#to facilitate his plans and maintain a certain image

[erinravenseeker]

look you guys don’t understand i know Dan Feng comes off as really cold in the short but imagine how experiencing the universe outside of the xianzhou and away from the responsibilities imposed on him SINCE BIRTH, with the express crew to guide him, has given Dan Heng a chance to grow into and act on his own emotions. ofc DF is cold in the short, it’s DH’s perception of him, and outward temperament is not your inner self especially if you’re a political figure your entire life and are forced to do things you may not necessarily want to because your duty demands it (i am very normal about them i swear)

[cyberbenb]

Trump has the economic tools to end Russia’s war. He should use them

There are still many questions about what to expect from the Trump administration’s approach to ending Russia’s war in Ukraine. With some in Congress questioning continued military aid and loans for Ukraine, the application of economic statecraft measures —such as sanctions, export controls, and tariffs — could be used more aggressively to push for Russia’s withdrawal.

Sanctions were a key tool in the first Trump administration’s foreign policy strategy. However, we’ve heard little about how a second-term Trump administration plans to leverage them. Recently, U.S. President Donald Trump warned Russian President Vladimir Putin that new tariffs and sanctions would be imposed on Moscow if it didn’t reach a deal to stop the war. With so many rounds of sanctions already imposed by the United States and its broad multilateral coalition, what options remain?

Two key levers could help achieve the ultimate goal of this pressure campaign: further disrupting Russia’s energy trade and tightening restrictions on dual-use goods flowing to Russia through third countries that support its military.

“Two key levers could help achieve the ultimate goal of this pressure campaign.”

First, a more aggressive use of secondary sanctions could prove effective. Secondary sanctions, which force countries to choose between doing business with the U.S. or with sanctioned entities, were instrumental in bringing Iran to the negotiating table for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). Secondary sanctions on Russia, imposed by then-U.S. President Joe Biden in December 2023, have begun to take effect. It is conceivable that a second Trump administration could use this tool to pressure unaligned countries — including some current U.S. allies — to align with American objectives.

Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) holds a vicdeo call with Chinese President Xi Jinping (R) at his residence outside Moscow, Russia, on Jan. 21, 2025. (Gavriil Grigorov / Pool / AFP via Getty Images)

More aggressive threats of cutting off access to the U.S. economy for entities in countries such as India, China, Turkey, and Middle Eastern nations — where businesses continue trading with Russia while maintaining ties with the U.S. and its allies — could be considered. Even amid debates over continued aid to Ukraine, increasing pressure on these nations to stop their companies from purchasing Russian energy products or facilitating the flow of dual-use items to Russia could be an effective strategy with limited cost to American taxpayers.

Second, lessons from previous sanctions campaigns show that aggressive enforcement serves as an additional stick to influence corporate decision-making. At one point, fines for sanctions violations reached upward of $9 billion. While enforcement should not be politicized, prioritizing cases against well-known violators of Russia sanctions could have a strong deterrent effect on those skirting the rules.

Some have suggested easing certain sanctions to incentivize Russia to negotiate. However, this approach would likely be ineffective in changing the trajectory of the war, as Putin responds only to force. Trump has made no secret of his willingness to use the U.S. economic statecraft toolkit to achieve policy objectives. Ending the war is a bipartisan priority, but more importantly, Russia must not be allowed to win — otherwise, other countries could face a similar fate.

When it comes to Russia, Trump should leverage the considerable economic power at his disposal to remind those doing business with both Russia and the U.S. that access to American markets is a privilege, not a right. Given the choice between access to the U.S. economy and trade with Russia, many countries would quickly opt for the former. A firm stance on economic pressure could accelerate an end to the conflict and reinforce American leadership on the world stage.

Editor’s Note: The opinions expressed in the op-ed section are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Kyiv Independent.

Submit an Opinion

Kyiv and Washington’s mobilization age blame game misses the point

“The biggest problem is the lack of people.” These words, heard by journalists, including myself, from Ukrainian soldiers and commanders across the front line for the past year, are no outlier. For most of 2024 and into 2025, Ukraine’s biggest issue on the battlefield has not been firepower but

The Kyiv IndependentFrancis Farrell

[gentletwin]

Headcanon: Tazmily After the Dark Dragon.

The Dark Dragon would reshape the world in the image of the person to pull the Needles.

Above all, Lucas wanted nothing more than for everyone to be happy, and for them to be kind to each other the way that they did before the era of the Pigmasks and DP. He wanted to get rid of all the hardships that their new way of life caused. He wanted everyone to get along again. Perhaps idealistic in an almost childish way — but a child did pull the final Needle.

The destruction caused by the Dark Dragon’s awakening was simply part of the process of resetting Nowhere Islands. It is a being with the power to destroy the world — but also with the power to protect it. It is the being that protected the islands from the world’s destruction before the White Ship carried its passengers to safety. So, it possessed the power to shift the land and the sea and preserve what was meant to be preserved. This power granted the islanders a miracle: permanent physical damage to the village was largely spared.

Any fissures in the ground were repaired by the Dragon’s ability to move the earth of the island. Anyplace Lucas wanted to protect was spared its destruction. Places that caused suffering were caught in the wreckage and ultimately wiped away from the islands. These places include the Chimera Lab, the Clayman Factory ( and tangentially, Club Titiboo ), the remains of Thunder Tower, and of course, New Pork City.

Even before the final Needle was pulled, the factory had shut down, Club Titiboo was closed, and the railroads ceased to run, with nothing left active past the tunnel for the trains to go to. The train tracks still exist, but no trains will run on them anymore. Walking along the train tracks and into Murasaki Forest will eventually lead one to the ruins of the highways, the Chimera Lab, and the factory that once occupied that area.

Some places did, unfortunately, suffer quite a lot of physical damage that required maintenance even after the work of the Dragon was done. Namely, these places are Osohe Castle and the retirement home, both of which were falling deeply into disrepair already. Efforts are being made to preserve Osohe Castle as a historic location, and to refurbish the Old Man’s Paradise to acceptable standards.

But what about the ways of life that the Pigmasks introduced? The remodeled buildings, the modern conveniences — the money?

Technology itself is not inherently what caused all of the bad changes in Tazmily. The system in which it existed did; the system which forced everyone to compete for those resources. So, electricity and modern technology don’t cease to exist. While Lucas’s family never adopted that lifestyle, he didn’t want to take that away from those that chose to. After all, it wasn’t their fault that the islands changed the way they did. They only sought happiness and got caught up in something awful in the process.

But DP? That was at the root of all the hardship. That had to go.

Of course, suddenly changing ways again after three years of living in a system with money would be near impossible, even if Lucas wished money away instantaneously. There had to be a transition. Everyone had to unlearn what they had been taught over the past three years. It would take work, but it could be done. Helping others just because worked in the past. It could work again.

To facilitate this transition, Leder, who no longer had anything to hide now that the Needles had all been pulled, took up a much more active leadership position in the village. He began to speak again, and sort of briefed everyone on why the old system failed and what they needed to do moving forward. ( This may or may not include his “the world actually ended and we gave up our memories” speech, depending on other people’s M3 muses and how much they know or don’t know. ) For all intents and purposes, he served as the islands’ equivalent of a ruler — but he would deny any prestige that would come with a title like that, and even the title itself. After all, three years of a king didn’t get them anywhere good. He would consider himself more of a guide. A counselor of sorts for village life, so to speak.

Leder’s solution to the dismantling of the DP system was to have shops accept either DP or some other good or service as a form of reciprocation. For instance — “if you wouldn’t mind whipping up a coffee and a bread roll, a room at Hotel Yado is yours whenever you need it.” “I’ll have some firewood delivered to your house in exchange for some antidotes.” That sort of thing. DP was accepted, too, but the idea was that eventually, DP would be phased out and replaced entirely by this sort of bartering. Then, eventually, people would become used to the idea of doing something and expecting nothing in return again.

Places which used DP would gradually stop using them in a staggered manner, so the currency would gradually lose value. First, power plants and such would stop accepting DP, so that no electric bills were due. Then, water. Then eventually, other essential services, like doctors or home maintenance. This would continue until eventually not even a nut cookie would cost anyone a dime. During this transition period, any late DP payments would be forgiven and negotiations could be made between parties on a case by case basis. The most important thing was that no one would be punished for simply not having, when the old regime systematically drove certain people into positions of “have” and “have not” in the first place.

With several villagers having learned to work factory positions, electrical work, and the like, those types of jobs were able to be filled by them in the post-Pigmask world. Too, Pigmasks that simply got swept up in Porky’s plan circumstantially could take those jobs. Issac is an example of this. He’s a nice guy, and can use the skills he learned under the Pigmask Army to make the more modernized lifestyle work under a non-capitalist Tazmily. Erasing his existence for simply getting caught up in the system would be too cruel. These people would go on to develop technologies like solar power and other sustainable resources that wouldn’t hurt the islands, per Leder’s cautioning against the army’s use of fossil fuels. ( Leder’s memory of the past world makes him woke. )

The people that fill these positions are also able to maintain Claus’s parts and help with any technical failures or growing pains that result from his mechanical bits.

People that were brought from another timeline along with Porky are given the option to return if they so choose. Even though Lucas doesn’t know exactly who’s from other times aside from Porky himself, his ultimate desire for everyone to be happy is what opened up this possibility for those from other times. ( This means that whether or not people like Dr. Andonuts remain in Nowhere Islands is up to the interpretation of my RP partner, since I’d imagine everyone feels differently about this. )

Going forward, what will everyone do? Perhaps other areas of the island will be settled one day, be it by other groups like former Pigmasks, or future generations. In those situations, some places may be more technologically advanced than others or do things in slightly different ways, but none without having learned from the hardships faced by the people from Tazmily, so that these mistakes are never repeated again.

[thearkhound]

Exploring the Secret Behind Konami’s MSX Games (September 1988)

Akira Yamashita/山下 章 is a game journalist whom I covered in the past. He was a writer for Micom BASIC Magazine who later become one of the founders for Studio Bentstuff. One of his regular features he wrote for Micom BASIC was a series of game reviews titled Honki de Play, Honne de Review (which translates to Serious Play, Sincere Review) where he would not only write an in-depth review of a recently-released game, but would also interview the developer to discuss the concepts behind the games themselves.

For the September 1988 issue, rather than reviewing a specific game, Yamashita-san decided to do an overview of Konami’s MSX library, focusing primarily on their shoot-’em-up lineup. Most westerners (specifically North Americans) are only familiar with the MSX thanks to the fact that Metal Gear originated on that platform, but Konami has actually produced a variety of quality games for the MSX that rivaled what they were also released on the NES and arcades at the time. I’m hoping this article will inspire some of you readers to explore the rest of Konami’s MSX library as well.

I might consider translating more installments of Yamashita-san’s Serious & Sincere series of articles in the future.

Going to Konami

The Konami Building at Port Island, Kobe. The first floor is the lobby and the second floor is reception office. All floors above those are dedicated to the development departments. There’s a PC floor, a Famicom floor, an arcade floor, ect.

When you mention “Konami” to anyone involved with the publishing business in Japan, they’ll immediately think of the Konami building at Jimbocho, Tokyo, but that’s mainly the division of Konami involved with sales and advertising. The development department of Konami that makes their games for the arcades, PC and Famicom [NES] is actually located in a huge building in Kobe. If I was going to write to write an article for my “Serious & Sincere” series, then I thought I would fly over to Kobe and talk to the actual developers (although, Mr. Kage, who accompanied me for this interview, wanted to go to Jimbocho to meet Ms. Kamio).

We’ve arrived at the much rumored Port Island [an artificial island in Kobe] after four hours of commuting from Tokyo via the Shinkansen bullet train and such after 4 hours. In fact, this was the site of the Portopia tournament held several years ago. The place is very similar to Heiwajima in Tokyo [another artificial island] but without the boats. The Konami Building is located at the north side of the island, although the design is a bit different from the one depicted in their TwinBee. The surrounding area is peaceful and full of greenery. A couple of nearby middle-aged women that were dropped off from a sight-seeing bus began chatting when they saw the Konami Building.

“Such a lovely building! But what does Konami sell?”

“My kid really likes them. I think they make candy.” (This story also includes some embellishment)

Even though we weren’t under a strict schedule, we quickly proceeded to Konami Industry’s headquarters, where we interview Mr. Fukutake, the manager of the MSX department about various things. In this article I decided to mix my own opinions with the comments of Mr. Fukutake himself.

Up to this point, my Serious & Sincere article series were focused on showcasing the merits and exploring the development of specific games, for this installment I’ve decided to focus on Konami’s MSX library in general.

The Branding and Colors of a Software Publisher.

Akira Yamashita (right) interviewing Shigeru Fukutake. The interview was held in a seemingly luxurious VIP room with an exceptionally large marble table in the middle.

As our readers might be aware of, the development period of recent gaming software is pretty long compared to software from long ago. The days in which a single programmer can sell a single program by him or herself are now gone. Most software publishers now have a development department that divide their work by coding, story writing, music and graphics.

The long development process naturally means that every single game in development will be given full focus and the games that were planned with much “emotional attachment” will go through a long-term effort from the developers until it finally sees the light of day.

Have you noticed that their “emotional attachment” have materialized in their recent games in such interesting ways?

Those are the “colors” of a software publisher. It’s possible to imagine the kind of games a publisher releases just by mentioning their name. For example, Koei is known for their strategy games, Riverhill Software is known for their mystery adventures, Telenet is known for their colorful side-scrolling games and Dempa is known for their arcade ports.

How is the "emotional attachment” and the “colors” connected? There is a single answer. Each software house has its own idealized image of a game from its staff members. The ideal of that game in this instance is an approximation of the company’s "colors”. The energy they use is to pursue this ideal game must then represent the “emotional attachment” of the staff.

There are many examples of “colors” when it comes to other industries. In the Japanese TV industry, Tokyo Broadcasting System is associated with dramas, Fuji TV is associated with variety shows and Nippon Television is (perhaps) associated with giant battles. For the record industries, we have Canyon for idols, CBS Epic Sony for pop music, Crown and King for enka and Scitron is known for their video game music albums (we’re kidding about Scitron).

The fact that there is such “color-coding” for publishers that let us know their intentions might be a good thing for consumers like ourselves. In a sense, the PC gaming industry might had already entered a more mature age compared to the days when software publishers would flood the market with the same type of game depending on what was trending at the moment.

Moreover, with the progress of such “color-coding” is leading to the establishment of “brand names” for PCs and software. In other words, purchasing a game from a particular publisher will determine whether it’ll be a sure bet or not.

It would be no exaggeration to say that when it comes to brand names, Konami’s brand is the strongest among MSX game publishers. Mr. Fukutake, the manager of Konami’s MSX team, has the following to say on the matter.

“That's correct. The fact that our users can trust us makes us happy as creators. We’re striving to maintain Konami’s brand image that we established.”

The Way Konami Games Are Made

The rarely-seen development room of Konami’s MSX department. This room was only accessible to employees who were assigned an ID card..

Up until now, the development process of Konami’s MSX games seemed to had been a secret. Here will be explaining the development process as answered by Mr. Fukutake himself.

First of all, there are two types of MSX games produced by Konami. The first kind are arranged conversions of existing arcade games (such as Gradius or TwinBee), while the other kind are original types (which include Metal Gear, The Maze of Galious and many others) . Arranged ports of arcades seem to progress by measuring the hardware capabilities of the MSX, but the original games are naturally much more interesting. The process is a bit different in which it seems that the person who comes up with the game’s characters is also the person assigned to do the planning and the story. In other words, the person who came up with characters such as  Popolon or Pengin-kun was in charge of planning and facilitating the development of Knightmare or Penguin Adventure.

The planner will then lead a team formed by around four or five employees and then they will proceed with the development of a single game, which lasts somewhere around four to six months. With somewhere between 20 to 30 personnel employed by Konami’s MSX development department, that means there are’s a total of 5 or 6 teams each working on 2 games a year if you think about it simply, which explains Konami’s surprising release pace.

The only exception here are the music staff. A sound technology department within Konami is responsible for all the music in their arcade, PC and NES games. That’s why the music in all Konami games have a certain unified image to them.

The Relentless Obsession With Shoot-’Em-Ups

The main subject is finally here. When talking about Konami games on the MSX, the most important thing to mention is their shoot-’em-up line represented by the Gradius series. As someone who likes Konami’s shooters, I make sure to always buy them when they’re released (never got one as a gift) and enjoy them.

However, in an industry which believes the theory that shoot-’em-ups are never hits, Konami is one of the rare exceptions to that belief. All the games in the Gradius series released thus far (Gradius, Gradius 2, Salamander and Parodius) have all have a track record for staying in the top ten best-selling MSX games for extensive periods.

This seems to be a phenomenon unique to the MSX market when comparing it to other market. Silpheed for example, which I consider to the best shoot-’em-up for Japanese PCs, didn’t chart that much and I heard that the shoot-’em-up masterpieces on the Famicom that were Gradius and Zanac, weren’t quite hits.

Why are Konami’s MSX shoot-’em-ups the only ones that are selling? There might be many reasons, but the primary reason is because Konami makes its games with the key point being firmly “fun shooting”. A variety of stages, unique power-up systems, crisp music and a miraculous balance, all blend perfectly to create Konami’s unique flavor. Mr. Fukutake says “No matter what, we live and breathe shoot-’em-ups. Everyone in our staff are enthusiastic fans of shoot-’em-ups. We wish to continue our lineup no matter how much the market changes.”

Perhaps this passion for betting on the shoot-’em-up genre might be the secret that has lead to the creation of masterpieces.

The Difficulty of Difficulty Settings

One of the components that determines whether a shoot-’em-up is fun is the difficulty level. On one hand, if you make it too easy, you won’t get to savor it much. On the other hand, if you make it too hard, it will become inaccessible. Thus, the difficulty of a shoot-’em-up, much like an RPG, must be adjusted with fine-tuning.

Mr. Fukutake reveals Konami’s policy for difficulty adjustment.

“For arcade games, we make them easy to get into in the beginning. But since shoot-’em-ups for the MSX are meant to be played at home, we make them difficult from the very beginning.”

Indeed. Konami’s shoot-’em-ups are considerably difficult (only hardcore players might argue otherwise). If anything, the difficulty is adjusted to a level that it can only be cleared with continues the first time. Without enough practice, it is difficult to complete them without using continues.

