EA Sports FC 24: Women are at the center of the rebranding of the famous computer game
For the first time since the game's debut in 1993, software company EA Sports has ditched the FIFA branding and switched to EA Sports FC. This coincides with a major change in the most popular mode of play, one that reflects the increasing diversity of the real sport.
Even with skills that allow her to wipe the floor with the vast majority of FIFA's male player base, it usually doesn't take long for Lisa Manley to hear predictably sexist abuse in her headphones. The 24-year-old boasts that she is one of England's best in the popular game of football, which she took up after a serious knee injury ended her hopes of a professional football career.
"When I had to have the operation, I devoted a lot more time to FIFA and I got a lot better at the game. It sounds a bit silly, but you can use your knowledge on the field in the game,".
In another life, she could have been one of England's national team players who reached the final of the World Cup. She started playing football when she was only five years old and attracted the attention of Fulham and Chelsea, one of the most successful teams in women's football. Instead, she is one of the e-representatives, but still represents her country on the global stage.
**Her success has not earned her respect in the notoriously toxic realm of online gaming**
Earlier this year, representing England, she was among the best at the e-sports FIFA tournament in Zurich, and her skills attracted an audience of millions on platforms such as Twitch and TikTok. Her campaign in the Swiss city ended with a penalty shootout defeat in the quarter-finals. Her success has not earned her respect in the notoriously toxic realm of online gaming, where strangers with microphones never hold back on abuse.
"There is a lot of sexism. Men are also exposed to hate on the Internet, they all do it in games. But no one tells them that they should not play this game, but be in the kitchen or worse. Even though my name became known to everyone, it hasn't really changed that much," .
For many women and girls who play games, the solution is often in silence - no microphones or webcams, no recognizable usernames and certainly no streaming. A Sky News survey found that almost half of women have faced abuse or harassment while gaming online, with women aged 18 to 24 experiencing abuse rising to 75 percent.
**Soccer's biggest female stars join their male counterparts in Ultimate Team**
Just as England's internationals helped make women's football truly mainstream, there is hope that the digital version of the often not-so-pretty game will follow suit. The rebranding of said game is bigger news than Twitter becoming X. We should certainly sympathize with the retailers when next week they explain to confused mums, dads, grandparents why "the FIFA game" isn't on the shelves.
But regardless of the new name, an even bigger change is coming to the game itself, as soccer's biggest female stars join their male counterparts in Ultimate Team. It has long been the most popular and lucrative way to play. It allows players to build their teams using mysterious packs similar to trading cards, before taking them online to play against the world.
And this year, that dream could include England captain Leah Williamson playing alongside Liverpool's Virgil van Dijk; French goal machine Kylian Mbappé and Australian striker Sam Kerr or Mary Earps defending Erling Haaland's penalties.
**"It is the perfect time to put women in the foreground"**
EA Sports' Andrea Hopelain says this makes this year's game "the most comprehensive and diverse" yet. Female stars have been in FIFA since 2015, but they've always felt like a token gesture, limited to side modes that players mostly don't bother with. With EA Sports running an even bigger marketing campaign than usual to promote its rebrand, it's the perfect time to put women front and center.
"After the World Cup and the Euros, there are a lot more women who want to play this game. Women's football is now watched by more people - men, women, children. I started playing FIFA because of football and it goes hand in hand. People want to play like their role models and heroes play,".
Of course, the gaming community may have more undersized men than some other communities, and a quick YouTube search finds many such "fans" criticizing the decision. Some have tried to argue that this contradicts what they see as an "authentic" football simulation, ignoring that it is a simulation that allows for unlikely scenarios such as Tottenham winning the title.
Marie-Claire Isaaman, executive director of Women in Games, which advocates for a sex-free games industry, culture and community, says EA Sports' move is a big step forward: "It's an important step forward for the gaming community and the games industry. When they're not playing game physically, it is not unreasonable that girls and women want to play virtually".
**Football Manager announces that it will add women's football next year**
It certainly feels like a watershed moment, with Football Manager announcing that it will be adding women's football next year. This detailed and addictive series was developed by British studio Sports Interactive and is one of the most popular sports games in the country.
