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๐ Noam Chomsky Passed Away
Avram Noam Chomsky (born December 7, 1928) is an American professor and public intellectual known for his work in linguistics, political activism, and social criticism. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is a laureate professor of linguistics at the University of Arizona and an institute professor emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Among the most cited living authors, Chomsky has written more than 150 books on topics such as linguistics, war, and politics. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism.
Born to Ashkenazi Jewish immigrants in Philadelphia, Chomsky developed an early interest in anarchism from alternative bookstores in New York City. He studied at the University of Pennsylvania. During his postgraduate work in the Harvard Society of Fellows, Chomsky developed the theory of transformational grammar for which he earned his doctorate in 1955. That year he began teaching at MIT, and in 1957 emerged as a significant figure in linguistics with his landmark work Syntactic Structures, which played a major role in remodeling the study of language. From 1958 to 1959 Chomsky was a National Science Foundation fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study. He created or co-created the universal grammar theory, the generative grammar theory, the Chomsky hierarchy, and the minimalist program. Chomsky also played a pivotal role in the decline of linguistic behaviorism, and was particularly critical of the work of B. F. Skinner.
An outspoken opponent of U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War, which he saw as an act of American imperialism, in 1967 Chomsky rose to national attention for his anti-war essay "The Responsibility of Intellectuals". Becoming associated with the New Left, he was arrested multiple times for his activism and placed on President Richard Nixon's list of political opponents. While expanding his work in linguistics over subsequent decades, he also became involved in the linguistics wars. In collaboration with Edward S. Herman, Chomsky later articulated the propaganda model of media criticism in Manufacturing Consent, and worked to expose the Indonesian occupation of East Timor. His defense of unconditional freedom of speech, including that of Holocaust denial, generated significant controversy in the Faurisson affair of the 1980s. Chomsky's commentary on the Cambodian genocide and the Bosnian genocide also generated controversy. Since retiring from active teaching at MIT, he has continued his vocal political activism, including opposing the 2003 invasion of Iraq and supporting the Occupy movement. An anti-Zionist, Chomsky considers Israel's treatment of Palestinians to be worse than South African-style apartheid, and criticizes U.S. support for Israel.
Chomsky is widely recognized as having helped to spark the cognitive revolution in the human sciences, contributing to the development of a new cognitivistic framework for the study of language and the mind. Chomsky remains a leading critic of U.S. foreign policy, contemporary capitalism, U.S. involvement and Israel's role in the IsraeliโPalestinian conflict, and mass media. Chomsky and his ideas are highly influential in the anti-capitalist and anti-imperialist movements. Since 2017, he has been Agnese Helms Haury Chair in the Agnese Nelms Haury Program in Environment and Social Justice at the University of Arizona.
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- "Noam Chomsky Passed Away" | 2024-06-18 | 14 Upvotes 1 Comments
๐ Entirety of Wikinews to be shut down
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- "Entirety of Wikinews to be shut down" | 2026-03-31 | 47 Upvotes 9 Comments
๐ Chloropicrin
Chloropicrin, also known as PS and nitrochloroform, is a chemical compound currently used as a broad-spectrum antimicrobial, fungicide, herbicide, insecticide, and nematicide. It was used as a poison gas in World War I. Its chemical structural formula is Cl3CNO2.
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- "Chloropicrin" | 2023-08-08 | 11 Upvotes 1 Comments
๐ Larry Ellison Owns 98% of Lanai Island, Hawaii
Lanai (Hawaiian: Lฤnaสปi, Hawaiian: [laหหnษสi, naหหnษสi], lษ-NY, lah-NAH-ee, also US: lah-NY, lษ-NAH-ee,) is the sixth-largest of the Hawaiian Islands and the smallest publicly accessible inhabited island in the chain. It is colloquially known as the Pineapple Island because of its past as an island-wide pineapple plantation. The island's only settlement of note is the small town of Lanai City. As of 2012, the island is 98% owned by Larry Ellison, cofounder and chairman of Oracle Corporation; the remaining 2% is owned by the state of Hawaii or individual homeowners.
Lanai is a roughly apostrophe-shaped island with a width of 18 miles (29ย km) in the longest direction. The land area is 140.5 square miles (364ย km2), making it the 43rd largest island in the United States. It is separated from the island of Molokaสปi by the Kalohi Channel to the north, and from Maui by the Auสปau Channel to the east. The United States Census Bureau defines Lanai as Census Tract 316 of Maui County. Its total population rose to 3,367 as of the 2020 United States census, up from 3,193 as of the 2000 census and 3,131 as of the 2010 census. As visible via satellite imagery, many of the island's landmarks are accessible only by dirt roads that require a four-wheel drive vehicle due to the lack of paved roadways.
There is one school, Lanai High and Elementary School, serving the entire island from kindergarten through 12th grade. There is also one hospital, Lanai Community Hospital, with 24 beds, and a community health center providing primary care, dental, behavioral health and selected specialty services in Lanai City. There are no traffic lights on the island.
