November 12, 2013
• Natural-color portrait that is first to show Saturn, its moons and rings, plus Earth, Venus and Mars
• Sweeps nearly 405,000 miles across Saturn and its inner rings
NASA has released a natural-color image of Saturn from space, the first in which Saturn, its moons and rings, and Earth, Venus and Mars, all are visible.
The new panoramic mosaic of the majestic Saturn system taken by NASA's Cassini spacecraft, which shows the view as it would be seen by human eyes, was unveiled at the Newseum in Washington on Tuesday.
Cassini's imaging team processed 141 wide-angle images to create the panorama. The image sweeps 404,880 miles (651,591 kilometers) across Saturn and its inner ring system, including all of Saturn's rings out to the E ring, which is Saturn's second outermost ring. For perspective, the distance between Earth and our moon would fit comfortably inside the span of the E ring.
"In this one magnificent view, Cassini has delivered to us a universe of marvels," said Carolyn Porco, Cassini's imaging team lead at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo. "And it did so on a day people all over the world, in unison, smiled in celebration at the sheer joy of being alive on a pale blue dot."
The mosaic is part of Cassini's "Wave at Saturn" campaign, where on July 19, people for the first time had advance notice a spacecraft was taking their picture from planetary distances. NASA invited the public to celebrate by finding Saturn in their part of the sky, waving at the ringed planet and sharing pictures over the Internet.
An annotated version of the Saturn system mosaic labels points of interest. Earth is a bright blue dot to the lower right of Saturn. Venus is a bright dot to Saturn's upper left. Mars also appears, as a faint red dot, above and to the left of Venus. Seven Saturnian moons are visible, including Enceladus on the left side of the image. Zooming into the image reveals the moon and the icy plume emanating from its south pole, supplying fine, powder-sized icy particles that make up the E ring.
The E ring shines like a halo around Saturn and the inner rings. Because it is so tenuous, it is best seen with light shining from behind it, when the tiny particles are outlined with light because of the phenomenon of diffraction. Scientists who focus on Saturn's rings look for patterns in optical bonanzas like these. They use computers to increase dramatically the contrast of the images and change the color balance, for example, to see evidence for material tracing out the full orbits of the tiny moons Anthe and Methone for the first time.
"This mosaic provides a remarkable amount of high-quality data on Saturn's diffuse rings, revealing all sorts of intriguing structures we are currently trying to understand," said Matt Hedman, a Cassini participating scientist at the University of Idaho in Moscow. "The E ring in particular shows patterns that likely reflect disturbances from such diverse sources as sunlight and Enceladus' gravity."
Cassini does not attempt many images of Earth because the sun is so close to our planet that an unobstructed view would damage the spacecraft's sensitive detectors. Cassini team members looked for an opportunity when the sun would slip behind Saturn from Cassini's point of view. A good opportunity came on July 19, when Cassini was able to capture a picture of Earth and its moon, and this multi-image, backlit panorama of the Saturn system.
"With a long, intricate dance around the Saturn system, Cassini aims to study the Saturn system from as many angles as possible," said Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist based at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Beyond showing us the beauty of the Ringed Planet, data like these also improve our understanding of the history of the faint rings around Saturn and the way disks around planets form -- clues to how our own solar system formed around the sun."
Launched in 1997, Cassini has explored the Saturn system for more than nine years. NASA plans to continue the mission through 2017, with the anticipation of many more images of Saturn, its rings and moons, as well as other scientific data.
The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. JPL designed, developed and assembled the Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras. The imaging team is based at the Space Science Institute, Boulder, Colo.
To view the image, visit: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17172 .
A new version of the collage of photos shared by the public, with the Saturn system as backdrop, is available at: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17679 .
More information about Cassini is available at: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov .
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-329
The first song performed on John Sebastian Presents Folk Rewind (on the PBS series My Music) is not by The Lovin' Spoonful, but an ancient video of Harry Belafonte (the man who gave John Sebastian his first job). Sebastian is the host for this salute to folk music of the past that includes legends of the folk world reunited to sing some of their greatest songs.
Vintage clips of old television and other archived performances begin with The Kingston Trio performing several songs, both humorous and serious ("Where Have All the Flowers Gone?"). The Limelighters are introduced and perform "There's a Meeting Here Tonight," on archival footage, and The Highwaymen perform "Michael, Row the Boat Ashore." With the passing of time and the evolution of folk music, one tends to forget how beautiful these voices were.