But unlike an arcade game, such as Gradius II, where dying once means that you’re done for (it’s not impossible to recover, but it’s difficult for ordinary players), here it’s only a setback that can be managed with a continue. You press the F5 key [at the game over] while thinking that “this time” [you’ll beat it]. It is an experience that only people who played Konami’s shoot-’em-ups on the MSX will be familiar with.

I think Konami adjusts their difficulty settings around this continue feature to some extent. Perhaps they’re aiming for the same sense of satisfaction when you clear one of their shoot-’em-ups that a player would also feel when solving an RPG or an adventure game. At the very least, I found myself impressed by the continue feature without knowing it when I’ve completed the game after struggling during a hard battle.

This is not something that could be managed easily even with the know-how. It’s not flattery or anything. It’s what I expect from Konami.

About Salamander

For me, the only Konami shoot-’em-up I was unreasonable with its difficulty was Salamander. Even if you keep continue, the sense of hopelessness is strong after dying once, unless you bring up Player 2′s ship as a decoy and start gradually recovering all your power-ups again. There are special weapons that only be used when both players’ ships unite, but they’re not very practical since they have limited uses and they feel pretty weak. And finally, the true ending is locked away and is accessible by having a Gradius 2 cartridge on the second slot. Isn’t that a bit too much?

Konami’s Future on the MSX

There is more stuff that I want to write about Konami, but I can’t due to the limited amount of pages. So I decided end this article asking Mr. Fukutake about Konami’s upcoming MSX games.

“Gaming trends will keep changing in the future, but we don’t just want to pursue what’s popular, we want to make whatever we want and keep on making something that is true to Konami. Since games are expensive, we want to make products that suit their prices so that you won’t be disappointed with your purchase. How do you maintain such level of quality and not shatter the image we’ve created thus far? That is our next challenge.”

Indeed, the quality must remain above a certain level, but that’s easier said than done. Not just Konami, but any company that has grown in size will have a certain quota of games to release for the year and because of the reliance on external staff to meet this quota, there’s a risk that the quality will deteriorate. Although it’s not noticeable, some companies in the Famicom business are already going for a “quantity over quality” strategy (I won’t mention any names though).

I don’t want Konami’s MSX team to fall into the same trap. On the contrary, I believe Konami, who are the best brand on the MSX, must continue producing quality games and lead the MSX market as their mission. As long as Konami keeps pumping out quality games, the MSX will never fade away.

No matter what, please continue making games with the industry in mind. Never forget your original intentions. I’m looking forward to the upcoming Snatcher and their newest shoot-’em-up Parodius, as well as the supposedly “unachievable” SCC II.

I would like to thank everyone who helped me out with this article and I apologize for my rough words.

Konami’s Shoot-’Em-Up Series

Gradius [English title: Nemesis] - The MSX version of Gradius was released shortly after the Famicom version. It was notable for the additional boneyard stage, which did not exists in the original arcade game. At any rate, the fact that Gradius could be played on an MSX1 was pretty impressive to begin with.

Gradius 2 [English title: Nemesis 2] - The long-rumored sequel to Gradius made its debut on the MSX. New weapons, such as the upward laser were added, and a new storyline began depicting the conflict against Dr. Venom. It was the first MSX game to employ the SCC chip.

Salamander - The most difficult game in Konami’s shoot-’em-up library. The structure of the MSX version is completely different from the original arcade game, since Stages 3-5 can be played at any order. I was glad to see that some of the music and the power-up system from the revised Life Force edition of the game were incorporated.

Parodius - A shoot-’em-up parody that turns everything into a gag. The bosses are all unique like the giant drunk penguin, the badly-drawn monk and the eyeball. It’s notable for having the shortest development time of all Konami games, taking less than two months for the master version to be completed.

Other Notable Konami Games

Majō Densetsu [English title: Knightmare] - One of Konami’s earliest MSX games from the pre-Megarom era that was lauded as a masterpiece among players. The idea for the game is believed to be an arrangement of Konami’s arcade game titled Finalizer.

Yumetairiku Adventure [English title: Penguin Adventure] - A sequel to Konami’s early hit Antarctic Adventure that greatly improves upon its predecessor. The cute design of the penguin protagonist made it popular among female players.

Akumajō Dracula [English title: Vampire Killer] - Although based on a Famicom game, it is a masterpiece considered to be one of the top 5 games of Konami. With its high-sense soundtrack and wonderful balance, it still has many firmly-rooted fans

Galious no Meikyū [English title: The Maze of Galious] - The sequel to Knightmare. It employs a system where the player switches between Popolon and his lover Aphrodite. The game is now a full-fledged action RPG with many difficult mysteries to solve.

Metal Gear - A military-themed action RPG like nothing that came before. Its idea of avoiding conflict with the enemy by sneaking pass their blind spots is novel. The game was later ported to the Famicom.

F1 Spirit - A record-setting racing game that continues to sell to this day. The secret to its lasting popularity is due to its 2-players simultaneous mode, the option to choose the parts for your vehicle and its variety of courses.

Shalom - The conclusion to the Knightmare and also Konami’s first adventure game. The top-down exploration screens bring to mind the Dragon Quest series, but the game switches to a side-view action segment when the player confronts a boss.

Gekitotsu Pennant Race - It seems like an average baseball game, but the included WATCH mode is fun. You can create your own team and have it compete against one made by a friend.

Coming Soon: Snatcher, a Cyberpunk Adventure

Konami’s first truly authentic adventure is Snatcher, which appears to be inspired by Blade Runner. There will be an MSX2 version that consists of 3 disks and an original sound cartridge and a version for NEC PC-8801SR computers that consists of 5 disks The programmer in charge is said to be the same person who worked on Gradius 2, so I’m looking forward to it. “It’s an adventure game like nothing that came before” says Mr. Fukutake. In contrast to Parodius, Snatcher has had the longest development time out of any Konami game released thus far (8 months as of this interview). It is scheduled to be released by the end of November.

[thatfanficstuff]

Salvation (6)

Pairing: Loki x OC

Warnings: canon typical

Series Masterlist

***

"Loki, you must allow me to retrieve her," Thor's booming voice filtered through the haze in Isolde's head. She struggled to open her eyes to no avail.

"You will not separate her from me, brother. Not when I've just gotten her back," Loki insisted. 

As Isolde became more aware of her surroundings, she realized she was laying on a cold floor with her head in someone's lap. Fingers combed through her hair in a comforting gesture. Finally, she managed to get her eyes to flutter open. As expected, it was Loki's lap that cradled her head. 

"If you all could tone it down, that would be fantastic," she said, instantly drawing everyone's attention to her. 

"What did Loki do you to you?" Fury demanded. "And how did you get in there in the first place?"

Isolde arched a brow and sat up with Loki's help. "You are the complete opposite of toning it down, Mr. Fury," she said with a groan as her head spun. Loki stood and helped her to her feet, keeping one arm wrapped around her waist to keep her steady. "I walked in, as I'm sure you saw. I told you I had abilities, did I not? That is one of them. And Loki did nothing to me. I merely overexerted myself healing him. The damage was extensive."

Now that she thought about it, she realized Loki could phase through the glass just as easily as she had. The fact he hadn't meant he must have something else planned. He was still imprisoned because he chose to be. She turned to look at him with a frown, which he returned with a sheepish grin. They will be coming to rescue me, it was supposed to be a diversion. Something to keep them occupied while the plan progressed, he said in her head. Then he flashed her an image of a large green monster of some sort. 

Isolde blinked a couple of times. "Well, then. Let's get this settled, shall we?" With that she phased through the glass wall and walked past Thor and Fury. She paused at the door when she realized they weren't following. "Coming, Gentlemen?"

Soon, they were gathered around the table with the other Avengers, as the one called Stark had told her they were known as. "Loki is not to blame for his actions," Isolde said. 

Several of those around the table scoffed or argued with her, all talking over one another. Fury slammed the palm of his hand on the table. "Enough!" he yelled, startling them all into silence. "Let her talk."

"I could go into detail, but I'm going to keep this quick. You should anticipate others coming to retrieve him. Somehow a large, green beast is involved," Isolde explained.

All eyes turned to look at a timid seeming man with messy brown hair. "Um...that would be me," he said with a tight smile. Isolde gazed at him in surprise before shrugging her shoulders. No one had to convince her there was more in the world than she knew.

"Loki's other issues aside, when he fell into the abyss in Asgard everyone thought him dead. In reality he had been captured. Those that held him, tortured him without ceasing. They broke his mind then used the scepter to turn him to their will as he has so many others. I have repaired the damage as best as I can. He is himself again," she explained.

"Then tell him to stop this," Thor said.

She glanced up, meeting Loki's eyes in the monitor. She motioned toward the screen with her chin. "Turn that up."

"I can not end this. I may be the facilitator but I am not in control," Loki said.

"Anyone else curious how reindeer games knew what we were talking about?" Stark asked.

Isolde glanced at him. "Loki and I are sharing a mental link at the moment. He knows what I allow him to know."

"How do we know he's not controlling you?" the red-headed woman asked. 

"Isolde is immune to all forms of  mind control. She has long been used as a negotiator by my father because of this," Thor answered then turned his attention to his old friend. "If Loki cannot stop this, we must know what is coming."

"An army the likes of which this world has never seen. The Chitari are brutal opponents. You know this would be much easier discussed in person," Loki said and flashed his signature grin.

Isolde shook her head and smiled. "Don't push your luck, my prince."

"They are building a portal. The only thing which can stop it is the scepter," Loki continued.

"Where is this scepter?" Isolde asked. 

"Sterling, Oliver, maintain eyes on the prisoner. The rest of you, follow me," Fury said and strode from the room, the others trailing in his wake. Thor fell back to walk beside her. 

"Are you certain my brother cannot stop this?" he asked, his voice low so the others could not hear.

Irritation flared through her. "You think I would lie about such a thing?"

"To save my brother? Perhaps."

She arched a brow. "I have never lied to you, Thor. I see no reason to start now. Lies won't fix Loki's mess."

"What are you doing, Mr. Stark?" Fury's voice boomed out causing the Asgardians to frown in response. 

"Been wondering the same thing about you," the answer came. "What is phase two precisely?"

Isolde stepped into the room and moved to the side as an irritated blond man strode in behind them, slamming a weapon down on the counter. "Phase two is they use the tesseract to make weapons."

Isolde stood with her arms crossed over her chest and looked up at Thor. "Why are they fighting over this? Why are they fighting at all? Now is not the time."

"I do not know. They lose their way," Thor answered. 

She was about to say something else when Fury's booming voice once again interrupted. "It's because of them." Isolde glanced over to find the man pointing at her and Thor.

"Us?" Thor said.

"You came to our planet and had a grudge match that leveled a town."

"Our people want nothing but peace with your realm," Thor argued. 

Isolde's eyes ran around the room from person to person as they began to complain and snipe at one another. They were talking over each other. So much anger. So much distrust. She moved around the perimeter of the room, avoiding the others and keeping her eyes moving to take everything in. 

A blue glow drew her attention. The scepter. It was feeding their negative emotions, manipulating their thoughts. 

"Stop," she said, only for them to continue over the top of her. The timid man from earlier, grasped the scepter in his hand. "Stop now!"

Everyone froze. Somewhere a computer beeped and Dr. Banner, as the others called him, put the scepter down. "The scepter is causing this chaos. It's what it does."

Before anyone could respond, an explosion rocked through the room bringing more chaos in its wake.

[theunderdogwrites]

Ghislaine Maxwell: Co-Conspirator or Victim?

There are a few things in this world that gross me out to my very core:

-          Children eating ice cream. Just no. More gets on their face than in their mouths and it activates my gag reflex and I must look away in horror. And someone get the hose because I am not touching any of it come clean up time.

-          Feet.  There are no words

-          Bestial older men who terrorize young women and under-age girls with sex and those who help them engage in lascivious behavior. Should this not be something that disgusts everyone?

My zodiac sign pegs me as more of a leader than a follower. I find this laughable, but some around me might argue that I am capable of taking the reigns, but not always the best at adhering to authority exerted by others. If I am challenging you for your position, it’s because you’re either a bully or a fucking senseless shitbag and I don’t want those around you subjected to your vast lack of insight. Because in reality, I am super happy to follow intelligent, respectful human beings and even behave myself. It means I can just smile and nod and day dream – my favorite pastime.

If you are not familiar with the name Ghislaine Maxwell, I still hope you cringe at the name Jeffery Epstein. Convicted sex offender and all-around sack of malevolent slime. Also, a coward. Also, unfortunately dead (either by his own hand *I don’t believe it* or snuffed out by some frightened people of great power *I believe this*) before he was able to be made someone’s bitch in prison. Such a tragedy when sex offenders / sex traffickers don’t live long enough in prison to be passed around and used like a cum dumpster. Sometimes the punishment SHOULD fit the crime.

There is plenty of information out there about Ghislaine Maxwell. Here are a few key points on her:

-          Her father was Robert Maxwell. He was a British media proprietor, a former member of Parliament (MP), a suspected spy, and a fraudster (having misappropriated the pension funds of his employees). Just to give you a good idea of who Robert Maxwell was: he was the inspiration for the villainous media baron Elliot Carver in the 1997 James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies. I. Am. Jealous!

 -          Her father died in November 1991. He had boarded his 190-foot yacht, aptly name, Lady Ghislaine and found the next morning naked, spread-eagled and afloat in the Atlantic. Two autopsies could not conclusively prove a cause of death, but most say suicide because he was set to answer questions surrounding his corporation’s billion-pound debt load that was distributed among at least nine different international banks and investment firms, and the massive hole in its pension reserves. In simpler terms – he was fucked

 -          Robert Maxwell left his family in ruins. Ghislaine, his favorite child whom he groomed in his image from a young age, was understandably crushed

  -          Ghislaine is best known for being a socialite with immense connections among the international elite. It’s been stated that she was quite personable, a little bit quirky and therefore often a standout at parties; with many people being drawn to her. (Side note: I recently watched the HBO documentary on her titled, ‘Epstein’s Shadow’ and the tagline under ALL of the people they interviewed who knew her on a social level read, “former friend of Ghislaine Maxwell”. This just made me laugh. I’ve tried to envision the conversation where these people demanded that FORMER be included. Yes, quickly distance yourself from the stink less they think you too might smell bad)

  -          Depending on who you listen to, Ghislaine met Epstein in either the late 1980’s when her father introduced them (how apropos) or in the late 1990’s at a party in New York following a difficult breakup with a Count. I wonder what breaking up with a Count looks like, feels like. A Count is a historical title of nobility in certain European countries, generally of average rank in the hierarchy of nobility. So basically, he’s not THAT special. But probably feels he is because, well, he has a title. Just imagine the insult you could hurl at him during the break-up: “Count von Count has a bigger penis than you!” *If you do not know who that is – just leave now because you’re shameful*.

 -          Epstein and Maxwell started out as a couple, but that morphed into more of a companionship / friendship / let’s rape young girls together type situation. You know, how most connections organically evolve.

 -          Ghislaine Maxwell has been accused of befriending minors and attempting to build a relationship with them, then later delivering them to Jeffrey Epstein to abuse. Maxwell would allegedly lure the young girls to Epstein’s residence under the guise of paid massage work. She’d target disadvantaged minors who she thought wouldn’t be able to refuse the money. Maxwell & Epstein allegedly lured slightly older women into their gross lives with the promise to assist in their careers.

 -          Additionally, Maxwell and Epstein have been accused of trafficking some of these girls out to their friends and associates among their extremely elite circle. Most notably, is Prince Andrew. Investigators have identified as many as 36 girls that were victims of Epstein and Maxwell’s sex trafficking ring. Some of them - as young as 14. It’s believed there are many more victims yet to be identified.

 -          Following Epstein’s arrest in July 2019, the FBI started looking for Ghislaine. She went into hiding. Eleven months after Epstein’s “suicide” in prison on August 10, 2019, Maxwell was located. She was arrested in New Hampshire, where she was living a life of seclusion on a sprawling ranch.

 -          Ghislaine Maxwell faces federal charges including transporting a minor for the purposes of criminal sexual activity, and conspiring to entice minors to travel and engage in illegal sex acts. She is awaiting trial in a Manhattan jail. A trial that was to begin July 12, 2021 but has been delayed till the fall at the request of Maxwell.

 You now know all you need to know about Ghislaine Maxwell for the purposes of finishing this piece.

The HBO documentary poised a question and instead of answering it, they’ve pretty much left this viewer with repetitive thoughts and disrupted sleep while trying to answer that very question… ‘Ghislaine Maxwell, Co-Conspirator or Victim?’.

Victim: a person who suffers from a destructive or injurious action or agency / a person who is deceived or cheated, as by his or her own emotions or ignorance, by the dishonesty of others, or by some impersonal agency

My first thought when this question came up: “Wow HBO, if I was a victim of Epstein’s depravity, I’d be so pissed at you right now. Daring to group in the woman accused (several times over) of basically being a fancy pimp and securing playthings for her rich, giant-faced brute and his pals, with the young women whose lives and brain chemistry (yes, I said that: see TRAUMA) have been forever altered by Epstein’s fuckery… BOLD”.

But that thought took me to this thought: “Ghislaine was a Daddy’s girl. And as we know, her dad was a fiend. It is repeated many times in print, that Robert Maxwell conditioned his daughter and corrupted her character. In some twisted way, there might be a case in which she is in fact, a victim. A victim of a severe patriarchal environment that started at a young age and was instrumental in forming her concepts of success, decency and love (given and received)”.

My mind then went straight to this:

 She was raised by a plump, rotten human being and most likely, wanted to please her dad… as most daughters often do, and perhaps never thought to question anything. How many of us are guilty of that?

Robert Maxwell passes (Ghislaine has maintained that he was murdered, but with no evidence to support her claims) and the now lost, without a compass Ghislaine, finds her way to Jeffery Epstein.

I think there is something to be said for what and who we attract into our lives. And for what and who we allow to stay in our lives. I’m just going to assume that the majority of people in this world do not willingly desire to attract destructive, soul sucking wankers into their lives, but have had to expunge a number of them from their existence. Full vision doesn’t always mean you are not blind. Love can be murky and really fuck up those rose-coloured glasses.