Isaaman says, whether it's football or any other genre, representation in games is important. Like Manley, she hopes more women and girls will look at eSports as a real career option, especially given the huge earning potential.
"We need more female role models in e-sports and streaming. But these women and girls are put in a position where they are likely to face abuse.
Manley expects abuse every time she plays, either from opponents or in the comments on her streams and videos. Game publishers are clearly aware of the issues women face, with Call Of Duty introducing an artificial intelligence tool to monitor hate speech, and Microsoft relying on similar technology to protect players on Xbox.
**"In two or three years no one will ask why women play"**
Manley believes it will still take time to improve, but sees the greater prominence and influence of women in traditionally male-focused games like FIFA as a vital step towards acceptance.
"In two or three years, no one will be asking why women are playing, people will be excited because they got Leah Williamson or Sam Kerr on Ultimate Team. I hope it works both ways and that their presence in the game encourages more people to they watch the Women's Super League. Trust the process - it will become the norm and people won't expect anything different," .
Artificial Intelligence's Achilles Heel: Why Can't AI Bots Guess the Appearance of Human Hands?
Ever since AI drawing tools came to life, their users have noticed a significant flaw in their work – regardless of whether the user's queries are specific or vague, AI bots simply cannot create a realistic representation of human hands in their outputs. That problem is so widespread that it's even turned into a viral joke in the AI community.
Even the most popular and advanced AI tools make the same mistakes. And it's quite fascinating, really, that AI tools like Mid journey or DALLE can generate an image of a robotic cowboy baking muffins on Mars, but at the same time generate an extra pair of fingers or completely distort the image when asked to draw a human hand.
But why do artificial intelligence programs responsible for creating content in the form of images have a problem with "drawing" hands? And why are the hands, and not other body parts like the nose or ears, the problem?
**Similarities between humans and AI bots**
Art class is a favorite subject of talented people. But regardless of our interests and talents, there is one thing we all have in common – we can all agree that drawing realistic hands and arms is mission impossible. Even talented children would often have to put in extra time and effort to get the desired results.
In reality, it's not a lack of talent or dedication that makes us terrible at drawing fists. They are challenging to depict on paper due to the numerous bones, tendons and muscles in each hand. But despite the complex anatomy and subtle details that make hands so challenging to draw, a realistic representation of them is possible with regular practice.
If you are one of those people who can't draw fists - welcome to the club! And if you need something to make you feel a little better about your artistic skills (or lack thereof) you're going to love the absolute disaster that comes from AI art.
Despite people praising AI and its superiority over humans, we are more alike than you might think. However advanced they might be, AI tools are also terrible at drawing human hands. And let's not lie, they don't really like drawing feet either (and neither do we!).
You've probably seen an example somewhere - a detailed depiction of a person with all the facial features and details that would make you believe someone had drawn it by hand, and then you suddenly notice the hands and realize the art was either created by a surrealist, or an AI tool for drawing. It might look like this:
image source: Night Caffe
These examples show that AI is quite good at delivering results that resemble human faces and other body parts, such as the shape and length of arms, collarbones or necks. Even this tool I'm using is advanced enough to beautifully show skin texture and show signs of aging on a person.
But when it comes to hands - that's a completely different story. And what's even more fascinating is that one of the reasons AI can't draw hands properly is, well, their complexity. So basically, the same factor that makes us terrible artists with no future also affects the ability of artificial intelligence to generate a realistic image of human hands and arms.
**Artificial intelligence can't draw human hands: What's the problem?**
I've already mentioned that some people see AI as a "better version of a human" with all those extra abilities. But that is far from the truth. Yes, an AI bot can generate a picture or write you a school play in seconds, but AI programs still have many flaws that we have yet to overcome and conquer.
On the other hand, with all the new options and AI software developers competing with each other to see who can deliver the better tool, we are undoubtedly in the midst of an AI boom. Of course, in the sea of options, we will expect only the best of the best.
All things considered, we currently have very unrealistic expectations for machine learning. And once we find a flaw - which, let's be honest, we always do - it's suddenly a big deal, as if we weren't given a tool that allows us to generate an image based on just one query. Sure, some flaws shouldn't be tolerated, but if AI's inability to "draw" realistic human hands is a disaster of abnormal proportions? I do not think so.
