Five innovations harness new technologies for people with visual impairment, blindness
February 7, 2017
Five innovations harness new technologies for people with visual impairment, blindness

February is Low Vision Awareness Month

During Low Vision Awareness Month, the National Eye Institute (NEI), part of the National Institutes of Health, is highlighting new technologies and tools in the works to help the 4.1 million Americans living with low vision or blindness. The innovations aim to help people with vision loss more easily accomplish daily tasks, from navigating office buildings to crossing a street. Many of the innovations take advantage of computer vision, a technology that enables computers to recognize and interpret the complex assortment of images, objects and behaviors in the surrounding environment.

Low vision means that even with glasses, contact lenses, medicine, or surgery, people find everyday tasks difficult to do. It can affect many aspects of life, from walking in crowded places to reading or preparing a meal, explained Cheri Wiggs, Ph.D., program director for low vision and blindness rehabilitation at the NEI. The tools needed to stay engaged in everyday activities vary based on the degree and type of vision loss. For example, glaucoma causes loss of peripheral vision, which can make walking or driving difficult. By contrast, age-related macular degeneration affects central vision, creating difficulty with tasks such as reading, she said.

Here’s a look at a few NEI-funded technologies under development that aim to lessen the impact of low vision and blindness.

Co-robotic cane
Navigating indoors can be especially challenging for people with low vision or blindness. While existing GPS-based assistive devices can guide someone to a general location such as a building, GPS isn’t much help in finding specific rooms, said Cang Ye, Ph.D., of the University of Arkansas at Little Rock. Ye has developed a co-robotic cane that provides feedback on a user’s surrounding environment.

The co-robotic cane includes a motorized roller tip that guides the user.

Ye’s prototype cane has a computerized 3-D camera to “see” on behalf of the user. It also has a motorized roller tip that can propel the cane toward a desired location, allowing the user to follow the cane’s direction. Along the way, the user can speak into a microphone and a speech recognition system interprets verbal commands and guides the user via a wireless earpiece. The cane’s credit card-sized computer stores pre-loaded floor plans. However, Ye envisions being able to download floor plans via Wi-Fi upon entering a building. The computer analyzes 3-D information in real time and alerts the user of hallways and stairs. The cane gauges a person’s location in the building by measuring the camera’s movement using a computer vision method. That method extracts details from a current image captured by the camera and matches them with those from the previous image, thus determining the user’s location by comparing the progressively changing views, all relative to a starting point. In addition to receiving NEI support, Ye recently was awarded a grant from the NIH’s Coulter College Commercializing Innovation Program to explore commercialization of the robotic cane.

Robotic glove finds door handles, small objects
In the process of developing the co-robotic cane, Ye realized that closed doorways pose yet another challenge for people with low vision and blindness. “Finding the door knob or handle and getting the door open slows you way down,” he said. To help someone with low vision locate and grasp small objects more quickly, he designed a fingerless glove device.

Ye’s fingerless glove uses a camera to detect small objects such as door handles.

On the back surface is a camera and a speech recognition system, enabling the user to give the glove voice commands such as “door handle,” “mug,” “bowl,” or “bottle of water.” The glove guides the user’s hand via tactile prompts to the desired object. “Guiding the person’s hand left or right is easy,” Ye said. “An actuator on the thumb’s surface takes care of that in a very intuitive and natural way.” Prompting a user to move his or her hand forward and backward, and getting a feel for how to grasp an object, is more challenging.

Ye’s colleague Yantao Shen, Ph.D., University of Nevada, Reno, developed a novel hybrid tactile system that comprises an array of cylindrical pins that send either a mechanical or electrical stimulus. The electric stimulus provides an electrotactile sensation, meaning that it excites the nerves on the skin of the hand to simulate a sense of touch. Picture four cylindrical pins in alignment down the length of your index finger. One by one, starting with the pin closest to your finger tip, the pins pulse in a pattern indicating that the hand should move backward.

An array of small, cylindrical pins prompts users to position their hand to grasp a desired object.

The reverse pattern indicates the need for forward motion. Meanwhile, a larger electrotactile system on the palm uses a series of cylindrical pins to create a 3-D representation of the object’s shape. For example, if your hand is approaching the handle of a mug, you would sense the handle’s shape in your palm so that you could adjust the position of your hand accordingly. As your hand moves toward the mug handle, any slight shifts in angle are noted by the camera and the tactile sensation on your palm reflects such changes.

Smartphone crosswalk app
Street crossings can be especially dangerous for people with low vision. James Coughlan, Ph.D., and his colleagues at the Smith-Kettlewell Eye Research Institute have developed a smartphone app that gives auditory prompts to help users identify the safest crossing location and stay within the crosswalk.
The app harnesses three technologies and triangulates them. A global positioning system (GPS) is used to pinpoint the intersection where a user is standing. Computer vision is then used to scan the area for crosswalks and walk lights. That information is integrated with a geographic information system (GIS) database containing a crowdsourced, detailed inventory about an intersection’s quirks, such as the presence of road construction or uneven pavement. The three technologies compensate for each other’s weaknesses. For example, while computer vision may lack the depth perception needed to detect a median in the center of the road, such local knowledge would be included in the GIS template. And while GPS can adequately localize the user to an intersection, it cannot identify on which corner a user is standing. Computer vision determines the corner, as well as where the user is in relation to the crosswalk, the status of the walk lights and traffic lights, and the presence of vehicles.

CamIO system helps explore objects in a natural way
Imagine a system that enables visually impaired biology students to explore a 3-D anatomical model of a heart by touching an area and hearing “aortic arch” in response. The same system could also be used to get an auditory readout of the display on a device such as a glucose monitor. The prototype system, designed with a low-cost camera connected to a laptop computer, can make physical objects – from 2-D maps to digital displays on microwaves – fully accessible to users with low vision or blindness.

The CamIO system consists of a laptop computer and a camera and enables users to explore any 3-D or 2-D object. By holding a finger on an object, users prompt the system to provide audio feedback.

The CamIO (short for camera input-output), also under development by Coughlan, provides real-time audio feedback as the user explores an object in a natural way, turning it around and touching it. Holding a finger stationary on 3-D or 2-D objects, signals the system to provide an audible label of the location in question or an enhanced image on a laptop screen. CamIO was conceived by Joshua Miele, Ph.D, a blind scientist at Smith-Kettlewell who develops and evaluates novel sound/touch interfaces to help people with vision loss. Coughlan plans to develop a smartphone app version of CamIO. In the meantime, software for the laptop version will be available for free download. To watch a demonstration of the CamIO system, visit

High-powered prisms, periscopes for severe tunnel vision
People with retinitis pigmentosa and glaucoma can lose most of their peripheral vision, making it challenging to walk in crowded places like airports or malls. People with severe peripheral field vision loss can have a residual central island of vision that’s as little as 1 to 2 percent of their full visual field. Eli Peli, O.D., of Schepens Eye Research Institute, Boston, has developed lenses constructed of many adjacent one-millimeter wide prisms that expand the visual field while preserving central vision. Peli designed a high-powered prism, called a multiplexing prism that expands one’s field of view by about 30 degrees. “That’s an improvement, but it’s not good enough,” explained Peli.
In a study, he and his colleagues mathematically modeled people walking in crowded places and found that the risk of collision is highest when other pedestrians are approaching from a 45-degree angle. To reach that degree of peripheral vision, he and his colleagues are employing a periscope-like concept. Periscopes, such as those used to see the ocean surface from a submarine, rely on a pair of parallel mirrors that shift an image, providing a view that would otherwise be out of sight. Applying a similar concept, but with non-parallel mirrors, Peli and colleagues have developed a prototype that achieves a 45-degree visual field. Their next step is to work with optical labs to manufacture a cosmetically acceptable prototype that can be mounted into a pair of glasses. “It would be ideal if we could design magnetic clip-ons spectacles that could be easily mounted and removed,” he said.

For more information about resources for living with low vision, visit


Ouch! That Hurt!

Communication can be rife with misunderstanding and hurt feelings!
Communication can be rife with misunderstanding and hurt feelings!

  • to offer constructive critique
  • to create motivation to change
  • to unsettle and create opportunity for a victory
  • to be spiteful and deliberately hurtful.

  • Consider what result you want from your response
  • Neutralise your emotion in forming and sending the response

Building Resilience

Lone palm
Bend rather than break, a quality of resilience

The idea of developing resilience has been embraced by many businesses only to be put on the back burner, with so many other good ideas, as the requirement for a longer-term commitment and conscious effort became evident. Those organisations that are mature enough to commit energy and resource to the long haul do realise value beyond what any short-term initiative could enjoy.

