Leptis Magna was a punic and then roman settlement. Septimius Severus (145 – 211), Roman Emperor from 193 to 211, was born in this town. Leptis Magna: in the past was known as the "Town of white shadows", a name due to the white statues appearing and disappering amid the dunes of sand. The city had temples, a theatre and an amphitheatre, with a profusion of decorations and statues.
Leptis Magna’s market is a particularly well preserved example of such structures of a Roman city. In fact, many of the features of this market are unique. Along with typical porticoes of shops, the structure had two central circular stalls. The system used by stall holders for measuring the quantities of goods was still found in the market.
"The Roman food market of Leptis Magna was built in 8 BC by a wealthy citizen Hannibal Tapapius Rufus. The evidence for this comes from two inscriptions: one in Latin over the entrance of the market and another in neo Punic on the architrave of one of the market’s circular central stalls."
http://www.suite101.com/content/the-market-place-leptis-magna-a138237
For a web tour in this town, see for instance
Thursday, January 6, 2011
Three poleis - Tripoli
By the fifth century B.C., Carthage, the greatest of the overseas Phoenician colonies, had extended its hegemony across much of North Africa, where a distinctive civilization, known as Punic, came into being. Punic settlements on the Libyan coast included Oea (Tripoli), Labdah (later Leptis Magna), and Sabratah, in an area that came to be known collectively as Tripolis, or "Three Cities".
read more http://countrystudies.us/libya/5.htm Libya, by Helen Chapin Metz, ed. Libya: A Country Study. Washington: GPO for the Library of Congress, 1987.
Tripoli is the mondern town corresponding to the old Oea, one of the three old Phoenician towns along the coast of Tripolitania, in Libya. http://www.livius.org/oa-om/oea/oea.html
Wednesday, January 5, 2011
Possible geoglyphs spotted in Peru
Possible geoglyphs spotted in Peru, by Rossella Lorenzi.
A huge network of earthworks, or geoglyphs, is visible in satellite imagery of a large area around Titicaca Lake, a researcher claims. http://news.discovery.com/archaeology/geoglyph-peru-andean.html
Was this a planned symbol? Yes, says scientist Amelia Carolina Sparavigna."An Italian researcher may have discovered a huge network of earthworks representing birds, snakes and other animals in Peru, according to a study published on the Cornell University physics website arXiv.
Amelia Carolina Sparavigna, assistant professor at the department of physics of Turin's Polytechnic University, used Google satellite maps and AstroFracTool, an astronomical image-processing program which she developed, to investigate over 463 square miles of land around Peru's Titicaca Lake "
New Desert Crater Found Using Google Maps and Free Software
"The discovery of a new crater in the Bayuda Desert in Sudan suggests that the next generation of crater hunters could be amateurs based at home.
Most of the rocky planets, moons and asteroids in the Solar System are pock-marked with impact craters of all sizes. On Earth, however, small craters are rare because they quickly get eroded by weather and water.
So the discovery of new small craters is a reason to celebrate. A couple of weeks ago, an Italian team announced in the journal Science that it had used Google Earth to identify an impact crater in the remote desert of southern Egypt. A quick trip to the region showed this crater to be 45 meters in diameter and reasonably well-preserved in the desert rocks.
Now, just a few days later, Amelia Sparavigna at the Politecnico di Torino in Italy has found evidence of another crater in the Bayuda Desert in Sudan using Google Maps. This one is a little bigger: about 10 kilometres in diameter."
Most of the rocky planets, moons and asteroids in the Solar System are pock-marked with impact craters of all sizes. On Earth, however, small craters are rare because they quickly get eroded by weather and water.
So the discovery of new small craters is a reason to celebrate. A couple of weeks ago, an Italian team announced in the journal Science that it had used Google Earth to identify an impact crater in the remote desert of southern Egypt. A quick trip to the region showed this crater to be 45 meters in diameter and reasonably well-preserved in the desert rocks.
Now, just a few days later, Amelia Sparavigna at the Politecnico di Torino in Italy has found evidence of another crater in the Bayuda Desert in Sudan using Google Maps. This one is a little bigger: about 10 kilometres in diameter."
The Hindu : Sci-Tech / Internet : New crater in Sudan discovered using Google Maps
"Software scientists have discovered a 10 kilometre wide crater like structure in the Bayuda Desert of Sudan using Google Maps.
