SearchSuite provides further control over Wikipedia search results, such as on/off features to sort them, to present results one-per-line, and more. While it seems to work fairly well, there is definitely room for improvement. Comments and suggestions are welcome.
By the way, most of the scripts I've been working on are for building and augmenting outlines...
I'm interested in all knowledge, especially how to organize it so you can find whatever is most relevant at any given moment.
I've been around Wikipedia since the Fall of 2005, and have been working mostly on Wikipedia's structure, and its knowledge navigation systems, throughout that time.
A depiction ofIdris visiting Heaven and Hell from a Persianilluminated manuscript version of the Islamic textStories of the Prophets (1577) Theafterlife orlife after death is a postulated existence in which the essential part of an individual'sstream of consciousness oridentity continues to exist after the death of their physical body. The surviving essential aspect varies between belief systems; it may be some partial element, or the entiresoul or spirit, which carries with it one's personal identity.
In some views, this continued existence takes place in aspiritual realm, while in others, the individual may be reborn intothis world and begin the life cycle over again in a process referred to asreincarnation, likely with no memory of what they have done in the past. In this latter view, such rebirths and deaths may take place over and over again continuously until the individual gains entry to a spiritual realm orotherworld. Major views on the afterlife derive from religion,esotericism, andmetaphysics.
Some belief systems, such as those in theAbrahamic tradition, hold that the dead go to a specific place (e.g.,paradise orhell) after death, as determined by their god, based on theiractions andbeliefs during life. In contrast, in systems of reincarnation, such as those of theIndian religions, the nature of the continued existence is determined directly by the actions of the individual in the ended life. (Full article...)
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Ablock is adefensive tactic inchess in response to an attack, consisting ofinterposing apiece between the opponent's attacking piece and the piece being attacked. This type ofblocking will only work if the attacking piece is a type that can move linearly an indefinite number of squares such as aqueen,rook, orbishop and there is at least one empty square in the line between the attacking and attacked piece. Blocking is not an option when the attacking piece is directly adjacent to the piece it is attacking, or when the attacking piece is aknight (because knights "jump over other pieces" and cannot be blocked). When an opponent's attack on a piece is blocked, the blocking piece is to some extentpinned, either relatively or absolutely, until a future move by either side allows it to be unpinned.
Acheck on aking by an opponent's queen, rook, or bishop can sometimes be blocked by moving a piece to a square in line in between the opponent's checking piece and the checked king. The blocking piece is then absolutely pinned to the king by the attacking piece.
Another type of interposing in chess can involve placing a piece between two opponent's pieces where one of those pieces is protecting the other, or they are both protecting each other. Thischess tactic can be calledinterference. (Full article...)
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Traditionally, meals have been prepared by women in a homekitchen (painting from the circle of Jean-Baptiste de Saive, 1563). Ameal is an occasion that takes place at a certain time and includesconsumption offood. The English names used for specific meals vary, depending on the speaker's culture, the time of day, or the size of the meal. A meal is different from asnack in that meals are generally larger, more varied, and more filling.
Though they can be eaten anywhere, meals usually take place in homes, restaurants, and cafeterias. Regular meals occur on a daily basis, typically several times a day. Special meals are normally held in conjunction with celebratory or momentous occasions such asbirthdays,weddings,anniversaries,funerals, andholidays.
The type of food that is served or consumed at any given time depends on regional customs. Three main meals are typically eaten in the morning, early afternoon, and evening in most civilizations. Furthermore, the names of meals are often interchangeable by custom as well. Some servedinner as the main meal at midday, withsupper as the late afternoon/early evening meal, while others may call their midday meallunch and their early evening meal supper or dinner. Except forbreakfast, these names can vary from region to region or even from family to family. (Full article...)
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Natural science orempirical science is a branch of science concerned with the description, understanding, and prediction of natural phenomena, based onempirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such aspeer review andreproducibility of findings are used to try to ensure the validity of scientific advances.
Natural science can be divided into two main branches:life science andphysical science. Life science is alternatively known asbiology. Physical science is subdivided intophysics,astronomy,Earth science, andchemistry. These branches of natural science may be further divided into more specialized branches, also known as fields. As empirical sciences, natural sciences use tools from theformal sciences, such asmathematics andlogic, converting information about nature into measurements that can be explained as clear statements of the "laws of nature".
Genius is a characteristic oforiginal and exceptionalinsight in the performance of some art or endeavor that surpasses expectations, sets new standards for the future, establishes better methods of operation, or remains outside the capabilities of competitors. Genius is associated withintellectual ability andcreative productivity. The termgenius can also be used to refer to people characterised by genius, and/or topolymaths who excel across many subjects.
There is no scientifically precise definition of genius. When used to refer to the characteristic, genius is associated withtalent, but several authors such asCesare Lombroso andArthur Schopenhauer systematically distinguish these terms.Walter Isaacson, biographer of many well-known geniuses, explains that although highintelligence may be a prerequisite, the most common trait that actually defines a genius may be the extraordinary ability to applycreativity andimaginative thinking to almost any situation.
In the early-19th centuryCarl von Clausewitz, who had a particular interest in what he called "military genius", defined "the essence of Genius" (German:der Genius) in terms of "a very high mental capacity for certain employments". (Full article...)
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Trichophyton rubrum
Trichophyton is agenus offungus, which includes theparasitic varieties that causetinea, includingathlete's foot,ringworm,jock itch, and similar infections of the nail, beard, skin and scalp. Trichophyton fungi aremolds characterized by the development of both smooth-walled macro- andmicroconidia.Macroconidia are mostly borne laterally directly on the hyphae or on short pedicels, and are thin- or thick-walled,clavate tofusiform, and range from 4 to 8 by 8 to 50μm in size. Macroconidia are few or absent in many species. Microconidia are spherical, pyriform to clavate or of irregular shape, and range from 2 to 3 by 2 to 4 μm in size. (Full article...)
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An abdominous obese male Weight: 182 kg/400 lbs Height: 185 cm/6 ft 1 in Body mass index: 53
Researchers first started to focus on abdominal obesity in the 1980s when they realized it had an important connection to cardiovascular disease,diabetes, anddyslipidemia. Abdominal obesity was more closely related withmetabolic dysfunctions connected with cardiovascular disease than was general obesity. In the late 1980s and early 1990s insightful and powerful imaging techniques were discovered that would further help advance the understanding of the health risks associated with body fat accumulation. Techniques such ascomputed tomography andmagnetic resonance imaging made it possible to categorize mass ofadipose tissue located at the abdominal level into intra-abdominal fat and subcutaneous fat. (Full article...)
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Asuperintelligence is a hypotheticalagent that possessesintelligence surpassing that of the mostgiftedhuman minds. PhilosopherNick Bostrom definessuperintelligence as "anyintellect that greatly exceeds the cognitive performance of humans in virtually all domains of interest".
Technological researchers disagree about how likely present-dayhuman intelligence is to be surpassed. Some argue that advances inartificial intelligence (AI) will probably result in general reasoning systems that lack human cognitive limitations. Others believe that humans will evolve or directly modify their biology to achieve radically greater intelligence. Severalfuture study scenarios combine elements from both of these possibilities, suggesting that humans are likely tointerface with computers, orupload their minds to computers, in a way that enables substantialintelligence amplification. The hypothetical creation of the first superintelligence may or may not result from anintelligence explosion or atechnological singularity.
Some researchers believe that superintelligence will likely follow shortly after the development ofartificial general intelligence. The first generally intelligent machines are likely to immediately hold an enormous advantage in at least some forms of mental capability, including the capacity ofperfect recall, a vastly superior knowledge base, and the ability tomultitask in ways not possible to biological entities.
Two pieces of string under a light microscope String is a long flexibletool made fromfibers twisted together into a single strand, or from multiple such strands which are in turn twisted together. String is used to tie, bind, or hang other objects. It is also used as a material to make things, such as textiles, and in arts and crafts. String is a simple tool, and its use by humans is known to have been developed tens of thousands of years ago. String may also be a component in other tools, and in devices as diverse as weapons, musical instruments, and toys. The ubiquity of string as a tool has led to conceptual and scientific uses of the term, includingstrings in computer science,cosmic strings, andstring theory. (Full article...)
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Roboticists with threeMars rover robots. Front and center is the flight spare for the first Mars rover,Sojourner, which landed on Mars in 1997 as part of the Mars Pathfinder Project. On the left is a Mars Exploration Rover (MER) test vehicle that is a working sibling toSpirit andOpportunity, which landed on Mars in 2004. On the right is a test rover for the Mars Science Laboratory, which landedCuriosity on Mars in 2012.
The goal of most robotics is to design machines that can help and assisthumans. Many robots are built to do jobs that are hazardous to people, such as finding survivors in unstable ruins, and exploring space, mines and shipwrecks. Others replace people in jobs that are boring, repetitive, or unpleasant, such as cleaning, monitoring, transporting, and assembling. Today, robotics is a rapidly growing field, as technological advances continue; researching, designing, and building new robots serve various practical purposes.
Aroboticist is someone who specializes in robotics. (Full article...)
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Location ofAsia Asian cuisine encompasses several significant regional cooking styles ofAsia: Central Asian, East Asian, North Asian, South Asian, Southeast Asian, and West Asian. Cuisine is a distinctive way of cooking practices and customs, usually associated with a specificculture. Asia, as the largest and most populouscontinent, is home to many cultures, each with its own characteristic cuisine. Asian cuisine, also known as Eastern cuisine, is considered the "culture of food within a society" due to the beliefs, cooking methods, and the specific ingredients used throughout the entire process. Asian cuisines are also renowned for their spices. A key taste factor in Asian cuisine is “umami” flavor, a strong savoriness prominent in Asian cooking, which can be achieved through fermented food or meat extract.
Ingredients common to many cultures inEast andSoutheast Asia include rice, ginger, garlic, sesame seeds, chilis, dried onions, soy, and tofu.Stir frying, steaming, anddeep frying are common cooking methods.
While rice is common to most Asian cuisines, different varieties are popular in the various regions.Glutinous rice is ingrained in the culture, religious tradition and national identity ofLaos. Basmati rice is popular in theIndian subcontinent,jasmine rice is often found acrossSoutheast Asia, while long-grain rice is popular in China and short-grain in Japan and Korea.