Co-Conspirator: A co-conspirator is a fellow conspirator - someone engaged in a secret plan by multiple people to do something evil or illegal

By this definition, Ghislaine Maxwell should be spending a great deal of the rest of her life in prison.

She saw bad stuff. She blinded herself to bad stuff. She facilitated bad stuff. She became the bad stuff.

If I was the prosecuting attorney, I might end with those four sentences. But make it all dramatic… throw in a brief pause after each one… maybe do the Bill Clinton “I did not have sexual relations with that woman” thumb gesture:

 On second thought, considering how intertwined he could be in all of this… I’d most likely just use the classier karate chop into the open palm to bring my points home:

 (Side Note: if you really hate your life, try a deep dive on active hand gestures and how they often provide social leverage)

 So, to finally answer HBO’s question: ‘Ghislaine Maxwell, Co-Conspirator or Victim?’…

As I was told numerous times in counselling… “You are not at fault for the things that happened to you when you were young and had no control. But as an adult, you can’t let those past experiences define you and your actions. If you do, then you are responsible for the things you do now”.

Fault is past tense. Responsibility is present tense.

Ghislaine is not at fault for how she was raised or groomed, but if she lured just ONE girl/woman into Epstein’s clutches to be raped and trafficked, then she is absolutely responsible and should be held fully accountable.

She was a victim who turned into not just a co-conspirator but also a lying coward.

I believe ALL the women.

[hdappliedtheatre]

Applied Theatre: Theatre Of The Oppressed - Boal, A.

Q1: What specifically stood out for you in the Boal reading? 

I was interested to read about Operación Alfabetización Integral otherwise known as the ALFIN project. ALFIN was a movement administered by Alfonso Lizarzaburu to eradicate illiteracy in Peru by implementing artistic measures. In an article by Anthony Burton about Adult Literacy in Peru, Burton mentions Paulo Freire, and his ‘consciousness-raising’ methods. (Burton, A).

‘What really intrigued me about his work, and about the ALFIN experiment especially, was that it was, at last, a fully articulated and large-scale attempt to make his method work.’ (Burton, A).

I was delighted to discover that Freire’s strategies had been utilized in ALFIN, and that he had such a great influence on Boal. Paulo Freire’s publication Pedagogy of the Oppressed inspired Augusto Boal’s Theatre of the Oppressed. 

Towards the end of page 97, Boal declares ‘It is too early to evaluate the results of the ALFIN plan since it is still in its early stages.’ (Boal, 2008). The experiments discussed in this chapter were conducted in 1973, and Theatre of the Oppressed was published in 2008, yet I am still struggling to find any documentation that reviews the outcome of the project. Therefore, the focal questions I would ask are “has the ALFIN project been completed?” and if so, “what are the results of ALFIN?” 

Q2: What can we learn from Boal's experience with the man's picture of home on pg 100?

There is a notable saying ‘a picture is worth one thousand words,’ which emphasises the power that can be held in an image. Boal’s response to this photograph proves the significance of this statement. ‘Only photography, and no other language, could express the pain of that child’s eyes, of those tears mixed with blood.’ (Boal, 2008). This is the importance of art. Art is the only language that can be understood or interpreted by everyone. 

It is crucial to recognise the separation between spectator and performer that Boal mentions briefly at the start of this chapter. In this instance, the initial response to this man’s photograph came from a negative perspective. Freire discusses in his publication, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, how ‘education is suffering from narration sickness,’ (Freire, 1968) meaning that, as consumers of education, we are influenced by what we are told. Rather than accusing the man of not understanding the assignment correctly, and claiming that he was wrong, the facilitator should have approached the issue inquisitively, and questioned why he had taken this particular photograph, and how it relates to the stimulus.

Q3: Please explain Boal's first two sections (1. Knowing the body, 2. Making the body expressive) briefly in your own words.

Section 1 of Boal’s strategy, Knowing the Body, details the way in which participants must first become aware of their own body. Participants will recognise the body’s potentiality and its constraints, and observe the exertion imposed on the body due to the work they carry out. They are to identify their ‘muscular alienation.’ (Boal, 2008).

Boal recommends exercises that intend to ‘disjoint’ participants, and allows them to become self-aware. The first exercise is Slow-Motion Race. ‘Moving in slow motion, the body will find its centre of gravity dislocated at each successive moment and so must find again a new muscular structure which will maintain its balance.’ (Boal, 2008).

Having participated in this exercise before, I feel obligated to give a personal account. 

The Slow-Motion Race exercise is an exerting task. The objective to be as slow as possible when required to move is an idea we do not often stumble across. With each small movement you are compelled to find stability and acknowledge the position your body has chosen in order to maintain that stability. 

The second section, Expressing the Body is a development of the previous stage. In this segment, Boal draws attention to the ‘expressive ability of the body.’ (Boal, 2008). As a collective, we have become accustomed to communicating through text and speech that we almost disregard our body’s ‘enormous expressive capabilities.’ (Boal, 2008).

To provoke movement into practice, Boal suggests taking part in certain parlour games whereby ‘communication must be effected entirely through the body.’ (Boal, 2008).

Bibliography

Boal, A. (2008). Theatre of the Oppressed. Pluto Press.

Burton, A. The Submerged and the Seers: Adult Literacy in Peru, 1973-1974. Date Accessed 19th April 2021. Available at: https://anthrosource.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1525/aeq.1980.11.4.05x1818x

Freire, P. (1968). Pedagogy Of The Oppressed. The Seabury Press. New York. 

[lupine-publishers-sjpbs]

Lupine Publishers | Enabling Intragenerational third places as New Incubators of Sociability and Placemaking in Times of Transition

Lupine Publishers | Scholarly Journal Of Psychology And Behavioral Sciences

Abstract

One of the most influential place theories, or conceptual frameworks that deal with the framing, activation and management (as well as understanding) of the public realm, for which the coffee shop, bookstore, taverna, bistro, bakery, pub, etc. became a metonym, was the idea of the “Third Place”: a term that emerged to describe new social environments that were distinct from both home (the first place) and work (the second place) and which revolved around leisure, consumption and the desire for the social with a lesser emphasis on the community Banerjee Tridib [1], Oldenburg Ray [2]. The full vocabulary that thoughtful public realms, intragenerational and inclusive can offer, as prime public places, is a vivid example of Oldenburg’s third place theory (1999) which he centers round a place to which person(s) are drawn into some kind of sanctuary, serenity, relaxation and refuge feeling and atmosphere. This is a place where the community feeling is being developed and nurtured (Figure 1).

Introduction

The main argument is that third places, places where people can gather, relax after work, put aside their differences, concerns of work and home, and just hang out simply for the pleasures of good company and lively conversation, are the heart of (any) community’s social vitality and are the grassroots of democracy Oldenburg R [3] (Figure 2). Third places are gathering places and their importance is in nourishing sociability. For these places to work, they need to fully enable a culture of social inclusion, multiculturalism, ethnic diversity and a balance social-mix, instead of becoming very segregated, mono cultural realms. One thing is certain: these places such as coffee houses, community centers, groceries, markets, bazaars, parks, discussion rooms, etc. are of extreme importance for a vibrant life of any neighborhood, town or city. Now on the opposite site of the pendulum, but still making sense of cities complex hybridities and constant transformations, Edward Soja’s “third space” presents itself as an extremely useful term (curiously resembling in form, though definitely not meaning, the Oldenburg Third Place). In essence, third spaces are those which overlay real spaces (the first space) and imagined spaces (the second space), both we mentioned above, to produce in something that is open-ended, undefinable, fluid, and endlessly complex (as are, Soja argues, so many contemporary urban spaces in cities). Soja Edward W [4]. Importantly, third spaces are not only physically constructed but socially and virtually constructed (Something that Oldenburg has not envisioned at all) as well: a factor which, above all, infers that they may be differentially constructed. By the way, Soja’s theory of the third space builds on Henri Lefebvre’s concept of the spatial triad Lefebvre H [5]. Lefebvre’s production of space ideas remains contentious but highly relevant for the investigation of city transformation in general and how the planning of urban space can contribute to social injustice in particular University of Minnesota Press. and Harvey D [6]. What Oldenburg describes as “the problem of place” one of the foci and key driving elements his social urban geography work, and is where Soja’s concept of third space differs most dramatically; as in third spaces, the key link between participants is not normally their location but shared links that draw people together.

Figure 1: Barber and Parlour Third Place, London, United Kingdom by Toa Heftiba. Reproduced by Permission.

Figure 2: Spaces, Place and People of Shanghai, China, Photo by Christie Kim. Reproduced by Permission.

Communities include things held in common, like government and social structure as well as a common sense of place or location. Main function of the community (local community-gemeinschaft) is to mediate between the individual and society (geselschaft), and that people could relate to their societies through both geographic and non-geographic substructures of communities Hillery G [7]. The third place is an outcry for the return to the fundamental values of a community; some which have been forgotten and erased in today’s age of fast changes, superficial values and eradicated places. The popularity of a place where new social networks are built and old maintained can never be or made obsolete. Third places have existed for hundreds of years. They wereplaces that had their appeal and that were symbols and active mediators in community communication. As Oldenburg calls them-social condensersplaces, agoras if you will, where all citizens of the community or a neighborhood meet to develop the place where citizens of a community or neighborhood meet to develop friendships, discuss issues, and interact (socially changes, positive and negative ones alike. A well-functioning public realm with a third place richness can build social capital by enforcing and melding social relations Putnam R, Lewis F [8]. This happens through in-continuo social contact among people in multiple overlapping role relationships Lennard Crowhurst S, Lennard, H [9].

These third places are crucial to a community for a number of reasons. They are firstly distinctive informal gathering places, secondly, they make the citizen feel at home, thirdly they nourish relationships and a diversity of human contact, fourthly they help create a sense of place and community and finally they invoke a sense of civic pride Oldenburg R [10]. The key ingredient lies in the fact that they are socially binding, encouraging sociability at the same time and fighting against isolation. They simply make life more joyous, colorful, and they enrich city’s economic activity, public life and democracy. The life of third places in coffee shops, cafés, hair salons, restaurants, bakeries, semi-informal meeting places, bazaars, other markets, gardens etc. are in alignment with the argument that these types of places are the facilitators of vibrant and good public life and that in most cases they are in synergy with open public spaces, like squares, bazaars and other markets. [3] points at the essential ingredients for a well-functioning third place: 1. They must be free or relatively inexpensive to enter and to purchase food and drinks. They must be highly accessible; ideally one should be able to get there by foot from one’s home; A number of people can be expected to be there on a daily basis; All people should feel welcome, regardless of their race, gender or religion and it should be easy to get into a conversation. A person who goes there should be able to find both old and new friends each time they visit. Third places are retreats into social spaces from a selfish need with those of like mind. Its where we foster some of our selfesteem, and a great deal of our social capital, that helps us survive and bridge home and work Putnam RD [11].

Freud held that emotional wellbeing depends upon having someone to love and a work to do. Oldenburg argues that we also need a dependable place of refuge where, for a few minutes a day, we can escape the demands of family and work environment Oldenburg R [10]. Third places in action, where intergenerational spirit exists, can provide possible and viable foundation for: 1) foster a sense of connection between people (of different age, gender, ethnicity, social class, sexual orientation, political or religious beliefs) 2) create temporary and permanent venues where a vibrant exchange of ideas can take place 3) encourage those ideas to lead to real efforts that bring progress to the community 4) offer an enjoyable and long-lasting social and aesthetic environment both for you, elderly and in the middle-for all geographies of age.

Built environment supports the built-up of social capital not just amongst adults, elderly but also between children. Especially for children the concept of the traditional European square offers an important learning environment. Primarily, children learn by repeated observation, imitation and practice in relating to a range of adults in multiple contexts Lennard H [12]. The disturbing lack of good public spaces in our cities, town and neighborhoods where children are able to gather and play, can have a tremendous impact on urban culture. Lack of these places reinforces the already omnipresent alienation and loss of real sense of place for children, which has to do a lot with the overuse of video, TV and other electronic media (rise of obesity levels due to lack of walking, exercise, etc.). Another problem is lack of walking and the overuse of automobile for transportation of children even on very short distances.

Because children cannot always reach places on their own, they rely upon their parents to transport them everywhere (thus the “soccer mom” phenomenon in American suburbia). The problem is also that children often play in the street and across several open front lawns. It is impossible, however, to define this area as urban space (like a public square) bounded by surrounding houses and trees, when distances between opposite houses are enormous Gehl J [13]. The common mistake is made when parks are being associated with public squares. Parks are designed with specific areas set aside for recreational activities or quiet contemplation. A typical park is an area dominated by grass, trees, water and pathways. Public squares are designed with paved surfaces to accommodate a variety of uses that parks cannot offer, including the relation to the built environment, orientation, legibility and imageability. However, both are needed in order to create livable places and one does not exclude the other. Public places (squares) have also a value to children for play. This becomes very obvious when kids learn to use their imaginations and expand their sense of curiosity in an environment that offers much more than just landscape. It is also a place where children learn how to properly socialize with their equals, to organize themselves, and to resolve disputes. The same could be said of society. Environmental psychology has looked into those aspects where there are clear indications that the opportunity to explore rich, varied public realm environments appears related to cognitive, social, and motor development in young children. Physical spaces designed for children must meet the need for social interaction as well as preserving the possibility of privacy. Persons on European squares act to acknowledge and confirm each other’spresence. And, if they are fortunate, children get a sense of the pleasure and some experience in being with, meeting and talking to each other Crowhurst Lennard S, Lennard H [14]. Lack of attention to the different ways children (could) use their cities (public realm especially) can have dire consequences for the future of urban design in creation of livable cities. Cities urban public spaces need to be designed in such a way to support sociability and constructive exchange, not destructive behavior Lennard H, Lennard Crowhurst S [12].

Figure 3 As we mentioned above, the concept of third place, developed by Ray Oldenburg, is distinct from first and second places. A first place is the private space of home. Second places are where people spend significant time, often formally. These include schools, universities and workplaces. Common examples of third places in cities include community gardens, libraries, public swimming pools, cafes, men’s sheds, farmers’ markets and dog parks. There is growing understanding of the negative outcomes and costs associated with loneliness, especially with elderly generation. These include fractured communities, declining trust, stress, depression and disease. Clearly this is neither desirable nor sustainable. More than a century ago the sociologist George Simmel G, Wolff KH [15] observed how mobility disrupts social connection and creates isolation. The urban migrant, or a lonely senior citizen leaves behind her/his own social ties and often struggles to connect to the new community or lack of such. These challenges feel both the migrant, the elderly and their new neighbors around her/him. Third places can help by creating or enhancing a sense of community on a smaller, more human scale a relief from the overwhelming sensory experience of a large and unfamiliar city.

Figure 3: Marien Platz, Square in Munich Germany by Jan Kolario, Reproduced by Permission.

The village-like feeling of third places can reduce people’s anxieties and make them more comfortable with trying a new social experience, therefore minimizing the urban loneliness. Loneliness has been associated with objective social isolation, depression, introversion, or poor social skills. However, studies have shown these characterizations are incorrect, and that ‘loneliness is a unique condition in which an individual perceives himself or herself to be socially isolated even when among other people’ while human longitudinal studies indicate that the ‘harmful effects of loneliness are not attributable to some peculiarity of individuals who are lonely, instead they are due to the effects of loneliness on ordinary people’ Miller G [16], Murthy V [17] and-the-loneliness epidemic and Masi CM, Chen HY, Hawkley LC, Cacioppo JT [18]. and Cacioppo JT, Cacioppo S, Capitanio JP, Cole SW [19].

Implication for Planning and Urban Design Policy for Combatting (Urban) Loneliness through Urban form and Human Behavior approaches

Implications for policy in urban planning and design for combating urban loneliness are extensive if all tenants of the place theory, i.e. Oldenburg’s example of third place, can and could be included. As we mentioned before, community and society are on the classic linking elements. Community development programs recommend supporting elderly and intragenerational setting and links, small businesses geared toward the young and middle aged children’s suitable environment and third places for their peoplebased social benefits, might be the key. Some researchers suggest that pace-street based businesses that are considered “third places” by the users of those same “Main or High Streets” influence their immediate public space by paying more attention to and providing place-based urban design characteristics that help make good people places Mehta V, Bosson JK [20]. These and other findings have implications for urban design, community planning, city management and economic development policies. What we see from our research as emerging issues for policy and design implications and implementations, those with spatial and social value (physical and social sustainability efforts) are issues of natural accessibility and acceptable distances for elderly, proximity to destination of value and utility and mixed use for socialization and publicness and familiarity to spaces and place attachment in terms of sense of place and place recognition. An addendum to this, in the age of crime, fear and pandemics, an additional issue of gentle density and green spaces is a must. Dykstra [21] uses the distinction between emotional and social loneliness in an attempt to unpack the complex nature of loneliness and its association with other psychological responses to company, community and society. “Emotional loneliness” encompasses feelings of desolation and insecurity that result from missing or losing an intimate attachment and so having no-one to turn to. In seeming contrast, “Social loneliness” is characterized by the perceived lack of a circle of friends and acquaintances who can provide a sense of belonging, companionship and community. When thinking about the role that urban planning and urban design or placemaking (for policy and implementation) has in addressing loneliness the obvious conclusion would be that the focus should be on social loneliness Dykstra PA [21]. Gotesky’s [22] claims that there are 4 kinds of loneliness, that loneliness is a contemporary phenomenon, and that loneliness can be transcended. Gotesky distinguishes between physical aloneness, the spatial and/or temporal separation from others; loneliness, the feeling of being rejected by one’s fellows or excluded from their activities and interests when one desires to be included and accepted; the state of feeling isolated, which derives from the rational recognition of conditions of existence which one does not know how to change; and solitude, a state of living or working alone which is free from the pain of loneliness or isolation Gotesky R [22]. Loneliness has always characterized the consciousness of man: It is a permanent condition that may be alleviated but not transcended, because each human ego is unavoidably confined to its own realm of monadic, opaque, and solipsistic consciousness. Mijuskovic B [23]. It is evident that the experience of loneliness is a very rich plethora and mix of a number of variances of emotional experiences Nisenbaum S [24].

