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Hyas

Hyas (Ὑάς, ; ), in Greek mythology, was a Boeotian who was regarded as the ancestor of the ancient Hyantes (Ὕαντες), who were the aboriginal inhabitants of Boeotia. His name means rain from hyô, hyetos.

Family
Hyas was the son of the Titan Atlas and either of the Oceanids, Pleione or Aethra, thus brother to the Pleiades and Hyades. In one account, Hyas instead was called the father of the Hyades by Boeotia.

Death
Hyas was a notable archer who was killed by his intended prey. Some stories have him dying after attempting to rob a lion of its cubs. " While his [i.e. Hyas] beard was fresh, stags trembled in terror before him, and the hare was welcome prey. But when years matured his manhood, he breavely closed with the shaggy lioness and the boar. He sought the lair and brood of the whelped lioness and was bloody prey to the Libyan beast. "Some have Hyas killed by a serpent, but most commonly he is said to have been gored by a wild boar. His sisters, the Hyades, mourned his death with so much vehemence and dedication that they died of grief. Zeus, in recognition of their familial love, took pity upon them and changed them into stars—the constellation Hyades—and placed them in the head of Taurus, where their annual rising and setting are accompanied by plentiful rain. {{blockquote|text= '' His {i.e. Hyas]] mother [Aethra] sobbed for Hyas, his sad sisters sobbed and Atlas, whose neck would haul the world. The sisters surpassed both parents in pious love and won heaven. Their name is from Hyas." }}

Interpretation
The mythological use for a Hyas, apparently a back formation from Hyades, may simply have been to provide a male figure to consort with the archaic rain-nymphs, the Hyades, a chaperone responsible for their behavior, as all the archaic sisterhoods— even the Muses— needed to be controlled under the Olympian world-picture (Ruck and Staples). In fact among the poets it is immaterial whether Hyas is described as their father or their brother. And his death gave these weepy rain-nymphs a cause for their weeping, mourning for a male being an acceptably passive female role in the patriarchal culture of the Hellenes. Hyas had no separate existence except as progenitor/guardian of the Hyantes, neither in mythic narrative nor in rite, even the alternative accounts of his demise being somewhat conventional and interchangeable: compare the death of Meleager or Actaeon.

Hyantes
The Hyantes, descendants of Hyas—or rather of the Hyades, for the fertility of rain-nymphs needs no male consort— were the original ("Pelasgian") inhabitants of Boeotia, from which country they were expelled by the followers of Cadmus. Into late Classical times (as by Pausanias, for example), Cadmus was remembered as having been a Phoenician, or at least backed by a Phoenician army, and there may be a nugget of political reality at the heart of the myth, that a Phoenician colony established along the Boeotian coast had displaced some of the area's aboriginal inhabitants while absorbing others.

Some of the Hyantes are said to have emigrated to isolated and pastoral Phocis, where they founded Hyampolis, or at least that gave a good etiological explanation for the city's name. Others supposedly fled to Aetolia, another region that retained a primitive character into Classical times. The poets used the adjective Hyantius as equivalent to Boeoticus, or "rural", partly as a demonstration of how conversant they were with such arcane details:

 * Thus, then, Hyantius to his Partners spake,
 * That trod the Mazes of the pathlesse Wood:
 * My Friends our nets and javelins reake with blood:
 * Enough hath been the fortune of this day: —(Ovid)

The speaker is Actaeon, grandson of Cadmus, who came to an end somewhat similar to that of Hyas.

title: Hyas


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W. E. B. Du Bois Library

The W. E. B. Du Bois Library is one of the three libraries of the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts, the others being the Science and Engineering Library and the Wadsworth Library at the Mount Ida Campus. The W. E. B. Du Bois Library holds resources primarily in humanities and social and behavioral sciences. At 28 stories and 286 feet $4 1/8$ inches (roughly 88 m) tall, it is the third-tallest library in the world after the National Library of Indonesia in Jakarta at 414 feet (126 m) and Shanghai Library in China at 348 feet (106 m). Measuring taller purely by height, the libraries in Jakarta and Shanghai both only have 24 floors. The W. E. B. Du Bois Library is also considered to be the tallest academic research library (despite claims by UMass that it is the largest ) and 32nd tallest educational building in the world. The building maintains a security force, which is managed by various supervisors and student employees.

Present holdings at the UMass Libraries include over 4 million titles and over nine million individual items, providing access to over 200,000 online journals, over 1,700,000 e-books, and more than 500 databases.

As part of the Five College Consortium, the UMass Amherst Libraries also have access to material from its partners in the Consortium: Amherst College, Hampshire College, Mount Holyoke College, and Smith College. Students can also take advantage of the Interlibrary Loan Services to obtain materials from libraries beyond the Five College system and from all over the world.

History
As the University of Massachusetts Amherst began to grow exponentially in the 1960s it was decided by the Board of Trustees that a large University Library would be needed for the library system to make the transition into the future. The designer was Edward Durrell Stone who followed recommendations by a Boston library consultant who recommended that the university would require a building of nearly 310,000 square feet to meet with the growing demands of students. Ground was broken in April 1969 and the building was opened to the public in 1973, with an official dedication taking place in 1974.

The building was ordered closed in September 1979 by then Chancellor Henry Koffler to address the serious issue of "spalling" where bits of brick from the facade on the exterior building would fall away. The most important and most used volumes were removed to the former Goodell Library Stacks (located adjacent to the building) as well as the majority of the library departments. The building was closed to all except staff who were allowed to retrieve any books left in the building. In December 1979 the building was reopened with a maximum occupancy of 500 persons, and a special ticket was required for entry. In 1983, the university acquired $2.5 million from the state legislature to begin a major renovation of the building's brick veneer. The money would also be used to reconstruct the main lobby and resize the first few floors of the building. The building was restored to full usage in 1985 and students and staff led an initiative in 1986 called "Mass Transformation" to clean up and restore the interior of the building. This initiative also was responsible for establishing the campus competition to add murals to the library stairwells.

The building was originally referred to as the University Tower Library, but was renamed the W. E. B. Du Bois Library following a popular student movement in 1994. There was significant debate on whether or not it was appropriate to name the library after W. E. B. Du Bois due to his ties to the Communist Party USA. University policy also dictated that dedications were to be made for those who made significant donations to the university. While administration focused on the more practical reasons for the dedication, students were focused on his communist leanings with fighting imperialism and capitalism. There were many conflicts between administration, students, and the general public on whether or not it was appropriate to dedicate the library after Du Bois, but ultimately, the dedication gathered enough support and was celebrated over a period of several days by the entire community.

Special Collections is home to the memoirs and papers of the distinguished African-American scholar, writer, and activist, W. E. B. Du Bois, which were acquired by former Chancellor Randolph Bromery, a friend of Du Bois. The library is also the depository for other important collections relating to social issues, such as the papers of Congressman Silvio O. Conte, Horace Mann Bond, Kenneth R. Feinberg, and Daniel Ellsberg.

General information
The library offers several computer labs, a tutoring center, the writing center, equipment lending from the Digital Media lab, the Digital Scholarship Center (formerly the Image Collection Library) and an IT Support Desk. The upper floors contain books from various academic fields focusing primarily on the humanities and social behavioral sciences, including a sizeable East Asian Collection, Art Collections, UMass Thesis Archive, and "SCUA," the Special Collections and University Archives. Some floors also house special offices and study carrels that are available to graduate students and postdoctoral researchers seeking a private study area. The library offers tutoring, writing workshops, and supplemental instruction scattered among its 26 floors.

The topmost floors of the library are a popular destination for those wishing to see a panoramic view of the campus and surrounding Pioneer Valley. The 23rd Floor is quite popular as it is the highest floor from which patrons can view the Valley from each of the building's four sides.