The ability to actually hang in for the long-haul, exert energy and attention over time, even when apparent benefits are not immediately noticed, is a quality of resilience, whether speaking of individuals, teams or organisations. Resilience enables us to bend without breaking, and to adapt and find our way to back to the surface when immersed in a flood of trial, trauma, adversity or other challenges. Like a muscle, resilience is developed with practice, by engaging with “reasonable” amounts of stress. Developing resilience facilitates the growth of self-esteem, self-efficacy and other intra-personal capacities. As we develop our own resilience we are then better placed to lead teams and organisations, and support the development of resilience in others.

I have just finished reading “Long Walk to Freedom”, the autobiography of Nelson Mandela, and as a result have found myself reflecting on the subject of resilience. Unwavering in his commitment to the freedom of his people, a concept placed higher in his value system than personal freedom, Nelson passed through 27 years of imprisonment to come out conqueror. I specifically don’t say “suffered through”. Suffering is a choice. While he certainly experienced significant trauma, his capacity to reframe his moment-by-moment experience within the context of his higher purpose gave his life meaning and shifted his experience from what could have been severe suffering to clean struggle. While not a perfect being, and he does admit to many flaws, Nelson consciously looked for the response from within himself that would create the most significant, beneficial outcome. As he struggled under significant oppression, he sought to move from fear to love, consciously chose powerful responses over fear-based reactions, and maintained a consistent internal dialogue regarding purpose and meaning regardless of external pressures to change his core beliefs. His struggle brought meaning, and ultimately victory, though the latter is never assured.

In “Man’s Search for Meaning”, writing from his personal experiences and his professional background as a psychologist, Viktor E. Frankl asserts that it is those who found meaning in the adversity that they experienced who were best able to survive the traumas of the World War II concentration camps.

Some well recognised techniques for developing resilience include:

  • cognitive reappraisal: re-framing negative experiences using a more positive perspective
  • mindfulness meditation: develop the capacity to observe stimuli and the physical, emotional and mental responses in an impartial way that enables objective detachment and an increases one’s capacity to stay present
  • aerobic exercise: well recognised for reducing symptoms of depression and anxiety, and improving mental capacities of attention, memory, decision-making and planning.
  • Stress inoculation: taking on increasingly difficult challenges in a deliberate manner to develop the resilience muscle
  • Backing of trusted people (without advice): increases self-confidence, provides a safety net and supports the development of problem solving, reappraisal and actively engaging with challenges

How resilient are you? How do you handle the challenges that come your way? Do you find your inner mettle in times of challenge, or do you look for external circumstances and people to blame? What strategies have you got in place to develop your capacity further?


Swannanoa is a five piece band based out of Johnson City, Tennessee.  The band has put together an energetic recipe of Bluegrass and modern Old-Time music sure to entertain audiences of all ages.  All members of Swannanoa are seasoned, experienced musicians having toured and recorded with various groups in the past.  Individual members have played the Grand Ole Opry (with Ralph Stanley), written a song that charted at number 12 on the national Bluegrass Charts, won the 2016 Rockygrass Banjo competition, and won the SPBGMA International Bluegrass Band Competition. Swannanoa is excited to share its own unique blend of Bluegrass and Old-Time.


Our brains are complex and require significant effort to rewire. After all, our brains manage dozens of detailed operations throughout our body at any given time, so it tries to take shortcuts where it can. As a result, learning new skills — whether it be a foreign language or coding — becomes more difficult each day. Don’t believe me? Watch this video, where the man before SmarterEveryDay tries to learn a backward bicycle for months, and his son crushes it in a few minutes.

Why is it so difficult to learn new skills?

As said in the video, knowledge is not the same as understanding. We may read a book that gives us information, but that doesn’t mean we know what that information means. This is because of biases in our brain. Think of it like predictive text; the software uses your normal sentence patterns to predict what you will type next. This is nearly the same process our brain takes multiple times every day. By predicting our surroundings, what we read, what we hear, and what we will do, our brain makes it incredibly difficult to deviate from the pattern.

When is the best time to learn skills?

As a result, the older we get, the more difficult it becomes for us to learn new skills. It makes sense, as we have more experience detecting patterns each day. There is a scientific term to describe how structured your brain is: neuroplasticity. As children, we have more neuroplasticity, because our brains are able to take in and interpret more information without biases. As we learn, we create biases naturally. This is actually the basis for many psychological phenomena. Therefore, the best time to learn skills is as soon as you are able.

How should you learn a new skill?

The way you should learn a new skill may technically vary depending on the skill, but the best way is to practice regularly. Practicing for even 5 minutes every day is better than practicing for an hour every week. The skill needs to stay fresh in your mind and become a habit in order to stick. This is why many people lose the ability to speak a foreign language after they leave school, and why it is possible to forget how to do just about anything.

What are some skills you should learn?

Now that you understand why it is so difficult to learn a skill, you may be wondering which skills to learn. This will, for the most part, depend on your field and your interests. For example, a web design freelancer may also want to learn about ethical hacking. If there is nothing of interest in your field, you could always try learning a difficult foreign language (such as Arabic or Mandarin), improve your writing skills, or public speaking. No company will criticise you for practicing one of these.

Whether you are a manager or a low-level employee, you should keep this information in the back of your mind. Every year, our ability to learn decreases at a constant rate, and that can make training and retraining more difficult. However, it is also important to remember that while learning new skills is challenging, it is ultimately not impossible.


Leo Backup
Continuous (Real-Time) Backup

The Principles of Continuous Backup Software

Real-time backup data processing is also called continuous backup and it is one of the most effective data backup technologies. If a system is set to this backup mode, each data change will be caught by a backup program and its copy will be saved in a backup storage. So a system administrator or a common user is able to restore the backed up information to any point of time. Continuous backup software is widely popular in software development companies, as well as some enterprises with heavy electronic document processing system.

Continuous Backup

Such programs simply catch any change in data assigned to backup copying and store these changes backed up in a specific storage. Different realtime backup software uses different technologies of capturing the changes in files or system configuration, but the principle is the same.

There is a difference between traditional and continuous backup systems. Using real-time backup software there is no need to set specific points of time when the backup copy update should be done. When some changes are written to a computer memory, they will be automatically reflected in the backup data repository. This is more resource-consuming technology, but it provides more efficient recovery facilities. You can always rollback the system right to the point you need.

Sometimes continuous backup software requires less memory space than the traditional one. That is why its backup storage mostly contains the byte differences between the current and the previous update versions, while the traditional storages record file-level differences.

The major shortcoming of realtime backup software use is heavy load of network traffic that may negatively influence network performance. Special solutions for prioritizing network traffic can improve the situation, enabling to use network bandwidth in a more efficient way.

See also: business backup software | backup types | differential backup software | backup secure | backup encrypted
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Eating healthy requires acquired taste obedience

Eating healthy requires acquired taste obedience for many reasons as a lifestyle. While most food addicts follow undiscriminating diets, eating healthy means making choices that we hope will keep bodies and minds healthy and well. A healthy lifestyle offers no assurances of longevity. Eating healthy results rely mostly on faith through obedience in optimizing your living life by choice.

In Corinthians 6:19-20: Do you not know that your bodies are temples of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your bodies. Many forget that phrase, especially when it comes to eating healthy. A few remember that, as a body temple, how, what, and when you eat is bound to body and soul and even fewer practice eating healthy.

A recent recent study published in the Journal of the American Health Association Journal 3/7/2017, discusses observations of those eating healthier as a means of dieting. The article, Change in Percentages of Adults With Overweight or Obesity Trying to Lose Weight, 1988-2014 indicates that there is a percentage loss among these dieters when compared to studies in 1990. About 2 out of every 3 Americans are either overweight or obese, a decline of 7 percent means millions more people may have given up on dieting. The stumbling block is a motivational drop-off. Those who focus on eating healthy make a life-long commitment, for whatever the results.

Eating a healthy diet and what it means starts at younger ages. When integrated into a learning process when younger, eating healthy is normal. It is definitely a nurturing process.

Eating healthy requires acquired taste obedience as an alternate lifestyle. While there are many foods considered healthy, there are some with dietary restrictions due to illnesses. Among the lists of healthy foods, there are serving size considerations. Eating healthy requires focus and acquired taste as an alternate lifestyle sense of obedience. In most cases and situations, eating healthy in a world surrounded by snacks and sugary desserts, is a form of strict discipline. After all, eating healthy is not normal. There are so many attractive, delicious less healthy foods all over the place.

At the supermarket, the customer in front of me purchased 5 largebags of assorted chips, 2 boxes of crackers, 2 pounds M&M’s, potato salad, cole slaw, 10 liters of Coke and 2 packs of cookies. She also added about a dozen of those Ramen noodle soups in a cup. Thankfully, she added family packs chicken and steak. I noted to her that it looks like a great diet. She says, “That’s what my family wants. I make them happy.” While eating healthy requires discipline, eating unhealthy delivers quick gratifications of happiness. It’s a sharp contrast of rewards.

