Acemoglu, Daron, and James Robinson, Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity and Poverty, Crown Business 2012 "Some time ago a little-known Scottish philosopher wrote a book on what makes nations succeed and what makes them fail. The Wealth of Nations is still being read today. With the same perspicacity and with the same broad historical perspective, Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson have retackled this same question for our own times. Two centuries from now our great-great- . . . -great grandchildren will be, similarly, reading Why Nations Fail." —George Akerlof, Nobel laureate in economics, 2001  
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Broderick, Damien, The Dreaming Dragons, Pocket 1980 Customer review: 'I first read this over 10 years ago and it is still one of the few books I can read and re-read. It is one of the best SF books I have read, and amazingly is very short. The story is so complex I wont even try to describe it (since it involves mixed up time-lines). It starts with a man trying to find the source of the Rainbow Serpent legend in outback Australia and instead finds an ancient working matter transmitter ... from there the ideas come so thick and fast that it is a little disorienting. What a ride! The book covers topics and issues such as the nature of mind, myth, the extinction of the dinosaurs, telepathy, alternate histories, space travel, time travel, particle physics etc. Some might find the pace a bit daunting, and the mixing of story lines separated by millions of years a bit confusing but I didn't find it that way and the end result is to me quite powerful. Broderick can sometimes write poorly, but this is one book where he shines.' A Customer 
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Dawkins, Richard, The Selfish Gene , Oxford UP 1976 Amazon: Editorial review: 'Inheriting the mantle of revolutionary biologist from Darwin, Watson, and Crick, Richard Dawkins forced an enormous change in the way we see ourselves and the world with the publication of The Selfish Gene. Suppose, instead of thinking about organisms using genes to reproduce themselves, as we had since Mendel's work was rediscovered, we turn it around and imagine that "our" genes build and maintain us in order to make more genes. That simple reversal seems to answer many puzzlers which had stumped scientists for years, and we haven't thought of evolution in the same way since.' Rob Lightner 
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Deighton, Len, Spy Sinker, HarperCollins 1990 'The third novel in Deighton's "Hook, Line and Sinker" trilogy. Spanning a ten year period (1977-87), Deighton solves the mystery of Fiona's defection - was she a Soviet spy or wasn't she? He also retells some of the events from the "Game, Set and Match", trilogy from Fiona's point of view.' 
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Feynman, Richard P, and Robert B Leighton, Matthew Sands, The Feynman Lectures on Physics (volume 3) : Quantum Mechanics, Addison Wesley 1970 Foreword: 'This set of lectures tries to elucidate from the beginning those features of quantum mechanics which are the most basic and the most general. . . . In each instance the ideas are introduced together with a detailed discussion of some specific examples - to try to make the physical ideas as real as possible.' Matthew Sands 
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Kelty, Christopher M, Two Bits: The Cultural Significance of Free Software, Duke University Press Books 2008 'In Two Bits, Christopher M. Kelty investigates the history and cultural significance of Free Software, revealing the people and practices that have transformed not only software but also music, film, science, and education. Free Software is a set of practices devoted to the collaborative creation of software source code that is made openly and freely available through an unconventional use of copyright law. Kelty explains how these specific practices have reoriented the relations of power around the creation, dissemination, and authorization of all kinds of knowledge.' 
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Lonergan, Bernard J F, Insight: A Study of Human Understanding (Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan : Volume 3), University of Toronto Press 1992 '. . . Bernard Lonergan's masterwork. Its aim is nothing less than insight into insight itself, an understanding of understanding' 
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Mandino, Og, The Greatest Salesman in the World, Bantam 1983 'Amazon.com Review: The Greatest Salesman in the World is a tiny book, and it is a treasure. First published in 1968, Og Mandino's classic remains an invaluable guide to a philosophy of salesmanship. Mandino's clear, simple writing style supports his purpose: to make the principles of sales known to a wide audience. A parable set in the time just prior to Christianity, The Greatest Salesman in the World weaves mythology with spirituality into a much needed message of inspiration in this culture of self-promotion. Mandino believes that to be a good salesperson, you must believe in yourself and the work you are doing. It is a simple but profound spiritual philosophy about how to succeed in the world's marketplace, easily understood and easy to take to heart. --Jodie Buller' 
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Marr, David, Patrick White: A Life, Knopf 1992 Editorial review from Library Journal : 'From Library Journal An admirably readable biography of the Nobel Prize-winning author of Voss , The Tree of Man , and many other books, this work is full of detail on White's family and prosperous background, the events and people in his life, his writing habits, his religious beliefs, his cantankerousness and temper, his causes and doubts, his attraction to the theater, and much more. White helped Marr gain access to people and material, even authorizing him to collect his letters, "the backbone of this book." Marr deals intelligently with important issues (among them, White's rootedness in and dissatisfaction with Australia, his sense of himself as an outsider, his relation to his mother, and, in particular his homosexuality, which White considered central to his novelistic and theatrical ability), avoiding psychoanalytical speculations and other intrusions. White reviewed the book shortly before he died, finding it "so painful he often found himself reading through tears. He did not ask Marr to change a line."' Richard Kuczkowski Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc. 
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Spitz, Bob, Reagan: An American Journey, Penguin Press 2018 ' “This captivating and evenhanded biography of America’s first celebrity president, Ronald Reagan, reads like a novel but doesn’t skimp on the scholarship… Impressive research, including numerous interviews with a wide array of Reagan cohorts, from 1930s movie star Olivia de Havilland to national security adviser Robert “Bud” McFarlane, undergirds the exceptional writing. Spitz synthesizes other scholars’ analyses, the firsthand memoirs of key players, original press coverage, and archival holdings. Readers need not be Reagan fans or Republicans to enjoy this outstanding biography.” — Publisher’s Weekly' 
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Williams, L Pearce, Michael Faraday: A Biography, Chapman and Hall 1965 Jacket: 'Michael Faraday has often been described as the greatest experimentalist in the history of science. There is considerable evidence to support this view; but it is not often realised that Faraday was not only the master of experimental technique, but also the leading theorist of the nineteenth century, who drew much of his inspiration from a view of the universe that was very similar to the German Nature Philosophers. Professor William's book describes his development of these ideas when confronted with empirical evidence and the ways in which they led to discoveries beyond the conception of his more orthodox contemporaries. The tenacity and courage he showed in the face of increasing official opposition to his work make for a story which will appeal as much to the general reader as to those with a more specialised interest in the subject.'back