Curry is a common dish in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and East Asia. Curry dishes have their origins in the Indian subcontinent. Countries in Indochina typically use a coconut milk base in their curries; countries in Southwest Asia typically use a yogurt base. (Full article...)
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Friendly artificial intelligence (friendly AI orFAI) is hypotheticalartificial general intelligence (AGI) that would have a positive (benign) effect on humanity or at leastalign with human interests such as fostering the improvement of the human species. It is a part of theethics of artificial intelligence and is closely related tomachine ethics. While machine ethics is concerned with how an artificially intelligent agentshould behave, friendly artificial intelligence research is focused on how to practically bring about this behavior and ensuring it is adequately constrained. (Full article...)
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Ontology learning (ontology extraction,ontology augmentation generation,ontology generation, orontology acquisition) is the automatic or semi-automatic creation ofontologies, including extracting the correspondingdomain's terms and the relationships between theconcepts that these terms represent from acorpus of natural language text, and encoding them with anontology language for easy retrieval. Asbuilding ontologies manually is extremely labor-intensive and time-consuming, there is great motivation to automate the process.
Types of democracy refers to the various governance structures that embody the principles ofdemocracy ("rule by the people") in some way. Democracy is frequently applied togovernments (ranging fromlocal toglobal), but may also be applied to other constructs like workplaces, families, community associations, and so forth.
Types of democracy can cluster aroundvalues. Some such types, defined asdirect democracy (orparticipatory democracy, ordeliberative democracy), promote equal and direct participation in political decisions by all members of the public. Others, including the many variants ofrepresentative democracy (i.e., constitutional), favor more indirect or procedural approaches to collectiveself-governance, wherein decisions are made by elected representatives rather than by the people directly.
Types of democracy can be found across time, space, and language. The foregoing examples are just a few of the thousands of refinements of, and variations on, the central notion of "democracy." (Full article...)
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Themeaning of life is the concept of an individual'slife, human life, orexistence in general having aninherent significance or aphilosophical point. There is no consensus on the specifics of such a concept, or whether the concept itself even exists in anyobjective sense.Thinking anddiscourse on the topic is sought in the English language throughquestions such as—but not limited to—"What is the meaning of life?", "What is the purpose of existence?", and "Why arewehere?". There have been many proposed answers to these questions from many differentcultural andideological backgrounds. The search for life's meaning has produced muchphilosophical,scientific,theological, andmetaphysical speculation throughout history. Different people and cultures believe different things for the answer to this question. Opinions vary on the usefulness of usingtime andresources in the pursuit of an answer. Excessive pondering can be indicative of, or lead to, anexistential crisis.
Knowledge extraction is the creation ofknowledge from structured (relational databases,XML) and unstructured (text, documents,images) sources. The resulting knowledge needs to be in a machine-readable and machine-interpretable format and mustrepresent knowledge in a manner that facilitates inferencing. Although it is methodically similar toinformation extraction (NLP) andETL (data warehouse), the main criterion is that the extraction result goes beyond the creation of structured information or the transformation into arelational schema. It requires either the reuse of existingformal knowledge (reusing identifiers orontologies) or the generation of a schema based on the source data.
Some researchers argue that state‑of‑the‑artlarge language models (LLMs) already exhibit signs of AGI‑level capability, while others maintain that genuine AGI has not yet been achieved. Beyond AGI,artificial superintelligence (ASI) would outperform the best human abilities across every domain by a wide margin.
Unlikeartificial narrow intelligence (ANI), whose competence is confined to well‑defined tasks, an AGI system can generalise knowledge, transfer skills between domains, and solve novel problems without task‑specific reprogramming. The concept does not, in principle, require the system to be an autonomous agent; a static model—such as a highly capable large language model—or an embodied robot could both satisfy the definition so long as human‑level breadth and proficiency are achieved.
Emerging technologies aretechnologies whose development, practical applications, or both are still largely unrealized. These technologies are generallynew but also include old technologies finding new applications. Emerging technologies are often perceived as capable of changing thestatus quo.
Emerging technologies are characterized by radical novelty (in application even if not in origins), relatively fast growth, coherence, prominent impact, and uncertainty and ambiguity. In other words, an emerging technology can be defined as "a radically novel and relatively fast growing technology characterised by a certain degree of coherence persisting over time and with the potential to exert a considerable impact on the socio-economic domain(s) which is observed in terms of the composition of actors, institutions and patterns of interactions among those, along with the associated knowledge production processes. Its most prominent impact, however, lies in the future and so in the emergence phase is still somewhat uncertain and ambiguous."
Emerging technologies include a variety of technologies such aseducational technology,information technology,nanotechnology,biotechnology,robotics, andartificial intelligence. New technological fields may result from thetechnological convergence of different systems evolving towards similar goals. Convergence brings previously separate technologies such as voice (and telephony features), data (and productivity applications) and video together so that they share resources and interact with each other, creating new efficiencies.
Emerging technologies are those technical innovations which represent progressive developments within a field forcompetitive advantage; converging technologies represent previously distinct fields which are in some way moving towards stronger inter-connection and similar goals. However, the opinion on the degree of the impact, status and economic viability of several emerging and converging technologies varies. (Full article...)
Some scientists, includingStephen Hawking, have expressed concern thatartificial superintelligence could result inhuman extinction. The consequences of a technological singularity and its potential benefit or harm to the human race have been intensely debated.
Prominent technologists and academics dispute the plausibility of a technological singularity and associated artificial intelligence "explosion", includingPaul Allen,Jeff Hawkins,John Holland,Jaron Lanier,Steven Pinker,Theodore Modis,Gordon Moore, andRoger Penrose. One claim is that artificial intelligence growth is likely to run into decreasing returns instead of accelerating ones.Stuart J. Russell andPeter Norvig observe that in the history of technology, improvement in a particular area tends to follow an S curve: it begins with accelerating improvement, then levels off without continuing upward into a hyperbolic singularity. (Full article...)
Stories of AI takeovershave been popular throughoutscience fiction, some commentators argue that recent advances have heightened concern about such scenarios. Some public figures such asStephen Hawking have advocated research intoprecautionary measures to ensure future superintelligent machines remain under human control. (Full article...)
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Moore's law is an example of futurology; it is a statistical collection of past and present trends with the goal of accuratelyextrapolating future trends. Futures studies,futures research orfuturology is the systematic,interdisciplinary andholistic study of social and technological advancement, and other environmental trends, often for the purpose of exploring how people will live and work in the future. Predictive techniques, such asforecasting, can be applied, but contemporary futures studies scholars emphasize the importance of systematically exploring alternatives. In general, it can be considered as a branch of thesocial sciences and an extension to the field of history. Futures studies (colloquially called "futures" by many of the field's practitioners) seeks to understand what is likely to continue and what could plausibly change. Part of the discipline thus seeks a systematic and pattern-based understanding of past and present, and to explore the possibility of future events and trends.
Unlike the physical sciences where a narrower, more specified system is studied, futurology concerns a much bigger and more complex world system. Themethodology and knowledge are much less proven than innatural science andsocial sciences like sociology and economics. There is a debate as to whether this discipline is an art or science, and it is sometimes described aspseudoscience; nevertheless, the Association of Professional Futurists was formed in 2002, developing a Foresight Competency Model in 2017, and it is now possible to study it academically, for example at theFU Berlin in their master's course. To encourage inclusive and cross-disciplinary discussions about futures studies,UNESCO declared December 2 as World Futures Day. (Full article...)
The termanthropogenic designates an effect or object resulting fromhuman activity. The term was first used in the technical sense by Russian geologistAlexey Pavlov, and it was first used in English by British ecologistArthur Tansley in reference to human influences onclimax plant communities. The atmospheric scientistPaul Crutzen introduced the term "Anthropocene" in the mid-1970s. The term is sometimes used in the context of pollution produced from human activity since the start of theAgricultural Revolution but also applies broadly to all major human impacts on the environment. Many of the actions taken by humans that contribute to a heated environment stem from the burning of fossil fuel from a variety of sources, such as electricity, cars, planes, space heating, manufacturing, or the destruction of forests. (Full article...)
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Auserscript (oruser script) is a program, usually written inJavaScript, for modifyingweb pages toaugment browsing. Uses include adding shortcut buttons and keyboard shortcuts, controlling playback speeds, adding features to sites, and enhancing thebrowsing history.
On desktop browsers such as Firefox, userscripts are enabled by use of auserscript managerbrowser extension such asTampermonkey orGreasemonkey. The Presto-based Opera-supported userscripts (referred to as User JavaScript) are placed in a designated directory. Userscripts are often referred to asGreasemonkey scripts, named after the original userscript manager for Firefox.
On Wikipedia, auser scripts feature is enabled for registered users that allows them to install userscripts to augment editing and viewing of the encyclopedia's pages. (Full article...)
Scraping a web page involves fetching it and then extracting data from it. Fetching is the downloading of a page (which a browser does when a user views a page). Therefore, web crawling is a main component of web scraping, to fetch pages for later processing. Having fetched, extraction can take place. The content of a page may beparsed, searched and reformatted, and its data copied into a spreadsheet or loaded into a database. Web scrapers typically take something out of a page, to make use of it for another purpose somewhere else. An example would be finding and copying names and telephone numbers, companies and their URLs, or e-mail addresses to a list (contact scraping).
Web pages are built using text-based mark-up languages (HTML andXHTML), and frequently contain a wealth of useful data in text form. However, most web pages are designed for humanend-users and not for ease of automated use. As a result, specialized tools and software have been developed to facilitate the scraping of web pages. Web scraping applications includemarket research, price comparison, content monitoring, and more. Businesses rely on web scraping services to efficiently gather and utilize this data. (Full article...)
Selected emerging technologies and related articles
Since its founding, the company has hired several high-profileneuroscientists from various universities. By 2019, it had received $158 million in funding ($100 million was from Musk) and had 90 employees. At that time, Neuralink announced that it was working on a "sewing machine-like" device capable of implanting very thin (4 to 6μm in width) threads into the brain, and demonstrated a system that reads information from a lab rat via 1,500electrodes. It anticipated starting experiments with humans in 2020, but later moved that to 2023. As of May 2023, it has been approved for human trials in the United States. On January 29, 2024, Musk announced that Neuralink had successfully implanted a Neuralink device in a human and that the patient was recovering. He was later identified asNoland Arbaugh. (Full article...)
