title: Strike action

paragraphs: A strike action (or simply a strike) is when many workers stop working in protest. Strikes are usually done by a labor union to get better pay, hours, or working conditions. They became important during the Industrial Revolution, when many worked in factories and mines. In many countries, it is against the law to strike. In other countries, people who strike are protected under certain conditions.

paragraphs: Strikes generally take the form of a picket line. The workers walk in front of where they work, chanting and holding signs. Workers on strike usually do not stop people from crossing the picket line. However, some people will not cross a picket line to buy something from the company. This is a way of showing solidarity (or support) for the union. Most unions will also not cross a picket line and do business with companies on strike. For example, members of the Teamsters, a truck driving union, will not deliver to a business that is on strike.

paragraphs: The first known strike was in the 12th century B.C., in Egypt. Workers under Ramses III stopped working on the Necropolis until they were treated better. The word gets its name from modern times: in 1768, sailors in London "struck" or removed the sails of trade ships at port.

paragraphs: In 1917, the Mexican Constitution was the first to make sure that workers had the right to strike.

paragraphs: A wildcdat strike is a strike that is not approved by the labor union. Wildcat strikes are not always protected like union-approved strikes are.

paragraphs: A sympathy strike is a strike that is done to support another group of workers on strike.

paragraphs: A slowdown strike is when the workers are still working, but very slowly. It is usually done when workers are not allowed to have a full strike.

paragraphs: A green ban is a strike that is done to get the company to adopt more environmentally friendly practices.

paragraphs: Despites, International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights ensure the right to strike, many countries do not allow workers to strike at all, but some allow it under certain conditions.

paragraphs: In the United States, people who work for the Federal Government are not allowed to strike. Some states, like New York, do not allow people who work for the state government (including teachers) to strike. Railroad and airline workers are not allowed to strike, except under certain conditions.

paragraphs: When a strike is called, a government may try to stop it by calling in the police or the military. The threat of force is sometimes enough to get the workers to stop. This happened in the Seattle General Strike of 1919, when over three thousand marines, sailors, and police officers were called into the city by the mayor of Seattle and the Attorney General of Washington.

paragraphs: The owners of a company may also decide to hire new workers. This may cost less than giving into the demands of the workers. This is another way of breaking the strike. These workers, called "scabs" by strikers, are often yelled at as they pass through the picket line. Many unions say that workers who helped break a strike by crossing the picket line are not allowed to be in the union. If the company is a union shop (meaning that only union workers can work there) this means that helping break a strike could get a worker fired from that company forever.


title: Bird flight

paragraphs: Flight is a method of moving through the air. To do this, birds use wings with light, hollow bones and feathers on them. Birds have a streamlined body shape, so that they slip through air more easily.

paragraphs: Birds can move by flapping their wings, or they can stay in the same place. This is called hovering, with rapid wing beats, as with the kestrel. Birds that soar use very little energy for it: they use columns of rising hot air to lift them. They glide from the top of a warm air current, and then move on to another warm air current. That way birds like buzzards can fly all day while using little energy.

paragraphs: Birds like hawks and gannets dive on their prey. They get to a height, them fold their wings and dive head-first.

paragraphs: The fundamentals of bird flight are similar to those of aircraft. Lift force is produced by the action of air flow on the wing, which is an airfoil. The lift force occurs because the air has a lower pressure just above the wing and higher pressure below.


title: Super Mario Land

paragraphs: Super Mario Land is a platform video game made by Nintendo for the Game Boy game console. It is one of the only two Mario games designed by Gunpei Yokoi, and the first Mario game for a handheld console.

paragraphs: An evil alien monster called Tatanga comes to a kingdom called Sarasaland and kidnaps Princess Daisy. Mario comes to save her and has to go through four worlds and defeat Tatanga's four minions to rescue Daisy from Tatanga.


title: Mario (series)

paragraphs: The series started out in 1981 with the arcade video game, "Donkey Kong", and has since then taken off into its own series. It was created by Shigeru Miyamoto, Mario, going under the name Jumpman when "Donkey Kong" was first released, is the main protagonist throughout most of the series; the main antagonist of the series is Bowser, the King of all Koopas. Most of the games have something to do with jumping and defeating enemies. The games usually feature simple storylines; the most common plot theme in the series being Bowser, the main bad person, taking away Princess Peach, who the Mario brothers try to save during the games, with their latest release was "Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020" on November 5, 2019; and the next release being a upcoming "Mario" games including: "Super Mario 3D World Deluxe", "Super Mario All Stars 2" & A New "Paper Mario" Game in 2020.


title: Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island

paragraphs: Super Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (called in Japan) is a platform video game made by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System game console. A follow-up game called "Yoshi's Story" was released for the Nintendo 64, and a direct sequel was released for the Nintendo DS called "Yoshi's Island DS".

paragraphs: "Yoshi's Island" takes place many years before "Donkey Kong", the first "Mario" game. Baby Mario and Baby Luigi are being taken to their parents by the Stork, but a Magikoopa named Kamek attacks it, kidnapping Baby Luigi and causing Baby Mario to drop to Yoshi's Island. Baby Mario lands on the back of Yoshi, who, along with seven other Yoshis, helps Baby Mario defeat Baby Bowser and rescue Baby Luigi.


title: Palindrome

paragraphs: A palindrome is a word, sentence, or number that reads the same from left to right as from right to left. Punctuation does not matter, but letters and digits do. All alphabetic languages have palindromes. The first palindrome was the Latin Sator Square, which reads:

paragraphs: You can read it horizontally, backwards, even vertically!


title: Environmentalism

paragraphs: Environmentalism is both a philosophy and a social movement that is about protecting nature. It advocates helping to preserve, protect, and restore the natural environment from damage. Environmentalists often talk about threats to the earth from pollution, climate change and overpopulation. Environmentalism is both personal and political. In their own lives, environmentalists do things that are better for the earth, such as recycling, using natural products, and supporting businesses that try not to harm the environment. Politically, they support laws that help the environment, like laws against pollution.

paragraphs: The word Environmentalism comes from 'environmental' and '-ism'. 'Environmental' is the chemical, physical, and biological components of the environment while '-ism' is a suffix used to create action nouns out of verbs.


title: Samurai Champloo

paragraphs: Samurai Champloo is a Japanese anime television show. Mugen is a fierce animal-like warrior with a unique Bboying (break-dance) inspired fighting style. Jin has a more traditional style. The two opposing samurai warriors are far from friends, yet their split paths seem to cross anyways. Mugen is wandering aimlessly through the city when he walks upon a teahouse where he meets Jin and Fuu. Fuu convinces them both to come with her in search of a mysterious samurai that smells like sunflowers and their journey begins. This modernized hip-hop tale breaks the barriers of the common, historical, samurai anime.

paragraphs: This anime contains 26 episodes and two seasons, documenting the journey of these three misfits. The episodes are shown on Adult Swim from time to time, but never consistently. Whenever on American television, only the first season is aired.


title: Chris Thile

paragraphs: Chris Thile () (born February 20, 1981) is an American musician, best known as a member of acoustic band Nickel Creek. He has made six albums as a solo artist and with his band, Punch Brothers. His first, "Leading Off", was released in 1994 when Thile was 13. Thile has also played and recorded with artists like Mike Marshall, Béla Fleck, Glen Phillips, and Edgar Meyer.

paragraphs: Thile's third album, "Not All Who Wander Are Lost", was released in 2001. His fourth, "Deceiver" had all songs written and performed by Thile alone. His most recent solo work was 2006's "How to Grow a Woman from the Ground", and Thile released "Punch" in 2008 with the band Punch Brothers. Also in 2008, Thile will make an album with Edgar Meyer, which will come out in the fall.

paragraphs: Thile was born in Oceanside, California in 1981. When he was two, his family started going to "That Pizza Place", where he listened to John Moore's band "Bluegrass Etc". When Thile was four, his family moved to Idyllwild, California.

paragraphs: He started playing mandolin at the age of five. He took lessons from John Moore. When Thile was eight, Nickel Creek was formed. After playing many music festivals with Nickel Creek, he won the national mandolin contest at the Walnut Valley Festival in Winfield, Kansas at age twelve.

paragraphs: In 1993, Thile was signed to the bluegrass record label Sugar Hill. The next year, he released his first album, "Leading Off", and most of the songs were written by Thile. In 1997, Thile released "Stealing Second" and Nickel Creek released "Here to There".

paragraphs: After "Nickel Creek" sold 500,000 copies, Thile released "Not All Who Wander Are Lost" in 2001. The name of the album comes from a quote in J. R. R. Tolkien's book "The Lord of the Rings". The album had guest appearances from his Nickel Creek bandmates as well as Stuart Duncan, Béla Fleck, Edgar Meyer, Jerry Douglas, and Bryan Sutton.

paragraphs: In 2003, Thile and mandolinist Mike Marshall made a duet album called "Into the Cauldron," which had covers by artists from Charlie Parker to Bach. The next year, Thile released "Deceiver", a pop album on which he played and wrote every song himself. He mainly played his mandolin on the album, but also played electric guitar, piano, drums, violin, viola, cello, and bass.

paragraphs: In August 2006, Nickel Creek announced in "Billboard" and on their official website that they would take an "indefinite hiatus", which means a break for an unknown amount of time.

paragraphs: Just before this, Thile formed the How to Grow a Band. He made "How to Grow a Woman from the Ground", with them. This was Thile's fifth album. In an interview with the "Nashville City Paper", Thile talked about the band's start:

paragraphs: The band's members are Thile (mandolin), Gabe Witcher (fiddle), Chris Eldridge (guitar), Greg Garrison (bass), and Noam Pikelny (banjo). Bryan Sutton also played guitar for the band when Chris Eldridge could not. In 2007, the band changed its name twice: first to "The Tensions Mountain Boys" and then "Punch Brothers."

