It's not about 'black' people anymore. Condella Rice made a greater impact as F_Secy of USA than 'white' Clinton did. (speaking from India).

After B. Obama the word 'black' lost meaning to this part of the world where Muslims are in majority & may come as a surprise: Muslims in India are more 'white' than their Hindu counterparts.

So the question narrows down to coverage of Africa in comparison to Europe;
not black to white; unless we want to make it so.

it was like unreal as a few of us saw the news channels halfway across the globe - camp / construction site. then a second plane? something from H.Wood; channel mix-up(?) and then the disaster started to filter in.

just can't imagine how you witnessed it first hand,

Got it, when they say
floor him!

in the picture (link) his mother looks as dumb as the rest of us.
so what would DNA reveal? - a different neural structure??

nope, the TV was kept on - his mom could not afford a baby sitter.
good thing the child is not wearing glasses; not yet.

H could've declared that "France's Muslim community must accept the Syrians on same lines like France accepted them (the earlier Muslim immigrants) OR ELSE..."

Instead: He declares war on ISIS - which does not 'exist on French soil'; just French Shia's network. So instead of the F_Shia community opening up & weeding out the anti-Syrians the declaration closed ranks among all Shia's.

As i said, H has absolutely no idea on governance.

Hollande seems to be like O, absolutely no idea what to do!!
All shadow targets. He was in the football stadium!!

I see some validity in this view point: surrogate motors as a vessel.

In fact, this post coincided with a recent article in the n_papers here about an ongoing industry where Indian women were volunteering as surrogate mothers for overseas couples.
The news mentioned the government banning "foreign implants". I suppose it had something to do with our country's resources being drained; haha.

Branching off to a scientific view; if a test tube baby can grow in a human womb why not in an animal womb, like say some orangutan's? The reason for this inquiry is my growing belief that if man is to colonize planets like Mars he needs to acquire a skin with furs to resist radiation effects. (w.r.t a debate on the value of skin in the post: NASA Makes Major Mars Discovery );

The human embryo in the orangutan womb, if he/she survives to birth, could very well acquire superhuman powers; some details if any however unlikely genetically; like tail growth could be amputated. What I mean is if a womb is a vessel; we do need to consider all potential nature offers.

Ah, the many inferences of Law: There's a possibility that governments may wrangle over kids born of rental-wombs. If we go by the rule that any child born in the US territory automatically becomes a US citizen then we must allow this rule to extend to kids born off surogate moms in Indian territory.

This would not apply if the kids were born off a lab or an orangutan's womb. It would then be deemed as similar to a contract between companies and shipyards for building 'vessels'.

On an aside: Orangutan mom's don't feel anything when they lose a child year after year till her womb can no longer be milked to bear any more human kids. They call it karma.

Which finally leads me to think that Indian surrogate mothers, mired in poverty as they are; are this new age O_moms. Maybe they harbor a secret solace that their kid is in a better home. (just thinking aloud in tangents).

Which finally leads me to conclude that giving equal rights to women; how-so-ever revered for their motherhood (which by this post means zilch) is not only against nature's law of male-female equation but the root of all disaster in our modern society.

Thanks for wakening me up.
Yeah, i'm going to relish those 'yo-mom' jokes after all.

Agreed, but as this is not a moon landing with a quick round trip; I'm sure NASA scientists are working out all possible scenarios: unknowns & unexpected risks and planning risk responses.

But working out the 'unknowns'; for durations like 30 day stay on Mars may not be possible from earth. So animals yes, they could be sacrificed; if they reduce these 'unknowns'.

There are challenges as MM pointed out: 'breathing'; but are they really 'impossible to learn' with suitable gear? or is it cause we are so completely disconnected from 'wild' life?

Experts who train police dogs for tracking, etc; or the Swiss with their Bernard can probably tell us whether dogs wearing some breathing implants; feeding systems; sun glasses; cameras, etc; would perform even for a few days. If these animals could live even a week; that would be a signature event bringing us closer to colonization.

Bears in substitution for dogs; appear to have more advantages: natural hibernation for one and of course their fur skin properties which have spiked up their study in some univs. recently.

Fantastic!!

Anything and everything that reduces risk should be weighed upon??
After all this one is in line with the gorilla and the dog (Russian) that went out in space before man..

Rural folks over here used to train bears to perform till the government banned it. Yes Sir, bears can be trained all right. May have to catch them young though.

Thinking aloud MM, thinking aloud.