Butler, Declan, "Lost in translation", Nature, 449, 7159, 13 September 2007, page 158-159. 'The culture of academia needs to change is scientists are to bridge the gp between research and the development of drugs and vaccines for neglected diseases n the developing world . . . '. back

Danzon, Patricia M, "At what price?", Nature, 449, 7159, 13 September 2007, page 176-179. 'Differential pricing could make global medicines affordable in developing countries. But drugs for diseases that have no market in the developed world will require additional subsidies . . . '.. back

A Simple Favor (Film) - Wikipedia, A Simple Favor (Film) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A Simple Favor is a 2018 American mystery thriller film[1] directed by Paul Feig from a screenplay by Jessica Sharzer, based on the 2017 novel of the same name by Darcey Bell. The film stars Anna Kendrick, Blake Lively, Henry Golding, Andrew Rannells, Linda Cardellini, Rupert Friend, and Jean Smart, and follows a small town vlogger who tries to solve the disappearance of her mysterious and rich best friend.' back

Aaron Hanlon, Postmodernism didn't cause Trump. It explains him, ' Ironically, the urge to blame postmodernism for Trump-era politics blinds us to the explanatory value postmodernism holds for what’s happening today. . . . it’s clear that the real enemy of truth is not postmodernism but propaganda, the active distortion of truth for political purposes. Trumpism practices this form of distortion on a daily basis. The postmodernist theorists we vilify did not cause this; they’ve actually given us a framework to understand precisely how falsehood can masquerade as truth.' back

ACT Heritage Council, Signadou and Blackfriars Precinct, Australian Catholic University, ' BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Signadou and Blackfriars Precinct
(Block 1 and Block 7 Section 49, Watson)
At its meeting of 31 May 2018 the ACT Heritage Council decided that the Signadou and Blackfriars Precinct was eligible for provisional registration.
The information contained in this report was considered by the ACT Heritage Council in assessing the nomination for the Signadou and Blackfriars Precinct against the heritage significance criteria outlined in s10 of the Heritage Act 2004.'
back

