I bet you didnt know that

The Shaker religion is an offshoot of the Quakers, or Society of Friends, which was in turn an offshoot of mainstream Christian churches. The Quakers sought to practice their religion in a more personal way, focusing on the God within the person or the divine in a person, and the Shakers refined it further into an even more personal and perhaps austere form of worship. The Shaker religion was established in England but moved to the US where it concentrated in Massachusetts.

Because the Shakers sought to practise celibacy they adopted or employed needy and orphaned children to bump the numbers and were the founders of a very progressive and successful form of education that taught children according to capability rather than age. Shakers had a form of the Amish Rumspringa when children reached young adulthood, but the majority abandoned the religion when they had the chance. That, and the outlawing of the loose adoption systems of the time led to a steady decline in numbers. Shakers also espoused a no frills approach to living similar to, but not as strict as, the Amish, and the simple elegance of their furniture design has found new fans in the last decades.

It was a very egalitarian religion for it's time, men and women were seen as equals and although they lived mainly segregated lives and had defined roles, neither genders role was seen as less or more important, and all hands worked together at times of necessity like bringing in the harvest. All councils were considered incomplete unless they contained equal numbers of men and women to represent the community.

The religion was founded by a woman, Ann Lee, and in the early days they were known as the Shaking Quakers as they would move their limbs to maintain concentration while praying (sadly, this isn't the origin of the term 'Movers and Shakers' which would be cool). Throughout the history of the Shakers they've had male and female leaders in broadly equal numbers, a major departure from the norms of the time - and they were also the first religion to refer to their God as either Father or Mother, seeing the creator as a parent of undefined gender.

In the Massachusetts Shaker community of the early 1800's, a weaver called Miss Babbitt watched two men work a two-handed saw to cut wood and noted that the cutting action was limited to the forward motion and that the energy expended in pulling the saw back into position doubled the effort involved for half the output. Using her spinning wheel as inspiration, she developed an early prototype of the circular saw and it is that same basic design that is still used in lumber mills across the USA today. In the industrial North of England similar saws were being developed and have been patented, but in accordance with the teaching of the Shakers, Ms Babbitt never patented her invention. She's also credited with inventing a particular kind of timber nail and with improving the design of the spinning wheel, and possibly with an early version of a belt-driven washing machine.

The religion steadily declined and today there are two Shakers left. When you promote celibacy as they did, it's pretty impressive it's lasted this long.





TL:DR Shakers; more than just a style of kitchen cabinet.

Are Am Eye

More books have been written about Napoleon Bonaparte than have days passed since his death(5/5/1821) Only JC has had more books written about him. Shakespeare is in the shakeup there somewhere.

What would appear to be Napoleons favorite reading was the Ossian epic cycle of poems published by Scotsman James MacPherson. Ossian is a scots gaelic spelling and version of our Oisín. The son of Fionn Mac Cumhaill. Or Fingal in the scots cycle. So basically Napoleon as an adult was reading the same crap I was reading when I was seven.

The critical success factor in Napoleon's victories was the overwhelming artillery advantage of his armies. It was Irish born Arthur Wellesley while leading English armies against the French in Spain developed the tactic of using terrain features such as the reverse slope of hills to negate this artillery advantage. Very successful. This very tactic was classically exhibited at the Battle of Waterloo which was Napoleon's great defeat.
So eh Irish, it all ties in.

New Home

A research team composed of scientists from the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN) of the Agency for Science, Technology and Research (A*STAR) and IBM Research has produced a new synthetic molecule that can target and kill five multidrug-resistant bacteria. This synthetic polymer was found to be non-toxic and could enable entirely new classes of therapeutics to address the growing problem of antibiotic-resistant superbugs.

The synthetic molecules are called guanidinium-functionalized polycarbonates and were found to be both biodegradable and non-toxic to human cells. Essentially, the positively-charged synthetic polymer enters a living body and binds specifically to certain bacteria cells by homing in on a microbial membrane's related negative charge. Once attached to the bacteria, the polymer crosses the cell membrane and triggers the solidification of proteins and DNA in the cell, killing the bacteria.

