Conferencia Utopías
Imparte: Nigel Helyer
Miércoles 25 de noviembre, 13: 00 hrs.
Lugar: sala de usos múltiples, Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado (ENPEG), “La Esmeralda”
Entrada libre

Nigel Helyer (Australia) es escultor y artista sonoro, director del equipo multidisciplinario Sonic Objects en el que ha llevado a cabo diversos proyectos de instalaciones escultóricas y sonoras de gran escala, piezas de arte público y obras con el uso de nuevos medios con un marcado acento interdisciplinario. En su trabajo relaciona una amplia plataforma de prácticas artísticas con la investigación científica en contextos industriales y académicos. Entre sus proyectos se encuentran Sonic Landscapes en colaboración con Dolby Australia, Wireless House, obra comisionada por la ciudad de Sydney y una escultura de audio con energía solar para la Macquarie University Helyer. Es director artístico de Audio Nomad Research Group y co-fundador de la Sound Culture Organization. Actualmente se encuentra en México realizando un proyecto con el apoyo del Centro Multimedia del CENART y la ENPEG.

This post is based on a true story … really!

There was an elderly, widowed 9th grade algebra teacher in Alabama, who, as a result of the years and the students she had to put up with, became convinced that she was an equilateral triangle.  When she was cornered, she always looked for a new angle, in her own way of circular thinking she could never measure up. She treated everyone equilaterally, until someone called her a square. Although this may have been an acute observation, it was not right. The Pythagorean who made this accusation did not realize that it was actually an obtuse theorem. The teacher was put on a plane, sent away and committed for her polygonous belief. Many thought that being institutionalized would scalene down her parallelanoia, however, it must have been geometrically impossible to solve that equation. To sum up … there is good news and bad news. The good news is that this teacher was cured of believing she was a triangle. The bad news: in a special, isoscelestic, 180° turn, she now thinks she is trapped inside a triangle. Does that mean that she is trapezoid?

Note: Puns have been added to protect the insanely and algebraically innocent.

Artwork by Lauren.

This grudge of time is ratio only
As I want some other time to be
Present and the little minutes of ‘happier,’ or just
“not right now,” filtering through my
Spindley little fingers, just as if to say ‘they’re mine.’

Gradient from wall to vision, cannot shorten,
Replay or lengthen. The sum component of existing,
Is that we must exist at all, and if
Not existing we
accomplished nothing since
The fall.

Ringrazio l’amico MareaMarea per lo spunto di discussione che parte da questo suo quesito:

” Girando nel sito Tesoro, mi sono imbattuto nella recenzione del Cortes ed in una sua modalità di ricerca………strana che nessun metal ha, e che merita approfondimento!

Vorrei lasciare la parola a Bodhi3, quanto sarà disponibile, per un analisi di questa modalità di ricerca.
A volte metal, ignorati possono nascondere caratteristiche interessanti.!
Quindi dò il via a questa discussione.” (MareaMarea dal forum METALDETECTORPERTUTTI )

Riporto qui alcune informazioni su questa modalità direttamente estratte dal sito della Tesoro:
“The Sum mode is another feature to help identify targets. While the detector is in either the Discriminate or All Metal mode, the display shows the target information from the entire sweep of the coil. Each time the coil passes over the target the microprocessor generates a new target ID reading. While this is nice for general searching, it can be confusing while pinpointing. This is where the Sum mode becomes useful. Pushing the springloaded switch into the Sum mode causes the detector to start a multi-tone ID and averages all of the coil passes over the target. The tone ID has nine different tones and relates directly to the bar graph segments. The higher up on the graph the target is, the higher the pitch of the audio signal. Averaging the coil passes over the target gives the detectorist the ability to get rid of most of the signal noise that prevents making an accurate target identification. Here’s how it works: when the detectorist gets a target signal that he wishes to check out, he pushes and holds the Mode switch in the Sum position. Shortening his coil sweep to only a two or four inch sweep he passes the coil over the target three to seven times. The short multiple sweeps give the microprocessor the chance to sum the passes and average them. During the sweeps the audio ID will start at the lowest signal and will get progressively higher in pitch until there is no more change. When this happens the detector is giving the most accurate ID possible. Then the user can decide if he wants to dig or ignore the target.”

