An Overview of Trust

In a social context, trust has several connotations.  Definitions of trust typically refer to a situation characterized by the following aspects: One party (trustor) is willing to rely on the actions of another party (trustee); the situation is directed to the future. In addition, the trustor (voluntarily or forcedly) abandons control over the actions performed by the trustee. As a consequence, the trustor is uncertain about the outcome of the other's actions; they can only develop and evaluate expectations. The uncertainty involves the risk of failure or harm to the trustor if the trustee will not behave as desired.

Trust can be attributed to relationships between people. It can be demonstrated that humans have a natural disposition to trust and to judge trustworthiness that can be traced to the neurobiological structure and activity of a human brain. Some studies indicate that trust can be altered e.g. by the application of oxytocin.

Conceptually, trust is also attributable to relationships within and between social groups (history, families, friends, communities, organisations, companies, nations, etc.). It is a popular approach to frame the dynamics of inter-group and intra-group interactions in terms of trust.

When it comes to the relationship between people and technology, the attribution of trust is a matter of dispute. The intentional stance demonstrates that trust can be validly attributed to human relationships with complex technologies. However, rational reflection leads to the rejection of an ability to trust technological artefacts.

One of the key current challenges in the social sciences is to re-think how the rapid progress of technology has impacted constructs such as trust. This is specifically true for information technology that dramatically alters causation in social systems.

In the social sciences, the subtleties of trust are a subject of ongoing research. In sociology and psychology the degree to which one party trusts another is a measure of belief in the honesty, fairness, or benevolence of another party. The term "confidence" is more appropriate for a belief in the competence of the other party. Based on the most recent research, a failure in trust may be forgiven more easily if it is interpreted as a failure of competence rather than a lack of benevolence or honesty. In economics trust is often conceptualized as reliability in transactions. In all cases trust is a heuristic decision rule, allowing the human to deal with complexities that would require unrealistic effort in rational reasoning.

Systems

In systems, a trusted component has a set of properties which another component can rely on. If A trusts B, this means that a violation in those properties of B might compromise the correct operation of A. Observe that those properties of B trusted by A might not correspond quantitatively or qualitatively to B’s actual properties. This happens when the designer of the overall system does not take the relation into account. In consequence, trust should be placed to the extent of the component’s trustworthiness. The trustworthiness of a component is thus, not surprisingly, defined by how well it secures a set of functional and non-functional properties, deriving from its architecture, construction, and environment, and evaluated as appropriate.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trust_(social_sciences)

The Historical Jesus

There is widespread disagreement among scholars on the details of the life of Jesus mentioned in the gospel narratives, and on the meaning of his teachings, and the only two events subject to "almost universal assent" are that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist and was crucified by the order of the Roman Prefect Pontius Pilate.

According to New Testament scholar James Dunn, nearly all modern scholars consider the baptism of Jesus and his crucifixion to be historically certain.  He states that these "two facts in the life of Jesus command almost universal assent" and "rank so high on the 'almost impossible to doubt or deny' scale of historical 'facts' they are obvious starting points for an attempt to clarify the what and why of Jesus' mission." John P. Meier views the crucifixion of Jesus as historical fact and states that based on the criterion of embarrassment Christians would not have invented the painful death of their leader.  The criterion of embarrassment is also used to argue in favor of the historicity of the baptism of Jesus by John the Baptist as it is a story which the early Christian Church would have never wanted to invent.  Based on this criterion, given that John baptised for the remission of sins, and Jesus was viewed as without sin, the invention of this story would have served no purpose, and would have been an embarrassment given that it positioned John above Jesus.

Amy-Jill Levine has summarized the situation by stating that "there is a consensus of sorts on the basic outline of Jesus' life" in that most scholars agree that Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist, and over a period of one to three years debated Jewish authorities on the subject of God, gathered followers, and was crucified by Roman prefect Pontius Pilate who officiated 26–36 AD.  There is much in dispute as to his previous life, childhood, family and place of residence, of which the canonical gospels are almost completely silent.

Scholars attribute varying levels of certainty to other episodes. Some assume that there are eight elements about Jesus and his followers that can be viewed as historical facts, namely:

• Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist.
• He called disciples.
• He had a controversy at the Temple.
• Jesus was crucified by the Romans near Jerusalem.
• Jesus was a Galilean.
• His activities were confined to Galilee and Judea.
• After his death his disciples continued.
• Some of his disciples were persecuted.

Scholarly agreement on this extended list is not universal.

The Mishnah (c. 200) may refer to Jesus and reflect the early Jewish traditions of portraying Jesus as a sorcerer or magician.  Other references to Jesus and his execution exist in the Talmud, but they aim to discredit his actions, not deny his existence.

Since the 18th century, three separate scholarly quests for the historical Jesus have taken place, each with distinct characteristics and based on different research criteria, which were often developed during that phase. The portraits of Jesus that have been constructed in these processes have often differed from each other, and from the dogmatic image portrayed in the gospel accounts.

Currently modern scholarly research on the historical Jesus focuses on what is historically probable, or plausible about Jesus.

The mainstream profiles in the third quest may be grouped together based on their primary theme as apocalyptic prophet, charismatic healer, Cynic philosopher, Jewish Messiah and prophet of social change, but there is little scholarly agreement on a single portrait, or the methods needed to construct it.  There are, however, overlapping attributes among the portraits, and scholars who differ on some attributes may agree on others.

The criterion of embarrassment developed during the second quest was applied to the Baptism of Jesus.

While there is widespread scholarly agreement on the existence of Jesus, and a basic consensus on the general outline of his life, the portraits of Jesus constructed in the quests have often differed from each other, and from the image portrayed in the gospel accounts. There are overlapping attributes among the portraits, and while pairs of scholars may agree on some attributes, those same scholars may differ on other attributes, and there is no single portrait of the historical Jesus that satisfies most scholars.

Nearly all modern scholars of antiquity, which is the majority viewpoint, agree that Jesus existed and most biblical scholars and classical historians see the theories of his non-existence as effectively refuted.  There is no evidence today that the existence of Jesus was ever denied in antiquity by those who opposed Christianity.  Geoffrey Blainey notes that "a few scholars argue that Jesus... did not even exist," and that they "rightly point out that contemporary references to him were extremely rare."