If confirmed, it will be the second such discovery using the popular online mapping tool and could spawn a new generation of home-based amateur crater hunters.
Amelia Sparavigna from the Politecnico di Torino in Italy said she got the idea from Italian researcher Vincenzo de Micheles who identified an impact crater in the remote desert of southern Egypt by 2008 using Google Earth.
Located between the fourth and sixth cataract, the area is characterised by basaltic rocks from ancient volcanoes."The Hindu : Sci-Tech / Internet : New crater in Sudan discovered using Google Maps
If confirmed, it will be the second such discovery using the popular online mapping tool and could spawn a new generation of home-based amateur crater hunters.
Amelia Sparavigna from the Politecnico di Torino in Italy said she got the idea from Italian researcher Vincenzo de Micheles who identified an impact crater in the remote desert of southern Egypt by 2008 using Google Earth.
Located between the fourth and sixth cataract, the area is characterised by basaltic rocks from ancient volcanoes."The Hindu : Sci-Tech / Internet : New crater in Sudan discovered using Google Maps
M R James - The Treasure of Abbot Thomas
Up to the present day there is much gossip among the Canons about a certain hidden treasure of this Abbot Thomas, for which those of Steinfeld have often made search, though hitherto in vain. The story is that Thomas, while yet in the vigour of life, concealed a very large quantity of gold somewhere in the monastery. He was often asked where it was, and always answered, with a laugh: 'Job, John, and Zechariah will tell either you or your successors.' He sometimes added that he should feel no grudge against those who might find it.
http://ghost.new-age-spirituality.com/mrjames10.html
M R James - The Treasure of Abbot Thomas
Bel racconto breve di James sulla ricerca di un tesoro nascosto.
M R James - The Treasure of Abbot Thomas
Bel racconto breve di James sulla ricerca di un tesoro nascosto.
Ivory from the melting permafrost
Trade in the ivory from the tusks of dead mammoths has occurred for 300 years and continues to be legal. Mammoth ivory is rare and costly, because mammoths have been extinct for millennia: in fact this trade does not threaten any living species. However, this uncontrolled extraction of mammoth remains from the melting Siberian permafrost is a problem. from Wiki
From a NY Times item:"There's a kind of discomfort when you're a scientist and you see something that could have scientific value being carved up and destroyed," Haynes said. "But this is the trade-off," he added. "I see the businessman's arguments, too. Mammoths are already extinct and people need an economy." In addition, the Russian government examines the tusks to make sure none bearing disease, prehistoric human markings or other scientifically valuable elements are exported.
Scared of being hit by a meteor?
A very interesting article discussing a book on dinosaurus, meteorites and volcanos.
"But Dr Nield’s book even excuses the meteorite from wiping out the dinosaurs. He cites one scientist, Professor Gerta Keller of Princeton University, who claims there were signs of them on Earth 300,000 years after the meteorite struck. The suggestion is that while the meteorite dealt the dinosaurs an all-but-fatal blow, what finally finished them off was a massive volcano. Just before the dinosaurs died, there was a huge eruption of volcanic rock and gas in India, with a truly stupendous outpouring of lava with toxic exhalations that would have had a catastrophic effect on the atmosphere."
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1343905/Scared-hit-meteor-Dont-dinosaur.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
"But Dr Nield’s book even excuses the meteorite from wiping out the dinosaurs. He cites one scientist, Professor Gerta Keller of Princeton University, who claims there were signs of them on Earth 300,000 years after the meteorite struck. The suggestion is that while the meteorite dealt the dinosaurs an all-but-fatal blow, what finally finished them off was a massive volcano. Just before the dinosaurs died, there was a huge eruption of volcanic rock and gas in India, with a truly stupendous outpouring of lava with toxic exhalations that would have had a catastrophic effect on the atmosphere."
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1343905/Scared-hit-meteor-Dont-dinosaur.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
The Amazing Steam Engines Of The First Century: An online translation of an ancient text reveals some engineering marvels from antiquity.
by KFC 01/20/2011, http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/26285/
"Ask a person in the street who invented the steam engine and you're more than likely to hear the names of various Renaissance inventors such as Denis Papin or James Watt. Less well known is the fact that steam engines were in use at least 2000 years ago. Our knowledge of these devices is largely the result of a text called Pneumatica written in the first century by the Greek mathematician, engineer and inventor Hero of Alexandria. Today, Amelia Carolina Sparavigna, at the Politecnico di Torino in Italy, talks us through some of these devices as they are described in an online translation of Hero's work."