If you look at supermarket circulars, many listings promote normal lifestyles. Some support healthy lifestyles, where available. People choosing to eat healthy is a minority.

Eating healthy is akin to a religion. There are guides and scores of information. There are no spiritual leaders. The adage of “Seek and Ye Shall Find” requires lots of fervor. The rewards are fewer diseases, weight management, and going to heaven later than sooner. Most do not follow this faith. They’d rather die happy with lunches of 2 burger deluxe and 2 cans of coke. While eating healthy requires a tossed salad or sandwich on multi-grain bread, with spring water. Quite an alternative! Who is happier? Who is sicker?

How and what you eat influences your health and mental state. Eating unhealthfully may affect your body weight, blood pressure, your spine, your arteries, your heart, and brain. It may confuse hormones and the vital fluids that flow through them. There are no guarantees that your body won’t suffer by eating healthy, but eating healthy might skew the variables to your favor.

Statistics do seem to show that unhealthful eating and physical inactivity may result in disabilities as you age. An unhealthy diet may a leading cause of disability. Unhealthy eating habits and physical inactivity are leading causes of loss of independence: Roughly 73,000 people have lower-limb amputations each year due to diabetic infections that may develop in obese people. Based on the Center for Science in the Public Interest over 600,000 deaths per year in the United States have been associated with unhealthy eating and inactivity.

According to studies at EPIC-Oxford, vegetarians had lower rates of mortality from pancreatic cancer and lymphatic cancer. Semi-vegetarians had lower rates of death from pancreatic cancer. Pesco-vegetarians had lower death rates from all cancers but higher rates of cardiovascular diseases.

According to Harvard University Center of Public Health, eating more whole grains may reduce mortality rates overall, as part of a healthy diet.

Although dietary supplements of vitamins and antioxidants are helpful, eating a balanced diet is vital for good health and wellbeing. Food provides our bodies with the energy, protein, essential fats, vitamins and minerals to live, grow and function properly, according to the National Institutes of Health.

Eating healthy may help allow longer, active lives because people followed a healthy lifestyle AND avoided unhealthy eating and inactivity.

For the long term, gaining weight to obesity and the potential for numerous nutritional diseases, many tend not to follow health maintenance and rehabilitation over the long term. While much is written about eating healthy foods, there are no real specific formulas (many contradict) what a healthy eating diet implies.

Thus, the popular umbrella over eating healthy does require more science research and evidence of what eating healthy means, along with benefits and consequences.

There are some who have genetic and/or developmental problems with foods that are deemed part of what eating healthy accepts.

Sometimes the rules for eating healthy don’t apply. For example, nuts are considered healthy. Tree nut or seed allergies, for some people, may be extremely harmful allergens. Tree nuts can cause a severe, potentially fatal, allergic reaction (anaphylaxis). Tree nuts include, but are not limited to, walnut, almond, hazelnut, cashew, pistachio, and Brazil nuts. Seeds include sunflower or sesame. Most packages notify if a food product was manufactured in a factory that is exposed to nuts or seeds. Having a soy allergy might knock out even more products.

While meat, poultry and fish are (by small servings) traditionally great sources of complex proteins, many people watch their blood cholesterol levels and triglyceride levels.

Then, of course, there are those that are gluten-free – no wheat products. Diabetics have to watch carbohydrate intake – basically all foods that grow from the earth. As you see, for many, eating healthy faces some very difficult obstacles. No way fits all. Eating healthy diets might also be dangerous to your health!

Eating healthy and setting activities may have something to do with appearance or fashionable vanity – Body Image. People are seeking more than health – attraction, romance, perceived fashionability, social – and eating healthy or obsessively healthy can lead to eating disorders that are also harmful for health. Eating healthy for health and wellness might be individually specific. As a consumer cyclical, more money, more marketing, high motivation is spent on getting the body image you seek. Eating healthy as a lifestyle may be targeted at more than personal health. The aim may be more social. Those that eat healthy may also pursue many activities and seek to make their bodies as attractive as possible.

Bariatric surgery is often advertised on TV. It clips an area of your stomach to inhibit food intake. The use of bariatric surgery is suggested for those people who weigh 100 pounds or more than their average weight and have related health issues. When asked why they were pursuing bariatric surgery, the answers were generally, “tried everything else to improve my body image.” Health was often secondary as they received medicine for that.

Despite side effect possibilities from bariatric surgery, and possible dangers with any surgery, it is a very popular route to improved body image. The number of bariatric surgeries increased to 179,000 in 2013 with 34.2% of surgeries as Roux-en-Y gastric bypass, 14% gastric banding, 42.1% gastric sleeve, 1% as duodenal switch, 6% as revisional surgery and 2.7% classified as other (American Society for Metabolic and Bariatric Surgery).

Biliopancreatic diversion is able to lead to an average of 73% excessive weight loss after two years, while gastric bypass about 65%, sleeve gastrectomy 56%, and gastric banding 49%, according to the study “Biliopancreatic Diversion: The Effectiveness of Duodenal Switch and Its Limitations.”

As one of my early internships, I sat in with groups who had the surgery and I observed, over a course of of 6 months, that several regained their weight and complained about vomiting when they ate too much. Most in the groups had depressive states due to no visible improvements in body image and social successes.

While the discipline of eating healthy is designed to help support weight management, there are several genetic predispositions and rare diseases where excessive weight is unmanageable. There are rare diseases that may also be associated with weight gain that general medical practitioners don’t necessarily focus on. Rare hormonal imbalance conditions may override healthy eating habits that result in excessive weight gain.

For all of those people with sensitivities and diseases, eating healthy might be extremely challenging. Among the reasonably healthy population, finding ways of healthy nutrition is easier. It still requires motivation and fortitude. It may require acquired tastes and compromises but easily adaptable via a continuous lifestyle.

Sadly, many people compromise their options and sensitivities. For quite a few people, eating healthy is filled with unique challenges. Then again, for numerous reasons, noy eating healthy may contribute yo developing diabetes 2.

Eating healthy is about eating the right foods, at the right times, with suggested servings. A serving is usually a few ounces. That may mean that a big salad or large steak each day might be more toxic.

Different plans present different options and formulas to help maintain healthy weight and overall wellness. Choose one of these or create one of your own. As a lifestyle approach, eating healthy guidelines may change as you age or what you do.

Choosing a healthier diet of foods for weight management or some irregular blood score may be helpful. See if your physician can refer you to a qualified nutritionist. For those that eat healthy as a lifestyle, regardless of age, your discriminating dietary obedience MAY pay off with more robust spirit with generally good feeling and body image.

A growing number of people regard the biblical concept of the body as a temple (whether observant or not). Eating healthy is a discipline and habit that you observe through your life span.

Scientifically, eating healthy doesn’t necessarily guaranty that your overall life, wellness, and body image will be excellent. There is a faith and motivation quotient that following a wellness lifestyle will be better than not following one. It is alternative thinking that makes sense to you. As any lifestyle, eating healthy requires motivation, rules, obedience and pleasure.

Eating healthy isn’t a matter of deprivation. If you are celebrating and see attractive food, sample it. Just don’t eat the entire portion. You deserve it. Just don’t exceed serving sizes.

Follow these habits as a core to your healthy eating lifestyle:

1) Developing healthy eating habits isn’t as confusing or as restrictive as many people imagine.
2) Consume a Variety of Foods.
3) Keep an Eye on Portions.
4) Eat Plenty of Produce.
5) Get More Whole Grains.
6) Limit Refined Grains, Added Sugar.
7) Enjoy More Fish and Nuts.
8) Cut Down on Animal Fat.
9) Try to add exercise into your daily routine.

Many might agree or disagree. Eating healthy is an individual choice. For many, healthy food is an acquired taste compared to average eaters. No temple is the same as another. Vive la différence! Choose which healthy mode you want to obey.

Your body may be leased from God but your body health is part of you and your personal responsibility. Seek and find your paths to eating healthy. Any thoughtful healthy actions you contribute may help you live a little bit better.

Vitamin E and metabolic syndrome

According to Ohio State University research, 1 out of 3 Americans may need more vitamin E to combat metabolic syndrome.

Vitamin E is an essential antioxidant that helps reduce free radicals (or sludge) from your body. Other major vitamin antioxidants include vitamins A and C. Antioxidants may come naturally from many fruits and vegetables. People in the study who drank milk along with the natural form of vitamin E absorbed between 26.1 and 29.5 percent of the vitamin, depending on their health status. Those with metabolic syndrome absorbed considerably less.

Those who have been diagnosed with Metabolic Syndrome would then have to be more vigilant in taking vitamin E supplements.

Metabolic Syndrome is not just one disease or condition. It is a cluster that brings symptoms such as high blood sugar level, excess body fat around the waist and abnormal cholesterol levels together. Doctors believe that these symptoms are involved in increasing your risk of heart disease, stroke and diabetes. Studies have correlated those as cofactors that may lead to those main diseases.