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

Antibiotic Resistance from Pollution

UGA Ecologist Finds another
Cause of Antibiotic Resistance
by Vicky L. Sutton-Jackson, University of Georgia, December 23,2015

Aiken, S.C. - While the rapid emergence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria has prompted the medical community, non-profit organizations, public health officials and the national media to educate the public to the dangers of misusing and overusing antibiotics, the University of Georgia's J. Vaun McArthur is concerned that there's more to the problem than the misuse of common medications.

McArthur, a senior research ecologist with the Savannah River Ecology Laboratory and Odum School of Ecology, believes environmental contaminants may be partly to blame for the rise in bacterial resistance, and he tested this hypothesis in streams on the U.S. Department of Energy's Savannah River Site.

The 310-square mile site near Aiken, South Carolina, east of the Savannah River, was closed to the public in the early 1950s to produce materials used in nuclear weapons. This production led to legacy waste, or contamination, in limited areas of the site. This waste impacted some of the streams in the industrial areas.

"The site was constructed and closed to the public before antibiotics were used in medical practices and agriculture," McArthur said. "The streams have not had inputs from wastewater, so we know the observed patterns are from something other than antibiotics."

McArthur tested five antibiotics on 427 strains of E. coli bacteria in the streams. His research team collected samples from 11 locations in nine streams, which included sediment as well as water samples. The level of metal contamination among these locations varied from little to high.

The results, published in the journal Environmental Microbiology, revealed high levels of antibiotic resistance in eight of the 11 water samples. The highest levels were found at the northern location of Upper Three Runs Creek, where the stream system enters the site, and on two tributaries located in the industrial area, U4 and U8. The level of antibiotic resistance was high in both water and sediment samples from these streams.

McArthur said Upper Three Runs Creek flows through residential, agricultural and industrial areas before it enters the SRS, so the bacteria in this stream have been exposed to antibiotics. In contrast, U4 and U8 are completely contained within the site and have no known input from antibiotics. However, they have a long history of inputs from the legacy waste.

McArthur conducted a second screening using 23 antibiotics on U4, U8 and U10, a nearby stream with little to no industrial impact.

"More than 95 percent of the bacteria samples from these streams were resistant to 10 or more of the 23 antibiotics," McArthur said. These included front-line antibiotics-gatifloxacin and ciprofloxacin, which are used to treat basic bacterial infections from pink eye to urinary tract and sinus infections.

The contaminated streams U4 and U8 had the highest level of antibiotic resistance.

"These streams have no source of antibiotic input, thus the only explanation for the high level of antibiotic resistance is the environmental contaminants in these streams—the metals, including cadmium and mercury," McArthur said.

McArthur said the three tributaries of Upper Three Runs Creek, U4, U8 and U10 vary in the level of contamination respectively, from highly impacted and impacted to not as impacted.

It is possible that antibiotic-exposed wildlife may have dumped waste into these streams, MacArthur said, but only streams with a history of industrial input had antibiotic-resistant bacteria. Bacteria in the six streams in the pristine areas of the site were susceptible to the antibiotics.

McArthur said it is concerning that these antibiotic-resistant streams drain into the Savannah River, a large body of water bordering Georgia and South Carolina. The Savannah River shares at least two major characteristics with many large bodies of water in the U.S. It is in close proximity to residential communities, and it receives industrially contaminated water-prone to antibiotic resistance.

"The findings of this study may very well explain why resistant bacteria are so widely distributed," McArthur said.

Additional researchers on this study include R. Cary Tuckfield, Ecostatys, LLC, Aiken, S.C.; Craig Baker-Austin, Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science, Lowestoft, U.K.; and Dean E. Fletcher, UGA Savannah River Ecology Laboratory, Aiken, S.C.

The study, "Patterns of Multi-Antibiotic-Resistant Escherichia Coli from Streams with No History of Antimicrobial Inputs," is available at http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00248-015-0678-4/fulltext.html.

The entire article above is available at:  http://news.uga.edu/releases/article/another-cause-antibiotic-resistance-1215/

Magnesium nanoparticle alloy

UCLA Researchers Create Exceptionally
Strong and Lightweight New Metal
Magnesium infused with dense silicon carbide nanoparticles
could be used for airplanes, cars, mobile electronics and more
By Matthew Chin -- December 23, 2015
 

At left, a deformed sample of pure metal; at right, the strong new metal made of magnesium with silicon carbide nanoparticles. Each central micropillar is about 4 micrometers across.

A team led by researchers from the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science has created a super-strong yet light structural metal with extremely high specific strength and modulus, or stiffness-to-weight ratio. The new metal is composed of magnesium infused with a dense and even dispersal of ceramic silicon carbide nanoparticles. It could be used to make lighter airplanes, spacecraft, and cars, helping to improve fuel efficiency, as well as in mobile electronics and biomedical devices.

To create the super-strong but lightweight metal, the team found a new way to disperse and stabilize nanoparticles in molten metals. They also developed a scalable manufacturing method that could pave the way for more high-performance lightweight metals. The research was published today in Nature.

“It’s been proposed that nanoparticles could really enhance the strength of metals without damaging their plasticity, especially light metals like magnesium, but no groups have been able to disperse ceramic nanoparticles in molten metals until now,” said Xiaochun Li, the principal investigator on the research and Raytheon Chair in Manufacturing Engineering at UCLA. “With an infusion of physics and materials processing, our method paves a new way to enhance the performance of many different kinds of metals by evenly infusing dense nanoparticles to enhance the performance of metals to meet energy and sustainability challenges in today’s society.” 

Structural metals are load-bearing metals; they are used in buildings and vehicles. Magnesium, at just two-thirds the density of aluminum, is the lightest structural metal. Silicon carbide is an ultra-hard ceramic commonly used in industrial cutting blades. The researchers’ technique of infusing a large number of silicon carbide particles smaller than 100 nanometers into magnesium added significant strength, stiffness, plasticity and durability under high temperatures.

The researchers’ new silicon carbide-infused magnesium demonstrated record levels of specific strength — how much weight a material can withstand before breaking — and specific modulus — the material’s stiffness-to-weight ratio. It also showed superior stability at high temperatures.

Ceramic particles have long been considered as a potential way to make metals stronger. However, with microscale ceramic particles, the infusion process results in a loss of plasticity.

Nanoscale particles, by contrast, can enhance strength while maintaining or even improving metals’ plasticity. But nanoscale ceramic particles tend to clump together rather than dispersing evenly, due to the tendency of small particles to attract one other.

To counteract this issue, researchers dispersed the particles into a molten magnesium zinc alloy. The newly discovered nanoparticle dispersion relies on the kinetic energy in the particles’ movement. This stabilizes the particles’ dispersion and prevents clumping.

