2014

March 2014, Lyse's BDay

Cake turned out okay!

So proud of Lyse!!

Finally powered through the Cave of Coding Confusion

Thank you, Harvard CS50

Made personal use applications

with shameless recourse to Web resources

but some original aspects

Had oodles of fun!

ALL MY BEST FOR THE NEW YEAR!

Help from China

La Russie n'a pas encore actionné un accord de «swap» rouble-yuan portant sur 24 milliards de dollars qui pourrait offrir d'urgence des liquidités à l'économie russe. Cet accord conclu en octobre, en pleine défiance entre Moscou et l'Occident, qui permet de changer des roubles contre des yuans sans passer par le dollar, pourrait être élargi, a laissé entendre le ministre du Commerce, Gao Hucheng. 

http://www.lefigaro.fr/conjoncture/2014/12/22/20002-20141222ARTFIG00269-la-chine-offre-son-aide-financiere-a-la-russie-en-crise.php

Winter Solciste

Not Considered

source: Agence France-Presse, on MSN France.

author: Clément Sabourini

translation: doxa-louise

Kuujjuarapik, outpost on a thawing Canadian Artic

The Ancients can attest to this, never have polar bears ventured so far south.

But 30 years after the thaw of the tundra, Kuujjuarapiq has learnt that none 

could predict the worst consequences of global warming.

Word rapidly got out: a polar bear, then two, were seen roaming around this 

small settlement on Hudson’s Bay, southerly outpost for the Inuit people some 

1800 kms north of Montreal.

Once the alarm sounded, children were forbidden to go beyond the last houses

 of this village of 1500 souls. In the midsts of a blizzard, the men took to arms and 

snowmobiles and killed one of the two beasts, something unthinkable in earlier times.

‘In the 1920s, when I was a child, polar bears existed only in tales. Now they

 are coming forward, in ever increasing numbers’, tells us Alec Tuckatuck, one of

 the hunters of the village.

The largest carnivores on the planet now meander around Kuujjuarapik for in this early

December, the sea ice, from which they hunt for seal, no longer forms as in times immemorial.

‘The winters are shorter and the summers longer, and we are now seven months 

without snow’, comments Alec, explaining that the Inuit no longer trust the ice cover, 

as they had in the past.

Comfortable in his yellow ski pants, the old hunter remembers that higher temperatures 

were first felt ‘in the middle of the 1980s’, with the thaw of the permafrost layer. ‘This has 

changed the pace at which ice forms, as well as the thaw. (...) Now vegetation grows more quickly’.

A Climate Bomb

If higher temperatures can bring advantages for the local population, such as a greater

abundance of fish in this part of Hudson’s Bay, the lost of permafrost is feared by scientists.

‘This could be a climate bomb’, opines Florent Domine, a rare specialist on permafrost, on 

loan from the CNRS (Centre National de la recherche scinetifique, France) to the nordic

studies research lab Takuvik at Laval University, Quebec.

Crouched in snow at -25C, this French researcher has layed out his measuring instruments i

n peatland, a few minutes by helicopter form the Inuit burg.

At Kuujjuarapiq, as in the High Artic, the biologist commes to the same conclusion: the

ground is heating up inexorably. ‘If permafrost thaws quickly, part of the carbon 

(it contains) will be liberated into the atmosphere in the form of CO2 (carbon dioxide) and

CH4 (methane), through the action of bacteria, thus aggravating considerably the greenhouse effect’.

According to available dayta, there is tow times the carbon present in permafrost that

 there is in air. This phenomena is so little understood and studied that the intergovernmental 

expert group on climate evolution (IPCC) of the UN does not integrate it in climatic models, 

the researcher points out.

The worst case scenario from IPCC evoques temperature increases in the order of 4C or 5C

by 2100. Florient Domine for his part expects an increase of around 8C, once one has factored

in the multiplier effect of the thawing of permafrost.

In order to evaluate the volumes of greenhouse gases emitted during the mineralization

of organic basements during heating, M. Domine and his team follow notably the evolution 

of tens of ponds created by the collapse of thawed tundra. In particular Pascal Bégin, a 

Quebec biologist, follows the spilling over of blocks of tundra into water holes

where they are susequently degraded by bacteria. In the absence of oxygen, the fermentation 

of sediemts creates methane, a greenhouse gas 20 times more potent than CO2, 

observes the young woman.