Regardless of your stance on the matter, there's no doubt that the often erratic AI output needs improvement. People in the AI community are trying to solve this problem, but who knows how long it will be before AI reaches enlightenment and understands how to represent human anatomy.
Disc herniation, a disease of the 21st century
Disc herniation is a degenerative disease of the spine. It is a disease of the modern lifestyle. Experts point out that about 80 percent of the population suffers from this disease.
There is no critical age for disc herniation. It also occurs in the younger population, in their twenties, although it was once thought to be a disease of the elderly. Men are more susceptible than women.
Disc herniation occurs in the cervical and lumbar spine, the exact cause of its occurrence is unknown. Genetics, weak connective tissue, poor body posture, aging of the spine, physical strain, weak back muscles and obesity play a big role.
"A disc herniation is a distortion of the joint between two vertebral bodies, when the upper vertebral body under the weight of the rest of the spinal column presses the elastic disc, pushes it outwards and then makes contact with the nerve,"
The symptoms are: pain in the shoulders, neck stiffness, headache, ringing in the ears... and there can also be pain and tingling in the lower extremities, hip, knee, as well as painful and limited movements. It is treated with medication and physical therapy.
The best medicine for recovery is kinesi-therapeutic treatment of exercises, which is determined on the basis of each patient and is conducted as a prevention in the further course of life.
After recovery, the patient is trained in physical therapy for further continuation of treatment without pain, which is also a form of prevention. The operative method of treatment is applied in the last phase, most often when the muscles have weakened.
IN WHICH PART OF THE SPINE DOES A HERNIATED DISC MOST OFTEN OCCUR?
Disc herniation occurs most often in the lower back (lumbar), less often in the neck (cervical), and extremely rarely in the thoracic (thoracic) part of the spine.
WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF A LUMBAR HERNIATED DISC?
First of all, it is pain and limited movements in the lumbar part of the spine, and then spasm, tension in the back muscles, often with pain and tingling down the leg, with weakness in the leg muscles, difficulty walking on toes or heels, difficulty and painful standing and sitting, as well as the most severe and fortunately the rarest disorder of urination, stool and sexual function in men. The pain can be dull and long-lasting, but it is usually very strong, radiating or sharp "like a knife stab" and increases with coughing, sneezing and straining.
WHAT ARE THE SYMPTOMS OF A HERNIATED DISC IN THE CERVICAL SPINE?
These are pain and limited movements in the neck, with spasm and tension in the muscles of the neck and shoulders, with pain and tingling down the arm, with weakness in the muscles of the arms. The pain can be very strong and sharp or dull and constant.
In advanced disease, and sometimes from the very beginning, signs of damage to the spinal cord and/or nerve roots - myelopathy and radiculopathy - may appear. They are manifested by weakness, numbness, tingling and/or clumsiness in the arms and legs. There is also often a feeling of dizziness and instability, especially with sudden movements in the neck.
WHO EXAMINES PATIENTS WITH THE MENTIONED DISORDERS?
Disc herniation requires multidisciplinary treatment, and depending on the leading symptoms, the examination is performed by a specialist in physical medicine and rehabilitation and a neurologist, and if necessary, a rheumatologist, orthopedist, ENT, ophthalmologist and spinal surgeon.
WHAT IS THE DIAGNOSIS BASED ON?
The diagnosis is made on the basis of:
- Anamnesis - through a conversation with the patient, data are taken on the characteristics and quality of pain, as well as other ailments.
- Clinical examination of the neck and hands - the function of the bone system, muscles and nerves is examined.
- Diagnostic procedures.
WHICH DIAGNOSTIC PROCEDURES ARE USED ?
In the process of obtaining and confirming the diagnosis, the following methods are used:
- X-ray imaging,
- MR - magnetic resonance, as the "gold standard" in diagnostics,
- CT - computerized tomography (scanner),
- EMNG - electromyoneurography,
- Doppler blood vessels of the neck and head,
- EEG - Electroencephalography,
- SSEP - Somatosensory evoked potentials
– Laboratory testing.
HOW IS A HERNIATED DISC TREATED ?