To further enhance the new metal’s strength, the researchers used a technique called high-pressure torsion to compress it.

“The results we obtained so far are just scratching the surface of the hidden treasure for a new class of metals with revolutionary properties and functionalities,” Li said.

The new metal (more accurately called a metal nanocomposite) is about 14 percent silicon carbide nanoparticles and 86 percent magnesium. The researchers noted that magnesium is an abundant resource and that scaling up its use would not cause environmental damage.

The paper’s lead author is Lian-Yi Chen, who conducted the research as a postdoctoral scholar in Li’s Scifacturing Laboratory at UCLA. Chen is now an assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at Missouri University of Science and Technology.

The paper’s other authors from UCLA include Jia-Quan Xu, a graduate student in materials science and engineering; Marta Pozuelo, an assistant development engineer; and Jenn-Ming Yang, professor of materials science and engineering.

The other authors on the paper are Hongseok Choi, of Clemson University; Xiaolong Ma, of North Carolina State University; Sanjit Bhowmick of Hysitron, Inc. of Minneapolis; and Suveen Mathaudhu of UC Riverside.

The research was funded in part by the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

http://newsroom.ucla.edu/releases/ucla-researchers-create-exceptionally-strong-and-lightweight-new-metal

Ebola Survivors' Health Issues

Largest Study of Ebola Survivors Finds They Often Report Vision, Hearing, Joint Pain Problems
Suggest Virus Lives Longer in Certain Body Fluids
By Leslie Shepherd, Toronto, December 22, 2015

The largest study of survivors of the largest recorded outbreak of Ebola Virus Disease found they commonly reported complications such as vision, hearing and joint pain problems up to months after they were discharged from an Ebola treatment facility.

The findings, published today in the journal Lancet Infectious Diseases, are based on clinical and laboratory records from patients at the EVD Survivor Clinic in Port Loko, Sierra Leone, one of the West African countries hardest hit by the Ebola outbreak that began in December 2013.

The clinic, run by non-governmental organizations under the oversight of the Sierra Leone health ministry, provided clinical care for 603 of the 661 survivors of Ebola living in the Port Loko district, about 45 kilometers east of Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone.

Among 277 survivors studied in March and April of this year, complications were common, said Dr. Sharmistha Mishra, the senior author of the paper and an infectious diseases physician at St. Michael’s Hospital in Toronto.

The authors said 76 per cent of the survivors reported joint pain, 60 per cent reported new vision problems, 18 per cent had an eye inflammation (some potentially sight-threatening), and 24 per cent had hearing problems. The median time between their discharge from an Ebola treatment facility to their follow up appointment at the survivor clinic where they reported these symptoms was 122 days.

Patients who had a higher Ebola viral load when diagnosed with the diseases had a higher rate of eye inflammation and new vision problems, said Dr. Mishra, who spent five months working as a World Health Organization clinical consultant for the Ebola response in Sierra Leone. The survivor clinic was jointly run by the Boston-based Partners in Health, Sierra Leone Association of Survivors in Port Loko, GOAL Global, International Medical Corps, Christian Blind Mission, and the Sierra Leone Ministry of Health and Sanitation.

The authors said the findings may suggest that while the Ebola virus is rapidly cleared from most bodily fluids after resolution of the acute disease, it might persist in “immunologically privileged sanctuary sites” -- certain bodily fluids such as semen and the vitreous humour fluid of the eyeballs. However, their study did not look for persistence of virus.

She said the findings also underline the need for follow up care in West Africa, to make sure these complications are diagnosed and treated. She noted there was no systematic clinical care for Ebola survivors in the early part of the outbreak in Sierra Leone due to the overwhelming need to care for those with acute disease.

Furthermore, there are only two ophthalmologists (the lead authors of the study) and eight mid-level ophthalmological providers in the country’s National Eye Health Program. Access to eye health care is further restricted by lack of equipment and medications and by the mobility of clinicians and patients. The two ophthalmologists, Dr. Matthew Vandy of the Sierra Leone National Eye Health Program, and Dr. John Mattia, of the Christian Blind Mission Sierra Leone, are the lead authors of the study.

This study received funding from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research Innovative Ebola Research Grants.

http://www.stmichaelshospital.com/media/detail.php?source=hospital_news/2015/20151222_hn

Iago's Heroic Resentment

Iago is a fictional character in Shakespeare's Othello (c. 1601–1604). Iago is the play's main antagonist, and Othello's standard bearer. He is Emilia's husband, who is in turn the attendant of Othello's wife Desdemona. Iago hates Othello and devises a plan to destroy him by making him believe that his wife is having an affair with his lieutenant, Michael Cassio.

The role is thought to have been first played by Robert Armin, who typically played intelligent clown roles like Touchstone in As You Like It or Feste in Twelfth Night.

The character's source is traced to Giovanni Battista Giraldi Cinthio's tale "Un Capitano Moro" in Gli Hecatommithi (1565). There, the character is simply "the ensign".

Role in the Play

Iago is a soldier who has fought beside Othello for several years, and has become his trusted advisor. At the beginning of the play, Iago claims to have been unfairly passed over for promotion to the rank of Othello's lieutenant in favour of Michael Cassio. Iago plots to manipulate Othello into demoting Cassio, and thereafter to bring about the downfall of Othello himself. He has an ally, Roderigo, who assists him in his plans in the mistaken belief that after Othello is gone, Iago will help Roderigo earn the affection of Othello's wife, Desdemona. After Iago engineers a drunken brawl to ensure Cassio’s demotion (in Act 2), he sets to work on his second scheme: leading Othello to believe that Desdemona is having an affair with Cassio. This plan occupies the final three acts of the play.

He manipulates his wife Emilia, Desdemona's lady-in-waiting, into taking from Desdemona a handkerchief that Othello had given her; he then tells Othello that he had seen it in Cassio's possession. Once Othello flies into a jealous rage, Iago tells him to hide and look on while he (Iago) talks to Cassio. Iago then leads Othello to believe that a bawdy conversation about Cassio's mistress, Bianca, is in fact about Desdemona. Mad with jealousy, Othello orders Iago to kill Cassio, promising to make him lieutenant in return. Iago then engineers a fight between Cassio and Roderigo in which the latter is killed (by Iago himself, double-crossing his ally), but the former merely wounded.