Traduco e adatto velocemente questo testo per i non anglofoni:
“La modalità SUM (Italiano: Somma) è un’altra funzione che può aiutare a identificare i target. Mentre il detector è in modalità DISCRIMINAZIONE o ALL METAL, il display mostra le informazioni del target prendendole dall’intera spazzolata della piastra. Ogni volta che la piastra passa sopra un target, il microprocessore genera una nuova lettura ID del target. Mentre ciò può essere utile durante la ricerca generale, può confondere l’utente quando si usa il pinpoint. Ecco dove la modalità SUM può essere di beneficio. Selezionando con l’interruttore a molla la modalità SUM, diremo al detector di iniziare la procedura di identificazione ID Multitono e di fare “una media” di tutte le passate della piastra sopra il target. L’ID con toni ha 9 suoni differenti che sono collegati direttamente ai segmenti del grafico a barre (N.d.B3. questi segmenti sono relativi alla composizione teorica del metallo… ferro, alluminio, oro, nickel, argento, rame etc. molto comune su tanti metal detector). Più il target si troverà in alto nel grafico, più acuto sarà il suono. Fare la “media” delle passate della piastra sopra il target da all’utente l’abilità di escludere la maggior parte dei segnali di disturbo che impediscono una corretta e accurata identificazione del target. Ecco come funziona: quando l’utente sente un segnale che vuole verificare, premerà e terrà premuto l’interruttore di modalità per attivare il “SUM mode”. A questo punto l’utente dovrà accorciare la propria spazzolata fino ad averla da 2 a 4 pollici (5-10 cm) passando la piastra sopra il target da 3 a 7 volte. Le multiple spazzolate “corte” daranno alla CPU del Metal Detector la possibilità di SUM (SOMMARE) le varie passate e di calcolarne la media (N.d.B3….delle identificazioni). Durante le spazzolate i toni ID partiranno dal livello più basso e diventeranno progressivamente più acute fino a quando non ci saranno ulteriori variazioni. Quando ciò accadrà, il detector ci starà mostrando l’ID più accurato possibile. A questo punto la scelta di scavare o meno ricade sull’utente”.

Funzione interessante anche se non proprio esclusiva del Cortes. Almeno non completamente.
Non so se altri metal implementino funzioni tipo questa ma il mio DFX direi di si. Il suo Signagraph (praticamente una specie di spettrogramma del segnale rilevato) può essere impostato in modo che i valori (barrette verticali) vengano mostrati sotto forma di media-valori. Ciò permette di “smussare” la naturale dispersione pseudo-casuale dei valori che sono legati alla presenza di ferro nel terreno “raggruppando” i segnali più intensi.

Mi spiego meglio… (anche se chi è stato così masochista da leggere i miei vecchi post riconoscerà concetti già trattati)

Quando la nostra piastra passa sopra al terreno dove c’è un oggetto ferroso o anche un oggetto non-ferroso ma magari inquinato da ferrite o vicino a altri oggetti di ferro, non è detto che la segnalazione ID sia proprio netta, precisa e inequivocabile come FERRO. Spessissimo la segnalazione di oggetti più o meno ferrosi si manifesta come un ventaglio apparentemente casuale di valori che possono spaziare da VDI estremamente ferrosi fino a VDI estremamente non ferrosi.
Questo ovviamente è il caso più estremo ma non il meno frequente. Altrettanto spesso la dispersione di valori non è così ampia ma è comunque abbastanza “larga” da lasciarci perplessi se scavare o meno. Giova ricordare un concetto che è stato trattato da poco relativamente all’uso della discriminazione. Più ampia è la dispersione di valori, maggiore è la possibilità che questi “cadano nel trappolone” della discriminazione rendendo la segnalazione ancora più dubbia.

Siamo al concetto fondamentale:

“L’applicazione di una media permette di “restringere” queste dispersioni intorno al valore con segnale più forte.”

Ciò ha dei pro e dei contro:

PRO:
1) Ci aiuta a capire più facilmente quale POTREBBE essere il vero ID del nostro target
2) Stringendo la dispersione dei valori, le possibilità di “cascare nel trappolone” della discriminazione diminuiscono e quindi avremo un suono più netto e preciso.
3) E’ un sistema ottimo per combattere gli effetti nefasti dell’inquinamento da ferro. Ci permette alcune volte di “domare” situazioni che ci farebbero altrimenti impazzire per il numero di falsi segnali.
CONTRO:
1) Dato che si tratta pur sempre di una media, perderemo sia informazione qualitativa che quantitativa. “POTREBBE ESSERE non significa E’ ASSOLUTAMENTE CERTO”
2) Se ci sono due oggetti vicini, l’uso della funzione SUM ci fa perdere in sensibilità e difficilmente riusciremo a distinguere i due target proprio perché il metal continuerà a calcolare una media dei valori dei due oggetti.