Treatment of a herniated disc can be
Conservative (non-operative) - is carried out with medication and physical procedures.
Operationally.
Hi to all i hope we spend here a lot nice time
Negative thoughts and blocking emotions
image source: pixabay
They block our purposeful activity and at the same time create a "vicious circle", so it is important to recognize them and you do not need to "make a donkey out of a mosquito"
We all sometimes have the experience that the world "suffocates" us, that we are completely unsuccessful in life, when, as the poet would say, "the soul weaves sorrow from everything". For some, this happens very often and significantly affects their quality of life. In these cases, it is usually a matter of creating a "vicious circle" between negative thoughts and blocking emotions.
In order to know how to fight against negative thoughts, we need to know how to recognize them. They always appear as ready-made conclusions that do not require further evidence: "the elevator will surely break down", "today I fail the exam", "people around me are constantly lying to me" ... They often appear before some important events in our lives and after stressful situations, but they can occur at any time.
**Dangerous exclusive claims**
According to the content, they can be very different, depending on our age, experience, environment. They can refer to the external reality ("everything I eat is poisonous"), the social environment ("people who know me don't like me at all") or our personality ("I am completely incompetent").
They most often appear in the form of exclusive claims that include superlatives: the ugliest, the stupidest, the most unhappy, the fattest, as well as in the form of general phrases such as all people, the whole world ...
These thoughts are always accompanied by negative emotions (shame, fear, anger ...) of varying intensity. These emotions block our purposeful activity and at the same time additionally strengthen negative thoughts and create a "vicious circle". These thoughts are not the product of a rational process of thinking as a relatively free assessment of the state of affairs in external and internal reality based on our knowledge and experiences, but prevent us from thinking rationally and acting purposefully.
It is even more important to recognize blocking emotions, which in intensity and duration are never appropriate to the reason they were provoked, which would be called a folk proverb in their case "we make a donkey out of a mosquito". That's why a joke or an incidental remark from a colleague from work or a friend sounds like an unforgivable insult to someone.
Characteristic of blocking emotions is the sudden and rapid increase in the intensity of emotional reactions (irritation-anger-anger, discomfort-fear-panic) as their change from positive to negative and vice versa from fascination to disappointment, from elation to despair.
As they cause strong feelings of discomfort, and often a feeling of remorse and guilt, we often do not recognize these feelings as a certain emotion, but they appear in us in the form of general anxiety, which is professionally called anxiety. It is often accompanied by palpitations, dizziness, sweating, upset.
These emotions are a reaction to both negative thoughts and events from our past experience, so they have little to do with current events in our lives. They often lead to completely inadequate and harmful actions: endless quarrels with close people, creating addictions, whether emotional or gambling, psychoactive substances, social networks on the Internet. This destroys real emotional relationships with close people and further impairs mental stability.
What can be done to break this vicious circle? A good first step is to notice their appearance and influence in our lives through self-observation. How often do negative thoughts or blocking emotions occur? In what environment does this happen? How much does it bother us in everyday life?
The second step may be to talk to close people, instead of shutting yourself in. It is always useful to try to find out if someone close to us has similar experiences and what they are doing in those moments. It is also important to communicate about how we feel at the moment, which will make those thoughts and feelings closer and more understandable to ourselves. More importantly, we reduce our focus on ourselves and our own problems and dilemmas and share one shared experience that can help us in life.
Negative thoughts are very resistant to outside advice, but once we recognize them in ourselves, we can try to include real opinion and thus "defeat" the accuracy of negative thoughts and reduce their importance in our mental life.
Nobody is successful all the time, but he can fight with the negative thought that "I can't do anything right". When you think about it, you will remember situations that refute that.
**Activities that bring joy**
With a little recollection and reflection, you will see that the thought "nothing good ever happens to me" is not positive, because there are certainly things that make you happy.
A person who notices the appearance of blocking feelings in himself can make an effort and wonder if his anger, rage, jealousy, envy, the appropriate response given the circumstances. As much as it is to others, and so much to her. Prolonged anxiety exhausts us and often completely passivates and disables us in our activities.
Mental and in general every purposeful activity always helps us to focus on something else, in that sense every quality pastime is useful: sports activities, reading, watching movies, listening to music ... Everything that helps us not to remain passive and preoccupied with ourselves .