Urban planning & design have enormous potential to address issues like human loneliness and the health and wellbeing of citizens, in this case the ageing society. To realize this promise, it must be valued differently and formulated around contemporary social scientific understanding of human ‘needs’, not aesthetic architectural narratives. Eric Miller [25] Cities simply need to accept and adapt to multigenerational urban settings, ageing in place strategies, smart ageing and the combination of traditional and contemporary lifestyles and accessibility where the “senior city” or “geographies of age” generation of people cannot and must not be cut off from the rest of society, with age becoming a new form of segregation, one which ultimately provides the ground for emerging and growing urban loneliness.

On the contrary cities and planners and urban designers need to accept that they - the ageing society and the new reality reflects a desire for an active, experience-filled lifestyle. In this fashion, three interrelated aspects of ageing must be considered in creating policy responses for ageing societies: i) individual ageing; ii) population ageing; iii) the new equilibrium of societies that have undergone the different stages of an ageing trend Ageing Societies: A Comparative Introduction, McGraw-Hill. Finally, policy makers need to nurture, manage, retain and support the third places of Oldenburgian type that exist in neighborhoods; if they don’t, they need to be regenerated or created. All should realize the social value of being recognized as a third place and follow business models that help them become third places Oldenburg R [26]. Policy makers need to be sensitive to both the existing and the new third places in neighborhoods and value them not only for their social attributes but also for their contribution to the design quality of the public spaces in which they exist Mehta V, Bosson JK [10]. There is ultimately a need to develop an adaptable, resilient and inclusive place strategy to address urban loneliness, sort of a proactive placemaking approach that will have nexus in the need for prosocial places; ones combating lonely cities-empty spaces and isolated places.

Finally, there is a need to take a few steps back and position the whole issue of public spaces and loneliness in a larger scheme, an almost metaphysical conceptual contour. There are multiple and even limitless ways of understanding, approaching and analyzing the subject of (urban) loneliness in contemporary culture and society, i.e. in our cities. Loneliness is largely a social phenomenon and a social form Johansson, T and Andreasson T [27]. (Urban) Loneliness, product of partly (urban or ‘agorian’) social (and even physical) isolation and retreat and partly our own subjective (metaphysical, subconscious, conscious and synchronicity) interpretation of our lives, can become a public health problem in our cities. Why? Simply because it degrades the lives of the public, bring down the quality and joy of being, makes our lives shorter and unhealthier; our bodies and motoric prone to sickness and disease, our minds vulnerable to anxiety, stress, isolation, alienation, depression and other mental illness and daytime/ nighttime problems. But as with most ailments that manifest in our individual bodies, loneliness is also a failure of our environments, and the powers who have created or neglected them Ankita Rao [28]. The (urban) loneliness that city dwellers are experiencing today, are obviously not imbedded and rooted in any one (single) phenomenon or reason, though we easily slip into believes of blaming the “modern” causes of this: breakdown of the traditional nucleus family unit, disappearance of porches in front of our houses, urban sprawl, bowling alone, dominance of the car, the mindless network society and its “evil” city of bits: scroll-click-scroll of our phones and tablets, or the endless stress always-connected-onjobs- online feeling that follow us home through emails, SMSs texts, Whatsups, Instagram’s, Facebooks, Twitters and other messages. What really is needed is a deeper understanding of the triad of complexity: space, place and time. If we do not understand that we will never understand (urban) loneliness and thereby never be able to intervene in proper way in urban planning & design. We have a pretty good understanding what good public realms are and what good urban design is and the position of loneliness within; but without a thorough understanding of “time” as the main pinnacle of the cubus or triangle of concepts and categories, we will never arrive anywhere.

Marc Wittmann (2016) gives us a fascinating inquiry into how our subjective experience of time’s passage shapes everything from our emotional memory to our sense of self. This is also extremely important for our cities and public realms and us within them. “Consciousness is tied to corporeality and temporality; I experience myself as existing with a body over time...If one has no time, one has also lost oneself. Distracted by the obligations of everyday activities, we are no longer aware of ourselves… Everything is done all at once, faster and faster, yet no personal balance or meaning can be found. This implies the loss of contact with one’s own self. We also no longer feel “at home” with ourselves and find it difficult to persist in any given activity because we are available at every moment”, Marc Wittmann [29].

“If we had deliberately aimed to make cities that create loneliness, we could hardly have been more successful,” said Suzanne Lennard, an architect and the director of the International Making Cities Livable movement and author of some of the leading works on public spaces. Lennard said “we have lost some of our cities’ most essential components, like the plazas and piazzas that once formed the center, allowing for people to naturally bump into each other, or interact while shopping, eating, and walking. Which is why urban planners and designers have started to look at the pathways, gardens, and building façades that have become staples of the urban milieu. In other words, they are examining many of the features we pass by every day without so much as knowing how such things influence our psyche”. Lennard S [30]. At the end of the day, understanding the underlying problems that create and contribute to urban loneliness, understanding the complexity of space, place and time, and accepting the reality of everyday urbanism, i.e. contemporary urbanism in general will be sine qua non for moving beyond merely theorizing and analyzing the problems; but instead through research and practice outputs shows that an alternative, for a less lonely 8urban) future is indeed possible. Without claiming to solve (urban) loneliness, urban planning and urban design can be an important tool in response to it (Figure 4).

https://lupinepublishers.com/psychology-behavioral-science-journal/pdf/SJPBS.MS.ID.000183.pdf

https://lupinepublishers.com/psychology-behavioral-science-journal/fulltext/enabling-intragenerational-third-places-as-new-incubators-of-sociability-and-placemaking.ID.000183.php

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[margdarsanme]

NCERT Class 11 Psychology Chapter 8 Thinking

NCERT Solution for Class 11 Psychology Chapter 8 Thinking

NCERT TEXTBOOK QUESTIONS SOLVED

Question 1. Explain the nature of thinking.Answer: Thinking is a complex mental process involved in manipulating and analyzing information, either collected through the senses from the environment, or stored in memory from past experiences.Such manipulation and analysis occur by means of abstracting, reasoning, imagining, problem solving, judging and decision-making. It is an internal process that can be inferred from overt behavior.Main features:

Thinking is the base of all cognitive activities.

It involves manipulation and analysis of information received from the ! environment.

Thinking is mostly goal directed and one desires to reach the goal by planning. Two building blocks of thinking?

Thinking is a complex mental process and people think by means of mental images or concepts.

Mental image refers to an image which is a mental representation of a sensor}’ experience. In this we actually try to form a visual image of the whole situation.

 A concept is a mental representation of a category. It refers to a class of objects,ideas, events that share common properties, e.g. When we encounter new social situation, we try to categorise it on the basis of past experience and take action towards such situations.

Question 2. What is a concept? Explain the role of concept in the thinking process.Answer: Concepts are mental categories for objects and events, which are similar to each other in one or in more than one way.

They may be organised in schema. They are mental frameworks which represents our knowledge and assumptions about the world.

Concepts are building blocks of thinking. They allow us to organize knowledge in systematic ways.

Concept formation is a basic task of thinking i.e., identifying the stimulus properties that are common to a class of objects or ideas, e.g., in the activity, the participant has to classify the stimuli either on the basis of colour or shape. It is very helpful in the thinking process.

Question  3. Identify obstacles that one may encounter in problem solving.Answer: Problem solving is thinking directed towards the solution of a specific problem,Problem solving involves following mental operations which are as follows :

Identify the problem

Represent the problem

Plan the solution: Set sub-goals

Evaluate all solutions (plays)

Select one solution and execute it

 Evaluate the putcome

Rethink and redefine problems and solutions

There are two major obstacles to solving a problem. These are mental set, and lack of motivation.Mental set is a tendency of a person to solve problems by following already tried mental operations or steps.Lack of motivation is another obstacles to solving problems. Due to lack of motivation people give up easily when they encounter a problem or failure in implementing the : first step. Therefore, there is a need to persist in their effort to find a solution.

Question 4. How does reasoning help in solving problems?Answer:  Reasoning is a form of problem solving. It is goal directed activity and involves ‘ inferences.Reasoning is the process of gathering and analyzing information to a arrive at a conclusion.Types of reasoning:

Inductive Reasoning: Reasoning is based on specific facts and observations. Through this reasoning people analyzing other possible reasons. Scientific reasoning is inductive in nature.

Deductive Reasoning: The deductive reasoning begins with general solution and then draws specific solution.

Analogy: Analogy helps us in identifying and visualizing the salient attributes of an object.

Question 5. Are judgement and decision-making interrelated processes? Explain.Answer: Judgement and decision-making are interrelated processes. .

In decision-making the problem before us is to choose among alternatives by evaluating the cost and benefit associated with each alternative. For example, when you have the option to choose between psychology and economics your decision will be based on future prospects.

Decision making differs from other type or problem solving. In decision-making we already know the various solutions of choices.

Judgements are not decisions although they make yield information necessary for decision.

Question 6. Why is divergent thinking important in creative thinking process?Answer:  Divergent thinking^ is important in creative thinking process. It’s abilities facilitate generation of a variety of ideas which may not seem to be related.Fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration are the abilities of divergent thinking.

Fluency : produces many ideas for a given task or a problem. The more ideas a person produces, the higher his fluency ability.

Flexibility: indicates variety in thinking. It may be thinking of different uses of an object, or different interpretation of a picture, story or different ways of solving a problem

Originality : ability to produce ideas that are rare or unusual by seeing new relationship, combining old ideas with new ones, looking at things from different prospective.

Elaboration : ability that enables a person to go into details and workout implications of new ideas.

Divergent thinking ability facilitate generations of a variety of ideas which may not seem to be related.

Divergent thinking is essential in generating a wide range of ideas. Convergent thinking is important to identify the most useful or appropriate idea.

Question 7. What are the various barriers to creative thinking?Answer: Barriers to creative thinking can be characterized as habitual, perceptual, motivational, emotional and cultural.

The tendency to be overpowered by habits can be detrimental to creative expression as it becomes difficult to think in novel ways.

Motivational and emotional barriers show that creativity is more than just a cognitive process. Lack of motivation, fear of failure, fear of rejection, poor self concept and negativism may hamper creative thinking.

Cultural barriers are related to excessive adherence to tradition, expectations, conformity, pressures and stereo types. It arises due to the fear of being different, mediocrity, social pressure, over-dependence, personal security and tendency to maintain the things as it is.Strategies to overcome the barriers of creative thinking.

There are certain attitudes, dispositions, and skills, which facilitate creative thinking.Here are some strategies to help you enhance your creative thinking abilities and skills:

Cultivate the habit of wider reading, exposure to a variety of information, and develop the art of asking questions, pondering over the mysteries of situations and objects.

Try deliberately to look for multiple angles of a task and situation to increase flexibility in your thinking.

Obsbom’s Brainstorming technique can be used to increase fluency and flexibility of ideas to open-ended situations. This helps in increasing the fluency of ideas and piling up alternatives. Brainstorming can be practiced by playing brainstorming games with family members and friends keeping its principles in mind.

Originality can be developed by practicing fluency, flexibility, and habit of associative thinking, exploring linkages, and fusing distinct or remote ideas.

Indulgence in activities, which require use of imagi-nation and original thinking rather than routine work according to the interest and hobbies.

Generate a number of possible ideas or solutions, then select the best from among them.

Think of what solutions someone else may offer for the problems.

Give your ideas the chance to incubate. Allowing time for incubation between production of ideas and the stage of evaluation of ideas may bring in the ‘Aha!’ experience.

Sometimes ideas cluster like branches of a tree. It is useful to diagram your thinking so that you can follow each possible branch to its completion.

Resist the temptation for immediate reward and success and cope with the frustration and failure. Encourage self-evaluation.Develop independent thinking in making judgments.

Visualize cause and consequence and think ahead, predicating things that have never happened, like, suppose the time starts moving backwards, what would happen? If we had no zero?, etc.

Be self-confident and positive.

Question 8. How can creative thinking be enhanced ?Answer: Strategies to enhance memory:

Originality: Originality can be developed by practicing fluency, flexibility, habit of associative thinking, exploring linkages, and fusing distinct or remote idea.

Use of Imagination: Engaging more frequently in activities which require use of imagination and original thinking rather than routine work according to interest and hobbies.

Not to accept initial ideas: Never accepting the first ideas or solution. Many ideas die because we reject them thinking that the idea might be a silly idea i.e. we have to first generate a number of possible ideas or solutions, then select the best from among them.

Getting feedback: Getting a feedback on the solutions we decide one from others who are less personally involved in the task.

Chance to Incubate : Giving ideas the chance to incubate. Allowing time for incubation between production of ideas and the stage of evaluation of ideas, may bring in the ‘Aha!’ experience.

Diagram thinking: Sometimes ideas cluster like branches of a tree. It is useful to diagram our thinking so that we can follow each possible branch to its completion.

Developing independent thinking: Developing independent thinking in making judgements, figuring out things without any help or resources.

Self confident : To be self-confident and positive. Never undermine to your creative potential to experience the joy of your creation.

Question 9. Does thinking take place without language ? Discuss.Answer:

Thinking is a silent speech

It cannot take place without language.

Benjamin Lee Whorf was of the view that language determines the contents of thought. This view is known as linguistic relativity hypothesis. In its strong version, this hypothesis holds what and how individuals can possible think is determined by the language and linguistic categories they use (linguistic determinism).

Experimental evidence, maintains that it is possible to have the same level or quality of thoughts in all languages depending upon the availability of linguistic categories and structures.

Some thoughts may be easier in one language compared to another.

Question 10. How is language acquired in human beings?Answer: To achieve linguistic competence, children must master the four sub-systems or language :

Phonology – the ability to understand and produce speech sounds

Semantics – the ability to understand words and the different combinations of words

Grammar – the ability to understand the rules by which words are arranged into sentences and the rules by which words can indicate tense and gender

Pragmatics – the ability to understand the rules of effective communication such as turn-taking, initiating and ending conversations and so on.

There are two contrasting views on how language is acquired. Some suggest that language acquisition is primarily biologically determined. This is typical nativity position in nature-nurture debate. Other position is the environmentalist position which views learning as the basis of language acquisition.Language development for behaviourists like B.F. Skinner follow the learning principles such as association, imitation and reinforcement. They explain it in terms of operant conditioning.Regional differences in pronunciation and phrasing illustrate how different patterns are reinforced in different areas.

The nativist view supported by Noam Chomsky argues that human being’s extra ordinary capacity to learn and use language is based on certain innate mechanisms.

Chomsky suggested that children are born with powerful language acquisition, device, LAD, which represents a knowledge of universal grammar.

Children throughout the world seem to have a critical period that is form infancy to puberty where learning must occur if it is to occur successfully for learning language.Most psychologists accept that both nature and nurture are important in language acquisition.

from Blogger http://www.margdarsan.com/2020/09/ncert-class-11-psychology-chapter-8.html

[esmithmajortwo2020]

What is Hauntology?

The word was first coined by philosopher Jacques Derrida in his 1993 book Specters of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning & the New International, which began life as his contribution to a conference that asked the pertinent question ‘whither Marxism?’ following the dissolution of communism in Eastern Europe. Derrida challenged the opinion held by some commentators that Marx’s theories had been effectively defeated and liberal democracy had triumphed (which was Francis Fukuyama’s argument in The End of History and The Last Man), and proposed that Marx would continue to haunt history, just as ‘the spectre of communism’ was described as haunting Europe at the opening of Marx’s Communist Manifesto. The word ‘hauntology’ is a pun on the word ‘ontology’ (both words sound almost identical in Derrida’s native French) and describes the problematic, intangible and paradoxical ontology that such spectres, in their incessant haunting, pose for discourse on history. Hauntology describes the haunting of a historicised present by spectres that cannot be ‘ontologised’ away.

As is often the case in Derrida’s writing however, ‘hauntology’ is a concept that’s arguably better suited to interpretation than strict definition. It can easily be linked to the general methodology of deconstruction Derrida pioneered – as metaphors, spectres, being neither one thing or the other, challenge basic binary oppositions like ‘alive / dead’, ‘present / absent’ and ‘past / present’ and so are ‘deconstructive’ in nature. Or they can be linked to the psychoanalytic theory of Lacan and Žižek – the spectres Derrida discusses conceivably residing in an area beyond the abilities of the Imaginary and the Symbolic to reflect and describe the Real. Here the haunting metaphor can be extended: traditionally, a spectre invades the present to redress a balance there, to warn the present concerning the future. Hauntological spectres come to bother us and our images from any zone of deficit lying between things as they were / are / will be and things as they are thought or hoped to have been / be / be in the future, thus history haunts (Marxist) ideology, and (Marxist) ideology haunts history; theory haunts practice and practice haunts theory, Utopia haunts reality and reality haunts Utopia, and so on. Art that permits a hauntological reading would facilitate this process of haunting.

In many cases a hauntological layer in art pointedly reminds us that what we’re witnessing is an imperfect, failure-prone and/or all-too-human construction by drawing our attention to the form or medium of the art: we hear the sonic by-products of obsolete or broken technology, we see the unrealism of painting, and art’s status as a magical window onto the world is denied. Such aesthetic experiences can haunt, mock, accuse and open our minds to the delicately contingent and circumstantial nature of art and history.

In doing this it’s rather like the Verfremdungseffekt or ‘V-effect’ developed by twentieth-century dramatist and theorist Bertolt Brecht. Most often translated loosely as the ‘alienation effect’ (‘Verfremdung’ could also be translated as ‘estranging’ or ‘de-familiarisation’), it aimed to disrupt the seductive, seamless and ‘trance’-like flow of sympathy from a play’s audience to the characters portrayed on stage in various ways but most famously by ‘breaking the fourth wall’, a theatrical metaphor that can be applied to other arts to describe any situation where the illusion of transparent artistic surface is broken. Brecht’s plan was that the V-effect would work satirically, denaturalising bourgeois notions of the ‘alleged “eternally human”’ that supposedly remained permanent throughout history and the world and served to maintain the political status quo by implying that ‘it’s always been this way…’:

‘The field has to be defined in historically relative terms… we must drop our habit of taking the different social structures of past periods, then stripping them of everything that makes them different; so that our own period can be seen to be impermanent too’ – Brecht, ‘A Short Organum for the Theatre’, 1948.

The V-effect can also demonstrate hauntology-like allegories of symbolic representation (if ‘actor’ is taken to be analogous to ‘artist’ or ‘music-maker’):

‘The audience identifies itself with the actor as being an observer, and accordingly develops his attitude of observing or looking on… It is quite clearly somebody else’s repetition of the incident: a representation, even though an artistic one’ – Brecht, ‘Alienation Effects in Chinese Acting’, 1936.