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Ecological modernization is a school of thought that argues that both the state and the market can work together to protect the environment. It has gained increasing attention among scholars and policymakers in the last several decades internationally. It is an analytical approach as well as a policy strategy andenvironmentaldiscourse (Hajer, 1995). (Full article...)
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The US-IsraeliTactical High Energy Laser (THEL) was used to shoot down rockets and artillery shells before being canceled in 2005 as a result of "its bulkiness, high costs and poor anticipated results on the battlefield".
Alaser weapon is a type ofdirected-energy weapon that useslasers to inflict damage. Whether they will be deployed as practical, high-performance military weapons remains to be seen. One of the major issues with laser weapons is atmosphericthermal blooming, which is still largely unsolved. This issue is exacerbated when there is fog, smoke, dust, rain, snow, smog, foam, or purposely dispersed obscurant chemicals present. In essence, a laser generates a beam of light that requires clear air or a vacuum to operate. Laser-baseddirected energy weapons generally have two primary types: low-powerlaser dazzlers that blind optical systems or human eyes, and high-power lasers that can physically damage or destroy targets, such as enemy aircraft and ammunition. (Full article...)
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Desorption is the physical process whereadsorbed atoms or molecules are released from a surface into the surrounding vacuum or fluid. This occurs when a molecule gains enough energy to overcome theactivation barrier and thebinding energy that keep it attached to the surface.
Desorption is the reverse of the process ofadsorption, which differs from absorption in that adsorption refers to substances bound to the surface, rather than beingabsorbed into the bulk. (Full article...)
Energy harvesters usually provide a very small amount of power for low-energy electronics. While the input fuel to some large-scale energy generation costs resources (oil, coal, etc.), the energy source for energy harvesters is present as ambient background. For example, temperature gradients exist from the operation of a combustion engine and in urban areas, there is a large amount of electromagnetic energy in the environment due to radio and television broadcasting. (Full article...)
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Mobile device runningMortal Kombat 11 on Stadia with official controller
Stadia was acloud gaming service developed and operated byGoogle. Known in development asProject Stream, the service debuted through aclosed beta in October 2018, and publicly launched in November 2019. Stadia was accessible throughChromecast Ultra andAndroid TV devices, on personal computers via theGoogle Chrome web browser and otherChromium-based browsers,Chromebooks and tablets runningChromeOS, and the Stadiamobile app on supportedAndroid devices. There was also an experimental mode with support for all Android devices that were capable of installing the Stadia mobile app. In December 2020, Google released aniOS browser-basedprogressive web application for Stadia, enabling gameplay in theSafari browser.
Stadia was capable of streaming video games to players from the company's numerousdata centers at up to4K resolution and 60frames per second, with support forhigh-dynamic-range (HDR) video. It offered the option to purchase games from its store, along with a selection of free-to-play games. While the base service was free and allowed users to stream at resolutions up to 1080p, aStadia Pro monthly subscription allowed for a maximum resolution of 4K,5.1 surround sound,HDR, and offered a growing collection of free games that—once claimed—remained in the user's library whenever they had an active subscription. Both tiers allowed users to play online multiplayer games without any additional costs. Stadia was integrated withYouTube, and its "state share" feature allowed players to launch a supported game from asave state shared by another player viapermalink. The service supported Google's proprietary Stadiagame controller, along with various non-Stadia controllers throughUSB andBluetooth connections. (Full article...)
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Thespecific strength is a material's (or muscle's)strength (force per unit area at failure) divided by itsdensity. It is also known as thestrength-to-weight ratio orstrength/weight ratio orstrength-to-mass ratio. In fiber or textile applications,tenacity is the usual measure of specific strength. The SI unit for specific strength isPa⋅m3/kg, orN⋅m/kg, which isdimensionally equivalent to m2/s2, though the latter form is rarely used. Specific strength has the same units asspecific energy, and is related to the maximum specific energy of rotation that an object can have without flying apart due tocentrifugal force.
Another way to describe specific strength isbreaking length, also known asself support length: the maximum length of a vertical column of the material (assuming a fixed cross-section) that could suspend its own weight when supported only at the top. For this measurement, the definition ofweight is the force ofgravity at the Earth's surface (standard gravity, 9.80665 m/s2) applying to the entire length of the material, not diminishing with height. This usage is more common with certain specialty fiber or textile applications. (Full article...)
Of the many different viruses being explored for oncolytic potential, an adenovirus was the first to be approved by a regulatory agency, the genetically modifiedH101 strain. It gained regulatory approval in 2005 from China's State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA) for the treatment of head and neck cancer. (Full article...)
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GNU Radio is afree software development toolkit that provides signal processing blocks to implementsoftware-defined radios andsignal processing systems. It can be used with externalradio frequency (RF) hardware to create software-defined radios, or without hardware in a simulation-like environment. It is widely used in hobbyist, academic, and commercial environments to support both wireless communications research and real-world radio systems. (Full article...)
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Inductive charging pad for a smartphone as an example of near-field wireless transfer. When the phone is set on the pad, a coil in the pad creates a magnetic field which induces a current in another coil, in the phone, charging its battery.
Wireless power transfer (WPT; alsowireless energy transmission orWET) is the transmission ofelectrical energy withoutwires as a physical link. In a wireless power transmission system, anelectrically powered transmitter device generates a time-varyingelectromagnetic field that transmits power across space to a receiver device; the receiver device extracts power from the field and supplies it to anelectrical load. The technology of wireless power transmission can eliminate the use of the wires and batteries, thereby increasing the mobility, convenience, and safety of an electronic device for all users. Wireless power transfer is useful to power electrical devices where interconnecting wires are inconvenient, hazardous, or are not possible.
British RNMBHarrier, an autonomous USV of the Atlas Elektronik ARCIMS mine warfare system (2020) Anunmanned surface vehicle,unmanned surface vessel oruncrewed surface vessel (USV), colloquially called adrone boat,drone ship or sea drone, is a boat or ship that operates on the surface of the water without a crew. USVs operate with various levels of autonomy, fromremote control to fullyautonomous surface vehicles (ASV). (Full article...)
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Laser color television (laser TV), or laser color video display, is a type of television that utilizes two or more individually modulatedoptical (laser) rays of different colors to produce a combined spot that is scanned and projected across the image plane by a polygon-mirror system or less effectively byoptoelectronic means to produce a color-television display. The systems work either by scanning the entire picture a dot at a time and modulating the laser directly at high frequency, much like the electron beams in acathode ray tube, or by optically spreading and then modulating the laser and scanning a line at a time, the line itself being modulated in much the same way as withdigital light processing (DLP).
Simplistic schematic representation of endolysins cleaving the peptidoglycan layer of a Gram-positive bacterial cell wall. As endolysins degrade the peptidoglycan layer, the high internal pressure within the cell can no longer be maintained, resulting in cell lysis. Enzybiotics are an experimentalantibacterial therapy. The term is derived from a combination of the words “enzyme” and “antibiotics.” Enzymes have been extensively utilized for their antibacterial and antimicrobial properties.Proteolytic enzymes calledendolysins have demonstrated particular effectiveness in combating a range ofbacteria and are the basis for enzybiotic research. Endolysins are derived frombacteriophages and are highly efficient atlysing bacterial cells. Enzybiotics are being researched largely to address the issue ofantibiotic resistance, which has allowed for the proliferation of drug-resistant pathogens posing great risk to animal and human health across the globe. (Full article...)
While no aircraft is completely invisible to radar, stealth aircraft make it more difficult for conventional radar to detect or track the aircraft effectively, increasing the odds of an aircraft avoiding detection by enemy radar and/or avoiding being successfully targeted byradar guided weapons. Stealth is a combination of passive low observable (LO) features and active emitters such aslow-probability-of-intercept radars, radios and laser designators. These are typically combined with operational measures such as carefully planning mission maneuvers to minimize the aircraft'sradar cross-section (RCS), since common hard turns or openingbomb bay doors can more than double an otherwise stealthy aircraft's radar return. Stealth is accomplished by using a complex design philosophy to reduce the ability of an opponent's sensors to detect, track, or attack the stealth aircraft. This philosophy takes into account the heat, sound, and other emissions of the aircraft which can also be used to locate it. Sensors are made to reduce the impact of low observable technologies and others have been proposed such asIRST (infrared search and track) systems to detect even reduced heat emissions, long wavelength radars to counter stealth shaping andRAM focused on shorter wavelength radar, or radar setups with multiple emitters to counter stealth shaping. However these have disadvantages compared to traditional radar against non-stealthy aircraft. (Full article...)
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A model of a space fountain
Aspace fountain is a proposed form of an extremely tall tower extending into space. As known materials cannot support a static tower with this height, a space fountain has to be anactive structure: A stream of pellets is accelerated upwards from a ground station. At the top it is deflected downwards. The necessary force for this deflection supports the station at the top and payloads going up the structure. A spacecraft could launch from the top without having to deal with the atmosphere. This could reduce the cost of placing payloads into orbit. Its largest downside is that the tower will re-enter the atmosphere if the accelerator fails and the stream stops. This risk could be reduced by several redundant streams.
The lower part of a pellet stream has to be in a vacuum tube to avoid excessive drag in the atmosphere. Similar to the top station, this tube can be supported by its own system of transferring momentum from a space-bound stream to a surface-bound stream. If the tube itself also accelerates the station-supporting stream, it would have to transfer additional momentum to an earth-bound stream in order to keep itself supported. The tube-supporting streams could also be designed to integrate with the station-supporting streams. (Full article...)
Fusion reactions for reactors usually combine lightatomic nuclei ofdeuterium andtritium to form analpha particle (helium-4 nucleus) and aneutron, where the energy is released in the form of the kinetic energy of the reaction products. In order to overcome theelectrostatic repulsion between the nuclei, the fuel must have a temperature of hundreds of millions ofkelvin, at which the fuel is fullyionized and becomes aplasma. In addition, the plasma must be at a sufficient density, and the energy must remain in the reacting region for a sufficient time, as specified by theLawson criterion (triple product). The high temperature of a fusion plasma precludes the use of material vessels for direct containment. Magnetic confinement fusion attempts to use thephysics of charged particle motion to contain the plasma particles by applying strong magnetic fields. (Full article...)
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Intelligent Environments (IE) are spaces withembedded systems andinformation and communication technologies creating interactive spaces that bring computation into the physical world and enhance occupants experiences. "Intelligent environments are spaces in which computation is seamlessly used to enhance ordinary activity. One of the driving forces behind the emerging interest in highly interactive environments is to make computers not only genuine user-friendly but also essentially invisible to the user".