Molto carina la funzione audio del Cortes che aumenta il tono dell’ID fino ad indicare quello più probabile in base al procedimento indicato sopra. Pur non avendolo mai provato dal vivo, non mi dispiacerebbe affatto poterlo avere anche sul mio. Il Minelab ETRAC ha un qualcosa di simile con il famoso PITCH HOLD ma quest’ultimo è relativo al suono di soglia e non ai suoni di discriminazione.

Happy (x+y)/2 Hunting!

Bodhi3

Time for yet another episode of the ‘What Have I been reading’-lists I’ve been keeping. I use a little booklet for this, and I’m already dreading the day that the book is full. Most of it is written in pencil, so that I could erase it, but maybe I’ll just make a 900 pages long notebook myself, in which I meticulously keep listed what I’ve read in my life. My children, or my parents, my friends will find this list one day, thinking that I spent too much time reading and too little time living. But They don’t know that that’s just the same. By the way, no Amazon links this time, cause i think you all should start to buy at your independent or secondhand bookstores. Go for it guys.

David Eagleman – Sum

This is one of the best books I read this year, I think. Eagleman, a neuroscientist and writer, comes up with 40 short tales (microfiction it is called) about how the afterlife would be. Especially the first ones made me gasp for air, admiring the great train of thoughts Eagleman is taking in all these little stories. On his website you can read a few sample stories. They are not all as great, and I think I read the book in a too short time. You should be able to just read one story a week, so you’ll be amazed for forty weeks. I tried to keep it to 3 stories a day, but ended up finishing it faster than I could.

Richard Brautigan – The Abortion

A story from the sixties about a man who works in a library for unwanted books, hooks up with an unwanted writer, gets her pregnant, and they decide to have an abortion in Mexico. The plot is a perfect recipe for melodrama, but Brautigan, the hippie that he was, makes into this sweet love story. There is this lack of tension, which makes it a good in-between read, but I’m not sure if Brautigan will ever become my favorite sixties writer (he has to compete with people like Vonnegut and Tom Robbins)

Paul Auster – Timbuktu

I’m a big Auster fan, and this was one of the few books i hadn’t read yet, but it quite disappointed me. I love the beginning, when Mr. Bones is still around his excentric boss, Willy Christmas, whose job it is to spread the merry Christmas thought, after Santa Claus himself told him too. I loved the hobo monologues. But then Willy Christmas disappears from the story, and you get this tale of a dog looking for a new home. It was just too much a disney story to me. It hadn’t the same depths like other Auster books. The main character being a scruffy dog just didn’t work for me. I can remember I felt the story had a bit a too much constructed plot, just because you’re dealing with a dog here. Making the dog able to understand people? It’s a bit too easy.

Alex Robinson – Box Office Poison

This was my Graphic Novel portion for this month – I have no graphic novel buying frenzy planned for the following weeks, so there probably won’t be one in my next list, though you never know off course how much i break my own promises – but boy did I love it. It wasn’t too alternative underground this time, although it still had this typical American “look at me, cause I’m neurotic feel to it”. Box office poison deals with the life of twenty-somethings in New York, growing up; It was like a more serious version of Friends in a way. One of the main characters is a comic book artist (see, it’s all self-indulgent), and ends up working for this guy who invented a famous super hero, but doesn’t get the recognition for it. But it’s also about friendship, relationships… really nice one…

Hugo Claus – Friday

Hugo Claus is supposed to be one of the finest writers to have ever lived in Belgium, the one Belgian writer ever been named for the Nobel prize, but I never had read something from him before. Excuse me: I had tried, but put the book away after 10 pages, cause it bored the hell out of me. Friday was okay, because it was a play, and because it was short. It’s about this man who returns from prison where he has been because he supposedly sexually harassed his own daughter. His wife in the meantime got pregnant from the man’s best friend. The emotional relationships between those three characters, the doubt about the guilt or innocence from the father..it was quite interesting. But there are so many referrings to a world in Flanders that no longer exists, that it also seemed archaic… I guess that most people nowadays will think this is just out of time.

Magnus Mills – The Scheme for Full Employment

Magnus Mills is a British writer, who is writing about absurd situations. Not very high-brow literature, but just a writer who likes to amuse his audience. I read a few books of him, and quite liked this one. It’s about the Plan, a sort of government business that involves people riding down in vans from one storage place to another, being on very tight time schedules. People that are part of the plan get payed good, have job security. But then there is this feud about the time schedules, and everything starts crumbling down. Witty stuff.

