An interesting piece of WW II history remembered and celebrated in the Czech Republic.
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
Mau Piailug - rest in peace
From The Economist:
In the spring of 1976 Mau Piailug offered to sail a boat from Hawaii to Tahiti. The expedition, covering 2,500 miles, was organised by the Polynesian Voyaging Society to see if ancient seafarers could have gone that way, through open ocean. The boat was beautiful, a double-hulled canoe named Hokule’a, or “Star of Gladness” (Arcturus to Western science). But there was no one to captain her. At that time, Mau was the only man who knew the ancient Polynesian art of sailing by the stars, the feel of the wind and the look of the sea. So he stepped forward.
As a Micronesian he did not know the waters or the winds round Tahiti, far south-east. But he had an image of Tahiti in his head. He knew that if he aimed for that image, he would not get lost. And he never did. More than 2,000 miles out, a flock of small white terns skimmed past the Hokule’a heading for the still invisible Mataiva Atoll, next to Tahiti. Mau knew then that the voyage was almost over.
On that month-long trip he carried no compass, sextant or charts. He was not against modern instruments on principle. A compass could occasionally be useful in daylight; and, at least in old age, he wore a chunky watch. But Mau did not operate on latitude, longitude, angles, or mathematical calculations of any kind. He walked, and sailed, under an arching web of stars moving slowly east to west from their rising to their setting points, and knew them so well—more than 100 of them by name, and their associated stars by colour, light and habit—that he seemed to hold a whole cosmos in his head, with himself, determined, stocky and unassuming, at the nub of the celestial action.
In the spring of 1976 Mau Piailug offered to sail a boat from Hawaii to Tahiti. The expedition, covering 2,500 miles, was organised by the Polynesian Voyaging Society to see if ancient seafarers could have gone that way, through open ocean. The boat was beautiful, a double-hulled canoe named Hokule’a, or “Star of Gladness” (Arcturus to Western science). But there was no one to captain her. At that time, Mau was the only man who knew the ancient Polynesian art of sailing by the stars, the feel of the wind and the look of the sea. So he stepped forward.
As a Micronesian he did not know the waters or the winds round Tahiti, far south-east. But he had an image of Tahiti in his head. He knew that if he aimed for that image, he would not get lost. And he never did. More than 2,000 miles out, a flock of small white terns skimmed past the Hokule’a heading for the still invisible Mataiva Atoll, next to Tahiti. Mau knew then that the voyage was almost over.
On that month-long trip he carried no compass, sextant or charts. He was not against modern instruments on principle. A compass could occasionally be useful in daylight; and, at least in old age, he wore a chunky watch. But Mau did not operate on latitude, longitude, angles, or mathematical calculations of any kind. He walked, and sailed, under an arching web of stars moving slowly east to west from their rising to their setting points, and knew them so well—more than 100 of them by name, and their associated stars by colour, light and habit—that he seemed to hold a whole cosmos in his head, with himself, determined, stocky and unassuming, at the nub of the celestial action.
How well we in Hawaii remember that voyage! When European sailors hugged the coast of the Med, and never ventured much past the Isles of Dogs, (the Canaries) the Polynesians, hundreds of years before Columbus, were sailing the world's biggest ocean. How pale is the English word for the boundless vast "in-finity". A negation! The Hawaiians had two words..."out of sight up" (infinitely big, the ocean) and "out of sight down" (infinitely small, you in your war canoe).
The world's greatest seamen never got around to inventing the wheel (they never had a need for it.) Winds, tides, currents, scents of the land driven out to sea, the stars, the sun, the moon...they could do this. The Hawaiian and Tahitian languages have many similar words.
Lima (hand) = 5 (Hawaiian)
Luna (hand) = 5 (Tahitian)
Lua Lima (two hands) = 10 Hawaiian)
Lua Luna (two hands) = 10 (Tahitian)
In one version from New Guinea the word for "forty" was "mattress"...a man sleeps together with his wife on such. I am not making this up.
Many years ago, our destroyer came upon two women in a small sailboat. We had just come out of the edge of a hurricane which had savaged our home island of Oahu. It had been overcast for an entire week. No stars, no sun, no moon. "Where are we?" semaphored (I love verbing nouns) the women. Our navigator told them where they were withing 100 square feet on the surface of the ocean (this was before GPS...we had it but they didn't.) "Would you like to come aboard for dinner?" our captain asked them. "No thank you, we are sailing around the world and would rather remain aboard our own boat" they replied. "We can ship over fresh fruit, ice cream, whatever you would like" we said. "No thank you very much for our position; we are OK" and they sailed off into the gloom. Modern-day Hawaiians. With a boost from NASA. But still...they were far better sailors than anyone aboard the USS Brewton. Our captain knew this, and we, admiringly, coveted their company for dinner.