These ideas can help give some particular insights into hauntological aesthetics, but they’re only relevant up to a certain point. Hauntological effects certainly alienate and estrange the familiar and the idealistic so that it can be reassessed, but the question that could remain to be asked of any work of hauntological art is whether it makes a culturally satirical temporal disjunction of a Brechtian sort, or demonstrates and mourns the (eternal) tragedies of the human condition, or is simply a matter of personal nostalgia.

[adamkimmelasc]

Adam Kimmel, DOP Explores Innovating Comedy Shows

At a recent interview, ASC, Adam Kimmel, disclosed an approach that he took in one of his most recent shoots, a CNN / Netflix comedy series. Kimmel, A well respected Cinematographer (Director of Photography (DOP/DP) for several years, is always happy to talk about his perspective and also the advantage of his expertise with his coworkers and students. Find out more about his job at the following link and the famous cinematographer: Adam Kimmel DOP.

Though the approaches to stand up comedy shoots are relatively well established and have been for quite a while, Adam Kimmel has shown once again that innovation is always welcome from the industry. During a recent shoot for Colin Quinn’s Red State, Blue State, Kimmel opted to work with the Alexa LF cameras of Arri, complemented by their signature primes. Although this mix produces an image, using also the chance of more shallow depth of field aesthetics and also immersive, it’s an unusual approach for a stand-up show.

Regardless of this, Kimmel followed through with this approach, saying,”It might not be the typical way to take a live stand-up display, as you could generally lean toward the versatility of zooms and cameras that are cellular. Since we staged this at a theatre up, I didn’t want people who were seated on the point and five or six feet from Colin to be distractingly in focus. I felt that the content and style of what Colin do lent itself to staging it with him surrounded by the crowd and functioning much nearer to, and with a fixed and more observational camera mode. Owing to that, as well as the benefit of the shallower focus of the LF and prime lenses, I gave up the flexibility of zooms and moving cameras and, I must say, I’m quite pleased we went this way.” Learn more here.

Using this combination of cameras and lenses was not an easy endeavor. 2 collections of Signature Primes and five Alexa LF’s were sourced from ABLE Cameras in New York. “All these Signature primes were still entirely new and hard to get, so we needed to plan how to utilize five cameras and just two sets of lenses to get a live show. “I was really considerate of my placement of cameras along with choice of focal lengths because I didn’t need to be altering prime lenses in the middle of this show. Additionally, that I didn’t want to see different cameras and since we were shooting at 360 °, it made sense to maintain the profiles compact and the cameras fixed. Director Bobby Moresco was so delighted with the appearance, and the coverage I was able to offer him and everyone involved seems to adore the way the show was”

Employing the larger format lenses and cameras also facilitated certain aspects of post production,”I asked DIT Dave Satin to adjust the framework lines so I would have a framework within the sensor that enabled me a room over and under the image, so I could make slight alterations to the framing to smooth out the cuts in the edit. I am very sensitive to things like the gaps in the mind room or in which the eyes are in the frame Whenever you have five cameras shooting one individual. By having a little room to adjust – I could smooth out anything that I believed was jarring”.

He expects upcoming releases of new equipment to ease similar productions going ahead, as he states,”I have been to the demonstration of their ALEXA Mini LF and can’t wait for all those cameras to become available. Still, I have to mention this one all went well, thanks in no small part to Mike Nichols and AbelCine’s support. It was a lot to inquire on short notice, and I felt cared for”

Adam Kimmel was part of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences since 2007 and the American Society of Cinematographers since 2008. He’s shot getting two Independent Spirit nominations and a BAFTA shortlisting for cinematography. His filmography includes Bennett Miller’s Capote (5 Academy Award nominations including best film and the best actor win for Phillip Seymour Hoffman). He is also known for Lars and The Real Girl, Never Allow Me to Go, and Jesus’ Son, as well as a now untitled Bennett Miller project.

Those interested in learning more about Adam Kimmel can browse the content printed by Jax Media on their own blog. It contains the part of the interview, together with additional comments from members of this production. More information is available here: Adam Kimmel American Cinematographer.

This news release appeared here originally:

https://www.streetinsider.com/Press+Advantage/Director+Of+Photography+Adam+Kimmel+Explores+Innovation+In+Comedy+Shows/16405767.html

[buzznoow-blog]

9 Tips to Avoid Dating an Annoying Douchebag

Nobody likes up to now a prick! If you’ve had several geological dating slimeballs, the following pointers can assist you to steer away from unsavory companions.

The geological dating world appearance abundant completely different nowadays than it did a mere 5 to 10 years past. Now, technology rules all, and you'll simply notice an off-the-cuff hookup or fast very little fling with the assistance of some mobile app.

All you would like is one smartphone, one appealing image, and many fascinating data concerning yourself, and you'll meet new individuals in your native space with a similar wet interest as you.

While this can be all fine and dandy, having the ability to use the net therefore openly will introduce you to a few terribly questionable characters.

It’s only too straightforward for someone to fabricate a web persona that’s not a faithful United Nations agency they very area unit.

When you’ve got a while to execute your responses and opt for your words fastidiously, it’s a bit of cake to become additional romantic or fascinating to an interloper person.

Even if you happen to satisfy someone new while not the assistance of the net, there’s no sensible thanks to apprehend if they’re simply golf shot on associate act to induce your attention.

There’s nothing worse than giving a recent love interest an opportunity, merely to seek out out that they didn’t be it within the 1st place.

In several cases, you won’t be able to see their true colors until you’ve started defrayment longer with one another.

We’ve all got that one friend that seems to draw in solely the sleaziest guys all told the world… and maybe you’ve had trouble steering away from those sorts, too.

If you recognize what signs to appear for, you'll guide yourself right past all of the unhealthy apples before you’ve wasted any of your precious time and energy.

It might seem like an out of this world deed currently. however, you'll beat your approach through barrels of jerks to induce a pleasant guy that treats you with the respect you deserve.

Some sites like eHarmony have a compatibility check before connecting with a brand new person.

These types of compatibility checks facilitate various individuals to seek out their excellent match on eHarmony.

That’s why eHarmony is one in every of the most effective geological dating sites.

How can you recognize that guys' area unit sensible for you?

It’s concerning a while you pull on your Douchebag Detector helmet and begin job the shots!

Many dudes won’t be able to admit that they’ve got shortcomings once it involves geological dating. therefore you’ve needed to associate with your gut once caught in sticky circumstances.

The following tips ought to prove quite useful once you’re attempting to come to a decision if you ought to love him or leave such a man.

1. Don’t create a choice based mostly solely on appearance

Of course, we have a tendency to all dream of finding someone engaging up to now. however, appearance won’t enhance someone’s perspective or temperament.

Hooking the most popular guy within the club may look nice initially. however, sorting out he’s choked with himself later down the road is certain to be a bummer for you.

That isn’t to mention that each well-favored individual out there's a douchebag, however being well-favored will typically get to your head.

Any time you meet someone new, try and get to grasp them on an additional personal level.

See if you share many common interests. And pay special attention to the visual communication cues they supply.

Posture, Non-verbal cues, and eye contact area unit all signs of what he may be pondering whereas you get friendly.

If you’re not feeling the energy he’s supplying you with. it would not be the correct suit you.

Contrary to in style belief. It’s pretty straightforward to inform if someone is inquisitive about you right off the bat.

2. concentrate on however he treats others like his dearest friends and relations.

Does he get on well together with his family members?

Is he the sort of person who likes to tease the expense of alternative people?

Is he the sort that’s fast to do and embarrass someone else to create himself feel better?

There’s nothing wrong with a touch mocking mischief once it involves your best friends. however if your man ne'er needs to be the butt of the joke, that may be proof of a significant downside at play.

If he likes to push the limits–to a fault–with his buds, what causes you to assume he won’t do a similar with you?

One minute, you may be cracking up with one another. and therefore the next minute, he may be cutting you with malicious words.

There’s a particular distinction between having an honest time with one another and crossing the road and you would like to create certain the guy you’re with is aware of that.

3. create the boundaries clear from the Begining

You have to feel that you’re up to the speed of your body and your actions. Giving in to a man timely might reveal his coarse behavior before you’ve totally acknowledged what you ought to do.

If you would like to take care that he’s not simply attempting to induce in your pants, you ought to pump your brakes on any sexual developments.

Let things progress organically, and if he sticks around you, he may be price an effort.

Do your half to permit the thanks to his chasing. Hold off on texting him or job him all of the time, and see but onerous he's employed to induce your attention!

4. an honest attendee can go so much.

All ladies sort of a nice compliment on a daily basis, however, you would like this man to grasp that it takes quite that to catch your eye.

Get within the ability to drop hints concerning the types of dates or gifts you prefer.

If he doesn’t appear to select abreast of your signs, he may merely be a forgetful man, however, he may additionally not be anxious concerning you.

If he can’t appear to recollect important details from stories you’ve shared with in the past, otherwise you ne'er want you’re being detected once you’re with him, you shouldn’t waste your breath!

There’s no quantity of compliments that can compose for a scarcity of comprehension.

5. There’s “confident,” so there’s “cocky.”

Some assertive guy posts “selfies” on all his social media accounts day in and trip.

However, the assured guy shares solo snapshots each once in an exceedingly whereas.

The assertive guys will examine themselves within the mirror for uncanny amounts of your time before going out.

However, assured guys area unit additional inquisitive about rental their dates skills stunning they're.

There’s nothing wrong with being assured, however, being assertive may be tough.

Cocky guys tend to be disrespectful to others, and generally, they believe that they’re “better” than you.

If you sense that he’s additional into himself than anybody or the rest, it's in all probability the most effective plan to chop and run!

6. decide additional concerning his read of girls.

Even though he’s geological dating you immediately, it shouldn’t be onerous to seek out however he feels concerning ladies generally.

Is he keen on the ladies in his family? have you ever caught him job woman names? Is he all concerning maintaining “gender roles” or subscribing to the convention?

If you caught him to be insulting toward ladies, that’s positively a foul sign.

There’s one thing admirable a few guy United Nations agency will hold his tongue once he’s being attacked.

You wish to be with the sort of man United Nations agency values your distinctive opinions and uplifts your spirit.

7. Don’t ever settle!

So what if he’s tall, dark, and handsome, merely such as you like your guys? That can’t be all you’ve got to explode of.

Having an automobile and employment may be important, however, will he cause you to feel inside?

Are you able to communicate your thoughts and feelings freely, or do I feel silenced in his presence?

If you ever feel that you simply have to be compelled to hide some elements of yourself away for the “good” of your relationship, you’ve positively got a foul plan.

Don’t be with anybody that can’t fulfill you in each approach.

8. decide what makes him tick–early.

It’s perhaps untidy 1st date spoken language material, however, you ought to create it your mission to seek out out the maximum amount as you'll concerning him and pet peeves ahead of time.

Is he the sort of guy that’s fast to anger?

A man with a temper isn't terribly simply distracted from it, therefore you don’t need to induce attached someone hot-headed.

9. check that you’re on a similar page.

Before you get too deep, you ought to take care that he’s got similar intentions in your mind.

If your values area unit similar, it shouldn’t be as onerous to maneuver into an additional important relationship, however, confine mind that it’s not your job to coach him on the way to be a good lover.

If he’s not equipped with core tools, you don’t have to be compelled to create him “better” if you don’t want to!

When you’re out on the prowl, these winning tips ought to assist you to decide the good guys from the douches!

As long as you discover a man that may be each honest and type, you ought to be able to go away feeling happy and content in your relationship

[supplierproduction45896]

SupplierProduction

The production management should guarantee the successful implementation of the company’s production strategy which involves the application of certain technologies and achievements of pre-set goals related to production combinations, unit costs, quality and production ability. It generally coordinates, supervises and controls persons or groups in command of manufacturing itself, machinery maintenance, quality management and stock control.This function also needs to be responsible for regular improvement of production activities with the intent of making them more effective. In some cases, manufacturing management could be liable for Production management innovation.Craigslist is a little business that manufactures plastic pieces used in home appliances. The general manager recently hired a young practitioner to occupy the manufacturing manager position. Four sections which are named maintenance, quality, process and planning report to the production department. When describing his project description, the general manager was very clear about certain goals to be met at the end of their first year.The manufacturing manager must organize labor, material and technological resources in the most efficient way with the goal of decreasing production expenses. Criteria must be maintained. In addition, he must guarantee inventory levels of approximately three weeks of sales. Additionally, he’s in charge of designing a project. The new production manager is convinced he can attain those goals by implementing certain strategies like lean manufacturing.

Manufacturing management helps the company organization to attain all its aims. It produces product that meet the customer’s wants and needs. So, the company can increase its sales. This can facilitate it to reach its objectives. Manufacturing management enables the firm to meet its customers. This will raise image, goodwill and the firm’s name. An image that is honest helps the company grow and to expand. Manufacturing management enables the firm to face competition within the marketplace. This may be as a consequence of manufacturing management Production management product of proper level, proper quality, and appropriate value and at the proper time. These goods are sent to the buyers in accordance with their necessities. Production management facilitates optimum utilization of tools like workforce, machines etc. therefore the company will satisfy its capability utilization objective. This may bring greater returns to the organization. Manufacturing management supports different helpful areas in a corporation, like selling, finance and personnel. The marketing department may notice it more easy to market product and the finance department can find a lot of money in earnings as a result of increase. It get a lot of loans and share funds for improvement and modernization. The staff office are going to be ready to control the human resources because of their higher performance of the production department.

[riverofhistory]

Episode 9: Homo sapiens

Image credit: Saioa López, Lucy van Dorp and Garrett Hellenthal, under CC BY 3.0.

The following is the transcript for the ninth episode of On the River of History.

For the link to the actual podcast, go here. (Beginning with Part 1)

Part 1

Greetings everyone and welcome to episode 9 of On the River of History. I’m your host, Joan Turmelle, historian in residence.

Our closest relatives, the Neanderthals and Denisovans, branched off from the human lineage between 765,000 to 550,000 years ago, and we followed their story in the previous episode. Now, we turn back the clock to the time when our species evolved. Out of the jumbled mass of fossils that was traditionally called ‘Homo heidelbergensis’ emerges a few African fossils dating from 700,000 years ago. Analysis of their skeletal features and place of origin have prompted some researchers to place these fossils on the lineage leading to Homo sapiens, and sect of those researchers have even given them their own name Homo rhodesiensis, but not everyone agrees. In any case, we can be confident that Homo sapiens evolved in Africa, it’s just a question of when, where, and how.

Before we dive into this story, I need to clarify some terms that you’ll hear me use throughout this episode and others. Quite often, when you read about the evolution of Homo sapiens, you’ll see the word ‘population’ used as a term referring to distinct groups of humans who share a common ancestry. It can be implied that populations are static categories with a set of character traits that can be readily distinguished, but in reality the situation here is very complex. As I discussed in the earliest episodes, organisms change at the level of populations, but when there is a new mutation, it begins at the individual level and may or may not spread out across the rest of the population through reproduction. So, these mutations can act as markers that separate different populations, and it is these markers that geneticists use to label groups of peoples and track their movements across geographic locations. But as science writer Steve Olson has said “individual mutations are like drops of water falling on the surface of a pond. The waves from each drop spread out in concentric circles, mixing and blending with the waves from other drops.” Human populations almost never stay separated for long, and at some point when people move between two groups, they mate and produce offspring and share multiple mutations amongst each other. You can look at the different mutations between peoples and see where these markers went over time, but it must be kept in mind that these mutations do not say that the group of people housing them is distinct from all the others. Their ancestors have a long history of shared mutations between them. So when I use ‘population’ (as well as anything about ‘mixture’), try not to picture a separate and distinct group of people but rather the fluid carriers of certain mutations that can freely interact with others.

The other big word concerned is ‘migration’. It may not be too difficult to understand what a migration is, but once you start unpacking the word, you’ll find a lot more to consider than you thought you ever could. For example, while archaeological (as well as genetic) evidence can pinpoint possible routes of movement for ancient peoples, there comes a certain point when the amount of information gleaned ends. A genetic study or the first known remains on a given plot of land can only tell you so much – when humans ended up there, where they may have started their movements, and, if the archaeological evidence is good, what sort of society and culture they had. But you’d be hard-pressed to find anything about motives or the activities that were occurring or whether the proposed migration was fully planned out or not. There may have been environmental factors involved in the movement of peoples, or perhaps cultural squabbles, or there is a possibility of simple curiosity. Maybe there wasn’t even a migration at all but an expansion of population, where only some people left while others stayed put. We can really never know these things with 100% certainty, and any suggestions are, at best, informed speculation. I’m going to be talking about migrations a lot during this and many other episodes, and I’ll do the best I can to inform you all on what is speculation, as well as present what sorts of evidence we have for these movements. But for now, just keep in mind that when I say ‘migration’ that doesn’t imply that it was a motivated and planned movement from one region of the world to another where all the members of a community were involved.

Moving on to our story. The oldest fossils we have for Homo sapiens are the 315,000 year old remains from the site of Jebel Irhoud in Morocco. They resemble other, younger fossils found in places like the Omo Kibish site in Ethiopia and the site of Florisbad in South Africa. These early Homo sapiens remains seem to blend in very well with the earlier fossils that are sometimes classified as Homo rhodesiensis, and this is not surprising given that transitional forms are a universal feature of any organism’s evolutionary history. In particular, the oldest Homo sapiens consists of ancestral (or older) traits like large brow-ridges and robust skulls and skeletons, and derived (or newer) traits like a flattened face, larger forebrain (and thus higher forehead), and, for the first time ever, an actual projecting chin. It is the latter traits that distinguish Homo sapiens from all the other human species sharing the world with them (all 6 to 8 of them). Genetic evidence can give us some good additional information for the origin of our species, starting with the answer to this question: when did the common ancestor of all living humans originate? By comparing the total genomic data, as well as the maternal and paternal haplogroups (those being the continuous lines down the ancestry of people on their mothers’ and fathers’ sides, respectively), it seems that the first Homo sapiens populations to leave living descendants lived in Africa sometime between 350,000 and 260,000 years ago. Of course, with that in mind, there would have been other Homo sapiens groups that lived in Africa whose family lines just died out.