Ulysses' last voyage
I and my company were old and slow when at that narrow passage we arrived where Hercules his landmarks set as signals, that man no farther onward should adventur. On the right hand behind me I left Seville, and on the other already had left Ceuta. 'O brothers, who amid a hundred thousand perils,' I said, 'have come to the West, to this short eve which is the remaining of your senses, still be you unwilling to deny the knowledge, following the sun, of the unpeopled world. Consider the seed from which you sprang; you were not made to live like brutes, but for pursuit of virtue and of knowledge.' So eager did I render my companions, with this brief exhortation for the voyage, that then I hardly could have held them back. And having turned our stern to the morning, we of our oars made wings for this mad flight, evermore gaining on the larboard side.
Already saw the night all the stars of the other pole, and ours so very low that they did not rise above the ocean floor. Five days and nights lasted since we had entered into the deep pass, when a mountain appeared to us, dim from distance, and it seemed to me so high as I had never any one seen.
Joyful were we, and soon it turned to weeping; for out of the new land a whirlwind rose, and smote upon the fore part of the ship. Three times it made her whirl with all the waters, at the fourth time it made the stern uplift, and the prow downward go, as pleased Another, until the sea above us closed again."
arranged from Longfellow's Translation
Already saw the night all the stars of the other pole, and ours so very low that they did not rise above the ocean floor. Five days and nights lasted since we had entered into the deep pass, when a mountain appeared to us, dim from distance, and it seemed to me so high as I had never any one seen.
Joyful were we, and soon it turned to weeping; for out of the new land a whirlwind rose, and smote upon the fore part of the ship. Three times it made her whirl with all the waters, at the fourth time it made the stern uplift, and the prow downward go, as pleased Another, until the sea above us closed again."
arranged from Longfellow's Translation
Ulisse
Lo maggior corno de la fiamma antica comincio` a crollarsi mormorando pur come quella cui vento affatica; indi la cima qua e la` menando, come fosse la lingua che parlasse, gitto` voce di fuori, e disse:
...
Io e compagni eravam vecchi e tardi quando venimmo a quella foce stretta dov'Ercule segno` li suoi riguardi, accio` che l'uom piu` oltre non si metta: da la man destra mi lasciai Sibilia, da l'altra gia` m'avea lasciata Setta.
"O frati", dissi "che per cento milia perigli siete giunti a l'occidente, a questa tanto picciola vigilia d'i nostri sensi ch'e` del rimanente, non vogliate negar l'esperienza, di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente. Considerate la vostra semenza: fatti non foste a viver come bruti, ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza". Li miei compagni fec'io si` aguti, con questa orazion picciola, al cammino, che a pena poscia li avrei ritenuti; e volta nostra poppa nel mattino, de' remi facemmo ali al folle volo, sempre acquistando dal lato mancino. Tutte le stelle gia` de l'altro polo vedea la notte e 'l nostro tanto basso, che non surgea fuor del marin suolo.
Cinque volte racceso e tante casso lo lume era di sotto da la luna, poi che 'ntrati eravam ne l'alto passo, quando n'apparve una montagna, bruna per la distanza, e parvemi alta tanto quanto veduta non avea alcuna.
Noi ci allegrammo, e tosto torno` in pianto, che' de la nova terra un turbo nacque, e percosse del legno il primo canto. Tre volte il fe' girar con tutte l'acque; a la quarta levar la poppa in suso e la prora ire in giu`, com'altrui piacque, infin che 'l mar fu sovra noi richiuso.
...
Io e compagni eravam vecchi e tardi quando venimmo a quella foce stretta dov'Ercule segno` li suoi riguardi, accio` che l'uom piu` oltre non si metta: da la man destra mi lasciai Sibilia, da l'altra gia` m'avea lasciata Setta.
"O frati", dissi "che per cento milia perigli siete giunti a l'occidente, a questa tanto picciola vigilia d'i nostri sensi ch'e` del rimanente, non vogliate negar l'esperienza, di retro al sol, del mondo sanza gente. Considerate la vostra semenza: fatti non foste a viver come bruti, ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza". Li miei compagni fec'io si` aguti, con questa orazion picciola, al cammino, che a pena poscia li avrei ritenuti; e volta nostra poppa nel mattino, de' remi facemmo ali al folle volo, sempre acquistando dal lato mancino. Tutte le stelle gia` de l'altro polo vedea la notte e 'l nostro tanto basso, che non surgea fuor del marin suolo.