Also included in the retrospective are The Serendipity Singers ("Don't Let the Rain Come Down"), The New Christie Minstrels ("Today"), and the incredibly harmonious Brothers Four are seen performing two lost-love songs ("Green Fields" and "500 Miles").
Bobby Darin, wearing the widest lapels this side of Cartoondom, is shown performing "Simple Song of Freedom," the Rooftop Singers perform their hit coffee house song "Walk Right In," and Rod McKuen gives a gentle rendition of "Seasons in the Sun." Fans of 1960's folk music will enjoy seeing Peter, Paul, and Mary ("Lemon Tree"), Trini Lopez ("If I Had a Hammer"), and Pete Seeger and Judy Collins ( "Turn Turn Turn") again.
In the second portion of the show, the performances recorded live for John Sebastian Presents Folk Rewind are as vital as the songs were back in the day. Adding to the enjoyment is the sight of senior citizens…er…I mean "Baby Boomers"… singing along with the performers. The recorded-live segments include The Chad Mitchell Trio ("Mighty Day" and "Blowin' in the Wind"), Jesse Colin Young of the Youngbloods ("Come Together"), Barry McGuire ("Eve of Destruction"), and Roger McGuinn ("My Back Pages" and "Turn Turn Turn") still looking cool.
The one disappointment of the show was that John Sebastian didn't perform. A little bit of "Daydream" is heard over the closing credits and Sebastian strummed a few notes between breaks, but that wasn't enough to satisfy this fan. However, John Sebastian Presents Folk Rewind is a satisfying journey back to a time when there were more important things to protest than being felt up at the airport.
PBS stations will begin showing John Sebastian Presents Folk Rewind on Saturday, November 27, 2010; check local listings for air dates and times.
Native American history stretches back many centuries and continues until the present day. There are many tribes and climates where indigenous populations left their mark in the form of artifacts, traditions and records made by white explorers. Native American history begins before European explorers arrived on American soil and deals with the culture of tribes as far north as modern day Canada, to Indians in Peru and Mexico. Each tribe has its own distinct history and culture, and to learn more about Native American history, it is worthwhile to concentrate on individual tribes.
Native American history covers tribes who built cities and other who subsisted by simple hunting and fishing. Some tribes had quite sophisticated forms of trade, and in later generations, money was used. Other tribes were mainly hunters and gatherers and wished to remain so. Native American history often includes battles between tribes, and the Iroquois were known as effective warriors. However, they included tribes they conquered into their sophisticated political system which included governing many small nations and forming legislative bodies.
When European explorers settled the continent, many tribes who once fought against each other were joined by a common enemy. However, some tribes were so at odds that they joined settlers in a fight against other colonists just to fight a tribe allied with the other side. For instance, during the French and Indian War, tribes chose to side with the British or French based on which tribe was on the opposition. Native American History is rich with such rivalries and alliances.
Native American History includes many unhappy episodes beginning with the European settlers. Many Native Americans died because they had no immunity to the settler's small pox. Some American Indians cooperated with the settlers and others fought them. However, Native American History records tragic events, such as the Trail of Tears, when American Indians were forced to march westward, and many died on the way.
http://www.indians.org/articles/native-american-history.html
Lev Tahor member Yoil Weingarten says the community suddenly left because members felt trapped by the Quebec government. (Radio-Canada)
A youth court judge in Quebec has ordered that 14 children from the ultra-orthodox Jewish sect Lev Tahor be placed temporarily in foster care, undergo medical exams and receive psychological support.
The order also compels the children's parents to turn over their passports.
The hearing, in the St. Jérôme courthouse, took place in the absence of the Lev Tahor parents.
The fathers of those families sent a lawyer instead.
Some 200 members of the group — including about 130 children — fled to the town of Chatham-Kent in rural Ontario with the apparent intention to resettle there.
The judge's decision came after Quebec's youth protection services asked that the 14 children from two families in Lev Tahor be removed from their families and placed in foster homes.
Members of the Lev Tahor community of about 200 people — about half of them children — were under investigation by social services in Quebec for a host of issues, including hygiene, children's health, and allegations that the children weren't learning the Quebec curriculum.
They suddenly fled their home in Ste-Agathe-des-Monts for southern Ontario last week amid those allegations.
Child-welfare authorities and local police in Ontario say they found nothing unusual when they checked in on the Lev Tahor children that fled to that province. The community denies any mistreatment of the children.
