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๐ Type A and Type B personality theory
Type A and Type B personality hypothesis describes two contrasting personality types. In this hypothesis, personalities that are more competitive, highly organized, ambitious, impatient, highly aware of time management and/or aggressive are labeled Type A, while more relaxed, less 'neurotic', 'frantic', 'explainable', personalities are labeled Type B.
The two cardiologists who developed this theory came to believe that Type A personalities had a greater chance of developing coronary heart disease. Following the results of further studies and considerable controversy about the role of the tobacco industry funding of early research in this area, some reject, either partially or completely, the link between Type A personality and coronary disease. Nevertheless, this research had a significant effect on the development of the health psychology field, in which psychologists look at how an individual's mental state affects physical health.
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- "Type A and Type B personality theory" | 2014-03-22 | 26 Upvotes 3 Comments
๐ SmartWater โ Anti-theft Asset Marking System
SmartWater is a traceable liquid and forensic asset marking system (taggant) that is applied to items of value to identify thieves and deter theft. The liquid leaves a long lasting and unique identifier, whose presence is invisible except under an ultraviolet black light.
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- "SmartWater โ Anti-theft Asset Marking System" | 2014-03-22 | 12 Upvotes 2 Comments
๐ Exercises in Style
Exercises in Style (French: Exercices de style), written by Raymond Queneau, is a collection of 99 retellings of the same story, each in a different style. In each, the narrator gets on the "S" bus (now no. 84), witnesses an altercation between a man (a zazou) with a long neck and funny hat and another passenger, and then sees the same person two hours later at the Gare St-Lazare getting advice on adding a button to his overcoat. The literary variations recall the famous 33rd chapter of the 1512 rhetorical guide by Desiderius Erasmus, Copia: Foundations of the Abundant Style.
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- "Exercises in Style" | 2014-03-22 | 20 Upvotes 7 Comments
๐ Ballistic Recovery Systems
Ballistic Recovery Systems, Inc. (commonly referred to as BRS Aerospace, or simply BRS) is a manufacturer of aircraft ballistic parachutes.
The company was formed in 1980 by Boris Popov of Saint Paul, Minnesota, after he survived a 400-foot (120ย m) fall in a partially collapsed hang glider in 1975. As a result, Popov invented a parachute system that could lower an entire light aircraft to the ground in the event of loss of control, failure of the aircraft structure, or other in-flight emergencies.
Popov was granted a U.S. patent on 26 August 1986 for the so-called Ballistic Recovery System (BRS) - patent US 4607814 A.
The company has two divisions: BRS Aviation and BRS Defense.
Discussed on
- "Ballistic Recovery Systems" | 2014-03-21 | 43 Upvotes 30 Comments
๐ Indian Ocean garbage patch
The Indian Ocean garbage patch, discovered in 2010, is a gyre of marine litter suspended in the upper water column of the central Indian Ocean, specifically the Indian Ocean Gyre, one of the five major oceanic gyres. The patch does not appear as a continuous debris field. As with other patches in each of the five oceanic gyres, the plastics in it break down to ever smaller particles, and to constituent polymers. As with the other patches, the field constitutes an elevated level of pelagic plastics, chemical sludge, and other debris; primarily particles that are invisible to the naked eye. The concentration of particle debris has been estimated to be approximately 10,000 particles per square kilometer.
A similar patch of floating plastic debris in the Pacific Ocean, the Great Pacific garbage patch, was predicted in 1985, and discovered in 1997 by Charles J. Moore as he passed through the North Pacific Gyre on his return from the Transpacific Yacht Race. The North Atlantic garbage patch was discovered in 2010.
Discussed on
- "Indian Ocean garbage patch" | 2014-03-20 | 92 Upvotes 45 Comments
๐ Rimac Concept One
The Rimac Concept One, sometimes stylized as Concept_One, is a two-seat high-performance electric car designed and manufactured in Croatia by Rimac Automobili. With a total output of 913ย kW (1,241ย PS; 1,224ย hp) and an acceleration time from 0โ62ย mph (0โ100ย km/h) in 2.5 seconds.
The Rimac Concept One was claimed to be the world's fastest accelerating electric vehicle in 2013.