If we notice that this "whirlpool" constantly pulls us towards negative thoughts, blocking feelings and problematic behavior that upsets us and our loved ones, it is necessary to seek professional help that should help us cope with the psychological crisis.
Coke
Sweet, carbonated, brown - dark red drink, common name Cola is there a man in the world who has not tried this drink. There are countless different brands of this drink in the world.
Today, the most famous cola is Coca-Cola, from which it all began.
**A brief history of the origins of Coca-Cola**
The original recipe for making Coca-Cola was devised by John Pemberton, a Confederate veteran, chemist and pharmacist, who at the time worked for the pharmaceutical and chemical company Eagle, from the American state of Georgia. He named the drink Pemberton's wine coca, but in 1886, when a ban was introduced, he modified the recipe by eliminating alcohol. In pharmacies, as a medicine, he sold a glass of drink for five cents, which went well, because at that time, carbonated drinks were considered very healthy. Pemberton himself claimed that Coca-Cola cures various diseases, including headaches, impotence and stomach problems. Its concentrate could be bought in pharmacies as a means of relieving stomach problems.
The number of producers soon increased, so the fight over the patent and the right to use the name Coca-Cola began, a drink that was created from a combination of two ingredients - cocaine leaves and fruits of the tropical cola tree, which contains two to three percent caffeine. About 150 grams of coca leaves went for four liters of syrup, but later that amount was reduced, so that in 1903, fresh coca leaves were completely removed from the recipe. It was replaced by the remains from the leaves of this plant from which cocaine was extracted, so that this substance remained only in traces.
Today, specially modified coca leaves that do not contain cocaine are used. In addition to carbonated water and caffeine, Coca-Cola also contains sugar, phosphoric acid, caramel color and flavors that are the company's trade secret.
**How Coca-Cola conquered the world**
We can best see how strong the marketing influence on the modern world is on the example of Santa Claus. Santa Claus we know today came from an advertisement. Based on Nast's illustrations, the Coca-Cola company launched a global marketing campaign in 1931, where it promoted the human-sized figure of Santa Claus, who is still recognizable today.
Although only a trademark of one of the first major marketing campaigns, Santa Claus has gone from being a Coca-Cola poster hero to a global phenomenon.
**Warning**
Since Coca-Cola contains a large amount of sugar, it should be consumed in moderation, otherwise it can lead to increased obesity.
Kidney stone
Many people who have had the misfortune to get a kidney stone say it is one of the strongest pains they have felt.
**What are and why do kidney stones form?**
Simply put, kidney stones are crystals of salt that we excrete from our body with the help of urine that for some reason crystallized. There may be several reasons, but the bottom line is that they have failed certain inhibitors whose role is to prevent the formation of these crystals from solution.
According to their chemical composition, these stones are the most commonly crystallized calcium salts (calcium oxalate and calcium phosphate), and they can also be magnesium-ammonium phosphates, as well as in rare cases some other complex salts.
Citrates, magnesium, glycoproteins, urea, pyrophosphate play the role of crystallization inhibitors.
**Why kidney stones hurt us so much?**
To understand why this is so I need to look at how the most common stones look under a microscope. The crystals that form have long and thin sharp spikes that irritate our tissue at every slightest movement of the calculus.
In the picture you can see the appearance of the surface of the kidney stone under the microscope.
**Symptoms people with kidney stones show**
The formation of kidney stones can be without accompanying symptoms, because small stones usually get wet spontaneously. Renal colic is the most characteristic manifestation and occurs when a stone moves from the renal pelvis along the ureter. An attack of pain usually occurs suddenly, although it can be provoked by a blow, concussion or physical exertion. The pain is very intense, starting from the lumbar region and spreading to the groin. In addition to pain, nausea, vomiting, blood in the urine and reduced urine output often occur, because stones can cause obstruction of the urinary tract. Urinary retention affects the occurrence of urinary tract infection, which in turn increases the deposition of crystals and the increase in stones, and also leads to kidney damage. After the first attack, the tendency for the reappearance of stones is great, so relapses occur in as many as 75% of cases.