IEs describe physical environments in which information and communication technologies and sensor systems disappear as they become embedded into physical objects, infrastructures, and the surroundings in which we live, travel and work. The goal here is to allow computers to take part in activities never previously involved and allow people tointeract with computers via gesture, voice, movement, andcontext. (Full article...)
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Various uncrewed vehicles Anuncrewed vehicle orunmanned vehicle is avehicle without a person on board. Uncrewed vehicles can either be undertelerobotic control—remote controlled orremote guided vehicles—or they can beautonomously controlled—autonomous vehicles—which are capable of sensing their environment and navigating on their own.
It has been reported that thearmed forces of more than 100 countries have approximately 170 different types of drones in service. (Full article...)
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Sustainable development is an approach to growth andhuman development that aims to meet the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. The aim is to have a society where living conditions and resources meet human needs without underminingplanetary integrity. Sustainable development aims to balance the needs of theeconomy,environment, and society. TheBrundtland Report in 1987 helped to make the concept of sustainable development better known.
Sustainable development overlaps with the idea ofsustainability which is anormative concept.UNESCO formulated a distinction between the two concepts as follows: "Sustainability is often thought of as a long-term goal (i.e. a more sustainable world), whilesustainable development refers to the many processes and pathways to achieve it." (Full article...)
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An image generated using StyleGAN that looks like a portrait of a young woman. This image was generated by an artificial neural network based on an analysis of a large number of photographs.
StyleGAN depends on Nvidia'sCUDA software, GPUs, andGoogle'sTensorFlow, orMeta AI'sPyTorch, which supersedes TensorFlow as the official implementation library in later StyleGAN versions. The second version of StyleGAN, called StyleGAN2, was published on February 5, 2020. It removes some of the characteristic artifacts and improves the image quality. Nvidia introduced StyleGAN3, described as an "alias-free" version, on June 23, 2021, and made source available on October 12, 2021. (Full article...)
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Radio frequency (RF) andmicrowave filters represent a class ofelectronic filter, designed to operate on signals in themegahertz togigahertz frequency ranges (medium frequency toextremely high frequency). It is a component that is used in electronic systems to pass or reject specific frequencies and attenuate unwanted signals within the microwave and RF range. This frequency range is the range used by most broadcast radio, television, wireless communication (cellphones,Wi-Fi, etc.), and thus most RF and microwave devices will include some kind of filtering on the signals transmitted or received. Such filters are commonly used as building blocks forduplexers anddiplexers to combine or separate multiple frequency bands. (Full article...)
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Anactive structure (also known as asmart oradaptive structure) is amechanical structure with the ability to alter its configuration, form or properties in response to changes in the environment.
The term active structure also refers tostructures that, unlike traditionalengineering structures (e.g., bridges, buildings), require constant motion and hence power input to remain stable. The advantage of active structures is that they can be far more massive than a traditionalstatic structure: an example would be aspace fountain, a building that reaches into space. (Full article...)
A change in pH by 0.1 represents a 26% increase in hydrogen ion concentration in the world's oceans (the pH scale is logarithmic, so a change of one in pH units is equivalent to a tenfold change in hydrogen ion concentration). Sea-surface pH and carbonate saturation states vary depending on ocean depth and location. Colder and higher latitude waters are capable of absorbing more CO2. This can cause acidity to rise, lowering the pH and carbonate saturation levels in these areas. There are several other factors that influence the atmosphere-ocean CO2 exchange, and thus local ocean acidification. These includeocean currents andupwelling zones, proximity to large continental rivers,sea ice coverage, and atmospheric exchange withnitrogen andsulfur fromfossil fuel burning andagriculture.
A lower ocean pH has a range of potentially harmful effects formarine organisms. Scientists have observed for example reduced calcification, loweredimmune responses, and reduced energy for basic functions such as reproduction. Ocean acidification can impactmarine ecosystems that provide food and livelihoods for many people. About one billion people are wholly or partially dependent on the fishing, tourism, and coastal management services provided bycoral reefs. Ongoing acidification of the oceans may therefore threatenfood chains linked with the oceans. (Full article...)
Global monthly average total ozone amount Ozone depletion consists of two related events observed since the late 1970s: a lowered total amount ofozone inEarth's upper atmosphere, and a much larger springtime decrease instratospheric ozone (theozone layer) around Earth's polar regions. The latter phenomenon is referred to as theozone hole. There are also springtime polartropospheric ozone depletion events in addition to these stratospheric events.
The main causes of ozone depletion and the ozone hole are manufactured chemicals, especially manufacturedhalocarbonrefrigerants,solvents,propellants, and foam-blowing agents (chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), HCFCs,halons), referred to asozone-depleting substances (ODS). These compounds are transported into thestratosphere byturbulent mixing after being emitted from the surface, mixing much faster than the molecules can settle. Once in the stratosphere, they releaseatoms from thehalogen group throughphotodissociation, whichcatalyze the breakdown of ozone (O3) into oxygen (O2). Both types of ozone depletion were observed to increase as emissions of halocarbons increased.
Ozone depletion and the ozone hole have generated worldwide concern over increased cancer risks and other negative effects. The ozone layer prevents harmful wavelengths ofultraviolet (UVB) light from passing through theEarth's atmosphere. These wavelengths causeskin cancer,sunburn, permanent blindness, andcataracts, which were projected to increase dramatically as a result of thinning ozone, as well as harming plants and animals. These concerns led to the adoption of theMontreal Protocol in 1987, which bans the production of CFCs, halons, and other ozone-depleting chemicals. Over time, scientists have developed new refrigerants with lowerglobal warming potential (GWP) to replace older ones. For example, in new automobiles,R-1234yf systems are now common, being chosen over refrigerants with much higher GWP such asR-134a andR-12. (Full article...)
Environmental disasters show how the impact of humans' alteration of the land has led to widespread and/or long-lasting consequences. These disasters have included deaths of wildlife, humans and plants, or severe disruption of human life or health, possibly requiringmigration. Some environmental disasters are the trigger source of more expansiveenvironmental conflicts, where effected groups try to socially confront the actors responsible for the disaster. (Full article...)
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Thedodo became extinct during the mid-to-late 17th century because of habitat destruction, overhunting, and predation by introduced mammals. It is an often-cited example of a human-driven extinction.
TheHolocene orAnthropocene extinction is an ongoingextinction event caused by human activity during thecurrent geological epoch, impacting diverse families of plants and animals, includingmammals, birds, reptiles,amphibians, fish, andinvertebrates, as well as both terrestrial andmarine species. It is sometimes also called thesixth mass extinction (orseventh if counting theCapitanian andEnd Permian extinctions separately).
Current extinction rates are estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than naturalbackground extinction rates and are accelerating. The Holocene extinction was preceded by theLate Pleistocene megafauna extinctions (lasting from 50,000 to 10,000 years ago), in which many large mammals – including 81% ofmegaherbivores – went extinct, a decline attributed at least in part to human (anthropogenic) activities. There continue to be strong debates about the relative importance of anthropogenic factors and climate change, but a recent review concluded that there is little evidence for a major role of climate change and "strong" evidence for human activities as the principal driver. Examples from regions such asNew Zealand,Madagascar, andHawaii have shown how human colonization andhabitat destruction have led to significant biodiversity losses.
In the 20th century, the human population quadrupled, and the global economy grew twenty-five-fold. This period, often called theGreat Acceleration, has intensified species' extinction. Humanity has become an unprecedented "global superpredator", preying on adultapex predators, invadinghabitats of other species, and disruptingfood webs. (Full article...)
Graph of human population from 10 000 BC to 2000AD. It shows exponential rise in world population that has taken place since the end of the seventeenth century. Human overpopulation (orhumanpopulation overshoot) is the idea that humanpopulations may become too large to besustained by their environment or resources in the long term. The topic is usually discussed in the context ofworld population, though it may concern individual nations, regions, and cities.
Since 1804, the global living human population hasincreased from 1 billion to 8 billion due tomedical advancements and improvedagricultural productivity. Annual world population growth peaked at 2.1% in 1968 and has since dropped to 1.1%. According to the most recentUnited Nations' projections, the global human population is expected to reach 9.7 billion in 2050 and would peak at around 10.4 billion people in the 2080s, before decreasing, noting thatfertility rates are falling worldwide. Other models agree that the population will stabilize before or after 2100. Conversely, some researchers analyzingnational birth registries data from 2022 and 2023—which cover half the world's population—argue that the 2022 UN projections overestimated fertility rates by 10 to 20% and were already outdated by 2024. They suggest that the global fertility rate may have already fallen below thesub-replacement fertility level for the first time in human history and that the global population will peak at approximately 9.5 billion by 2061. The 2024 UN projections report estimated that world population would peak at 10.29 billion in 2084 and decline to 10.18 billion by 2100, which was 6% lower than the UN had estimated in 2014.
Deforestation of the Amazon rainforest in Brazil'sMaranhão state, 2016 Deforestation orforest clearance is the removal and destruction of aforest or stand of trees from land that is thenconverted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land tofarms,ranches, orurban use. About 31% of Earth's land surface is covered byforests at present. This is one-third less than theforest cover before the expansion of agriculture, with half of that loss occurring in the last century. On average 2,400 trees are cut down each minute. Estimates vary widely as to the extent of deforestation in thetropics. In 2019, nearly a third of the overall tree cover loss, or 3.8 million hectares, occurred within humid tropicalprimary forests. These are areas of maturerainforest that are especially important forbiodiversity andcarbon storage.
Soil retrogression and degradation are two regressive evolution processes associated with the loss of equilibrium of astablesoil. Retrogression is primarily due tosoil erosion and corresponds to a phenomenon where succession reverts the land to its natural physical state. Degradation orpedolysis is an evolution, different from natural evolution, related to the localclimate andvegetation. It is due to the replacement of primaryplant communities (known asclimax vegetation) by the secondary communities. This replacement modifies thehumus composition and amount, and affects theformation of the soil. It is directly related to human activity. Soil degradation may also be viewed as any change orecological disturbance to the soil perceived to bedeleterious or undesirable.
According to the Center for Development Research at the University of Bonn and the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, the quality of 33% of pastureland, 25% of arable land and 23% of forests has deteriorated globally over the last 30 years. 3.2 billion people are dependent on this land. (Full article...)