The library is accessible to UMass Amherst and 5-College Students for 7 days a week during the normal academic year. The building is a public library so citizens of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts who are 18 years of age can access the majority of the building and its materials. An application for a borrowers card can be made online or on-site.

Peregrine falcons have nested atop the building since 2003 and a camera was installed so that their nest box could be live streamed to the public.

In 2011, Room 25 located on the Lower Level, was transformed into a "Team Based Learning Classroom" that can hold approximately 75 students.

In time for the fall 2017 semester, a refresh of the lobby was completed included the installation of new digital signage and a new information desk, the Graduate Commons was opened on the 5th floor, and a second teaching space was finished for the Archives.

The Science and Engineering Library, which holds the bulk of the STEM related collection is located at a separate location in the Lederle Graduate Research Center Lowrise.

Learning Commons
A prominent feature of the W.E.B. Du Bois Library is the Learning Commons, located on the Lower Level, which opened in 2005. The Learning Commons provides a central location for resources provided by many departments across campus including Circulations/Reserves/Interlibrary Loan, the Writing Center, Reference and Research Assistance, the Assistive Technologies Center, an Information Technologies Help Desk, and the Learning Commons and Technical Support desk.

The Learning Commons has over 30,000 square feet, with 450 seats available. There are 18 group study rooms which can be reserved, so students can work together without disturbing others, and there are over 200 work stations equipped with Mac and PC computers. The computers have a broad range of software installed, and are arranged in a variety of configurations to allow both individual and collaborative work. The entire building gained wireless Internet access in 2008. The North End is also home to the micro climate area, which consists of many experimental seating arrangements and television screens for group work.

Access to the Oswald Tippo Library Courtyard is on this level, which contains the statue entitled Searching for Buddha in the Mountains, designed by Thomas Matsuda in 1999 and installed in 2000.

Building myths
The building has fallen victim to several myths since its opening in 1973, the most popular of these being a variation of the "Sinking Library Myth," where the architect supposedly forgot to account for the weight of the books in the building's designs, resulting in a settling of the building. This is a popular myth attributed to many university libraries and is untrue.

The spalling of the bricks has also led to the common assumption that entire bricks fall away from the building, and invariably make contact with someone on the ground. While bits of material do occasionally break away, a full brick has never come away from the building.

The unusual inclusion of carrel floors bred the belief that the building was not originally designed to be a library, but was supposed to be an office building and the plans were mixed up. The building was designed to work in units of three, with two stacks floors holding similar subjects and a carrel floor to accommodate departments and librarians related to those materials. The plan never fully came to fruition, and carrels are used by graduate students and professors as quiet study spaces. This myth gained further traction after the construction of the Standard Oil building (now Aon Center) by Durell's firm in Chicago which features a similar design with an exterior clad in marble.

Renovations
Throughout the years since the building was first built, many renovations and upgrades have been completed on the library. These renovations have included a new entryway, brand new elevator systems, a sprinkler system and fire suppression, a reconfigured cafe, as well as electrical upgrades and an HVAC system. There is also a new loading dock and service entrance being built in conjunction with the renovation of the South College Building on the west side of the library.

In 2017, the Digital Scholarship Center and the Freshman Writing Program (both formerly located in Bartlett Hall) moved to the sixth and twelfth floors respectively, and renovations were completed to provide additional space to the Learning Resource Center on the thirteenth floor.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: W. E. B. Du Bois Library


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Uwe Johnson

Uwe Johnson (20 July 1934 – 22 February 1984) was a German writer, editor, and scholar. Such prominent writers and scholars as Günter Grass and Hans Mayer declared Johnson to be the most significant writer to emerge from East Germany. During the 1950s, he had troubles with the East German authorities, being treated as a "dissident" both for political reasons and for Modernist experiments in his works which made him opposed to the dominant doctrine of Socialist realism; after moving to West Berlin in 1959, he gained the label of "the author of the two Germanies", as, while criticizing the East Germany as the state which betrayed the Socialist ideals, he didn't regard the West Germany as a viable alternative and opposed the division of Germany in general. His works were dedicated both to East and West German societies and examined the relations between them.

Life
Johnson was born in Kammin in Pomerania (now Kamień Pomorski, Poland). His father was a peasant of Swedish descent from Mecklenburg and his mother was from Pomerania. In 1945 the family fled to Anklam in West Pomerania and in 1946 his father died in a Soviet internment camp (Fünfeichen). The family eventually settled in Güstrow, where he attended the John Brinckman-Oberschule from 1948 to 1952. He went on to study German philology, first in Rostock (1952–1954), then in Leipzig (1954–1956). His Diplomarbeit (final thesis) was on Ernst Barlach. Due to his failure to show support for the Communist regime of East Germany, he was suspended from the university on 17 June 1953, but he was later reinstated.

Beginning in 1953, Johnson worked on his first novel, Ingrid Babendererde, which was rejected by various publishing houses and remained unpublished during his lifetime.

In 1956, Johnson's mother left for West Berlin. As a result, he was not allowed to take a normal job in the East. Unemployed for political reasons, he translated Herman Melville's Israel Potter: His Fifty Years of Exile (the translation was published in 1961) and began to write the novel Mutmassungen über Jakob, published in 1959 by Suhrkamp in Frankfurt am Main. Johnson himself moved to West Berlin at this time. He promptly became associated with Gruppe 47, which Hans Magnus Enzensberger once described as "the Central Café of a literature without a capital".

During the early 1960s, Johnson continued to write and publish fiction, and also supported himself as a translator, mainly from English, and as an editor. He travelled to America in 1961. The following year he was married, had a daughter, received a scholarship to Villa Massimo, Rome, and won the Prix International.

In 1964 he wrote reviews for the Tagesspiegel of television programmes broadcast from East Germany, published later under the title ''Der 5. Kanal [The Fifth Channel], 1987). In the same year he also published a collection of stories, Karsch, und andere Prosa (Karsch, and Other Prose), and, two years later, Zwei Ansichten'' (Two Views).

In 1965, Johnson travelled again to the United States. He then edited Bertolt Brecht's ''Me-ti. Buch der Wendungen. Fragmente 1933–1956 (Me-ti: the Book of Changes. Fragments, 1933–1956''). From 1966 to 1968, he worked in New York City as a textbook editor at Harcourt, Brace & World, and lived with his wife and their daughter in an apartment at 243 Riverside Drive (Manhattan). In 1967, he began work on his magnum opus, Jahrestage. and edited Das neue Fenster (The New Window), a textbook of German-language readings for English-speaking students learning German.

In February 1967, the Kommune 1 moved into Johnson's apartment building in West Berlin. He first learned about in a newspaper report about a plan for a "pudding attack" on the U.S. Vice-President Hubert Humphrey.

Returning to West Germany in 1969, Johnson became a member of both its PEN Center and its Akademie der Künste (Academy of the Arts). In 1970, he published the first volume of his Jahrestage (Anniversaries). Two more volumes were to follow in the next three years, but the fourth volume did not appear until 1983.

In 1972, Johnson became Vice President of the Academy of the Arts and edited Max Frisch's Tagebuch 1966–1971.

In 1974, Johnson, his wife and their daughter moved into 26 Marine Parade, a Victorian terrace house overlooking the sea in Sheerness on the Isle of Sheppey in Southeast England. Shortly afterwards, he broke off work on Jahrestage, due partly to health problems and partly to writer's block. However, his ten years in Sheerness were not completely unproductive. He published some shorter works and continued to do some work as an editor. In 2020, a monograph by cultural historian Patrick Wright, The Sea View Has Me Again, was published by Repeater Books, focusing on Johnson's decade living in Sheerness.

In 1977, he was admitted to the Darmstädter Akademie für Sprache und Dichtung (Darmstadt Academy for Speech and Writing). Two years later he informally withdrew.