paragraphs: Punch Brothers released their first album, "Punch", on the Nonesuch Records on February 26, 2008. The album has Thile's four piece song "The Blind Leaving the Blind", along with other original songs.


title: Košice

paragraphs: Košice (, IPA kɒʃɪtsə) is the second biggest city in Slovakia, and the biggest city in eastern Slovakia. About 235,000 people live in the city. Košice was founded in 1230.

paragraphs: The town of Košice is divided into 4 districts and 22 city parts:


title: International Brotherhood of Teamsters

paragraphs: The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (also just called the Teamsters) is an American labor union of truck drivers. With over 1.4 million members, it is one of the largest unions in the United States.

paragraphs: The Teamsters was founded in 1903, when most packages and other goods were delivered by a "team" of horses or oxen.


title: Entente cordiale

paragraphs: The Entente cordiale (French for 'friendly agreement') was a number of agreements signed on 8 April 1904 between the United Kingdom and France. The two countries were worried that their two growing empires would cause a war between them. The "Entente cordiale" was the end of almost a millennium (one thousand years) of intermittent war (they were not fighting all the time). The agreement led to the Triple Entente (including Russia) that fought the Triple Alliance (Germany, Italy and Austria-Hungary) in the First World War. The "Entente cordiale" has lasted until modern times (now). This was a very important move as it was the start of the Triple Entente and it was the first step to stopping Germany, their plan was to block France from Europe with a group of countries (the Triple Alliance) but joining with Britain gave them a better chance on the Western front.


title: Parma wallaby

paragraphs: The Parma wallaby (Macropus parma) is the smallest of the macropus genus. It can grow up to 52 cm in length, with a tail about the same length. They weigh up to 5 kg. The Parma wallaby's fur is a grey-brown colour on the back with a dark stripe. It has a white stripe on its face, and a white belly.

paragraphs: In the late 1800s it was thought to be extinct. Parma wallabies had been introduced and established on Kauwau Island, New Zealand, where they were rediscovered in the 1960s. A lot of effort was made to capture and take the wallabies back to Australia. A small, wild group was found in Gosford, New South Wales in the 1970s by Eric Worrell from the Australian Reptile Park. Parma wallabies are officially listed as vulnerable because there are not many of them, they only live in small areas, and they are threatened by land clearing and other animals such as foxes.


title: Triple Entente

paragraphs: The Triple Entente (English: "Triple Agreement") was the name given to an alliance between the United Kingdom, France and the Russian Empire. The alliance was made after the Anglo-Russian Entente, an agreement between Britain and Russia in 1907. The alliance was made stronger by agreements made with Japan, the United States and Spain. In this form, there was a balance of power, which meant that no group was much stronger than any other one, with the "Triple Alliance" of Germany, Austria-Hungary and Italy. If Italy was attacked by France she would have the help of the other two powers, and if France attacked Germany Italy would help Germany and danger was that if triple alliance was if France should come into an agreement with Russia. The was solved by Bismarck by persuading Russia and Austria [Hungary] to revive the old Dreikaiserbund treaty.

paragraphs: With the First World War, these ententes were not military agreements - but they later involved the military because of the problems between the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente. That's why the Triple Entente became a military alliance. In 1915, Italy left the Triple Alliance, and from 1916 fought against Germany. The Russian revolution in October 1917 meant that Russia left the alliance, but the military alliance between France and the UK lasted until 1940, when Nazi Germany invaded France.

paragraphs: Later on, Italy joined the Entente in a battle against Austria–Hungary in May 1915 and Germany in August 1916. Dudley, Thomas Lloyd and Davey Murphy.

paragraphs: the triple entente was to fight for the Anglo German navy race countries had to become stronger.

paragraphs: During World War I, the alliance was expanded to create a multinational coalition, known as the "Allies".


title: Triple Alliance (1882)

paragraphs: The Triple Alliance was a military alliance (agreement to fight together) between Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy, that lasted from 1880 until the start of World War I in 1914. The three countries promised to help each other if another country attacked them. Some Italian people were not happy about the agreement because Austria-Hungary was an old enemy. In 1914, the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente (France, Russia and the United Kingdom) started World War I. In 1915, Italy left the alliance and fought against Austria-Hungary and Germany from 1916.

paragraphs: The triple Alliance had many strong points but also negative ones. The positive ones were: the Alliance included two very powerful countries which were industrialized but the negatives were that if war were to be declared they would be encircled by the Triple Entente (France, Russia, and Britain). That would mean that they would have to divide their troops in two which would make the Germans much weaker

paragraphs: Bismark was the man behind the formation of the Triple Alliance. It was started as a dual alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary because Germany had defeated the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871.

paragraphs: With the outbreak of war amongst all of Europe, the Ottoman Empire joined the Triple Alliance in a pursuit of protection and power.


title: Campus novel

paragraphs: A campus novel, also called the academic novel, is a novel that's story is around or about a campus of a university. The genre is said to have started in the 1950s. "The Groves of Academe" by Mary McCarthy, written in 1952, is often called the first campus novel, but some have also said that novels such as C.P. Snow's "The Masters", of the year before, were campus novels.


title: Crime fiction

paragraphs: Crime fiction is the genre of fiction that has to do with crimes, their solving, criminals, and their reasons for doing crime. Sometimes, crime fiction is also in the science fiction or historical fiction genres, but usually they are separate. It has several sub-genres, such as mystery fiction, legal thriller, (see John Grisham) and courtroom drama.


title: Marco Pantani

paragraphs: Marco Pantani (13 January 1970 – 14 February 2004) was an Italian professional cyclist. He was born in Cesena, Emilia-Romagna. He was very good at climbing mountains in races. In 1998 he won both the Tour de France and the Giro d'Italia. He was a popular cyclist, and his Italian fans gave him the nickname 'Il Pirata' (the pirate) because of his appearance (he often wore a bandana) and because of his aggressive riding style. He failed a test in the 1999 Giro d'Italia. He returned to cycling, but never won a major race again. In June of 2003 he went into hospital with depression. He died of a cocaine overdose in 2004 in Rimini, Emilia-Romagna. His last entry in his diary read:


title: Conscience

paragraphs: Conscience is something that tells people if what they are doing is right or wrong. Having it can make people sad about what they have done. It is the sense of the moral goodness or blameworthiness of one's own conduct, intentions, or character together with a feeling of obligation to do right or be good.

paragraphs: Middle English (also in the sense ‘inner thoughts or knowledge’): via Old French from Latin conscientia, from conscient- ‘being privy to’, from the verb conscire, from con- ‘with’ + scire ‘know’.


title: Clare, Suffolk

paragraphs: Clare is a small town on the north bank of the River Stour in Suffolk, England. Clare is an amazing town with it containing ruins of an old railway station.It has an amazing market in the town center every week.


title: Bernard Hinault

paragraphs: Bernard Hinault (born 14 November 1954) in Yffiniac is a French cyclist who won the Tour de France five times. He is also one of only seven cyclists to have won all three Grand Tours, the Tour de France, the Giro d'Italia, and the Vuelta a España. He is one of the two cyclists who has won each Grand Tour more than once. He won the Tour de France in 1978, 1979, 1981, 1982 and 1985. He was first in the Giro d'Italia in 1980, 1982 and 1985. He was first in the Vuelta a España in 1978 and 1983. Hinault had the nickname Le Blaireau (the Badger). Hinault says this was a local custom with cyclists when he was young. Professional cyclists used the nickname because badgers do not let go of their prey (animals they want to eat) easily. People know him as a very independent and strong man.

paragraphs: Hinault also won the season-long "Super Prestige Pernod International" competition four times from 1979 to 1982, the same as Jacques Anquetil's total.


title: Muzaffarabad

paragraphs: Muzaffarabad () is the capital city of Azad Kashmir. It is in Muzaffarabad District on the banks of the Jhelum and Neelum rivers. It is very hilly.

paragraphs: The district is bounded by Khyber Pakhtunkhwa in the west, by the Kupwara and Baramulla districts of the Indian Jammu and Kashmir in the east, and the Neelum District of Azad Kashmir in the north.


title: America's Next Top Model, Cycle 1

paragraphs: This is the results of "America's Next Top Model", Cycle 1.


title: Post-traumatic stress disorder

paragraphs: Post-traumatic stress disorder (sometimes also written "Posttraumatic stress disorder", often shortened to "PTSD") is an anxiety disorder. It can develop when people are severely harmed, or experience something extremely upsetting.

paragraphs: PTSD is different from traumatic stress, which is less intense and shorter, and combat stress reaction, which happens to soldiers in wartime situations and usually goes away. PTSD has been recognized in the past by different names, like shell shock, traumatic war neurosis, or post-traumatic stress syndrome (PTSS).

paragraphs: Throughout history, there have been many accounts of people experiencing symptoms of what is now called PTSD. One such account describes Samuel Pepys, who witnessed the Great Fire of London in 1666. "Six months after the event, he wrote in his diary that he was unable to sleep at night, because a great fear of fire took him; one night he was unable to fall asleep before two in the morning, because of that fear."

paragraphs: Between 50% and 90% of people in the United States will experience a trauma at least once in their life. However, not everyone who experiences a trauma will develop PTSD. In the US, the prevalence of PTSD - the percentage of people who have the condition - is about 8%.

paragraphs: PTSD is more common among specific groups of people who are more likely to experience a trauma. These groups include physicians, firefighters, soldiers and people working in emergency medical services. Among these people, the prevalence of PTSD is much higher, reaching over 50%.

paragraphs: For PTSD to be diagnosed officially, a person has to meet specific criteria, or requirements, and show specific symptoms. These requirements are listed in the "Diagnostic and Statistical Manual-IV-TR" (usually called the DSM-IV-TR). Written by the American Psychiatric Association (APA), the DSM-IV-TR (DSM, 4th Edition, Text Revision) lists all of the mental health conditions that are recognized by the APA, and sets out the official requirements that have to be met for each condition to be diagnosed.