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Map of the world's biodiversity hot spots, all of which are heavily threatened by habitat loss and degradation
Habitat destruction (also termedhabitat loss orhabitat reduction) occurs when a naturalhabitat is no longer able to support itsnative species. The organisms once living there have either moved elsewhere, or are dead, leading to a decrease in biodiversity andspecies numbers. Habitat destruction is in fact the leading cause ofbiodiversity loss and speciesextinction worldwide.
A plot showing the length of software engineering tasks achievable by leading AI models with a 50% success rate; the data suggests an exponential rise. Existential risk from artificial intelligence, orAI x-risk, refers to the idea that substantial progress inartificial general intelligence (AGI) could lead tohuman extinction or an irreversibleglobal catastrophe. One argument for the validity of this concern and the importance of this risk references howhuman beings dominate other species because thehuman brain possesses distinctive capabilities other animals lack. If AI were to surpasshuman intelligence and becomesuperintelligent, it might become uncontrollable. Just as the fate of themountain gorilla depends on human goodwill, the fate of humanity could depend on the actions of a future machine superintelligence.
Experts disagree on whether artificial general intelligence (AGI) can achieve the capabilities needed for human extinction. Debates center on AGI's technical feasibility, the speed of self-improvement, and the effectiveness of alignment strategies. Concerns about superintelligence have been voiced by researchers includingGeoffrey Hinton,Yoshua Bengio,Demis Hassabis, andAlan Turing, and AI company CEOs such asDario Amodei (Anthropic),Sam Altman (OpenAI), andElon Musk (xAI). In 2022, a survey of AI researchers with a 17% response rate found that the majority believed there is a 10 percent or greater chance that human inability to control AI will cause an existential catastrophe. In 2023, hundreds of AI experts and other notable figuressigned a statement declaring, "Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such aspandemics andnuclear war". Following increased concern over AI risks, government leaders such asUnited Kingdom prime ministerRishi Sunak andUnited Nations Secretary-GeneralAntónio Guterres called for an increased focus on globalAI regulation. (Full article...)
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Pollution is the introduction ofcontaminants into thenatural environment that cause harm. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light).Pollutants, the components of pollution, can be either foreign substances/energies or naturally occurring contaminants.
Summary of major environmental-change categories that cause biodiversity loss. The data is expressed as a percentage of human-driven change (in red) relative to baseline (blue), as of 2021. Red indicates the percentage of the category that is damaged, lost, or otherwise affected, whereas blue indicates the percentage that is intact, remaining, or otherwise unaffected. Biodiversity loss happens whenspecies disappear completely from Earth (extinction) or when there is a decrease or disappearance of species in a specific area. Biodiversity loss means that there is a reduction inbiological diversity in a given area. The decrease can be temporary or permanent. It is temporary if the damage that led to the loss is reversible in time, for example throughecological restoration. If this is not possible, then the decrease is permanent. The cause of most of the biodiversity loss is, generally speaking, human activities that push theplanetary boundaries too far. These activities includehabitat destruction (for exampledeforestation) andland use intensification (for examplemonoculture farming). Further problem areas areair andwater pollution (includingnutrient pollution),over-exploitation,invasive species andclimate change.
Many scientists, along with theGlobal Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, say that the main reason for biodiversity loss is agrowing human population because this leads tohuman overpopulation andexcessive consumption. Others disagree, saying that loss of habitat is caused mainly by "the growth of commodities for export" and that population has very little to do with overall consumption. More important are wealth disparities between and within countries. In any case, all contemporary biodiversity loss has been attributed to human activities.
Climate change is another threat toglobal biodiversity. For example,coral reefs—which arebiodiversity hotspots—will be lost by the year 2100 if global warming continues at the current rate. Still, it is the general habitat destruction (often for expansion of agriculture), not climate change, that is currently the bigger driver of biodiversity loss. Invasive species and other disturbances have become more common in forests in the last several decades. These tend to be directly or indirectly connected to climate change and can cause a deterioration of forest ecosystems. (Full article...)
Besides the immediate destruction of cities by nuclear blasts, the potential aftermath of a nuclear war could involvefirestorms, anuclear winter, widespreadradiation sickness fromfallout, and/or the temporary (if not permanent) loss of much modern technology due toelectromagnetic pulses. Some scientists, such asAlan Robock, have speculated that a thermonuclear war could result in the end of modern civilization onEarth, in part due to a long-lasting nuclear winter. In one model, the average temperature of Earth following a full thermonuclear war falls for several years by 7 to 8 °C (13 to 15 degrees Fahrenheit) on average.
EarlyCold War-era studies suggested that billions of humans would survive the immediate effects of nuclear blasts and radiation following a global thermonuclear war. TheInternational Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War believe that nuclear war could indirectly contribute to human extinction via secondary effects, including environmental consequences,societal breakdown, and economic collapse. (Full article...)
In most countries, suchtrade represents a significant share ofgross domestic product (GDP). While international trade has existed throughout history (for exampleUttarapatha,Silk Road,Amber Road,salt roads), its economic, social, and political importance has been on the rise in recent centuries.
Carrying out trade at an international level is a complex process when compared todomestic trade. When trade takes place between two or morestates, factors likecurrency, government policies, economy,judicial system, laws, and markets influence trade. (Full article...)
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Unemployment rate, 2021
Unemployment, according to theOECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is the proportion of people above a specified age (usually 15) not being in paidemployment orself-employment but currently available forwork during thereference period.
Unemployment is measured by the unemployment rate, which is the number of people who are unemployed as a percentage of thelabour force (the total number of people employed added to those unemployed).
Unemployment can have many sources, such as the following below: (Full article...)
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Fruit and vegetables in a dumpster, discarded uneaten The causes of food going uneaten are numerous and occur throughout thefood system, duringproduction,processing,distribution,retail and food service sales, andconsumption. Overall, about one-third of the world's food is thrown away. A similar amount is lost on top of that by feeding human-edible food to farm animals (the net effect wastes an estimated 1144 kcal/person/day). A 2021meta-analysis, that did not include food lost during production, by theUnited Nations Environment Programme found that food waste was a challenge in all countries at all levels ofeconomic development. The analysis estimated that global food waste was 931 million tonnes of food waste (about 121 kg per capita) across three sectors: 61 percent fromhouseholds, 26 percent fromfood service and 13 percent fromretail.
Wasted food is a major part of theimpact of agriculture on climate change (it amounts to 3.3 billion tons ofCO2e emissions annually) and otherenvironmental issues, such asland use,water use andloss of biodiversity. Prevention of food waste is the highest priority, and when prevention is not possible, the food waste hierarchy ranks the food waste treatment options from preferred to least preferred based on their negative environmental impacts. Reuse pathways of surplus food intended for human consumption, such as food donation, is the next best strategy after prevention, followed byanimal feed, recycling of nutrients and energy followed by the least preferred option,landfill, which is a major source of thegreenhouse gasmethane. Other considerations include unreclaimed phosphorus in food waste leading to furtherphosphate mining. Moreover, reducing food waste in all parts of thefood system is an important part of reducing theenvironmental impact of agriculture, by reducing the total amount of water,land, and other resources used.
Global distribution ofdryland areas based on thearidity index computed over a 30-year average during 1981 to 2010. Typical deserts are indicated by thehyper-arid category (light yellow). Desertification is a type of gradualland degradation offertile land into ariddesert due to a combination of natural processes and human activities.
The immediate cause of desertification is the loss of most vegetation. This is driven by a number of factors, alone or in combination, such as drought, climatic shifts, tillage for agriculture,overgrazing anddeforestation for fuel or construction materials. Though vegetation plays a major role in determining thebiological composition of the soil, studies have shown that, in many environments, the rate of erosion and runoff decreases exponentially with increased vegetation cover. Unprotected, dry soil surfaces blow away with the wind or are washed away by flash floods, leaving infertile lower soil layers that bake in the sun and become an unproductive hardpan.
At least 90% of the inhabitants of drylands live indeveloping countries, where they also suffer from poor economic and social conditions. This situation is exacerbated by land degradation because of the reduction in productivity, the precariousness of living conditions and the difficulty of access to resources and opportunities. (Full article...)
While the ability to deliberately engineer pathogens has been constrained to high-end labs run by top researchers, the technology to achieve this is rapidly becoming cheaper and more widespread. For example, the diminishing cost of sequencing thehuman genome (from $10 million to $1,000), the accumulation of large datasets of genetic information, the discovery ofgene drives, and the discovery ofCRISPR. Biotechnology risk is therefore a credible explanation for theFermi paradox. (Full article...)
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A typical suburban development in the United States, located inChandler, Arizona
Urban sprawl (also known assuburban sprawl orurban encroachment) is defined as "the rapid expansion of the geographic extent of cities and towns, often characterized by low-density residential housing, single-use zoning, and increased reliance on the private automobile for transportation. ". Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growth in manyurban areas of housing, commercial development, and roads over large expanses of land, with little concern for very denseurban planning. Sometimes the urban areas described as the most "sprawling" are the most densely populated. In addition to describing a special form ofurbanization, the term also relates to the social and environmental consequences associated with this development. In modern times somesuburban areas described as "sprawl" have less detached housing and higher density than the nearbycore city. Medieval suburbs suffered from the loss of protection of city walls, before the advent ofindustrial warfare. Modern disadvantages and costs include increased travel time, transport costs, pollution, and destruction of the countryside. The revenue for building and maintainingurban infrastructure in these areas are gained mostly through property and sales taxes. Most jobs in the US are now located insuburbs generating much of the revenue, although a lack of growth will require higher tax rates.
InEurope, the termperi-urbanisation is often used to denote similar dynamics and phenomena, but the termurban sprawl is currently being used by theEuropean Environment Agency. There is widespread disagreement about what constitutes sprawl and how to quantify it. For example, some commentators measure sprawl byresidential density, using the average residential units per acre in a given area. Others associate it withdecentralization (spread of population without a well-defined centre), discontinuity (leapfrogging development, as definedbelow), segregation of uses, and so forth.
The termurban sprawl is highly politicized and almost always has negative connotations. It is criticized for causingenvironmental degradation, intensifyingsegregation, and undermining the vitality of existing urban areas, and is attacked on aesthetic grounds. The pejorative meaning of the term means that few openly support urban sprawl as such. The term has become a rallying cry for managing urban growth. (Full article...)