Iago’s plan appears to succeed when Othello kills Desdemona, who is innocent of Iago's charges. Soon afterwards, however, Emilia brings Iago’s treachery to light, and Iago kills her in a fit of rage before being arrested. He remains famously reticent when pressed for an explanation of his actions before he is arrested: "Demand me nothing. What you know, you know. From this time forth I never will speak word." Following Othello's suicide, Cassio, now in charge, condemns Iago to be imprisoned and tortured as punishment for his crimes.

Description of Character

Iago is one of Shakespeare's most sinister villains, often considered such because of the unique trust that Othello places in him, which he betrays while maintaining his reputation of honesty and dedication. Shakespeare contrasts Iago with Othello's nobility and integrity. With 1,097 lines, Iago has more lines in the play than Othello himself.

Iago is a Machiavellian schemer and manipulator, as he is often referred to as "honest Iago", displaying his skill at deceiving other characters so that not only do they not suspect him, but they count on him as the person most likely to be truthful.

Shakespearean critic A. C. Bradley said that "evil has nowhere else been portrayed with such mastery as in the evil character of Iago", and also states that he "stands supreme among Shakespeare's evil characters because the greatest intensity and subtlety of imagination have gone into his making"  The mystery surrounding Iago’s actual motives continues to intrigue readers and fuel scholarly debate.

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

Trade Center Conspiracies Fail Tests

The Conspiracy Theories about the Fall of the Twin Towers and Subsequent Collapse of WTC 7 Are Probably False

Blacksmith shows why kerosene at 1500 degrees F weakens structural steel even if that steel doesn’t melt until 2300 degrees or 2700 degrees.  Conclusion: a kerosene fire is intense enough to bring down the two buildings by weakening structural steel:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FzF1KySHmUA&feature=share

The blacksmith’s argument is strongly supported by Popular Mechanics at:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/military/a6384/debunking-911-myths-world-trade-center/

Oh.  And bringing down the twin towers of the World Trade Center set fire to WTC 7, across the street, which was evacuated so that no one died in the collapse of the building, because no one was still in the building.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2056088/Footage-kills-conspiracy-theories-Rare-footage-shows-WTC-7-consumed-fire.html

Obama Signs Record of Regulations

President Obama Holds the Record for
Imposing Costly Regulations, says AMAC
Government regulatory authority run-amok is not a political issue

WASHINGTON, DC, Dec 18 – Most Americans were too busy preparing for the Thanksgiving holiday to have noticed the White House announcement that the president seeks to impose 2,224 new regulations on us in the coming months, according to Dan Weber, president of the Association of Mature American Citizens.

The new rules include 144 regulations that are officially considered to be “economically significant” because they come with a price tag of $100 million or more each.

“Mr. Obama, in fact, broke his own record set last spring when he announced 136 mega-buck rules, the most ever in history until then.  That news came out just before Memorial Day weekend.  This time around he told us about the new rules only a few days before Thanksgiving.  It appears the president chooses to make these kinds of announcements at some of the busiest times of the year, hoping that few of us will pay attention to the fact that he plans to spend billions of taxpayer dollars,” Weber said.

The newest regulatory plan has a total price tag of more than $92 billion, according to some estimates.  But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.  The Competitive Enterprise Institute says that in 2014 regulations cost American consumers and businesses a staggering $1.88 trillion in lost economic productivity and higher prices.  CEI says the price tag for the average American household was $14,976

“If that is not enough to warrant Congressional scrutiny, I don’t know what is.  Government spending, deficits and the national debt are out of control and we all know it, but the cost of regulations and the impact these rules have on our daily lives gets little notice.  Perhaps it is because the rules are imposed without benefit of debate.  It is about time, therefore, that we encourage those who we elected to be our eyes and ears inside the beltway to do what they were sent there to do—to protect our interests.”

The Federal Research Division of the Library of Congress published a study noting that liberals favor government intervention that promotes social, non-economic objectives, while conservatives see government intervention as an intrusion that makes us less competitive.

“The issue of government regulatory authority run-amok is not a political issue.  It’s an American issue that requires bi-partisan attention because we simply can’t afford the nearly $2 trillion dollar price tag,” Weber concluded.

http://amac.us/president-obama-holds-the-record-for-imposing-costly-regulations-says-amac/

Which wolves became dogs?

Carrie Arnold of National Geographic has an article that looks at DNA studies of dogs and wolves to help determine the origin of the domestication of dogs.

 

Dogs appear to be the descendents of wolves from Southeast Asia, probably from China around 33,000 years ago.  There was subsequently a broader expansion of dogs into diverse worldwide distribution about 15,000 years ago.

Link: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/2015/12/151217-dogs-domestication-asia-china-genetics-animals-science/

Key Antiviral Research

Progress Toward Creating

Broad-Spectrum Antiviral

Compound found to trigger innate immunity against viruses

University of Washington Health Sciences – December 17, 2015 -- UW researchers working in collaboration with Kineta Inc. and the University of Texas at Galveston have shown that making a drug-like molecule to turn on innate immunity can induce genes to control infection in several -known viruses. The findings being published in the Journal of Virology Dec. 18 show promising evidence for creating a broad spectrum antiviral that can suppress a range of RNA viruses, including West Nile, dengue virus, hepatitis C, influenza A, respiratory syncytial, Nipah, Lassa and Ebola.

"Our study shows that our compound has an antiviral effect against all these viruses," said Michael Gale Jr., UW professor of immunology and director of the UW Center for Innate Immunity and Immune Disease.

Gale said the findings are the first he knows of which show that a small molecule can trigger innate immunity through a molecule present in all our cells known as RIG-I.

RIG-I is a cellular protein known as pathogen recognition receptor. These receptors function to detect viral RNA and signal an innate immune response inside the cell that is essential for limiting and controlling viral infections. This signaling then induces the expression of many innate immune and antiviral genes and the production of antiviral gene products, pro-inflammatory cytokines, chemokines and interferons.

"These products act in concert to suppress and control virus infection," the researchers wrote.

The researchers said inducing signaling to activate the innate immune response to control virus infection has been tested successfully in cells and in mice. The next step would be to test dosing and stability in animal models and then in humans - a process that could take between two and five years, said Gale.

Currently, there are no known broad spectrum antiviral drugs, and few cures for infection by RNA viruses, much less much effective treatments. RNA viruses pose a significant public health problem worldwide because of their high mutation rate that allows them to escape the immune response, and they are a frequent cause of emerging and re-emerging viral infections. West Nile virus infections, for example, started in the USA in 2000 and remerged again in 2012. Moreover, the World Health Organization reports about 50 million to 100 million new cases of dengue fever yearly and 22,000 deaths caused by the related dengue virus. Dengue is now present in the southern U.S.