paragraphs: According to the DSM-IV-TR, for PTSD to be diagnosed, a person has to meet the following requirements:

paragraphs: (A) Traumatic Exposure: The person has experienced a traumatic event. (Common traumatic events include being raped or sexually abused; being attacked or badly hurt; having a loved one die or be hurt; being a victim of a crime; and experiencing war or terrorism.) The traumatic event caused the person to be physically hurt or violated, or it put the person or others around them in danger of being hurt or killed. During the traumatic event, the person felt very scared, horrified, or helpless.

paragraphs: (B) Re-experiencing: Even after the trauma has ended, the person continues to re-experience the trauma in some way. For example, the person might have nightmares, or flashbacks (strong memories of the trauma, which are so vivid and intense that the person feels like they are experiencing the trauma all over again). The person might also have a strong physical or emotional reaction when something happens which reminds them of the trauma.

paragraphs: (C) Avoidance/Numbing: The person keeps trying to avoid things which remind them of the trauma, or things which bring up upsetting feelings about what happened. They might also forget parts of what happened to them, or might feel numb emotionally (have trouble feeling emotions as strongly as usual).

paragraphs: (D) Increased Arousal: The person's body shows signs of being on high alert, like it is always under attack. They might be jumpy, or have trouble with sleeping, concentrating, or feeling angry.

paragraphs: (E) The person's symptoms have lasted for at least a month. (If the person's symptoms have lasted for less than a month, Acute Stress Disorder is usually diagnosed instead of PTSD).

paragraphs: (F) The person's symptoms causes them to have trouble at work, in his relationships, or in some other important area of their life.

paragraphs: Some experts have written that fabricated posttraumatic stress disorder should be considered when a patient's symptoms are suspicious or unusual. These experts (specifically, the "American Psychiatric Association" DSM IV manual; expert witnesses such as Eli S. Chesen, M.D.; and the textbook "Comprehensive Textbook of Psychiatry," by Freedman & Kaplan) have suggested that it should raise a "red flag" if a patient claims to be suffering from both PTSD and a Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) as a result of the same accident. They suggest that TBI - a physical injury to the brain - causes amnesia, or memory loss, for the event that caused the brain injury. Without memory of the traumatic event, they reason, a patient probably could not experience certain symptoms of PTSD, like nightmares or flashbacks about the event, because they do not remember what happened. They conclude that in typical cases, Traumatic Brain Injury "trumps" the diagnosis of PTSD.


title: Hugo de Vries

paragraphs: Hugo Marie de Vries (Haarlem, 16 February 1848 – Lunteren, 21 May 1935) was a Dutch botanist and one of the first geneticists. He suggested the concept of genes, rediscovered Gregor Mendel's laws of heredity, and introduced the term "mutation". He developed a mistaken mutation theory of evolution, mainly due to the peculiarities of his favourite organism, the Evening Primrose ("Oenothera lamarckiana").

paragraphs: Carl Correns also – independently – rediscovered Gregor Mendel's work on genetics. Erich von Tschermak's status as a third rediscoverer is now less convincing.


title: Carl Correns

paragraphs: Carl Erich Correns (10 September 1864 – 14 February 1933) was a German botanist and geneticist. His research into heredity led to his rediscovery of Gregor Mendel's earlier work.

paragraphs: Hugo de Vries also – independently – rediscovered Gregor Mendel's work on genetics. Erich von Tschermak's status as a third rediscoverer is now less convincing.

paragraphs: Correns grew hybrids of peas, and of maize, and reached the same interpretation as Mendel, in 1899.

paragraphs: The occurrence of cases in which the heterozygote is intermediate (the absence of dominance) was added in a footnote to his 1900 paper. That dominance was not always present had been seen and understood by Mendel, according to his letters to Nägeli. By a quirk of history Correns was a student of Nägeli, a renowned botanist with whom Mendel corresponded about his work with peas. Nägeli failed to understand how significant Mendel's work was.

paragraphs: In 1913 Correns became the first director of the newly founded Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology in Berlin-Dahlem.

paragraphs: Correns produced the first evidence of cytoplasmic inheritance, in his 1909 paper on variegated leaf colour in "Mirabilis jalapa". The basis of this inheritance is that chloroplasts, the organelles which conduct photosynthesis, are inherited solely from the maternal parent.


title: Erich von Tschermak

paragraphs: Erich von Tschermak-Seysenegg (15 November 1871 – October 11 1962) was an Austrian botanist.

paragraphs: Von Tschermak is one of three men – the others were Hugo de Vries and Carl Correns – who were credited with independently rediscovering Gregor Mendel's work on genetics. Von Tschermak published his findings in June 1900.

paragraphs: By a quirk of history, Correns had been a student of Karl Wilhelm von Nägeli. Nageli was a renowned botanist with whom Mendel corresponded about his work with peas, but who failed to understand how significant Mendel's work was. Von Tschermak was a grandson of a man who taught Mendel botany during his student days in Vienna.

paragraphs: Though von Tschermak was originally also credited with the rediscovery, this is no longer generally accepted, because he did not understand Mendel's laws.


title: Woodward's wallaroo

paragraphs: Woodward's wallaroo ("Macropus bernardus"), also called the black wallaroo and Bernard's wallaroo, is the smallest of the wallaroos. The male is black or dark brown and the female is a grey colour. It is a shy nocturnal grazer and does not live in big groups. It uses the rocky cliffs where it lives to shelter and hide from danger.

paragraphs: It is only found in a small, mountainous area in Arnhem Land, Northern Territory, between South Alligator River and Nabarlek. It classified as near threatened, because it is only found in this small area. The name wallaroo means a "rock kangaroo."


title: Alex Rodriguez

paragraphs: Alexander Emmanuel Rodriguez (born July 27, 1975 in New York City, New York). In the past, he played as shortstop for the Seattle Mariners and Texas Rangers.

paragraphs: He is currently first in runs scored and total bases; second in extra base hits and RBI, and 4th in hits among all players in baseball history since their 31st birthday. Also, Rodriguez has more HR, RBI, runs scored and more base hits than all-time leaders Hank Aaron (RBI), Barry Bonds (HR), Rickey Henderson (runs scored), and Pete Rose (hits) did before their 31st birthdays. He is the youngest player ever to hit 500 home runs, breaking the record Jimmie Foxx set in 1939.

paragraphs: He has been said to be one of the best all-around players currently in baseball.

paragraphs: In 2009, he admitted to using steroids from 2001-2003, during his time with the Texas Rangers, in order to become better at baseball.

paragraphs: His playing career ended in August of 2016.


title: Alex

paragraphs: Alex shortened version of the male name Alexander or the female version Alexandria. Both names mean "protector of men" or "defender of men".


title: Tomatina

paragraphs: La Tomatina is a festival held on the last Wednesday of August each year in the town of Buñol in the Valencia region of Spain. Many people come from all over the world to throw one hundred tons of over-ripe tomatoes in the streets.


title: Wallaroo

paragraphs: A wallaroo is an Australian macropod with its size between the big kangaroos and the small wallabies. The name "wallaroo" is a mix of wallaby and kangaroo. Most wallaroos are smaller than a kangaroo, and live in open, rocky country. Wallaroo means "rock kangaroo". There are three types of wallaroo. They all stand the same way: wrists raised, elbows close into the body, and shoulders back, and all have a large, black nose.

paragraphs: The eastern wallaroo, "Macropus robustus", sometimes called the, common wallaroo or just wallaroo lives on the sides of the Great Dividing Range (which runs for more than 3,000 km along the eastern and south-eastern coast of Australia). There are four subspecies of Eastern Wallaroo:

paragraphs: Woodward's wallaroo or black wallaroo, "Macropus bernardus", lives in steep, rocky ground in Arnhem Land. Between 60 to 70 cm in length (without tail) it is the smallest wallaroo and the most heavily built. Males weigh 19 to 22 kg, females about 13 kg.

paragraphs: The antilopine wallaroo, "Macropus antilopinus", also called the antilopine kangaroo, is different to other wallaroos. It is, more like the eastern and western grey kangaroos. It lives in groups on the grassy plains and woodlands, where the other wallaroos live by themselves.


title: Zoe (name)

paragraphs: Zoë (and other such names) is a female name which came from ancient Greece and means "life" in Greek.


title: Rick Warren

paragraphs: Richard D. "Rick" Warren (born January 28, 1954) is both the founder and pastor of Saddleback Church in Southern California. It is the largest Christian church in California. He is also the best-selling author of many Christian books, such as "The Purpose Driven Life". He is also an influential evangelical leader.


title: Antilopine kangaroo

paragraphs: The antilopine kangaroo ("Macropus antilopinus"), also called the antilopine wallaroo or the antilopine wallaby, is a large macropod that lives only in the tropical areas of northern Australia. They live in Cape York Peninsula in north Queensland, the "Top End" of the Northern Territory, and the Kimberley region of Western Australia. They live in groups feeding on the open grass lands. Antilopine kangaroos are often in groups of all males, or all females.

paragraphs: The male is a red colour and females are grey. The males can get as big as 70 kg, but the females are usually around 30 kg. It is slightly smaller than the red kangaroo ("Macropus rufus") and the eastern grey kangaroo ("Macropus giganteus"). Babies are born in the summer (February-March), and leave the mother's pouch in Novemember, at the start of the wet season

paragraphs: Climate change could mean that this kangaroo could become extinct in the future.


title: Synchronization

paragraphs: Synchronization is the co-ordination of a set of events into a system that works according to time. For example, a conductor of an orchestra serves to keep the orchestra "in time", or "synchronized". Systems that operate with all their parts in synchrony are said to be "synchronous" or "in sync".

paragraphs: In synchronization, time and order are important. It is used in many everyday systems, including those in transport, computer science, music, multimedia and telecommunication.

