Medley

Coalsack Nebula

The Coalsack Nebula is located about 600 light-years away in the constellation of Crux. This huge, dusky object forms a conspicuous silhouette against the bright, starry band of the Milky Way and for this reason the nebula has been known to people in the southern hemisphere for as long as our species has existed.

The Spanish explorer Vicente Yáñez Pinzón first reported the existence of the Coalsack Nebula to Europe in 1499. The Coalsack later garnered the nickname of the Black Magellanic Cloud, a play on its dark appearance compared to the bright glow of the two Magellanic Clouds, which are in fact satellite galaxies of the Milky Way. These two bright galaxies are clearly visible in the southern sky and came to the attention of Europeans during Ferdinand Magellan's explorations in the 16th century. However, the Coalsack is not a galaxy. Like other dark nebulae, it is actually an interstellar cloud of dust so thick that it prevents most of the background starlight from reaching observers.

Richard Hiltner – USA

As Dr. Samuel Hahnemann explains, the term “cure” or health occurs when:

“…the spirit-like vital force [dynamis] animating the material human organism reigns in supreme sovereignty. It maintains the sensations and the activities of all the parts of the living organism in a harmony that obliges wonderment. The reasoning spirit who inhabits the organism can thus freely use this healthy living instrument to reach the lofty goal of human existence.”¹

Christian Friedrich Samuel Hahnemann was a German physician, best known for creating a system of alternative medicine called homeopathy

Theoretical physicists at the Université libre de Bruxelles have developed a fully-symmetric formulation of quantum theory which establishes an exact link between asymmetry and the fact that we can remember the past but not the future.

The laws of classical mechanics are independent of the direction of time, but whether the same is true in quantum mechanics has been a subject of debate. While it is agreed that the laws that govern isolated quantum systems are time-symmetric, measurement changes the state of a system according to rules that only appear to hold forward in time, and there is difference in opinion about the interpretation of this effect.

Aboriginal man

Native Americans living in the Amazon bear an unexpected genetic connection to indigenous people in Australasia

Native Americans living in the Amazon bear an unexpected genetic connection to indigenous people in Australasia, suggesting a previously unknown wave of migration to the Americas thousands of years ago, a new study has found.

Leo Babauta – USA

A simplicity manifesto in the Age of Distraction: Part 12

Creating an uncluttered environment

“If your mind isn’t clouded by unnecessary things,

then this is the best season of your life.”

Wumen Huikai (1183 -1260) is a Song period Chán master most famous as the compiler of and commentator on the 48-koan collection The Gateless Gate. Wumen was at that time the head monk of Longxiang monastery

Imagine you’re trying to create your masterpiece — a work that will change your life and perhaps make the world a better place in some small way. You’re at your computer, making it happen, at a desk piled with clutter, surrounded by clutter on the floor and walls, in the middle of a noisy workplace, phones ringing. A notification pops up — you have a new email — so you open your email program to read it and respond. You get back to work but then another notification pops up — someone wants to chat with you, so you go on IM for a little bit. Then your Twitter client notifies you of some new replies, and you check those. Then you see some paperwork on your desk you need to file, so you start doing those.

Edi Bilimoria – UK

 The author is a gifted pianist and lecturer

Summary and a Possible Way Forwards

What then is the remedy? The great poet Keats talks about negative capability – the capacity to sit with the unknown but with an inner conviction that something truly precious will come out of the unknown. In other words, to trust the process and have faith that there is a greater consciousness that we can tune into. But being with the unknown is something that the predominantly left brain orientated scientific community finds very frightening. It again underscores the deterministic drive of the left brain to strive for precision, certainty and objectification, eschewing uncertainty, the unknown and the unknowable (by science). But the right brain, preferring to deal with wholes rather than parts has no problem with subjective experience or waiting patiently in silence attuning to a higher power. So this is the kind of holistic approach used by the luminaries of science and as Leonardo and Newton that we need to face the complex problems we face today. It is highly significant that Leonardo was as much a genius of science as of art. Moreover, Newton’s alchemical writings and drawings reveal great sensitivity and poetry.

Some time ago an article appeared on the website My Jewish Learning written by Rabi Jill Jacobs.

Rabi Jill Jacobs

Here follows an excerpt:

The concept of Tzaar Baalei Hayim demands that we take animal suffering seriously.

Beginning with the first chapters of the Torah, Judaism establishes a fundamental connection between human beings and animals. Animals, created on the fifth day of the biblical story of creation, can be understood as prototypes of the first human beings – Adam and Eve, created on the sixth day. One of Adam’s first responsibilities as a human being is to name the animals. As evidenced by the episode in which a serpent tempts Eve to eat a forbidden fruit, humans and animals originally speak one another’s language (Genesis 1-3).

The story of Noah’s ark represents a turning point in the relationship between human beings and animals. Furious about human misbehavior, God decides to destroy the world by flood, saving only the righteous Noah and his family and enough animals to sustain all of the species. When the waters recede, God gives Noah seven laws – now known as the Noahide laws–aimed at establishing a just society.