Science Zone: Hard Facts

Francesco ZantedeschiFrancesco Zantedeschi (August 20, 1797 – March 29, 1873) was an Italian priest and physicist.

In 1829 and again in 1830, Zantedeschi published papers on the production of electric currents in closed circuits by the approach and withdrawal of a magnet, thereby anticipating Michael Faraday’s classical experiments of 1831.[citation needed]

While carrying out researches on the solar spectrum, Zantedeschi was among the first to recognize the marked absorption by the atmosphere of red, yellow, and green light.

He also thought that he had detected, in 1838, a magnetic action on steel needles by ultraviolet light. Though this effect was not confirmed, a connection between light and magnetism was suspected so many years before the announcement in 1867 by James Clerk Maxwell of the electromagnetic theory of light.

In a tract of 16 pages, published in 1859, Zantedeschi defended the claims of Gian Domenico Romagnosi to the discovery in 1802 of the magnetic effect of the electric current, a discovery which is usually accredited to Hans Christian Ørsted in 1820. Zantedeschi’s experiments and papers on the repulsion of flames by a strong magnetic field (discovered by Padre Bancalari of the Pious Schools in 1847) attracted general attention at the time.

In his later years Zantedeschi dictated an autobiography which is kept in the archives of the Academy of Verona. His principal works are: Ricerche sul termo-elettricismo dinamico (1838) and Trattato del Magnetismo e della Elettricità (1843).

See also:

* Francesco Zentedeschi @ Gnomon Chronicles

Posted in People

Brazen Ring Denies Reek — As If!

Indian Creek in Bears Ears National MonumentZinke fingered in Bears Ears” is a phrase which derives from “Zinke fingered in Bears Ears corruption probe over uranium mining interests”, the title of a post on the popular blog Boing Boing.

Exerpt:

An energy firm linked to uranium mining interests around Bears Ears National Monument in Utah met with a senior Department of Interior official just one month President Donald Trump issued a surprise request to review the monument’s boundaries. When the review concluded, Trump shrank the monument by 85%. Some 100 uranium claims that were previously *inside* the monument’s protected boundary were suddenly on the outside.

Now, House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raul M. Grijalva (D-AZ) says Democrats plan hold a hearing on March 13, to look into that shady review.

They sent an invitation to Ryan Zinke, who led the Department of the Interior under Trump at that time and was forced to resign in disgrace over other corruption charges.

Zinke declined the invitation.

Roll Call reports that documents show that Energy Fuels Resources (USA) Inc., a United States subsidiary of a Canadian energy and mining firm, met with a top DOI official who knew he’d be personally involved with such a review, before Trump requested it.

The House Natural Resources Committee wants know if the 2017 reassessment “had a predetermined outcome of shrinking Bears Ears to benefit the uranium sector generally and Energy Fuels Resources specifically.”

In the comments section, user Pensketch wryly observed:

“Zinke fingered in Bears Ears” sounds like the worst porn title ever.

Which inspired me to write this anagram.

Posted in Politics

Calculation, His Serene Muse

Title page of Cours de mathématique (vol. 1) by French mathematician Charles Étienne Louis Camus; first published in 1749Charles Étienne Louis Camus (25 August 1699 – 2 February 1768) was a French mathematician and mechanician who was born at Crécy-en-Brie, near Meaux.

He studied mathematics, civil and military architecture, and astronomy after leaving Collège de Navarre in Paris.

In 1730 he was appointed professor of architecture and, in 1733, associate of the Académie des Sciences. He also became a professor of geometry, secretary to the Academy of Architecture and fellow of the Royal Society of London. In 1727 he presented a memoir to the academy on masting ships, in consequence of which he was named the same year joint mechanician to that body.

In 1736 he accompanied Pierre Louis Maupertuis and Alexis Claude Clairaut in the expedition to Lapland for the measurement of a degree of meridian arc.

He was the author of Cours de mathématiques (Paris, 1766), along with a number of essays on mathematical and mechanical subjects.