Hepatitis C, which is transmitted through the blood, infects about 3 million-4 million people each year and about 150 million people are chronically infected and at risk for developing liver cirrhosis or liver cancer, according to the paper. Researchers said direct acting antiviral drugs have been developed to control hepatitis C and show promise of long-term cure of infection but treatment of disparate hepatitis C genotypes remains a concern, and viral mutation to drug resistance is an underlying concern with prolonged use of these drugs. Also, the researchers noted, the cost of the drugs are exorbitant, which make them unaffordable to most patients.

Shawn Iadonato, the chief scientific officer at Kineta, a Seattle-based biotechnology firm, said there is tremendous interest in triggering innate immunity for a number of reasons. One, he said, is because some viral infections can't be treated by traditional antivirals, such as chronic hepatitis B infection. Also, by triggering innate immunity, the viruses will be much less likely to resist the drug actions because they are targeted to the cell through the actions of many different genes and not to the virus itself, thus making drug resistance much harder if not impossible to achieve.

The span of viruses that could be treated would also have a huge benefit globally since many RNA viruses - Ebola, Nipah, Lassa and dengue - affect mainly developing countries.

"It's routine for us to think of broad-spectrum antibiotics, but the equivalent for virology doesn't exist," said Iadonato.

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2015-12/uowh-ptc121715.php

How Humans Recognize Objects

Georgia Tech Researchers Demonstrate
How the Brain Can Handle So Much Data
Georgia Tech, Tuesday, December 15, 2015

Humans learn to very quickly identify complex objects and variations of them. We generally recognize an “A” no matter what the font, texture or background, for example, or the face of a coworker even if she puts on a hat or changes her hairstyle. We also can identify an object when just a portion is visible, such as the corner of a bed or the hinge of a door. But how? Are there simple techniques that humans use across diverse tasks? And can such techniques be computationally replicated to improve computer vision, machine learning or robotic performance?

Researchers at Georgia Tech discovered that humans can categorize data using less than 1 percent of the original information, and validated an algorithm to explain human learning -- a method that also can be used for machine learning, data analysis and computer vision.

“How do we make sense of so much data around us, of so many different types, so quickly and robustly?” said Santosh Vempala, Distinguished Professor of Computer Science at the Georgia Institute of Technology and one of four researchers on the project. “At a fundamental level, how do humans begin to do that? It’s a computational problem.”

Researchers Rosa Arriaga, Maya Cakmak, David Rutter, and Vempala at Georgia Tech’s College of Computing studied human performance in “random projection” tests to understand how well humans learn an object. They presented test subjects with original, abstract images and then asked whether they could correctly identify that same image when randomly shown just a small portion of it.

“We hypothesized that random projection could be one way humans learn,” Arriaga explains, a senior research scientist and developmental psychologist. “The short story is, the prediction was right. Just 0.15 percent of the total data is enough for humans.”

Next, researchers tested a computational algorithm to allow machines (very simple neural networks) to complete the same tests. Machines performed as well as humans, which provides a new understanding of how humans learn. “We found evidence that, in fact, the human and the neural network behave very similarly,” Arriaga said.

The  researchers wanted to come up with a mathematical definition of what typical and atypical stimuli look like and, from that, predict which data would hardest for the human and the machine to learn. Humans and machines performed equally, demonstrating that indeed one can predict which data will be hardest to learn over time.

Results were recently published in the journal Neural Computation (MIT press). It is believed to be the first study of “random projection,” the core component of the researchers’ theory, with human subjects.

To test their theory, researchers created three families of abstract images — some originally as large as 500 x 500 pixels — and extracted very small, random samples from them, ranging in size from 6 to 20 pixels square. Humans and simple neural networks were shown the whole image for 10 seconds, then randomly shown 16 smaller sketches and asked to identify the original image. Using abstract images ensured that neither humans nor machines had any prior knowledge of what the objects were.

“We were surprised by how close the performance was between extremely simple neural networks and humans,” Vempala said. “The design of neural networks was inspired by how we think humans learn, but it’s a weak inspiration. To find that it matches human performance is quite a surprise.”

“This fascinating paper introduces a localized random projection that compresses images while still making it possible for humans and machines to distinguish broad categories,” said Sanjoy Dasgupta, professor of computer science and engineering at the University of California San Diego and an expert on machine learning and random projection. “It is a creative combination of insights from geometry, neural computation, and machine learning.”

Although researchers cannot definitively claim that the human brain actually engages in random projection, the results support the notion that random projection is a plausible explanation, the authors conclude. In addition, it suggests a very useful technique for machine learning: large data is a formidable challenge today, and random projection is one way to make data manageable without losing essential content, at least for basic tasks such as categorization and decision making.

The algorithmic theory of learning based on random projection already has been cited more than 300 times and has become a commonly used technique in machine learning to handle large data of diverse types.

The complete research paper, “Visual Categorization with Random Projection,” can be found here http://www.mitpressjournals.org/doi/abs/10.1162/NECO_a_00769#.VeIchPmq and in the October edition of Neural Computation.

http://www.cc.gatech.edu/news/478901/georgia-tech-researchers-demonstrate-how-brain-can-handle-so-much-data

Positive Quiddity: Bert Kaempfert

Berthold Heinrich Kämpfert, (16 October 1923 – 21 June 1980), better known as Bert Kaempfert, was a German orchestra leader and songwriter. He made easy listening and jazz-oriented records and wrote the music for a number of well-known songs, including "Strangers in the Night" and "Moon Over Naples".

Biography

Kaempfert was born in Hamburg, Germany, where he received his lifelong nickname, Fips, and studied at the local school of music. A multi-instrumentalist, he was hired by Hans Busch to play with his orchestra before serving as a bandsman in the German Navy during World War II. He later formed his own big band, toured with them, then worked as an arranger and producer, making hit records with Freddy Quinn and Ivo Robić. In 1961, he hired The Beatles to back Tony Sheridan for an album called My Bonnie. The album and its singles, released by Polydor Records, were the Beatles' first commercially released recordings.