Mario Reading – The New Prophecies of Nostradamus

I’m interested in the obscure, and Nostradamus has fascinated me. But,  I also think it’s a lot of bollocks. Mario Readings thinks it’s not and tried to interpret quite a few of Nostradamus’ predictions. I bought this book from a friend who works in a secondhand bookstore, and texted her just a few hours later that this is probably the worst book I’ve ever read in my entire life (well, no..nothing beats Siloam in Dutch translation) . You see, Mario Reading’s readings are laughably far-fetched. He connects dots by pulling a curly line from point A to point Q, to end up at point B. If he reads about burning suns, he’ll look up some sort of mythology, going from Egyptian to Persian mythology, and then come up with an interpretation that makes me think the writer’s a bit schizophrenic. This book got released in 2006, and the fact that every interpretation thus far, is completely wrong, proves my point. Don’t buy this junk.

Michel Tournier -The Ogre (book cover is in Dutch, exactly like the book I have)

Classic of the month. Don’t know how I do it, but I always end up reading at least one novel that is part of world literature a month. Anyway, this one definitely deserves to be there. It’s perhaps quite the dramatic, baroque and intellectual – with all the cultural references – story, but it touches a strange nerve that only classics are able to touch. I don’t know. These books have proven themselves, and though the status of this book is probably not that big in Anglosaxon parts of the world, it is also a book of a certain status. The story is quite hard to just put into a few words, but it’s about this man Tiffauges, who has his own garage on the dawn of World War 2, but has this urging sense of some sort of holy mission in his life. I don’t wanna spoil the rest of the story, but the outcome seems to be quite gruesome. It’s an allegory about the dark sides of life, without even realizing it until you finish it.

Brian Evenson – The Wavering Knife

This guy was on my list for a long time, as many others, but I finally decided to buy a copy of one of his books. Based upon reviews I read about other works of him, I had suspected more something in the line of Chuck Palahniuk, but Evenson is gruesome in a different way. He has this aura of intellectuality over him, which i like at times, and deals not so much with typical american themes. That being said, some of his stories are hilarious, e.g. the one where a disgruntled German man writes an essay about a travel guide his grandfather has written about mexico. He’s raving about the poor English translation by this American writer, but it turns out the English book isn’t even close to a translation. It’s a different book all together. Very nice one. Really makes me wanna read one of his novels.

Ian McEwan – Amsterdam

A modern classic perhaps, but one that didn’t appeal to me that much. Just up until the ending, when I decided that i was curious enough to read it all the way to the end. Here, the artifial atmosphere of intellectuality quite bothered me. An editor-in-chief of a news paper, a classical composer… I normally don’t care about jobs and lives, but I always have a hard time if books have characters of a certain standing (That’s why victorian novels don’t appeal to me at all). That being said, I think the book had some interesting themes, and the ending was quite surprising. I just think it would’ve worked better as a short story though.

Things I am reading now, but haven’t finished yet, are: Roland Topor, Daniil Charms and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible Man. Enjoying all three of them.

See you next time.

Excel is great program once you learn how to use it. It can very stressful when you cannot understand what functions to use in Excel. By now, you probably may have guessed that this next assignment was created using Excel. I was given a class list with marks from labs, midterms, quizzes, and finals. Here, I was required to use the functions: SUM, AVG, VLOOKUP, COUNTIF, and IF and graph the information. Many of these functions were nested. Conditional formatting was mandatory to help determine which students had failed or passed.

Click on image to enlarge

Quem nunca faz esse algoritmo pra somar os primeiros 100 naturais né…
geralmente fazemos um loop e vamos somando a cada iteração, bom em python podemos fazer isso de uma maneira muito mais simples, simples assim:
sum(range(1, 101))

Dificil né…
bom range cria uma lista com a sequencia dada…
e sum soma os valores de uma lista…

abraços

Marcio

Hace dos mil años, el alarde más orgulloso era “civis romanus sum”. Hoy, en el mundo de la libertad , el alarde más orgulloso es “Ich bin ein Berliner” (…) Todos los hombres libres, dondequiera que vivan, son ciudadanos de Berlín y, por tanto, como hombre libre, me enorgullezco en las palabras ”Ich bin ein Berliner!”.

Disini saya mencoba untuk membuat kasus sesuai dengan panduan Excel, yaitu mengolah data secara sederhana dengan menggunakan Formula Sum, Avg, Max, Min dan Count. Hasil dari data tersebut juga akan diaplikasikan dalam bentuk Grafik, yaitu Grafik Batang dan Pie.