Remarkable!!
On a similar note; may be NASA should consider landing polar bears somewhere near the Mars pole before any of their 'manned missions'? Assuming details like training, light gear and a supply of frozen fish (for 2 years). Add some friendly rovers to keep them company and observe their survival techniques.

is this practical?

Furs and feathers could be an ideal 'skin' to wear if people are to live and move around on mars. see link.

http://www.osa.org/en-us/about_osa/newsroom/news_releases/2014/fur_and_feathers_keep_animals_warm_by_scattering_l/

In short:
It's not the 'trapping a layer of air' (alone) within the fur that keep animals warm. In other words it's not conduction/convection within the air layer that slows down the heat loss.

Individual hair mimic as radiation shields (heat).


So it's no coincidence that polar bears have white furs...or

MM is absolutely right. Life expectancy over 80 is normal these days, even in India where with rising prices life is a continuous struggle; and with all this baggage it's bound to rise to 100 plus for kids born in this 2010-15 edition, right here in India.

The magic number could be '150'. The day people cross their 150th year; there's no medical reason for them to die. Aging which ceased to reach the 150th year can stay ceased for ever, why not?

Why would these elders need a sex life, anyway? Like ice-cream bells they might welcome it but as an occasional delight.

The real issue would be the enormous pressure on resources as the population builds up. Heck, not my problem.

An article which could be indirectly related to 'hopping' over the belt.

'To Get to Mars, pit stop at the Moon' http://news.discovery.com/space/private-spaceflight/to-get-to-mars-pit-stop-at-the-moon-151022.htm



On the same vein it appears that the shortest path for manned flights to Jupiter could involve a detour to Mars. Then use a bit of Mars gravity to 'hop' over the asteroid belt and then Jupiter's gravity to thrust beyond.

NASA is probably considering all such possibilities including a base station called 'Newton' (New Houston) on Mars.

The reflection appears to have more energy to it. Maybe this illusion could be expanded, magnified & the above ground grimy buildings further dimmed?

Notice plenty of minarets in this picture.

ok, i think i over did this a wee bit but could be this what's happening here: In a bus one has a view of the countryside but when you are in the driver's seat all one sees is the road & traffic.

if you tell us what specifically draws you to your present job maybe other teachers here could 'add value'? Specifics could begin with subjects, class; a bit about the community the kids come from and so on?

Which also brings to light the rights of surrogate mothers who hatch em?

Or show them Crystals Unicorn Horse and ask them what they think of the person who painted it.


Pegasus is quite dear.

we were having a family discussion on various religions one evening and my daughter, 6 or 7 then, asked: ok, so what is the religion of this cat?

Hi Alicia,
i'm close to retirement years and taken some time out reflecting on life, etc., etc. & thanks to Mingle, re-adjusting my thoughts. So here's my take.

Lets say you are a farmer with a 2 acre patch. You grow tomatoes, you love tomatoes & the local ketchup factory also loves you; but they barely cover your costs.

Now you can grow potatoes & there's a chip factory willing to take in your potatoes at a higher price. The problem is potatoes suck out more from the land; so there's larger re-investments.

So as a small farmer you explore and find that green peas tendril can grow comfortably next to tomatoes plant. The tendril leaves don't compete for sunlight & so on.

What i mean is the grass may look greener on the other side; those high paying teaching jobs in cities carry lot more stress (i think).

So now the question is what sort of green peas. Tutorials, oh, no. The peas could be some of the best work submitted by your own students in the past.

Have you documented a drawing(?) taken a video of a recital(?) and so on; recycled it for next batch to come up with their own judgement? Asking a student for his opinion, thoughts as compared to demanding he get those exam Q's right? Taken pictures with a small group; (not those class photos where every kid looks like a big dot on a dash). At some point of time these things start coming together; maybe as a handbook; or something larger.

Just read about a Vietnamese teacher working in an Indian school here. She says she searches for jokes to share with the children at the end of a class; cause she believes laughter should be part of the journey of learning.

Oh yeah, you could always invite a person like me to hold a class. My method would be to ask your kids to help me out with a math problem; cause I'm dumber!! Bet you, they will.

Conclusion: May not be the solution you are looking for. If you are looking for a larger income; think about publishing some of the results from such experiments or working on this with your peers and being part of a larger school program.

We normally focus on why kids are doing badly in math or spelling. We don't explore why some of them are doing well. just thinking aloud.

i'm assuming that American school systems are similar to what we have in some of the elite schools here.

Let me know how right or wrong I am.
I like to learn things the hard way.