In 1979, he gave a series of lectures on poetics at the University of Frankfurt, published posthumously as ''Begleitumstände. Frankfurter Vorlesungen''.

In 1983, the fourth volume of Jahrestage was published, but Johnson broke off a reading tour for health reasons. He died from hypertensive heart disease in Sheerness on 22 February 1984. His body was not found until 13 March. At the time of his death, he had been planning a one-year stay in New York City.

Marriage
On 27 February 1962, Johnson married Elisabeth Schmidt, whom he later (1975) accused of conducting a love affair with the Czech Mozart scholar Tomislav Volek.

Honors

 * 1960 – Fontane Prize, West Berlin
 * 1962 – Prix International, awarded by the Formentor Group
 * 1971 – Georg Büchner Prize
 * 1975 – Wilhelm Raabe Prize, Braunschweig
 * 1978 – Thomas Mann Prize, Lübeck
 * 1983 – Literature prize from the city of Cologne

Works

 * Mutmassungen über Jakob (1959). Speculations About Jakob, trans. Ursule Molinaro (Grove, 1963)
 * Das dritte Buch über Achim (1961). The Third Book About Achim, trans. Ursule Molinaro (1967)
 * Karsch, und andere Prosa (1964). Karsch and Other Prose
 * Includes "Eine Reise wegwohin" (written in 1960). An Absence, trans. Richard and Clara Winston (1969)
 * Zwei Ansichten (1965). Two Views, trans. Richard and Clara Winston (1966)
 * Jahrestage. Aus dem Leben von Gesine Cresspahl (1970–83). Anniversaries: From a Year in the Life of Gesine Cresspahl, trans. Damion Searls (2018)
 * Eine Reise nach Klagenfurt (1974). A Trip to Klagenfurt: In the Footsteps of Ingeborg Bachmann, trans. Damion Searls (2004)
 * Berliner Sachen, Aufsätze (1975). Berlin Things: Essays
 * Max Frisch Stich-Worte (1975). Max Frisch Reference
 * Skizze eines Verunglückten (1982). Sketch of an Accident Victim
 * Begleitumstände. Frankfurter Vorlesungen (1980). Attendant Circumstances: Frankfurt Lectures
 * Ingrid Babendererde. Reifeprüfung 1953 (1985). Ingrid Babendererde: Final Exam 1953
 * Inselgeschichten (1995). Island Stories: Writings from England, trans. Damion Searls (forthcoming)

As translator

 * Translation of Herman Melville's Israel Potter: His Fifty Years of Exile (1961)
 * Translation of Das Nibelungenlied from Middle High German (1961)
 * Translation of John Knowles's A Separate Peace (1959) as In diesem Land (1963)

As editor

 * Edition of Bertolt Brecht's Me-ti. Buch der Wendungen. Fragmente 1933–1956 (Me-ti: the Book of Changes. Fragments, 1933–1956) (1965)
 * Das neue Fenster, a textbook of German-language readings for foreign students (1967)
 * Textbook for the documentary film "A Summer in the City" (1968?)
 * Co-editor with Hans Mayer, Das Werk von Samuel Beckett. Berliner Colloquium (1975, The Work of Samuel Beckett: Berlin Colloquium)

Short pieces

 * Von dem Fischer un syner Fru (Of the Fisherman and His Wife; the German-language title is in dialect): a fairy tale by Philipp Otto Runge with seven pictures by Marcus Behmer, and a retelling and afterword by Uwe Johnson (1976)
 * "Ein Schiff" ("A Ship") in Jürgen Habermas (ed.), Stichworte zur "Geistigen Situation der Zeit" (References on "The Spiritual Situation of the Time") (1979)
 * "Ein unergründliches Schiff" ("An Unfathomable Ship") in Merkur 33 (1979)

title: Uwe Johnson


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Electrical wiring in North America

Electrical wiring in North America follows the regulations and standards applicable at the installation location. It is also designed to provide proper function, and is also influenced by history and traditions of the location installation.

The US National Electrical Code is applicable to many areas in the US where state, county or local authorities have adopted it. For electrical wiring in Canada, the Canadian Electrical Code is a very similar standard published in Canada by the Canadian Standards Association.

Terminology
Although much of the electrician's field terminology matches that of the electrical codes, usages can vary:
 * Neutral wire is the return conductor of a circuit; in building wiring systems, the neutral wire is connected to earth ground at only one point. North American standards state that the neutral is neither switched nor fused except in very narrowly defined circumstances. The neutral is connected to the center tap of the power company transformer of a split-phase system, or the center of the wye connection of a polyphase power system.
 * United States electrical codes require that the neutral be connected to earth at the "service panel" only and at no other point within the building wiring system. Formally, the neutral is called the "grounded conductor"; as of the 2008 NEC, the terms "neutral conductor" and "neutral point" have been defined in the Code to conform to what had been common usage.

 * Hot is any line or neutral conductor (wire or otherwise) connected with an electrical system that has electric potential relative to electrical ground or line to neutral.
 * Ground is a safety conductor with a low impedance path to earth. It is often called the "ground wire," or safety ground. It is either bare or has green insulation.
 * Leg as in "hot leg" refers to one of multiple hot conductors in an electrical system. The most common residential and small commercial service in Canada and the U.S., single split-phase, 240 V, features a neutral and two hot legs, 240 V to each other, and 120 V each to the neutral. The most common three-phase system will have three hot legs, 208 V to each other and 120 V each to the neutral. An older, but still widely used, high-leg delta system uses three phases with 240 volts phase-to-phase for motor loads, and 120 volts for lighting loads by use of a center-tapped transformer; two of the phases are 120 volts to neutral. The third phase, the "high leg" of the system (also referred to as the "wild leg"), has 208 V to neutral and is not usually used for single-phase connections, so is distinctively colored. For larger commercial installations, 277/480 V or 347/600 V three-phase is common.
 * An outlet is defined by the NEC as "a point in the wiring system at which current is taken to utilization equipment". This definition includes receptacles, lighting, motors, etc. Ordinary switches control but do not consume electricity, and therefore are not defined as outlets in this sense.

Electrical codes and standards
The National Electrical Code (NEC) specifies minimum acceptable wiring methods and materials for many states and municipalities in the U.S. It is sponsored by the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and has been periodically revised since 1897. Local jurisdictions usually adopt the NEC or another published code and then distribute documents describing how local codes vary from the published codes. Governments cannot distribute the NEC itself for copyright reasons, though parts that have been adopted into law are not subject to copyright.

The purpose of the NEC is to protect persons and property from hazards arising from the use of electricity. The NEC is not any jurisdiction's electrical code per se; rather, it is an influential work of standards that local legislators (e.g., city council members, state legislators, etc. as appropriate) tend to use as a guide when enacting local electrical codes. The NFPA states that excerpts quoted from the National Electrical Code must have a disclaimer indicating that the excerpt is not the complete and authoritative position of the NFPA and that the original NEC document must be consulted as the definitive reference.

New construction, additions or major modifications must follow the relevant code for that jurisdiction, which is not necessarily the latest version of the NEC. Regulations in each jurisdiction will indicate when a change to an existing installation is so great that it must then be rebuilt to comply with the current electrical code. Generally existing installations are not required to be changed to meet new codes.

Other code requirements vary by jurisdiction in the United States. In many areas, a homeowner, for example, can perform household wiring for a building which the owner occupies; this may even be complete wiring of a home. A few cities have more restrictive rules and require electrical installations to be done by licensed electricians. The work will be inspected by a designated authority at several stages before permission is obtained to energize the wiring from the local electric utility; the inspector may be an employee of the state or city, or an employee of an electrical supply utility.

For electrical wiring in Canada, the Canadian Electrical Code is a very similar standard published in Canada by the Canadian Standards Association since 1927.