The vicious cycle of global warming thus seems to be accelerating in the Artic and the 

inhabitants of this polar region ‘have no alternative but to to adapt’, remarks the old Inuit 

hunter, Alec Tuckatuck.

Even polar bears, confused by the thawing of the ice shield, seem to have integrated the

new reality: as they adventure further south seeking food, these carnivores have 

been mating with their cousins the Grizzlies. A few years back such hybridization would 

have seemed unnatural.

UN Numbers

http://populationpyramid.net/world/

Convex means population is growing quickly.

Concave means it is growing slowly.

China!

DClock

Should I add the date!?

DateTime

Looks simple enough: I now have two digital clocks that show current time,

the first for Montreal, the second for Barcelona. I need to go into design mode to produce a visually compelling interface to frame this information.

In fact, the code for each was taken from a different tutorial. Each uses the DateTime class in 

Visual Studio. For the first:

The second was adapted form Home and Learn, UK. The code is quite lean:

In effect, the first creates a new timer object and fills it with DateTime data. 

For the time to show as 24-hour, one's computer needs to be set that way because DateTime

gets the computer's own settings. Which argues that, should one use the app from another country,

one needs to be careful...

The best solution, clearly, is to think it terms of Utc:

Precipitation

We seem destined to receive  mixed precipitations in the next few days. The above

table - from the French language Weather Network - gives some idea of how much

water is involved in the production of varying kinds of precipitation. On average, 1 millimeter

of water is good for 1 centimeter of snow. If the air is very cold, this 1 mm can produce up to 3 cms of snow ( the totally air crazy kind, that doesn't stick). In warm air, the result can be as low as 0,7 centimeters. For the formation of ice pellets, it takes 4 mm of water to form a mere 1 cm.

65 Today

Romans

'works!

Alternative

So my off-line currency converter does work, for the four currencies required: 

CAD, GBP, EUR and USD. But the coding cost is high on my first model.

There are sixteen cases to be defined for the switch statement:

Then a much more economical way dawned on me: just create a two-dimensional array with the 

exchange values, and access the relevant case as the array index. This is going to work!!

So There!

source: Huffington Post
author: Sylvain Bosselet, agrégé de philosophie et docteur en psychologie
translation: doxa-louise

IS THE GOAL OF SEXUALITY REPRODUCTION?

We deny ourselves a host of sexual activities stemming from unfounded restrictions, in the name of illusory principles such as 'against nature', 'evil', 'not conforming to our sexual gender', 'perversion' (anormality) or again 'barbarism' (a behaviour contrary to our culture). Implicitly, these criteria derive more or less from the idea that "the goal of sexuality is reproduction". Yet, contrary to popular belief, this is false.

The weakness in this widely held opinion resides in the little word (aiming) toward

According to Genesis, God created the world and animal species "for" man, who constitutes the aim and endpoint of his creation. He would thus have given man eyes "for" seeing, a stomach "for" digesting, a womb "for" carrtying a foetus, etc.

Applied to biology in general, this approach can rest on an argument put forward by Paley, who offers a comparison: if you find a watch on the beach, with its complex mechanism, you are forced to conclude that it was made toward an end by an intelligent being. If you then discover the incredible complexity of living beings and the different functions of their numerous organs, you are necessarily brought to conclude that these were conceived by an infinitely intelligent being.

The creator of biology, Aristotle, shares a viewpoint that is similar with his notion of a 'final cause'. every living being would thus possess a soul and a 'telos', an end that is his alone. This conception is called "teleological". The aim of man would be happiness in society. This would be his 'final cause',  in effect the kind of cause most important to explain is behaviour. In this context, one can see how sex could easily be seen as tending toward reproduction.

There are two major problems with these old theories, often shared by one and all in an unquestioning manner.