Adam Lusher, Toynbee Hall inspired Beveridge and introduced Lenin to muffins - but it is not a place of the past, ' It stands where gastropubs now jostle beside the old East End of Petticoat Lane market, where streets are overshadowed by the gleaming towers of the modern City of London. Amid such bustle, it is easy to overlook the lower rise, altogether more modest Toynbee Hall, and still easier to miss its significance. Yet this is the place that provided formative experiences for two key architects of the welfare state, William Beveridge and Clement Attlee.' back

Alea jacta est - Wikipedia, Alea jacta est - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Alea iacta est (Latin: "The die has been cast") is a Latin phrase attributed by Suetonius (as iacta alea est [ˈjakta ˈaːlea est]) to Julius Caesar on January 10, 49 BC as he led his army across the River Rubicon in Northern Italy. With this step, he entered Italy at the head of his army in defiance and began his long civil war against Pompey and the Optimates. The phrase is still used today to mean that events have passed a point of no return, that something inevitably will happen.' back

Aquinas 1036, Is the good of nature diminished by sin, 'I answer that, The good of human nature is threefold. First, there are the principles of which nature is constituted, and the properties that flow from them, such as the powers of the soul, and so forth. Secondly, since man has from nature an inclination to virtue, as stated above (60, 1; 63, 1), this inclination to virtue is a good of nature. Thirdly, the gift of original justice, conferred on the whole of human nature in the person of the first man, may be called a good of nature. Accordingly, the first-mentioned good of nature is neither destroyed nor diminished by sin. The third good of nature was entirely destroyed through the sin of our first parent. But the second good of nature, viz. the natural inclination to virtue, is diminished by sin.' back

Aquinas 1040, Whether death and other bodily defects are the result of sin?, 'I answer that, . . . death and all consequent bodily defects are punishments of original sin. And although the defects are not intended by the sinner, nevertheless they are ordered according to the justice of God Who inflicts them as punishments.' back

Catholic Church - Wikipedia, Dominican Order - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Order of Preachers (Latin: Ordo Praedicatorum), after the 15th century more commonly known as the Dominican Order or Dominicans, is a Catholic religious order founded by Saint Dominic and approved by Pope Honorius III (1216-27) on 22 December 1216 in France. Membership in the Order includes friars, congregations of active sisters, and lay persons affiliated with the order (formerly known as tertiaries, now Lay or Secular Dominicans).' back

Cosmology - Wikipedia, Cosmology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Cosmology (from the Greek κόσμος, kosmos "world" and -λογία, -logia "study of"), is the study of the origin, evolution, and eventual fate of the universe. Physical cosmology is the scholarly and scientific study of the origin, evolution, large-scale structures and dynamics, and ultimate fate of the universe, as well as the scientific laws that govern these realities. Religious or mythological cosmology is a body of beliefs based on mythological, religious, and esoteric literature and traditions of creation and eschatology.' back

Dan Weijers (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy), Hedonism, 'The term "hedonism," from the Greek word ἡδονή (hēdonē) for pleasure, refers to several related theories about what is good for us, how we should behave, and what motivates us to behave in the way that we do. All hedonistic theories identify pleasure and pain as the only important elements of whatever phenomena they are designed to describe. If hedonistic theories identified pleasure and pain as merely two important elements, instead of the only important elements of what they are describing, then they would not be nearly as unpopular as they all are. However, the claim that pleasure and pain are the only things of ultimate importance is what makes hedonism distinctive and philosophically interesting.' back

Dark Night of the Soul - Wikipedia, Dark Night of the Soul - Wikipedia, the free encylopedia, ' Dark Night of the Soul (Spanish: La noche oscura del alma) is a poem written by the 16th-century Spanish mystic and poet St. John of the Cross. The author himself did not give any title to his poem, on which he wrote two book-length commentaries: Ascent of Mount Carmel (Subida del Monte Carmelo) and The Dark Night (Noche Oscura).' back