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Summary of major environmental-change categories that cause biodiversity loss. The data is expressed as a percentage of human-driven change (in red) relative to baseline (blue), as of 2021. Red indicates the percentage of the category that is damaged, lost, or otherwise affected, whereas blue indicates the percentage that is intact, remaining, or otherwise unaffected. Biodiversity loss happens whenspecies disappear completely from Earth (extinction) or when there is a decrease or disappearance of species in a specific area. Biodiversity loss means that there is a reduction inbiological diversity in a given area. The decrease can be temporary or permanent. It is temporary if the damage that led to the loss is reversible in time, for example throughecological restoration. If this is not possible, then the decrease is permanent. The cause of most of the biodiversity loss is, generally speaking, human activities that push theplanetary boundaries too far. These activities includehabitat destruction (for exampledeforestation) andland use intensification (for examplemonoculture farming). Further problem areas areair andwater pollution (includingnutrient pollution),over-exploitation,invasive species andclimate change.
Many scientists, along with theGlobal Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, say that the main reason for biodiversity loss is agrowing human population because this leads tohuman overpopulation andexcessive consumption. Others disagree, saying that loss of habitat is caused mainly by "the growth of commodities for export" and that population has very little to do with overall consumption. More important are wealth disparities between and within countries. In any case, all contemporary biodiversity loss has been attributed to human activities.
Climate change is another threat toglobal biodiversity. For example,coral reefs—which arebiodiversity hotspots—will be lost by the year 2100 if global warming continues at the current rate. Still, it is the general habitat destruction (often for expansion of agriculture), not climate change, that is currently the bigger driver of biodiversity loss. Invasive species and other disturbances have become more common in forests in the last several decades. These tend to be directly or indirectly connected to climate change and can cause a deterioration of forest ecosystems. (Full article...)
Did you know...
... thatPriamurye Governorate-General, a Russian colony in East Asia, issued passports in order to segregate East Asian migrants from the general population?
... thatNyango Star, a half-cat, half-apple character who playsdeath metal drums, helps fund a town with a declining population?
... that a 2018 film byDavid Wilcock has been described byVice as making the case that space aliens "occupy large swaths of Antarctica [and] are massing for an invasion"?
... thatLeik Myrabo invented a laser-propelled type of spacecraft?
Image 3TheDoor to Hell is a natural gas field in Derweze, Turkmenistan, which has been burning since 1971 when it was ignited by Soviet scientists who expected it to burn out within days. They were trying to prevent the release of poisonous gases. The name "Door to Hell" was given to the field by locals. The hot spots range over an area with a width of 60 metres (200 ft) and to a depth of about 20 metres (66 ft).
Image 4A swan created usingmodular origami, apaperfolding technique which uses two or more sheets ofpaper to create a larger and more complex structure than possible with single-pieceorigami techniques. Each individual sheet of paper is folded into a module, or unit, and then modules are assembled into an integrated flat shape or three-dimensional structure by inserting flaps into pockets created by the folding process. These insertions create tension or friction that holds the model together.
Image 5TheHubble Extreme Deep Field is an image of a small area of space in the constellationFornax released byNASA on September 25, 2012. The successor to theHubble Ultra-Deep Field, this image was compiled from 10 years of previous images with a total exposure time of two million seconds, or approximately 23 days.
Image 6One of twomonkey selfies taken byCelebes crested macaques using equipment belonging to the British nature photographer David Slater. In mid-2014, the images' hosting onWikimedia Commons was at the centre of a dispute over whether copyright could be held onartworks made by non-human animals. Slater argued that, as he had "engineered" the shot, he held copyright, while Wikimedia considered the photographspublic domain on the grounds that they were made by an animal rather than a person. In December 2014, theUnited States Copyright Office stated that works by a non-human are not subject to US copyright, a view reaffirmed by aUS federal judge in 2016.
Image 7TheInternational Space Station (ISS) as seen from the Space ShuttleEndeavour.Zarya, the first module of the ISS launched in 1998, is seen in the foreground. Since then, twenty-sixSpace Shuttle flights have docked with the ISSto assemble various other modules and components, which include four pairs ofsolar arrays seen on each side.
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Image 9A man engaging inbig wave surfing atMavericks, located just north ofHalf Moon Bay, California. Big wave surfing is a discipline withinsurfing in which experienced surfers paddle into or are towed ontowaves which are at least 20 ft (6.1 m) high, and is a hazardous activity, as surfers can be pushed far beneath the surface of the water after a wipeout.
Image 10An overhead view ofSkylab, the United States' first space station, in Earth orbit as photographed from theSkylab 4 Command and Service Modules. Skylab 4 was the last mission to Skylab and brought back its final crew; this photograph was the last one taken of the station before the mission re-entered Earth's atmosphere and disintegrated in 1979.
Image 11Adust storm rushes towards a military camp as it rolls overAl Asad Airbase,Iraq, just before nightfall on April 27, 2005. A dust storm (orsandstorm) is ameteorological phenomenon common in dry,arid and semi-arid regions, usually the result ofconvection currents created by intense heating of the ground. These currents then carry clouds ofsand over large distances.
Image 12Imagine waking up to this. Which makes me wonder whatever happened to the guy who took this photo.
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Image 14NGC 1300 is abarred spiral galaxy located roughly 69 millionlight-years away in the direction of the constellationEridanus. In its core, the nucleus shows its own extraordinary and distinct "grand-design" spiral structure that is about 3,300 light-years long.
Image 16Aneutral density filter is a filter that reduces or modifies the intensity of all wavelengths or colors of light equally, giving no changes in hue of color rendition. The filter reduces the amount of light entering the lens, allowing the photographer to select combinations of aperture, exposure time and sensor sensitivity to avoid overexposed pictures. It would normally be attached to the lens, but is hand-held here to illustrate the effect.
Image 19Lucky Diamond Rich (b. 1971) is a New Zealand-born performance artist and street performer who holds theGuinness World Record for most tattooed man, taking the title fromTom Leppard in 2006. He is recognized by Guinness as being covered in tattoos over 100% of his body, including the inside of his eyelids, ears, and mouth.
Image 20Thesperm whale is the largest toothed animal on Earth. The species was hunted extensively by humans throughout history, until protected by aworldwide moratorium on whaling starting in 1985–86.
Image 22San Francisco Bay shrouded infog, as seen from theMarin Headlands looking east. Thefog of San Francisco is a kind of sea fog, created when warm, moist air blows from the centralPacific Ocean across the cold water of theCalifornia Current, which flows just off the coast. The water is cold enough to lower the temperature of the air to thedew point, causing fog generation. In this photo, the towers of theGolden Gate Bridge can be seen poking through the fog, and theBay Bridge is visible in the distance.
Image 23Alava lake atMount Nyiragongo, a volcano found inVirunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Lava lakes, which can form in three different ways, are large volumes of moltenlava, usuallybasaltic, contained in a volcanic vent, crater, or broad depression. Persistent lava lakes such as the one at Nyiragongo, which is the largest to appear in recent times, are rare.
Image 24ThePinwheel Galaxy is a face-onspiral galaxy located 21 millionlight-years away in theconstellationUrsa Major. It was first discovered byPierre Méchain on March 27, 1781, and communicated toCharles Messier, who verified its position for inclusion in theMessier Catalogue as one of its final entries. This image, released on February 28, 2006, is composed of 51 individual exposures, as well as some extra ground-based photos. At the time of its release, it was the largest and most detailed image of a galaxy by theHubble Space Telescope.
Image 25Glaucus atlanticus is a species of small, bluesea slug. Thispelagic aeolidnudibranch floats upside down, using the surface tension of the water to stay up, and is carried along by the winds and ocean currents. The blue side of their body faces upwards, blending in with the blue of the water, while the grey side faces downwards, blending in with the silvery surface of the sea.G. atlanticus feeds on other pelagic creatures, including thePortuguese man o' war.
Image 27TheLeaning Tower of Pisa is the freestandingbell tower of theCathedral of Pisa, Italy. The third oldest structure in the city'sSquare of Miracles, it is known worldwide for its unintended tilt. The tower's tilt began during construction in the 12th century, caused by an inadequatefoundation on ground too soft on one side to properly support the structure's weight. The tilt gradually increased until the tower was stabilized (and the tilt partially corrected) by efforts in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The tower, which measures 55.86 metres (183.27 feet) from the ground on the low side and 56.67 metres (185.93 feet) on the high side, has been listed as aUNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987.
Image 29TheAmerican Bison, orBuffalo, is the largest terrestrial mammal inNorth America, and once inhabited theGreat Plains in massive herds. They were central to the lives ofNative American tribes. This pile of bison skulls from the1870s illustrates the extent of their slaughter in the19th century by settlers: from a population of about 60 million in1800 to as few as 750 in1890. They have since been reintroduced into the wild and are no longer considered a high riskendangered species.
Image 31Sandboarding is aboardsport similar tosnowboarding, but competitions take place on sand dunes rather than snow-covered mountains. Here, a member of the US Navy sandboards down a dune inJebel Ali,Dubai.
Image 32Crash landing of anF6F Hellcat into theport side 20mm gun gallery of theUSSEnterprise, November 10, 1943. Lieutenant Walter L. Chewning, Jr.,USNR, the Catapult Officer, is climbing up the plane's side to assist the pilot from the burning aircraft. The pilot, Ensign Byron M. Johnson, escaped without significant injury. Note the plane's ruptured belly fuel tank.
Image 33TheAqueduct of Segovia is aRoman aqueduct located inSegovia, Spain that transports water from the Rio Frio. It is thought to have been constructed during the 1st century CE. One of the most significant and best-preserved ancientmonuments left on theIberian Peninsula, the aqueduct is considered a symbol of Segovia and is present on the city'scoat of arms.
Image 39TheI-35W Mississippi River bridge was an eight-lane, steel trussarch bridge that carriedInterstate 35W across theSaint Anthony Falls of theMississippi River inMinneapolis, Minnesota. Once the third-busiest bridge in the state, itsuddenly collapsed on August 1, 2007, killing 13 and injuring 145. Rescue of people stranded on the bridge was complete in three hours, while recovery of bodies—involving 75 local, state and federal agencies—took three weeks. AnNTSB investigation cited a design flaw as the likely cause of the collapse, noting that a too-thingusset plate ripped along a line of rivets.