Cinque volte racceso e tante casso lo lume era di sotto da la luna, poi che 'ntrati eravam ne l'alto passo, quando n'apparve una montagna, bruna per la distanza, e parvemi alta tanto quanto veduta non avea alcuna.
Noi ci allegrammo, e tosto torno` in pianto, che' de la nova terra un turbo nacque, e percosse del legno il primo canto. Tre volte il fe' girar con tutte l'acque; a la quarta levar la poppa in suso e la prora ire in giu`, com'altrui piacque, infin che 'l mar fu sovra noi richiuso.
Ozymandias
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
- Percy Bysshe Shelley, 1818
Questa poesia parla di Ozymandias, altro nome di Ramses II.
Ramses II, Egyptian Museum, Torino
Iris Nebula
Iris Nebula LBN 487 and NGC 7023 in Cepheus
From an image by Hewholooks, which is the user page of Hunter Wilson. Images may be seen at http://hwilson.zenfolio.com/f129011888 or on
Wikimedia athttp://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Special:Search?search=hewholooks
Tuesday, January 4, 2011
Testa osiriaca danneggiata
"Uno dei pezzi esibiti alla mostra di antichità del Museo Egizio di Torino a Shizuoka (Giappone), durante i lavori di imballo/trasporto, ha subito un grave danno. Si tratta della testa osiriaca che era a suo tempo stata riparata con l'aggiunta di una corona bianca, non sua. Viva preoccupazione degli Egittologi italiani."
http://www.archaeogate.org/egittologia/article/1277/1/danneggiata-la-testa-osiriaca-del-museo-egizio-di-torin.html
http://www.archaeogate.org/egittologia/article/1277/1/danneggiata-la-testa-osiriaca-del-museo-egizio-di-torin.html
Egyptian Museum, Torino
This head has been damaged during the packaging after an exhibition in Japan
The cloak of Harry Potter
This left only one parcel. Harry picked it up and felt it. It was very light. He unwrapped it. Something fluid and silvery grey went slithering to the floor, where it lay in gleaming folds...
"What is it?"
Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into material.
"It's an Invisibility Cloak"
http://stretchingtheboundaries.blogspot.com/2011/01/invisibility-cloak.html
"What is it?"
Harry picked the shining, silvery cloth off the floor. It was strange to the touch, like water woven into material.
"It's an Invisibility Cloak"
http://stretchingtheboundaries.blogspot.com/2011/01/invisibility-cloak.html
Eta Carinae's Homunculus
Homunculus Nebula is surrounding the star system Eta Carinae. The nebula is embedded within a much larger ionized hydrogen region, which is the Carina Nebula. Homunculus is believed to have been ejected in a huge outburst from Eta Carinae in 1841, so brightly to be visible from Earth. This massive explosion produced two polar lobes and an equatorial disc, moving outwards. Though Eta Carinae is quite away, approximately 7,500 light-years, it is possible to distinguish in the nebula, many structures with the size of about the diameter of our solar system. Knots, dust lanes and radial streaks appear quite clearly in many images.
At the http://staff.polito.it/amelia.sparavigna/Astronomical-astrofractool-web.htm, I am comparing the imaging of Homunculus Nebula, obtained by Hubble Space Telescope, and that from the Gemini South Telescope.
ESO - AB Pictoris and its companion
Chandra Proxima Centauri
"The Chandra X-ray Observatory is a satellite launched on STS-93 by NASA on July 23, 1999. It was named in honor of Indian-American physicist Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar who is known for determining the maximum mass for white dwarfs. "Chandra" also means "moon" or "luminous" in Sanskrit. Chandra Observatory is the third of NASA's four Great Observatories. The first wasHubble Space Telescope; second the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, launched in 1991; and last is the Spitzer Space Telescope." read more at
See at http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2004/proxima/ images of Proxima Centauri.