Dominican Order - Wikipedia, Dominican Order - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Order of Preachers (Latin: Ordo Praedicatorum, postnominal abbreviation OP), also known as the Dominican Order, is a mendicant Catholic religious order founded by the Spanish priest Dominic of Caleruega in France, approved by Pope Honorius III via the Papal bull Religiosam vitam on 22 December 1216. . . .Founded to preach the Gospel and to oppose heresy, the teaching activity of the order and its scholastic organisation placed the Preachers in the forefront of the intellectual life of the Middle Ages. The order is famed for its intellectual tradition, having produced many leading theologians and philosophers.' back

Elizabeth Bruenig, Kavanaugh is one more step in America's cycle of self-destruction, 'The Brett Kavanaugh Confirmation Affair is almost over, and there’s no outcome that isn’t nightmarish. I don’t just mean for the left. I am a leftist, but I’ve long since given up on the idea that much can be done for the left — or for any constituency — until the massive dysfunction in the U.S. political system is resolved. ' back

Epistemology - Wikipedia, Epistemology - Wikipedia,the free encylopedia, 'Epistemology . . . (from Greek ἐπιστήμη (epistēmē), meaning "knowledge, science", and λόγος (logos), meaning "study of") is the branch of philosophy concerned with the nature and scope (limitations) of knowledge. It addresses the questions: What is knowledge? How is knowledge acquired? How do we know what we know?' back

Eva Wiseman , Maye Musk: 'We used to live in a rent-controlled apartment in Toronto with Elon on the couch', ' I brought my kids up as a single mother with very little money, and we survived. We used to live in a rent-controlled apartment in Toronto with Elon on the couch. It took three weeks to clean, then I saved to buy $5 sheets. Eventually I bought beds, then a computer, and after that chairs – you can always work on the floor. I cut their hair, gave them mani-pedis, wore $19 shoes to walk the runway. You don’t need massages to be happy.' back

Excommunication - Wikipedia, Excommunication - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to deprive, suspend, or limit membership in a religious community or to restrict certain rights within it, in particular receiving of the sacraments. The term is often historically used to refer specifically to Catholic excommunications from the Catholic Church, but it is also used more generally to refer to similar types of institutional religious exclusionary practices and shunning among other religious groups.' back

Frances Arnold, New enzymes by evolution, ' Dr Frances Arnold's lecture at the Molecular Frontiers Symposium at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, Sweden, May 2017. The topic of the symposium was "Tailored Biology". Check our YouTube channel for more exciting science videos! For more information, visit www.molecularfrontiers.org.' back

Galileo affair - Wikipedia, Galileo affair - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'The Galileo affair was a sequence of events, beginning around 1610, during which Galileo Galilei came into conflict with both the Catholic Church, for his support of Copernican astronomy, and secular philosophers, for his criticism of Aristotelianism.' back

Greg Jericho, Just a populist whinge? The banking report if damning of Morrison's judgement, ;And so when the royal commission into the home insulation program gave its findings, you would have expected its conclusion on house fires to be pretty damning. Instead, the commissioner found that the number of fire incidents equated to “0.02% of installations” and that the fire incident rate for homes was actually lower under the program than that which had occurred prior to the program’s commencement.' back

Heresy - Wikipedia, Heresy - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs. Heresy is distinct from both apostasy, which is the explicit renunciation of one's religion, principles or cause, and blasphemy, which is irreverence toward religion.' back

John Maynard Smith, Natural Selection and the Concept of a Protein Space, ' SALISBURY1 has argued that there is an apparent contradiction between two fundamental concepts of biology—the belief that the gene is a unique sequence of nucleotides whose function it is to determine the sequence of amino-acids in a protein, and the theory of evolution by natural selection. In brief, he calculated that the number of possible amino-acid sequences is greater by many orders of magnitude than the number of proteins which could have existed on Earth since the origin of life, and hence that functionally effective proteins have a vanishingly small chance of arising by mutation. Natural selection is therefore ineffective because it lacks the essential raw material—favourable mutations.' back

John of the Cross - Wikipedia, John of the Cross - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' John of the Cross (Spanish: San Juan de la Cruz; 1542– 14 December 1591) was a major figure of the Counter-Reformation, a Spanish mystic, a Roman Catholic saint, a Carmelite friar and a priest, who was born at Fontiveros, Old Castile. John of the Cross is known for his writings. Both his poetry and his studies on the growth of the soul are considered the summit of mystical Spanish literature and one of the peaks of all Spanish literature. He was canonized as a saint in 1726 by Pope Benedict XIII. He is one of the thirty-six Doctors of the Church. ' back