Quebec child-welfare officials said on Monday they briefed their counterparts in Ontario on the case and would wait to see how authorities in Chatham-Kent and Windsor, Ont., decide to proceed.
Authorities in Ontario have only said they are aware of the group's presence in the region. The local police said on Tuesday that they checked in on the community and are monitoring the situation.
"An initial assessment of the children's well-being has been conducted with the assistance of the Chatham-Kent Integrated Children's Services and at this time there are no concerns," Const. Renee Cowell of the Chatham-Kent police said in a statement.
The investigation began last winter. Quebec welfare authorities have described the situation for some children as "serious."
The head of youth protection for Quebec's Laurentians region said there were concerns about the health and level of education of the children.
There were claims the homes where the children lived were dirty and littered with garbage and that the children, who are home-schooled, were not capable of doing basic math. Many also spoke neither French nor English.
Quebec officials alleged the situation "establishes a presumption of neglect against children." The Quebec authorities had been working with the group until Nov. 18, when some 40 families left their homes in Ste-Agathe-des-Monts in the middle of the night.
"With the Lev Tahor community moving to Ontario, exchanges have continuously been made by the Quebec welfare office and aid workers in Ontario as well as police in that province," the Quebec organization said in a statement.
The Lev Tahor has denied through spokespeople that the children are being neglected.
Nachman Helbrans, a spokesman for the sect, has said they want to educate their children according to their own religious beliefs and fled to Ontario to avoid Quebec's education system, which "doesn't give freedom of religion as most people understand it."
Helbrans said the move had been in the works for some time.
In a radio interview with Radio-Canada on Tuesday, Quebec Education Minister Marie Malavoy called the situation "sensitive" and one that must be taken seriously.
The Education Department had negotiated with the community over the children's schooling, which is largely religious teaching, in an environment without proper permits.
Malavoy said the government offered compromises over the months but the families chose to leave.
"Our biggest preoccupation is the plight of these children, the well-being of these kids who are caught up in a situation for which they are not responsible," she said.
One expert on sects called the situation complex.
"Part of it is a need to understand how to deal with these kinds of closed groups," said Mike Kropveld, executive director of Montreal-based Info-Cult.
"Dealing with them and then deciding what to do is far more complex than people want to believe or understand."
Kropveld says it is important to act without exacerbating the situation. For example, he said if the leader is perceived as the sole representative of God, that person's power can be enhanced if the intervention of authorities is unsuccessful.
"You can make the group more closed and more extreme," Kropveld warned.
The Lev Tahor, which means "pure heart," came to Canada in 2005 after their spiritual leader, Rabbi Shlomo Elbarnes, was granted refugee status here.
Members of the anti-Zionist group, which opposes Israel and advocates Arab domination in the region, settled in a popular tourist destination in the Laurentian mountains north of Montreal.
Elbarnes, who also goes by the last name Helbrans and is Nachman Helbrans's father, made headlines in the United States in 1994 when he was convicted of kidnapping a teenage boy. The boy was studying under him in Brooklyn.
After serving his sentence, Elbarnes was deported to Israel. He then entered Canada on a temporary visa.
A Federal Court ruling in 2005 upholding Elbarnes's refugee status in Canada found he could not be considered safe in Israel, in part because his "religious belief and opinion are against the mere existence of Israel as an independent country."
One Jewish rights organization called the group extreme and said that no one in the Jewish community — be they traditional or ultra-Orthodox — would view the organization in a positive light.
"This group exhibits cult-like behaviour and is nothing more than a perversion of Judaism," Frank Dimant of B'nai Brith Canada said in a statement.
"We are very much worried about the well-being of the children and have advised the social service and police authorities to ensure that they are properly cared for."
An area from West Montreal to Cornwall, Ont., to upstate New York was reportedly rocked by the sound of a massive explosion at around 8 p.m. Tuesday, but with no immediate evidence of structural damage on the ground, residents began speculating that the boom had come from the cosmos.
"People are reporting a blue flash of light that lasted a couple of seconds and then a loud booming sound. This has the hallmark of a meteor blast," said Andrew Fazekas, a spokesman with the Montreal Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. "It could be anywhere from the size of a living room sofa to the size of a car."
"These stones can be travelling at speeds of up to 50 to 60,000 km per hour when they collide with the atmosphere of earth and at those speeds you would hear a sonic boom as it's zipping across the overhead sky."