"Proxima Centauri: A red dwarf star 4 light years from the Sun. (Credit: NASA/CXC/SAO). X-ray observations of Proxima Centauri, the nearest star to the Sun, have shown that its surface is in a state of turmoil. Flares, or explosive outbursts occur almost continually. This behavior can be traced to Proxima Centauri's low mass, about a tenth that of the Sun. In the cores of low mass stars, nuclear fusion reactions that convert hydrogen to helium proceed very slowly, and create a turbulent, convective motion throughout their interiors. This motion stores up magnetic energy which is often released explosively in the star's upper atmosphere where it produces flares in X-rays and other forms of light. X-rays from Proxima Centauri are consistent with a point-like source. The extended X-ray glow is an instrumental effect. The nature of the two dots above the image is unknown - they could be background sources."
Physics - Chance of thunder and gamma-ray flashes
Physics - Chance of thunder—and gamma-ray flashes
In a paper appearing in Physical Review Letters, scientists in Italy (Tavani et al.) present new space-based observations of gamma-ray emissions from thunderclouds, called terrestrial gamma-ray flashes (TGFs). Their analysis suggests that storms located deep within our atmosphere sometimes produce bursts of electrons with energies up to 100 MeV.
In a paper appearing in Physical Review Letters, scientists in Italy (Tavani et al.) present new space-based observations of gamma-ray emissions from thunderclouds, called terrestrial gamma-ray flashes (TGFs). Their analysis suggests that storms located deep within our atmosphere sometimes produce bursts of electrons with energies up to 100 MeV.
Monday, January 3, 2011
Craters on Mercury
This image has been obtained processing an image recorded by the spacecraft MESSENGER during its planet fly-by (credits: NASA-JPL)
Lord Arthur Savile's Crime
Il delitto di Lord Arthur Savile, titolo originale Lord Arthur Savile's Crime è un racconto di Oscar Wilde del 1887. Il sottotitolo dell'opera era A Study of Duty (letteralmente "uno studio sul dovere").
In this story, Lord Arthur Savile, is introduced by Lady Windermere to Mr Septimus R. Podgers, a chiromantist, who reads his palm and tells him that he will be a murderer. Lord Arthur wants to marry, so he decides that he has no right to do so until he has committed the murder...
...
Suddenly she looked eagerly round the room, and said, in her clear contralto voice, 'Where is my cheiromantist?' 'Your what, Gladys?' exclaimed the Duchess, giving an involuntary start. 'My cheiromantist, Duchess; I can't live without him at present.'
'Dear Gladys! you are always so original,' murmured the Duchess, trying to remember what a cheiromantist really was, and hoping it was not the same as a cheiropodist.
'He comes to see my hand twice a week regularly,' continued Lady Windermere, 'and is most interesting about it.' 'Good heavens!' said the Duchess to herself, 'he is a sort of cheiropodist after all. How very dreadful. I hope he is a foreigner at any rate. It wouldn't be quite so bad then.'
'I must certainly introduce him to you.' 'Introduce him!' cried the Duchess; 'you don't mean to say he is here?' and she began looking about for a small tortoise-shell fan and a very tattered lace shawl, so as to be ready to go at a moment's notice.
...
Suddenly she looked eagerly round the room, and said, in her clear contralto voice, 'Where is my cheiromantist?' 'Your what, Gladys?' exclaimed the Duchess, giving an involuntary start. 'My cheiromantist, Duchess; I can't live without him at present.'
'Dear Gladys! you are always so original,' murmured the Duchess, trying to remember what a cheiromantist really was, and hoping it was not the same as a cheiropodist.
'He comes to see my hand twice a week regularly,' continued Lady Windermere, 'and is most interesting about it.' 'Good heavens!' said the Duchess to herself, 'he is a sort of cheiropodist after all. How very dreadful. I hope he is a foreigner at any rate. It wouldn't be quite so bad then.'
'I must certainly introduce him to you.' 'Introduce him!' cried the Duchess; 'you don't mean to say he is here?' and she began looking about for a small tortoise-shell fan and a very tattered lace shawl, so as to be ready to go at a moment's notice.
Rhapsody in Blue
At http://www.archive.org/details/rhapblue11924 there is the original recording of Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue. This record was released soon after the piece was first performed (1924) and soon replaced by an electrically recorded record.