**Prevention and treatment**
When it comes to prevention, the healthiest thing for your kidneys is to drink enough each day at regular intervals. It is ideal to drink more than 3 liters of water a day. In addition, useful substances that have a beneficial effect on preventing the formation of kidney stones are the consumption of apples and citrus fruits.
****If the disease has already occurred, see a doctor.****
****Don't treat yourself to gossip on the internet !!!!!****
Baklava
Baklava is one of the most popular sweets in Southeast Europe. Its origin is from Central Asia. As far as I know, it is most represented in Turkey and Greece, as well as in the Balkan countries. While there are many different ways you can prepare baklava, it is by structure, baklava is a dry baked pie made from dough sheets and nuts, dipped in sugar syrup.
In the original, baklava is made from fresh sheets of dough, which are very thinly stretched so that one can practically look through them. However, since it is a very demanding job, we can also make baklava from half-baked dough sheets that we have to buy in markets or specialty stores. Since I am writing this post because of a few friends who are not from our area, in the following text you can see a photo of what this dough looks like in our store.
The most tedious part of the job is shredding and cleaning the nuts. It is easier to buy already cleaned fruits, but since I have my own, I don't buy them in the store.
To start, you need to make the filling first. Baklava is most often filled with ground walnuts, then pistachios, hazelnuts, almonds, and it is possible to combine all these fruits. I set up the making here with a filling that I combined with ground coconut, chopped walnuts and dried cranberries. It’s up to you to make a filling out of what you love most.
Mix all ingredients. This will make it easier for you to distribute them evenly when filling.
Separate two sheets of dough. Since I buy half-baked sheets, I use one little trick and that is to spray the first sheet on which I apply the filling with water using a sprayer, so that the sheet rolls better and to avoid cracking.
This is my sprayer I use in the kitchen
Apply the filling evenly on the dough and roll the first sheet firmly.
On the second sheet of dough, apply the oil and spread it evenly over the entire surface
Place the rolled dough over this sheet and roll again.
No matter how you prepare baklava, it is very important that you cut it to the desired size before baking. For the vast majority of cutting in the kitchen I use scissors, they make the job a lot easier.
Arrange the pieces in a lightly oiled pan and bake at a temperature of 220C. Baklava is baked when it gets a golden yellow color.
When I make baklava in this way, I like to bake it so that the pieces do not touch, so I achieve greater crunchiness. However, this can be a problem for us when we pour syrup over it, because in that case it will be necessary to make a lot more syrup than we really need. For this reason, I usually transfer to another container before pouring the syrup where the pieces are compacted next to each other.
**Syrup**
You need water and sugar to make the basic syrup. I always add lemon to it, and often honey is added. Unfortunately I can’t give you precise measurements and dimensions for water and sugar because I always cook the syrup as much as I need until it’s right. Some basic determinant is that, the syrup is ready when it stops boiling intensively.
At that point, I add sliced lemon to it. This will dilute it a bit, so I let it cook for a few more minutes.
This is what it looks like when the syrup is ready. I don't know how much you will be able to see in the photo itself, it is very inconvenient to photograph the liquid that evaporates.
When the syrup is ready, pour it over the baklava and wait for it to absorb nicely and cool down. As for the topping of baklava, some are topped with chilled syrup, some with hot, mostly it doesn't matter if the syrup is well cooked.
**Important Notice**
If you add **honey** to the syrup, wait for it to cool to body temperature, otherwise the honey will lose a lot of its taste. Also, you can just pour honey over the already prepared baklava.
**The most common mistakes and how to solve them**
First of all, I would like to mention that failure in cooking is a common occurrence. Don’t be discouraged if something fails you the first time. Analyze mistakes and avoid them next time. It should also be noted that tastes vary. You can always customize the recipe to your liking, changing what you didn't like.
**Baklava is too greasy**
Next time, add a little less oil.
If you see oil coming out during baking, drain it.
After baking, place the baklava on a kitchen towel to soak up the excess fat.
**Baklava is gooey**
Next time, cook the syrup a little longer
**Baklava is not sweet enough**
If you like too sweet, add a little sugar to the filling, but don't forget that too much sugar is harmful to the body.