Image 40Devastation caused byHurricane Katrina inNew Orleans,Louisiana during 2005, shown here looking down onInterstate 10 at West End Boulevard towardsLake Pontchartrain. Over 1,800 people were confirmed dead with 705 still missing. It was the costliestAtlantic hurricane in history causing around$86 billion in damage. This photo shows flooded roadways as theUnited States Coast Guard conducted initial damage assessment overflights of New Orleans on Monday, August 29, 2005. The city flooded due primarily to the failure of thelevee system. Many who remained in their homes had to swim for their lives, wade through deep water, or remain trapped in their attics or on their rooftops.
Image 45Ananimation of acicada undergoingecdysis, themolting of theexoskeleton inarthropods and related groups. Since thecuticula of these animals is inelastic, it is shed during growth and a new, larger covering is formed. The old, empty exoskeleton is called anexuvia. Within one or two hours, the cuticle hardens and darkens, during which time the animal grows, since growth is otherwise constrained by the rigidity of the exoskeleton. Each frame of this image was taken at one-minute intervals, with a 30-minute gap in middle while the cicada rested. The entire process took about 2 hours to complete.
Flooding onIndonesia'sSumatra island kills 49 people, leaves 67 others missing, and submerges over 2,000 buildings, with many of the worst affected areas still unreachable a day after Cyclone Seynar's landfall.(The Independent)
27 November 2025 –
Eleven people are killed and two more injured inKunming,China, when a train hits a group of railway maintenance workers.(Al Jazeera)
TheWorld Food Programme reports that escalating instability innorthernNigeria is increasing acutefood insecurity to record levels, with nearly 35 million people projected to face hunger in 2026 as the agency exhausts its funding by December.(Reuters)
Moldova reports that six Russiandrones entered itsairspace, including one that came down on a residential roof nearFlorești and another that crossed into Moldova before continuing towardRomania.(Reuters)
TheShenzhou 22 spacecraft entersorbit afterChina conducts its first emergency space launch to restore a safe return option for the three astronauts aboard theTiangong space station following damage to theShenzhou 20 return capsule earlier in November. The uncrewed spacecraft, launched on aLong March 2F rocket, carries replacement parts and supplies and aims to return the current crew toEarth in 2026.(Reuters)
At least seven people are killed, including two attackers, and two others are injured in amass shooting when unidentified gunmen opened fire on the governor ofTaiz's motorcade on a road linking the southwestern city to the rest ofYemen.(MSN)
One person is killed in an Israeli airstrike attack against a vehicle inBint Jbeil,Lebanon. Several students are also wounded on a bus passing in the area.(Al Jazeera)
One person is killed and another injured in a large-scale fire inŌita,Japan. At least 170 homes are damaged and another 260 households remainwithout electricity.(NPR)
Lawrence Reed, alleged to have poured flammable liquid over a 26-year-old woman on aChicagoCTA Blue Line train and later set her on fire Monday evening, faces a federal terrorism charge.(NBC News)(Department of Justice)
Denmark holds local elections, with the rulingSocial Democrats suffering large losses, including the mayoralty ofCopenhagen, which they had held since 1903.(Politico EU)
A majoroutage ofCloudflare causes global disruptions to numerous apps and websites. Cloudflare says the outage occurred after aconfiguration file designed to handle threat traffic malfunctioned and triggered a crash in its software handling traffic for its wider services.(BBC News)
Tip of the day April 21, 2006: Thanks for helping a newbie!
Filmcom 14:36, 23 February 2006 (UTC)I award this random acts of kindness Barnstar to Go for It! for being very helpful to a newcomer wikipedian, without being asked to.Filmcom 19:41, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
I just want to thank you for building on my tip and making it a true wikipedia tip of the day. I'm still learning a lot about how to do things around here, so your help was greatly appreciated! Keep up the great work, and keep on Going for it!
Smashing!
Smashing job onTip of the day!You've done a great job getting the Tip of the Day off the ground. As a result, I think you deserve this!smurrayinchester(User), (Talk) 17:52, 9 March 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar
ThisWorking Man's Barnstar is awarded to Go for it! for your tireless and diligent work on the reference desk templates! --Natalya 19:37, 25 March 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar
For going above and beyond the call of duty atEsperanza/Admin coaching, I award you this Original Barnstar. Good work! --Fang Ailitalk 18:34, 1 November 2006 (UTC)
Award
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
Your kindess was not random, because you were kind enough to listen to my requests to fix my userpage. Your major kindness will not be ignored, as this BarnStar is my token of appreciation!Kyo catmeow! 01:59, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
Awarded toUser:The Transhumanist. Sometimes those who take on large areas of wikipedia organisation seem to be taken for granted, and this is just to show that your work is appreciated by the community.Khukri(talk .contribs) 09:56, 12 December 2006 (UTC)
Thanks so much for the hints in your userpage tutorial.. I am a new user and familiar with HTML markup, but not so with Wikimark up. Your userpage tutorial really helped!Real96 06:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
You're welcome. I'm glad you found it useful. If you see any way to improve it, by all means, please feel free to do so. The Transhumanist 06:36, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
as a near- noob, this is by far the most detailed and useful article on wikipedia for me! Excellent! I really wish I had a user page like this after two years...Snailey! 15:42, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
For all your work with admin coaching, barnstar awarding, Wikipedia-expanding, and various administrative duties (if you can call all that political stuff we Wikipedians must wade through such a name), I,Sharkface217, hereby award you this Tireless Contributor Barnstar. Good job.S h a r kf a c e2 1 7 19:36, 5 May 2007 (UTC)
Just a few words...
TT, my friend, my mop would never have been gained without your incredible expertise. My kindest regards to you, and drop by as often as possible! Now, a little token of my appreciation...
The Golden Wiki Award; This, the Golden Wiki Award, the highest attainment level of awards and barnstars, goes to you - The Transhumanist - for being one of the most helpful, kind, resourceful and generous Wikipedians I've had to utmost fortune to meet. Your contributions around the Wiki - at the WikiClassroom, in Dispute Resolution, at the Welcoming Committee, but most of all being a genuinely fun guy, are an amazing feat, and if half the trolls I'll undoubtedly meet after gaining my mop (thanks to you) took a leaf from your book, Wikipedia would be a nicer place.
My kindest possible regards, Anthony 21:38, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar
What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar
I award you this Brilliant Idea Barnstar for helping others to earn Barnstars and awards through your Award Center!• The Giant Puffin • 13:31, 3 June 2007 (UTC)
Award
Hello The Transhumanist, (Hold on, can I say that or is it "Hello Transhumanist") I was going to give you an award but there wasn't one good enough, so I made one better than any that has ever been seen before - This message. Yes, yes, I know, you don't think your worthy of it, but I assure you, you are the only one good enough for it -Pheonix 19:34, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
A Help:Contents Barnstar
The Tireless Contributor Barnstar
As the top contributor toHelp:Contents, you deserve this barnstar. Thank you!Jreferee(Talk) 05:59, 23 August 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar
The Original Barnstar
For taking up the challenge and improving mycommand page, I,Sharkface217, hereby award you this Original Barnstar. Another feather in the Transhumanist cap, eh? :-P
You deserve a barnstar for your efforts. I can't think of anyone who has contributed more to Wikipedia, except maybe Jimbo. I'm not sure where to put this on your frontpage, so here it is:
Hi ThereFirst id like to thank you immensly for your pages about creating a decent userpage!! They are great and I would be lost without them!! Just one question, On myuserpage i have a small welcome banner up the top. How do I make this text larger and change the font? Sorry if you have already covered this somewhere. Thanks in advanceCstubbies (talk) 12:40, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
A valuable service
I think you need recognition for doing the job of ten other editors, and doing it out of altruism and genuine belief in Wikipedia. Not many editors here have the same good attitude and provide the same service as you - I don't have any specific point to put across, but I thought you should just be prodded and reminded that you do a lot of good around here, in the hope you'll keep it up. Kudos!Seegoon (talk) 17:43, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
Just a note, I've made aminor update to your contributions. To reiterate my edit summary, you put in a tonne of effort there, and you deserve to be credited for it :) Feel free to revert, nonetheless. Regards,AGK (contact) 16:44, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi there TTH, Just wanted to thank you for your labors on this page, which is a great resource for us. BillWwheaton (talk) 17:48, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
You'd better hope there is a humour barnstar
... because you just gave me the biggest laugh in weeks. Good stuff giving that RfA spammer what-forhere.αѕєηιηєt/c 22:03, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
The deletion review was approved for recreation:Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2008 March 10. Just letting you know, in case you weren't watchlisting it. I'm not sure what you have to do next to get the old version undeleted though (if that's what you wanted :) Nice catch on rescuing that grouping. --Quiddity (talk) 00:21, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
'Tis for you
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
I've noticed the extra mile you've gone to help anew user, and I wanted you to know it hasn't gone unnoticed. Keep up the good work!Keeper |76 |Disclaimer 16:40, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
Barnstar
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
I award this barnstar to The Transhumanist, for being patient and taking four rounds of references from me, until they were all valid.LAAFan 01:21, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
I award this barnstar to The Transhumanist, for putting funny stuff on his discussion page which led me to copy them and put some of those funny stuff on my website. Thanks.Emir34 01:21, 17 June 2008 (UTC)
Hi Transhumanist, I wanted to note that I saw all of your work on the List of Basic France topics, and I appreciate it!Lazulilasher (talk) 02:12, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
From Zach...
The da Vinci Barnstar
For helping me so many times. and for my wonderful userpage. Cheers,Zacharycrimsonwolf 04:08, 30 September 2008 (UTC)
For helping me to find resources on humanism, which I will hopefully be able to use to improve the articles on it here as well!Scapler (talk) 02:39, 11 November 2008 (UTC)
Happy Transhumanist's Day!
The Transhumanist has been identified as anAwesome Wikipedian, so I've officially declared today asTranshumanist's Day! For your incredible organization and leadership skills, enjoy being the star of the day, dear The Transhumanist!
The Transhumanist has been identified as anAwesome Wikipedian, and therefore, I've officially declared today asThe Transhumanist's day! For your history of dedicated work to the project, enjoy being the Star of the day, The Transhumanist!
