος Γαληνός; AD 129 –c. 200/c. 216), better known as Galen of Pergamon (/ˈɡeɪlən/),[2] was a prominent Greek physician, surgeon and philosopher in the Roman empire.[3][4][5] Arguably the most accomplished of all medical researchers of antiquity, Galen influenced the development of various scientific disciplines, including anatomy,[6] physiology, pathology,[7] pharmacology,[8] and neurology, as well as philosophy[9] and logic.
The son of Aelius Nicon, a wealthy architect with scholarly interests, Galen received a comprehensive education that prepared him for a successful career as a physician and philosopher. He traveled extensively, exposing himself to a wide variety of medical theories and discoveries before settling in Rome, where he served prominent members of Roman society and eventually was given the position of personal physician to several emperors.
Galen's understanding of anatomy and medicine was principally influenced by the then-current theory of humorism, as advanced by ancient Greek physicians such as Hippocrates. His theories dominated and influenced Western medical science for more than 1,300 years. His anatomical reports, based mainly on dissection of monkeys, especially the Barbary Macaque, and pigs, remained uncontested until 1543, when printed descriptions and illustrations of human dissections were published in the seminal work De humani corporis fabrica by Andreas Vesalius[10][11] where Galen's physiological theory was accommodated to these new observations.[12] Galen's theory of the physiology of the circulatory system endured until 1628, when William Harvey published his treatise entitled De motu cordis, in which he established that blood circulates, with the heart acting as a pump.[13][14] Medical students continued to study Galen's writings until well into the 19th century. Galen conducted many nerve ligation experiments that supported the theory, which is still accepted today, that the brain controls all the motions of the muscles by means of the cranial and peripheral nervous systems.[15]


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Dec 20, 2014

On This Day - Dec. 20

69 CE - Vespasian, formerly a general under Nero, returns to Rome after besieging Jerusalem to claim the title of Emperor, marking the end of the tumultuous Year of Four Emperors.




Photo of the Day

In the News

Quote of the Day
"Liberty is the right of doing whatever the law permits". --Montesquieu




Song of the Day
Iron Tusk
Artist - Mastodon
Album - Leviathan

Film of the Day
A Clockwork Orange
Director - Stanley Kubrick
Starring - Malcolm McDowell, Patrick Magee, Michael Bates




Wiki of the Day
The classification of the Japonic languages (Japanese and Ryukyuan) is unclear. Linguists traditionally consider the Japonic languages to belong to an independent family; indeed, until the classification of Ryukyuan as separate languages within a Japonic family rather than as dialects of Japanese, Japanese was considered a language isolate. Among more distant connections, the possibility of a genetic relationship to the Goguryeo (Koguryŏ) languages, or perhaps more specifically to Kara (Gaya), has the most currency. Goguryeo itself may be related to Old Korean Peninsula, and a Japonic–Korean grouping is widely considered plausible. Independent of the question of a Japonic–Korean connection, both the Japonic languages and Korean are often included in the Altaic family. Relevance for Old Korean and modern Korean is unknown.
The Japanese–Koguryoic proposal dates back to Shinmura Izuru's (1916) observation that the attested Goguryeo numerals—3, 5, 7, and 10—are very similar to Japanese.[citation needed] The hypothesis proposes that Japanese is a relative of the extinct languages spoken by the Buyeo-Goguryeo cultures of Korea, southern Manchuria, and Liaodong. The best attested of these is the language of Goguryeo, with the more poorly attested Buyeo languages of Baekje and Buyeo believed to also be related.
A monograph by Christopher Beckwith (2004) has established about 140 lexical items in the Goguryeo corpus. They mostly occur in place-name collocations, many of which may include grammatical morphemes (including cognates of the Japanese genitive marker no and the Japanese adjective-attributive morpheme -sa) and a few of which may show syntactical relationships. He postulates that the majority of the identified Goguryeo corpus, which includes all of the grammatical morphemes, is related to Japanese.


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Dec 19, 2014

On This Day - Dec. 19

1932 CE - BBC World Service begins broadcasting as the BBC Empire Service, aimed principally at English speakers in the outposts of the British Empire. 




Photo of the Day
Skyline of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, with the Scotiabank Saddledome in the forefront.




In the News

Quote of the Day




Song of the Day
Artist - Ramin Djawadi
Soundtrack - Game of Thrones




Film of the Day
Director - Tommy Wiseau
Starring - Tommy Wiseau, Greg Sestero




Wiki of the Day
Transnistria (also called Trans-Dniestr or Transdniestria) is a breakaway state located mostly on a strip of land between the River Dniester and the eastern Moldovan border with Ukraine. Since its declaration of independence in 1990, and especially after the War of Transnistria in 1992, it has been governed as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic (PMR, also known as Pridnestrovie), a state with limited recognition that claims territory to the east of the River Dniester, and also to the city of Bender and its surrounding localities on the west bank, in the historical region of Bessarabia. The names "Transnistria" and "Pridnestrovie" both refer to the Dniester River.
Unrecognised by any United Nations member state, Transnistria is designated by the Republic of Moldova as the Transnistria autonomous territorial unit with special legal status (Unitatea teritorială autonomă cu statut juridic special Transnistria),[3] or Stînga Nistrului ("Left Bank of the Dniester").[4][5][6]
After the dissolution of the USSR, tensions between the newly created Moldova and thede facto sovereign state of Pridnestrovia (which unlike the rest of Moldova did not wish to separate from the Soviet Union) escalated into a military conflict that started in March 1992 and was concluded by a ceasefire in July 1992. As part of that agreement, a three-party (Russia, Moldova, Transnistria) Joint Control Commission supervises the security arrangements in the demilitarized zone, comprising twenty localities on both sides of the river. Although the ceasefire has held, the territory's political status remains unresolved: Transnistria is an unrecognized but independent[7][8][9][10] presidential republic with its own government, parliament, military, police, postal system, and currency. Its authorities have adopted a constitution, flag, national anthem, and coat of arms.


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