Gershwin told his first biographer Isaac Goldberg in 1931: "It was on the train, with its steely rhythms, its rattle-ty bang, that is so often so stimulating to a composer – I frequently hear music in the very heart of the noise... And there I suddenly heard, and even saw on paper – the complete construction of the Rhapsody, from beginning to end. No new themes came to me, but I worked on the thematic material already in my mind and tried to conceive the composition as a whole. I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our blues, our metropolitan madness. By the time I reached Boston I had a definite plot of the piece, as distinguished from its actual substance."
Gershwin told his first biographer Isaac Goldberg in 1931: "It was on the train, with its steely rhythms, its rattle-ty bang, that is so often so stimulating to a composer – I frequently hear music in the very heart of the noise... And there I suddenly heard, and even saw on paper – the complete construction of the Rhapsody, from beginning to end. No new themes came to me, but I worked on the thematic material already in my mind and tried to conceive the composition as a whole. I heard it as a sort of musical kaleidoscope of America, of our vast melting pot, of our unduplicated national pep, of our blues, our metropolitan madness. By the time I reached Boston I had a definite plot of the piece, as distinguished from its actual substance."
Analogue audio - Cylinders and 78 rpm
"Phonograph cylinders were the earliest commercial medium for recording and reproducing sound. Commonly known simply as "records" in their era of greatest popularity (c. 1888–1915), these cylinder shaped objects had an audio recording engraved on the outside surface which could be reproduced when the cylinder was played on a mechanical phonograph. The competing disc-shaped gramophone record system triumphed in the market place to become the dominant commercial audio medium in the 1910s, and commercial mass production of phonograph cylinders ended in 1929" from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phonograph_cylinder
"Early disc recordings were produced in a variety of speeds ranging from 60 to 130 rpm, and a variety of sizes. From 1900, the two leading manufacturers of flat records were Columbia, which used 80 rpm as its speed, and Victor, which used 76.59 rpm. Since one company's records were playable on the other's machines, the standard speed became 78 rpm, which is around the average speed between the two. By 1925, the speed of the record became standardised at a nominal value of 78 rpm."
You can listen old cylinders and 78 rpms at http://www.archive.org/details/78rpm Internet Archive has a huge collection, quite interesting for researches on the modern music history.
rpm = revolutions per minute
rpm = revolutions per minute
Sunday, January 2, 2011
E A Poe - The Gold-Bug
William Legrand becomes obsessed with searching for treasure after being bitten by a scarab-like bug thought to be made of pure gold. He notifies his closest friend, the narrator, telling him to immediately come visit him at his home on Sullivan's Island in South Carolina. Upon the narrator's arrival, Legrand informs him that they are embarking upon a search for lost treasure of the pirate Captain Kidd. http://poe.thefreelibrary.com/Gold-Bug
Profiles - Duchess of Medina Sidonia
"Luisa Isabel Álvarez de Toledo was not only a novelist but also a historian, and lived in her palace in Sanlúcar with the most important private archive in Europe, said to be more than one million historical documents. She spent the latter years of her life cataloguing this legacy, in the residence where he ancestors have lived since 1297. The Duchess said in an interview in 2004 that the oldest document in the archive dates from 1128, and published a book ‘Africa versus America’ at the beginning of this decade, the result of years of exhaustive research of her own archive and others in Spain. In it, she challenged the official history that the Americas were discovered by Christopher Columbus, claiming that trade had been taking place across the Atlantic for centuries before the official ‘Discovery.’"
Read more:
http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publish/article_15508.shtml#ixzz19sDv9POH
and http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/spanish/misc/newsid_1683000/1683276.stm
Read more:
http://www.typicallyspanish.com/news/publish/article_15508.shtml#ixzz19sDv9POH
and http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/spanish/misc/newsid_1683000/1683276.stm
A fish or a bird - Geoglyphs Titicaca
A geoglyph of Titicaca - As seen by Google Maps
The geoglyph viewed from the ground (Courtesy, Gary Mariscal Herrera, Director Instituto Nacional de Cultura, Peru)
Centenario - Jose Maria Arguedas
2011, Centenario della nascita di Jose Maria Arguedas, here a poem
They say that we do not know anything
That we are backwardness
That our head needs changing for a better one
They say that some learned men are saying this about us
These academics who reproduce themselves
In our own lives
What is there on the banks of these rivers, Doctor?
Take out your binoculars
And your spectacles
Look if you can.
