Leonardo da Vinci was truly an inventor and someone way ahead of his time. He left some great masterpieces for the world to behold like the Mona Lisa and a treasure trove of ideas which he recorded in his notebooks. And though it has been 500 years since his death, a pair of impersonators keep his memory alive.
This is standard fare for artistic impersonators Valter Conti and his daughter Elena Pinori who masquerade as Italy’s majestic painter and his most famous subject. At least three days a week, Conti spends two hours dressing to look like a statue of the artist that stands outside the Uffizi Gallery.
Paintings and murals on ancient artifacts may sometimes depict actual events or rituals being done by a society and in some cases, they are only figurative and might be a narrative of the culture's myths or lore surrounding their beliefs and values.
In Christopher Donnan's research on Peruvian artifacts, in particular the pottery of Moche culture, he noticed something that resembled badminton of today. Going deeper into the meanings and significance of these paintings, he finds that it is rooted in Moche culture.
There were also depictions of ceremonial badminton contests that showed groups of figures armed with a type of spear-thrower called an atlatl, which is essentially a stick with a handle on one end and a hook or socket that attaches to a spear on the other.
Participants seemed to use their atlatls to hurl spears with feathered objects attached to them. Like the sacrifice ceremony, ceremonial badminton could have been an actual event or a supernatural contest that occurred largely in the Moche mythological realm.
“When I looked at these rituals I often wondered if the activities were real. Did they really do that?” says Donnan. Now, building on decades of archaeological discoveries and his own extensive experience analyzing depictions of Moche rituals, Donnan, an archaeologist at the University of California, Los Angeles, has re-created ceremonial badminton.
There are various ways in which culture spreads from one place to another. There are missionaries who use religion to spread their influence. There is the military which subdues other groups with might and conquest.
And perhaps, the most convenient of them all and least menacing, the merchants who trade wares and goods as they travel to various places. Along with the products they sell, these merchants also bring with them words which are unique to their own culture. Through their interactions with other merchants, they get to share their language and exchange ideas.
The map shown above illustrates only a few of the words that have been taken from their native languages and how they were adapted by other languages.
Over the UK's history, politics has been a bloody battleground of ideals, words, and just all around banter. It still persists today and perhaps, we might see even more.
But the tides have shifted from when Britain's illustrious yet slightly infamous former PM Winston Churchill was at the height of his premiership all the way to Thatcher's rollercoaster government known for its strict and pragmatic rule.
Which begs the question, what could have happened if these politicians hadn't become the most powerful person in the land? We will try to look back at the top ten would-have-been British PMs had circumstances been slightly different or had they not abruptly died.
Yukio Iwamasa was only about five or six years old when authorities barged into their home and told them they needed to evacuate. They had to sell all their things and live not knowing what would happen to them.
This was midway through World War II and he described how difficult it was to have your home and possessions stripped from you suddenly without prior notice and be subsequently brought into cramped barracks with two other families.
This is a story of remembrance, of losing one's place in the world, and of trying to rebuild that in the aftermath.
Many people might have certain impressions about Japanese comics and animation, also known as manga and anime respectively, but as we have seen in recent years, these Japanese art forms are slowly but surely spreading its influence around the world.
The story of how the world fell in love with manga is all the more extraordinary because there was a time when it was regarded as too extreme, too niche, too Japanese for international tastes.
Many Westerners found reading right to left too strange, and in any case it was difficult to find manga outside of Japan. Stories in the international media about hentai, or “perverse” manga, did much to sully its reputation.
But thanks to the internet, people began to realise that hentai was not synonymous with manga, which spans a breathtaking range of styles, from the completely wacky and transgressive, to exquisite and sensitive, to macho and hardcore.
We always hope for the best and prepare for the worst in all things, especially when the stakes involve human lives and freedom from a despotic overlord. And great leaders know how to move their people toward the goal they have set for themselves.
Former US President and General Dwight D. Eisenhower had led his forces on the Normandy Invasion which marked the beginning of the Allied Forces' counterattack. The series of events that followed it gave way to an Allied victory after the dust has settled. However, Eisenhower wasn't as certain of the result as we might think. Here's what he wrote before the invasion:
"Our landings in the Cherbourg-Havre area have failed to gain a satisfactory foothold and I have withdrawn the troops. My decision to attack at this time and place was based on the best information available. The troops, the air and the Navy did all that bravery and devotion to duty could do. If any blame or fault attaches to the attempt it is mine alone."
Imagine you're having a nice night out watching the star-filled sky while enjoying a swim in the pool? Well, with the new concept of a four-sided infinity pool atop a skyscraper, you might be able to do that once the project has been approved and done.
Called Infinity London, the project is described by the swimming pool manufacturer as "only building in the world to incorporate a 360-degree infinity pool".
The pool is imagined atop a 220-metre-high, 55-storey skyscraper. Containing 600,000 litres of water, it would be surrounded by clear walls made from acrylic. The bottom of the pool would also be transparent, so it could act as a skylight. At night it would be lit up with colour-changing lights.
Although it would be a great experience, I might be a bit wary of falling off the edge. Still however, it will be a thrilling feeling to be so high up in the sky and yet be surrounded in water. And just think of the lovely view you would see overlooking London at night.
Something has been stirring on Jupiter's surface and everyone is paying close attention. The Great Red Spot might be at the end of its rope and it could soon be dissipating amidst the swirling vortex of the atmosphere.
The huge red storm has been a distinctive feature of the gaseous giant for centuries. If it were to disappear soon, perhaps now is the time for us to behold it one last time.