Design and installation conventions
For residential wiring, some basic rules given in the NEC are:

 * Terminals for the neutral (grounded) conductor in general, and for receptacles, plugs, and connectors specifically, are required to be substantially white in color [NEC 200.9, NEC 200.10 (B)], and if the terminal itself is not visible, the hole leading to it must be marked with the word "white" or the letter "W". Edison-base lamp sockets (called screw shell devices in the NEC) are required to have the neutral conductor attached to the outer screw shell [NEC 200.10(C)]. In actual practice, the neutral terminal is silver colored, the line and load terminals are brass or (rarely) painted black), and the grounding screw is usually colored green. A common mnemonic electricians use to remember which wire goes to which terminal is "white to light…black to brass…green to green".
 * Phase wire in a circuit may be any color other than green, gray, or white (whether these are solid colors or stripes). The common colors are black, red, blue, brown, yellow, and orange (high-leg delta) insulated wire, sometimes other colors. Specific exceptions apply, such as a cable running to a switch and back (known as a traveler) where the white wire will be the hot wire feeding that switch.  Another is for a cable used to feed an outlet for 250 VAC appliances that do not need a neutral, there the white is hot. In both those instances the white wire should be identified as being hot, usually with black tape inside junction boxes.
 * The neutral wire is identified by gray or white insulated wire, perhaps using stripes or markings.
 * With lamp cord wire the ribbed wire is the neutral, and the smooth wire is the hot. NEC 2008 400.22(f) allows surface marking with ridged, grooves or white stripes on the surface of lamp cord. With transparent cord the hot wire is copper colored, and the neutral is silver colored.
 * Grounding wire of circuit may be bare or identified insulated wire of green or green having yellow stripes. All metallic systems in a building are to be bonded to the building grounding system, such as water, natural gas, HVAC piping, and others.
 * Larger wires are generally furnished only in black; these black wires may be properly re-identified with suitable paint or tape.
 * All wiring in a circuit except for the leads that are part of a device or fixture must be of the required gauge or larger. Different size wires may be used in the same raceway so long as they are all insulated for the maximum voltage of any of these circuits.
 * The Code gives rules for calculating circuit loading and maximum ampacity.
 * Ground-fault circuit interrupter (GFCI) protection is required on receptacles in wet locations and locations where there exists an easy path for fault current to travel to earth. This includes all receptacles intended to service kitchen counter surfaces, crawl spaces at or below grade level, basements, garages and accessory buildings, bathrooms, laundry areas, within 6 ft. of the outside edge of a sink bathtub or shower stall, as well as outdoors. There were previous exceptions for refrigerators because unattended disconnection could cause spoilage of food and for garbage disposals. Instead, for refrigerators and other semi-permanent appliances in basements and wet areas, a one-outlet non-GFCI dedicated receptacle was generally used. As of the 2020 NEC this exception no longer exists and those devices in are required to have GFCI protection where otherwise required. Two-wire outlets having no grounding conductor may be protected by a GFCI or one upstream of the receptacle and must be labelled "No Equipment Ground" and "GFCI Protected". Most GFCI receptacles allow the connection and provide GFCI protection for down-stream connected receptacles.  Receptacles protected in this manner or with a GFCI circuit breaker should be labeled "GFCI protected".  (Outside North America these are referred to as  a "Residual-current device" or RCD.)
 * Arc-Fault Circuit Interrupter (AFCI) protection is required to protect nearly all finished areas of a home with the exception of bathrooms. This device, which can be a circuit breaker or the first outlet on a circuit, is designed to detect hazardous electrical arcing in the branch circuit wiring as well as in cords and plugs. An AFCI device is designed to trip quickly when it detects potentially dangerous arcing that could start a fire, but not trip with harmless arcing as part of the normal operation of devices such as motors.
 * Most circuits have the metallic components interconnected with a grounding wire connected to the third, round prong of a plug, and to metal boxes and appliance chassis.
 * Furnaces, electric water heaters, heat pumps, central air conditioning units, electric dryers, electric stoves or cooktops, and built-in microwave ovens must be on dedicated circuits.
 * The code provides rules for sizing electrical boxes for the number of wires and wiring devices in the box.

The foregoing is just a brief overview and must not be used as a substitute for the actual National Electrical Code.

Comparison of US practices with other countries
Electrical wiring practices developed in parallel in many countries in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. As a result, national and regional variations developed and remain in effect. (see National Electrical Code, electrical wiring, electrical wiring in the United Kingdom). Some of these are retained for technical reasons, since the safety of wiring systems depends not only on the wiring code but also on the technical standards for wiring devices, materials, and equipment.

Grounding (earthing) of distribution circuits is a notable difference in practice between wiring systems of the United States and those of other regions. Since the early 1960s, wiring in new construction has required a separate grounding conductor used to bond (electrically connect) all normally non-current carrying parts of an electrical installation. Portable appliances with metal cases also have a bonding conductor in the flexible cable and plug connecting them to the distribution system. The circuit return conductor (neutral) is also connected to ground at the service entrance panel only; no other connections from neutral to ground are allowed, unlike regulations in some other parts of the world.

Lighting and power receptacle circuits in North American systems are typically radial from a distribution panel containing circuit breakers to protect each branch circuit. The smallest branch circuit rating is 15 amperes, used for general purpose receptacles and lighting. Often, 20 ampere circuits are used for general purpose receptacles and lighting. In residential construction, branch circuits for higher ratings are usually dedicated to one appliance, for example, fixed cooking appliances, electric clothes dryers, and air conditioners. Lighting and general purpose receptacles are at 120 volts AC, with larger devices fed by three wire single-phase circuits at 240 volts.

In commercial construction, three-phase circuits are often used. Common 3 phase configurations within a building are 208v/120 wye, 120/240 center tapped delta and 480v/277v wye. Lighting is usually fed by 277 V or 120v.

Countries such as Mexico may adopt the NFPA standard as their national electrical code, with local amendments similar to those in United States jurisdictions. The Canadian Electrical Code, while developed independently from the NFPA code, is similar in scope and intent to the US NEC, with only minor variations in technical requirement details; harmonization of the CEC and NEC codes is intended to facilitate free trade between the two countries.

Wiring methods
Most circuits in the modern North American home and light commercial construction are wired with non-metallic sheathed (NM) cable designated type. This type of cable is the least expensive for a given size and is appropriate for dry indoor applications. The designation NM XX-Y indicates, respectively, the type of sheathing (in this case, non-metallic), the size of the main conductors, and the total number of circuit conductors (exclusive of the grounding conductor). For example, NM 14-2 cable contains three conductors (two plus one ground) at 14 gauge, a size typically used for circuits protected at 15 amperes. Circuits with larger currents (such as for electric furnaces, water heaters, air conditioners, or sub-mains to additional circuit panels) will have larger conductors. Not all US jurisdictions permit use of non-metallic sheathed cable. The NEC does not permit use of NM cable in large, fire-resistant, or high-rise structures.

In type NM cable, conductor insulation is color-coded for identification, typically one black, one white, and a bare grounding conductor. The National Electrical Code (NEC) specifies that the black conductor represent the hot conductor, with significant voltage to earth ground; the white conductor represent the identified or neutral conductor, near ground potential; and the bare/green conductor, the safety grounding conductor not normally used to carry circuit current. Wires may be re-colored, so these rules are commonly excepted. In 240-volt applications not requiring a neutral conductor, the white wire may be used as the second hot conductor, but must be recolored with tape or by some other method. Four-wire flexible equipment connection cords have red as the fourth color; unlike older European practices, color-coding in flexible cords is the same as for fixed wiring.