As an anti-oxidant, Vitamin E helps eliminate byproducts within your body for cellular and organic wellness. Lack of dietary antioxidants may result in damaging vital networks that keep your body healthier. Some studies have been investigating a vitamin E role in preventing degenerative mental imbalances such as dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. Good thought when applying for research grants.

Dietary sources of vitamin E include: Almonds, Raw Seeds (sunflower and pumpkin), and Hazelnuts. Plant oils also have vitamin E. The benefit with these as they are high in good fats – mono- and poly-unsaturated. The downside is that excessive consumption may lead to fat elevation because these are still high in fat content.

Kale, spinach, collard greens, turnip greens and Swiss chard are low calorie vegetables that eaten raw or cooked releases vitamin E with natural co-factors that may help absorption without fats.

Foods high in antioxidants help reduce bad cholesterol levels and elevate good cholesterol levels when taken as part of an habitual diet, with minimal dietary cholesterol intake from meats and fish.

As a cluster of possible conditions, metabolic syndrome may actually have several other reasons. One is called insulin resistance that may be hereditary or dietary. Under normal conditions your digestive system breaks down many foods you eat into sugar (glucose). Insulin is a hormone made by your pancreas that helps sugar enter your cells to be used as fuel. People that are resistant to insulin don’t respond normally to insulin, and glucose can’t enter the cells as easily. Thus results in elevated glucose. It is a pre-diabetic condition that may likely contribute to belly fat accumulation.

Age also factors in belly fat as lean muscles tend to soften and develop fatty deposits up to 5% nearly each decade of age. By the time you reach 70, you may have lost 20% lean muscles and added belly fat.

Fats and sugars are fuels that keep your body going. Excesses often result in raising glucose levels, belly fat accumulation, and cholesterol markers.

Centuries ago, metabolic syndrome was less likely as people needed to walk and labor manually. In today’s age, fewer people walk and labor is more sedentary. Metabolic syndrome may be an adaptation to technology. Yet this adaptation may elevate risks of heart attacks, strokes, and diabetes.

Essentially, any activity after eating, dietary vigilance, and use of vitamin supplements at moderate levels will help adjust metabolism to normal levels over time. Vitamin E is only one possible factor. There are, as you see, many more. The Ohio University study only provides a glimpse of a much larger picture.

The good news is that Cow’s milk over water promotes absorption of supplemental vitamin E.

Carbohydrates and Weight Loss

When it comes to weight loss, carbohydrates are often viewed as the bad guys. Yet, we are the descendants of people that have eaten carbohydrates as food staples. Why are carbohydrates getting such bad press? Can they actually help with weight loss? What should you know?

As you escalate upwards on clothing sizes and notice bulges where you don’t want them, it may be time to consider weight loss. Many diets over the past 10 years have been lashing out on those nasty carbohydrates (carbs) and are professing that minimizing carbs help lead to weight loss quickly. The problem is we love our carbs. We need our carbs.

Carbohydrates are sugars and starches that are naturally found in most foods, excluding meat and fish. Basically, if it’s a plant (fruit, vegetable, legume,grain), juice, or dairy product, there are naturally occurring sugars or starches. Foods high in carbohydrates are an important part of a healthy diet.

Historically, people had high carbohydrate breakfasts because these natural sugars and starches provide bursts of energy required to start the day. In those days, people worked on farms and ranches. There were no cars and more people walked where ever they needed to travel to or rode on horses (that required upkeep). Carbs were considered great for most times in human history and, currently, in most uncivilized areas.

In civilized countries, sedentary lives suffer from too much carbohydrate intake. People drive cars, work with personal computers, and all sorts of mobile devices. Physical activity is more of an option as many more people choose to go home and watch TV for a few hours. Is this you?

Carbohydrates provide the body with glucose, which is converted to energy used to support bodily functions and physical activity. Your brain requires carbs for thinking as do many cellular networks. Sedentary lifestyles, following traditional eating habits formed for thousands of years, find that their trim bodies grow larger and they can’t figure out why.

A key problem is in society itself. Many “bought” foods use processed grains and add sugars to make them more palatable. These carbs are fine if you plan to go running for fifteen minutes after eating. The reason is these are simplex carbohydrates. These have simple, easily digestible carbs that are quickly absorbed by the body.

Examples of these are:
◾Table sugar
◾Brown sugar (including raw and organic sugar)
◾Corn syrup
◾Maple syrup
◾Jams, jellies
◾Fruit drinks
◾Soft drinks

Then there are complex carbohydrates that naturally occur in fruits and vegetables. The key difference between simple and complex carbs isn’t easily seen by your eye. It’s at microscopic levels. A carbohydrate is a molecule. Complex carbs have larger molecules than simple carbohydrates.

To understand this, you must be aware that our planet and everything on the planet and its atmosphere are made of atoms. There are many different types of atoms. When atoms are mixed together, you get molecules. For example, two hydrogen atoms meet one oxygen atom and, when they get together, the result is water. Zillions of these atomic bonds comprise our oceans. Carbohydrates are molecules, a group of atoms bonded together, representing the smallest fundamental unit of a chemical compound. There are many different carbohydrate molecules and those differences lie in what makes one better for you than others.

Foods containing the healthiest sources of carbohydrates—unprocessed or minimally processed whole grains, vegetables, fruits and beans—promote good health by delivering vitamins, minerals, fiber, and a host of important phytonutrients (nutritive molecules that help distinguish one food from another). Less healthy sources of carbohydrates include white bread, pastries, sodas, and other highly processed or refined foods. These items contain easily digested carbohydrates that may contribute to weight gain, interfere with weight loss, and promote diabetes and heart disease.

How can carbohydrates promote heart disease? Excess sugar in the bloodstream can contribute to plaque, arterial wall residue and releases a hormone called insulin from your pancreas. Carbohydrates (starches and sugars) raise blood sugar levels and trigger the release of insulin. Insulin helps leads in the reduction of excess sugars and starches in the bloodstream that would be thickening blood, in high amounts. Insulin helps convert those carbs into energy.

When there are problems with insulin production, thicker blood in arteries can result in plaque that could disrupt vascular flow to your heart, brain, or elsewhere. This may contribute to strokes, heart attacks, and issues throughout the body.

One of the problems that can occur over time, in previously healthy individuals, is the development of insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is a condition in which the body produces insulin but does not use it effectively. When people have insulin resistance, glucose builds up in the blood instead of being absorbed by the cells, leading to type 2 diabetes or pre-diabetes. Type-2 diabetes is usually found among obese people. In insulin resistance, muscle, fat, and liver cells do not respond properly to insulin and thus cannot easily absorb glucose from the bloodstream. As a result, the body needs higher levels of insulin to help glucose enter cells. This is hyperglycemia, a condition of insulin resistance, where not enough insulin can be produced to deal with excessive carbohydrate consumption.

On the other side of the coin, there’s a hypoglycemia condition. Hypoglycemia may be a result that, when carbs are present in your bloodstream, excess insulin attacks them. Hypoglycemia is a condition characterized by an abnormally low level of blood sugar (glucose), your body’s main energy source. Normally, there are certain pancreatic beta cells that help bring carbs to the cells but the flow is disrupted. In many cases, hypoglycemia occurs after meals because the body produces more insulin than is needed.
For those with hypoglycemia, excessive simple carbs can result in confusion, sleepiness, and (in extreme cases) unconsciousness. Other possible symptoms may include:

•Heart palpitations

When hunger occurs, a hypoglycemic is not satisfied after eating a full meal and feels the need to eat more. Eating more helps lead to excess weight gain and, perhaps, a higher degree of exhaustion.

How does your body react to carbs? There’s a rather long, tedious blood test that illustrates what happens after high-carb intake. The glucose tolerance test acts as a guide for you and your physician to take proper steps.

Carbohydrate consumption and problems associated with it may often be genetically linked, inherited through familial generations. In some ways, this may account for body appearance, and energy levels throughout a life span. Often, it can go undetected for many years under routine medical care.

Considering weight loss with carbohydrates? It is possible. The United States Department of Agriculture or USDA provides an excellent website with tons of information and recipes for each meal. Carb lovers needn’t worry. Slight modifications to how and when you eat, and how much you physically move, may contribute to an enduring weight loss program.

Carbs may not necessarily be the evil behind weight gain. How you consume carbs, especially mixed with excess saturated fats, may contribute to excess pounds. Consider that when you down a 4 ounce bad of chips and a liter of soda while wat5ching TV.

Knowing and using appropriate carbs and moving more actively may just help you achieve weight loss over time. Carbs are part of our history and are very addictive. Adapting responsible carb intake into a sedentary lifestyle may not be an easy task. Total carb withdrawal can be dangerous. Finding the responsible path may require aid from a certified nutritionist. Over years, you may find that your excess pounds have shed and your energy has improved, if you understand the virtues and dangers of carbs. It’s a lifestyle adaptation for the new lifestyle. It is not a quick-fix!