As of late Tuesday evening, officials in the Quebec towns of Hudson and St-Lazare, as well as the Surêté du Québec, were flummoxed, leaving residents who heard the noise to wonder on Twitter what happened.
"No one seems to know what it is exactly but a friend described it as a bright blue flash in the sky followed by the sound," wrote Kalina Laframboise.
"It's been heard all over the region but no details," wrote Greg Patterson. "My opinion is that it was a meteor hitting the atmosphere with sonic boom."
Nothing in the weather patterns in the area could be to blame, least of all the snow that began to fall around the same time, an Environment Canada spokesperson said.
Postmedia News, with files from Tristin Hopper, National Post
In his book, Zombie Politics and Culture in the Age of Casino Capitalism, author and scholar Henry Giroux connects the dots to prove his theory that our current system is informed by a "machinery of social and civil death" that chills "any vestige of a robust democracy."
This week on Moyers & Company, Giroux explains that such a machine turns "people who are basically so caught up with surviving that they become like the walking dead – they lose their sense of agency, they lose their homes, they lose their jobs."
What's more, Giroux points out, the system that creates this vacuum has little to do with expanding the meaning and the substance of democracy itself. Under "casino capitalism," the goal is to get a quick return, taking advantage of a kind of logic in which the only thing that drives us is to put as much money as we can into a slot machine and hope we walk out with our wallets overflowing.
A cultural and social critic of tireless energy and vast interests, Giroux holds the Global TV Network Chair in the English and Cultural Studies Department at McMaster University and is a distinguished visiting professor at Reyerson University, both schools in Canada.
Producer: Gina Kim. Associate Producer: Reniqua Allen. Editor: Rob Kuhns.
http://billmoyers.com/segment/henry-giroux-on-zombie-politics/
Giroux's work centers around cultural studies, youth, democratic theory, public education and the politics of higher education. Giroux is familiar with many of those topics due to his decades of experience teaching America's youth, beginning as a high school history teacher in Barrington, Rhode Island in 1968 and working his way through teaching jobs at prestigious institutions like Boston University, Tufts, Northeastern University and serving as the Waterbury Chair in Secondary Education at Penn State University.
Giroux has written over 55 books, including: On Critical Pedagogy (2011), Twilight of the Social: Resurgent Publics in the Age of Disposability (2012), Disposable Youth: Racialized Memories and the Culture of Cruelty (2012), Youth in Revolt: Reclaiming a Democratic Future (2013) and The Educational Deficit and the War on Youth (2013).
His two most recent books are Neoliberalism's War on Higher Education which will be published in December 2013 and The Violence of Organized Forgetting: Thinking Beyond America's Disimagination Machine which will be released the following year.
Giroux is the founder of Truthout's Public Intellectual Project and is a member of its board of directors. In 2012, he was named one of the top public intellectuals changing the way the world thinks by the Toronto Star. Born to a working class family in Rhode Island, Giroux received his doctorate from Carnegie-Mellon in 1977. Today he lives with his wife, Dr. Susan Searls-Giroux, in Ontario, Canada.
Bill Moyers' programs can be seen at this address.
Olde English
Although it has never been established that Robin Hood existed in real life, references to his lore began to appear in 13th century England. The ballad Robin Hood and the Monk, one of the oldest Robin Hood tales, written around 1450 A.D., sets up the classic legend of the hero and his conflict with an unspecified local sheriff. Above is an illustration of Robin Hood's Merry Men by Lucy Fitch Perkins.
The Play's the Thing
The story of Robin Hood has evolved over the centuries. In earlier tellings of the tale, Hood was depicted as a pious yeoman under the reign of an unspecified King Edward. By the 1500s, the hero's timeline paralleled the era of King Richard the Lionheart and the Third Crusade. By 1598, Hood was portrayed as a nobleman in two plays by Anthony Munday, The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington and The Death of Robert Earl of Huntington. In 1895's Runnymede, by William Greer Harrison, Hood clashes with John of Anjou in support of the absent King Richard
Robin Hood, 1922
The legend of the swashbuckling hero got a reset in 1825, when Sir Walter Scott published his epic Ivanhoe. In the book, the hero is known as Robin of Locksley and is first among archers, able to split arrows. By the late 1800s, Robin Hood had become known as a hero of the peasants. Stories depicted him as a noble bandit who robbed the rich to give to the poor. The 1922 movie Robin Hood, starring Douglas Fairbanks Sr., above, was one of the first films made about the hero of Sherwood Forest. One of the era's most expensive productions at nearly $1 million, Robin Hood was the first film to have a Hollywood premiere.