Berikut capture screen untuk dapat dilihat. Untuk lebih jelasnya Anda bisa men-download di sini.

Excel

The Excel Sum function will ADD the a range of cells. 
Select the cell where in you want the formula to be entered. (Cell B14)
Next Click on the Sigma  ∑ sign.  The drop down menu will give you a choice of functions - select Sum.
The formula =Sum(value1,[value2]….etc, highlite the section that you want to Add, hit Enter Key.
Or type the formula =Sum(B2:B13)  in the example shown below.

Do not wear matching costumes with your significant other. This special night should celebrate the juxtaposition of unlikely pairs, such as Cleopatra and The Hamburglar or a public option for healthcare and budget surplus.

EXCEPTION: Interracial couples should dress as Michael Jackson across time. Shamon.

Set Functions – COUNT, MAX, MIN, SUM and AVG

Many times the information we require from table doesn’t relate to individual rows but to set of rows. In such case we can use Set functions provided by the SQL Server. These function are COUNT, MAX, MIN, SUM and AVG. Set functions operate on groups of rows.

1. COUNT

The COUNT function returns the rows count in the table.  When used with WHERE clause, only number of rows which satisfy the condition will be returned. The DISTINCT can be used to get the count of rows with unique values.

Example

2. MAX

The MAX function returns the maximum value in the specified column. The MAX function can also be used as the part of sub-query.

Example

3. MIN

The MIN function returns the minimum value in the specified column. The MIN function can also be used as the part of sub-query.

Example

4. SUM

The SUM function adds up the values in a specified column. The column must be of one of numeric data types. The DISTINCT can be used to get the sum of only unique values.

Example

5. AVG

The AVG function returns the average of all the values in the specified column. As with SUM function, the column must be of one of numeric data types. The DISTINCT can be used to get the average of only unique values.

Example

Good Luck!

بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

إيجاد مجموع عدة قيم عملية متكرره الإستخدام فى ورقة العمل وحينها نستخدم الدالة SUM ولكن فى كثير من الأحيان نرغب فى حساب مجموع عدة قيم وفقاً لشرط محدد حينها نستخدم الدالة SUMIF؛ فى هذا الموضوع سأوضح كيفية حساب مجموع القيم الموجبة فقط ضمن مجموعة من القيم الموجبة والسالبة.

مثال: فيما يلى مجموعة من القيم الرقمية التى نريد حساب مجموع القيم الموجبة بها فقط

فى الخلية التى نريد إظهار مجموع القيم الموجبة بها نستخدم المعادلة التالية

تفسير المعادلة السابقة
» A1:A9 هو النطاق الذى يشتمل على القيم الرقمية
» “<="&0 تمثل الشرط الذى وفقاً له ستتم عملية الجمع مع ملاحظة أنه يمكن الإستغناء عن علامة (&) وإدخال القيمة (0) بين علامتى التنصيص لتصبح المعادلة كالتالى (مع الحصول على نفس النتيجة)

النتيجة النهائية

فى رعاية الله

Yes, being constantly connected to teh interwebs has brought on some form of ADD. Therefore it is quite rare for me to sit down and read a book these days (unless it’s about teh interwebs). Who has time to wade through a few hundred pages in teh off chance of being mentally-stimulated or experience something touching and beautiful when one can find out what’s trending in Dublin right now?

So it is with great relief that I can say that not only have I read an actual real book again, but it totally captured my imagination and I have to share.

David Eagleman’s Sum consists of 40 very brief descriptions of what the afterlife might be. In one version of the afterlife, we find ourselves accompanied only by people we know. We soon tire of being unable to meet strangers. In another, it turns out that our creators are have brought us back from life in order to ask us: “Do you have answer?”. Another version of the afterlife has all of the beings that have at some point in history been worshipped. They are now forgotten, marginalised and bored and we tiptoe around them oblivious of their previous glory.

This gem of a book is not one of those awful self-help things nor is it New Age gubbins. ‘Heaven’ is present in many of these tales, but the plurality of alternative afterlives reflects the fact that we no longer have to (can?) accept a prescribed or authoritative version of what comes next.

Here is a reading of the first and titular tale from the book. In this version of the afterlife, you live your life again, but instead of having events spread out, you experience everything one at a time. So, you spend 30 years sleeping soundly and two minutes thinking that you are falling etc etc. (The extract’s only a couple of minutes long.)

Each tale is similarly brief, witty and thought-provoking in a secular, modern way. I haven’t thought as much about existence and meaning since I was an annoying Philosophy undergrad.