paragraphs: Today, synchronization can be done across the world due to digital signals and GPS-enabled time-keeping systems.


title: Peptide

paragraphs: Peptides are organic chemical molecules. They are polymers made from linking amino acids together in a certain order. The link between one amino acid residue and the next is known as an amide bond or a peptide bond.

paragraphs: Linking peptides together gives proteins, which are also known as "Polypeptides".


title: Cubic foot

paragraphs: A cubic foot is a measure of volume. It is the amount of liquid that can be fit into a box 1 foot deep, one foot wide, and one foot in length. A cubic foot can be written ft. It is used in the United States, and partially in Canada, and the United Kingdom.


title: Webmin

paragraphs: Webmin is a web-based system configuration tool for OpenSolaris, Linux and other Unix-like systems. It can configure many operating system internals, such as users, disk quotas, services, configuration files, as well as modify and control many opensource applications, such as the Apache HTTP Server, PHP and MySQL.

paragraphs: Webmin is largely based on Perl, running as its own process and web server. It defaults to TCP port 10000 for communicating, and can be configured to use SSL if OpenSSL is installed with extra required Perl Modules.


title: Family tree

paragraphs: A family tree is a chart showing family relationships in a tree structure form. The more detailed family trees used in medicine, genealogy, and social work are known as genograms.

paragraphs: As normally showed, a family tree "grows" down from the top, from the oldest generations at the top to the newer generations at the bottom. A tree showing the descendants of an individual (illustration right) will more closely look like a tree in shape; one showing the ancestors of an individual (illustration below in "The Family Tree of Sigmund") will be wider at the top than the bottom. When looking at the closer to the bottom of the tree, it will show more recent generations, and when looking farther up, there will be older generations.

paragraphs: the oldest family members go on the right maybe the left.


title: Survival of the fittest

paragraphs: Survival of the fittest is a famous phrase of Herbert Spencer which describes the idea that, in nature, there is competition to survive and reproduce. It is a metaphor, as are the phrases "struggle for existence", and "natural selection", both of which were used by Charles Darwin. Scientists often use such metaphors as shorthand for key ideas. These metaphors stick in the mind, but they need to be properly understood, or they may be used wrongly.

paragraphs: Herbert Spencer was a British social philosopher who applied his personal conception of evolution to many other fields, from the origin of the solar system to economics. He first used the term in his book "Principles of Biology", published in 1864. In that book (vol 1 p444) he wrote: "This survival of the fittest, which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr. Darwin has called ‘natural selection’, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life".

paragraphs: Spencer later published a book called "The Man versus the State". There, he used the phrase to explain why societies of a militant type would not adopt his theories. The way he uses the term suggests he is talking about a general principle.

paragraphs: Thus by survival of the fittest, the militant type of society becomes characterized by profound confidence in the governing power, joined with a loyalty causing submission to it in all matters whatever.

paragraphs: In the first four editions of "On the Origin of Species", Darwin used only the phrase "natural selection". It was his way of making an analogy with artificial selection (selective breeding), a practice which was well understood in England at that time.

paragraphs: Spencer's "Principles of Biology" was the first to use the phrase "survival of the fittest" in print. Darwin agreed that the phrase "survival of the fittest" was better than "natural selection". Natural selection personified nature, but was really about survival. "Survival of the fittest" would avoid this problem, but it "lost the analogy between nature's selection and the fanciers" (breeders). The phrase was first used by Darwin in the 5th edition of "The Origin" published in 1869, in which Chapter 4 describes "Natural Selection, or the Survival of the Fittest".

paragraphs: In the introduction to the 5th edition Darwin gave full credit to Spencer, writing "I have called this principle, by which each slight variation, if useful, is preserved, by the term Natural Selection, in order to mark its relation to man's power of selection. But the expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient".

paragraphs: The co-discoverer of natural selection, Alfred Russel Wallace, also used the terms "survival of the fittest" and "struggle for existence". He rather preferred the last two terms to natural selection. Since both these evolutionists used them, the three metaphors were obviously useful in getting over what were, at the time, unfamiliar ideas.

paragraphs: The phrase "survival of the fittest" is shorthand for the fact that not all members of a species will contribute equally to the next generation. It is not a value judgement, but a concept of evolution equivalent to natural selection. Fitness is now used in a highly technical sense in population genetics, which should not be confused with its use in everyday language.

paragraphs: Today, the phrase "survival of the fittest" is widely used in popular literature for many topics, not just those related to biology. It has widely been used both by people who are in favour of Social Darwinism and those who are against it. It has also been used to talk about competition of all kinds. Popular literature often uses the phrase as a catchphrase. All such extensions of a metaphor need to be watched carefully. They may preserve the original meaning, or they may not.


title: Social responses to the idea of evolution

paragraphs: The idea that all life evolved was hotly debated even before Charles Darwin published "On the Origin of Species". Even today, some people still talk about the concept of evolution and what it means to them, to their philosophy and their religion. Sometimes these people also talk about the social implications of evolution. This debate is mostly about the meaning of evolution to human life, or about human nature, not about how evolution works.

paragraphs: Some people believe in "guided evolution" or "theistic evolution". They say that evolution is real, but it is being guided it some way.

paragraphs: There are many different concepts of "theistic evolution". Many creationists believe that the creation myth found in their religion goes against the idea of evolution. As Darwin found out early on, the most controversial part of the evolutionary thought is its implications for human origins.

paragraphs: In some countries, especially in the United States, there is tension between people who accept the idea of evolution and those who reject it. The debate is mostly about if the ideas in evolution should be taught in schools, and in what way.

paragraphs: Other fields, like cosmology and earth science also do not match with the original writings of many religious texts. These ideas were once also fiercely opposed. Death for heresy was threatened to those who wrote against the idea that the Earth was the centre of the universe. Giordano Bruno was burnt at the stake by the Holy Inquisition for teaching that the Earth moved around the Sun (and other ideas).

paragraphs: Evolutionary biology is opposed much more from religious believers than other groups or organizations.

paragraphs: The Roman Catholic Church now has a neutral position with regards to evolution. Pope Pius XII stated in his encyclical "Humani Generis" published in the 1950s:

paragraphs: Pope John Paul II updated this position in 1996. He said that Evolution was "more than a hypothesis":

paragraphs: The Anglican Communion also does not oppose the scientific account of evolution.

paragraphs: Many of those who accepted evolution were not much interested in biology. They were interested in using the theory to support their own ideas on society.

paragraphs: In the Bible, for instance, after Noah's Ark landed, there is a passage that describes how Noah got drunk while naked and Ham laughed at him. Noah cursed Ham, which somehow became part of a justification for racism and slavery.

paragraphs: Later, people also tried to use evolution to support racism. Evolution itself is not about racism. However, people wanting to justify racism claimed that black people were inferior. They said that because evolution shows that, in nature, "better" animals tend to survive, leading to evolution of improved animals, they had the right to oppress the "weaker". They believed they were clearly "better", but that would need evidence. There is no agreed evidence that any race of humans is better than any other race.

paragraphs: The idea of eugenics was rather different. Two things had been noticed as far back as the 18th century. One was the great success of farmers in breeding cattle and crop plants. They did this by selecting which animals or plants would produce the next generation (artificial selection). The other observation was that lower class people had more children than upper-class people. If (and it's a big if) the higher classes were there on "merit", then their lack of children was the exact reverse of what should be happening. Faster breeding in the lower classes would lead to the society getting worse.

paragraphs: The idea to improve the human species by selective breeding is called eugenics. The name was proposed by Francis Galton, a bright scientist who meant to do good. Today, Galton is remembered for many things he did in statistics and psychology. He was the first to use regression analysis to see how different things that depend on one another influence one another. He used fingerprints in forensic science. He is seen as the father of experimental psychology, together with Wilhelm Wundt. He developed the bean machine to show probability distributions, among other things.

paragraphs: Galton's ideas were meant to do good. He said that the human gene pool should be improved by selective breeding policies. This would mean that those who were considered "good stock" would receive a reward if they reproduced. However, other people added to this, and said those considered "bad stock" would need to undergo compulsory sterilization, prenatal testing and birth control; and they might even have to be killed.

paragraphs: The problem with Galton's idea is how to decide which features to select. There's so many different skills people could have, you could not agree who was "good stock" and who was "bad stock". There was rather more agreement on who should "not" be breeding. Several countries passed laws for the compulsory sterilisation of unwelcome groups. Most of these laws were passed during between 1900 and 1940. After World War II, disgust at what the Nazis had done lowered public support for forced eugenics.

paragraphs: Another example of using wrong ideas about evolution to support bad things is "Social Darwinism". Social Darwinism is a term given to the ideas of the 19th century British social philosopher Herbert Spencer. Spencer had ideas about "survival of the fittest", which he applied to commerce and human societies as a whole.

paragraphs: Other people used these ideas to claim that social differences, racism, and imperialism were justified. Today, most scientists and philosophers say that the theory of evolution should not be used to support such ideas. They also say that it is difficult to find data that can support them.

paragraphs: Certain people oppose the idea of evolution. They disagree with it for a number of reasons. Most often these reasons are influenced by their religious beliefs. Their beliefs are usually called creationism or intelligent design.

paragraphs: Despite this, evolution is one of the most successful theories in science. People have found it to be useful for different kinds of research. None of the other proposals explain things, such as fossil records, as well. So, for almost all scientists, evolution is not in doubt.


title: Palembang

paragraphs: Palembang is a city of 1,286,000 people in the south of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. It is the capital of the province of South Sumatra.

paragraphs: The city was the capital of the old, Buddhist kingdom of Srivijaya that included a large part of Malaysia and Indonesia. After a 1025 raid by the Chola Empire of southern India it became less imortant. Srivijaya's capital moved north to Jambi. Palembang is also the home of Parameswara, the ruler of Malacca (a state in Malaysia) who started the most important empire in Malaysian history.