Jupiter reaches what is called opposition on June 10th when it will be directly, well, opposite the Sun. This coincides with the planet's closest approach to Earth, called the perigee.
Anyone with a small telescope should be able to see the planet but, if you want to get a good look at the Great Red Spot, experts recommend a moderate 6-inch telescope or larger. We may not have many more chances.
Though some wounds heal, they could leave scars or damage which would affect the way we live going forward. When our bodies sustain damage, especially if it goes as deep as our tissues and cells, it would take a long time to repair if at all. Some damages are irreparable. But researchers are hopeful that with new tools and technology, we have a chance of restoring damaged parts.
That's why a team of scientists at Imperial College London have been working on a way to repair damaged heart tissue when people suffer heart attacks. They used millions of human stem cells to produce patches of heart tissue which will replace the damaged ones.
They programmed the stem cells to mature into working heart muscle, or cardiac progenitor cells. The patches are sewn onto the damaged area of the heart to help pump blood and release chemicals to stimulate repair and regeneration.
Using stem cells to treat weakened heart muscle isn’t a new concept. But many existing methods injected stem cells directly into damaged tissue, and without a ‘scaffold’ to hold them in place, the cells would clear out of the heart before achieving significant tissue repair.
The results of the research are promising. However, we have yet to test whether these patches would work on human hearts.
Apart from moving into a paperless economy, the issues of owning a printer from the occasional paper jam to running out of ink, to more hardware related problems, printers are a big nuisance. And they cost a lot to maintain. It would be a lot easier for one to just go to a nearby shop and have your documents printed there. It won't cost you money, time, or stress.
In these modern times, printers have become so shitty that it’s easier to just not own one and deal with whatever small inconveniences might result. I haven’t had one for about a decade, and have rarely missed it.
Specifically, a “good” printer costs about $180. In 2018, I went to the copy shop only once, and spent a total of $2.40. At this rate, it would take me about 75 years to spend the equivalent cost, without factoring in expensive ink refills.
Visited the grave of my friend’s father and witnessed a remarkable ceremony. The letters on the white crosses almost disappear in the brightness of the stone, so a soldier fills the indentations with sand from Omaha Beach to bring the name forward. It sent shivers down my spine. pic.twitter.com/e2G8KvvALt
Some of the letters engraved on gravestones tend to become indistinguishable when it is too bright and they blend together in the light. Despite this, there's actually a cool hack which could help bring out the engravements without having to paint on them. Jackie Speier tweets about what she saw as she and her friend visited the latter's father's grave.
One of Van Gogh's famous masterpieces, Starry Night, has given inspiration to many artists because of its beautiful impressionist style where the colors just flow into one another and you feel a sort of serenity when you look at it.
Artist Aja Trier has felt moved by the painting so much that she has been remaking it and putting her own twist into the scenes. With the Starry Night as a background, she paints various breeds of dogs as well as other characters and scenarios.
Check out her collection of the Starry Night Series on her Instagram page.
When we feel isolated or outright rejected by someone, it hurts. But we often deal with it as if it's not something serious or that we will eventually move on from it without having any drastic effects on our psyche or general well-being. However, there may actually be some kind of connection between emotional and physical pain. And rejection might cut deeper than we think.
In a landmark experiment in 2003, Eisenberger and her colleagues had test subjects strapped with virtual-reality headsets. Peering through goggles, the participants could see their own hand and a ball, plus two cartoon characters – the avatars of fellow participants in another room. With the press of a button, each player could toss the ball to another player while the researchers measured their brain activity through fMRI scans.
In the first round of CyberBall – as the game became known – the ball flew back and forth just as you’d expect, but pretty soon the players in the second room started making passes only to each other, completely ignoring the player in the first room. In reality, there were no other players: just a computer programmed to ‘reject’ each participant so that the scientists could see how exclusion – what they called ‘social pain’ – affects the brain.
After analyzing the data, researchers found that the same neural circuits that respond when we experience physical pain such as having a broken bone also lit up when the participants of CyberBall had experienced being rejected or socially excluded.
This leads us to considering whether social exclusion or rejection may need medical help instead of simply being shrugged off as something that we can get by or get used to. Further studies also suggest that the effects of these linked emotional and physical pain might lead to health compromises or even diseases.
According to Eisenberger, the significance of social pain goes back to evolution. Throughout history, we depended on other people for survival: they nurtured us, helped to gather food and provide protection against predators and enemy tribes. Social relationships literally kept us alive. Perhaps, then, just like physical pain, the pain of rejection evolved as a signal of threat to our lives.
And perhaps nature, taking a clever shortcut, simply ‘borrowed’ the existing mechanism for physical pain instead of creating a new one from scratch, which is how broken bones and broken hearts ended up so intimately interconnected in our brains.
The High Line on the west of Manhattan used to be an old, dilapidated and abandoned railway which was once part of the New York Central Railroad. Now, it has been gentrified with luxe condos and more modern urban designs which was conceptualized by a collaboration between James Corner Field Operations, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and Piet Oudolf.
Gothamist's Jake Dobkin took a lot of photos of The High Line long before its renovation and redesign. And you can feel from the photos just how much history the place has been through and as time passed by, how it was slowly brought back to life.
This week the High Line unveiled "The Spur," the final section of the park, which extends over the intersection of 10th Avenue at West 30th Street. It's a happy ending for the old cargo railroad trestle, which was slated for demolition during the Giuliani administration before a committed group of activists organized behind a bold vision to turn it into an elevated urban oasis.