Pediatric Orthotics – What It Is?

In this branch of medicine, orthotics deals with the use and manufacturing of orthotic devices that are used to correct the patient’s physical function and posture. Orthotics medicine serves to minimize pain, maximize mobility and function, and prevent the progression of most physical abnormalities. In the branch of pediatric orthotics it is any type of device like a brace or heel or foot insert that will help to assist a child’s limb. These devices are made to correct imperfections that affect the child’s lower legs, feet, or knees. There are many different conditions that can affect a child’s feet that may make it necessary to use pediatric orthotics. These can include multiple sclerosis, flat feet, or partial paralysis.

Many times if a child has plantar fasciitis pediatric orthotics are used to help support their foot. Plantar fasciitis is a medical condition that creates pain in their feet, usually their heels. When the heel insert is put inside their shoe it helps reduce any inflammation that often occurs with this medical condition and provides extra cushioning. The inserts can also help to lessen heel pain, which can be reoccurring. This type of device is called plantar fasciitis orthotics. Some children with this medical condition also require more arch support and additional shock absorption when standing or walking.

When a child suffers from deformities that affect their legs they often will need the use of orthotics. These devices can help to strengthen their muscles and help them to have correct posture while walking and standing. This form of leg brace that has special reinforcements created to help keep the bones and joints aligned properly. One medical condition that can affect both children and adults is called rheumatoid arthritis, which is considered a chronic disease. It is referred to as juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, when it affects adolescents and children. Many times the inflammation and pain associated with this disease may cause walking difficulties. This is due to immobile and stiff joints.

For children who require a special constructed fitted shoe orthotic therapy is often used. To construct the device the pediatrician will make a mold of the child’s foot, which can help when creating custom orthotics to accommodate each child’s unique needs. If it is a sports-related injury using pediatric orthotics during the process of healing may speed it up. Using them will often work to ease any pressure on the area that was injured. Sports-related injuries treated using these medical devices include fractures, sprains, and strains. In some instances a pediatrician will need to write a prescription for devices that are specially made or certain inserts for their shoe.


Primus is a device from the past

Primus - what is it? Today, few young people know what this device is and what it is for. The peak of its use came in the post-revolutionary years, only in the fifties of the last century, more modernized products began to crowd it out. However, among tourists and hunters, it is popular right up to our time.

Types of primus

Primus is (photo below) the device used in the household. Its purpose is to heat water, prepare food, as well as fulfill other needs that may arise on the farm. This device works on kerosene.

Such household appliances in different designs are made. They can be with one burner or two. The size of the primus depends on it accordingly. A tank for kerosene can also be in a primus stove, one or two. Such tanks are called cisterns. Depending on the type of stove, there may be two nozzles and special needles for cleaning them.

In addition, the stoves are divided into portable and stationary.The first ones are convenient because they can be folded in a metal box and applied anywhere, including on vacation.primus it

It is believed that this device, among other heating products operating on kerosene, has the greatest efficiency. Primus is a very economical device: fuel consumption is only about 70 grams per hour. The capacity of a primus tank is also different, it can be from half a liter to two. Primus stoves are divided into noisy and silent. The latter consume kerosene more.

Instructions for use

The most common type of stove is a product with one burner. The use of this device involves the implementation of several actions:

  1. Filling the tank with kerosene. Fuel should be poured only ¾ of the volume of the tank, not more. After that, the cover must be tightly closed.
  2. Further the screw by means of which excess air will leave the capacity opens.
  3. A cup of primus is filled with specially prepared denatured alcohol and ignited.
  4. After burning the alcohol, the screw through which the air was drained should be closed.
  5. A tank of kerosene is pumped up using a pump to create pressure.Inflation should be carried out until the desired flame is obtained.

Primus is a photo

If after carrying out all these actions, the primus still has a weak flame, or the fire burns unevenly, then you need to clean the nozzle with a special needle. After use, you must close the bleed screw so that the flame goes out.

Restrictions and prohibitions

It is forbidden to pour fuel, if the body of the device is very hot, to avoid fire. You can not use other fuel that ignites faster than kerosene (gasoline, gasoline, etc.). The use of a primus can take no more than three hours. Then he needs to cool down.

Portable device

Interesting portable primus. This product is primarily intended for tourists, hunters, fishermen. But, of course, its use is possible in the home. Usually the reservoir of such a device has a volume of about 160 grams. Portable stoves operate on gasoline, they have no pump. The transfer of fuel to the nozzle occurs with a cotton wick. In this device there is a specially built needle that acts as a flame regulator, limiting the flow of gasoline vapor.With its help, the device is also extinguished.Primus is that

The dimensions of such a primus are: height - 140 mm, diameter - 100 mm. At the same time it is quite light, the weight of the product is 0.6 kg. Fuel in a portable stove is enough to work for 1 hour. During this time, you can catch and cook some food, and boil water. So, a teapot with one and a half liters of water boils in 10 minutes.

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write_table - write design as connectivity table

    write_table [options] [filename]

Write the current design as connectivity table. The output is a tab-separated
ASCII table with the following columns:

  module name
  cell name
  cell type
  cell port

module inputs and outputs are output using cell type and port '-' and with
'pi' (primary input) or 'po' (primary output) or 'pio' as direction.


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Nullification Crisis : Nullification Proclamation

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Nullification Proclamation and Nullification Crisis
South Carolina and the Nullification Proclamation

President Andrew Jackson and the Nullification Crisis
Nullification Proclamation, Nullification Crisis, and the American Civil War
South Carolina threatened to secede from the Union in the 1830s because of high tariffs.

On December 10, 1832, President Andrew Jackson issued a proclamation to the people of South Carolina that disputed a state's right to nullify a federal law. Jackson's proclamation was written in response to an ordinance issued by a South Carolina convention that declared that the tariff acts of 1828 and 1832 "are unauthorized by the Constitution of the United States, and violate the true meaning and intent thereof and are null, void, and no law, nor binding upon this State." See also South Carolina Ordinance of Nullification: November 24, 1832.
Led by John C. Calhoun, Jackson's vice president at the time, the nullifiers felt that the tariff acts of 1828 and 1832 favored Northern-manufacturing interests at the expense of Southern farmers. After Jackson issued his proclamation, Congress passed the Force Act that authorized the use of military force against any state that resisted the tariff acts. In 1833, Henry Clay helped broker a compromise bill with Calhoun that slowly lowered tariffs over the next decade. The Compromise Tariff of 1833 was eventually accepted by South Carolina and ended the nullification crisis, but the tariff controversy fueled sectionalism and fanned the flames of secession and civil war.

(Additional reading below.)

Recommended Reading: Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, 1816-1836. Review: When William Freehling's Prelude to Civil War first appeared in 1965 it was immediately hailed as a brilliant and incisive study of the origins of the Civil War. Book Week called it "fresh, exciting, and convincing," while The Virginia Quarterly Review praised it as, quite simply, "history at its best." It was equally well-received by historical societies, garnering the Allan Nevins History Prize as well as a Bancroft Prize, the most prestigious history award of all. Now once again available, Prelude to Civil War is still the definitive work on the subject, and one of the most important in antebellum studies. It tells the story of the Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, describing how from 1816 to 1836 aristocratic planters of the Palmetto State tumbled from a contented and prosperous life of elegant balls and fine Madeira wines to a world rife with economic distress, guilt over slavery, and apprehension of slave rebellion. It shows in compelling detail how this reversal of fortune led the political leaders of South Carolina down the path to ever more radical states rights doctrines: in 1832 they were seeking to nullify federal law by refusing to obey it; four years later some of them were considering secession. Continued below…

As the story unfolds, we meet a colorful and skillfully drawn cast of characters, among them John C. Calhoun, who hoped that nullification would save both his highest priority, slavery, and his next priority, union; President Andrew Jackson, who threatened to hang Calhoun and lead federal troops into South Carolina; Denmark Vesey, who organized and nearly brought off a slave conspiracy; and Martin Van Buren, the "Little Magician," who plotted craftily to replace Calhoun in Jackson's esteem. These and other important figures come to life in these pages, and help to tell a tale--often in their own words--central to an understanding of the war which eventually engulfed the United States. Demonstrating how a profound sensitivity to the still-shadowy slavery issue--not serious economic problems alone--led to the Nullification Controversy, Freehling revises many theories previously held by historians. He describes how fear of abolitionists and their lobbying power in Congress prompted South Carolina's leaders to ban virtually any public discussion of the South's "peculiar institution," and shows that while the Civil War had many beginnings, none was more significant than this single, passionate controversy. Written in a lively and eminently readable style, Prelude to Civil War is must reading for anyone trying to discover the roots of the conflict that soon would tear the Union apart.