Kaempfert's own first hit with his orchestra had been in 1960, "Wonderland by Night". Wonderland by Night couldn't get a hearing in Germany. Instead, Kaempfert brought the track to Decca Records in New York, who released it in America in 1959; with its haunting solo trumpet, muted brass, and lush strings, the single topped the American pop charts and turned Bert Kaempfert and Orchestra into international stars. Over the next few years, he revived such pop tunes as "Tenderly", "Red Roses for a Blue Lady", "Three O'Clock in the Morning", and "Bye Bye Blues", as well as composing pieces of his own, including "Spanish Eyes (Moon Over Naples)", "Danke Schoen", and "Wooden Heart", which were recorded by, respectively, Al Martino, Wayne Newton, and Elvis Presley. For Kaempfert, little may have brought him more personal satisfaction than Nat King Cole recording his "L-O-V-E".

                                                             Bert Kaempfert in 1967

As a producer, Kaempfert also played a part in the rise of The Beatles when he signed a Liverpool-based singer named Tony Sheridan, who was performing in Hamburg, and needed to recruit a band to play behind him on the proposed sides. He auditioned and signed the Beatles, and recorded two tracks with them during his sessions for Sheridan: "Ain't She Sweet", sung by rhythm guitarist John Lennon and the instrumental "Cry for a Shadow", co-written by Lennon and lead guitarist George Harrison. Kaempfert's recording of the Beatles, even as a backing band for Sheridan, provided an impetus to their subsequent success, even though none of the Kaempfert-recorded sides resembled the music for which they became famous. On October 28, 1961, a man walked into the music store owned by Brian Epstein to ask for a copy of "My Bonnie", recorded by the Beatles, actually credited to Tony Sheridan. The store did not have it, but Epstein noted the request and was so intrigued by the idea of a Liverpool band getting a record of its own out that he followed up on it personally. This event led to his discovery of the Beatles and, through his effort, their signing by George Martin to Parlophone Records after getting clear of any contractual claim by Polydor.

Many of his tunes became better known as hits for other artists:

• "Strangers in the Night" (with words by Charles Singleton and Eddie Snyder), was originally recorded as part of his score for the 1965 film A Man Could Get Killed. It became a #1 hit for Frank Sinatra in 1966. This was followed a year later with another hit for Sinatra, "The World We Knew (Over and Over)".
• "Wooden Heart", sung by Elvis Presley in the film G.I. Blues was a hit in 1961. Joe Dowell's cover of "Wooden Heart" became a big hit, reaching #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 on August 28, 1961. Bert arranged this traditional German folk song for the Presley movie.
• His instrumental "Moon Over Naples", when given words by Snyder, became "Spanish Eyes", originally a hit for Al Martino and also recorded by Engelbert Humperdinck, Presley, and many others.
• "Danke Schoen", with words added by Kurt Schwabach and Milt Gabler, became Wayne Newton's signature song.
• "L-O-V-E", with words added by Milt Gabler, was a hit for Nat King Cole.
• "Almost There", which reached No. 67 on the U.S. charts but No. 2 on the U.K. charts, was recorded by Andy Williams.
• His 1962 movie theme from the film 90 Minuten nach Mitternacht (Terror After Midnight), with lyrics added by Herb Rehbein and Joe Seneca, became a pop ballad called "Love After Midnight", recorded by both Patti Page (1964) and Jack Jones (1966).
• A jazzier number called "A Swingin' Safari" was the initial theme tune for the long-running TV game show The Match Game used on the NBC version from 1962 to 1967. Billy Vaughn's cover of "A Swingin' Safari" also hit the Billboard charts, peaking at No. 13 in the summer of 1962. Another 1962 single, "That Happy Feeling", became well known as background music for children's television programming, most notably that of Sandy Becker on his daily WNEW-TV (now WNYW) show in New York between 1963 and 1967.
• The LP entitled A Swingin' Safari was heavily influenced by South African "kwela" style music, containing versions of "Zambesi", "Wimoweh", "Skokiaan", and "Afrikaan Beat", as well as the title track, which made Kaempfert an early exponent of world music. Many of the tracks were later used in the 1969 film An Elephant Called Slowly.
• "Tahitian Sunset" was sampled extensively by the lo-fi dance artists Lemon Jelly as their track "In the Bath".

Kaempfert's orchestra made extensive use of horns. A couple of numbers that featured brass prominently, "Magic Trumpet" and "The Mexican Shuffle", were played by both Kaempfert's orchestra and by Herb Alpert & the Tijuana Brass, whose initially Mariachi style, in fact, evolved towards the Kaempfert style as the 1960s progressed.  The Brass covered "Magic Trumpet", and Kaempfert returned the favor by covering Brass compadre Sol Lake's number "The Mexican Shuffle". The latter tune evolved into a TV ad, The Teaberry Shuffle.

Many of his hits during this period were composed and arranged with the help of fellow German Herb Rehbein, who became a successful bandleader in his own right. Rehbein's death in 1979 shook Kaempfert deeply. Both Kaempfert and Rehbein were posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

In 1963 jazz trumpeter Bobby Hackett recorded a complete album with 12 Kaempfert compositions, Bobby Hackett Plays the Music of Bert Kaempfert. It has now been re-released in the United States under the Sony Records label in the Collectable Jazz Classics series, along with the album Bobby Hackett Plays The Music of Henry Mancini on a "2-in-1" CD.

In 1967 jazz clarinetist Pete Fountain recorded the album Pete Fountain Plays Bert Kaempfert in Hamburg, Germany, with musicians from Kaempfert's orchestra. It featured Kaempfert's signature hits.

In 1967 the Anita Kerr Singers released the LP Bert Kaempfert Turns Us On!, a tribute to Kaempfert, featuring the standard hits.

In 1968 jazz trumpeter Al Hirt recorded the album Al Hirt Plays Bert Kaempfert. It too featured Kaempfert’s major hits.

His success as a composer was reflected in five awards received from BMI in 1968 for "Lady", "Spanish Eyes", "Strangers in the Night", "The World We Knew", and "Sweet Maria".

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

Telescopes: the basics

A telescope is an instrument that aids in the observation of remote objects by collecting electromagnetic radiation (such as visible light). The first known practical telescopes were invented in the Netherlands at the beginning of the 17th century, using glass lenses. They found use in terrestrial applications and astronomy.

Within a few decades, the reflecting telescope was invented, which used mirrors. In the 20th century many new types of telescopes were invented, including radio telescopes in the 1930s and infrared telescopes in the 1960s. The word telescope now refers to a wide range of instruments detecting different regions of the electromagnetic spectrum, and in some cases other types of detectors.

The word "telescope" (from the Ancient Greek τῆλε, tele "far" and σκοπεῖν, skopein "to look or see"; τηλεσκόπος, teleskopos "far-seeing") was coined in 1611 by the Greek mathematician Giovanni Demisiani for one of Galileo Galilei's instruments presented at a banquet at the Accademia dei Lincei.  In the Starry Messenger, Galileo had used the term "perspicillum".