"We have demonstrated the first example of a biodegradable synthetic macromolecule with broad-spectrum antimicrobial activity in mice, unique killing mechanism and no toxicity," says Yi Yan Yang, one of the authors on the study. "Once the polymer finishes its job of killing the bacteria, it will be naturally degraded after three days and will not remain in the body. This antimicrobial agent shows great promise for the treatment and prevention of multidrug-resistant systemic infections."

Original Publication

mzungu

The Anglo-Zanzibar war was the shortest in history, lasting somewhere between 38-45 minutes.

Realt Dearg Sec

Are Am Eye wrote: »

More books have been written about Napoleon Bonaparte than have days passed since his death(5/5/1821) Only JC has had more books written about him. Shakespeare is in the shakeup there somewhere.

.

In terms of academic books and articles about great writers, Shakepeare is the most written about writer of all time. The second is our own James Joyce, who started writing almost 300 years after Shakespeare died.

mzungu

Stalin was the father of Photoshop.

Soviet censors retouched old photographs, sometimes it was to edit out members and opponents that had fallen foul of the purges, and on other occasions for more mundane purpose of propaganda.



Above, Chairman of the Central Commission for Party Control Nikolai Yezhov has been edited out of reissues. Interestingly, he was purged in 1940 after being blamed for the excesses of the purges. He had written a paper in 1935 arguing that political opposition leads to violence (and thus provided ideological basis for purging) and under his watch the purges went out of control with just under half of the political and military establishment falling foul of it.




All purged!


It may look a bit shoddy to us now, but that would have taken some serious hours to get right.

I should add, the Soviets were not the only ones, the Germans, Red China and even Churchill did a spot of photoshopping too!

Oldtree

Assuming the speed of sound to be 343m/s, the new Russian "hypersonic" Kinzhal missile, which can travel at 10 times the speed of sound, would be traveling at 3.43 km/s and has a range of up to 2,000km. That's 12,345 km/h.

It would go from Dublin to Galway in about a minute, or for the full range go from Dublin to the outskirts of Vienna in 9 minutes 45 seconds give or take. If it could increase its range then only 3 1/4 hours to circumnavigate the equator.

david75

Isn’t there an island In the South Pacific called New Ireland?

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

david75 wrote: »

Isn’t there an island In the South Pacific called New Ireland?

It's part of Papua New Guinea

New Home

I wonder if they have moles and snakes in there.

Capt'n Midnight

mzungu wrote: »

Stalin was the father of Photoshop.
...
I should add, the Soviets were not the only ones, the Germans, Red China and even Churchill did a spot of photoshopping too!

Reminds me of a Romanian film of urban legends from communism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tales_from_the_Golden_Age

The Legend of the Party Photographer
Newspaper editors and Party officials fret over a photograph of Ceaușescu and the visiting Giscard d'Estaing to be published in tomorrow's paper. Much argument is had over how best to doctor the photograph to make Ceaușescu appear taller than d'Estaing, and whether he should be wearing a hat. Pressure is mounting as the deadline to get the paper out to the workers approaches. A hat is duly provided for Ceaușescu in the photograph, but no one notices until too late that he was already carrying one, leaving the image of him comically carrying one hat while wearing another. ...

Capt'n Midnight

New Home wrote: »

I wonder if they have moles and snakes in there.

Lidl had a FLORABEST Solar-Powered Mole Repeller on sale here not so long ago.


The absence of sunlight here wasn't even the biggest problem :rolleyes:

sightband

mzungu wrote: »

Stalin was the father of Photoshop.

Soviet censors retouched old photographs, sometimes it was to edit out members and opponents that had fallen foul of the purges, and on other occasions for more mundane purpose of propaganda.