It's about time you deserve a barnstar for all your contributions to outlines on Wikipedia, and also for being the promoter that you are for outlines. If it wasn't for you we might not have outlines as they are, so it is my honor to present to you the Special Barnstar because no other barnstar could merit what you do for outlines on Wikipedia. :-)Burningview (talk) 03:42, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
The Special Barnstar
This barnstar is presented to Transhumanist for all the hard work, contributions, coordination, and promotion he does in advancing the idea, coverage, content, and quality of Outlines on Wikipedia. For this he deserves a Special BarnstarBurningview (talk) 03:42, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
Well done
The Special Barnstar
This award is in appreciation of the excellent work you have done supporting the development of Outlines on WikipediaThruxton (talk) 18:59, 5 December 2010 (UTC)
Made me laugh
You once said in a AFD: "If you are building a robot, you can start with just the left pinky." I love that. Happy New Year!Jerrydelusional ¤kangaroo 20:34, 31 December 2010 (UTC)
another thanks
I appreciate you pointing me in the direction of a formatted signature. For some reason I couldn't find any reference to how it is done in the years I have been here. Cheers.◦◦derekbd◦◦my talk◦◦ 12:16, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
Impressed
I just wanted to tell you (probably not the 1st ^^ ) that your are an incredible wikipedia member, your userpage is simply amazing and your contribution is...gigantic? huge? Incredible? not for the number edits (still high) but rather over the appropriateness of the things that you have created, especially the outline project. I wont give you another award, you already have billions, but simply a modest "Bravo!". --Offiikart (Talk) 05:23, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
Thanks
Hi, thanks a lot for the barnstar, you are truly a user with whom it is pleasant to interact. I greatly appreciate your help, your tips and you recognition on the work done, even if only very minimal compared to the workyou have done.
I think you, more than everyone else, deserve a special recognition. Here is the first Barnstar I ever awarded :
The WikiProject Barnstar
ToThe Transhumanist who created the outline project and tirelessly continues to improve it. A special thanks for your help and your recognition.OffiikartTalk 13:54, 29 June 2011 (UTC)
ps. I did put the page alert on my watchlist
A barnstar for you!
The Original Barnstar
Your fine contributions are not overlooked. You are a quality editor, and we are so glad you are here. Thanks to the user:Transhumanist!Pinkstrawberry02™ talk 01:49, 13 October 2011 (UTC)
Note to user getting this message: Please respond on Pinkstrawberry02's talk page. If for some reason you cannot, please send them a{{talkback}} and reply on your own talk page. Thanks for your understanding in this manner. See ya around the wiki!
Thanks so much for your work on theOutline of domestic violence, it is so much better that it's astounding how far it's come along. Thanks for making my first outline "sing"!CaroleHenson (talk) 11:11, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
You'refirst one? Wonderful! I can't wait to see what you come up with next. And I also look forward to seeing what you have in store for this outline. Thank you for the barnstar. It's very nice to feel appreciated.The Transhumanist 22:10, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Original Barnstar
Wow! Thanks for your help on the Future studies project. I can't believe all the pages you've contributed to, but glad you found ours!...RealFuturist (talk) 17:09, 3 February 2012 (UTC)
Many years ago, back before I had created my current account, I created a humble little userspace navigation menu based off of two of your menus from the User Page Design Center (initially15, but ultimately6). Over the years it has grown, but I don't know if I ever would have started it without seeing your menus first. I just want to thank you for putting the effort into creating those menus and then sharing them at the Design Center where they have been helpful for people like me. I hope you don't mind me borrowing from your hard work! Thanks again and take care!Michael Barera (talk) 03:30, 13 January 2013 (UTC)
Thank you
The Instructor's Barnstar
ThisBarnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have performed stellar work in the area ofinstruction &help for other editors. Just wanted to stop by and saythis edit was something I wanted to do but simply did not have the "kahunas" to do so. Thank you for the bold edit :-)Moxy (talk) 07:25, 13 February 2013 (UTC)
At Tip-Of-The-Day: Thank you for your updates & guidance!
Do have ane-cookie and enjoy! GreetingsThe Transhumanist,
Want to let you know the value of your insights & feedback! Regards,JoeHebda (talk) 21:53, 19 October 2015 (UTC)
Thank you. Keep up the good work.The Transhumanist 16:50, 21 October 2015 (UTC)
Pony!
Pony! Congratulations! For all your hard work on redirect repair atGlossary of North American horse racing and general wikignoming along the way of articles such asEasy Goer, you have received apony! Ponies are cute, intelligent, cuddly, friendly (most of the time, though with notable exceptions), promote good will, encourage patience, and enjoy carrots. Treat your pony with respect and he will be your faithful friend! We need more wikipedia editors like you!Montanabw(talk) 02:22, 1 November 2015 (UTC)
To send a pony or a treat to other wonderful and responsible editors,click here.
Thank you for being one of Wikipedia's top medical contributors!
please help translate this message into the local language
The Cure Award
In 2015 you were one of thetop 300 medical editors across any language of Wikipedia. Thank you fromWiki Project Med Foundation for helping bring free, complete, accurate, up-to-date health information to the public. We really appreciate you and the vital work you do! Wiki Project Med Foundation is a user group whose mission is to improve our health content. Consider joininghere, there are no associated costs, and we would love to collaborate further.
Hi there! I just wanted to let you know that I think your planet outlines are really cool. I have long thought it was a shame that only Wikipedians seem to know about Books or Portals, because they are really great tools for structuring knowledge (while everyone loves diving down the Wikipedia rabbit hole, we couldreally do with some better content organization). The outlines strike me as a great way to bring that sort content organization to mainspace, where it will actually reach a large number of readers. I notice that I am the first one to edit them besides yourself, and I hope you know that I do so with love.
What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar
Great idea with the outline articles - a great solution to a need for better mainspace-based content structuring!I see fromWP:Outlines that you actually came up with this concept some years ago, but this is the first I've noticed it.A2soup (talk) 02:46, 8 February 2017 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you!
The Portal Barnstar
The Portal Barnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have made significant contributions totopic portals. Awarded to Transhumanist for his overly enthusiastic efforts regarding the portal system and WikiProject Portals. –Lionel(talk) 11:02, 30 April 2018 (UTC)
Transhumanist, thank you for your extraordinary efforts on behalf of portals. It reminds me of the time when a series of attacks on scientific bibliographies led to the formation ofWikiProject Bibliographies. I don't understand why your detractors are so passionate about deleting portals, but your actions have been a model for how to deal with an attack constructively.RockMagnetist(talk) 16:10, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you!
The Article Rescue Barnstar
May all who see this barnstar know thatThe Transhumanist made a valiant and commendable effort for defending theportal namespace from deletion. It preserved countless hours of work initially invested into creating the content. Moreoever, The Transhumanist, is doing a yeoman's job in attempting to improve the content within with portal namespace.RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 00:24, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
@RightCowLeftCoast: Thank you. I feel honored. Please keep in mind that I have not been working alone. Credit goes to the nearly 400 editors who came forward to speak up for the keeping of portals. And although theRfC to delete all portals is over, the job of defending portals from deletion is not. For the portal namespace to be retained in the long term, the portals in it will need to be improved to a worthy quality level, otherwise we may see more deletion attempts. This task is far more than a single editor can handle. Fortunately, many editors have come forward to meet the challenge. Working to develop portals and the entire portal system, is ateam of 80 editors who are diligently redesigning, upgrading, updating, and maintaining portals. They are the members of thePortals WikiProject, and without them there might be no portals. They aredoing a wonderful job, and I am very proud of them. Thank you. —The Transhumanist 17:22, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
Thank you for your thoughts and efforts regarding portals, for the concept of outlines, for sectional redirects, for articles such asLife Extension Foundation, for service from 2006, including portal philosophy and user page design center, - repeating (1 & 4 June 2009): you are anawesome Wikipedian!
Thank you. I looked, but couldn't figure out what 1 & 4 June 2009 were referring to. Just curious. —The Transhumanist 19:26, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
Follow the link "awesome W." and look for your name: 2 others said it before me! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:48, 5 June 2018 (UTC)
Executive director of portals
The Portal Barnstar
Not sure if a simple barnstar can express the communities gratitude to the portal work that you're doing. Your an indispensable member of our community.Moxy (talk) 18:08, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
Moxy, thank you. I'm honored, and I receive this praise for theteam, without whom there would be very little progress on portals. They are literally transforming them into something new. I'm glad to be a part of that. —The Transhumanist 18:20, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you
The Portal Barnstar
The Portal Barnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have made significant contributions totopic portals. Thanks for the great work you have been doing in the WikiProject.DreamyJazztalk |contribs 22:15, 4 July 2018 (UTC)
You are welcome, formerly Wpgbrown. Nice new name. ;) —The Transhumanist 10:26, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Technical Barnstar
Good to see others of the view we have as to the need to know more. Im a research person here just of this week and your views relate to my work here. take care.
For your excellent work on Portals. Everyday the portal project improves. Your dedication and willingness to get people involved really pays off. Cannot wait to continue working with you and the Portal team. Thank you for your work.AmericanAir88(talk) 00:30, 30 October 2018 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar
Thank you for helping me in my first attempt in creating a portal page ‑‑V.S.(C)(T) 10:51, 23 December 2018 (UTC)
For your tireless dedication to creating, maintaining, and improving portals, as well as your active involvement in making improvements to the system of portals itself. I'm sorry to hear that you're temporarily unable to create them, but your work is greatly appreciated 🙂Brendon the Wizard✉️✨ 14:17, 23 March 2019 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you
The Original Barnstar
message Ambuj Shukla 19:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
You have made immense contributions to outlines over the years, and have encouraged many more Wikipedians to follow your lead. The impact of your contributions are great. Keep doing the good work!— Precedingunsigned comment added byAmbujshukla2004 (talk •contribs) 19:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
Hello The Transhumanist, you are receiving this award for the creation and continued dedication toWikiProject Outlines. You deserve this barnstar more than anyone.Jerium (talk) 19:18, 12 November 2023 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
The Barnstar of Good Humor
I appreciate you reviving theUser page design center! I used this when I was new. Also, everyone has a phases where they religiously obsess over their user page (especially userboxes), and this tool is a good way to show them how to have fun with it.Panini!•🥪 23:59, 2 June 2024 (UTC)
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. I am a new user and familiar with HTML markup, but not so with Wikimark up. Your userpage tutorial really helped!Real96 06:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
X××x××pink×jellocreature××x××X (talk) 01:36, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
Offiikart (Talk) 05:23, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
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