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Related Reading:

From the Inside Flap: Unconstitutional laws are pouring out of Washington…but we can stop them.
Just ask Thomas Jefferson. There is a “rightful remedy” to federal power grabs—it’s called Nullification.
In Nullification: How to Resist Federal Tyranny in the 21st Century, historian and New York Times bestselling author Thomas E. Woods, Jr. explains not only why nullification is the constitutional tool the Founders envisioned, but how it works—and has already been employed in cases ranging from upholding the First Amendment to knocking down slave laws before the Civil War. In Nullification, Woods shows:
Nullification is not just a book—it could become a movement to restore the proper constitutional limits of the federal government. Powerful, provocative, and timely, Nullification is sure to stir debate and become a constitutional handbook for all liberty-loving Americans.

Recommended Reading: When in the Course of Human Events: Arguing the Case for Southern Secession. Review: As a historian, I have learned that the heart of any great work in history lies in the ample and accurate use of primary sources, and primary sources are the great strength of this work. While countless tomes have debated the perceived moral sides of the Civil War and the motivations of the various actors, this work investigates the motives of the primary players in the era and in their own words and writings. This gives the work an excellent realism and accuracy. The author, Charles Adams, has earned a reputation as one of the leading economic historians in the field, particularly in the area of taxes. He utilizes this background to investigate the American Civil War, and comes to some very striking conclusions, many that defy the politically-correct history of today. His thesis postulates that the Civil War had its primary cause not in slavery or state's rights, but rather in cold, hard economic concerns. Continued below...

He shows that the North used its supremacy in Congress to push through massive tariffs to fund the government, and that these tariffs fell much harder on the export-dependent South than upon the insular north. In fact, the total revenue from the "Compromise" Tariffs on the 1830s and 40s amounted to $107.5 million, of which $90 million came from the South. The majority of the revenue, moreover, was spent on projects “far from the South.” According to Adams, this disparity finally pushed the South to seek its own independence. Supporting this conclusion is the fact that the South enacted extremely low tariffs throughout the war, whereas the north enacted the Morrill Tariff of 1861, which enacted tariffs as high as 50 percent on some goods. Adams also chronicles the oft-overlooked excesses of the Lincoln Administration, and compares them to the actions of Julius Caesar. Using the letters and reports of the times, he tells how Lincoln suspended habeas corpus, trod roughshod over the Constitution, jailed thousands of U.S. citizens who dared disagree with him and even wrote a warrant for the arrest of the Chief Justice of the United States. Adams also ably uses the viewpoints of British and other Europeans to describe different contemporary views on the struggle. These provide excellent outside insight. On the whole, readers will find the book a superb and scholarly analysis, providing fresh insights into the motivations and causes of the defining war in American history. AWARDED 5 STARS by

Recommended Reading: The South Was Right! (Hardcover). Description: Kin Hubbard said "'Tain't what a man don't know that hurts him; it's what he does know that just ain't so." Much of what people "know" about the causes, conduct, and consequences of the Civil War "just ain't so." The Kennedy brothers make a strong case that the real reasons and results of the War Between the States have been buried under the myth of Father Abraham and his blue-clad saints marching south to save the Union and free the slaves. Sure, the tone is polemical. But the "enlightened" elements of American opinion have been engaging in a polemic against the South and its people for decades… Continued below...

This book adopts the "following the money approach" to analyzing who profited most from slavery – a convincing argument that reflects that much of the wealth went to the North. It also points out that slavery was not new to Africa, and was practiced by Africans against Africans without foreign intervention. A strong case is made that the North and Lincoln held strong racist views. Lincoln proposed shipping, or transporting, blacks back to Africa  The blacks residing in the Northern states were in a precarious predicament (e.g. draft riots and lynchings in NY City). The authors, however, do not make any argument supporting slavery - their consistent line is the practice is vile. The fact that many blacks served, assisted and provided material support to Union and Confederate Armies is beyond refute. Native Americans also served with distinction on both sides during the Civil War. “A controversial and thought-provoking book that challenges the status-quo of present teachings…”

Recommended Reading: CAUSES OF THE CIVIL WAR: The Political, Cultural, Economic and Territorial Disputes Between the North and South. Description: While South Carolina's preemptive strike on Fort Sumter and Lincoln's subsequent call to arms started the Civil War, South Carolina's secession and Lincoln's military actions were simply the last in a chain of events stretching as far back as 1619. Increasing moral conflicts and political debates over slavery-exacerbated by the inequities inherent between an established agricultural society and a growing industrial one-led to a fierce sectionalism which manifested itself through cultural, economic, political and territorial disputes. Continued below...

This historical study reduces sectionalism to its most fundamental form, examining the underlying source of this antagonistic climate. From protective tariffs to the expansionist agenda, it illustrates the ways in which the foremost issues of the time influenced relations between the North and the South.

Sources: Ellis, Richard E. The Union at Risk: Jacksonian Democracy, States' Rights, and the Nullification Crisis. New York: Oxford University Press, 1987; Freehling, William W. Prelude to Civil War: The Nullification Controversy in South Carolina, 1816-1836. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992; Peterson, Merrill D. Olive Branch and Sword: The Compromise of 1833. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1982.

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Tuesday, 6 November 2018

To vote, or not to vote?

As this Election Day in the USA has approached, I've been seeing more and more "Get Out The Vote" messages that argue (or, worse, don't bother to argue but rather presume as not needing argument) that voting is some kind of duty or obligation, and that eligible citizens "ought" to vote.

I think we need more, not less, discussion of whether or not to vote, and of the reasons people choose to vote or not to vote. And more people should have that choice: non-citizens, people under 18 years old, people in most states (but not all) who are imprisoned or on parole or probation (which not infrequently continues for life) for felonies, and people in some states who were ever convicted of a felony, no matter how long ago, are disenfranchised by current state laws, and don't have a choice of whether to vote.

But telling me I have an ethical duty to vote is both wrong, in my opinion, and unlikely to persuade me to vote. I'm not trying to persuade anyone to vote, or not to vote, but here's my response to those who tell me I "ought" to vote, without first asking why I might choose not to do so:

I'm a political activist, but little of my activism is directed at electoral politics. Government decisions -- including legislative, judicial, executive, and administrative decisions -- are influenced by many factors, and are not solely determined by elections. I've been working against government actions with bipartisan support (war, conscription, restrictions on freedom of movement, etc.). This work will remain important regardless of who wins today's elections, or the next, or the next.

A central element of Gandhian political analysis is recognition that governments have less power than they claim, -- and as a corollary, that we the people have, as my mentor Dave Dellinger titled one of his books, More Power Than We Know. The ability of governments to do anything, including to do evil, is constrained by the people's willingness to carry out their orders. I resist participation in war not to opt myself out of participation in evil, but as a form of direct action to deprive the government, incrementally, of its power to do evil.

This article about voting began on a mailing list of war resisters. If we approach the question of whether or not to vote by analogy to the question of whether to provide labor for war by enlisting or submitting to conscription, or to provide money for war by paying taxes, then one place to start is by asking whether resistance to war is a duty or a right. It might be both, but not all things it is our right to do are also our duty to do.

Much of the discourse of conscientious objection to war (and, for what little it is worth, current law on conscientious objection to warmaking in the USA and many but not all other countries) frames conscientious objection as an ethical or moral duty, and posits that conscientious objection is a right only to the extent that it is perceived by the individual as a duty that leaves no discretion.

I don't define my war resistance as "conscientious objection", or myself as a "conscientious objector". I strongly oppose being labeled as a CO, and I strongly oppose those who try to define or label all war resisters as COs.

My war resistance is a choice, not a duty. As an atheist, an anarchist, and a pacifist (each of which, as I understand them, implies the others), I define my war resistance in anti-religious, not religious, terms. Similarly, neither voting nor not voting is a religious obligation or a "sin".

If war is evil and inherently illegitimate, how can resistance to war be a choice and not a duty? My answer is rooted in my anarcho-pacifism, which leads me to the conclusion that stateism, property ownership (enforced by the state), and other institutions of violence are so pervasive that almost everything we do involves a degree of participation in structures of violence.

I'm humbled by those who live their lives in ways that use fewer of the Earth's finite resources, and that involve less collaboration with states, property, and other structures of violence. But that doesn't mean that they, or anyone I can imagine, is living or can live a totally nonviolent life. And even if we could, opting out would not stop others from killing us and killing our future through climate change or nuclear war. Survival, sadly, requires active and not just passive resistance.

One need not be an anarcho-pacifist to see the state as per se an institution of violence. The conventional definition of political scientists is that the state is that entity which claims a monopoly on the right to determine who can legitimately use violence within a defined jurisdiction.

Voting is part of the process of determining how and against whom the state will direct its violence. Voting is not a nonviolent act.

