Inside a laboratory nestled above the mist of the forests of South Dakota, scientists are searching for the answer to one of science's biggest questions: why does our Universe exist?
They are in a race for the answer with a separate team of Japanese scientists – who are several years ahead.
The current theory of how the Universe came into being can't explain the existence of the planets, stars and galaxies we see around us. Both teams are building detectors that study a sub-atomic particle called a neutrino in the hope of finding answers.
The US-led international collaboration is hoping the answer lies deep underground, in the aptly named Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (Dune).
A memorial bust of American singer Jim Morrison that was stolen from his grave 37 years ago has been found by chance, according to French police.
The statue of The Doors frontman was recovered in Paris during an investigation conducted by its financial and anti-corruption arm that was unrelated to the original theft, it said in a post on Instagram.
Morrison's grave has long been a site for fans of the rock band to pay their respects in an unusual way - graffiti sprawls across neighbouring gravestones in the poet's corner of the famous Père-Lachaise cemetery, which also houses the tombs of Edith Piaf and Oscar Wilde.
Little information has been released about the investigation and no suspects have been named in the theft of the statue of the singer, who died in 1971.
Progress toward your goals is never going to be a straight line. It will always be a bumpy line. You'll go up and then come down a little. Two steps forward and one step back. There's a good rhythm in that. It is like a dance. There's no rhythm in a straight line upward. However, people get discouraged when they slide a step back after two steps forward. They think they are failing, and that they've lost it. But they have not. They're simply in step with the natural rhythm of progress. Once you understand this rhythm, you can work with it instead of against it. You can plan the step back. In The Power of Optimism, Alan Loy McGinnis identifies the characteristics of tough-minded optimists, and one of the most important is that optimists always plan for renewal. They know in advance that they are going to run out of energy. "In physics," says McGinnis, "the law of entropy says that all systems, left unattended, will run down. Unless new energy is pumped in, the organism will disintegrate.
Pessimists don't want to plan for renewal, because they don't think there should have to be any. Pessimists are all-or-nothing thinkers. They're always offended when the world is not perfect. They think taking a step backward means something negative about the whole project. "If this were a good marriage, we wouldn't have to rekindle the romance," a pessimist would say, dismissing the idea of taking a second honeymoon. But an optimist knows that there will be ups and downs. And an optimist isn't scared or discouraged by the downs. In fact, an optimist plans for the downs, and prepares creative ways to deal with them. You can schedule your own comebacks. You can look ahead on your calendar and block out time to refresh and renew and recover. Even if you feel very "up" right now, it's smart to plan for renewal. Schedule your own comeback while you're on top. Build in big periods of time to get away—even to get away from what you love.
If you catch yourself thinking that you are too old to do something you want to do, recognize that you are now listening to the pessimistic voice inside of you. It is not the voice of truth. You can talk back. You can remind the voice of all the people in life who have started their lives over again at any age they wanted to. John Housman, the Emmy award-winning actor in The Paper Chase, started acting professionally when he was in his 70s. I had a friend named Art Hill, who spent most of his life in advertising. In his heart, however, he always wanted to be a writer. So in his late 50s, he wrote two books that got published by a small publishing house in Page 81 Michigan. Then, when he was 60 years old, Hill had his first national release with I Don't Care if I Never Come Back, a book about baseball published by Simon and Schuster.