Highly-recommended.

This week, I’m talking you about a little identity that crops up often in the study of algorithms and which isn’t found in formula compendia—anyway, none that I have. I’m talking about this function:

This is a variation on the Gabriel’s Staircase function that does not have an infinite number of terms. Let us solve it without supposing that .

Let’s warm up by solving a similar function (which will be instrumental later on), the sum . This is known as the geometric series. Put:

and

Let us combine the two:

This is a telescoping sum and terms mostly cancel each other out:

and finally:

There, we’re done for this one. Reversing into is allowed because we multiply both the numerator and the denominator by (thus the whole expression by , so it doesn’t change its value).

Now, back to our main concern, the truncated staircase. Put:

and

So you’re guessing right, we’ll use the same overall trick as we did for the geometric series. Quite so!

then

After much pericombobulations, we, at last, get our solution:

*
* *

Despite all the work, only basic algebra is needed to obtain the desired expression, and, well, a lot of patience. We also note that a difficulty arises when . The denominator is zero, which is bad. But fortunately, is 1, so we have:

which is a sum you should already know:

*
* *

A few friends of mine decided to return to school—well, the university, that is. And all of them have to take (or retake) math classes to enroll in their programs. They’re not all at the same level, but they’re quite decided and working hard to get there. However, I do hear complaints now and then and it’s mostly about how bad introductory-level textbooks are. In one book my friend Vincent showed me, a suddenly becomes a , altering the derivation of the solution in ways that are more tragic than funny. I guess college-level textbooks do not all get that much of a scrutiny before release.

Another complaint I hear is how things are derived. While it may be perfectly acceptable in an advanced textbook to simply state that and move on as you expect your readers to be able to take 5 or 10 minutes to obtain the result by themselves, that’s not something you can do too often in an introductory- or college-level textbook because, guess what, you’re teaching math to people that may not know enough math to know beforehand what’re you’re trying to teach them. Wait, what?

Clear, step by step, derivations of equations are sometimes necessary, and not always for college-level textbooks. Some authors are notoriously vague in derivation. Sentences like “it naturally follows” are proverbially antinomic.

Imorse (22 okt) var Mohammed Amin Kharraki, ordförande för Sveriges Unga Muslimer och Anna Waara, ordförande för Svenska Muslimer för Fred och Rättvisa på SVTs Gomorron Sverige. Igår (21 okt) publicerades också Anna Waaras debattartikel på SVD rörande islamofobin som SD sprider.

Titta på diskussionen i morgonsoffan, den är kvar t.o.m 29 oktober står det.
Jag lägger in en ny länk efter det datumet i detta inlägg om jag finner den publicerad på annat håll.

Anna som konverterade till Islam för ett par år sedan och därefter började bära slöja svarar på frågan om  vad hon märkte för skillnad efter att hon började med slöjan:
Jag hade en väldigt fin bild av Sverige som tolerant och öppet. Men när jag tog på mig sjalen var det som om jag inte tillhörde samhället längre.  Jag får fortfarande frågor nästa dagligen om vilket land jag kommer ifrån. Och jag är född och uppvuxen här. Så det är som om jag inte är en del av samhället längre.

Mohammed Amin svarar angående att många politiker inte vill ta  denna debatt med SD:
Jag tror att många politiker inte vill ta den på grund av att dom inte kan ta en riktig ställning i den. Alltså, jag tror att någon stans har man sagt som nu tillexempel att ‘ja, vi tar öppet avstånd från Sverigedemokraterna’, men vi behöver inte bara ta avstånd från Sverigedemokraterna, vi behöver ta det från deras politik och från deras retorik i första hand, som många av de i sin politik nu har börjat använda. Och det är där faran ligger.

Något jag starkt känner igen är det Anna  berättar kring oliktänkande muslimska  grupper som per automatik i median och i folkmun upplevs representera alla enskilda muslimer också:
Och det är lite typiskt också att man som muslim får stå till svars för sånna företrädare. Medan jag som svensk kvinna innan jag var muslim, en icke-muslimsk svensk kvinna, inte behövde stå till svars för vad svenska företrädare eller kvinnor gjorde.

• 

  is this racist?

• you will need:
• 1 cup cabbage, finely chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 lb shrimp, peeled, deveined and finely chopped
• 1/2 lb lean pork, ground
• 1 tablespoon light soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon rice wine, sherry or white wine
• 1/2 tablespoon green onion, chopped
• 1/2 tablespoon sesame oil
• 1 teaspoon fresh ginger, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 32 wonton wrappers (usually 1 pkg)
• 1/8 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup chicken stock

DIPPING SAUCE

• 1 tablespoon light soy sauce
• 1/2 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ginger, minced

• 

  apparently the other picture was racist

Directions

1. 1

   Sprinkle salt over the shredded cabbage and let stand for 5 minutes, then squeeze out liquid.