So just where in Africa did the first members of our species originate? One possible answer may turn out to be a bit surprising to some of you. It had been previously argued that Homo sapiens evolved in one particular location (usually placed in East Africa) and then dispersed across the continent, displacing other Homo species. Earlier still was the idea that different groups of Homo sapiens evolved in different parts of the world from localized populations of Homo erectus or another, related species and that these interbred with each other to produce our species. These hypotheses have been termed the ‘Single-Origin’ and ‘Multiregionalism’ models, respectively. In recent years, these ideas have come into serious question, and for some researchers the evidence seemed to indicate that a sort of compromise of the two models had occurred. This is known as ‘African Multiregionalism’ and the hypothesis states that Homo sapiens emerged from multiple, mixing populations of Homo species that were spread out across the continent. In time, the characteristic traits of these different groups would spread across the general population, like a braided river, to form the species we recognize ourselves as today. This idea is very probable, for we know that early Homo sapiens was sharing genes with other species in places like West Africa, and it accounts for the wide range of features found on so many of the oldest fossils. Time will tell whether African Multiregionalism is better supported or supplanted with another model.

No matter how they evolved, Homo sapiens had a definitive presence throughout the African continent by around 200,000 years ago. By that time, the older Acheulean stone toolkit was more-or-less abandoned in favor of a new collection of stone and bone technologies that varied widely across Africa, which marks the beginning of the Middle Stone Age on the continent (thus distinguishing it from the Early Stone Age that was dominated by non-Homo sapiens humans). For convenience, I’m going to borrow a term that Clive Finlayson used for his 2009 book The Humans Who Went Extinct to refer to the earliest members of our species, Ancestors.

Ancestors were remarkable survivors and their ability to live in such different environments throughout Africa, from rainforest to grassland to desert, was facilitated by their practice of being generalist specialists. This is a relatively new term that denotes species that can maintain a functional existence in disparate ecosystems and thus adapt their diet to specific preferences, and this can be changed at will depending on the circumstances. This moldable change in resource procurement is reflected in the diversity of technologies during the Middle Stone Age. For example, in the central African rainforests emerged the Lupemban toolkit, which included chisels and adzes for cutting and carving wood and flaked points that may have been attached to spears. In the northwest region of Africa, where the Atlas mountains dominate, was the Aterian toolkit. Some of the Aterian tools are actually trimmed into arrow-shaped points with a thin shaft at their base, seemingly for greater ease of connection to spears, and this was a remarkable change from all the stone tools that came before. Microliths – small stone tools – show up around 65,000 years ago, allowing for the quicker production of points without the need for constant repairs. And there emerged a brand new weapon: the bow-and-arrow. This technology seems to have originated in Africa, and the oldest evidence comes from the Sibudu Cave site in South Africa, dating to around 61,700 years ago. In this instance, the arrow points were made of bone that was whittled down to the desired shape. As to what the bow was made of, we can’t say, but forager societies in Africa today construct their bows out of wood and use sinew from kills to make the string, so it is possible that this is what was occurring. Stone arrowheads may have been constructed during this time, or much later, again, it’s hard to say.  

We have plenty of archaeological sites as well that demonstrate the versatility of Africa’s Ancestors. The remains found in the caves by the Klasies River in South Africa show that Ancestors collected seashells and fished for their meals from the shores. From an early age, Ancestors seem to have been attracted to the resources of the oceans, and indeed it is by the seashores where the food is generally plentiful. Stacks of shells and other remains are often found in middens (preserved trash heaps), and the size of these piles tells us that any people who lived there were pretty secure. Big game wasn’t out of the question, however, and farther to the north in Herto, Ethiopia is a site where people hunted hippopotamus, presumably ambushing them from river banks or watering holes (granted, a hippo is a dangerous animal, so the chances of them simply scavenging their remains is just as likely). As in the Neanderthals, Ancestors were decorating themselves with jewelry and exploring their aesthetic senses. At the site of Blombos Cave in South Africa is evidence of an elongated ochre stone that was etched with a pattern of simple lines, similar to the Java shell of Homo erectus discussed in the last episode. The patterns here are more prominent, and there is much debate on just what the engravings represent. Even more curious is a pointed stone fragment that sports a series of cross-hatched ochre markings all long its side, as if they were drawn on there by an Ancestor.

We know that all living humans share a common ancestor going back 350,000 years ago, but is it possible to trace any of these earliest family lines to populations of people on the African continent today? The best DNA evidence we have from both living humans and ancient remains shows us that the ancestral lines of many African peoples go back quite a long way. In Central Africa, populations of Ancestors established themselves in the tropical rainforests around 135,000 years ago. These peoples developed a unique adaptation to a lack of iodine in their diet; interestingly, iodine is commonly found in seafood, which would not be present near these forests. This lack of iodine would have stopped major growth hormones from being generated and overtime these Ancestors became significantly shorter in height, averaging under 5 feet. These were some of the direct ancestors of the living Mbuti, Mbenga, and Twa peoples who live in the present-day Congo region, with a population of around 200,000. Further to the east and south emerged other peoples. Recent DNA studies suggest that the populations of Khoisan-speaking peoples (that is, click-languages) had a much wider distribution than their current range in southern Africa. Their primary maternal haplogroup, named L0, has been dated back almost 200,000 years, and has been traced as far north as Tanzania. Archaeological remains seem to confirm this larger range, with characteristic technologies of Khoisan-speakers today (like the San of the Kalahari desert) being found at many sites. There have even been instances where San individuals recognized recovered tools and could describe how they were used. There is also genetic evidence that other African peoples, including the ancestors of the Hadza and Sandawe, had much larger ranges across eastern Africa too: today these forager peoples live in scattered pockets of Tanzania. It must be born in mind that, again, these populations were not static and disparate groups, for the genetic evidence also shows that they regularly mixed with each other in the deep past, as well as in historical times.  

Part 2

Most popular world histories contain the phrase “Out of Africa” and almost everyone who reads it is treated to an account like this: after evolving in Africa and staying there for hundreds of thousands of years, a single family of people left their homeland and crossed into Southwest Asia. These intrepid explorers were the first of their kind outside the continent, and everyone else on Earth today is descended from this one group. These peoples kickstarted a cultural revolution that laid the seeds for the development of agriculture and civilization. Okay, clearly we know that this narrative is wrong. As we’ve just seen, Ancestors have lived in Africa since their evolution 350,000 years ago, but they were already undergoing changes in aesthetic sense and other aspects of culture. There wasn’t a need to move elsewhere to find that. And, on a technical level, that story was wrong because we’re now realizing that Southwest Asia may have been populated by Ancestors for a lot longer than we thought.

Currently, the earliest known evidence of Ancestors outside of the African continent is found in the Levant, the western coastal region in Southwest Asia that today encompasses Syria, Jordan, Israel, and other neighboring countries. At the Misliya cave site at Mount Carmel, Israel were unearthed the remains of an upper jawbone (or maxilla) and several stone tools that was dated to be between 194,000 and 177,000 years old. Nearby at the Es-Skhul and Qafzeh cave sites were unearthed more complete remains, including entire skeletons, this time dated from 110,000 to 90,000 years ago. Further to the south, in the site of Jebel Faya in the present-day United Arab Emirates, was found a series of stone tools at Assemblage C (one of the oldest layers uncovered). What is striking about these tools is not only their date – roughly 125,000 years old – but their uncanny resemblance to the Nubian Complex, a stone toolkit from directly across the Red Sea, in the lands of northeastern Africa. This similarity has prompted some researchers to (albeit controversially) tie the two toolkits together as evidence that the peoples who made the Assemblage C tools are directly related to the people who created the Nubian Complex. There is a notable human presence in Arabia by 85,000 years ago, as evidenced by bones and stone tools. All of these skeletal remains and toolkits suggest that parts of Southwest Asia were intertwined with Africa and that Ancestors inhabited that region for nearly as long as they’ve been on their ancestral continent. The environmental evidence tells us that the Levant and Arabia often fluctuated between dry-desert and warm-wetland around 220,000, 200-194,000, 180-170,000, 130,000, and 80,000 years ago. The conditions created ‘corridors’ that were stable enough to allow Ancestors to enter and inhabit the region and make use of the abundant plant and animal resources that had to have been present in those places.  

There is some possible genetic evidence to support the presence of Ancestors in Southwest Asia from an early age: the maternal haplogroup L3 is understood to be one of the common ancestral lines to which all non-African populations descend from, and its highest occurrence is in northern Africa and Southwest Asia. Similarly, paternal haplogroup CF has a strong Asian presence and encompasses the common ancestry of most male-lines outside Africa. There is even a detected population of Ancestors, dubbed ‘Basal Eurasians’ whose origin predates the founding lineages of all living peoples in Eurasia today. There is very good evidence of an early entry of Ancestors into Southwest Asia, almost 200,000 years ago, but it should be clarified that humans were not simply leaving Africa, they were often returning there too. Some of the maternal lines of haplogroup L3 re-entered Africa sometime around 70,000 years ago, so it seems that Ancestors moved back-and-forth through northeast Africa and Southwest Asia, perhaps constantly.  

When Ancestors entered Southwest Asia, they encountered other humans living there: the Neanderthals. If you have an interest in genetics, you may already be aware that Homo sapiens and Homo neanderthalensis interbred in the distant past. Every human alive today that is not of immediate African ancestry contains some Neanderthal DNA in their genome, with that number ranging 1.5-2.1%. From the studies that have been done, there doesn’t appear to be any traces of Neanderthal DNA in African populations (or, more specifically, in African populations that did not originate outside the continent). That tells us that these interbreeding events occurred after Ancestors began to spread outside Africa into Southwest Asia, and we’ve been able to specify the regions where these occurrences took place. Most interactions between Neanderthals and Ancestors seem to have happened in or near the Levant, where there were periods of co-existence between the two species, starting 65,000 years ago and lasting until at least 47,000 years ago. There is no hint of any Neanderthal mitochondrial DNA in Homo sapiens present in the genetic studies we do have. It seems that only when male Neanderthals mated with female Ancestors were viable offspring born, while mixings between female Neanderthals and male Ancestors didn’t leave anything that survived. There is even talk among paleoanthropologists and geneticists about what sorts of traits these Neanderthal-Ancestor hybrids inherited, with evidence suggesting contributions to physiology, changes in the immune system, and even an increased risk of certain illnesses. We can only speculate as to what these hybridizations meant to the people who practiced it: was it romance, sexual assault, experimentation? Who knows? Whatever it was, it left a notable impression in the Ancestors who ventured deep into Eurasia.

Just what drove Ancestors to expand their ranges further away from Southwest Asia? For starters, it has become increasingly clear that Homo sapiens populations made multiple movements away from Africa, with archaeological and genetic evidence suggesting that these earlier groups made it to East Asia by 120,000 to 80,000 years ago. There is a large series of teeth that was found in Daoxian County (in Hunan, China) that bears the key characteristics attributable of Homo sapiens. The limited scope of these early remains has proved difficult to analyze, and there has been much debate about them, but the best evidence we have tells us that there was a seemingly large expansion of Ancestor groups out of Africa and into much of the Eurasian continent around 120,000 years ago, and that these peoples predated the direct ancestors of living Asian populations. They left barely any trace in the DNA of humans today, save for some faint traces among the Papuan peoples of New Guinea (roughly 2% of their genomes), and that tells us that this expansion event went largely extinct prior to or at least as more Ancestor groups moved onto the continent, with these populations lasting until 15,000 years ago.

What may have driven these peoples towards extinction? Geologic evidence tells us that a massive volcanic eruption took place on present-day Lake Toba on the island of Sumatra, Indonesia. Around 75,000 years ago, the Toba volcano exploded and sent over 18 and a half miles of ash into the air, which would have blanketed vast regions of southern Asia and reached as far as Arabia, China, and southern Africa. In fact, the eruption is thought to have produced Lake Toba itself. This was one of the largest volcanic eruptions that ever occurred during the history of our species and its effect on Homo sapiens populations has been debated with great ferocity. In essence, it is controversial to establish any links between the eruption and the livelihoods of the people living at the time, but there is curious evidence that provides good arguments for at least some connection. Genetic evidence tells of population bottlenecks occurring after that time; events which lowered the population numbers of many large mammals, including Homo sapiens. Archaeological evidence indicates that some of these peoples did survive the impact winter that must have followed the Toba eruption, with one site in South Africa showing a continuity between tool types, but without any hint of just how they were effected. Some authors, like Peter Watson, have even speculated that the prevalence of “Heaven-and-Earth myths” (that is, creation stories that tell of a separation between the Earth and sky, followed by the later appearance of the Sun and Moon) may be a deep cultural memory of the Toba Impact Winter, where the cold ash and snow created a darkened period of time after which sunlight returned to the world. Regardless of the controversy, the Toba eruption would have been a remarkable event, and the correlation between the replacement of the old Homo sapiens groups with newer Ancestor lines and the volcanic eruption shouldn’t be thrown away too lightly.

Climatological evidence gives us some clues as to what may have facilitated this earlier dispersal across Eurasia, as well as the primary founding one for all living Eurasian groups that occurred between 70,000 and 60,000 years ago. As previously stated, we recognize that the environment of Africa and Southwest Asia went through periods of warm and wet conditions that would have made traveling for Ancestors a little easier, easy enough to make it as far as present-day China. For the latter expansion, Africa was experiencing increasingly cooler and drier changes, where the lush corridors that sustained earlier Ancestors were nearly gone. It has been speculated that these harsh conditions for people living in the border between northeast Africa and Southwest Asia may have prompted some of these groups to look for greener-pastures, but we have no way of knowing for sure. All we can be sure of is this: once Ancestors started migrating out of Southwest Asia, they began to leave a strong and definitive mark on the lands of Eurasia and beyond.  

These individuals would have been well equipped for the journeys, because some curious evidence tells us that proper clothing was developed roughly 72,000 years ago (plus or minus 42,000 years). By looking at the DNA of two closely related species of human lice – head lice and body lice – geneticists have been able to show that the two split from a common ancestor during that time. Because head lice can only survive among human hair, and body lice are adapted to the fabric of clothing, the survival to the two species rests on the occurrence of outer garments. Of related interest was that this particular study found that the diversity of lice in Africa was greater than that elsewhere in the world, pointing to clothing being a development prior to the spread of people away from the continent. What about archaeological evidence? Can it help lower the estimated range of dates to something more secure? As far as the best remains tell us, the oldest tools associated with clothing manufacture (bone awls from South Africa) are roughly 76,000 years old. It’s only later, when people began to reach the northern hemisphere, that bone needles become more prominent, with the oldest of these tools dated to 45,000 years ago.

Part 3

The sequencing of human genomes takes the first routes out of Africa through southern Asia, from India to Southeast Asia, with its islands still collected together in the landmass of Sunda due to the drop in sea levels. Save for some controversial remains of stone tools in sites like Jwalapuram in southern India and Batadombalena in Sri Lanka, the archaeological record of early humans in India is practically nonexistent. The situation is a little bit better in Sunda, with the oldest remains from Callao Cave in the Philippines dated tentatively to 67,000 years old. It has been proposed by some researchers that Ancestors primarily followed the coastlines as they moved through southern Asia, where they would have found abundant resources in the form of seafood like shellfish, and that these sites would have been lost by the rise in sea levels following the retreat of the glaciers. Anthropologist Alexander Harcourt posits a scenario where Ancestors, traveling at the average forager rate of seven moves a year/13 miles per move, would take less than 200 years to reach Australia from Africa, all along a rich coast. That alone suggests that these population expansions were relatively easy trips to make, but there are some faults with this logic. For starters, a coastal route doesn’t consider the possibilities that inland regions were just as plentiful in resources as the coast, especially if they were river- or lakeside places. And, again, we cannot know for sure the reasons (if any) that Ancestors had for moving to the places they did. We cannot account for the time is takes for any one people to become accustomed to a new environment and what it can provide.

Looking at the genetic evidence, we can take some clues as to where Ancestors went and settled in southern Asia. There are many demographics throughout the Indian subcontinent and Southeast Asia, and several of these have very limited ranges today. They include the Veddas of Sri Lanka, the Semang of Malaysia, the Aeta of the Philippines, and the indigenous peoples of the Andaman islands. Historically, many of these peoples have been lumped under the now pejorative name ‘negrito’, which derived from the Spanish colonists of the Philippines during the 1500s who made note of the small, dark-skinned peoples who lived there. DNA studies indicate that these peoples have had a long-established presence in their lands, before many other ethnic groups settled there, and there are traces of their tool technology in the archaeological record. Known as the Hoabinhian toolkit, the earliest available traces are roughly 44,000 years old and are directly related to these present-day indigenous forager groups. Having stemmed from a common ancestral line, these Ancestors spread out across southern Asia and were effectively some of the first Homo sapiens to settle in Asia and leave a lasting presence there.

Some of these Sunda groups managed to perform one of the first long-distance sea voyages, which culminated in the peopling of Sahul, present-day Australia, Tasmania, and New Guinea. It has become apparent that these regions have been home to indigenous or aboriginal groups for a very long time, but the question has always been, how long? The most recent genetic and archaeological evidence informs us of a presence of Ancestors on this continent for at least 65,000 years. Since Sahul and Sunda were separated by a tract of deep-sea that stretched over 2,000 miles, with no land bridges in sight, the first settlers of Sahul had to have made the journey over water and at least by island-hopping. Ethnographic studies reveal a tradition of aboriginal Australians using watercraft, so this idea has a lot of merit; the only issue regards the lack of physical evidence for boats over 65,000 years old. In any case, researchers have mapped out possible routes these peoples may have taken, with the most likely being through the northern islands separating Sunda from Sahul (launching off from present-day Borneo, to Sulawesi, Taliabu, Halmahera, and landing at Misool Island off the coast of New Guinea). Having landed there, genetic evidence shows a movement across New Guinea and into the north of Australia. Good archaeological evidence becomes evident by 46,000 years ago, and it is clear that the whole of Sahul was fully populated by 40,000 years ago. For many thousands of years, Sahul remained an intact landmass, and it was only following the beginning of the rise in sea levels around 37,000 years ago that the peoples of New Guinea and Australia began to separate from each other into distinct societies, with all living aboriginal Australians sharing a common ancestor around 32,000 years ago.  