Participation in electoral politics or other government decision-making is collaboration with violence just as much as is participation in structures or organizations of non-state or anti-state violence such as those that engage in armed struggle for national liberation or other goals. To refer to those who choose electioneering over armed struggle against the state as having "renounced violence" is to reinforce a statist lie that obscures the violence inherent in the state, regardless of whether decisions of how to wield state violence are made by majority vote.

In that context, I see the choice of whether to vote as one of many choices -- including whether to pay war taxes, participate in military activity as a conscript or worker in the arms industry, or work in coalitions with individuals or groups that engage in armed struggle -- of how to relate to the pervasive presence of institutions of violence. When and how can what degree of collaboration or acquiesence be justified?

I evaluate voting in this framework as a choice of lesser evils rather than as a moral duty one way or the other. Voting is evil. Sometimes voting in a particular election is the lesser evil.

The potential positive effect of voting is electing less evil officials.

The more certain (in my opinion) negative effect of voting is that it legitimates the state -- an institution of violence -- and, in the present-day USA, the system of ageist birthright-citizenship majoritarianism that is mislabeled "democracy". (My point with respect to birthright citizenship isn't that fewer people should have citizenship, but that more people should have political rights, an issue explored in depth in the work of Jacqueline Stevens on the basis of an anarcha-feminist critique of birth as the basis for political rights or denial thereof.)

My attitude isn't so much, "Don't vote, it only encourages them", as "Don't vote, it only makes others believe in the system". Claiming that voting is a "duty" greatly enhances that negative effect.

Making this balancing test, I vote only when I think that the probability that voting could affect the outcome of the election and the subsequent actions of the state is suffiently great to outweigh the certainty that voting will be taken as an endorsement of the legitimacy of the state as an institution of violence, and of its enforcement of ageist majoritarianism.

If you want to persuade me to vote in a particular election, start by acknowledging that voting is, in general, a bad thing, and give me reason to overcome the weight of that factor.

I am much more likely to vote for or against legislation than candidates. Here in California, we often have a couple of dozen initiative and referendum questions on each ballot, with the ballot summaries and texts of the proposals running to several hundred pages. State and local referenda and legislative initiatives are on ballots throughout the country.

Amendment 4 in Florida would enfranchise more than a million people, and is probably the single most significant question being put to a vote anywhere in the USA today. In 1984, I voted by absentee ballot from a Federal Prison Camp. That's another story for another day, but it was one of the most effective political actions I took while I was imprisoned. As a felon in California, I've had the right and have often made the choice to vote. But if I moved to Florida (or Iowa, Kentucky, or Virginia), unless Amendment 4 or similar legislation is approved, I would no longer have the right to make that choice.

But my voting isn't limited to legislative questions. Sometimes I vote for or against candidates, especially where it seems likely that votes in a particular election will be seen as votes for a lesser evil, motivated by exigency, and not as endorsement of the system.

As I've said before (in the context of Clinton v. Trump), if the thugs who are holding us hostage choose to amuse themselves or try to boost their image in their own or others' eyes by letting us vote for which one of them will stand over us with their finger on the button of nuclear annihilation for the next four years, I see no immorality -- and little risk that my vote will be misinterpreted as acquiescence to the kidnappers -- in raising my hand for whichever one of them seems least trigger-happy.

That voting is generally evil is, for me, a rebuttable presumption, based on the fact that voting necessarily involves collaboration with, and a risk of legitimating, institutions of violence. But saying that voting is sometimes justifiable doesn't mean that it is ever obligatory.

My bottom line is that I think it legitimate neither to criticize all those who vote, nor to criticize all those who chose not to vote. Those I would criticize, if any, would be those who choose to vote or choose not to vote, or tell me I should do so, without thinking about the implications of that choice.

Did I vote today? And if so, which candidate(s) or proposition(s) did I vote for or against?

As a matter of principle, of self-protection, and of protection of electoral rights, I won't say. I don't tell my friends who I voted for, I don't tell pollsters who I voted for, and least of all do I tell candidates, elected officials, or campaigners who I voted for.

We have secret ballots for a reason, although that seems to have been largely forgotten.

Literally the last person in the world who I would want to know who (if anyone) I voted for as President of the USA is the President of the USA. That's the most powerful person in the world, and the person with the greatest power to abuse their knowledge of who their supporters and opponents are. That was true when Barack Obama was President, it's true now that Donald Trump is President, and it will remain true whoever becomes President in 2020 or if Trump is impeached.

Secret ballots are under attack by campaigning that relies on databases of individual preferences, past and present, to predict future voting, allocate campaign resources, and determine personalized messaging. I want all entries about me in these databases expunged, but I can't even find out what information (or misinformation) is being kept about me. Candidates and elected officals' databases are exempt from any of the fundamental principles of data protection. But these are exactly the sorts of records, in less high-tech forms, that have been long been central to machine politics and its abuses: rewarding supporters with patronage and punishing non-supporters with denial of government services.

That's how it worked in Chicago when I lived there in the late 1970s, and how it works in too many places today. "You want a summer job for one of your relatives with the Parks Department? You want a permit for renovations to your house? Let me check my little black book and see how many hours you spent walking the ward for our slate in the last election."

Not enough? No job, no permit. "Come back when you've proved your loyalty. You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours."

That's not the form of governance I want to enable.

When an elected official is making a decision or meeting with a constituent, I don't want them to know, or to be able to consider, whether that person voted for them, against them, or not at all, or whether or how much time and/or money they gave to them and/or to their opponent(s).

It's important to defend the right to vote secretly, just as it's important to defend and extend the right to vote in the first place.

Link | Posted by Edward on Tuesday, 6 November 2018, 11:46 (11:46 AM) | TrackBack (0)
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101 advice for mobile engineers

What languages, frameworks & tech do you need to succeed in Germany?

The following is an excerpt from a conversation between mobile engineer Mohamed from vivy.com and Johann, Founder & CEO of Imagine. This event was hosted by Egyptian Techies in Berlin & Imagine Foundation e.V.

Johann: Welcome Mohamed. Great to have you here. Who are you, and what do you do?

Mohamed: Hi, I’m Mohamed, I’m a software engineer, I’m an android developer. I work for a company called Vivy.com. We build a secure health management assistant.

Johann: Awesome! What are the skills required, skills, technologies, languages, tools to find and do a great job here in Germany?

Mohamed: I mean, in the end, there are some foundations which all the front end developers share. I’m talking about them from the mobile perspective. These are basic skills on how to manage a big codebase. Because most of us work in small companies at some point and they saw how weak the code can grow. For small apps, it’s really tempting to, like, take shortcuts just to get things done, but after some time it grows massively.

So, the main skill I see in the mobile technology or any mobile development is to be able to manage large codebases which has some principles and software writing skills.

You need to have SOLID principles, how to write clean code, how to write your code in a way that follows design patterns that solves future problems that may come into place and of course to stay up-to-date with the technology.

This means you have to look at the latest technology in the market, the community, you have to participate in conferences. If you don’t have the luxury to participate in conferences you can watch some talks. This way you will increase your knowledge and you will gradually become a better developer.

Johann: What technologies or languages would you advise aspiring mobile developers should know?

Mohamed: Well, the market here I see in Germany doesn’t go toward cross-platforms. Even though it’s tempting and there are some really nice frameworks, but cross platforms has not matured yet. In fact, a lot of big names are moving away from it, such as AirBNB and some parts of Facebook, they all reverted back to native. So all the markets are going toward the native languages.

So Android is mainly going towards Kotlin. iOS is all about Swift now. I mean, nobody’s using Objective-C anymore.

For Android its mostly Kotlin, and Kotlin’s trending. I see also a lot of people, a lot of companies are moving 100% to Kotlin. It’s become like really mature and you can use well it in production.

Johann: Mohamed, I know you are an active believer in lifelong learning. Can you give an example of how you learn?

Mohamed: Yes. I used to learn and listen to specific podcasts. In particular, a podcast called Fragmented. It’s an Android podcast. And there are some newsletters for Android, like Android Weekly. The good thing about the newsletter is that the most experienced people look at their blogs and they talk and they group it all together in one newsletter. It’s really beautiful to find such information all gathered in one place.

Johann: Thanks. Another question relating to experience. How many years of experience should an android mobile developer have to move to Germany and what are the desirable skills they should have?

Mohamed: Well, how many years of experience is really dependent on the type of experience. I see young developers, by young I mean 2 years experience in Android, but some of them have experience in Java, some of them have like worked with back-end before. But just 2 years of experience is enough, just make sure that the developer has worked with the relevant technologies and business cases. If you work for 2 years in a service company that only writes content without any logic or without any business growth, it doesn’t really count as experience.

So make sure your current job is adding relevant software engineering experience to your career.
And for the desirable skills make sure you use Kotlin, you are familiar with functional programming, make sure to use RX java for example, and Reactive overall concept. Make sure you know design patterns, lean architecture, best practices like SOLID principles, make sure to read Clean Code book.