Larry
Pi - to 5 trillion digits
http://www.numberworld.org/misc_runs/pi-5t/details.html
The Plouffe formula is very clever but elementary to derive.
The Plouffe formula is very clever but elementary to derive.
A building made in the shape of a Möbius strip
(click picture to read more about this building)
What's next...a Klein bottle hospital??
The Pope in Alaska
The Pope took a couple of days off to visit the rugged mountains of Alaska for some sightseeing. He was cruising along the campground in the Pope-Mobile when there was a frantic commotion just at the edge of the woods. A helpless Democrat, wearing sandals, shorts, a "Vote for Obama" hat and a "Save the Trees" T-shirt, was screaming while struggling frantically and thrashing around trying to free himself from the grasp of a 10-foot grizzly.
As the Pope watched in horror, a group of Republican loggers, wearing "Go Sarah" t-shirts raced up to the commotion. One quickly fired a 44 magnum into the bear's chest. The other two reached up and pulled the bleeding, semi-conscious Democrat from the bear's grasp. Then using long clubs, the three loggers finished off the bear and two of them threw it onto the bed of their truck while the others tenderly placed the injured Democrat in the back seat.
As they prepared to leave, the Pope summoned them to come over. "I give you my blessing for your brave actions!" he told the men. "I had heard that in America there was a bitter hatred between Republican loggers and Democratic environmental activists, but now I've seen with my own eyes that this is not true."
As the Pope drove off, one logger asked his buddies, "Who was that guy?"
"That was the Pope," another replied. "Well," the logger said, "he sure doesn't know squat about bear hunting! By the way, is the bait still alive, or do we need to go back to Massachusetts and get us another one?"
As the Pope watched in horror, a group of Republican loggers, wearing "Go Sarah" t-shirts raced up to the commotion. One quickly fired a 44 magnum into the bear's chest. The other two reached up and pulled the bleeding, semi-conscious Democrat from the bear's grasp. Then using long clubs, the three loggers finished off the bear and two of them threw it onto the bed of their truck while the others tenderly placed the injured Democrat in the back seat.
As they prepared to leave, the Pope summoned them to come over. "I give you my blessing for your brave actions!" he told the men. "I had heard that in America there was a bitter hatred between Republican loggers and Democratic environmental activists, but now I've seen with my own eyes that this is not true."
As the Pope drove off, one logger asked his buddies, "Who was that guy?"
"That was the Pope," another replied. "Well," the logger said, "he sure doesn't know squat about bear hunting! By the way, is the bait still alive, or do we need to go back to Massachusetts and get us another one?"
How fast is the Beacon of Gondor
http://scienceblogs.com/dotphysics/2010/07/how_fast_is_the_beacon_of_gond.php
Around the Civil War [sic], Morse signals from Washington DC could be sent to San Francisco. This is how the news of Lincoln's assassination was dissiminated. Of course when it was raining, you had to wait. Under ideal conditions, it took about a few hours or so.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heliograph
Larry
"Breitbart is a media genius"
From my email inbox:
Andrew Breitbart is a media genius.
He proved it originally with his brilliant handling of the ACORN ‘hooker’ scandal which he skillfully manipulated so that the corrupt media was forced, against its will, to broadcast corruption in one of Obama’s most powerful political support groups. But Breitbart’s handing of that affair is nothing compared to his brilliant manipulation of the Shirley Sherrod ‘white farmer’ scandal.
It all began last Monday, July 22, 2010. As the country watched in horror, Breitbart released a snippet of a tape on his “Big Government” site which showed an obscure black female official of the Dept. of Agriculture laughing to a roomful of NAACP members about how she’d discriminated against a destitute white farmer and refused to give him the financial aid he desperately needed. As she smirked to the room, she’d sent him instead to a white lawyer – ‘one of his own kind’ – for help. The black woman was Shirley Sherrod – and almost immediately she became the center of a firestorm of controversy which exploded throughout the country. Within a day of the release of that infamous tape, the head of the Dept. of Agriculture, spurred on by Obama, demanded – and received – Sherrod’s resignation. Breitbart had won.