John Paul II, Fides et Ratio: On the relationship between faith and reason , para 2: 'The Church is no stranger to this journey of discovery, nor could she ever be. From the moment when, through the Paschal Mystery, she received the gift of the ultimate truth about human life, the Church has made her pilgrim way along the paths of the world to proclaim that Jesus Christ is “the way, and the truth, and the life” (Jn 14:6).' back

Josh Gabbatiss, Child abuse leaves molecular 'scars' in DNA of victims' sperm, new study suggests, ' Child abuse may leave marks that go even deeper than psychological trauma by physically etching itself into people’s DNA, according to a new Harvard study. Research based on a small sample of men found differences in chemical marks within the genetic code of those who have experienced abuse as children. The scientists examined a chemical process termed methylation in DNA from sperm samples, and found noticeable differences that appeared to distinguish victims and non-victims.' back

Julie Zauzmer, Amid fight over Kavanaugh, annual Red Mass for Supreme Court skips over the politics, ' As the nation focuses on the bitter fight over Supreme Court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh, Washington’s Catholic cathedral held its annual Red Mass honoring Supreme Court justices and the judiciary on Sunday — with nary a word about the debate over whether to confirm President Trump’s pick.' back

Leif Wenar (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy), John Rawls, 'John Rawls (b. 1921, d. 2002) was an American political philosopher in the liberal tradition. His theory of justice as fairness describes a society of free citizens holding equal basic rights and cooperating within an egalitarian economic system. His theory of political liberalism delineates the legitimate use of political power in a democracy, and envisions how civic unity might endure despite the diversity of worldviews that free institutions allow. His writings on the law of peoples set out a liberal foreign policy that aims to create a permanently peaceful and tolerant international order.' back

Metaphysics - Wikipedia, Metaphysics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy that studies the essence of a thing. This includes questions of being, becoming, existence, and reality. The word "metaphysics" comes from the Greek words that literally mean "beyond nature". "Nature" in this sense refers to the nature of a thing, such as its cause and purpose.' back

Minkowski space - Wikipedia, Minkowski space - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'In mathematical physics, Minkowski space or Minkowski spacetime is a combination of Euclidean space and time into a four-dimensional manifold where the spacetime interval between any two events is independent of the inertial frame of reference in which they are recorded. Although initially developed by mathematician Hermann Minkowski for Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism, the mathematical structure of Minkowski spacetime was shown to be an immediate consequence of the postulates of special relativity.' back