paragraphs: The Battle of Palembang was fought near the city during the Second World War between February 13-February 15 1942. Japanese forces captured the airport and nearby oil refinery after a short but bloody battle.

paragraphs: Palembang's economy has grown after it became a venue for National Sporting Event in 2004. . Palembang was also one of hosts of the 2007 AFC Asian Cup.

paragraphs: The city is served by Sultan Mahmud Badaruddin II Airport which has many flights to many cities in Indonesia and also to Singapore and Malaysia.

paragraphs: This city is famous in Indonesia for its "Pempek" fish cakes.


title: Social darwinism

paragraphs: Social darwinism is a term used for different movements. Charles Darwin was one of the main proponents of evolution. Evolution is a concept from biology that tries to explain how different life-forms change over time. It basically says that because most children are not exactly like their parents, there is change. Some of the children will have different features (or traits). These features will mean that some children are better adapted to the place where they live. They will therefore be better able to have offspring. Some of the offspring might also have the trait of their parents.

paragraphs: Social darwinism theories try to use these ideas from biology for human society. They talk about a "Struggle for survival" of human societies. During the era of Nazi ideologies, the idea of Survival of the fittest combined with racism. They claimed the Aryan race was better than all the other races and therefore needed more space to live. This space was to be provided in the east (where mostly Slavs lived).

paragraphs: Today, this is seen as badly named. Most of the ideas for the theories are from Lamarckism and not from the theory of evolution, proposed by Charles Darwin.

paragraphs: Although Darwin's idea was revered in most of the western societies, many Russian intellectuals did not accept his ideas. They feared that accepting Darwin's ideas would harm their morality. One of Darwin's biggest critic was Leo Tolstoy, who felt strongly against what he thought was Darwin's idea. In a letter from his death bed, he warned his children not to take Darwin's struggle for existence as a moral guide. Darwin never suggested his ideas were a basis for human life, just a description of what had happened in evolution.


title: Beccles

paragraphs: Beccles is a small market town in Suffolk, England, around the area of The Broads. The town had a population of about 9, 850 people around 2005. Beccles has a suburb called Worlingham which has a combined population of about 13,580. Beccles is twinned with Petit-Couronne in France.

paragraphs: Beccles was once a flourishing Saxon riverport, but today it is in the Waveney valley. There is a popular boating centre. The town was granted its Charter in 1584 by Queen Elizabeth I.

paragraphs: The Peck family was associated with Beccles for a long time. The Puritan Peck was eventually forced to leave, and went to Hingham, Massachusetts, founded by many members of his parish, where he lived for several years, until King Charles I had been executed and Oliver Cromwell was in charge of government. At that time, Robert Peck decided to return to Hingham, Norfolk, and continued his pastorship of St. Andrews Church. He died in Hingham but he left descendants in America, as well as his brother Joseph Peck, who settled in Rehoboth, Massachusetts.


title: Lamarckism

paragraphs: Lamarckism (also called Lamarckian evolution) is a hypothesis regarding evolution. Evolution tries to explain how species change over time. Today, the only widely accepted theory of evolution is that developed from the ideas of Charles Darwin.

paragraphs: Lamarckism was developed by Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck. He based his ideas, to some extent, on those of Erasmus Darwin, the grandfather of Charles Darwin. Lamarckism says that individuals do not only pass on the things they received from their parents, but also some things they experienced during their lifetime. As an example, he cited giraffes. Giraffes, which have long necks, must have evolved from ancestors with much shorter necks. His idea was that adults needed to stretch their neck to reach leaves from high branches. Therefore, he thought, the children inherited longer necks. This idea is called "the inheritance of acquired characteristics".

paragraphs: Although Darwin did not entirely break with these ideas, his characteristic idea of natural selection relates to the individuals's relative survival and success in reproduction. Better adapted forms leave, on average, more offspring. This changes the proportion of alleles in the population.

paragraphs: Gregor Mendel discovered some basic rules of heredity. These rules of Mendelian inheritance contradict Lamarck's hypotheses entirely, but are consistent with natural selection. This explains why Lamarck's ideas are no longer regarded as a sound explanation of evolution. Where Lamarck and Darwin do agree is that evolution did take place.

paragraphs: The identification of "Lamarckism" with the inheritance of acquired characteristics alone is regarded by some as an over-simplification, rehashed in textbooks repeatedly. Stephen Jay Gould wrote that late 19th century evolutionists "re-read Lamarck, cast aside the guts of it... and elevated one aspect of the mechanics – inheritance of acquired characters – to a central focus it never had for Lamarck himself". He argued that "the restriction of Lamarckism to this relatively small and non-distinctive corner of Lamarck's thought must be labelled as more than a misnomer, and truly a discredit to the memory of a man and his much more comprehensive system". Gould advocated defining "Lamarckism" more broadly, in line with Lamarck's overall evolutionary theory.

paragraphs: However, as scientist historians such as Michael Ghiselin and Stephen Jay Gould have pointed out, none of these views were original to Lamarck. On the contrary, Lamarck's contribution was a systematic theoretical framework for understanding evolution. He saw evolution as comprising two processes;

paragraphs: In essence, a change in the environment brings about a change in needs ("besoins"), resulting in a change in behavior, bringing change in organ usage and development, bringing change in form over time — and thus the gradual transmutation (change) of the species.

paragraphs: The modern point of view is that neither of his two 'forces' exists; Lamarck can be credited with the first fully worked-out account of evolution. However, his ideas of how it came about are entirely mistaken.


title: Darwinism

paragraphs: Darwinism is a term used to talk about ideas connected to those Charles Darwin had about evolution. The meaning of 'Darwinism' has changed over time, and depends on who uses the term.

paragraphs: The term was coined by Thomas Henry Huxley in April 1860. He used it to describe evolutionary concepts, including similar ideas such as Malthusianism and Spencerism. In the late 19th century it came to mean the concept that natural selection was the only mechanism of evolution, in contrast to Lamarckism. Around 1900, Gregor Mendel's work was rediscovered. Today, Darwin and Mendel's ideas have been brought together. The term 'Darwinism' has become associated with the modern evolutionary synthesis.


title: Istria

paragraphs: Istria (Croatian, Slovene: "Istra", Italian: "Istria"), formerly Histria (Latin), is the biggest peninsula in the Adriatic Sea.

paragraphs: Source: Croatian Census - 2001. Slovenian Census - 2002. Italian Census - 1970/2001


title: Prenatal diagnosis

paragraphs: Prenatal testing or Prenatal diagnosis are tests done on pregnant women. They are used to test fetuses for birth defects and some genetic disorders.

paragraphs: Prenatal tests can be non-invasive or invasive. Non-invasive tests include things like utrasounds. In invasive tests, a needle is inserted - for example, to get a sample of fluid from the placenta).

paragraphs: Prenatal tests can check for many conditions, like:

paragraphs: In some cases, the tests are administered to determine if the parents want to abort the fetus.

paragraphs: In some cases, fetal screening has been done to identify things that are not birth defects. For example, in some parts of the world, if an ultrasound shows that a fetus is female, it is sometimes aborted. The rise of designer babies raises a number of ethical and legal issues.


title: Compulsory sterilization

paragraphs: Compulsory sterilization is a term used for laws that force certain groups of people to be sterilized so that they can no longer make babies. International Criminal Court considers compulsory sterilization for a "crime against humanity". Transgender persons are often obliged to undergo sterilization for legal rocognition of legal status depite the Principle 3 of the Yogyakarta Principles.

paragraphs: Such laws were mainly introduced because of Eugenic views of the start of the 20th century. Today, most compulsory sterilizations are done to mentally ill people who are not able to handle a pregnancy on their own. In China, compulsory sterilization is part of family planning.


title: Malthusianism

paragraphs: Malthusianism is a set of ideas developed by Reverend Thomas Robert Malthus. Malthus was an economist who lived during the industrial revolution.

paragraphs: In 1798, Mathus published a book, called "An Essay on the Principle of Population". In it, he describes the Malthusian growth model. He wrote that the growth of the population is exponential. The growth of the food supply however is only arithmetical. This means if there are no limits to the growth of the population, that it will not be possible to produce food for all of them. This is known as Malthusian catastrophe. Malthus wrote during the time of the Manchester School of thought.

paragraphs: The Tory party had paternalistic ideas such as charity for the poor. Malthus said this would not work, and it would only lead to increased numbers of the poor. The theory was developed into Whig economic ideas such as The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834. Its opponents described the act as "a Malthusian bill designed to force the poor to emigrate, to work for lower wages, to live on a coarser sort of food". The act brought the construction of workhouses despite riots and arson.

paragraphs: By that time the ideas were widespread in progressive social circles. One supporter was the novelist Harriet Martineau whose circle of acquaintances included Charles Darwin. The ideas of Malthus were a significant influence on the inception of Darwin's theory.

paragraphs: According to Dr. Dan Ritschel of the Center for History Education at the University of Maryland, The great Malthusian dread was that "indiscriminate charity" would lead to exponential growth in the population in poverty, increased charges to the public purse to support this growing army of the dependent, and, eventually, the catastrophe of national bankruptcy. Though Malthusianism has since come to be identified with the issue of general over-population, the original Malthusian concern was more specifically with the fear of over-population by the dependent poor!

paragraphs: One of the earliest critics of Malthusian theory was Karl Marx who referred (in "Capital", see Marx's footnote on Malthus from Capital - a reference below) to it as "nothing more than a schoolboyish, superficial plagiary of De Foe, Sir James Steuart, Townsend, Franklin, Wallace" and others, postulating that progress in science and technology would allow for indefinite exponential population growth.

paragraphs: Many people today still believe that Mathus was right about human population growth getting out of hand.