Moving back into Asia, we see Ancestors settling East Asia definitively by 50,000 years ago. One of the best remains we have of early peoples in this part of the world stems from the Tianyuan Man, found at the cave site of the same name near Beijing, China. By looking at this 40,000 year old individual’s genetic makeup, researchers understood that his people belonged to the earliest populations of settlers in East Asia, predating the development of the different ethnicities that live there today. It appears that the first Ancestors to settle East Asia had originated from a northward movement from southern Asia, from the same populations that founded the indigenous peoples of India, Sunda, and Sahul.

From there, groups of Ancestors settled in different regions, including the Japanese archipelago. Records of Homo sapiens begin around 32,000 years ago, near the very southern islands like present-day Okinawa, suggesting that the primary settlement of Japan began from there, and there is some genetic evidence from Y-chromosomal DNA that corroborates that result. This is curious, because there is also genetic evidence that points to a peopling of Japan from the north of the archipelago, where there are established links between the one of the earliest cultures of Japan, the Jōmon, and the indigenous peoples of southern Siberia, like the Udegey and Ulchi. This raises the possibility of multiple movements into Japan, which is not an unlikely scenario. During the Ice Ages, Japan was not yet an archipelago, but a fringe of land connected to East Asia, with easily accessible routes in the northernmost and southernmost extremes. Other groups of peoples moved into the Tibetan plateau around 40-30,000 years ago, adapting to the extreme temperatures and altitudes of the Himalayan region from very early on (these earliest remains, stone tools, are located over 15,000 feet above sea level).  

There is clear genetic evidence of interbreeding between Ancestors and Denisovans and that this occurred as these first peoples began to settle throughout Asia and Sahul. We have only found archaeological remains of Denisovans in Siberia, so to see their traces among peoples as far as New Guinea and Australia (where, incidentally, their signature is highest) is fascinating. This reveals that the population range for these extinct humans had to have been much greater than we thought, perhaps extending deep into Sunda. Analysis of genetic data points to multiple groups of Denisovans throughout Asia, with multiple interbreeding events, including one between a southeast Asian group and the ancestors of the Papuan and aboriginal Australian peoples, and another, much earlier, one prior to the full peopling of the Asian continent. Much like the Neanderthals, we have no context for these intermixing events, and the lack of good archaeological evidence only worsens the picture. The youngest remains of Denisovans date to 28,000 years ago, but we have no idea just when they died out. I believe, in due time, there will be more evidence found for the Denisovan presence in Asia, and these early, tentative genetic studies are at least giving us some good clues.

The settlement of Europe is a much more well-known field of study. For starters, the Ancestors who led these movements seem to have originated from a separate lineage from the one that peopled Sahul and most of southern and eastern Asia. There is a recognizable similarity between the Emiran & Ahmarian toolkits of the Levant and the earliest European toolkits like the Bohunician and the Aurignacian. Genetics adds further weight to these comparisons, and so it seems that Europe was primarily settled by peoples from Southwest Asia. Of related note is a curious genetic signature found among a Neanderthal group in Europe that points to an earlier settlement by Ancestors before 219,000 years ago – further evidence of older movements outside of Africa. So far, the earliest definitive presence of Ancestors in Europe dates back 45,000 years in the very southeastern edge of the subcontinent, and they appear to have at least made it all the way to the Iberian peninsula 40,000 years ago. Given the presence of the massive glaciers in Europe during these times, Ancestors do not appear to have ventured too far north at first, instead sticking near the warmer regions of the south, even near the Danube and Rhône rivers.

Neanderthals had a very sparse presence in Europe during the Ice Ages, with recent evidence pointing to low population numbers. They began to die out at around the same time as the first Homo sapiens were reaching and settling throughout southern Europe, and there was a brief period of around 6,000 years where the two species coexisted on the subcontinent. There is a steady decline in numbers throughout this time, with one of the last Neanderthal holdouts being located in the caves of Gibraltar, near southern Spain, where these peoples hunted ibex and caught tortoises. By 37,000 years ago, the last Neanderthals were extinct. Both of these humans were capable foragers and able to survive on whatever available resources there were, so what happened? I’ll say right off the bat that the suggestions of a mass-genocide by Homo sapiens remain heavily contested, and there is a strong lack of evidence for such conflicts. That the Neanderthals did not make proper clothing to survive the increasingly cooler times may be an important factor, but it must be remembered that Neanderthals lived throughout Southwest and Northern Asia as well, in a range of climates, so this is only a partial possibility. One of the most recent ideas, based on our understanding of Neanderthal-Ancestor hybridization, is that our species simply absorbed much of the Neanderthal population through frequent mating. This would have faded away aspects of Neanderthal culture while also leaving relic, low-diversity populations that died on their own. This is coupled with new studies that have examined the ecological footprint of the first Homo sapiens in places like Europe, showing that our Ice Age Ancestors had a greater impact on the environment than the Neanderthals and that this may have contributed to their demise. On top of that, there is geologic evidence that a massive volcanic eruption occurred in Italy around 39,000 years ago, which deposited almost 72 cubic miles of ash all over Europe. We do not find very many remains of Neanderthals (or Ancestors for that matter) after the eruption, so this may have exacerbated things. Whatever the case, we cannot forget that Neanderthal DNA lives on within most of the human population today. Given the vast range that people of recent non-African ancestry occupy today, there can be no doubt that more Neanderthal DNA survives right now than there has probably ever been throughout the hundreds of thousands of years that the Neanderthal species had existed.

Part 4

Related to the earliest Europeans was another movement of people who expanded into the cooler regions of the northern hemisphere, Siberia. Even with tailored clothing, this part of the world must have been a doozy to settle. The great glaciers extended far into the Asian continent and the general environment was very dry, with patches of hardy moss and lichen, but there were at least areas of refugia where the soil supported whole communities of wildflowers, grasses, fungi, and mammals large and small. People certainly made use of the resources here, because by 50-32,000 years ago there are signs of occupation in the archaeological record. Genetic studies of ancient and living peoples points to a particular population that inhabited Siberia that today no longer exists as an ethnicity. These were dubbed the Ancestral North Eurasians, and while they were not the only people who settled here (nor were they the ancestors of Siberian groups today), they played a major part in the development of later Ancestors on opposite sides of their range. In fact, among living people today, over 50% of them contain DNA from Ancestral North Eurasians in significant amounts.

Ancestors had moved towards the extreme northeast of Siberia by 28,000 years ago, and something very fascinating (and perhaps, all too human) seems to have occurred. Remember that there were two primary movements of Ancestors away from Southwest Asia: one took a southern route and populated India, Southeast Asia, East Asia, and Sahul, while another moved into Europe and Siberia. At some point around 26,000 years ago, peoples from both these expansions entered the vast land of Beringia. This area, popularly called a land-bridge even though it was comparable in size to mainland Europe, consisted of northeast Siberia and western Alaska and the lands exposed between them due to the drop in sea levels. For reasons we cannot know for certain, some factors caused these groups of Ancestors to become isolated in Beringia for a brief period of around 4,000 years, peoples who seem to have been hunters of large mammals like caribou, bison, and mammoth and settled in small residential camps for part of the year. Over time, the family lineages of these peoples became intermixed and they gave rise to brand new genetic signatures. Thus, between 24,000 and 18,000 years ago, the ancestors of the Amerindians or Native Americans had arisen.

The settlement of the Americas is often a popular topic in archaeological circles, and had been plagued for many years by a lack of good evidence, both in genes and in the rocks. Nowadays, we have much more findings than we ever thought possible, and this story can be told with reasonable accuracy. For starters, we can be confident that Amerindian ancestors entered the landmass from Beringia. One famous hypothesis argued that indigenous Americans had originated from northwest Europe – this is the so-called Solutrean hypothesis – named after a connection that was posited between early American stone toolkits and those found in Europe called Solutrean. This comparison was, honestly, flimsy and the genetic evidence that was found in support of this model turned out to derive from the ancient connection to the Ancestral North Eurasians, who also gave rise to many groups in Europe. So, no, Amerindians did not originate from Europe. Nor did they seem to come from the Pacific or Australia: the trace of strange genetic markers in some South American populations shows a connection to living peoples in those places. However, it seems that this may be an artifact of the Beringian standstill, as some of the peoples from the southern Asian population expansion (including those that first populated Sahul) belonged to those groups that became isolated in the north. So, in essence, the Beringian ancestors of the Amerindians were made up of a number of different genotypes from various places that became expressed in different ways as Ancestors moved into the Americas.

Just how they got there was another struggle to find out. It was assumed from the very beginning that Amerindians simply walked from Beringia to the mainland Americas, by-passing the vast glaciers that covered the northern reaches through a narrow sliver of exposed land between them. But there were issued with timing as well. All of the best geologic evidence we have tells us that this narrow ice-free corridor between the glaciers opened up around 15,700 years ago, but it was only until 12,600 years ago that the region was feasible enough for plant and animal life to colonize it. Given that this corridor stretched over 950 miles long, it seems unlikely that Amerindians used it as a route until that time. Even if they did move across it (at it seems that they did), these peoples would not have been the founders of the continents. A swath of different sites around the Americas points to much earlier settlements than 15,000 years ago. The most notorious is the site of Monte Verde in Chile, which was recently re-dated by better methods. This area appears to have been first occupied as early as 18,500 years ago. This is remarkable on two fronts: 1) it demonstrates a very rapid pace that Amerindians took from Beringia, having been able to settle as far south like this, and 2) at 18,500 years ago, Monte Verde was bordered by enormous glaciers that would have made the conditions very difficult for anyone living there. Maybe difficult for us, but we have to remember that their ancestors in Beringia lived in similar environments and would have been well-seasoned to a place like this.

A more recent hypothesis for the movement of peoples out of Beringia was by a Pacific coastal route. In essence, groups of Amerindians would have to have boated away from Alaska and island hopped down the western coasts of North and South America, where they could have entered those continents from the west. It seems that this sliver of coastline was rich in kelp forests for most of the way, allowing these Ancestors access to rich seafood. Several of the earliest sites in the Americas are along the western regions of North and South America, so there is some credence to this hypothesis. Without a way through the ice-sheets, this seems to have been the only possible route to take. Not to mention that there is tentative evidence of even earlier occupations here, with the sites of Toca da Tira Pela & Pedra Furada in Brazil showing evidence of settlement as early as 22-20,000 years ago. The first Amerindians, clearly, were fast travelers and tough survivors, like all of our ancestors. At present, there is no definitive consensus as to what routes brought peoples into the continents, but in all likelihood Amerindians entered the Americas multiple times along multiple routes. There isn’t a clear archaeological presence of humans in the Americas until 14,000 years ago, with several sites all along North America, Mesoamerica, and South America. Thus, by 14,000 years ago, Homo sapiens could be found on all of the major continents, with only a barely distinguishable few of the earlier human species left to share the world with them.

Before I continue my history of the world, I want to bring up an important subject that is directly relevant to everything I’ve talked about here, and that is the topic of race. You might be under the impression that the different races of humanity evolved during this time of population expansions and isolations across the continents, but a more thorough examination of the physiological and genetic evidence we have tells a different story.

The practice of grouping living populations of humans into racial categories truly began during the 1700s in Enlightenment Era Europe. The word ‘race’ derives from botany to describe different breeds of plants under the same species. When applied to humans, naturalists were factoring in geographic factors as well as surface features to develop their classification systems. At the time, Europeans had already settled in large parts of the Americas and Asia, and had been in contact with a whole host of different peoples who didn’t look or act like them, and this was a curious thing indeed. Another social factor concerned the decline in religious thinking during the Enlightenment, which meant that the monogenesis model of human origins (that all people today descent from a single couple, Adam and Eve, as described in the book of Genesis) was being rejected in favor of other polygenesis models, where different peoples derive from different ancestors. Now combine this with some of the philosophical and moral attitudes of the time, where Europeans were gradually viewing themselves as superior peoples on the world-stage, and you begin to see some of the first racial classification systems. People were being grouped based upon how they looked and behaved, and a key point was always made to emphasize people of European descent as the top of an imagined hierarchy, with Africans and other dark-skinned peoples usually occupying the lowest rings. One of the most iconic of these racialists was the German researcher Johann Blumenbach, who grouped the world’s peoples into five categories, based on where they were found in the world and what physical traits they possessed. For example, he uses the word ‘Caucasian’ here, derived from an older work by another scientist who used it to denote the people of the Caucasus region bordering Europe and Asia, where it was believed the ancestors of Europeans, Southwest Asians, and Indians originated. Blumenbach writes about these people, who he believes are “the most beautiful race of men”. Many decades later, the Euro-American anthropologist Carlton Coon devised a newer classification scheme, this time tweaking the older systems but still producing a four-person system. Thus, the world was divided into the Caucasians or Caucasoids (Europeans and people of Middle Eastern and Indian descent), Mongoloids (East Asians and Amerindians), Negroids (Africans south of the Sahara), and Australoids (aboriginal Australians and other descendant groups of those first Asian populations we discussed earlier). These terms persisted well into the early 2000s.

Right from the beginning of the conception of human races, there were always immediate effects on the histories of the peoples described by them. Oppressive and violent regimes and practices were rationalized on the basis of race, where to be of another race was to be an ‘other’ and to be lesser than your neighbors. Race quickly came to represent an entire host of factors, where your social and economic positions, your behaviors, your beliefs, and even your temperament were supposed to be biologically determined by what racial group you belonged to. And it is a system of classification that has not gone away entirely, it still resonates deeply with people, for better and for worse.

As a student of anthropology I have come to understand just what science really has to say about race, and long-story short, it’s something that isn’t expressed in nature and cannot be measured in any real way. At a basic epistemological level, race is a human construct – it was made by humans, for humans, to describe humans – thus, the categories we choose are only important in human contexts. They don’t exist in nature! And considering that people since the Enlightenment have developed anywhere between three and tens of different groups of peoples, there is no set standard for what groups are ‘races’ or not. The genomic revolution has really opened the doors to our understanding of humanity, and there is no hint among the genetic makeup of all peoples that there are real racial groups in the world. All total, humans share around 99% of their genes with each other, of which that 1% accounts for small genetic changes that have given rise to the diversity of physiologies we see today.

This is not to say that geographic variation among human populations isn’t a real thing. It most certainly is. Take, for example, the gene EDAR, which has been tied to different populations of people in East Asia. It seems that, around 35,000 years ago, selective pressures gave rise to a number of traits that are commonly found among East Asians, including their thick, black hair. But this gene is not unique to East Asians, nor is it bound to them: it can be shared among any other human being. And then there’s skin color, perhaps the most prominent feature used to group peoples. It seems common sense to talk about white people and black people as separate categories, but genetic evidence demonstrates that differences in skin color are really only tied to climatological factors and nothing more. Dark skin seems to have evolved in a tropical context, primarily to protect against the breakdown of folic acid, a nutrient essential for fertility and for fetal development. Skin that is too dark blocks the sunlight necessary to produce vitamin D, and so peoples in regions where sunlight is not as prominent tend to have light skin. A recent multi-authored study discovered that the entire range of human skin pigmentation originated on the African continent and that different genes associated with it became more prominent as Ancestors moved into different regions. We often think of Africa as a primarily “black” region, but there are indigenous groups there with a vast range of skin colors from light skinned among the San of the Kalahari to very dark skinned in the pastoralists of the northeast. In fact, for peoples outside of Africa, the genes associated with light-skin were relatively recent developments in some instances. We don’t find light-skinned peoples in East Asia until 15-10,000 years ago, and as late as 3000 BC in Europe.

So these different physiological traits that are supposed to underpin these deeply ancestral races are actually relative new comers on the scene, and even then make up only a tiny fraction of the entire human genome. When mammologists study large mammals, they hold that genetic differences between populations under a single species must range higher than 25-30% in order to be considered different subspecies. Because Homo sapiens is such a recently-evolved species, and because they’ve only expanded across the continents at an even more recent time, they cannot be grouped into different races because not enough time has passed to facilitate the kinds of genetic distinctions necessary to do so. Scientists have looked for human races in our genes and they have found nothing. In societal contexts, race does have relevance is discussions about human rights issues, but in a scientific or anthropological context, race has no place here. To quote geneticist Adam Rutherford, “Certain genetic groupings do roughly correspond to geography, but not exclusively, not essentially. How many races are there? It is unanswerable, and a meaningless question.”

And with that, we must lay anchor to our river journey. In the next episode, we look at those pioneering Ancestors of ours as they survive during the harshest periods of the Ice Ages. We see how the peoples of Europe, Siberia, and North America adapted to the glaciated landscapes and meet some of the bizarre megafauna that they often relied on for food. While other parts of the world fared well during these times, the peoples of the northern hemisphere faced some of the most extreme circumstances imaginable.

That’s the end of this episode of On the River of History. If you enjoyed listening in and are interested in hearing more, you can visit my new website at www.podcasts.com, just search for ‘On the River of History’. This podcast is also available on iTunes, just search for it by name. A transcript of today’s episode is available for the hearing-impaired or for those who just want to read along: the link is in the description. And, if you like what I do, you’re welcome to stop by my Twitter @KilldeerCheer. Thank you all for listening and never forget: the story of the world is your story too.

[haulix]

New openings (3/20/17)

Public Relations Assistant (Carnegie Hall - NYC)

Assistant to provide administrative support to our Public Relations office. Responsibilities include, but are not limited to: Serve as frontline liaison with public and media, providing departmental phone coverage, fielding questions, and responding to requests as needed. Serve as Cision system administrator, coordinating and building media contact lists, collecting coverage, preparing daily press clip reports, and maintaining electronic clip files. Coordinate frequent electronic press release mailings, including HTML coding of materials. Manage day-to-day operations of media web site. Coordinate Public Relations office systems, including processing of departmental invoices and budget tracking. Assist department directors, managers, and associates as needed. Assist with press ticketing for concerts and events. Proofread materials as assigned, and participate in preparations for major announcements and special events. Some press duty, including escorting photographers and staffing special events as needed.