Patti Smith, Constantine's Dream, ' I dreamed a dream
of st Francis who kneeled and prayed
for the birds and the beasts and all human kind
all through the night I felt drawn in by him
and I heard him call like a distant hymn
I retreated from the silence of my room
stepping down the ancient stones
washed with dawn
and entered the basilica that bore his name
seeing his effigy I bowed my head
and my racing heart, I gave to him
I kneeled and prayed
and sleep that I could not find in the night
I found through him
I saw before me the world of his world
the bright fields
the birds in abundance
all of nature
of which he sang
singing of him
all the beauty that surrounded him as he walked
his nature that was nature itself
and I heard him
I heard him speak
and the birds sang sweetly
and the wolves licked his feet
but I could not give myself to him
I felt another call from the basilica itself
the call of art, the call of man,
and the beauty of the material drew me away
and I awoke
and beheld upon the wall, the dream of Constantine
the handiwork of piero della francesca
who had stood where I stood
and with his brush stroke the legend of the true cross
and he envisioned Constantine advancing to greet the enemy
and as he was passing the river
an unaccustomed fear gripped his bowels
an anticipation so overwhelming that it manifested in waves
all through the night
the dream drew toward him as an advancing crusade
he slept in his tent on the battlefield
while his men stood guard
and an angel awoke him
Constantine within his dream awoke
and his men saw a light pass over the face of the king
the troubled king
and the angel came and showed to him the sign of the true cross
in heaven
and upon it was written "in this sign shall thou conquer"
in the distance t
he tents of his army were lit by moonlight
but another kind of radiance lit the face of Constantine
and in the morning light the artist seeing his work was done
saw it was good
in this sign shall thou conquer
he let his brush drop and passed into a sleep of his own
and he dreamed of Constantine carrying him into battle in his right hand
an immaculate undefiled and simple white cross
Piero della Francesca, as his brush stroked the wall
filled with the torpor and fell into a dream of his own
from the geometry of his heart, he mapped it out
he saw the king rise, fitted with armor set upon a white horse
an immaculate cross in his right hand
he advanced toward the enemy
and the symmetry
the perfection of his mathematics
caused the scattering of the enemy—agitated, broken
they fled and Piero dela Francesca, waking, cried out
all is art
all is future
oh lord let me die on the back of adventure
with a brush and an eye full of light
as he advanced in age, the light was shorn from him
his eyes, blinded, he layed upon his bed
on an october morning, 1492
whispering
oh lord
let me die on the back of adventure,
oh lord let me die on the back of adventure, oh
and a world away, the world away
on three great ships, adventure itself,
as if to answer
pulling into the new world
and as far as his eyes could see
no longer blind
all of nature
unspoiled beautiful beautiful
such a manner it would have lifted the heart of st Francis
into the realm of universal love
Columbus set foot on the new world
he witnessed beauty unspoiled
all of the delights given by god
as if in Eden itself
as if Eden had opened up her heart to him
and opened her dress
and all of her fruit, gave to him
and Columbus so overwhelmed
fell into a sleep of his own
all the world in his sleep
all of the beauty
all of the beauty entwined with the future
the 21st century
advancing like the angel
advancing like the angel
that had come to Constantine
Constantine and history
oh this is your cross to bear
oh lord
oh lord let me deliver
hallowed adventure to all mankind
in the future
oh art, cried the painter
oh art, oh art, cried the angel
art the great material gift of man
art that hath denied the hungered pleas of st Francis
oh thou artist
all shall crumble in the dust
oh thou navigator
the terrible end of man
this is your gift to mankind
this is your cross to bear
then Columbus saw all of nature aflame
the apocalyptic night
and the dream of the troubled king
dissolved
into light
back

Perverse incentive - Wikipedia, Perverse incentive - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A perverse incentive is an incentive that has an unintended and undesirable result which is contrary to the interests of the incentive makers. Perverse incentives are a type of unintended consequences.' back

Politics - Wikipedia, Politics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Politics (from Greek: Politiká: Politika, definition "affairs of the cities") is the process of making decisions that apply to members of a group. More narrowly, it refers to achieving and exercising positions of governance — organized control over a human community, particularly a state. Furthermore, politics is the study or practice of the distribution of power and resources within a given community (this is usually a hierarchically organized population) as well as the interrelationship(s) between communities.' back

Ragnarök - Wikipedia, Ragnarök - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' In Norse mythology, Ragnarök . . . is a series of future events, including a great battle, foretold to ultimately result in the death of a number of major figures (including the gods Odin, Thor, Týr, Freyr, Heimdallr, and Loki), the occurrence of various natural disasters, and the subsequent submersion of the world in water. Afterward, the world will resurface anew and fertile, the surviving and returning gods will meet, and the world will be repopulated by two human survivors.' back

Religion - Wikipedia, Religion - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'Religion is a collection of cultural systems, belief systems, and worldviews that establishes symbols that relate humanity to spirituality and, sometimes, to moral values.[1] Many religions have narratives, symbols, traditions and sacred histories that are intended to give meaning to life or to explain the origin of life or the universe. They tend to derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle from their ideas about the cosmos and human nature.' back

Rex Miller (Director), Althea, ' Althea Gibson, a truant from the rough streets of Harlem, emerged as a most unlikely queen of the highly segregated tennis world in the 1950s. No player overcame more obstacles to become a champion. back

Ruth Graham, Conservative Catholics Are Digging for Dirt on American Crdinals, ' The culture war brewing within the American Catholic Church is about to get uglier. A group of wealthy American Roman Catholics have banded together to fund what they describe as a public investigation into every member of the church’s College of Cardinals. As the Catholic news site Crux reported on Monday, the group has assembled almost 100 academics, investigators, journalists, and former FBI agents to produce what it’s calling the “Red Hat Report.” ' back

Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Kubla Khan,
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure dome decree:
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
back

Sarah J. Goodman et al, Children's biobehavioural reactivity to challenge predicts DNA methylation in adolescence and emerging adulthood, 'A growing body of research has documented associations between adverse childhood environments and DNA methylation, highlighting epigenetic processes as potential mechanisms through which early external contexts influence health across the life course. The present study tested a complementary hypothesis: indicators of children's early internal, biological, and behavioral responses to stressful challenges may also be linked to stable patterns of DNA methylation later in life.' back

Second Vatican Council - Wikipedia, Second Vatican Council - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, ' The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council (Latin: Concilium Oecumenicum Vaticanum Secundum; more commonly known as the Second Vatican Council, or informally as Vatican II) addressed relations between the Catholic Church and the modern world. It was the twenty-first ecumenical council of the Catholic Church and the second to be held at St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican. The council, through the Holy See, formally opened under the pontificate of Pope John XXIII on 11 October 1962 and closed under Pope Paul VI on the Feast of the Immaculate Conception on 8 December 1965.' back

Short Circuit, Short Circuit, "number five is alive" back

The Editors (Encyclopedia Britannica), Modernism: Roman Catholicism , ' Modernism, in Roman Catholic church history, a movement in the last decade of the 19th century and first decade of the 20th that sought to reinterpret traditional Catholic teaching in the light of 19th-century philosophical, historical, and psychological theories and called for freedom of conscience. Influenced by non-Catholic biblical scholars, Modernists contended that the writers of both the Old and the New Testaments were conditioned by the times in which they lived and that there had been an evolution in the history of biblical religion. Modernism also reflected a reaction against the increasing centralization of church authority in the pope and the Roman Curia (papal bureaucracy).' back

The Saturday Paper and Aesop, The Horne Prize, 'Aesop and The Saturday Paper have been cultural partners since 2014, promoting the written word through an annual calendar of events. Together, they nurture writers of longform non-fiction through The Horne Prize, an essay award valued at $15,000. This year’s prize will be presented in early December for an essay of up to 3000 words, addressing some part of the theme ‘Australian life’ – shining light on a particular aspect of who we are, from a contemporary perspective. Entries are open until midnight on October 30, 2018. back

Theology - Wikipedia, Theology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, Theology is the systematic and rational study of concepts of God and of the nature of religious truths, or the learned profession acquired by completing specialized training in religious studies, usually at a university, seminary or school of divinity. . . . 'During the High Middle Ages, theology was therefore the ultimate subject at universities, being named "The Queen of the Sciences" and serving as the capstone to the Trivium and Quadrivium that young men were expected to study. This meant that the other subjects (including Philosophy) existed primarily to help with theological thought.' back

Turing machine - Wikipedia, Turing machine - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, A Turing machine is a hypothetical device that manipulates symbols on a strip of tape according to a table of rules. Despite its simplicity, a Turing machine can be adapted to simulate the logic of any computer algorithm, and is particularly useful in explaining the functions of a CPU inside a computer. The "machine" was invented in 1936 by Alan Turingwho called it an "a-machine" (automatic machine). The Turing machine is not intended as practical computing technology, but rather as a hypothetical device representing a computing machine. Turing machines help computer scientists understand the limits of mechanical computation.' back

Vera de Chalambert, Kali Takes the World: Dark Night of the World Soul, ' When in the summer of 2015 I saw the breathtaking image of the goddess Kali, the great Hindu goddess of death, destruction, and liberation, tongue outstretched, third eye blazing, projected onto the top of the Empire State Building for the documentary Racing Extinction, I ranted, “This a sign of the times—Kali takes New York!” ' back

Wavelet - Wikipedia, Wavelet - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, 'A wavelet is a wave-like oscillation with an amplitude that starts out at zero, increases, and then decreases back to zero. It can typically be visualized as a "brief oscillation" like one might see recorded by a seismograph or heart monitor. Generally, wavelets are purposefully crafted to have specific properties that make them useful for signal processing. Wavelets can be combined, using a "reverse, shift, multiply and sum" technique called convolution, with portions of an unknown signal to extract information from the unknown signal.' back