Johann: Good, thanks for your time and detailed advice, Mohamed. Thank you very much.

A special thanks to our partner Egyptian Techies in Berlin for their contributions to this article.

This post is part of a longer series. For more visit us here: https://medium.com/imagine-foundation


Lexical Statistical Machine Translation for Language Migration

A. T. Nguyen, T. T. Nguyen, T. N. Nguyen. FSE 2013

Prior research has shown that source code also exhibits naturalness, i.e. it is written by humans and is likely to be repetitive. The researchers also showed that the n-gram language model is useful in predicting the next token in a source file given a large corpus of existing source code. In this paper, we investigate how well statistical machine translation (SMT) models for natural languages could help in migrating source code from one programming language to another. We treat source code as a sequence of lexical tokens and apply a phrase-based SMT model on the lexemes of those tokens. Our empirical evaluation on migrating two Java projects into C# showed that lexical, phrase-based SMT could achieve high lexical translation accuracy ( BLEU from 81.3-82.6%). Users would have to manually edit only 11.9-15.8% of the total number of tokens in the resulting code to correct it. However, a high percentage of total translation methods (49.5-58.6%) is syntactically incorrect. Therefore, our result calls for a more program-oriented SMT model that is capable of better integrating the syntactic and semantic information of a program to support language migration.


Trump is abusing his power to declassify information and wielding it as a weapon in his ongoing war against the U.S. intelligence community.

In a move described as “stunning,” “unprecedented,” and “corrupt,” the White House announced on Monday that Trump had ordered the declassification of highly sensitive materials from the Russia probe so they can be weaponized and used in the ongoing effort by Trump and his allies to undermine a national security investigation for political purposes.

According to a White House statement, Trump directed the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the Department of Justice, and the FBI to release selective portions of the classified Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application that allowed the FBI to monitor former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page.

Trump also ordered “all FBI reports” prepared in connection with the FISA warrant application to be declassified and released.

In addition, Trump’s order calls for the unredacted release of “all text messages relating to the Russia investigation” from former FBI Director James Comey, former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, former FBI agent Peter Strzok, former FBI lawyer Lisa Page, and DOJ official Bruce Ohr.

All of those people have been targeted by Trump and his allies over the past year because of their roles in the Russia investigation.

The release of personal text messages from the named individuals appears to be yet another abuse of power by Trump aimed at exacting revenge against anyone in a position to hold him accountable, and sending a message to anyone who may try to hold him accountable in the future.

The order by Trump to declassify and release highly sensitive documents is just the latest attempt by Trump and his allies to weaponize the tools of America’s intelligence agencies for the purpose of undermining an active national security investigation to shield Trump from potential legal jeopardy.

Republicans in Congress have been pushing for the release of these documents for months, asserting — without any evidence — that they contain some sort of proof of wrongdoing and bias within the FBI.

Federal officials have granted access to many of the documents, but in other instances they have opted to keep the materials secret to avoid compromising an open investigation or, worse, risking the lives of informants involved in the investigation.

Sen. Mark Warner, ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, warned Monday that Trump “shouldn’t be declassifying documents in order to undermine an investigation into his campaign or pursue vendettas against political enemies. He especially shouldn’t be releasing documents with the potential to reveal intelligence sources.”

As NBC News pointed out, Trump’s order essentially throws these concerns aside and bypasses the standard safeguards in order to give his Republican allies access to the classified information they’ve been seeking in their quest to undermine the credibility of U.S. intelligence agencies.

“The documents Trump is releasing reflect a specific request, down to the page numbers, made by the Republican members of the House judiciary and intelligence committees this summer. Justice and intelligence officials had resisted releasing the information on the grounds that it was too sensitive,” NBC noted.

While Trump and his accomplices in Congress claim they are acting in the interest of transparency, nothing could be further from the truth.

In his order, Trump cherry-picked specific information to release while opting to keep much of it hidden — not out of concern for national security, but out of concern that releasing all of the information would prove that the FBI was, in fact, acting entirely appropriately when it sought a surveillance warrant on Page.

For example, as USA Today investigative reporter Brad Heath noted, Trump ordered the declassification of parts of the FISA application in which the FBI restates Page’s own denials, and other parts in which the FBI describes information they obtained from Christopher Steele, the author of the so-called “Steele Dossier.”

But, Trump chose not to declassify or release sections of the application that “most directly lay out the government’s (and the court’s) basis for believing there was probable cause to find that Page was an agent of a foreign power,” Heath added.

In other words, Trump is demanding that federal officials only release information that can be spun to prop up the false narrative he and his allies have been peddling for well over a year, while refusing to release any information that might reveal the truth.

As former federal prosecutor Renato Mariotti put it, “Trump ordered the release of sensitive information relating to the investigation of himself and his friends for his own political gain. That is corrupt, period.”

This is not the first time Trump and his GOP allies have pushed for the release of sensitive intelligence in their ongoing effort to sabotage the Russia investigation by falsely smearing the U.S. intelligence community.

In fact, Trump’s demand for declassification follows a familiar pattern that started shortly after he took office, when Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) secretly coordinated with the White House to fabricate “evidence” of improper unmasking to support Trump’s lie about the Obama administration “wiretapping” Trump Tower.

Instead, it showed that Trump’s wiretapping story was a lie and that the unmasking of Trump associates was not only done properly, but that it was unquestionably warranted due to the risk posed by incoming national security adviser Michael Flynn’s secret meetings with Russian officials.

This same pattern emerged again when Nunes and his GOP colleagues demanded the release of a memo that they claimed would provide bombshell evidence about the FBI harboring a bias against Trump that tainted the agency’s decision to launch the Russia probe. When the memo was finally released, it proved to be a complete flop that actually debunked the GOP’s own anti-FBI talking points.

Still, Trump’s accomplices in Congress have continued to demand access to more classified information in what can only be described as a desperate attempt to find something — anything — that can be twisted and spun into a false narrative to undermine the Russia investigation and everyone involved with it.

This tactic has failed at every turn. Each time classified information about the Russia probe has been released, the GOP’s disinformation campaign has been further debunked. Moreover, instead of discrediting the FBI and DOJ, all of the classified materials that have been released have proven that the agencies conducted a scrupulous and fair investigation that was sparked by the Trump campaign’s unscrupulous ties to Russia.

Already, the efforts by Trump and his allies to sabotage the ongoing Russia probe have endangered the lives of crucial informants and forced sources in Russia to go dark due to fears of being outed. This will have severe repercussions for national security that may last for years or even decades — but apparently that’s a price Trump is willing to pay to protect himself.

However, it still remains unclear if Trump’s demands will be met — and if they are, it may break the law.

Legal experts have raised concerns that Trump’s order may violate the federal Privacy Act, which protects against the public disclosure of personal information contained in government records.

Furthermore, House Intelligence Committee ranking member Adam Schiff said he was informed by the FBI and DOJ that they would consider the release of these materials “a red line that must not be crossed as they may compromise sources and methods.”

All of this comes at a bad time for Trump, as public opinion is turning sharply against him and in favor of special counsel Robert Mueller. At the same time, the Russia investigation only appears to be gaining steam with a new plea deal from former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort, who agreed to cooperate fully with investigators.

Clearly, Trump’s efforts to sabotage the investigation aren’t having their intended effect. He’s fighting a losing battle, and he likely knows it — which explains why he’s lashing out in such a desperate attempt to destroy the notion of truth before the truth destroys him.

Published with permission of The American Independent.


Tesoro Earnings: Here’s Why Shares are Falling Now

Tesoro Corporation Earnings Cheat Sheet

Results: Net income increased to $27 million ($1.34 per diluted share) in the quarter versus a net loss of $124 million in the year-earlier quarter.

Revenue: Decreased 97.54% to $190 million from the year-earlier quarter.

Actual vs. Wall St. Expectations: Tesoro Corporation reported adjusted net income of $1.34 per share. By that measure, the company missed the mean analyst estimate of $1.37. It missed the average revenue estimate of $6.95 billion.

Quoting Management: “Our solid operating performance allowed us to capture strong crack spreads and report record fourth quarter adjusted earnings per share,” said Greg Goff, President and CEO. “For the full year 2012, we continued to demonstrate our ability to drive fundamental improvements in the business while reporting the highest adjusted earnings in the Company`s history.”

Key Stats (on next page)…

Revenue decreased 97.84% from $8.78 billion in the previous quarter. Net income decreased 90.11% from $273 million in the previous quarter.

Looking Forward: Analysts have a more negative outlook for the company’s next-quarter performance. Over the past three months, the average estimate for next quarter’s earnings has fallen from a profit of $0.95 to a profit $0.93. For the current year, the average estimate has moved down from a profit of $6.73 to a profit of $6.7 over the last ninety days.

(Company fundamentals provided by Xignite Financials.)