- The first is a simple question of fact. Reality persists in contradiction this so reassuring view of things. Certain organs have no function. We all know of the well-publicized case of the appendix, which not onlky serves no function but can also become a  mortal threat. Our measly body hair offers little protection against cold. And certainly, the clitoris in no way serves reproduction. . It is not even sollicited during basic intercourse. All scientific studies to find it a role (useful to survival) have failed. Worse still, how should one explain that sodomy can lead to an orgasm for the sodomized person, and even more powerful than that coming from intercourse which is meant to lead to reproduction? And what about masochism, or sexual activities between two different species? Is nature perverse?
-Then, since at least the Galilean revolution, Descartes and Newton, a new model of explanation has come to prevail within science. To account for nature, they require that we look to physical causes and effects, without reference to the least intention of whatever creator may be. These are causes that the Aristotelean tradition had classed as 'motor', and which Aristotle had underestimated.

In this new scientific framework, living beings become incomprehensible: what unheard of play of causes and effect could possibly end up in something as complex as an eye, the human brain or the aptly named Fallopian tubes?

Darwin and his disciples have found a solution to this conundrum. Between each generation of a species, variations occur and multiply over millions of years. Those individuals most apt to survive and reproduce in a given environment have the best chances of passing on their characteristics to a descendance. Our organs and activities have appeared by natural selection, with respect to an environment in constant evolution, which is true for sexuality as well.

Direct selection for a given trait is not the only aspect to selection. The organs correlated genetically or mechanically come with it. The clitoris exists for its simple morphological symmetry with the male sex, and does not interfere in any way with survival or reproduction.

Ceretain sexual behaviours are certainly useless for reproduction, but have an indirect pertinence. A natural mechanism accounts for homosexuality, as in the animal kingdom: the selection of family sets (parentèle), according to which beneficial traits for all individuals linked to the possessor of the trait ( and not only his direct descendance) are selection worthy. Where homosexuals develop altruistic traits toward members of their families, they contribute to the spreading of genes similar to theirs. Other non-reproductive functions can be linked to sexuality. Mutual clitoris masturbation between female bonobos contribute to the social cohesion of the group, and hence to survival.

Each individul finds himself in competition with the other members of his species. Let us suppose that they are all equally well adapted to their environments. Which ones have the highest chance of transmitting their genes? Those who engage the most in sexual activity! Natural selection favours those who enjoy sex the most! The more excited will reproduce the most, and transmit their excitement genes!

"Wanting too much" is the natural lot of animals! They inherit a propensity to 'over excitement'(compared to what might be strictly necessary from a reproduction point of view). They will thus need to express this one way or another, hence the incredible amount of non-reproductive activity of which they are capable. Man is no exception. Believing that alternative uses to our sexual organs is "perverse" on the grounds that this is not directly linked to reproduction or survival, is to misunderstand how nature works.

But man adds to this peculiarities which complicate the given all the more

Modern man possesses a peculiar brain. The size of his neocortex offers new possibilities, quite difficult to manage. He can project into the future, remember many things and manipulate abstract notions such as mathematical properties, physical laws or values. Within sexuality, the imagination of a Sade pushes on the limits of sexual practice.

The human brain is very plastic, and can change its knowledge base and behaviours on the base of a large biological potential. With respect to sexuality, the more we advance in life the more we discover sources of desire and pleasure.

Finally, homo sapiens is far from having acted out all the possibilities of this new brain. He is in the midsts of mental evolution, research is proceeding apace, many surprises await us. One should not imagine that sexuality is a static undertaking, known and regimented, not only for oneself as an individual but for humanity as a whole. We keep on making discoveries.

As if this immense biological and neurobiological liberty were not enough, man has yet enlarged the field of possibles with technology. He has pushed to the limit the uncoupling between sexuality and reproduction, with many contraceptives. Conversely, he can reproduce himself without intercourse (sperm donors, in vitro fertilization, surrogate mothers, etc). He  masters as well, increasingly well, sexually transmitted diseases which used to limit his explorations. He can even test for the paternity of a child from a simple DNA test, while earlier without doubt society had to put in  place a heavy machine of constraint to fidelity, alledged divine laws and other systems of state and religious controls.

Humanity is just getting to know its biological determinants. The meaning of history consists of taking progressive control of self through a growing understanding of natural heritage, crafted by hasard and not intention. Humankind is like the pilot of a plane in flight who would learn little by little what the various indicators and commands do, to take over from automatic pilot.

The neocortex offers ever larger means of realization to our emotions and primary needs, taking the long term inton account. The time has come to take over our naturally inherited sexuality, rather than  endure it blindly. humanity must become adult. nature has thus given us sexual hyper excitability and an immense liberty, which we ourselves have enlarged all the more. Face with this menu of possibles of which he ignored the evolutionary past, we understand that man could have been dizzied and sought to invent unfounded limits. But freed from these constraints, one can well ask what now?