The book was a popular and critical success, and his dedication page is something I treasure above any possession I own: "To Steve Chandler—who cared about writing, cared about me, and one day said, 'You should write a book about baseball.' " Nobody cares how old you are but you. People only care about what you can do, and you can do anything you want, at any age. Dr. Monte Buchsbaum of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York has been one of many scientists conducting research into the effects of aging on the brain. He is finding that it isn't aging that causes a brain to become less sharp, it's simply lack of use. "The good news is that there isn't much difference between a 25-year-old brain and a 75-year-old brain," said Buchsbaum, who used his positron emission tomography laboratory to scan the brains of more than 50 normal volunteers who ranged in age from 20 to 87. The memory loss and mental passivity that we used to believe was caused by aging has now been proven to be caused by simple lack of use. The brain is like the muscle in your arm: When you use it, it gets strong and quick. When you don't, it grows weak and slow. Research at the UCLA Brain Research Institute shows that the circuitry of the brain—the dendrites that branch between cells—grows with mental activity. "Anything that's intellectually challenging," said Arnold Scheibel, head of the Institute, "can probably serve as a kind of stimulus for dendritic growth, which means it adds to the computational reserves in the brain." Translation: You can make yourself smarter. "Whoever told you that you cannot increase your intelligence?" asks Dr. Robert Jarvik, inventor of the artificial heart. "Whoever taught you not to try? They didn't know. Flex your mind. Develop it. Use it. It will enrich you and bring you the love of life that thrives on truth and understanding." Research shows that mathematicians live longer than people in any other profession do, and we never used to know why. Now, in further studies done at UCLA, there has been a direct connection established between dendrite growth and longevity. Mental activity keeps you alive. Lose your mental challenges, and life itself fades away. Don't listen to the voice inside that talks about your age, or your IQ, or your life history, or anything it can slow you down with. Don't be seduced. You can start a highly motivated life right now by increasing the challenges you give your brain.
As a sailor, sea captain, trader, and explorer, what Christopher Columbus lacked in navigation tools, he made up for with courage,daring, and perseverance as he headed straight west across an unknown ocean. A lot of people think that Christopher Columbus “discovered” America. However, by the time he made his first voyage, in 1492, aboriginal peoples had been living in North America for tens of thousands of years. Even the Vikings, who were also Europeans, had landed in Canada hundreds of years before Columbus was born. Furthermore, Columbus himself never actually set foot on mainland North America, but landed in the Caribbean Islands. Overall, Columbus was wrong about where he was going (Asia), how long the journey was (he thought it was 3,700 km, but it was more than 19,000 km), and where he landed (aboriginal American people became known as “Indians” because Columbus thought he had landed in India).
So, why is Columbus the most famous explorer of all time? Partly because what Columbus accomplished was amazing for the time. In those days, Europeans trading with Asia had to sail all the way south around the tip of Africa, then east across the Indian Ocean. Columbus had the daring idea to take a short cut - straight west across the empty ocean, into the complete unknown. It took tremendous determination for a man who was known as a trader - not an explorer to get backing for his plan to sail around the world. The experts said it couldn’t be done. One country after another turned him down until, after years of effort, Columbus finally got the king and queen of Spain to give him the money, ships, and sailors he needed. For Columbus to sail further out of sight of land than anyone ever had done before, trusting in his own calculations and abilities, took a lot of courage.
And he would need all of his seafaring abilities to find a safe route home again, using the Trade Winds that blow east across the Atlantic Ocean. While Columbus remained convinced to his death that he had found a route to India, his voyages changed the course of history. Even with all his mixups, Columbus brought back to Europe the news of amazing new lands and peoples. His discovery was the start of a huge movement of Europeans who came to North, Central, and South America to explore, trade, conquer, and occupy. Ultimately, Columbus’s adventuring meant that many changes would take place in the Americas. Whether you believe those changes were good, bad, or a mix of the two, there can be no doubt that Christopher Columbus altered the world through his vision and determination.
You Can’t Extinguish a Bad Habit, You Can Only Change It.
HOW IT WORKS: USE THE SAME CUE. PROVIDE THE SAME
REWARD. CHANGE THE ROUTINE. Dungy’s system would eventually turn the Bucs into one of the league’s winningest teams. He would become the only coach in NFL history to reach the play-offs in ten consecutive years, the first African American coach to win a Super Bowl, and one of the most respected figures in professional athletics.
His coaching techniques would spread throughout the league and all of sports. His approach would help illuminate how to remake the habits in anyone’s life. But all of that would come later. Today, in San Diego, Dungy just wanted to win.From the sidelines, Dungy looks up at the clock: 8:19 remaining. The Bucs have been behind all game and have squandered opportunity after opportunity, in typical fashion. If their defense doesn’t make something happen right now, this game will effectively be over. San Diego has the ball on their own twenty-yard line, and the Chargers’ quarterback, Stan Humphries, is preparing to lead a drive that, he hopes, will put the game away. The play clock begins, and Humphries is
poised to take the snap.