Many Filipino devotees perform religious penance during the week leading up to Easter Sunday as a form of worship and supplication, a practice discouraged by Catholic bishops, but widely believed by devotees to cleanse sins, cure illness and even grant wishes.
"I do this penance out of my free will because I believe that God will help relieve my sickness," Corazon Cabigting, a domestic helper and the only woman in a group of about 50 men carrying wooden crosses on their backs.
Like the men, Cabigting wore a maroon robe and covered her face with a veil, held on her head by a crown of stainless wire, dragging a 30-kg (66-lb) wooden cross and stopping every 500 meters (546 yards) in makeshift roadside chapels.
Elderly women chant the passion of Jesus Christ at some of the chapels, while the penitents, with their hands tied to the cross, are beaten by sticks and hemp.
"Priests often tell us that we should not be doing this," Melvin Pangilinan, an organizer of the annual Lenten ritual who carried cross in his younger days, told Reuters. "But, it has been our tradition for decades and we have to honor it."
In nearby Angeles City, bloody gashes from repeated strikes of whips could be seen on the backs of devotees as they walked barefoot along the streets, believing that their sacrifice would somehow grant salvation for their sins.
Devotees, begin the ritual by tying a rope around their arms and legs and inflicting wounds on their backs with a blade marching for about four to five hours under a scorching sun.
Carlito Santos, a pastor at a local Methodist Church, said the practice cannot be easily relinquished as it has already been embedded in the local culture.
"It is easy to change these religious practices by asking these devotees to refrain from practicing it, but, because of culture and tradition, it does not always work," he said.
Monsignor Pedro Quitorio, spokesman for the Catholic Bishops Conference of the Philippines, said the Church has discouraged the practices, describing them as "inappropriate".
"What happens here is that we want God to grant us what we wish for," Quitorio told Reuters, saying it is enough for true Catholics to pray, fast and give alms during the Lenten season.
Over 80 percent of Filipinos practice the Catholic religion.
(Reporting By Roli Ng, Peter Blaza, Krystine Antonio and Camille Elvina; Writing by Manuel Mogato; Editing by Ed Lane)
MABALACAT, Philippines
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/04/05/us-philippines-religion-life-idUSBRE8340DJ20120405
Kavadi Attam is a dance performed by the devotees during the ceremonial worship of Murugan, the Tamil God of War.[6] It is often performed during the festival of Thaipusam and emphasizes debt bondage. The Kavadi itself is a physical burden through which the devotees implore for help from the God Murugan.[7]
Generally, Hindus take a vow to offer a kavadi to idol for the purpose of tiding over or averting a great calamity. For instance, if the devotee's son is laid up with a fatal disease, he would pray to Shanmuga to grant the boy a lease of life in return for which the devotee would take a vow to dedicate a kavadi to Him.
Devotees like Avinash Gooransingh prepare for the celebration by cleansing themselves through prayer and fasting approximately 48 days before Thaipusam. Kavadi-bearers have to perform elaborate ceremonies at the time of assuming the kavadi and at the time of offering it to Murugan. The kavadi-bearer observes celibacy and take only pure, Satvik food, once a day, while continuously thinking of God.
On the day of the festival, devotees will shave their heads and undertake a pilgrimage along a set route while engaging in various acts of devotion, notably carrying various types of kavadi (burdens). At its simplest this may entail carrying a pot of milk, but mortification of the flesh by piercing the skin, tongue or cheeks with vel skewers is also common.
The simplest kavadi is a semicircular decorated canopy supported by a wooden rod that is carried on the shoulders, to the temple. In addition, some have a small spear through their tongue, or a spear through the cheeks. The spear pierced through his tongue or cheeks reminds him constantly of Lord Murugan. It also prevents him from speaking and gives great power of endurance. Other types of kavadi involve hooks stuck into the back and either pulled by another walking behind or being hung from a decorated bullock cart or more recently a tractor, with the point of incisions of the hooks varying the level of pain.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thaipusam
Shi'ite Muslims from Lebanon to Afghanistan mark Ashura, a day of mourning, celebration and remembrance
An Afghan Shi'ite beats himself with chains and blades in a ritual ahead of the Ashura holiday outside the Abul Fazel Shrine in Kabul, Afghanistan, November 10, 2013.
http://world.time.com/2013/11/14/shiite-muslims-celebrate-ashura/#ixzz2l7cnp3G8