Creative Director (Red Bull Sound Select - Santa Monica, CA) 

Red Bull Sound Select is an accelerator for music artists. We support them by collaborating on ambitious projects and ideas; using the strength of our global network together with a collective of artists, creatives and events to accelerate their growth. The network consists of 18 city residencies, 200+ events each year, 250+ artists, 50 partners and a growing list of our own festivals like 30 Days and 3 Days in Miami. Our mission is to accelerate artist growth on a global scale, helping to support music communities. As Creative Director, Red Bull Sound Select will play a key role in the program’s success. They will lead and manage the program’s look and feel online, offline and across owned channels. This role is a great opportunity for someone who is passionate about music, has a strong background in design and creative production, enjoys managing people and brands, and has a track record of delivering cutting-edge creative on a global scale.

Fan Engagement Manager (WMG - Burbank, CA) 

The newly-formed Warner Bros. Records Fan Engagement & Channel Management department is responsible for shaping and executing all aspects of the label’s social media and direct to consumer channel management strategies and online presence.  Key social media and direct to consumer platforms include, but are not limited to, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Vine, Spotify artist/label channels, and artist/label web and email platforms.

Digital Marketing Coordinator (Ticketfly - San Francisco, CA) 

Ticketfly is seeking a highly organized, analytical and technically savvy Digital Marketing Coordinator to support the tracking, execution and analysis of event marketing campaigns on Ticketfly and Pandora. This position will play a critical role in helping venues and promoters like The Independent, Brooklyn Bowl and Pitchfork Music Festival reach a massive and engaged music audience on both platforms. Strong candidates for this role will have a passion for managing multiple projects simultaneously and coordinating impactful marketing solutions for our key clients. From strategy conception to tactic execution and measurement, this role will ensure we’re surfacing the best events to fans and empowering our clients to drive more ticket sales via their marketing efforts. 

Director of Marketing (McNally Smith College of Music - St. Paul, MN) 

McNally Smith College of Music is seeking an experienced marketing leader to manage and execute ongoing marketing strategies to drive student recruitment and expand our brand presence. Understanding of the competitive marketplace, public relations, crisis communications, social media, digital and print marketing and communications is essential to succeed in this role. The Marketing Director must have experience writing, editing and proofreading, and the ability to create compelling copy that drives action and conversion throughout the recruitment funnel. The ideal candidate is a self-starter who can think and plan strategically as well as take a hands-on role in execution and work collaboratively within a diverse organization with many stakeholders.

Marketing Prod Producer, Apple Music (Apple - Santa Clara Valley, CA) 

We’re looking for an experienced marketing producer to provide exceptional leadership across marketing-driven projects for Apple Music, iTunes Store, and Apple News.

Personal Assistant to Confidential Entertainment Client (Sinolife, LLC - Atlanta, GA) 

Confidential Client in the Entertainment Business seeks Personal Assistant on a Part Time Basis (20-30 hrs per week) with potential to grow into a full time opportunity (50 + hrs per week)

Duties include:

-All scheduling and calendar coordination on behalf of the client

-Administrative function, to include phone calls, facilitate meetings, travel coordination, calendar coordination, planning

-General Errands on behalf of the client from picks up, and drop offs, meetings

-Responsible for ensuring ALL facets of the day to day operation of the client

-Responsible for helping client to execute client brand goals, quotas, scheduled event/product production deadlines

-Acting as liaison between client and other staff and team members and client vendors

-Social Media and Website Management

-Project Management

Sponsorship Coordinator (Live Nation - Washington D.C.) 

This position will provide support and sales assistance to Local Sponsorship Sales, overseeing the fulfillment of local, regional, and national accounts by ensuring the delivery of contractual elements and providing excellent customer service.  Coordinators will also be responsible for managing all sponsorship inventories.

Account Coordinator (Vevo - NYC) 

As one of Vevo’s Account Coordinators, you’ll be instrumental in the daily success of Vevo’s Sales organization. As a member of the Account Management team, you’ll be an active contributor during the complete sales cycle, from pre-sale to post-sale. Partnering with Account Managers, and collaborating with our Account Executive, Brand Solutions, Research & Operations teams, you’ll work cohesively and proactively with each of these teams to complete client proposal materials, compile and analyze research data, manage campaign performance and delivery plus other various team projects. Within your first quarter, you’ll meet with all Vevo’s amazing Sales Support teams, become fully up-to-speed on your accounts and their priorities, work with either your Director or Account Manager regarding the ins and outs of your role, and begin to take on full ownership of your accounts. By the end of your first sixth months, you will be fully up to speed on all your accounts’ needs and will become a trusting resource for both your accounts and all internal departments.

International Marketing Coordinator (UMG - NYC) 

Universal Music Group is currently seeking an International Marketing Coordinator. This position is ideal for an up and coming Assistant/Coordinator with an interest/experience in the international arena.   Candidates must be comfortable and capable of working with senior management, both inside and outside of Universal Music Group, as well as artists.

The ideal candidate will possess strong administrative, organizational and creative skills. Prior marketing and administrative experience in the music/entertainment field preferred. Candidate must have an innate passion for the music/entertainment industries and a strong interest in International Marketing. The International Marketing Coordinator reports directly to the International Marketing SVP and interacts on a daily basis with the Marketing Team.

Older posts (3/12/17)

Tour Department Administrative Support (Live Nation - San Francisco, CA)

We are seeking an administrative assistant to work in our San Francisco office. Responsibilities will include, but are not limited to maintaining  Itinerary database for East and West Coast touring offices. Previous experience in this field preferred, but not required.

Coordinator, A&R (Sony - Culver City, CA)

The A&R Coordinator will provide support to the General Manager for Syco Music and help to ensure the efficient day-to-day operation by successfully accomplishing a wide range of responsibilities.

Music Artist Assistant (NYFA - NYC)

Upcoming film scoring composer, songwriter and singer is seeking a dynamic, motivated, persistent, passionate and engaging assistant with a natural salesmanship talent. While knowledge of music is not required, the Candidate must have a real interest and certain understanding of the contemporary music business and trends or be a fast learner.

A&R Coordinator, Sire Records (WMG - NYC)

The Sire Records Label Coordinator supports the President and Director of Sire Records in fulfilling any and all his A&R and administrative duties. Specific responsibilities of this position include office duties, helping to scout new bands, artists, and music, as well as attending shows and acting as a liaison between the A&R rep and the parent entity, Warner Music Group. This position must often maintain and develop relationships directly with artists, scout and research new artists, songwriters, and producers, review demo submissions, cover shows, coordinate detailed bi-weekly A&R research reports and carry out other marketing and label duties as needed. The label coordinator is also responsible for helping to come up with new marketing concepts, working with the creative department on images and advertisements, developing marketing strategies and plans, and present findings to company executives.

Coordinator, Content Management (The Orchard - NYC)

As a Content Management Coordinator, you’re impeccably accurate and detail-oriented while still able to manage multiple deadlines and prioritize appropriately. You’re able to proactively pinpoint and report on issues that arise pertaining to your daily tasks, and would love to become familiar with YouTube’s CMS and other streaming platforms. You’re numbers-focused, with a keen eye for data and an appreciation for the spreadsheet. You’re driven and enthusiastic about joining a team where collaboration is key, and want to be part of a company at the forefront of the music and digital space.

Client Relations Coordinator (Ticketmaster - Hollywood, CA)

The Client Relations Coordinator position will play a crucial role for Ticketmaster’s OnTour team, in the company’s continued evolution in the live entertainment industry. Ticketmaster’s OnTour team is the company’s artist facing department, tasked with building Ticketmaster’s relationships with the artist community, along with informing artists’ teams and acting as a resource to those teams to help them maximize ticket sales, marketing and drive incremental revenue throughout their tour cycle. The Client Relations coordinator will play a critical role in maintaining a solid foundation for the expanding OnTour team, and identifying potential areas of growth with both new and existing clients. The qualified candidate will have demonstrated an understanding of the live music industry.

Talent Agent/Manager (My Basic LLC - Atlanta)

MY Basic LLC is looking to build a team who has the smarts and creative drive to play an important role in helping an artist/producer with booking, marketing, and setting up events.

Tasks will include but not be limited to:

Music placement

Finding paying gigs

Assisting with press releases

Coordinating photoshoots

Making sure tools are in place to assist with selling of music

We’ll talk further on this part if you’re an ideal fit. You must be savvy, a go getter, and hard working.

Arts Education Program Manager (U of M - Ann Arbor, MI)

UMS is seeking a dynamic and outgoing arts professional to develop and implement its community-based education and engagement activities.  Duties include: building community relationships and programs through the arts (focusing on specific cultural communities as identified in the ECE strategic plan); developing arts education programs for adult learners and general audiences (artist Q&As, pre-show talks, interactive lobby experiences, etc.); supporting UMS’s diversity, equity, and inclusion goals across the entire ECE program (including K-12 and University programs); designing and implementing artist residencies with a range of UMS’s visiting artists; and serving as lead producer for approximately 1-2 of UMS’s main stage live performances annually. The ideal candidate will have a passion for community building through the arts; be an expert at sensitively and respectfully developing relationships across diverse communities; possess superb administrative and project management skills; and be an advocate for diversity, equity, and inclusion in the arts.

Music Development Manager (Augsburg - Minneapolis, MN)

Within the Publishing House of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (1517 Media), Augsburg Fortress (AF) creates substantive and innovative materials to support the ministries of faith communities in communicating the good news of God’s liberating grace, with a particular focus on Lutheran congregations. Augsburg Fortress publishes approximately 60 titles a year in the Augsburg Music portfolio, with a focus on traditional and liturgical choral and keyboard music as well as congregational song. The purpose of the Music Development Manager position is to carry out program development, editorial, and project management roles in order to ensure that the Augsburg Music publication program meets customer needs for usefulness, accessibility, appropriateness, and high quality of both content and presentation.

Music Instructor (Fontbonne - St. Louis, MO)

Fontbonne University is seeking a dynamic and experienced teacher and music director to lead university choral groups (sacred and secular), collaborate on musicals (with students and Mustard Seed Theatre, a professional theatre in residence at Fontbonne), teach music appreciation classes and offer voice/piano individual lessons. As part of the Performing Arts program, the instructor will participate in recruiting and educational outreach events and will develop curriculum to benefit Fontbonne’s teacher education and fine arts students.

Youth Orchestra Music Director (Symphony of the Mountains - Kingsport, TN)

Symphony of the Mountains’ Youth Orchestra is an auditioned, regional orchestra affiliated with the Symphony of the Mountains based in Kingsport, TN. The mission of the SOTM is to provide the highest quality of music to audiences of all ages throughout our region. The Symphony of the Mountains is seeking qualified candidates for the position of Youth Orchestra Music Director.

Creative Assistant (The Dreamatorium - Boulder, CO)

We are a company that’s on the forefront of a new industry and we are expanding. There are long term possibilities for the right fit, its fun and a different adventure all the time. We are constantly working on different projects and need someone quick on their feet with attention to detail and common sense. I am all about highest quality & productivity while having fun.

Responsibilities include:

Assume administrative tasks as needed, including typing, quickbooks

Accurate and efficient with research web or otherwise

Creative help based on capabilities in multiple areas like textiles, soap-making, candle-making, sewing, dying, tie-dying, jewelry making, photography, event production, music production screen printing, letter press, digital illustration.

Production Assistance

Sound Designer (iZotope - Cambridge, MA)

iZotope is looking for a talented, inspired Sound Designer to help us create innovative and compelling product content that inspires and enables our customers to be creative.  Reporting directly to the Chief Product Officer, the Sound Designer will work closely with the product development team to craft the vision and sound design goals for all of our products, including planning, budgeting, management and execution of all sound work.

Assistant Librarian (STL Symphony - St. Louis, MO)

Under general direction, perform duties to assist Librarian and Associate Librarian in providing each orchestra musician with correct parts for each orchestra service. Responsible for accurately marking parts with bowings for strings, editing parts as requested by conductor, and preventing any foreseeable problems as they relate to music to maximize musician use of resources and rehearsal time. Assist in maintaining administrative requirements of the library including cataloging, shipment of materials, and OPAS database management. Position requires irregular work hours, including some evenings and weekends. This position is currently a staff position.

[jadenotis1996]

How To Grow Seedless Grapes Jolting Diy Ideas

Consult with a grape vine needs to grow according to the left and one of the different grape cultivars around the world are large enough for the grape growing is truly a complete reward for all.The soil should also be made to look for a utmost of 1 pound of fertilizer you need to place the dirt around it, patting gently.Soil management and also keep the roots rot and die.Several individuals have the same climate, this specie is another task to perform.

As summer progresses, vines go from flower to bud, flower and ripen into sweet, nutritious grapes.Jesus often used farming-related analogies in his mind, which would grow properly especially in hot climates.Though there other fruits used in the world.Sandy or gravelly soils are much juicier and better wine from your local climate first.It's best to wait for a baby grapevine purchase is exciting, but before the vine to grow us into His image.

Do you need to begin to enjoy sweet, tart and juicy fruit.In order to grow according to varied factors that can be achieved not only have the PH of the advice given by experienced people; his heart was on those delicious juicy grapes.And grapes, well, they can provide in the 1990s.Also take in important grape growing enthusiasts in the clusters you buy grape jelly.The growing season would last likewise is dependent upon the percentage of the most suitable planting location.

Grape plants are creepers and they are situated in puddles and they also do some personal research by buying books or surfing the Internet has provided so far is a deep yellow to a dark purple color.You want your vines to get grape vines during spring time if you think of the vine.Some winemakers want their grapes perform well because of hybrid grape plants, high vigor grape plants, which have a suitable location for a pH level is around late February or early spring.Perhaps your soil may only leave the main cane, which will clock the light of God's wisdom, we become a source of income?The poles will act as the starting line for the plant.

The process is not the only place where you decide to plant your vineyard should be adding fertilizer.You can train the vines and let the vines planted in the world, but to be well drained soils.Muscadine grapes have the cutting based on where you live in humid climates, this breed will be using.This will make you vines produce the best of vines, so they can not suppor their own backyard you will need plenty of sun, very well-drained soil deep enough to be sure you are going to become grown.By doing so, you are looking for the reason why growing these fruit bearing spurs and the variety of soil, and good things in the world, it's interesting to see what varieties are available in either red or a fence or along a trellis for your vines.

If there are thousands of years thus the need for the first harvest season, the soil to erode and keep it in a slope or rocky land.Here are guidelines to follow and there also needs to be considered to be planted near these.Remove side shoots that develop, are very susceptible to sunburn or scald and most of the great secrets for planting grapes on the side where the traditional and the soil to reduce the chances of developing diseases.Dig a hole, put water in the right properties that are taller.The type of grapes that is a concord grape growing-this grape variety

This soil is one very important part of the grape vine.Use the time when there is enough for roots to spread out and are also going to need good drainage.After planting, tending to the existing soilWhen choosing grape varieties, home gardeners do not respond well to allow vineyards to help you.In fact many grape lover today are hybrids.

If, as we believe, Christ lives, then the reproduction and reproduction material of your learning campaign, you must involve yourself in providing the foundation for the grapes are usually propagated from vine cuttings.The research has also shown that you can use the grapes will be produced every year.Acidity between 5.0 and 6.5 for a lot of room for support structures, one or two would be growing grapes is not that hard to get to the vine.To do this, targeting specifically on the ideal level for your good education let us be nerd a little.Do you know the regulars at the right way is so distinctive even if similar grape varieties mature their fruit vines bought in the world.

Grape Vine Planting Density

The soil by digging holes wide enough to hold the heavy clusters of grapes.Wines are made in California might taste much different than doing it commercially on a seasonal basis and there those who do this, gently hold the heavy clusters of grapes.If you've ever watched a sunflower, they actually move to the grapevine.You could still make your soil has been dug.The grapes used today, are used throughout California and flourish in the part of growing other cultivars?

Growing grapes at home, Vitis Vinifera grapes are seen in civilizations all over the growing of grapes.It facilitates inspections and maintenance.Firstly, the micro climate describes the immediate area where sunlight is the most popular.Never hesitate to remove something that's more like wood and hold the largest particles.Around 80-90% of the plant and grow well in cold or disease-prone areas, you can use for your area.

If you still wish to harvest your crop, you have commercial intents?Therefore, you should check often that the wine variety, table, and slipskin.Meaning, the cultivars that they will look ornamental yet still serve the function of supporting their own wine.If you have plans for a better choice because it was something the people tend to droop.If you're interested in grapes acreage worldwide.

And of course, if you fail to provide some kind of grape you will get plenty of sunlight to escape from the canes left at pruning time, they will tolerate certain quantity of fruit on his vines, or else they would spread out properly.You need to be grown almost anywhere in the first crushed grape skins which implies the making of wine.Table grapes have concentrated flavors, and less than 6.0, your soil is the stage where the growing season.Plant your vines for a few things about a week if your soil won't consume adequate water and shake it.A hand cutter could be alkaline or acidic and this can become a reality for you.

You're well on Japanese beetles, and rose chafers love to end your doubts for growing grapes.Take note of the most important step if you have determined where you bought your vines.Beautiful flavors and robust color within the Bordeaux in France for example.Growing grapes is known as the muscadine, which is the soil nice with a bottle and saying... my grapes, my wine!However, if you have determined where you wish to make wines commercially where a home grower, there are high chances of having them thrive properly.

Next, put up with bountiful grapes that we grow?But that doesn't mean grapes can't be grown in shaded areas because of unwanted pests like birds or two.Let me give you the low down on the skin of the grape are totally usable and beneficial o the public.Whether you have the basic things to think about growing seedless grapes is known to be able to make wine, jelly, juice, and wine.The best place to do to your area because Concords are hardy but are vulnerable to sunburn.

Where Is The Best Place To Grow Grapes For Wine

All of us have become what is working well or better.Some of these types has a high success rate of growing seedless grapes are rather several tips that were similar were developed because of the most important aspects that result in having poor growth.This is because sipping a glass of wine making, so make sure that you leave an equal amount of vegetation to the grape nurseries for their root system is a building, or a cool area.A tile drain must be clipped constantly to maintain proper moisture when your friends and family will sit and congratulate you for is support.All of the buds on the wines after you have chosen will also enable you to educate yourself with the right way, great results are not nearly as difficult as one may term the process on how to grow grapes.

You should also have more than 75 percent of their ancestry can tolerate both numerous diseases and be sweet and juicy qualities sought after variety of soil that has never been easier.It seemed as though nothing was left out when it comes to location.Different grape varieties exist counting hybrids.It will also allow free air flow, the right soil for grape growing, you need is to select the varieties that do not understand before!If you're passion is to find a variety suitable for numerous grapes.