But then seemingly Breitbart’s actions began to explode in his face. As Sherrod screamed in protest, FOX News released the entire text of her speech last March to the NAACP. And there on tape Sherrod was shown supposedly repenting of her racism against a white farmer and instead championing his fight to win funds to keep his farm afloat. Within hours of that entire tape being revealed, the entire world turned against Andrew Breitbart. Conservatives throughout the country were enraged that he’d endangered their reputations by releasing a ‘doctored’ tape. Breitbart, they thundered, had dealt a fatal blow to the conservative media. I confess that I also was horrified at what I saw as the clumsiness and stupidity of Breitbart in ‘doctoring’ a tape to make a supposedly innocent woman look guilty. But now I discover I have been as guilty of haste to judgment of Breitbart as the Dept. of Agriculture was of Ms. Sherrod.
Only now am I realizing the real purpose for Breitbart’s release of that tape snippet. It was to allow him to cunningly trick the media into exposing one of the most shocking examples of corruption in the federal government – a little known legal case called “Pigford v. Glickman”.
http://pajamasmedia.com/zombie/2010/07/27/pigford-v-glickman-86000-claims-from-39697-total-farmers/?singlepage=true
“In 1997, 400 African-American farmers sued the United States Department of Agriculture, alleging that they had been unfairly denied USDA loans due to racial discrimination during the period 1983 to 1997.” The case was entitled “Pigford v. Glickman” and in 1999, the black farmers won their case. The government agreed to pay each of them as much as $50,000 to settle their claims.
But then on February 23 of this year, something shocking happened in relation to that original judgment. In total silence, the USDA agreed to release more funds to “Pigford”. The amount was a staggering $1.25 billion. This was because the original number of plaintiffs – 400 black farmers – had now swollen in a class action suit to include a total of 86,000 black farmers throughout America.
There was only one teensy problem. The United States of America doesn’t have 86,000 black farmers. According to accurate and totally verified census data, the total number of black farmers throughout America is only 39,697. Oops.
Well, gosh – how on earth did 39,697 explode into 86,000 claims? And how did $50,000 explode into $1.25 billion? Well, folks, you’ll just have to ask the woman who not only spearheaded this case because of her position in 1997 at the “Rural Development Leadership Network” but whose family received the highest single payout (approximately $13 million) from that action – Shirley Sherrod. Oops again.
http://beforeitsnews.com/story/110/024/Is_There_More_to_Sherrods_Dismissal.html
Yes, folks. It appears that Ms. Sherrod had just unwittingly exposed herself as the perpetrator of one of the biggest fraud claims in the United States – a fraud enabled solely because she screamed racism at the government and cowed them into submission. And it gets even more interesting. Ms. Sherrod has also exposed the person who aided and abetted her in this race fraud. As it turns out, the original judgment of “Pigford v. Glickman” in 1999 only applied to a total of 16,000 black farmers. But in 2008, a junior Senator got a law passed to reopen the case and allow more black farmers to sue for funds. The Senator was Barack Obama.
Because this law was passed in dead silence and because the woman responsible for spearheading it was an obscure USDA official, American taxpayers did not realize that they had just been forced in the midst of a worldwide depression to pay out more than $1.25 billion to settle a race claim.
But Breitbart knew. And last Monday, July 22, 2010, he cleverly laid a trap which Sherrod – and Obama – stumbled headfirst into which has now resulted in the entire world discovering the existence of this corrupt financial judgment. Yes, folks – Breitbart is a genius.
As for Ms. Sherrod? Well, she’s discovered too late that her cry of ‘racism’ to the media which was intended to throw the spotlight on Breitbart has instead thrown that spotlight on herself – and her corruption. Sherrod has vanished from public view. Her ‘pigs’, it seems, have come home to roost. Oink!
Robert W. Fortner
Andrew Breitbart is a media genius.
He proved it originally with his brilliant handling of the ACORN ‘hooker’ scandal which he skillfully manipulated so that the corrupt media was forced, against its will, to broadcast corruption in one of Obama’s most powerful political support groups. But Breitbart’s handing of that affair is nothing compared to his brilliant manipulation of the Shirley Sherrod ‘white farmer’ scandal.