Types

The name "telescope" covers a wide range of instruments. Most detect electromagnetic radiation, but there are major differences in how astronomers must go about collecting light (electromagnetic radiation) in different frequency bands.

Telescopes may be classified by the wavelengths of light they detect:

• X-ray telescopes, using shorter wavelengths than ultraviolet light
• Ultraviolet telescopes, using shorter wavelengths than visible light
• Optical telescopes, using visible light
• Infrared telescopes, using longer wavelengths than visible light
• Submillimetre telescopes, using longer wavelengths than infrared light
• Fresnel Imager, an optical lens technology
• X-ray optics, optics for certain X-ray wavelengths

Atmospheric Electromagnetic Opacity

Since the atmosphere is opaque for most of the electromagnetic spectrum, only a few bands can be observed from the Earth's surface. These bands are visible – near-infrared and a portion of the radio-wave part of the spectrum. For this reason there are no X-ray or far-infrared ground-based telescopes as these have to be observed from orbit. Even if a wavelength is observable from the ground, it might still be advantageous to place a telescope on a satellite due to astronomical seeing.

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

Astronomical Seeing

Astronomical seeing refers to the blurring and twinkling of astronomical objects such as stars caused by turbulent mixing in the Earth's atmosphere varying the optical refractive index. The astronomical seeing conditions on a given night at a given location describe how much the Earth's atmosphere perturbs the images of stars as seen through a telescope.

The most common seeing measurement is the diameter (or more correctly the full width at half maximum or FWHM) of the optical intensity across the seeing disc (the point spread function for imaging through the atmosphere). The FWHM of the point spread function (loosely called seeing disc diameter or "seeing") is a reference to the best possible angular resolution which can be achieved by an optical telescope in a long photographic exposure, and corresponds to the FWHM of the fuzzy blob seen when observing a point-like source (such as a star) through the atmosphere. The size of the seeing disc is determined by the astronomical seeing conditions at the time of the observation. The best conditions give a seeing disk diameter of ~0.4 arcseconds and are found at high-altitude observatories on small islands such as Mauna Kea or La Palma.

Seeing is one of the biggest problems for Earth-based astronomy: while the big telescopes have theoretically milli-arcsecond resolution, the real image will never be better than the average seeing disc during the observation. This can easily mean a factor of 100 between the potential and practical resolution. Starting in the 1990s, new adaptive optics have been introduced that can help correct for these effects, dramatically improving the resolution of ground based telescopes.

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

Positive Quiddity: Lalo Schifrin

Lalo Schifrin (born June 21, 1932) is an Argentine pianist, composer, arranger and conductor. He is best known for his film and TV scores, such as the "Theme from Mission: Impossible". He has received four Grammy Awards and six Oscar nominations. Schifrin, associated with the jazz music genre, is also noted for work with Clint Eastwood in the late 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, particularly the Dirty Harry films.

Although Schifrin studied sociology and law at the University of Buenos Aires, it was music that captured his attention. At age 20, he successfully applied for a scholarship to the Paris Conservatoire. At night he played jazz in the Paris clubs. In 1955, Schifrin played piano with Argentinian bandoneon giant Ástor Piazzolla, and represented his country at the International Jazz Festival in Paris.

After returning home to Argentina, Schifrin formed a jazz orchestra, a 16-piece band that became part of a popular weekly variety show on Buenos Aires TV. Schifrin also began accepting other film, television and radio assignments. In 1956, Schifrin met Dizzy Gillespie and offered to write an extended work for Gillespie's big band. Schifrin completed the work, Gillespiana, in 1958 (it was recorded in 1960). Later that year Schifrin began working as an arranger for Xavier Cugat's popular Latin dance orchestra.

While in New York in 1960, Schifrin again met Gillespie, who had by this time disbanded his big band for financial reasons. Gillespie invited Schifrin to fill the vacant piano chair in his quintet. Schifrin immediately accepted and moved to New York City. Schifrin wrote a second extended composition for Gillespie, The New Continent, which was recorded in 1962. In 1963, MGM, which had Schifrin under contract, offered the composer his first Hollywood film assignment with the African adventure Rhino!. Schifrin moved to Hollywood late that year. He also radically re-arranged the theme for the popular NBC-TV series The Man from U.N.C.L.E., altering original composer Jerry Goldsmith's theme to a jazzy melody emphasizing flutes and exotic percussion, which wound up winning the Emmy award for Best TV Theme in 1965.

One of Schifrin's most recognizable and enduring compositions is the theme music for the long-running TV series Mission: Impossible. It is a distinctive tune written in the uncommon 5/4 time signature. Similarly, Schifrin's theme for the hugely successful Mannix private eye TV show was composed a year later in a 3/4 waltz time; Schifrin composed several other jazzy and bluesy numbers over the years as additional incidental music for the show.

Schifrin's "Tar Sequence" from his Cool Hand Luke score (also written in 5/4) was the longtime theme for the Eyewitness News broadcasts on New York station WABC-TV and other ABC affiliates, as well as National Nine News in Australia. CBS Television used part of the theme of his St. Ives soundtrack for its golf broadcasts in the 1970s and early 1980s.

Schifrin's score for Coogan's Bluff in 1968 was the beginning of a long association with Clint Eastwood and director Don Siegel. Schifrin's strong jazz blues riffs were evident in Dirty Harry.

Schifrin's working score for 1973's The Exorcist was rejected by the film's director, William Friedkin. Schifrin had written six minutes of difficult and heavy music for the initial film trailer, but audiences were reportedly frightened by the combination of sights and sounds. Warner Bros. executives told Friedkin to instruct Schifrin to tone it down with softer music, but Friedkin did not relay the message. Schifrin's final score was thrown out into the parking lot. Schifrin reported in an interview that working with Friedkin was one of the most unpleasant experiences in his life.

In the 1998 film Tango, Schifrin returned to the tango music he had grown familiar with while working as Ástor Piazzolla's pianist in the mid-1950s. He brought traditional tango songs to the film as well as introducing compositions of his own in which tango is fused with jazz elements.

In 1997, the composer founded Aleph Records.

He also wrote the main theme for Splinter Cell: Pandora Tomorrow.

Schifrin made a cameo appearance in Red Dragon (2002) as an orchestra conductor.