In commercial and industrial, unenclosed NM cable is often prohibited in certain areas or altogether (depending on what the building is used for and local/state building codes). Therefore, it is almost never used by commercial electrical contractors. Most wiring is put in non-flexible conduit, usually EMT because of its cost and durability. Rigid may be required for certain areas and additionally, vapor-lock fittings may be required in areas where a fire or explosion hazard is present (such as gas stations, chemical factories, grain silos, etc.) PVC can be used where wire is run underground or where concrete will be poured. A duct bank is usually made of multiple PVC conduits encased in concrete. FMC or Flex is used where EMT or other non-flexible conduit is impractical or for short runs, known as "whips", to lights or other devices. For power circuits, the color-coding uses the same colors as residential construction, and adds the additional wires used for three-phase systems. Black, Red and Blue are used for hot wires and White is used as the neutral wire in a 120/208 V circuit. Brown, Orange and Yellow are used as hot wires and gray is used as the neutral wire in a 277/480 V. For grounding, regardless of the voltage, Green (or a bare wire) is used.

Several other types of wiring systems are used for building wiring in the United States; these include corrugated metal armored cable, mineral-insulated cable, other types of power cable, and various types of electrical conduit. In industrial applications cables may be laid in cable trays. Cable type TC is especially intended for use in tray systems. Special wiring rules apply to wet or corrosive locations, and to locations which present an explosion hazard. Wiring materials for use in the United States must generally be made and tested to product standards set by NEMA and Underwriters Laboratories (UL) and must bear approval marks such as those set by UL.

Approved wiring types can vary by jurisdiction. Not all wiring methods approved in the NEC are accepted in all areas of the United States.

Wire types
When running through conduit, such as in commercial applications, it is typical to pull individual wires rather than a preassembled cable.

Wire is manufactured in a range of conductor sizes, stranding, and materials (copper or aluminum), but the term "wire type" usually refers to the insulation, which determines the environments in which the wire may be used.

Wire types for North American wiring practices are defined by standards issued by Underwriters Laboratories, the Canadian Standards Association, the American Society for Testing and Materials, the National Electrical Manufacturers Association, and the Insulated Cable Engineers Association.

One important property of the insulation which affects the current-carrying capacity of the wire is the maximum conductor temperature. This, in combination with the ambient temperature and ability of the environment to absorb heat, determines the amount of tolerable copper loss in the wire, and therefore its size in relation to the load current.

The most commonly used insulation type in AC electrical distribution systems throughout North America is THHN ("Thermoplastic High Heat-resistant Nylon-coated" ). This is a specification for PVC insulation (other thermoplastics are permitted, but rarely used) with a nylon jacket for abrasion resistance. THHN is suitable for dry or damp environments and conductor temperatures up to 90 C.

A second popular type is THWN ("Thermoplastic Heat and Water-resistant Nylon-coated" ). This is similar to the preceding, but rated for dry or wet environments and conductor temperatures up to 75 C, and is commonly used in subsurface conduits which may fill with water.

A great deal of THWN wire is actually dual-rated, and meets THHN the specification as well, so may be used in wet environments up to 75°C or dry environments up to 90°C.

An extended specification, THWN-2 permits use in wet locations and conductor temperatures up to 90°C simultaneously.

There are additional restrictions on such wire's use not mentioned here (for example, neither THHN nor THWN may be exposed to sunlight, or directly buried in the ground ); see the NEC for details.

XHHW-2 (XLPE High Heat-resistant Water-resistant" ) is a less commonly seen insulation type with a thermoset plastic insulation. It has the same moisture and temperature specifications as THWN-2 (the original XHHW was equivalent to THHN/THWN dual-rated insulation), but being a thermoset plastic, it is less affected by temperature, remaining firmer at high temperatures and significantly more flexible at low temperatures.  This  makes it popular for outdoor wiring applications.  The low dielectric constant of the insulation is also beneficial when high-frequency AC is present on the wire, such as the output of variable-frequency drives.

title: Electrical wiring in North America


text:
User:Horst F JENS

Hello, I'm Horst JENS living in Vienna, Austria, Europe, Earth. Currently i work as an freelance computer teacher and programmer.

=Contact=
 * [mailto:horstjens@gmail.com email]
 * http://spielend-programmieren.at (business homepage, computer courses for children)

Blogs

 * http://spielend-programmieren.at/en:blog:start Blog about ThePythonGameBook and other projects

Projects

 * Projects on Github

de:Benutzer:Horst_F_JENS

title: User:Horst F JENS


text:
River Out of Eden

River Out of Eden: A Darwinian View of Life is a 1995 popular science book by Richard Dawkins. The book is about Darwinian evolution and summarizes the topics covered in his earlier books, The Selfish Gene, The Extended Phenotype and The Blind Watchmaker. It is part of the Science Masters series and is Dawkins's shortest book. It is illustrated by Lalla Ward, Dawkins's then-wife. The book's name is derived from Genesis 2:10 relating to the Garden of Eden. The King James Version reads "And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads."

River Out of Eden has five chapters. The first chapter lays down the framework on which the rest of the book is built, that life is like a river of genes flowing through geological time where organisms are mere temporary bodies. The second chapter shows how human ancestry can be traced via many gene pathways to different most recent common ancestors, with special emphasis on the African Eve. The third chapter describes how gradual enhancement via natural selection is the only mechanism which can create the observed complexity of nature. The fourth chapter describes the indifference of genes towards organisms they build and discard, as they maximise their own utility functions. The last chapter summarises milestones during the evolution of life on Earth and speculates on how similar processes may work in alien planetary systems.

The digital river
Dawkins begins the book by stating that all our ancestors reached adulthood and begot at least one child before they died. In a world where most organisms die before they can procreate, descendants are common but ancestors are rare. But we can all claim an unbroken chain of successful ancestors, right back to the first single-celled organism.

If the success of an organism is measured by its ability to survive and reproduce, then all living organisms can be said to have inherited "good genes" from successful ancestors. Each generation of organisms is a sieve against which replicated and mutated genes are tested. Good genes fall through the sieve into the next generation while bad genes are removed. This explains why organisms become better and better at whatever it takes to succeed, and is in stark contrast to Lamarckism, which would require successful organisms to refine their genes during their lifetime.

Following this gene-centered view of evolution, it can be argued that an organism is no more than a temporary body in which a set of companion genes (actually alleles) co-operate toward a common goal: to grow the organism into adulthood, before they go their separate ways in bodies of the organism's progeny. Bodies are created and discarded, but good genes live on as replicas of themselves, a result of a high-fidelity copy process typical of digital encoding.

Through meiosis (sexual reproduction), genes share bodies with different companion genes in successive generations. Thus genes can be said to flow in a river through geological time. Even though genes are selfish, over the long run every gene needs to be compatible with all other genes in the gene pool of a population of organisms, to produce successful organisms.

A river of genes may fork, mostly due to the geographical separation between two populations of organisms. Because genes in the two branches never share the same bodies, they may drift apart until genes from the two branches become incompatible. Organisms created by these two branches form separate, non-interbreeding species, completing the process of speciation.

All Africa and her progenies
When tracing human lineage back in time, most people look at parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and so on. The same approach is often taken when tracing descendants via children and grandchildren. Dawkins shows that this approach is misguided, as the numbers of ancestors and descendants seem to grow exponentially as generations are added to the lineage tree. In just 80 generations, the number of ancestors can exceed a trillion trillion.

This simple calculation does not take into account the fact that every marriage is really a marriage between distant cousins which include second cousins, fourth cousins, sixteenth cousins and so on. The ancestry tree is not really a tree, but a graph.

Dawkins prefers to model ancestry in terms of genes flowing through a river of time. An ancestor gene flows down the river either as perfect replicas of itself or as slightly mutated descendant genes. Dawkins fails to explicitly contrast ancestor organism and descendant organisms against ancestor genes and descendant genes in this chapter. But the first half of the chapter is really about differences between these two models of lineage. While organisms have ancestry graphs and progeny graphs via sexual reproduction, a gene has a single chain of ancestors and a tree of descendants.