Five hundred flowers
From five hundred different types of potato
Grow on the terraces
Above abysses
That your eyes don't reach
Those five hundred flowers
Are my brain
My flesh
From: A call to certain academics by José María Arguedas, translated from the Quechua by William Rowe.
They say that we do not know anything
That we are backwardness
That our head needs changing for a better one
They say that some learned men are saying this about us
These academics who reproduce themselves
In our own lives
What is there on the banks of these rivers, Doctor?
Take out your binoculars
And your spectacles
Look if you can.
Five hundred flowers
From five hundred different types of potato
Grow on the terraces
Above abysses
That your eyes don't reach
Those five hundred flowers
Are my brain
My flesh
From: A call to certain academics by José María Arguedas, translated from the Quechua by William Rowe.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
New Horizons in Space Missions
New Horizons is a NASA spacecraft mission currently moving toward Pluto. It is expected to be the firsts pacecraft to fly by and study this dwarf planet and its moons, Charon, Nix, and Hydra.
New Horizons was launched on January, 2006. It flew by Jupiter on February, 2007, and orbited Saturn on June, 2008. It will arrive at Pluto on July, 2015, after which it will continue into the Kuiper belt.
Pluto is the largest object of the Kuiper belt, which is the region of the Solar System extending from the orbit of Neptune (at 30 AU) to approximately 55 AU from the Sun. The belt consists mainly of small bodies, remnants from the Solar System's formation. It is the home to at least three dwarf planets – Pluto, Haumea, and Makemake. Some of the Solar System's moons, such as Neptune's Triton and Saturn's Phoebe, are also believed to have originated in the region.
More info Wiki
New Horizons was launched on January, 2006. It flew by Jupiter on February, 2007, and orbited Saturn on June, 2008. It will arrive at Pluto on July, 2015, after which it will continue into the Kuiper belt.
Pluto is the largest object of the Kuiper belt, which is the region of the Solar System extending from the orbit of Neptune (at 30 AU) to approximately 55 AU from the Sun. The belt consists mainly of small bodies, remnants from the Solar System's formation. It is the home to at least three dwarf planets – Pluto, Haumea, and Makemake. Some of the Solar System's moons, such as Neptune's Triton and Saturn's Phoebe, are also believed to have originated in the region.
More info Wiki
W. Irving - The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
This evening the Legend of Sleepy Hollow, by Washington Irving.
"Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was to pass long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by the fire, with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and listen to their marvellous tales of ghosts and goblins, and haunted fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping Hessian of the Hollow, as they sometimes called him. He would delight them equally by his anecdotes of witchcraft, and of the direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air, which prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut; and would frighten them woefully with speculations upon comets and shooting stars; and with the alarming fact that the world did absolutely turn round, and that they were half the time topsy-turvy!"
"Another of his sources of fearful pleasure was to pass long winter evenings with the old Dutch wives, as they sat spinning by the fire, with a row of apples roasting and spluttering along the hearth, and listen to their marvellous tales of ghosts and goblins, and haunted fields, and haunted brooks, and haunted bridges, and haunted houses, and particularly of the headless horseman, or Galloping Hessian of the Hollow, as they sometimes called him. He would delight them equally by his anecdotes of witchcraft, and of the direful omens and portentous sights and sounds in the air, which prevailed in the earlier times of Connecticut; and would frighten them woefully with speculations upon comets and shooting stars; and with the alarming fact that the world did absolutely turn round, and that they were half the time topsy-turvy!"
Dumbledore, not Silente
A dumbledore is a bee (bombo). The Headmaster of Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore, has a name showing one of the features of his character: as a bee in summer, he is always moving and his humming is pervading all the school. On the contary, the italian translation of the name in Albus Silente changes the character in authority and austerity.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Where is Voyager 1?
"NASA Probe Sees Solar Wind Decline. The 33-year odyssey of NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft has reached a distant point at the edge of our solar system where there is no outward motion of solar wind."
7 Exoplanets (Amazing video)
"Hundreds of planets around other stars have been discovered recently, but many centuries may pass before human eyes actually see them up close. Interpreting current data, Hugo award-winning artist Ron Miller takes us to seven of the most fascinating of these worlds."
Wonderful!
"And while we are not quite ready for something like Star Trek’s United Federation of Planets, the almost daily discovery of new planets has brought the number of known worlds to well over 450."