He is also widely sampled in hip-hop and trip-hop songs, such as Heltah Skeltah's "Prowl" or Portishead's "Sour Times". Both songs sample Schifrin's "Danube Incident", one of many themes he composed for specific episodes of the Mission: Impossible TV series.

On April 23, 2007, Lalo Schifrin presented a concert of film music for the Festival du Film Jules Verne Aventures (aka Festival Jules Verne), at Le Grand Rex theatre in Paris, France – Europe's biggest movie theater – that was caught by Festival leaders for a 73 and a half minute CD named Lalo Schifrin: Le Concert à Paris.

In 2010, a fictionalised account of Lalo Schifrin's creation of the Mission: Impossible tune was featured in a Lipton TV commercial aired in a number of countries around the world.

Alternative hip hop group Blue Scholars recorded a track entitled "Lalo Schifrin" on their third album Cinemetropolis (2011).

To date, Lalo Schifrin has won four Grammy Awards (with twenty-one nominations), one Cable ACE Award, one Emmy Award, and received six Oscar nominations, and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

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

Positive Quiddity: Transactional Analysis

Transactional analysis is a psychoanalytic therapy wherein social transactions are analyzed to determine the ego state of the patient (whether parent-like, childlike, or adult-like) as a basis for understanding behavior.  In transactional analysis, the patient is taught to alter the ego state as a way to solve emotional problems. The method deviates from Freudian psychoanalysis which focuses on increasing awareness of the contents of unconsciously held ideas. Eric Berne developed the concept and paradigm of transactional analysis in the late 1950s.

Outline

Transactional analysis integrates the theories of psychology and psychotherapy because it has elements of psychoanalytic, humanist and cognitive ideas.

According to the International Transactional Analysis Association, TA 'is a theory of personality and a systematic psychotherapy for personal growth and personal change'.

1. As a theory of personality, TA describes how people are structured psychologically. It uses what is perhaps its best known model, the ego-state (Parent-Adult-Child) model, to do this. The same model helps explain how people function and express their personality in their behaviour
2. As Berne set his Psychology up, there are four life positions that a person can hold and holding a particular psychological position has profound implications for how an individual operationalizes his or her life. The positions are stated as:
1. I'm OK and you are OK. This is the healthiest position about life and it means that I feel good about myself and that I feel good about others and their competence.
2. I'm OK and you are not OK. In this position I feel good about myself but I see others as damaged or less than and it is usually not healthy,
3. I'm not OK and you are OK. In this position the person sees him/herself as the weak partner in relationships as the others in life are definitely better than the self. The person who holds this position will unconsciously accept abuse as OK.
4. I'm not OK and you are not OK. This is the worst position to be in as it means that I believe that I am in a terrible state and the rest of the world is as bad. Consequently, there is no hope for any ultimate supports.
3. It is a theory of communication that can be extended to the analysis of systems and organisations.
4. It offers a theory for child development by explaining how our adult patterns of life originated in childhood.  This explanation is based on the idea of a "Life (or Childhood) Script": the assumption that we continue to re-play childhood strategies, even when this results in pain or defeat. Thus it claims to offer a theory of psychopathology.
5. In practical application, it can be used in the diagnosis and treatment of many types of psychological disorders and provides a method of therapy for individuals, couples, families and groups.
6. Outside the therapeutic field, it has been used in education to help teachers remain in clear communication at an appropriate level, in counseling and consultancy, in management and communications training and by other bodies.

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

A Huge Domestic Cat

The Maine Coon is among the largest domesticated breeds of cats. It has a distinctive physical appearance and valuable hunting skills. It is one of the oldest natural breeds in North America, specifically native to the state of Maine, where it is the official state cat.

Although no records exist regarding the Maine Coon's exact origins and date of introduction to the United States, there are multiple competing theories. The breed was popular in cat shows in the late 19th century, but its existence became threatened when long-haired breeds from overseas were introduced in the early 20th century. The Maine Coon has since made a comeback and is now one of the most popular cat breeds in the world.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Liger_cat_2_mainecoon.jpg#/media/File:Liger_cat_2_mainecoon.jpg

The Maine Coon is a large and sociable cat, hence its nickname - "the gentle giant", and is characterised by a robust bone structure, rectangular body shape, a silky flowing coat and a long, bushy tail. The breed's colors vary widely, with only lilac and chocolate disallowed for pedigree. Reputed for its intelligence and playful, gentle personality, the Maine Coon is often cited as having "dog-like" characteristics. Professionals notice certain health problems in the breed including feline hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and hip dysplasia, but reputable breeders use modern screening methods to minimize the frequency of these problems.

History and Origin

The ancestral origins of the Maine Coon are unknown—there is only speculation and folk tales. One such folk tale involves Marie Antoinette, the Queen of France, who was executed in 1793. The story goes that before her death, Antoinette attempted to escape France with the help of Captain Samuel Clough. She loaded Clough's ship with her most prized possessions, including six of her favorite Turkish Angora cats. Although she did not make it to the United States, her pets safely reached the shores of Wiscasset, Maine, where they bred with other short-haired breeds and developed into the modern breed of the Maine Coon.

Another folk tale involves Captain Charles Coon, an English seafarer who kept long-haired cats aboard his ships. Whenever Coon's ship would anchor in New England ports, the felines would exit the ship and mate with the local feral cat population. When long-haired kittens began appearing in the litters of the local cat population, they were referred to as one of "Coon's cats."

A myth which is trait-based, though genetically impossible, is the idea that the modern Maine Coon descended from ancestors of semi-feral domestic cats and raccoons. This myth would account for the common color of the breed (brown tabby and its bushy tail. Another idea is that the Maine Coon originated between the matings of domestic cats and wild bobcats, which could explain the tufts of hairs that are so commonly seen on the tips of the ears.

The generally accepted theory among breeders is that the Maine Coon is descended from the pairings of local short-haired domestic cats and long-haired breeds brought overseas by English seafarers (possibly by Captain Charles Coon) or 11th-century Vikings.  The connection to the Vikings is seen in the strong resemblance of the Maine Coon to the Norwegian Forest Cat, another breed that is said to be a descendant of cats that traveled with the Vikings.

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

Secular Islamic Reformer Speaks

There’s an American MD and internist in Phoenix (who used to be a Navy doctor) who, himself, is an American Muslim, who offers a vigorous defense of Muslim participation in western secular society rather than living under Sharia law.  Here are two short videos from him that aired in recent days:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hCazJizgz_g&feature=youtu.be

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iFJ4xEwWYwM