Given any gene in the body of an organism, we can trace a single chain of ancestor organisms back in time, following the lineage of this one gene, as stated in the coalescent theory. Because a typical organism is built from tens of thousands of genes, there are numerous ways to trace the ancestry of organisms using this mechanism. But all these inheritance pathways share one common feature. If we start with all humans alive in 1995 and trace their ancestry by one particular gene (actually a locus), we find that the farther we move back in time, the smaller the number of ancestors become. The pool of ancestors continues to shrink until we find the most recent common ancestor (MRCA) of all humans alive in 1995 via this particular gene pathway.

In theory, one can also trace human ancestry via a single chromosome, as a chromosome contains a set of genes and is passed down from parents to children via independent assortment from only one of the two parents. But genetic recombination (chromosomal crossover) mixes genes from non-sister chromatids from both parents during meiosis, thus muddling the ancestry path.

However, the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) is immune to sexual mixing, unlike the nuclear DNA whose chromosomes are shuffled and recombined in Mendelian inheritance. Mitochondrial DNA, therefore, can be used to trace matrilineal inheritance and to find the Mitochondrial Eve (also known as the African Eve), the most recent common ancestor of all humans via the mitochondrial DNA pathway.

Do good by stealth
The main themes of the third chapter are borrowed from Dawkins' own book, The Blind Watchmaker. This chapter shows how the gradual, continuous and cumulative enhancement to organisms via natural selection is the only mechanism which can explain the complexity we observe all around us in nature. Dawkins adamantly refutes the "I cannot believe so and so could have evolved by natural selection" argument of Creationists, calling it the Argument from Personal Incredulity.

Creationists often claim that some features of organisms (e.g. resemblance of Ophrys (orchid) to female wasp, figure-eight dances of honeybees, mimicry of stick insects, etc.) are too complicated to be a result of evolution. Some say, "half of an X will not work at all." Others say, "in order for X to work, it had to be perfect the first time." Dawkins concludes that these are no more than bold assertions based on ignorance:

"... Do you actually know the first thing about orchids, or wasps, or the eyes with which wasps look at females and orchids? What emboldens you to assert that wasps are so hard to fool that the orchid's resemblance would have to be perfect in all dimensions in order to work?"

Dawkins goes on to illustrate his point by demonstrating how scientists have been able to fool creatures big and small using seemingly dumb triggers. For instance, stickleback fish treat a pear-shape as a sex bomb (a supernormal stimulus). Gulls' hard-wired instincts make them reach over and roll back not just their own stray eggs, but also wooden cylinders and cocoa tins. Honeybees push out their live and protesting companion from their hive, when the companion is painted with a drop of oleic acid. Furthermore, a turkey will kill anything which moves in its nest unless it cries like a baby turkey. If the turkey is deaf, it will mercilessly kill its own babies.

As part of this, Dawkins emphasises the gradual nature of evolution. For example, some creatures such as the stick insects possess the most amazing degree of camouflage, but in fact any sort of camouflage is better than none. There is a gradient from perfect camouflage to zero camouflage. A 100 percent camouflage is better than 99 percent. A 50 percent camouflage is better than 49 percent. A 1 percent camouflage is better than no camouflage. A creature with 1 percent better camouflage than its contemporaries will leave more descendants over time (an evolutionary success), and its good genes will come to dominate the gene pool.

Not only can we classify the degree of insect camouflage using a gradient, we can also study all aspects of the surrounding environment as gradients. For instance, a 1 percent camouflage may not be distinguishable from no camouflage under bright daylight. But as light fades and night sets in, there is a critical moment when the 1 percent camouflage helps an insect escape detection by its predator, while its companion with no camouflage is eaten. The same principle can be applied to the distance between prey and predator, to the angle of view, to the skill or the age of a creature, etc.

In addition to demonstrating how gradual changes can bring about features as complex as the human eye, Dawkins states that computer simulation work by Swedish scientists Dan Nilsson and Susanne Pelger (although it is not a computer simulation but simple mathematical model) shows that the eye could have evolved from scratch a thousand times in succession in any animal lineage. In Dawkins' own words, "the time needed for the evolution of the eye... turned out to be too short for geologists to measure! It is a geological blink." And, "it is no wonder the eye has evolved at least forty times independently around the animal kingdom."

God's utility function
This chapter is Dawkins's take on the meaning of life or the purpose of life.

Dawkins quotes how Charles Darwin lost his faith in religion, "I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of Caterpillars." We ask why a caterpillar should suffer such cruel punishment. We ask why digger wasps couldn't first kill caterpillars to save them from a prolonged and agonising torture. We ask why a child should die an untimely death. And we ask why we should all grow old and die.

Dawkins rephrases the word purpose in terms of what economists call a utility function, meaning "that which is maximised". Engineers often investigate the intended purpose (or utility function) of a piece of equipment using reverse engineering. Dawkins uses this technique to reverse-engineer the purpose in the mind of the Divine Engineer of Nature, or the Utility Function of God.

According to Dawkins, it is a mistake to assume that an ecosystem or a species as a whole exists for a purpose. In fact, it is wrong to suppose that individual organisms lead a meaningful life either. In nature, only genes have a utility function – to perpetuate their own existence with indifference to great sufferings inflicted upon the organisms they build, exploit and discard. As hinted at in chapter one, genes are the supreme lords of the natural world. In other words, the unit of selection is the gene, not an individual, or any other higher-order group as championed by proponents of group selection.

As long as an organism survives its childhood and manages to reproduce thus passing its genes down to the next generation, what happens to the parent organism afterwards does not really bother genes. Because an organism is always at the danger of dying from accidents (a waste of investment), it pays for the genes to build an organism which pools almost all its resources to produce offspring as early as possible. Thus we accumulate damages to our body as we age and harbour late-onset diseases such as Huntington's disease which have minimum impact on the evolutionary success of our gene overlords.

Genes, Dawkins argues, are indifferent to who or what gets hurt, so long as DNA is passed on. He concludes:

"During the minute it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive; others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear; others are being slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites; thousands of all kinds are dying from starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a time of plenty, this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored."

The replication bomb
In the last chapter, Dawkins considers how Darwinian evolution may look outside planet Earth. It seems that the trigger event would be the spontaneous arising of self-replicating entities or the phenomenon of heredity. Once this process is initiated, it will launch an explosion of replicating entities until all available resources are used and all vacant niches are taken. Thus the title of the chapter.

Dawkins tries to distill ten milestones from the history of the only one replication bomb we know of, life on Earth. He strips any local conditions peculiar to Earth from these milestones which he calls thresholds, in the hope that these thresholds will be applicable to an alien evolution in an alien planetary system.

From the starting point of the Replicator Threshold, we may eventually reach the higher thresholds of Consciousness, Language, Technology, and Radio. The final threshold is Space Travel. In reaching the Moon, we have hardly made it past the front door.

title: River Out of Eden


text:
User talk:20040302

Re: Syncretism vs. Variety - NPOV
Very interesting comments! The rebirth issue keeps coming up. You really know what you are talking about. That's so rare to find here! Viriditas (talk) 13:44, 19 January 2010 (UTC)

from the perspective of the awareness that realizes emptiness of self, that realization is not realization of emptiness of phenomena. that is a second realization that is "deduced" from the first. so prasanga shows emptiness of self, whereas the resulting realization of the emptiness of phenomena is a second negation not mentioned in the definition of the work that prasanga does http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Prasaṅgika

tell me what you think? i hope that i can be understood... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.153.97.122 (talk) 23:34, 6 February 2010 (UTC) thanks for the reply, i enjoyed that edit. maybe i can ask you if there's anything i'm stuck with in Buddhism - generally i mean. thanks... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.153.97.122 (talk) 12:57, 7 February 2010 (UTC)  I'm sorry to just jump at you asking a random question but I don't suppose you can explain the meaning of absolute truth in the separate teaching. I am thinking of Chih: what I have read says that it is "neither emptiness nor existence" or that they are "non dual" but I can't work out what that means. Any reply or help appreciated...