He was also employed in a variety of public works, and in 1765 was chosen a fellow of the Royal Society of London.

He died in 1768.

See:

* Charles Étienne Louis Camus (nonfiction) @ Gnomon Chronicles
* Charles Étienne Louis Camus @ Wikipedia

Posted in Computing, People

O! A Burning Odor!

Giordano BrunoGiordano Bruno, born Filippo Bruno, was an Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, mathematician, poet, and cosmological theorist. He is known for his cosmological theories, which conceptually extended the then-novel Copernican model. He proposed that the stars were just distant suns surrounded by their own exoplanets and raised the possibility that these planets could even foster life of their own (a philosophical position known as cosmic pluralism). He also insisted that the universe is in fact infinite and could have no celestial body at its “center”.

Starting in 1593, Bruno was tried for heresy by the Roman Inquisition on charges of denial of several core Catholic doctrines, including eternal damnation, the Trinity, the divinity of Christ, the virginity of Mary, and transubstantiation. Bruno’s pantheism was also a matter of grave concern, as was his teaching of the transmigration of the soul (reincarnation). The Inquisition found him guilty, and he was burned at the stake in Rome’s Campo de’ Fiori in 1600.

Source: Wikipedia.

Posted in People

Activated Fake Licensor

Denial of service attackA denial-of-service attack is a cyber-attack where the perpetrator seeks to make a machine or network resource unavailable to its intended users, such as to temporarily or indefinitely interrupt or suspend services of a host connected to the Internet.

Denial of service is typically accomplished by flooding the targeted machine or resource with superfluous requests in an attempt to overload systems and prevent some or all legitimate requests from being fulfilled.

It is analogous to a group of people crowding the entry door or gate to a shop or business, and not letting legitimate parties enter into the shop or business, disrupting normal operations.

Source: Wikipedia.

Image attribution: By Everaldo Coelho and YellowIcon, LGPL: https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=3980651

Posted in Computing

Tomb Is My Career

Seal of the CIATimber Sycamore is a classified weapons supply and training program run by the United States Central Intelligence Agency and supported by various Arab intelligence services, most notably Saudi Arabia’s. Launched in 2013, it supplies money, weaponry and training to rebel forces fighting in the Syrian civil war. According to US officials, the program has trained thousands of rebels.

One unintended consequence of the program has been to flood the Middle East’s black market with weapons including assault rifles, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.

Source: Wikipedia

Posted in Politics Tagged with:

Weird Elysian Tales

320px-Walt_Disney_1946Walter Elias Disney (December 5, 1901 – December 15, 1966) was an American entrepreneur, animator, voice actor and film producer. A pioneer of the American animation industry, he introduced several developments in the production of cartoons.

In the 1950s, Disney expanded into the amusement park industry, and in 1955 he opened Disneyland. To fund the project he diversified into television programs, such as Walt Disney’s Disneyland and The Mickey Mouse Club; he was also involved in planning the 1959 Moscow Fair and the 1960 Winter Olympics. In 1965 he began development of another theme park, Disney World (now Walt Disney World), the heart of which was to be a new type of city, the “Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow” (EPCOT). Disney was a heavy smoker throughout his life, and died of lung cancer in December 1966 before the park or city was completed.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Disney

Posted in People

Selfish troglodyte withholds interpersonal piety; I saw, am aghast.

Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest.

– Mark Twain

Posted in Ethics, Mark Twain

Openly Ante a Hoard

Texas Holdem All InOne player to a hand is an important poker rule designed to promote fair play that is universally applied in casino play. It states that all game decisions about the play of each hand must be made by one player without any assistance. This means, for example, that a player may not ask for advice from any other player or non-player during the play of the hand, nor should anyone offer such advice. The phrase is often used as a warning to players making what might be perceived as minor violations, such as commenting upon other players’ possible hands.

See One player to a hand @ Wikipedia

Image source: By Hober mallow at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13408909

Posted in Idioms

An Open Life

Feel No Pain.

Posted in Idioms