But Dungy isn’t looking at Humphries. Instead, he’s watching his own
players align into a formation they have spent months perfecting. Traditionally, football is a game of feints and counterfeints, trick plays and misdirection. Coaches with the thickest playbooks and most complicated schemes usually win.Dungy, however, has taken the opposite approach. He isn’t interested in complication or obfuscation. When Dungy’s defensive players line up, it is obvious to everyone exactly which play they are going to use. Dungy has opted for this approach because, in theory, he doesn’t need
misdirection. He simply needs his team to be faster than everyone else. In
football, milliseconds matter. So instead of teaching his players hundreds of
formations, he has taught them only a handful, but they have practiced over and over until the behaviors are automatic. When his strategy works, his players can move with a speed that is impossible to overcome.3.6
But only when it works. If his players think too much or hesitate or secondguess their instincts, the system falls apart. And so far, Dungy’s players have been a mess.This time, however, as the Bucs line up on the twenty-yard line, something is different. Take Regan Upshaw, a Buccaneer defensive end who has settled into a three-point stance on the scrimmage line. Instead of looking up and down the line, trying to absorb as much information as possible, Upshaw is looking only at the cues that Dungy taught him to focus on. First, he glances at the outside foot of the opposite lineman (his toes are back, which means he is preparing to step
backward and block while the quarterback passes); next, Upshaw looks at the
lineman’s shoulders (rotated slightly inward), and the space between him and the next player (a fraction narrower than expected).
Upshaw has practiced how to react to each of these cues so many times that,
at this point, he doesn’t have to think about what to do. He just follows his
habits. San Diego’s quarterback approaches the line of scrimmage and glances right, then left, barks the count and takes the ball. He drops back five steps and stands tall, swiveling his head, looking for an open receiver. Three seconds have passed since the play started. The stadium’s eyes and the television cameras are on him. So most observers fail to see what’s happening among the Buccaneers. As soon as Humphries took the snap, Upshaw sprang into action. Within the first second of the play, he darted right, across the line of scrimmage, so fast the offensive lineman couldn’t block him. Within the next second, Upshaw ran four more paces downfield, his steps a blur. In the next second, Upshaw moved three strides closer to the quarterback, his path impossible for the offensive lineman to predict.
As the play moves into its fourth second, Humphries, the San Diego
quarterback, is suddenly exposed. He hesitates, sees Upshaw from the corner of his eye. And that’s when Humphries makes his mistake. He starts thinking.
Humphries spots a teammate, a rookie tight end named Brian Roche, twenty
yards downfield. There’s another San Diego receiver much closer, waving his
arms, calling for the ball. The short pass is the safe choice. Instead, Humphries, under pressure, performs a split-second analysis, cocks his arm, and heaves to Roche.That hurried decision is precisely what Dungy was hoping for. As soon as the ball is in the air, a Buccaneer safety named John Lynch starts moving.Lynch’s job was straightforward: When the play started, he ran to a particular point on the field and waited for his cue. There’s enormous pressure to improvise in this situation. But Dungy has drilled Lynch until his routine is automatic. And as a result, when the ball leaves the quarterback’s hands, Lynch is standing ten yards from Roche, waiting.
As the ball spins through the air, Lynch reads his cues the direction of the
quarterback’s face mask and hands, the spacing of the receivers—and starts
moving before it’s clear where the ball will land. Roche, the San Diego receiver, springs forward, but Lynch cuts around him and intercepts the pass. Before Roche can react, Lynch takes off down the field toward the Chargers’ end zone.
The other Buccaneers are perfectly positioned to clear his route. Lynch runs 10, then 15, then 20, then almost 25 yards before he is finally pushed out of bounds. The entire play has taken less than ten seconds.Two minutes later, the Bucs score a touchdown, taking the lead for the first time all game. Five minutes later, they kick a field goal. In between, Dungy’s defense shuts down each of San Diego’s comeback attempts. The Buccaneers win, 25 to 17, one of the biggest upsets of the season.At the end of the game, Lynch and Dungy exit the field together. “It feels like something was different out there,” Lynch says as they walk into the tunnel. “We’re starting to believe,” Dungy replies.
At this question, Aladdin lowered his eyes, embarrassed. His mother,
however, answered in his place. ‘Aladdin is an idle fellow,’ she said.
‘While he was alive, his father did his best to make him learn his trade
but never succeeded. Since his death, despite everything I have tried to
tell him, again and again, day after day, the only trade he knows is
acting the vagabond and spending all his time playing with children, as
you saw for yourself, mindless of the fact that he is no longer a child.