"And while we are not quite ready for something like Star Trek’s United Federation of Planets, the almost daily discovery of new planets has brought the number of known worlds to well over 450."
T-Rex bad reputation got worse
It seems that the largest land predators, which ever stalked the earth, were cannibals. As reported among news in Telegraph UK (15 Oct 2010), the reserchers noticed bite marks on the bones of the dinosaurs. Comparing the marks, the scientists realised that a T-Rex was the only animal large enough to have caused them.
T-Rex, Museo Scienze
Thera and the biblical plagues
Thera, a volcano in the Mediterranean sea, produced with its explosion around 3,500 year ago, one of the biggest cataclysms in the human history. The remains of Thera are the Mediterranean islands of Santorini, north of Crete. As we can read from an article of Telegraph, the volcanic ash of eruption could have clashed with thunderstorms above Egypt, producing severe hail storms (one of the biblical plagues).
According to Prof.Trevisanato, a Canadian biologist, another plague, the locusts, could be explained by the volcanic fall out from the ash. The ash fall out caused weather anomalies, which produced higher precipitations and humidity, fostering the presence of the locusts. The volcanic ash could also have caused the plague of darkness. In fact, pumice stones have been found during excavations of Egyptian ruins despite there not being any volcanoes in Egypt.
Very interesting article.
According to Prof.Trevisanato, a Canadian biologist, another plague, the locusts, could be explained by the volcanic fall out from the ash. The ash fall out caused weather anomalies, which produced higher precipitations and humidity, fostering the presence of the locusts. The volcanic ash could also have caused the plague of darkness. In fact, pumice stones have been found during excavations of Egyptian ruins despite there not being any volcanoes in Egypt.
Very interesting article.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
Powering the space missions
Deep-space missions are powered by a RTG system. A radioisotope thermoelectric generator (RTG, RITEG) is a generator that obtains its power from radioactive decay. The heat released by the decay of a radioactive material is converted into electricity by the Seebeck effect using an array of thermocouples (see "how did Georg do it?").
RTGs are systems quite suitable as power sources for satellites and space probes and also for remote facilities where the use of solar cells is not feasible (for instance, lighthouses built by the former Soviet Union inside the Arctic Circle). RTGs are able to give few hundred watts for very long periods. The problem is to guarentee a safe use of radioisotopes.
RTGs are systems quite suitable as power sources for satellites and space probes and also for remote facilities where the use of solar cells is not feasible (for instance, lighthouses built by the former Soviet Union inside the Arctic Circle). RTGs are able to give few hundred watts for very long periods. The problem is to guarentee a safe use of radioisotopes.
Where is Cassini spacecraft?
Cassini–Huygens is a robotic spacecraft currently studying the planet Saturn and its satellites. The launched spacecraft consisted of two elements: the Cassini orbiter, named for the astronomer Giovanni Domenico Cassini, and the Huygens probe, named for the astronomer, mathematician and physicist Christiaan Huygens. Cassini-Huygens was launched on October 15, 1997, and it entered into orbit around Saturn on July 1, 2004. On December 25, 2004, the Huygens probe was separated from the orbiter and reached Saturn's moon Titan on January 14, 2005. It descended into the atmosphere of the moon, sending information back to the Earth. This was the first landing ever accomplished in the outer solar system. The mission will continue until 2017.
On November 2, Cassini was triggered into a standby mode, after a bit flip caused it to miss an important instruction. Cassini was reactivated as scheduled on November 24 and has returned to perfect working order, in time for two scheduled close fly-bys with Enceladus.
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm
What is powering Cassini?
Bacteria in Titanic rusticles
TITANIC BEING EATEN BY DESTRUCTIVE BACTERIA, by Rossella Lorenzi.
"A new bacterium isolated from the Titanic wreck is accelerating the wreck's disintegration into a pile of dust."
These are bacteria potentially dangerous to underwater metal structures. Shipwrecks disapper but also offshore oil and gas pipelines. The articecle tells that the newly discovered species could also have positive applications for industry for instance in the recycling of iron structures in deep ocean.
"A new bacterium isolated from the Titanic wreck is accelerating the wreck's disintegration into a pile of dust."
These are bacteria potentially dangerous to underwater metal structures. Shipwrecks disapper but also offshore oil and gas pipelines. The articecle tells that the newly discovered species could also have positive applications for industry for instance in the recycling of iron structures in deep ocean.