Paṭiccasamuppāda
A response to your message. Paticca means ground or foundation; Sammupada refers to causation. Paticcasammupada literally means 'by virtue of the fact of causation'. The Pali Text Society Dictionary gives the following'':

 * "arising on the grounds of (a preceding cause)" happening by way of cause, working of cause & effect, causal chain of causation; causal genesis, dependent origination, theory of the twelve causes.''

Most Pali translators I know translate the phrase generally with the expression 'Dependent Origination'. This is the standard phrase used in most of the literature published by the Buddhist Publication Society or Wisdom Books USA to name but two of the leading publishers of English translations of Pali (Theravada) literature. You are quite correct when you say that the phrase normally refers to the construction of the twelve nidanas. The reason this is the case is because the Buddha's principal activity was showing people the way out of suffering. He explained that suffering and incarnation exist due to the existence of other factors which are acting as causes. In other words, suffering and incarnation are dependently originated - namely dependent on the existence of causes which are giving rise to them. Remove the causes, he explained, and you remove the effects. However the doctrine of Dependent Origination actually refers to all phenomena in the universe. Everything is dependently originated. This means that everything that exists is connected to everything else in each moment. Thich Nhat Hanh calls this 'Interbeing'. Einstein was unhappy about it when Quantum physics discovered this (see EPR experiment). So properly speaking the twelve nidanas is a special instance of the dependently originated nature of all phenomena. This is not novel - many Buddhist teachers explain the interconnectedness of all things. The 14th Dalai Lama for example.

I was very sad to find the article in the state it was in. It was in much better shape last year. Someone calling himself Ormurin started meddling with it on January 5th and unfortunately it has degenerated from something that was quite passable. The article had remained more or less unchanged for the preceding year or two. Mostly I have retired from editing wikipedia due to having to deal with fundamentalists, upstarts, bullies etc. I am a published scholar and editor in the field of Theravada Buddhism. My work is respected by experts in the field. Thankyou for your understanding. 81.106.115.153 (talk) 03:46, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

 * Hi. Dependent Origination implies mutual interdependence and mutual interdependence gives rise to the phenomenon of non-local effects (an expression borrowed from quantum physics). Quantum theory implies that objects experiencing change locally cause simultaneous changes (effects) to phenomena non-locally - changes, for example, to phenomena at vast distances (billions of light years for example) from the local object (the object of our immediate perception). This leads to certain mysterious paradoxes regarding the nature of causation which I believe the Mahayana logicians were aware of. This is discussed in section four of the current article. As far as I am aware the Mahayana philosophers and scriptures go into this subject a great deal. For example, the Avatamsaka Sutra discusses dependent origination as the arising of phenomena in a mutually interdependent web of cause and effect by means of the metaphor of Indra's net. Here the principle of simultaneous non-local interconnectedness is explicitly advanced by the author(s) in the beautiful descriptive passages. I am sure it is also discussed in other Mahayana literature. If, by 'classical literature' you refer to the Pali Tipitaka then it is true that the subject is not expounded at length due to Buddha's principle of 'Ockham's razor' that characterises Theravada teaching in general (See Simsapa Sutta). So either with respect to scripture or doctrine I don't understand what is contentious. Dependent origination is a general metaphysical doctrine of which the mutually interdependent twelve nidanas is a specific example that just happens to be of vital importance for understanding the path to liberation. 81.106.115.153 (talk) 04:30, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Candrakirti
To answer a question you asked somewhere, he was "virtually unknown in East Asia until modern times" (Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Volume 2, 1998, page 81). Peter jackson (talk) 10:12, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Addition to Śūnyatā article
An addition was proposed to the Śūnyatā article here. I reverted that and asked the editor to discuss it. You seem to be knowledgeable in the Theravada tradition. Would you be able to take a look at his revisions and comment on the article talk page? My question is that whether it is expressed in a neutral and fair manner in accordance with Wikipedia policy. Sunray (talk) 19:00, 6 October 2011 (UTC)
 * Sometimes there are great rewards from editing Wikipedia. It is a joy to read commentary that not only accords with WP policies (verifiability, civility, and consensus), but is also in the observance of Buddhist precepts. Thank you. Sunray (talk) 17:17, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Gelugpa view
Karl Brunnhölzl says "First, with a few exceptions, the majority of books or articles on Madhyamaka by Western - particularly North American - scholars is based on the explanations of the Gelugpa school of Tibetan Buddhism. Deliberately or not, many of these Western presentations give the impression that the Gelugpa system is more of less equivalent to Tibetan Buddhism as such and that this school's way of presenting Madhyamaka is the standard or even the only way to explain this system, which has led to the still widely prevailing assumption that this is actually the case. From the perspective of Indian and Tibetan Buddhism in general, nothing could be more wrong. In fact, the peculiar Gelugpa version of Madhaymaka is a minority position in Indo-Tibetan Buddhism, since its uncommon features are neither found in any Indian text nor accepted by any of the other Tibetan schoools."Page 17, Center of the Sunlit Sky.Gogeta38947 (talk) 13:57, 14 October 2011 (UTC)

Bundle as a Western Loanword
I aleady addressed this issue 3 times. Bundle is a direct translation of skandha. It is a very Buddhist flavored word. ProvisionalMPEP (talk) 22:44, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Your comment on my talk page
Your statement: "... these accounts are all new, and are all agreeing with each other. The use of blatant non-sequiturs, a tendency to misinterpret reliable sources, other similar behaviours (misspellings of simple words like 'course' for 'coarse'; a strong aversion to the idea that the Madhyamaka denies inherent existence; an unwillingness to respond meaningfully to questions that are pertinent to investigation, uncalled for lack of civility, rewrites, attempts to undermine constructive, collaborative work. Other common interests such as a shared editorial trend across Hindu texts, tantra, and the middle-way philosophy. Similar timezones (which is a late evening for me), intense editorial sessions; pretty meaningless point-scoring, etc.," probably should go to WP:SPI. Some diffs as examples (such as similar phrasing) would be helpful. I could then proceed. Sunray (talk) 22:37, 31 January 2012 (UTC)

Query
Would you be able to comment on a query I've had on my talk page, here? Sunray (talk) 07:39, 13 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Thanks for your comment on my talk page. I take your point about the translation of the term. Probably a good idea to change the citation, though if you have one. Otherwise, I agree it is WP:SYN. I admire your patience with all of this. I am still considering options. Sunray (talk) 07:59, 14 February 2012 (UTC)

Essence and existence
Well, you're not alone. I put (back) some of your remarks in the article on Madhyamaka. Vriendelijke groet, Joshua Jonathan (talk) 07:16, 17 March 2012 (UTC)

No essential arising
Thanks. See also: No essential arising, no denying of the world, bu also no pinning it down in "things". Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   14:07, 8 May 2015 (UTC)
 * Susan Kahn, The Two Truths of Buddhism and The Emptiness of Emptiness
 * Patrick Jennings, Tsongkhapa: In Praise of Relativity; The Essence of Eloquence

 * Well, yes - exactly. :-D. In fact, the way I generally talk it is by looking at it from the other end of the telescope - we know that it is grasping/clinging to self/things (because we identify them as sources of pleasure/pain - cf. the 12 dependant links) which we must elminate, and we do that by understanding that they have no potency (they are not effective) as sources of pleasure/pain. This lack of potency is first understood at a coarse level by understanding momentary impermanence - and then at a finer level by understanding essencelessness (the inability to act as 'carriers' of pleasure/pain), based on the three dependencies (1: they are products, therefore have no essence; 2: they are dependent designations - constructs of language and convention, and therefore have no essence; 3: they are aggregates (dependent on their parts), and therefore have no essence).  So, then we also tend to conflate the event of pleasure with the cause of pleasure, and that's why understanding Karma is so important also. The "problem" with this sort of interpretation is that it's an "anti-philosophy" - it doesn't make any metaphysical assertions; it just says "watch closely, and learn".  I have always been astounded by critics of Tsongkhapa when they say he is too intellectual - when he doesn't leave much to be intellectual about. Of course he is incredibly deft at reducing other peoples constructs to dust. Anyway, thanks for the sharing :-D  (20040302 (talk) 14:20, 8 May 2015 (UTC))

