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🔗 Physics

An exotic atom is an otherwise normal atom in which one or more sub-atomic particles have been replaced by other particles of the same charge. For example, electrons may be replaced by other negatively charged particles such as muons (muonic atoms) or pions (pionic atoms). Because these substitute particles are usually unstable, exotic atoms typically have very short lifetimes and all currently observed atoms cannot persist under normal conditions.

🔗 France 🔗 Atheism

The Cult of Reason (French: Culte de la Raison) was France's first established state-sponsored atheistic religion, intended as a replacement for Catholicism during the French Revolution. After holding sway for barely a year, in 1794 it was officially replaced by the rival Cult of the Supreme Being, promoted by Robespierre. Both cults were officially banned in 1802 by Napoleon Bonaparte with his Law on Cults of 18 Germinal, Year X.

🔗 United States 🔗 Politics 🔗 Politics/American politics 🔗 Elections and Referendums 🔗 United States/U.S. presidential elections

The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC) is an agreement among a group of U.S. states and the District of Columbia to award all their electoral votes to whichever presidential candidate wins the overall popular vote in the 50 states and the District of Columbia. The compact is designed to ensure that the candidate who receives the most votes nationwide is elected president, and it would come into effect only when it would guarantee that outcome. As of March 2020, it has been adopted by fifteen states and the District of Columbia. Together, they have 196 electoral votes, which is 36% of the Electoral College and 73% of the 270 votes needed to give the compact legal force. Certain legal questions, however, may affect implementation of the compact.

🔗 Physics

In materials science, disappearing polymorphs (or perverse polymorphism) describes a phenomenon in which a seemingly stable crystal structure is suddenly unable to be produced, instead transforming into a polymorph, or differing crystal structure with the same chemical composition, during nucleation. Sometimes the resulting transformation is extremely hard or impractical to reverse, because the new polymorph may be more stable. It is hypothesized that contact with a single microscopic seed crystal of the new polymorph can be enough to start a chain reaction causing the transformation of a much larger mass of material. Widespread contamination with such microscopic seed crystals may lead to the impression that the original polymorph has "disappeared."

This is of concern to both the pharmaceutical and computer hardware industry, where disappearing polymorphs can ruin the effectiveness of their products, and make it impossible to manufacture the original product if there is any contamination. There have been cases of laboratories growing crystals of a particular structure and when they try to recreate this, the original crystal structure isn't created but a new crystal structure is. The drug paroxetine was subject to a lawsuit that hinged on such a pair of polymorphs, and multiple life-saving drugs, such as ritonavir, have been recalled due to unexpected polymorphism. Although it may seem like a so-called disappearing polymorph has disappeared for good, it is believed that it is always possible in principle to reconstruct the original polymorph, though doing so may be impractically difficult. Disappearing polymorphs are generally metastable forms, that are replaced by a more stable form.

It is hypothesized that "unintentional seeding" may also be responsible for the phenomenon in which it often becomes easier to crystallize synthetic compounds over time.

The Hacker's Diet (humorously subtitled "How to lose weight and hair through stress and poor nutrition") is a diet plan created by the founder of Autodesk, John Walker, outlined in an electronic book of the same name, that attempts to aid the process of weight loss by more accurately modeling how calories consumed and calories expended actually impact weight. Walker notes that much of our fat free mass introduces signal noise when trying to determine how much weight we're actually losing or gaining. With the help of a graphing tool (Excel is used in the book), he addresses these problems. Factoring in exercise, and through counting calories, one can calculate one's own total energy expenditure (basal metabolic rate, thermic effect of food, and day-to-day exercise) and cut back calorie intake or increase exercise to lose weight.

🔗 Computing 🔗 Computing/Computer hardware

Viewtron was an online service offered by Knight-Ridder and AT&T from 1983 to 1986. Patterned after the British Post Office's Prestel system, it started as a videotex service requiring users to have a special terminal, the AT&T Sceptre. As home computers became important in the marketplace, the development focus shifted to IBM, Apple, Commodore and other personal computers.

Viewtron differed from contemporary services like CompuServe and The Source by emphasizing news from The Miami Herald and Associated Press and e-commerce services from JCPenney and other merchants over computer-oriented services such as file downloads or online chat. Intended to be "the McDonald's of videotex," Viewtron was specifically targeted toward users who would be apprehensive about using a computer.

Viewtron also offered airline schedules from the Official Airline Guide (OAG), real estate research from Century 21, e-cards from Hallmark, product information from Consumer Reports, educational software from Scott Foresman, online auctions, financial services from American Express and EF Hutton, as well as limited online banking services as part of a research program into the uses and costs of banking online that included 20 US and Canadian banks.

At its height, Viewtron was operated in at least 15 cities by various newspaper companies. After six years of research and an investment reportedly in excess of $50 million, Viewtron never turned a profit, and, despite its developer's forecasts of breaking even in two years, Knight Ridder did not expect it ever would be profitable. AT&T had invested over $100 million in the project, but was forced to write off that investment as part of its court-ordered breakup. Viewtron closed on March 31, 1986, after an attempt by the Independent Commodore Users Group to buy the service failed.