Above, Chairman of the Central Commission for Party Control Nikolai Yezhov has been edited out of reissues. Interestingly, he was purged in 1940 after being blamed for the excesses of the purges. He had written a paper in 1935 arguing that political opposition leads to violence (and thus provided ideological basis for purging) and under his watch the purges went out of control with just under half of the political and military establishment falling foul of it.




All purged!


It may look a bit shoddy to us now, but that would have taken some serious hours to get right.

I should add, the Soviets were not the only ones, the Germans, Red China and even Churchill did a spot of photoshopping too!

I call serious bollocks on this

New Home

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Lidl had a FLORABEST Solar-Powered Mole Repeller on sale here not so long ago.

The absence of sunlight here wasn't even the biggest problem :rolleyes:

I heard.

Buford T. Justice XIX

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Lidl had a FLORABEST Solar-Powered Mole Repeller on sale here not so long ago.


The absence of sunlight here wasn't even the biggest problem :rolleyes:

Surely that problem points towards the devices success:D

New Home

It also works for dinosaurs and harpies, it would seem.

ohnonotgmail

sightband wrote: »

I call serious bollocks on this

all well documented

Buford T. Justice XIX

New Home wrote: »

It also works for dinosaurs and harpies, it would seem.

And Unicorns:(

New Home

No, those were driven away by Nessie. Everyone knows that.

Are Am Eye

sightband wrote: »

I call serious bollocks on this

Fake 'fake news' ?

unkel

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Reminds me of a Romanian film of urban legends from communism.

Make Ceaușescu look taller, LOL!

Ceaușescu was 5'5, Giscard d'Estaing is 6"2

The latter was actually born in Germany in an area occupied by France during the interbellum and he is still alive (age 92). He's fluent in German, which must have played a big role in the forming / growing in power of the EU

ohnonotgmail

unkel wrote: »

Make Ceaușescu look taller, LOL!

Ceaușescu was 5'5, Giscard d'Estaing is 6"2

The latter was actually born in Germany in an area occupied by France during the interbellum and he is still alive (age 92). He's fluent in German, which must have played a big role in the forming / growing in power of the EU

didn't realise he was still alive. I was a very young child when he was elected french president.

Realt Dearg Sec

sightband wrote: »

I call serious bollocks on this

Well that settles it then.

Fourier

sightband wrote: »

I call serious bollocks on this

Why? It's well documented.

sightband

Fourier wrote: »

Why? It's well documented.

Realt Dearg Sec wrote: »

Well that settles it then.

Two cracking responses which say otherwise.


Can send you on some quality photos of the Sasquatch and Loch Ness monster tag teaming Mary mcAleese if interested?

Realt Dearg Sec

sightband wrote: »

Two cracking responses which say otherwise.

Yeah those responses are clearly not as detailed and well articulated as your post.

Either you have a compelling reason to think the post you were dismissing is factually incorrect, or you don't. You could write your first post in response to literally any post on this whole thread, it wouldn't make it any more purposeful.

The fact that you responded to a post that discusses a subject that is widely known about and verified repeatedly in historical scholarship just makes you look a bit foolish. Your sarcasm in this post doesn't change that.

sightband

Realt Dearg Sec wrote: »

The fact that you responded to a post that discusses a subject that is widely known about and verified repeatedly in historical scholarship just makes you look a bit foolish. Your sarcasm in this post doesn't change that.

Pass it on so, genuinely curious as an avid historian.

ohnonotgmail

sightband wrote: »

Pass it on so, genuinely curious as an avid historian.

i call serious bollocks on this

Realt Dearg Sec

sightband wrote: »

Pass it on so, genuinely curious as an avid historian.

David King's book The Commissar Vanishes goes into plenty of detail on it.

Fourier

sightband wrote: »

Pass it on so, genuinely curious as an avid historian.

Okay so I knew nothing about this, but literally only a few minutes googling revealed five academic texts discussing it and the current location housing the photographs, the Newseum in Washington D.C.

Probably the most direct account from my searching:
https://www.amazon.com/Commissar-Vanishes-Falsification-Photographs-Stalins/dp/1849762511