File:Rizongmonks.jpg listed for discussion
A file that you uploaded or altered, File:Rizongmonks.jpg, has been listed at Files for discussion. Please see the to see why it has been listed (you may have to search for the title of the image to find its entry). Feel free to add your opinion on the matter below the nomination. Thank you. Iazyges  Consermonor   Opus meum  16:10, 25 December 2016 (UTC)

Revert at Buddhism
Sorry about the revert. Somehow, I hadn't noticed the discussion on my watchlist.-- Farang Rak Tham   (Talk) 11:24, 4 June 2018 (UTC)

GMO subjects
Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:03, 26 September 2020 (UTC)

File:Tetragrammaton-related-Masoretic-vowel-points.png
Images don't necessarily have sources in the same way that articles do, but all the information in the image is contained in the Gesenius-Kautzsch-Cowley grammar, or Yeivin on the Masorah... AnonMoos (talk) 20:25, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

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Buddhism
Hey there! I'm keen on religious studies and all things spiritual. Buddhism really grabs me. Fancy putting our noggins together for an article on the topic? You pick a subtopic that tickles your fancy.

To be honest, I took a likin' to ya from our chat in another article. You're a proper smart and interesting one, ain't ya?

By the way, are you a Buddhist now? Just curious! – Mariâ Magdalina (talk) 15:04, 1 December 2023 (UTC)

A kitten for you!
Happy WikiBirthday!

Mseingth2133444 ( talk / contribs ) 17:24, 13 March 2024 (UTC)

Invitation to join the Twenty Year Society
Dear ,

I'd like to extend a cordial invitation to you to join the Twenty Year Society, an informal group for editors who've been participating in the Wikipedia project for twenty years or more.

Best regards,  Chris Troutman  ( talk )  17:52, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

 * Thanks! I am honoured. 20040302 (talk) 17:54, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

title: User talk:20040302


text:
Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics

The von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics (VKI) is a non-profit educational and scientific organization which specializes in three specific fields: aeronautics and aerospace, environment and applied fluid dynamics, turbomachinery and propulsion. Founded in 1956, it is located in Sint-Genesius-Rode, Belgium.

About
The von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics is a non-profit international, educational and scientific organization which is working in three specific fields: aeronautics and aerospace, environment and applied fluid dynamics, turbomachinery and propulsion.

The VKI provides education in these specific areas for students from all over the world. A hundred students come to the Institute each year to study fluid dynamics, for a PhD programme, a research master in Fluid Dynamics, a final year project and also to gather further knowledge while doing a work placement in a specific area. Each year, Lecture Series and events are being organized inside and outside of the organization. These events emphasize on topics of great importance such as aerodynamics, fluid mechanics, heat transfer with application to aeronautics, space, turbomachinery, the environment and also industrial fluid dynamics. The Institute has built an international renown in these domains. Students who study these fields, researchers, industrials and engineers want to follow these Lecture Series. The information presented is accurate and reliable.

History
In the course of 1955, Professor Theodore von Kármán proposed with his assistants the establishment of an institution devoted to training and research in aerodynamics which would be open to young engineers and scientists of the NATO nations. It was strongly felt that this form of international undertaking would fulfil the important objective of fostering fruitful exchanges and understanding between the participating nations in a well-defined technical field.

The von Karman Institute was established in October 1956 in the buildings which formed what then was the aeronautical laboratory of the Civil Aviation Authority of the Belgian Ministry of Communications.

The history of the laboratory goes back to 1922 when, on farmland purchased by the Belgian Government, the first building was erected to house the STAé (Service Technique de l'Aéronautique), i.e. the technical services of the Civil Aviation Authority then under the Ministry of Defence. The building was designed to accommodate a large low speed wind tunnel of the Eiffel type with an open return circuit and open-jet test section of 2 m diameter, as well as offices and shops. It still exists and has been refurbished internally after removal of the low speed tunnel to make room for modern turbomachinery and high speed facilities. A second building was added in 1935 to house offices and laboratories. It is now the Institute's administrative building. The last addition was made after the war, in 1949, with the construction of a large building specially designed to house a supersonic tunnel and a multi-configuration low speed facility.

The AGARD Study Group of 1955 stated, in terms of training and research: "The Institute should aim toward a training which, apart from its direct and obvious ties with aeronautical industries, would be of value in wider areas such as industrial or scientific research where the application of experimental techniques of aerodynamics would be profitable".

Structure
There are three departments which are hosted at the von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, from the older to the younger:

A wide spectrum of facilities and computational tools covers the flow range from the low-speed regime of commercial aircraft to the supersonic and hypersonic regime of atmospheric space entry. The department focuses in particular on the modeling, simulation and experimental validation of atmospheric entry flows and thermal protection systems (TPS), including transition to turbulence and stability. The experimental studies are carried out in its top level Mach 14, Mach 6 and Induction Coupled Plasma windtunnels, for which dedicated measuring techniques have been developed e.g. involving spectroscopic laser techniques. On the computational simulation side the department has developed an extendable software platform Coolfluid for high performance computational flow simulation which incorporates the research on numerical algorithms, advanced physico-chemical and plasma models as well as fluid-structure interaction and conjugate heat transfer.
 * Aeronautics and Aerospace

The Turbomachinery and Propulsion department specializes in the aero-thermal aspects of turbomachinery components for aero-engines and industrial gas turbines, space propulsion units, steam turbines and process industry compressors and pumps. It has accumulated wide skills in high speed wind tunnel testing and related measurement techniques development and application. The department has acquired a world recognised expertise on steady/unsteady aerodynamic and aero/thermal aspects of high pressure, including cooling, and low pressure turbomachinery components through the design, development and use of a number of unique wind tunnels.
 * Turbomachinery & Propulsion

On the computational side, the department has over 20 years of experience in the analysis of flow in turbomachines, and in the design techniques and multi-disciplinary optimization methods or their components.

The Environmental and Applied Fluid Dynamics (EA) department covers all kinds of activities complementary to the other two departments related to fluid dynamics in the academic and industrial world. It has a large expertise in the study of aeroacoustics, multiphase flows, vehicle aerodynamics, biological flows and environmental flows (including the study of interaction between atmospheric winds and human activities). The department is also involved in the modeling of turbulence and in the development of advanced measurement techniques for fluid dynamics. The department has acquired a unique expertise in the study of fluid dynamics in industrial processes, with the development and construction of experimental facilities dedicated to the study of industrial  processes and also in the simulation of industrial flows using CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) codes.
 * Environmental and applied Fluid Dynamics

Lecture series
The VKI organises up to twelve different one-week Lecture Series with about 50 to 60 participants on specialized topics every year on various fields: industrial applications, turbomachinery, aerospace, aerodynamics, propulsion, aero engine, aeroacoustics, biological flows, large eddy simulation. Each year, the VKI also organises thematic conferences in collaboration with Belgian & foreign universities and research institutes.

These courses have gained worldwide recognition. Subjects are chosen carefully and the lecturers are well known for their professionalism and excellency in specific fields.

title: Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics


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Land survey

Land survey may refer to:

 * Topographic surveying and mapping, the survey of landscape features for general mapping purposes
 * Civil engineering surveying, a survey of local topographic features for engineering purposes
 * Cadastral surveying, the surveying of specific land parcels to define ownership

title: Land survey