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- "Larry Ellison Owns 98% of Lanai Island, Hawaii" | 2024-06-06 | 32 Upvotes 42 Comments
๐ Dick Smith (Entrepreneur)
Richard Harold Smith (born 18 March 1944) is an Australian entrepreneur, aviator and philanthropist. He holds a number of aviation world records and is the founder of Dick Smith Electronics, Australian Geographic and Dick Smith Foods. He was selected as 1986 Australian of the Year. In 2010, he founded the media production company Smith&Nasht with the intention of producing films about global issues. In 2015, he was awarded the Companion of the Order of Australia. He is a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.
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- "Dick Smith (Entrepreneur)" | 2021-11-19 | 90 Upvotes 106 Comments
๐ Great Pyramid of Cholula
The Great Pyramid of Cholula, also known as Tlachihualtepetl (Nahuatl for "made-by-hand mountain"), is a complex located in Cholula, Puebla, Mexico. It is the largest archaeological site of a pyramid (temple) in the New World, as well as the largest pyramid by volume known to exist in the world today. The adobe brick pyramid stands 25 metres (82ย ft) above the surrounding plain, which is significantly shorter than the Great Pyramid of Giza's height of 146.6 metres (481ย ft), but much wider, measuring 300 by 315 metres (984 by 1,033ย ft) in its final form, compared to the Great Pyramid's base dimensions of 230.3 by 230.3 metres (756 by 756ย ft). The pyramid is a temple that traditionally has been viewed as having been dedicated to the god Quetzalcoatl. The architectural style of the building was linked closely to that of Teotihuacan in the Valley of Mexico, although influence from the Gulf Coast is evident as well, especially from El Tajรญn.
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- "Great Pyramid of Cholula" | 2023-10-04 | 87 Upvotes 50 Comments
๐ The Dead HandโSoviet semi-autonomous nuclear command and control system
Dead Hand (Russian: ะกะธััะตะผะฐ ยซะะตัะธะผะตััยป, Systema "Perimetr", lit. "Perimeter" System, with the GRAU Index 15E601, Cyrillic: 15ะญ601), also known as Perimeter, is a Cold War-era automatic nuclear weapons-control system (similar in concept to the American AN/DRC-8 Emergency Rocket Communications System) that was used by the Soviet Union. The system remains in use in the post-Soviet Russian Federation. An example of fail-deadly and mutual assured destruction deterrence, it can automatically initiate the launch of the Russian intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) by sending a pre-entered highest-authority order from the General Staff of the Armed Forces, Strategic Missile Force Management to command posts and individual silos if a nuclear strike is detected by seismic, light, radioactivity, and pressure sensors even with the commanding elements fully destroyed. By most accounts, it is normally switched off and is supposed to be activated during times of crisis; however, it is said to remain fully functional and able to serve its purpose whenever it may be needed.
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- "The Dead HandโSoviet semi-autonomous nuclear command and control system" | 2022-04-04 | 73 Upvotes 90 Comments
๐ Inner-platform effect
The inner-platform effect is the tendency of software architects to create a system so customizable as to become a replica, and often a poor replica, of the software development platform they are using. This is generally inefficient and such systems are often considered to be examples of an anti-pattern.
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- "Inner-Platform Effect" | 2026-02-15 | 51 Upvotes 19 Comments
- "Inner Platform Effect" | 2024-02-17 | 35 Upvotes 12 Comments
- "Inner-platform effect" | 2012-01-09 | 79 Upvotes 31 Comments
- "Inner-platform effect" | 2009-09-10 | 42 Upvotes 24 Comments
๐ Can't Get You Out of My Head
Can't Get You Out of My Head: An Emotional History of the Modern World is a six-part BBC documentary television series created by Adam Curtis. It was released on BBC iPlayer on 11 February 2021.
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- "Can't Get You Out of My Head" | 2021-11-04 | 127 Upvotes 44 Comments
๐ Trachtenberg System for Rapid Mental Calculation
The Trachtenberg system is a system of rapid mental calculation. The system consists of a number of readily memorized operations that allow one to perform arithmetic computations very quickly. It was developed by the Russian Jewish engineer Jakow Trachtenberg in order to keep his mind occupied while being in a Nazi concentration camp.
The rest of this article presents some methods devised by Trachtenberg. Some of the algorithms Trachtenberg developed are ones for general multiplication, division and addition. Also, the Trachtenberg system includes some specialised methods for multiplying small numbers between 5 and 13.
The section on addition demonstrates an effective method of checking calculations that can also be applied to multiplication.
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- "Trachtenberg System of Mental Calculation" | 2024-09-21 | 20 Upvotes 2 Comments
- "Trachtenberg System for Rapid Mental Calculation" | 2018-06-22 | 31 Upvotes 4 Comments
- "The Trachtenberg System for mental arithmetic" | 2010-03-29 | 27 Upvotes 5 Comments