2. 2

   Squeeze out any liquid from the shrimp.

3. 3

   Mix cabbage, shrimp, pork, soy, wine, onion, oil, ginger and garlic (filling can be mixed and refrigerated for up to 6 hours in advance).

4. 4

   On each wrapper (keep them covered with a damp cloth so they do no dry out) place about 2 tsp of the mix and seal the edges, use a bit of water on the edge, try to press out all the air and ensure they are tightly sealed (At this point you can freeze them individually on a cookie sheet and them place in a plastic bag. They will keep for a month. Defrost in fridge before continuing).

5. 5

   In 2 large skillets heat 1 tbsp oil, fry 16 dumplings for 1 minute or until golden on one side add 1/4 cup of stock into the pan, reduce heat to low, cover and cook, without turning for about 7 minutes or until the dumpling is translucent and most of the liquid has evaporated Uncover and on higher heat cook for another 5-7 minutes or until the bottoms are dark brown, drain put on a platter and keep warm.

6. 6

   Repeat for the remaining 32 dumplings.

7. 7

   Mix the dipping sauce and serve with warm or hot dumplings.

You can do it too, in only 9 easy steps!

Step 1: BE in Uzbekistan(perhaps the hardest part). Take out US Dollars from the bank.

Step 2: GO to the obscure and god-forsaken border post of Yallama on the Kazakh border.

Step 3: LEARN from a snippy Uzbek customs official that you cannot leave the country with more dollars than you arrived with. Act distressed and confused.

Step 4: WALK back into the town of Yallama and change your $500 into 900,000 Uzbek Sum. Keep in mind the smallest bill in Uzbekistan is 1000 sum. You will need a bag or considerable space in your bag.

Step 5: CROSS the border into Kazakhstan and explain to Kazakh customs officials why your bag resembles that of a drug smuggler’s in bad Russian. The more confusing and incoherent your explanation, the more likely the guard will lose patience and let you through.

Step 6: TRAVEL to the next city that is of any consequence whatsoever (Shymkent).

Step 7: CHANGE your Uzbek sum in Shymkent, one of the only places where it’s possible to exchange sum.

Step 8: RECEIVE a terrible exchange rate, since no one wants your ragged satchel of sum. Kindly smile and take your 54,000 Kazakh tenge (~$360).

Step 9: LAMENT.

Why must it be this way?

I did actually get a copy of the book: Sum – forty tales from the afterlives by David Eagleman and am enjoying it. It really is not the kind of book, however, that you sit and read straight through. You more revisit it from time to time. Each tale tends to be between 1-4 pages and are pretty, sharp little narratives on possibilities in the afterlife. There are an awful lot focused on technologically-saturated scenarios, but Eagleman is after all a neuroscientist.

There are some keen, moral insights; some stark, jarring possibilities generatedin response to human nature.

Here’s only one out of many I found truly interesting. My disclaimer is of course, that I am not intending to use this for commercial purposes, rather to highlight the book and will take it down if it causes any stir:

***************************************************************

Will-o’-the-Wisp

In the afterlife you are invited to sit in a vast comfortable lounge with leather furniture and banks of television monitors. Upon the millions of blue-green glowing screens, you watch the world unfold. You can control the audio coming through your headphones. With a remote control, you can change the angles of the celestial cameras to capture the right action.

So although you’re not part of life on Earth anymore, you can monitor its progress. If you think this coul get boring, you’re wrong. It is seductive. It is spellbinding. You learn how to watch well. You become invested in the outcome of your descendants’ lives. Dozens of intriguing details need to be kept under surveillance. Once you’ve sat down, the monitors command your attention completely.

In theory, you could choose to watch anything; the private activities of single people in their apartments, the unfolding plans of saboteurs, the detailed progress of battlefields.

But, instead, we all watch for one thing: evidence of our residual influence in the world, the ripples left in our wake. You follow the successes of an organization you started or led. You watch appreciative people read the books you donated to your local religious group. You watch an irrepressible girl with pink shoes climbing the maple tree you planted. These are your fingerprints left on the world; you may be gone, but your mark remains. And you can watch it all.