And if you can’t make him feel ashamed and realize how pointless his
behaviour is, I despair of him ever amounting to anything. He knows his
father left nothing, and he can himself see that despite spinning cotton
all day as I do, I have great difficulty in earning enough to buy us bread.
In fact, I have decided that one of these days I am going to shut the door
on him and send him off to fend for himself.’
After she had spoken, Aladdin’s mother burst into tears, whereupon
the magician said to Aladdin: ‘This is no good, my nephew. You must
think now about helping yourself and earning your own living. There are
all sorts of trades; see if there isn’t one for which you have a particular
inclination. Perhaps that of your father doesn’t appeal to you and you
would be more suited to another: be quite open about this, I am just
trying to help you.’ Seeing Aladdin remain silent, he went on: ‘If you
want to be an honest man yet dislike the idea of learning a trade, I will
provide you with a shop filled with rich cloths and fine fabrics. You can
set about selling them, purchasing more goods with the money that you
make, and in this manner you will live honourably. Think about it and
then tell me frankly your opinion. You will find that I always keep my
word.’ This offer greatly flattered Aladdin, who did not like manual work, all the more so since he had enough sense to know that shops with these
kinds of goods were esteemed and frequented and that the merchants
were well dressed and well regarded. So he told the magician, whom he
thought of as his uncle, that his inclination was more in that direction
than any other and that he would be indebted to him for the rest of his
life for the help he was offering. ‘Since this occupation pleases you,’ the
magician continued, ‘I will take you with me tomorrow and will have
you dressed in rich garments appropriate for one of the wealthiest
merchants of this city. The following day we will consider setting up a
shop, as I think it should be done.’
Aladdin’s mother, who up until then had not believed the magician
was her husband’s brother, now no longer doubted it after hearing all
the favours he promised her son. She thanked him for his good
intentions and, after exhorting Aladdin to make himself worthy of all the
wealth his uncle had promised him, served supper. Throughout the meal,
the talk ran upon the same subject until the magician, seeing the night
was well advanced, took leave of the mother and the son and retired.
The next morning, he returned as he had promised to the widow of
Mustafa the tailor and took Aladdin off with him to a wealthy merchant
who sold only ready-made garments in all sorts of fine materials and for
all ages and ranks. He made the merchant bring out clothes that would
fit Aladdin and, after putting to one side those which pleased him best
and rejecting the others that did not seem to him handsome enough, said
to Aladdin: ‘My nephew, choose from among all these garments the one
you like best.’ Aladdin, delighted with his new uncle’s generosity, picked
one out which the magician then bought, together with all the necessary
accessories, and paid for everything without bargaining.
…cont
You have been exposed to the success habits of the world’s richest as well as most fulfilled human beings on the planet. Now it’s time for you to reach new heights. You can have everything you’ve dreamed about wealth, a great job, a terrific business, and incredible relationships. It doesn’t have to be a “wonderful thought” anymore, it can be your reality and all of it is within reach. So what’s holding you back?
Well, if you’re like a lot of people, you read these words, got inspired, started dreaming about what’s possible, and glimpsed where you might go. Maybe you even had a clear and powerful vision.
Your thoughts might have included all the positive things that could happen if you don’t let the villain within sabotage you, if you change your story from limiting to limitless.
You can envision how this type of change would affect your life. You get the Success Habits, the
Happiness Habits, the Success Hacks. It all makes sense, and you’re inspired by the stories I’ve told you stories of people just like you who have transformed their lives. Some of my stories might even
have made you think, “If this guy can do it, I surely can” So why the heck would you or anyone ever struggle to get started? Because the idea of making changes in your life can be overwhelming and scary. Your subconscious found a place to be safe and doesn’t want to stray. But safe doesn’t mean happy, fulfilled, or financially prosperous. And that’s just what’s going on below the surface! On a conscious level, you’ve got a lot going on. You’ve got bills to pay, jobs to do, chores to tackle. As much as you want to start making these Success Habits part of your life, you’ve got to take action. You’ve got to do stuff. I get it. I’ve been stuck in that place between thought and action. The good news is, I know how to get unstuck, and I’m going to share that with you right now so this book isn’t just a good inspirational read, but your road map to action.
