The Winners Of The Miss Perfect Posture Contest At A Chiropractors Convention, USA, 1956

Dead Poets Society (1989)

Director - Peter Weir, Cinematography - John Seale

“Boys, you must strive to find your own voice. Because the longer you wait to begin, the less likely you are to find it at all. Thoreau said, "Most men lead lives of quiet desperation.” Don’t be resigned to that. Break out!“

“I was on a leadership team in 5th grade. At the end of the year we were supposed to take a trip to Washington DC. We held fundraisers and everything. But when it was time to go, I didn’t have the identification papers to buy a plane ticket. So our teacher Ms. Rivera decided that we’d take a bus. Just so I could go too. That trip changed my life. It made me want to be a lawyer. And Ms. Rivera became one of the closest people in my life. She always kept in touch. She basically watched me grow up. One time in high school I got in a huge fight with my mom, and Ms. Rivera came and took me on a long car ride. I started to tell her everything. I told her about a recent break-up, and how I smoked weed, and ‘I did this,’ and ‘I did that.’ She just listened to everything. Then she started telling me about her life too. She told me that she’d been in an abusive relationship. I’d always thought her life was perfect because she was a guidance counselor. But she’d been through so much too. When it was came time to apply for college, Ms. Rivera was the one who helped me apply for DACA. She told me about the TheDream.us scholarship. I didn’t even want to apply. I was ready to give up. I’d just accepted that I’d always work in restaurants like my mom. But Ms. Rivera made me apply. She said: ‘What happened to that girl who wanted to be a lawyer?’ I learned that I got the scholarship in February. They’re paying for my entire college. Ms. Rivera was so proud of me. She kept saying: ‘I told you so.’”

Sleeping brain's complex activity mimicked by simple model

Researchers have built and tested a new mathematical model that successfully reproduces complex brain activity during deep sleep, according to a study published in PLOS Computational Biology.

Recent research has shown that certain patterns of neuronal activity during deep sleep may play an important role in memory consolidation. Michael Schellenberger Costa and Arne Weigenand of the University of Lübeck, Germany, and colleagues set out to build a computational model that could accurately mimic these patterns.

The researchers had previously modeled the activity of the sleeping cortex, the brain’s outer layer. However, sleep patterns thought to aid memory arise from interactions between the cortex and the thalamus, a central brain structure. The new model incorporates this thalamocortical coupling, enabling it to successfully mimic memory-related sleep patterns.

Using data from a human sleep study, the researchers confirmed that their new model accurately reproduces brain activity measured by electroencephalography (EEG) during the second and third stages of non-rapid eye movement (NREM) sleep. It also successfully predicts the EEG effects of stimulation techniques known to enhance memory consolidation during sleep.

The new model is a neural mass model, meaning that it approximates and scales up the behavior of a small group of neurons in order to describe a large number of neurons. Compared with other sleep models, many of which are based on the activity of individual neurons, this new model is relatively simple and could aid in future studies of memory consolidation.

“It is fascinating to see that a model incorporating only a few key mechanisms is sufficient to reproduce the complex brain rhythms observed during sleep,” say senior authors Thomas Martinetz and Jens Christian Claussen.

Mickey Mouse Remastered 

1928 vs. 2014

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2VdAV0Yp_Gg

Dead Poets Society (1989)

“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.”

Chances are you or somebody you know has recently become the owner of an Instant Pot, the multifunction electric pressure cooker that can produce fork-tender pot roasts in less than an hour, as well as brown meat, cook beans without soaking, and even do the job of a rice cooker or crockpot. The Instant Pot­­ isn’t advertised on TV or in the newspapers, and yet it’s become a viral marketing success story, with owners often describing themselves as “addicts” or “cult members.” That’s the kind of word-of-mouth publicity Instant Pot founders dreamed of when they first began designing the countertop appliances.

The Instant Pot electric pressure cooker has been around since 2010, but really became the buzz during the last six months of 2016. While the company’s electric pressure cookers are sold at Wal-Mart, Target and Kohl’s, the bulk of its sales come from Amazon, driven by social media. Deep discounts on Amazon Prime Day and again on Black Friday, along with the viral online sharing of these sales, turned Instant Pot into a household name. With 215,000 units sold on Prime Day alone, the Instant Pot Duo is Amazon’s top-selling item in the U.S. market. Not bad for a company that does no TV or print advertising and only recently began the process of hiring a marketing agency.

Not Just A Crock: The Viral Word-Of-Mouth Success Of Instant Pot

Photo: Grace Hwang Lynch

The Six Types of Middle-Earth Names

1. Characters whose Names are Secretly Insults: 

Samwise: means “Half-wise” or “Half-wit.” He is Stupid Gamgee

Faramir: Boromir’s name means “steadfast jewel”, but Faramir’s name just means “sufficient jewel.”

Sufficient.

Denethor took one look at baby Faramir and thought “eh I guess he exists or whatever” which is very in character

 2. Characters who Have Way Too Many Names

Examples include Aragorn son of Arathorn son of Arador heir of Isildur Elendil’s son, descendant of Numenor,  Thorongill,  Eagle of the Star,  Dúnadan, Strider,  Wingfoot, Longshanks, Elessar, Edhelharn, Elfstone, Estel (”Hope,”) The Chieftain of the Dúnedain, King of the West, High King of Gondor and Arnor, and Envinyatar the Renewer of the House of Telcontar

Wait I’m sorry did I say “examples” plural Cuz that was all one guy 3. Characters whose parents must’ve been prophets

-Frodo means “wise by experience.” His story is about becoming wise by experience -A lady named Elwing turns into a bird (geddit)

4. Characters whose families were so lazy that they copy-pasted the same first half of a name onto multiple people

Théoden/Théodred  Aragorn/Arathorn/Arador  Éomer/ Éomund/Éowyn/Éorl Elladan/Elrohir/Elrond/Elros/Elwing/Elenwë/Elendil/Eldarion (the laziest family) 

5.Characters whose Names are Expertly Designed so that Newbies can’t Remember Who is Who and Feel Sad

All the people mentioned in number 4 Celeborn, Celegorm, Celebrimbor, Celebrian All the rhyming dwarf names in the Hobbit Sauron and Saruman Arwen and Éowyn

6. Name so nice, you say it twice

Legoas Greenleaf: Legolas’s first name means “Greenleaf” in elvish. Legolas is Greenleaf Greenleaf (thranduil really likes green leaves ok) King Théoden’s name means King in Rohirric. Tolkien decided to name his king “King.” All hail King King  this is what the fanbase means when we say tolkien was a creative genius with language