title: Greg LeMond

paragraphs: Gregory James "Greg" LeMond (born June 26, 1961 in Lakewood, California) is an American road racing cyclist who raced as a professional from 1981 to 1994.

paragraphs: He became the first American to win the Tour de France in 1986. In 1987 he was injured in a shooting accident, and could not race again until 1989, when he won the Tour de France again. He beat the French cyclist Laurent Fignon in an individual time trial using aero bars, which made him more aerodynamic (able to move through air easily). He won the Tour de France again in 1990. He now runs a bicycle company, and works to help people who are victims of sexual abuse. He has been diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder.


title: Francis Galton

paragraphs: Sir Francis Galton FRS (Birmingham, 16 February 1822 – Surrey, 17 January 1911), half-cousin of Charles Darwin, was an English scientist. His main field of work was human biology and inheritance of mental characteristics.

paragraphs: Galton was a polymath: an anthropologist, a eugenicist, a tropical explorer, geographer, inventor, meteorologist, proto-geneticist, psychometrician, and statistician. He was knighted in 1909.

paragraphs: Galton produced over 340 papers and books in his lifetime. He created the statistical concepts of normal distribution, correlation and regression toward the mean. He was the first to apply statistical methods to the study of human differences and inheritance of intelligence.

paragraphs: He was the first person to do twin studies. His method was to trace twins through their life-history, making many kinds of measurement. Unfortunately, though he knew about monozygotic (identical twins) and dizygotic twins, he did not appreciate the real genetic difference. Twin studies of the modern kind did not appear until the 1920s.

paragraphs: He also introduced the use of questionnaires and surveys to collect data on human communities. He needed such data for genealogical and biographical works and for his anthropometric studies. He was a pioneer in eugenics, coining the very term itself and the phrase "nature versus nurture". As an investigator of the human mind, he founded psychometrics (the science of measuring mental faculties) and differential psychology.

paragraphs: Galton created a method for classifying fingerprints that proved useful in forensic science. As the initiator of scientific meteorology, he devised the first weather map, proposed a theory of anticyclones, and was the first to establish a complete record of short-term climatic phenomena on a European scale. He also invented the Galton Whistle for testing differential hearing ability.


title: Herbert Spencer

paragraphs: Herbert Spencer (27 April 1820 – 8 December 1903) was an English philosopher, and a prominent liberal political and social theorist of the Victorian era.

paragraphs: Spencer developed an all-embracing conception of evolution. He saw evolution as the progressive development of the physical world, biological organisms, the human mind, and human culture and societies.

paragraphs: Spencer never married; he remained a bachelor. He contributed to a wide range of subjects, including ethics, religion, politics, philosophy, biology, sociology, and psychology.

paragraphs: Like Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace, he read Malthus' "Essay on the principle of population", and was deeply impressed by its argument. Malthus said that sooner or later population growth gets checked by famine and disease, and there are then many deaths. So, he was prepared for Darwin's idea of natural selection, which he preferred to call "survival of the fittest". He did this in "Principles of Biology" (1864), after reading Charles Darwin's "On the Origin of Species".

paragraphs: Spencer's term does strongly suggest natural selection, yet as he extended evolution into realms of sociology and ethics, Spencer made use of Lamarckism rather than natural selection, so it seems he was not a Darwinian after all. Others took up his social ideas, and drew the conclusion that it was useless to try and help the poor, and that competition without limits was the way society should go. Darwin himself did not accept these ideas, but they were quite widespread in the United States at the end of the nineteenth century.


title: National sport

paragraphs: A national sport is a sport or game that was invented and firstly played by citizens of the same country or nation. It also means the game or sport has a long history of popularity in the country or nation.


title: Coevolution

paragraphs: Coevolution is where the existence of one species is tightly bound up with the life of one or more other species. Species whose lives connect, evolve together. What happens is that survival rates in each species changes as a result of changes in the other species.

paragraphs: Coevolution is extremely common, and may involve more than two species. Mimicry rings, with dozens of species, are known.

paragraphs: New or 'improved' adaptations which occur in one species are often followed by the appearance and spread of related features in the other species.

paragraphs: The study of coevolution dates back to Darwin's "On the Origin of Species". There he discussed how cats increased heather by reducing mice. The point being that mice raid bumblebee nests and bumblebees pollinate red heather. So more cats cause more heather. In the last paragraph of the Origin Darwin remarks:

paragraphs: Hermann Müller was an important worker on co-evolution. His studies on bees and the evolution of flowers were quoted by Darwin in "The Descent of Man". His papers in the journal "Nature" had heading "On the fertilisation of flowers by insects and on the reciprocal adaptations of both". This shows Müller fully understood the concept of coevolution.

paragraphs: The life and death of living things is intimately connected, not just with the physical environment, but with the life of other species. These relationships are dynamic, and may continue for millions of years, as has the relationship between flowering plants and insects (pollination).<br>The gut contents, wing structures, and mouthparts of fossilized beetles and flies suggest that they acted as early pollinators. The association between beetles and angiosperms during the Lower Cretaceous period led to parallel radiations of angiosperms and insects into the late Cretaceous. The evolution of nectaries in Upper Cretaceous flowers signals the beginning of the mutualism between hymenopterans and angiosperms.

paragraphs: Another good example is malaria, in which there are three 'partners': the mosquito, the parasite "Plasmodium", and a land vertebrate, such as a mammal or bird. The actual species of malaria differs according to the vertebrate, so there are actually thousands of different relationships which follow the same pattern.

paragraphs: Adaptive radiation and speciation rates can be high in parasites. Sibling species are very common in the bug "Erythroneura", in which about 150 transfers from one host to another has resulted in about 500 species in the genus.

paragraphs: The clearest evidence comes from the large size of many parasitic families.

paragraphs: A huge number of species are parasitic. A survey of the feeding habits of British insects showed that about 35% were parasites on plants, and slightly more were parasites on animals. That means that nearly 71% of insects in Britain are parasitic. Since British insects are better known than those elsewhere (because of the length of time they have been studied), this means that by far the majority of insect species throughout the world are parasitic. Another estimate went:

paragraphs: There are several other invertebrate phyla which are wholly or largely parasitic. Flatworms and roundworms are found in virtually every wild species of vertebrate. Protozoan parasites are also ubiquitous. Hence parasitism is almost certainly the most common feeding method on Earth.

paragraphs: Recent publications have given an overview of the 150 years of research into co-evolution after the "Origin of species".

paragraphs: Many species are parasites or are specialised to live in one or a few hosts. A single species of tropical tree is, on average, a host to 162 host-specific beetle species. Since there are 50,000 tropical tree species, and beetles amount to 40% of total insect species, and there are also tree-specific species below the canopy, it is possible to estimate the total number of arthropod species living in tropical forests. The number is 30 million. This contrasts rather strongly with the total of 1.4 to 1.8 million species which have already been described. It seems textbooks have underestimated the number of species in existence by a factor of about 20.

paragraphs: The single factor which most causes this high number of species is phytophagy: the huge number of insect species, each eating one or a few plant species. And what insects do, so do fungi, nematodes, mites and other invertebrates.

paragraphs: The geographic mosaic theory of coevolution was developed by John N Thompson as a framework for envisioning the coevolutionary process in real populations and species. It has been an attempt to incorporate the minimum components of population biology needed for an ecologically and evolutionarily realistic theory of coevolution and evolving interactions in general. It applies to pairs of interacting species, small groups of interacting species, and large webs of interactions.

paragraphs: Assumptions: Geographic mosaic theory is based on several observations long known to biologists. These observation are taken as assumptions in the development of geographic mosaic theory:

paragraphs: 1. Species are often collections of genetically distinct populations

paragraphs: 2. Interacting species often differ in their geographic ranges

paragraphs: 3. interactions among species differ among environments in their ecological outcomes.

paragraphs: The Hypothesis: From these assumptions, geographic mosaic theory argues that coevolution proceeds by natural selection acting on three sources of variation that affect interactions among species. These three sources of variation can be formally partitioned as genotype by genotype by environment interactions (GxGxE).

paragraphs: 1. Geographic selection mosaics: The "structure of natural selection" on interactions differs among environments (e.g., high vs. low temperatures, high vs. low nutrient conditions; a surrounding species web that is species-rich vs. species poor). This variation occurs because genes are expressed in different ways in different environments (GxE interactions) and species affect each other's fitness in different ways in different environments.

paragraphs: For example,  an interaction may be antagonistic in one environment and mutualistic in another environment; or it may be antagonistic in all environments but selection may favor different traits in different environments).

paragraphs: 2. Coevolutionary hotspots: The i"ntensity of reciprocal selection" differs among environments. Interactions are subject to reciprocal selection only within some local communities, called coevolutionary hotspots. These coevolutionary hotspots are embedded in a broader matrix of coevolutionary coldspots, where local natural selection is non-reciprocal or where only one of the participants occurs.

paragraphs: For example, an interaction may be mutualistic or antagonistic in some environments (coevolutionary hotspots) but commensalistic in other environments (coevolutionary coldspots).

paragraphs: 3. Trait remixing: The overall genetic structure of coevolving species continually changes through new mutations, genomic alterations, gene flow among populations, differential random genetic drift among populations, and extinction of local populations that differ in the combinations of coevolving traits they harbor. New genetic material on which natural selection can act can result from simple genetic mutations, chromosomal rearrangements, hybridization between populations, or whole genome duplications (polypoloidy). These processes contribute to the shifting geographic mosaic of coevolution by continually altering the spatial distributions of potentially coevolving genes and traits.

paragraphs: The combination of these processes continually changes the distribution of genotypes within any local population and the distribution of genotypes among populations.

paragraphs: NOTE: Some descriptions of geographic mosaic theory collapse this “trait remixing” part of geographic mosaic theory to gene flow. That is an incorrect characterization. The point of trait remixing is that through a combination of genetic, genomic, and ecological processes, the available distribution of coevolving traits on which natural selection can act continues to change over time within and among populations.