On-line Version

The off-line converter shown before was a code prototype.

From a design perspective one also needs to worry about what happens when

the user resizes the control. By default, a background image  will be of fixed size.

Docking the background image will keep a larger one in place, showing more or less as

a function of the size requested but the controls themselves still need to

be placed unto something, like a layout panel.

The on-line converter below will  not shrink smaller than the size of the browser on the bottom.

I have also placed the combo Boxes and buttons in a table, and they move as a block.

From a coding perspective, I have used the model from the You Tube tutorial cited

below.

One needs to be careful that the currencies requested will be recognized. Google

is the back-end here and a Canadian dollar is a CAD and a US dollar a USD etc...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JUpNwYnw058

Metronomy

Switchy

This is going to work!!

Goodies UK

Morrison's

Sainsbury's

Tesco

Lidl

Aldi

So Which is It?

Travel planning can get very tricky. Heere is what I am getting for
average temperature during the Holiday season for Barcelona Spain.

Windows 8.1 on a Surface Pro 2:

The Barcelona Tourism Bureau:

Makes a big difference when packing a suitcase and choosing a coat and footware!!

From Red to Blue (Microgravity)

I feel pretty bad about Philae’s current predicament. Robot was meant to 

find energy from solar panels, and now it is impossible. Back in the day, 

people were arguing that renewables, including solar, were the way to go. 

Even here in Canada,where winters are dark, the sun weak, and there is still 

no way to store what solar energy there is. It was a rallying cry, a form of faith in the future, 

and a resolve to live lean and mean. Now poor Philae is paying the price of that stubborn
arrogance.

Science is a real prison sometimes.l Scientists on the Tchouri

mission said they were quite surprised: the surface has both dune-like and jagged features 
and the interior has been described as porous. I would propose there were no surprises at all: 
this was one of the first things they found.1978 was surprised. The assumptions under which the
project was put together are behind us. The people here and now would not put a mission 
together on this same model. One needs a plan B; or at least an conceptual framework B. They

used to write science fiction stories about aliens in those days.

I’m not shifting blame here: the composition of the comet is part of what is being

investigated, and we are having trouble taking measures because of what the 

composition of the comet actually is. All part of the game, the problem is the answer.

Still, like all of us following this saga, I’m rooting for the team. And feeling helpless...

For what it's worth, my advice would be, get some rest. This project needs focused

people. Like MIT is currently telling its football players, Don't think, play!!

How Big

At 100 kgs, Philae weighs but one gram on the comet. The three landing legs are anchored correctly but the harpoons underneath deployed, met with a powdery surface, and retracted back.

All complex molecules are the work of stars.

There is a press conference planned for 15;30 Paris (which is 10:30 Montreal).

discussion: Le Monde.
photos: Der Spiegel.

Where

Some Progress

Life Question

Misson Rosetta : pourquoi se poser sur une... par lemondefr

Another

And yet another successful tutorial completion. One of these days...

Free Your Mind!

Clarity

And then one day, it all comes together; my long mathematical travails have
come full circle .I was keeping working on the notion of Taylor series as an interesting addendum to a lot of work on calculus. I recently stumbled upon an explanation in Math is Fun which made it clear and it is an absolutely central notion, which makes the (for me) long enigmatic Euler Formula crystal
clear. March on!

It's a beautiful thing. Every time one adds a member to the series (which is infinite), one arrives at a better approximation of the cos function. The series starts at one point and one converges to the

correct answer, which is a limit, all  notions central to Calculus.

The filiation to Euler is also quite enlightening, and clears up the confused historical record on mathematical finds in the Modern period. Quoting Wikipedia:

"The concept of a Taylor series was discovered by the Scottish mathematician James Gregory and formally introduced by the English mathematician Brook Taylor in 1715." James Gregory published

the series in 1668. But it did not originate with him either. The first publication was in the XIVth

century, in India, the work of  Madhava of Sangamagrama.

Clarity at last. The concept of an analytic function is present  at the beginning of the development of Calculus. 

Incidentally, the Kerala region of India where Madhava lived is superb, 'le pays de Dieu'.