[monochrom] Earth's Great Oxidation Event
The Earth's original atmosphere held very little oxygen. This began to change around 2.4 billion years ago when oxygen levels increased dramatically during what scientists call the Great Oxidation Event. The cause of this event has puzzled scientists, but researchers writing in Nature have found indications in ancient sedimentary rocks that it may have been linked to a drop in the level of dissolved nickel in seawater. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/04/090408145336.htmLink -- Posted By johannes to http://www.monochrom.at/english/2009/04/earths-great-oxidation-event.htmmonochrom at 4/09/2009 05:41:00 PM
[monochrom] French Bill Would Bar Illegal Downloaders From Internet
Anyone repeatedly caught illegally downloading films and music in France could be cut off from the internet if a new bill is passed by parliament this week. The bill would give French authorities powers to trace illegal downloads and cut repeat offenders off from the internet for a period of two months to one year. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/5128446/France-may-ban-music-pirates-from-using-the-internet.htmlLink -- Posted By johannes to http://www.monochrom.at/english/2009/04/french-bill-would-bar-illegal.htmmonochrom at 4/09/2009 05:45:00 PM
[monochrom] Drunken Nation: Russia's Depopulation Bomb
A specter is haunting Russia today. It is not the specter of Communismthat ghost has been chained in the attic of the pastâbut rather of depopulationa relentless, unremitting, and perhapps unstoppable depopulation. The mass deaths associated with the Communist era may be history, but another sort of mass death may have only just begun, as Russians practice what amounts to an ethnic self-cleansing. Since 1992, Russia's human numbers have been progressively dwindling. This slow motion process now taking place in the country carries with it grim and potentially disastrous implications that threaten to recast the contours of life and society in Russia, to diminish the prospects for Russian economic development, and to affect Russia's potential influence on the world stage in the years ahead. http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/2009%20-%20Spring/full-Eberstadt.htmlLink -- Posted By johannes to http://www.monochrom.at/english/2009/04/drunken-nation-russias-depopulation.htmmonochrom at 4/09/2009 05:46:00 PM
[monochrom] Making Sense of Things: The Tradescant's Ark Experiment
In a video published by Edge, archeologist Tim Taylor conducts an experiment about making sense of things. There are 43 stones passing amongst you. It's called the Tradescant's Ark Experiment and I've named it in honor of John Tradescant and John Tradescant, Sr. and Jr., father and son, who were collectors of things in the 17th century. They were the exhibitors of the world's first pay-to-view museum and they had a cabinet of curiosities set up in Lambeth, on the Thames, which much later was sold to Elias Ashmole and became the germ of the Ashmolean Museum. Not much of it survives, there are little parts of it in the Ashmolen Museum. What is more important is the intellectual move they made in the catalog, which John Tradescant the younger created and in which he distinguished between 2 types of things, naturalls and artificialls. He divided all the things he collected into those he thought were natural and those that were modified by human handwhat archaelogists today call artifacts.http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/serpentine-edge09/taylor_vid.htmlLink -- Posted By johannes to http://www.monochrom.at/english/2009/04/making-sense-of-things-tradescants-ark.htmmonochrom at 4/09/2009 05:51:00 PM
Re: [monochrom] French Bill Would Bar Illegal Downloaders From Internet
durchgefallen. http://www.heise.de/newsticker/Franzoesische-Nationalversammlung-laesst-Anti-Filesharing-Gesetz-ueberraschend-durchfallen--/meldung/136043 dedn Anyone repeatedly caught illegally downloading films and music in dedn France could be cut off from the internet if a new bill is passed by dedn parliament this week. The bill would give French authorities powers dedn to trace illegal downloads and cut repeat offenders off from the dedn internet for a period of two months to one year. dedn http://www.telegraph.co.uk/scienceandtechnology/technology/5128446/France-may-ban-music-pirates-from-using-the-internet.htmlLink dedn -- dedn Posted By johannes to dedn http://www.monochrom.at/english/2009/04/french-bill-would-bar-illegal.htmmonochrom dedn at 4/09/2009 05:45:00 PM -- Rainer Fuegenstein r...@kaneda.iguw.tuwien.ac.at -- Why are you looking into the darkness and not into the fire as we do ?, Nell asked. Because the darkness is where danger comes from, Peter said, and from the fire comes only illusion. (from The Diamond Age) --