paragraphs: In studies of coevolution, a GxGxE interaction can be viewed either in the most formal way at the gene or genotype level (i.e., how selection acts on the same gene or genotype in across contrasting environments), or it can be viewed more generally at the level of how natural selection acts on two or more interacting species across many contrasting environments.

paragraphs: See books by John N Thompson (1982 Interaction and Coevolution; 1994 The Coevolutionary Process; 2005 The Geographic Mosaic of Coevolution; 2013 Relentless Evolution)


title: Rongorongo

paragraphs: Rongorongo is a system of writing native to Easter Island. It cannot be read. There are two dozen examples of rongorongo script, mostly carved on tablets made from wood of the portia tree "Thespesia populnea," known as "makoi" in Rapanui (Easter Island) language. The longest inscription in existence is the Santiago Staff, a wooden sceptre 126 centimetres long and 6.5 centimetres wide, bearing 2300 glyphs (Gr. "γλυφη" "carving"). The staff, which once belonged to an Easter Island king, was acquired by the Chilean Navy in 1870 and is now in Santiago's Museum of Natural History.

paragraphs: In 2019, only 25 texts were seen as . These texts and artefacts are distributed over diffent museum in the world, none remains on the Easter Island. The total text corpus is about 14,000 "letters", made of about 600 different glyphs. The writing was probably used for religious puroposes; only very few people used it. The age of the writing is unknown. In the 19th century, Europeans received the first objects with writing on them. Some glyphs show plants that do not exist, or have never existed on Easter Island. One example is the Breadfruit, which has never existed on Eastter Island. The knowledge of the plant must have been passed on from the first settlers, from generation to generation.

paragraphs: When the Euopeans came ot the island, they paid high prices for tablets containing Rongoro. Today, there are a number of artefacts containing Rongorongo whch are clear forgeries. There are some, where the claim is disputed.


title: Candle Festival

paragraphs: The Candle Festival (known in Thai as Haetian) is held in Ubon Ratchathani, Isan, Thailand.

paragraphs: At the start of rainy season, it is traditional for the devout to donate to monks items of personal use, such as candles. This part of the festival became the core of the Ubon Ratchathani version of the event. It is now a major event both for residents and for tourists: giant candles are paraded through the town, each representing a local temple, district or other institution. The more elaborate versions are accompanied by scenes of Hindu and Buddhist mythology sculpted in wood or plaster and coated with wax.


title: Portia tree

paragraphs: The portia tree ("Thespesia populnea") Family Malvaceae, is a small tree or shrub 5-10 (-20) m high that is pantropical in littoral environments, although probably native only to the Old World. In Hawai‘i and elsewhere in the Pacific it is possibly indigenous, although may have been spread by early Polynesians for its useful wood and fiber.

paragraphs: Common names vary according to the country and include "Indian tulip tree", "Pacific rosewood", "seaside mahoe" (in Florida), "surina" (the "elegant tree"), "suriya" (Sinhala), "bebaru" or "baru baru" (Malay), "milo" or "miro" (in many Polynesian languages), "mako‘i" (Rapanui), "gangaraavi" (Telugu), "poovarasu" (Tamil), and "plaksa" (Sanskrit).

paragraphs: Traditionally it was planted in sacred groves and used for religious sculpture throughout eastern Polynesia. It was used for the rongorongo tablets of Easter Island.


title: The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap

paragraphs: The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, known in Japan as , is an action adventure video game made by Flagship and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Advance game console.


title: PAL region

paragraphs: The PAL region is a PAL region which covers most of Asia, Africa, Australia, New Zealand, and Europe.


paragraphs: The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Adventures, known in Japan as , is an action adventure video game made by Nintendo for the Nintendo GameCube game console.


title: The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages and Oracle of Seasons

paragraphs: The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages and The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Seasons are action adventure video games made by Capcom and published by Nintendo for the Game Boy Color game console.

paragraphs: The Triforce sends Link to the land of Holodrum, where he stumbles upon a traveling group of performers. After resting with them a bit, he finds out that the mysterious dancer from the troupe is actually the Oracle of Seasons, Din. An evil general named Onox comes and captures her in order to gain power. By doing so he also puts all the seasons into chaos and evil spreads throughout the land. Link must find all the essences of nature to defeat the evil general to save Din.

paragraphs: The Triforce sends Link to the land of Labrynna, where he finds a woman named Impa. They go to see a singer named Nayru. Nayru is the Oracle of Ages. Impa is revealed to have been possessed by Veran, Sorceress of Shadows, who leaves Impa and goes to possess Nayru, causing the time to fall into chaos. Link must find the Essences of Time in order to save Nayru from Veran.


title: The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask

paragraphs: After , Link is led to Termina by the possessed Skull Kid and is turned into a Deku, a small, wooden creature. He meets the Happy Mask Salesman, a very moody man. He offers to fix Link if he gets the mask Skull Kid got with a time of three days. However, three days passed, and the Skull Kid, possessed with Majora's Mask (what the Happy Mask Salesman needed) brings the moon down to destroy Termina. Link stops him, gets his ocarina back, and returns back three days ago. He returns to the Salesman who believes Link has the mask. He reheals him before he sees Link never got the mask. Link now has to stop the moon that will destroy everything, which is being done by Majora's Mask, the mask held by Skull Kid. To stop it, he needs to summon the Four Giants. He fights the possessed spirits, and the Giants hold the moon. However, Majora's Mask leaves Skull Kid and goes to the Moon, After helping people, Link finally goes to the moon. It is actually a plain with a tree. Under the tree, a kid agrees to play with him as the final battle takes hold. Link finally defeats the evil in Majora's Mask and it is now a lifeless mask. He returns it to the Salesman. After this, Link leaves Termina as the game ends.


title: The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening

paragraphs: The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening, known in Japan as , is an action-adventure video game made by Nintendo for the Game Boy game console. It was remade for the Game Boy Color with full color graphics and new features.


title: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

paragraphs: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, known in Japan as is an action-adventure video game made by Nintendo for the Super Nintendo game console. It's the third game of "The Legend of Zelda series", though it is a prequel to "The Legend of Zelda" and "". It's about a young boy named Link who has to save Princess Zelda and six other maidens from Ganon using the Master Sword to save them. It got great reviews and it's one of the best-selling Super Nintendo games of all time.

paragraphs: "A Link to the Past" is in Hyrule, the main area of "The Legend of Zelda" series. The Light World has many areas from other "The Legend of Zelda" games, like Hyrule Castle, Death Mountain, the Lost Woods, Lake Hylia, and Kakariko Village. Most of Hyrule is grass-land, with deserts, forests, and villages. The Dark World, a dark version of Hyrule, has very little grass-land and has a large pyramid in the middle. When people enter the Dark World, they get turned into what's in their hearts (for example, Link turns into a pink bunny).

paragraphs: The story starts with Link in bed when a voice calls out to him. The voice is Princess Zelda's, and she asks for help escaping from Hyrule Castle before the evil wizard Agahnim can seal her away like the other maidens before her. Link's Uncle hears it too, and goes to save her. When Link follows him into the sewer, he finds his Uncle half-alive, and his Uncle gives Link his sword and shield before he dies. Link breaks Zelda out of her cell and takes her through a secret path to a sanctuary where she stays and hides. Link is told by an old man called Sahasrahla that he has to find the pendants of power, wisdom, and courage in three dungeons so he can break the seal on the ancient weapon, the Master Sword. Link finds the pendants in the Eastern Palace, the Desert Palace, and the Tower of Hera, and brings them to the Lost Woods, where he pulls the Master Sword out of its pedestal. Zelda gets kidnapped before he can get to her, and Link fights Agahnim. He and Agahnim go to the Dark World, and Link appears on top of a large pyramid. He has to find the seven crystals that have seven maidens in them, including Zelda, so he can get to Ganon's Tower. After he gets them all, he goes to the top of the tower and battles Agahnim again. He kills him, and Ganon in a bat form flies out of the corpse and into the Pyramid of Power. Link battles Ganon using the Master Sword and Silver Arrows, and eventually kills him. He finds the Triforce that Ganon used to corrupt the Golden Land, and uses it to wish everything back to normal, and Link puts the Master Sword back in the pedestal.

paragraphs: "A Link to the Past" plays like "The Legend of Zelda" for the NES with a bird's eye view view instead of ""<nowiki>'</nowiki>s sidescrolling view, and stars a boy named Link. He has a sword and shield, and many other items from older games including a bow, a boomerang, and bombs. He always has a sword and shield out when he has them, and can have one other item equipped. Link uses them to explore Hyrule, battle enemies, and solve puzzles. It adds onto the gameplay of "The Legend of Zelda", with better controls and new items, like the hookshot and Pegasus Boots which have appeared in many "The Legend of Zelda" games after it. It also adds a feature used in many games after it, which is going back and forth between two worlds. This was first used again after "A Link to the Past" in "", where Link travels back and forth in time. Link also has a magic meter like in "Zelda II", which he needs to use items like the Lantern and Ice Rod. Throughout Hyrule, there are many items to find and Heart Pieces too that add to Link's health.

paragraphs: Link has to go around Hyrule and battle enemies, find items, and find the dungeons that he has to go to. There are many kinds of items, some of them being too strong for a sword. There are a lot of puzzles that require Link to use his many items to complete in the dungeons. In every dungeon, there is almost always these items - a Compass, a Dungeon Map, several Keys, a Big Key, a special dungeon item usually used to beat the dungeon, and a magical item after the boss. The boss at the end of the dungeon is always different, and are much more powerful than regular enemies in the game.

paragraphs: Kōji Kondō, a famous Nintendo musician, was in charge of the soundtrack for this game. Several songs in this game were remixed in "Super Smash Bros. Brawl", including the Dark Woods theme.