To advertise both Rimac Automobili and Formula E, the Concept One was used as the official zero-emission race director's car during the first season of Formula E championship in 2014.
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- "Rimac Concept One" | 2014-03-16 | 69 Upvotes 39 Comments
๐ Namecoin
Namecoin (Symbol: โ or NMC) is a cryptocurrency originally forked from bitcoin software. It is based on the code of bitcoin and uses the same proof-of-work algorithm. Like bitcoin, it is limited to 21 million coins.
Namecoin can store data within its own blockchain transaction database. The original proposal for Namecoin called for Namecoin to insert data into bitcoin's blockchain directly. Anticipating scaling difficulties with this approach, a shared proof-of-work (POW) system was proposed to secure new cryptocurrencies with different use cases.
Namecoin's flagship use case is the censorship-resistant top level domain .bit, which is functionally similar to .com or .net domains but is independent of ICANN, the main governing body for domain names.
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- "Namecoin" | 2014-03-16 | 150 Upvotes 51 Comments
๐ Edmund Thomas Clint
Edmund Thomas Clint (19 May 1976 โ 15 April 1983) was an Indian child prodigy known for having drawn over 25,000 paintings during his short life of less than seven years.
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- "Edmund Thomas Clint" | 2014-03-14 | 35 Upvotes 15 Comments
๐ List of aerial disappearances
This list of missing aircraft includes all of the aircraft that have disappeared in flight for reasons that have never been definitely determined. According to Annex 13 of the International Civil Aviation Organization, an aircraft is considered to be missing "when the official search has been terminated and the wreckage has not been located". However, there still remains a "grey area" on how much wreckage needs to be found for a plane to be declared "recovered". This list does not include every aviator, or air passenger that has ever gone missing as these are separate categories.
In the tables below, each missing aircraft is defined (in the Aircraft column) using one or more identifying features. If the aircraft was known by a custom or personalized name (e.g. Pathfinder), that name is presented first (in italics) followed by the aircraft type (in parentheses). The make of aircraft, although not necessarily a unique identifier, is also provided where appropriate. Aircraft registrations began to be used in the early 20th century for individual identification, so this is also included in the later tables (in parentheses).
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- "List of aerial disappearances" | 2014-03-11 | 12 Upvotes 7 Comments
๐ Khalid El-Masri
Khaled El-Masri (also Khalid El-Masri and Khaled Masri, Levantine Arabic pronunciation: [หxaหlษชd elหmษsหคษพi, -หmษsหคษพe], Arabic: ุฎุงูุฏ ุงูู ุตุฑูโ) (born 29 June 1963) is a German and Lebanese citizen who was mistakenly abducted by the Macedonian police in 2003, and handed over to the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). While in CIA custody, he was flown to Afghanistan, where he was held at a black site and routinely interrogated, beaten, strip-searched, sodomized, and subjected to other cruel forms of inhumane and degrading treatment and torture. After El-Masri held hunger strikes, and was detained for four months in the "Salt Pit", the CIA finally admitted his arrest and torture were a mistake and released him. He is believed to be among an estimated 3,000 detainees whom the CIA abducted from 2001โ2005.
In May 2004, the U.S. Ambassador to Germany, Daniel R. Coats, convinced the German interior minister, Otto Schily, not to press charges or to reveal the program. El-Masri filed suit against the CIA for his arrest, extraordinary rendition and torture. In 2006, his suit El Masri v. Tenet, in which he was represented by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), was dismissed by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia, based on the U.S. government's claiming the state secrets privilege. The ACLU said the Bush administration attempted to shield its abuses by invoking this privilege. The case was also dismissed by the Appeals Court for the Fourth Circuit, and in December 2007, the United States Supreme Court declined to hear the case.
On 13 December 2012, El-Masri won an Article 34 case at the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. The court determined he had been tortured while held by CIA agents and ruled that Macedonia was responsible for abusing him while in the country, and knowingly transferring him to the CIA when torture was a possibility. It awarded him compensation. This marked the first time that CIA activities against detainees was legally declared as torture. The European Court condemned nations for collaborating with the United States in these secret programs.
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- "Khalid El-Masri" | 2014-03-11 | 19 Upvotes 3 Comments