You may as well get comfortable: the stories play out over long time scales. You may choose to monitor the video screen showing your grandson, an aspiring playwright, deep in thought on a park bench, scribbling notes for a scene. In the meantime, waitresses drift by you with carts of sandwiches and coffee, and you only need to leave to sleep at night. When you return in the morning, you swipe your membership card at the security gate and choose a nice seat for the day.

But here’s the rub: everyone’s membership card expires at a different time, and expiration mens no more entry into the video lounge. Those who are excluded mill around outside the building, grousing and kicking at the dirt. Weren’t we good? they ask. Why should we be locked out while others watch?

They, too, want to discover how their contributions guide the course of the world, want to see their grandchildren develop, want to witness the proud future of their family name.

But they don’t know the full story. Locked outside, they miss seeing their organizations lose members. They miss watching their favorite people melt away with cancer. They miss seeing the aspiring playwright amount to nothing and do not have to watch his solitary death as he tries to drive himself to the hospital but draws his last ragged breath on the roadside. They miss the drift of social mores, their great-great-grandchildren changing religions, their lines of genetic descent petering out. They don’t have to watch as Moses and Jesus and Muhammed go the way of Osiris and Zeus and Thor.

Meanwhile, they kick the dirt and protest. They don’t understand they’ve been blessed with insulation from the future, while the sinners are cursed in the blue-green glow of the televisions to witness every moment of it.

******************************************************************

Also I love the last paragraph of the entry titled ” Ineffable“:

A consequence of this cosmic scene may surprise you: when you die, you are grieved by all the atoms of which you were composed. They hung together for years, whether in sheets of skin or communities of spleen. With your death they do not die. Instead, they part ways, moving off in their seperate directions, mourning the loss of a special time they shared together, haunted by the feeling that they were once playing parts in something larger than themselves, something that had it’s own life, something they can hardly put a finger on.

While it can be a morose topic, there are books that handle the topic of life after death with beauty, a sense of humor, some intense introspection. You might check out:

A Brief History of the Dead – Kevin Brockmeier

Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife – Mary Roach

RICHIE MC CAW’S headgear looks like a bathing cap – that was the first thought that crossed my mind when I watched Rugby for the first time. I found the game incredibly funny and terribly confusing as it didn’t make any sense to me at all.

ALL BLACK HAKA: Getting ready for 2011 (pic: ABC)

Rugby is not a big thing in my homecountry (although we actually have a  national team, I recently found out), but after having lived in New Zealand for roughly a year now, I have watched a lot of rugby. It’s still a mystery to me – but I love watching it.

Like many Kiwis, I am all excited about New Zealand hosting the Rugby Worldcup in 2011.

This major sports event is also a great opportunity for the country to draw the world’s attention on it’s positive aspects and to attract tourists from all over the globe.

Tourism NZ’s motto in their marketing campaign is: GIVE IT 100% and they want rugby fans from all parts of the world to experience Rugby as its best when coming to New Zealand in two years time.

One major aspect of their marketing campaign is the giant white rugby ball that has already accompanied the All Blacks in 2008 when touring the UK and Ireland.

Next station on the iconic ball’s journey will be the Tokyo Tower in central Tokyo, where it will open between 28 Ocotber and 3 November 2009 and over 7000 visitors are expected to enter the ball.

This marketing strategy coincidences with the All Blacks vs. Wallabies testmatch, the Japan-NZ Business Council and the Japan-NZ Partnership Forum.

Sounds good so far – New Zealand is represented, the country gets attention, which -hopefully- will result in a boost for the tourism industry and subsequently also for the economy…

BUT – as the Dominion Post reports today - there is also a downside of the story: money.

STANDING TALL: The Eiffel Tower and the giant rugby ball (pic: STUFF)

When the giant ball promoted New Zealand during the Rugby Worldcup 2007 right next to the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, it cost $907,000.

Eight days next to the Tower Bridge in London in 2008: $1.7 million.

Seven days in Tokyo… well, accoridng to the Dominion Post who use figures given to them by Tourism NZ, it would result in a daily sum which would be six times higher than the cost per day in Paris: $2.7 million – to taxpayers’ expenses.

The huge difference in costs in Paris and Tokyo partly comes from the rent for the venue of the ball: while Paris provided rent-free ground to erect the ball, Tokyo charges a rent of $95,000 as it was difficult to find a space big enough for the ball in downtown Tokyo.

- visit the website of the Rugby World Cup 2011

- have a look at NZS’s Rugby Basics

- read the NZ Herald’s latest story on the All Blacks

- visit the website of the NZ Embassy in Tokyo (press release about the giant ball)