A feature tying Viewtron to local newspapers was envisioned, with printed text instructing users how to access further information online, but it was never implemented.

In 2008, PCWorld magazine named Viewtron to a list of the biggest project failures in information technology (IT) history.

🔗 Medicine

Wake therapy is a form of sleep deprivation used as a treatment for depression. The subject stays awake all night, or is woken at 1AM and stays awake all morning, and the next full day. While sleepy, patients find that their depression vanishes, until they sleep again. Combining this with bright light therapy make the beneficial effects last longer than one day. Partial sleep deprivation in the second half of the night may be as effective as an all-night sleep deprivation session.

Wake therapy is a therapy that falls under chronotherapeutics. Chronotherapy (treatment scheduling) is a process to manipulate biological rhythms and sleep that can help to improve affective disorders quickly.

Wake therapy is beneficial for those experiencing major depression along with unipolar, bipolar, and melancholic types of depression. Wake therapy is best used to jump start the effects of the use of an antidepressant. Wake therapy is the use of prolonged times of wakefulness, along with periods of recovering sleep. It is a fast way to improve symptoms of depression. This therapy is best used with other chronotherapeutic techniques. Months of use of this therapy and other therapies can be quite effective to help prevent relapse of depression.

🔗 Biography 🔗 Computing 🔗 Biography/science and academia

Thomas Preston-Werner (born October 28, 1979) is an American billionaire software developer and entrepreneur. He is an active contributor within the open-source development community, most prominently in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he lives.

He is best known as the founder and former CEO of GitHub, a Git repository web-based hosting service, which he co-founded in 2008 with Chris Wanstrath and PJ Hyett. He resigned from GitHub in 2014 when an internal investigation concluded that he and his wife harassed an employee. Preston-Werner is also the creator of the avatar service Gravatar, the TOML configuration file format and the Semantic Versioning Specification (SemVer)

Preston-Werner lives in San Francisco with his wife Theresa and their sons.

His wife is a former graduate student in cultural anthropology known for her involvement in historical research and social subjects.

🔗 Typography

The Paige Compositor was an invention developed by James W. Paige (1842–1917) between 1872 and 1888. It was designed to replace the human typesetter of a lead type-composed printing form with a mechanical arm. In the early 1890s, a group of inventors signed a contract with Towner K. Webster in Chicago to produce 3000 compositors. However, the machine was not nearly as precise as it should have been and never turned a profit because of its complexity and continual need for adjustment based upon trial and error. As a result, it was the Linotype typesetting machine, which composed in a hot metal typesetting process, that became the new popular typesetting machine.

The Paige typesetting machine is notable for substantial investment that the prominent writer Mark Twain made into the failed endeavor: $300,000 ($6,000,000 today). Twain, a former printer, invested not only the bulk of his book profits but also a large portion of the inheritance of Olivia Clemens, his wife. Many point to his over-investment in the Paige typesetting machine and other inventions as the cause of not only his family's financial decline but also the decline of his wit and humor.

Webster Manufacturing made fewer than six machines costing $15,000 apiece, over three times as much as the initial production estimates. One was donated by Cornell University for a scrap metal drive during World War II. The only surviving machine is displayed at the Mark Twain House in Hartford, Connecticut.

🔗 Crime 🔗 Terrorism 🔗 Schools 🔗 Michigan

The Bath School disaster, also known as the Bath School massacre, was a series of violent attacks perpetrated by Andrew Kehoe on May 18, 1927, in Bath Township, Michigan. The attacks killed 38 elementary schoolchildren and 6 adults, and injured at least 58 other people. Prior to his timed explosives going off at the Bath Consolidated School building, Kehoe had murdered his wife, Nellie Price Kehoe, and firebombed his farm. Arriving at the site of the school explosion, Kehoe died when he detonated explosives concealed in his truck.

Kehoe, the 55-year-old school board treasurer, was angered by increased taxes and his defeat in the April 5, 1926, election for township clerk. He was thought by locals to have planned his "murderous revenge" after that public defeat. Kehoe had a reputation for difficulty on the school board and in personal dealings. In addition, he was notified that his mortgage was going to be foreclosed upon in June 1926. For much of the next year until May 1927, Kehoe purchased explosives. He secretly hid them on his property and under the school.

On May 18, 1927, Kehoe then set off almost simultaneous explosions at his farmstead and at the Bath Consolidated School. His explosives destroyed the farm's buildings and ripped through the north wing of the Bath Consolidated School building. As rescuers began working at the school, Kehoe drove up to the schoolyard and detonated dynamite inside his shrapnel-filled truck. The truck explosion killed Kehoe and several others nearby. Bystanders were injured. During the rescue and recovery efforts, searchers discovered an additional 500 pounds (230 kg) of unexploded dynamite and pyrotol in the south wing of the school that was set to explode at the same time as the initial explosions in the north wing; Kehoe had apparently intended to destroy the entire school and kill everyone in it.