Virgil’s Aeneid is arguably the most influential and celebrated work of Latin literature. Written in the epic meter, dactylic hexameter, the Aeneid follows the journey of Aeneas, son of Venus, after the fall of Troy. According to an ancient mythical tradition, Aeneas fled the burning city and landed in Italy, where he established a line of descendants who would become the Roman people.
Virgil (70–19 b.c.e.) draws on the works of numerous authors, such as Lucretius, Ennius, Apollonius
of Rhodes, and, especially, Homer. Virgil consistently adopts Homeric style and diction (a good example of this is the first line of the poem: “I sing of arms and a man . . .”). He also re-creates entire scenes from the Iliad and the Odyssey. Books 1 to 6 of the Aeneid show such close parallels to the Homeric epics that they are often called the “Virgilian Odyssey.” Books 7 to 12, meanwhile, closely echo the Iliad. Virgil’s use of Homeric elements goes beyond mere imitation. Virgil often places Aeneas in situations identical to those of Odysseus or Achilles, allowing Aeneas’s response to those situations to differentiate him from (and sometimes surpass) his Homeric counterparts.
Virgil constructs his epic in relation to the Roman people and their cultural ideals. He defines Aeneas by
the ethical quality of piety, a concept of particular importance for Rome at the time of the Aeneid’s composition. The Aeneid also contains several etiological stories of interest to the Roman people, most notably that of Dido and the origin of the strife between the Romans and the Carthaginians.
The Dido episode is one of the most famous vignettes of the Aeneid. Dido, the queen of Carthage
also known by her Phoenician name, Elyssa—aids Aeneas and his shipwrecked Trojans in Book 1. Through Venus’s intervention, Dido falls desperately in love with Aeneas and wants him and his men to remain in Carthage. But a message from Jove reminds Aeneas that his fated land is in Italy. Immediately, he orders his men to depart. Dido is heartbroken over Aeneas’s leaving: She builds a pyre out of Aeneas’s gifts and commits suicide on it, prophesying the coming of Hannibal before she dies. When Aeneas descends to the Underworld in Book 4, Dido’s shade refuses to speak with him.
Dido’s character shows a great deal of complexity. She appears first as an amalgam of Alcinous and Arete
as she hospitably receives her Trojan guests but soon becomes a Medea figure, well acquainted with magic and arcane knowledge. Dido is a sympathetic character throughout the epic, though much of how Virgil describes her would have brought to the Roman reader’s mind the Egyptian queen Cleopatra (associated withMark Antony and the civil war). Interpretations of the Aeneid are numerous and far
from unanimous. The Aeneid’s composition coincides with the end of the civil wars and the beginning of
Augustus’s regime. Virgil ostensibly endorses the new princeps by referring to him as the man who will usher in another golden age. Yet several elements of the epic might suggest that Virgil did not wholeheartedly support Augustus. Much of the debate centers on the war in Italy that occupies the second half of the epic, in which some scholars see a reference to the Battle of Perusia in 41 b.c.e., an event Augustus would have preferred to forget. Scholars also point to the end of the Aeneid, where Aeneas kills Turnus as he pleads for his life, as unambiguously criticizing the new leadership.
This anti-Augustan view of the Aeneid has, however, met with opposition. Many scholars find more evidence of the Iliad than of Augustus’s campaign in the latter half of the Aeneid. Others suggest that in killing Turnus, Aeneas acted appropriately for his cultural circumstances. The Aeneid
has also been proposed to represent, not Virgil’s view
of Augustus, but rather the condition of the Roman people. Virgil seems to offer conflicting evidence for his perspective on Augustan Rome and may intentionally leave the matter ambiguous so that the reader may decide for him- or herself.The Aeneid was highly anticipated even before publication and has since enjoyed immense popularity. Quintilian regarded Virgil as nearly equal to Homer and credits him with having the more difficult task. Latin epic writers after Virgil looked to the Aeneid as their model. Statius even acknowledges that his epic, the Thebaid, cannot surpass that of Virgil. The Aeneid became a standard school text of the ancient world and was a critical part of a good education. Virgil,
however, considered the work unfinished. At the time of his death he famously called for the Aeneid to be
burned rather than published. Augustus saved the Aeneid from the flames and ordered its publication.