Pollyanna is back and would like to wish all her Jewish readers and friends a Happy Succot holiday. This is holiday time, but we are still trying to keep the blogs coming. Why should you get a reprieve?
For starters, let us refer you to the Miriam Shlesinger Human Rights action blog. Nearly two years have gone by without Miriam and we continue to realize what we have lost. She got us into the human rights struggle. Please act on behalf of people who are so much in need of support in their trials and tribulations at the hands of oppressive regimes and corporations.
CHARITY CORNER
This week Pollyanna gets to choose a charity. Her choice is Excellence on the Horizon. This is an Israeli program designed to help and support Children with Blindness or Visual Impairment. We quote the Web site "The demand for the program is huge and we need your support. Last school year we had 45 children in the program, and we would like to increase the number this year to 60 children. Help us to finance 10 children in the program during this school year! "
On the site there are various options for donating or investing in the program. Please help out. This program is administered by someone whom Pollyanna loves dearly, our own Yael.
IN MEMORIAM
| Shlomo Lahat in 1972. (photo credit:PR) |
SERIOUS IDIOCY CAN BE FUNNY
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| Killing the Hydra |
RANTS AND RAVES
INDIGENOUS RIGHTS
The UN has adopted a document supporting the rights of indigenous peoples around the world. It was ratified at a special UN General Assembly meeting of more than 1,000 delegates and heads of state for the first-ever World Conference on Indigenous Peoples on Sept. 22 and 23. On day one, nations voted on the adoption of the document – the first vote of its kind after the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples was introduced in 2007. Only one country in the world opposed, Canada. The US had opposed it in the past, but President Obama reversed that position. Shame, Canada. To quote the UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples on the issue “The well-being gap between aboriginal and non-aboriginal people in Canada has not narrowed over the past several years; treaty and aboriginal claims remain persistently unresolved; indigenous women and girls remain vulnerable to abuse; and overall there appear to be high levels of distrust among indigenous peoples towards the government at both the federal and provincial levels.”
TIDBITS FROM SCIENCE
A huge tomb dating from the 4th century BCE, the time of Alexander the Great, has been found in the Greek city of Amphipolis. While it cannot be the tomb of Alexander himself, who is buried in Egypt, there are several candidates, including his mother and others close to him who were murdered after his death.
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| Detail of the Alexander Mosaic, c. 100 BC, originally from the House of the Faun in Pompeii, currently in Naples National Archaeological Museum. (Image: Museu Nacional Arqueológico de Nápoles) |
A SOGGY EXOPLANET
Scientists were excited to discover clear skies on a relatively small planet, about the size of Neptune, using the combined power of NASA's Hubble, Spitzer and Kepler space telescopes. Before now, all of the planets observed in this size range had been found to have high cloud layers that blocked the ability to detect molecules in the planet’s atmosphere.
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A
plot of the transmission spectrum for exoplanet HAT-P-11b, with data
from NASA's Kepler, Hubble and Spitzer observatories combined. The
results show a robust detection of water absorption in the Hubble data.
Transmission spectra of selected atmospheric models are plotted for
comparison.
Image Credit:
NASA/ESA/STScI
|
The clear planet, called HAT-P-11b, is gaseous with a rocky core, much like our own Neptune. Its atmosphere may have clouds deeper down, but the new observations show that the upper region is cloud-free. This good visibility enabled scientists to detect water vapor molecules in the planet's atmosphere.
INDIA GOES TO MARS
India has a spacecraft in orbit around Mars. It was done for only $74 million. It is small and has simple sensors, but its main purpose, to outdo China, was achieved. Cheers we say to our Indian friends. We hope their work enhances our knowledge of Mars.
EXERCISE IS GOOD FOR YOUR BRAIN
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| Good for your body, great for your brain: A new Swedish study has suggested that engaging in regular exercise can help protect against depression. Credit Fotolia |
exercise increases the production of a of a protein known as PGC-1(alpha)1. This protein helps to rid the body of a stress-induced amino acid called kynurenine that has been associated with mental illness. So put on your sneakers and head for the gym quickly. If not, WuMo give you a forecast of what awaits us. We give a link only because of dire copyright warnings.
BOOK REVIEW
Pollyanna is doing something a bit different, presenting a discussion of a book written by the author of the book decades after publication. The dystopian novel The Handmaid's Tale has been a major topic of interest since published in 1985. It describes a future world in which nearly all the women have become infertile, so the few who can still have babies have been rounded up, brainwashed, and assigned to powerful men in a twisted attempt to restore the human race. Read what the author, Margaret Atwood has to say of her creation.
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| The book appeared in Canada in the fall of 1985 to baffled and sometimes anxious reviews' … the English National Opera production of The Handmaid's Tale, 2003. Photograph: Tristram Kenton |
SILLY TIME
What If? asks:When I was about 8 years old, shoveling snow on a freezing day in Colorado, I wished that I could be instantly transported to the surface of the Sun, just for a nanosecond, then instantly transported back. I figured this would be long enough to warm me up but not long enough to harm me. What would actually happen?
AJ, Kansas City
Interesting question and answer--not bad for an 8 year old.
A NEW TYPE OF ASYLUM SEEKER
Pollyanna and Titan have always been sympathetic to persecuted minorities. One of their closest associates belongs to four of them in Israel:
- He comes from an English-speaking country
- He belongs to a Reform congregation
- He is a human rights activist
- He is a peace activist
For example take wolves:
or poor children:
LET US HAVE A RATIONAL DISCUSSION
BREAKFAST IN BED IN ID...
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