It all began last Monday, July 22, 2010. As the country watched in horror, Breitbart released a snippet of a tape on his “Big Government” site which showed an obscure black female official of the Dept. of Agriculture laughing to a roomful of NAACP members about how she’d discriminated against a destitute white farmer and refused to give him the financial aid he desperately needed. As she smirked to the room, she’d sent him instead to a white lawyer – ‘one of his own kind’ – for help. The black woman was Shirley Sherrod – and almost immediately she became the center of a firestorm of controversy which exploded throughout the country. Within a day of the release of that infamous tape, the head of the Dept. of Agriculture, spurred on by Obama, demanded – and received – Sherrod’s resignation. Breitbart had won.
But then seemingly Breitbart’s actions began to explode in his face. As Sherrod screamed in protest, FOX News released the entire text of her speech last March to the NAACP. And there on tape Sherrod was shown supposedly repenting of her racism against a white farmer and instead championing his fight to win funds to keep his farm afloat. Within hours of that entire tape being revealed, the entire world turned against Andrew Breitbart. Conservatives throughout the country were enraged that he’d endangered their reputations by releasing a ‘doctored’ tape. Breitbart, they thundered, had dealt a fatal blow to the conservative media. I confess that I also was horrified at what I saw as the clumsiness and stupidity of Breitbart in ‘doctoring’ a tape to make a supposedly innocent woman look guilty. But now I discover I have been as guilty of haste to judgment of Breitbart as the Dept. of Agriculture was of Ms. Sherrod.
Only now am I realizing the real purpose for Breitbart’s release of that tape snippet. It was to allow him to cunningly trick the media into exposing one of the most shocking examples of corruption in the federal government – a little known legal case called “Pigford v. Glickman”.
http://pajamasmedia.com/zombie/2010/07/27/pigford-v-glickman-86000-claims-from-39697-total-farmers/?singlepage=true
“In 1997, 400 African-American farmers sued the United States Department of Agriculture, alleging that they had been unfairly denied USDA loans due to racial discrimination during the period 1983 to 1997.” The case was entitled “Pigford v. Glickman” and in 1999, the black farmers won their case. The government agreed to pay each of them as much as $50,000 to settle their claims.
But then on February 23 of this year, something shocking happened in relation to that original judgment. In total silence, the USDA agreed to release more funds to “Pigford”. The amount was a staggering $1.25 billion. This was because the original number of plaintiffs – 400 black farmers – had now swollen in a class action suit to include a total of 86,000 black farmers throughout America.
There was only one teensy problem. The United States of America doesn’t have 86,000 black farmers. According to accurate and totally verified census data, the total number of black farmers throughout America is only 39,697. Oops.
Well, gosh – how on earth did 39,697 explode into 86,000 claims? And how did $50,000 explode into $1.25 billion? Well, folks, you’ll just have to ask the woman who not only spearheaded this case because of her position in 1997 at the “Rural Development Leadership Network” but whose family received the highest single payout (approximately $13 million) from that action – Shirley Sherrod. Oops again.
http://beforeitsnews.com/story/110/024/Is_There_More_to_Sherrods_Dismissal.html
Yes, folks. It appears that Ms. Sherrod had just unwittingly exposed herself as the perpetrator of one of the biggest fraud claims in the United States – a fraud enabled solely because she screamed racism at the government and cowed them into submission. And it gets even more interesting. Ms. Sherrod has also exposed the person who aided and abetted her in this race fraud. As it turns out, the original judgment of “Pigford v. Glickman” in 1999 only applied to a total of 16,000 black farmers. But in 2008, a junior Senator got a law passed to reopen the case and allow more black farmers to sue for funds. The Senator was Barack Obama.
Because this law was passed in dead silence and because the woman responsible for spearheading it was an obscure USDA official, American taxpayers did not realize that they had just been forced in the midst of a worldwide depression to pay out more than $1.25 billion to settle a race claim.
But Breitbart knew. And last Monday, July 22, 2010, he cleverly laid a trap which Sherrod – and Obama – stumbled headfirst into which has now resulted in the entire world discovering the existence of this corrupt financial judgment. Yes, folks – Breitbart is a genius.
As for Ms. Sherrod? Well, she’s discovered too late that her cry of ‘racism’ to the media which was intended to throw the spotlight on Breitbart has instead thrown that spotlight on herself – and her corruption. Sherrod has vanished from public view. Her ‘pigs’, it seems, have come home to roost. Oink!
Robert W. Fortner
Saturday, July 10, 2010
The IRS will be your new healthcare benefits administrator
Tell me again who thought ObamaCare was a good idea?
A must see
A Veteran Puts Kagan to Shame
You must watch this. It is worth every second of your time. We need many more men willing to speak out as he does.
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