paragraphs: "The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past" is considered to be one of the best Super Nintendo game ever made and one of the best video games ever made too. It was praised for how good the controls were, and how entertaining it was to explore the world and dungeons.

paragraphs: This game has been re-released several times, including a Satellaview remake, Game Boy Advance remake, and a port to the Wii's Virtual Console.

paragraphs: "A Link to the Past" was remade for the Satellaview, a Super Nintendo Entertainment System add-on, and was called "BS The Legend of Zelda: Kodai no Sekiban". It has a different plot and a slightly changed world. It had voice acting, and it lasted for four weeks. Each week, you have to do something, and when the next week comes, there's a new quest to do.

paragraphs: "A Link to the Past" was re-released on the Game Boy Advance as "The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past & The Four Swords". It came with a modified port of "A Link to the Past" along with the multiplayer-only game "Four Swords". The port added a new dungeon to the game called "The Palace of the Four Sword". "Four Swords"<nowiki>'</nowiki>s graphical style is similar to "."

paragraphs: On September 28, 2011, an updated version of "Four Swords" called "The Legend of Zelda: Four Swords Anniversary Edition" was released. It is available on Nintendo's DSiWare service. It includes a single player mode and more areas.


title: Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

paragraphs: Zelda II: The Adventure of Link is an adventure-role-playing video game made by Nintendo for the Nintendo Entertainment System game console.

paragraphs: The main hero of the series, Link, finds out that Princess Zelda has gone under a deep sleep after a fight with a wizard. While trying to find crystals to awaken Zelda, Link also fights off followers of Ganon, who are trying to bring him back to life.

paragraphs: The gameplay of "The Adventure of Link" is very different from the rest of the series. It is a role-playing game where the player gains experience and levels up stats. The map is also different; the overworld is a birds-eye view, while smaller maps are side scrolling where the player moves only left and right.

paragraphs: Shigeru Miyamoto wanted to have a very different game than the first game, The Legend of Zelda. While Miyamoto was still the producer of the game, it was developed by new people than before. Instead of keeping a view from above, "Zelda II" has a side-view of the game when fighting enemies or exploring dungeons. The game was originally developed for the Famicom, but was released on worldwide systems after.


title: PAL

paragraphs: PAL (short for Phase Alternating Line) is a method to encode color in analogue television broadcasting systems. It is one of three standards in wide use today. The other two are SECAM and NTSC.

paragraphs: European countries wanted to introduce colour television in the 1950s. They had a few problems though. NTSC is used in America. American electricity supply uses 60 Hz AC, but Europe uses 50 Hz. TV studios' lightbulbs change brightness at twice the supply frequency. If the TV picture rate is not the same as the grid frequency, then a dark bar can be seen on the TV. The bar moves up or down the TV screen. This is due to the stroboscope effect, which also makes car wheels appear to turn the wrong way on TV.

paragraphs: NTSC has some weaknesses. The most important weakness of NTSC was that colour tones would change if transmission conditions were bad. For these reasons the development of the SECAM and PAL standards began. The goal was to make a colour TV standard with a picture frequency of 50 fields per second (50 hertz), and a better colour picture than NTSC.

paragraphs: PAL was developed by Walter Bruch at Telefunken in Germany. The format was first unveiled in 1963, with the first broadcasts beginning in the United Kingdom and Germany in 1967.

paragraphs: Telefunken was later bought by the French electronics manufacturer Thomson. Thomson also bought the "Compagnie Générale de Télévision" where Henri de France developed SECAM. SECAM is the first European colour television standard. Thomson nowadays also co-owns the RCA brand for consumer electronics products, which created the NTSC colour TV standard before Thomson became involved.

paragraphs: The term PAL is often used informally to refer to a 625-line/50 Hz (576i, principally European) television system, and to tell it apart from a 525-line/60 Hz (480i, principally North American/Central American/Japanese) NTSC system. Accordingly, DVDs are labelled as either PAL or NTSC. This labelling is informally referring to the line count and frame rate even though technically the European discs do not have PAL composite colour. This usage may lead readers to believe that PAL defines image resolution, even though it does not. The PAL colour system can be used in conjunction with any resolution and frame rate, and various such combinations exist. NTSC, by contrast does define the video line and frame format.


title: Tautology (rhetoric)

paragraphs: In rhetoric, a tautology is the repetition of a statement, for example, "With malice toward none, with charity for all".

paragraphs: Unlike a tautology in logic, it is not automatically true.


title: Tautology (logic)

paragraphs: In propositional logic, a tautology (from the Greek word ταυτολογία) is a propositional formula that is always true, and is sometimes denoted by the symbol formula_1 (a symbol also reserved for the truth value 'true'). In other words, a tautology cannot be wrong. For example, formulae in maths are tautological, because they always hold true for any values. The philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein first applied the term to propositional logic in 1921.

paragraphs: A statement in logic is considered contingent if it is neither a tautology nor false.

paragraphs: Some examples of tautologies in natural language include:

paragraphs: These tautologies are sentences of the following form:

paragraphs: Indeed, if A is not true, then A is not true, so the tautology is still true.


title: Longhorn beetle

paragraphs: The longhorn beetles or long-horned beetles (Cerambycidae) are a family of beetles that usually have very long antennae. They can be longer than the beetles' body.


title: Macroevolution

paragraphs: Macroevolution refers to large-scale evolution. For some, this means the origin of species. For others, it means the large-scale changes seen in the fossil record.

paragraphs: It is a term of convenience: for most biologists it does "not" suggest any change in the process of evolution. For a few palaeontologists, some things they see in the fossil record cannot be explained just by the gradualist evolutionary synthesis. They are in the minority. There are some interesting discussions by other palaeontologists.

paragraphs: Some biologists use the term for evolution in already separated gene pools. For them, macroevolutionary studies focus on change that occurs at or above the level of species. Again, this is a minority position. Most biologist would not call evolution at the species level "macroevolution".

paragraphs: Microevolution, on the other hand, refers to smaller evolutionary changes "within" species or populations. During microevolution changes in allele frequencies definitely do occur. Some biologists, Richard Dawkins in particular, have suggested that the gene is the object of selection. This was always challenged by Ernst Mayr "The individual is the entity which survives or not, which reproduces or not, and which reproduces successfully or not". Changes in gene frequency in populations is a by-product of what happens to individuals.

paragraphs: Paleontology, evolutionary developmental biology, and sequence analysis contribute much evidence for the patterns and processes that can be classified as macroevolution. An example of macroevolution is the appearance of feathers during the evolution of birds from one group of dinosaurs.

paragraphs: Within the modern evolutionary synthesis school of thought, macroevolution is thought of as the compounded effects of microevolution. Thus, the distinction between micro- and macroevolution is not a fundamental one – the only difference between them is of time and scale.

paragraphs: Some creationists have also adopted the term 'macroevolution' to describe the form of evolution they reject. They may accept that evolutionary change is possible within species (microevolution), but deny that one species can evolve into another (macroevolution). These arguments are rejected by biologists, who hold that there is ample evidence that macroevolution has occurred in the past.

paragraphs: Some examples of subjects whose study falls within the realm of macroevolution:

paragraphs: Russian entomologist Yuri Filipchenko (or Philipchenko, depending on the transliteration) first coined the terms 'macroevolution' and 'microevolution' in 1927 in his German language work, "Variabilität und Variatio".

paragraphs: Since then, their meanings have been revised several times and fallen into disfavour with many, who prefer to speak of biological evolution as one process.

paragraphs: Evolution as a whole is strongly supported by many kinds of evidence.

paragraphs: The issue for biologists is whether there is any sense in having the special term "macroevolution". The answer is yes for a few biologists who proposed one or more evolutionary mechanisms which worked above the species level. The ideas of punctuated equilibrium and species selection were suggested, but in each case most biologists felt they could be explained by the usual small-scale changes. This explains why 'macroevolution' is perhaps a term biologists do not need to use.

paragraphs: When discussing the topic, creationists use "strategically elastic" definitions of micro- and macroevolution. Macroevolution, by their definition, cannot be attained. Any observed evolutionary change is described by them as being "just microevolution".

paragraphs: The debate between biologists continues, with some biologists stating that there is significant evidence that other factors have acted during macroevolution, and others maintaining that macroevolution can still be fully explained by the mechanisms of microevolution.


title: Gene pool

paragraphs: A gene pool is the set of all possible variations (alleles) of all genes of a population. It is a concept in population genetics.

paragraphs: For example, plants have genes that say what colour their flowers will be. The gene pool of peas has an allele for red flowers and another one for white flowers.


title: Transcription (genetics)

paragraphs: Transcription is when RNA is made from DNA. The DNA sequence is copied by a special enzyme called RNA polymerase to make a matching RNA strand.

paragraphs: The matching RNA strand is a 'pre-messenger RNA'. Next, the non-coding introns are stripped out by a spliceosome. The remaining exons are put together to make a messenger RNA.

paragraphs: The product is called messenger RNA (mRNA) because it carries a genetic message from the DNA to the protein-making machinery of the cell. Transcription is the first step that leads to the expression of the genes.

paragraphs: The stretch of DNA that is transcribed into an RNA molecule is called a "transcription unit". This contains:

paragraphs: As in DNA replication, only one of the two DNA strands is transcribed. This strand is called the "template strand", because it provides the template for ordering the sequence of nucleotides in an RNA transcript. The other strand is called the "coding strand". Its sequence is the same as the newly created RNA transcript (except for thymine being substituted for uracil).

paragraphs: The DNA template strand is read 3' → 5' direction by RNA polymerase and the new RNA strand is synthesized in the 5'→ 3' direction. RNA polymerase binds to the 3' end of a gene (promoter) on the DNA template strand and travels toward the 5' end.

paragraphs: Roger D. Kornberg won the 2006 Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for his studies of the molecular basis of eukaryotic transcription".