**BONUS**
Baklava with jam & walnuts
Since it is a tradition in our country to always prepare homemade jam for the winter, I also usually make baklava from it. The procedure is the same as for the classic. Put the jam on a sheet.
Spread it evenly.
Sprinkle with crushed walnuts.
Roll up the filled sheet.
Oil the other sheet, spread the oil evenly and roll everything again.
Cut to desired size
And bake
You can see the finished and served baklava in the initial photo.
Fireworks
**The right time to write about fireworks is the New Year holidays.**
Today, it is inconceivable for us to have a holiday or celebration without the use of fireworks. Depending on the country, there are different holidays that are most associated with fireworks, but one holiday is unique in this regard in the whole world, and that is the new year.
**History of fireworks**
There is no reliable information on where and how the fireworks were made. The story is mostly connected with China, where one chef came across the discovery by chance that some ingredients give an interesting color to the flame. Although Chinese legends about the origin of fireworks are the most famous, it is still believed that fireworks most likely originate from the area of India or Arabia.
Before the appearance of the fireworks themselves, it should be said that people made firecrackers. Their existence dates back as far as 1000 years. These were young bamboo stalks filled with gunpowder. They burned them at the beginning of the year, right after the reception, and the role of the explosion was to drive away evil spirits and bring happiness.
In order to have fireworks as we know them today, we need gunpowder, which, unfortunately, was used in the war. The moment someone added balls of various chemicals to the rocket instead of lead balls, the purpose of which was to destroy the enemy, we got the first fireworks intended for fun.
Already in the 15th century, fireworks became an integral part of all celebrations. They were used not only during military victories, but also on occasions such as weddings.
The arrival of gunpowder in Europe is associated with the 13th century and the legendary Marco Polo. Although it was already widely used for military purposes in Asia at the time, Europeans began to use it for that purpose much later. Very soon after the arrival of gunpowder in Europe, workshops and schools for making fireworks began to be established, and they reached their peak during the Renaissance. Even today, many types of fireworks are produced according to recipes from that period.
**Chemistry of fireworks**
Fireworks consist of a mixture of oxidizing agents, which usually consist of nitrates, chlorates or perchlorates, reducing agents, ie sulfur and carbon, metal salts and binders. A conventional fireworks rocket consists of a cardboard tube 1.5 to 3.5 centimeters in diameter. There is a fuse at the lower end, and after lighting the fuse, the fire causes a gunpowder charge (explosive - oxidizing and reducing agent) which is located in the lower part of the rocket and serves to eject the rocket to the desired height.
Nitrates were first used as oxidizing agents, namely potassium nitrate due to stability and controlled reaction.
2KNO3 → K2O + N2 + 2.5O2
Chlorates give a "more spectacular" reaction due to the higher oxygen content, give faster detonation, but are more unstable than nitrates. Due to their instability, they are more dangerous to handle than nitrates.
2KClO3 → 2KCl + 2O2
However, nowadays perchlorates are more often used due to increased stability and because they are richer in oxygen.
KClO4 → KCl + 2O2
A wooden stick is attached to the barrel filled with explosives, which maintains the flight direction of the rocket. The upper part of the rocket, which contains substances (metal salts) that develop strong light in color, then ignited from the ignited explosive. The appearance of fireworks depends on the way of packing inside the rocket. There is a precisely prescribed distance from the place where the fireworks were fired from the observer, as well as the condition that the wind must not be stronger than 20 km / h.
**The colors of fireworks**
The colors of fireworks are caused by the burning of metal salts, which have characteristic colors. The atoms of each element absorb energy and emit light of certain colors. With the absorption of energy, the electrons pass from the basic to the higher, excited, energy state. The excited electrons pass from the higher to the lower energy state, and then to the ground state. During these transitions, the electron releases energy (photon) of a specific wavelength - color, which is characteristic of the atom of each chemical element. For example, by burning sodium nitrate, sodium electrons absorb heat energy and go into a higher energy state. This state is not long-lasting, and the excited electrons in the sodium atom soon "fall" to the ground state and release photons of wavelength corresponding to yellow light.
The amount of energy emitted varies from element to element, and each has a characteristic wavelength. Higher energies correspond to shorter wavelengths, whose colors are in the purple-blue region of the visible spectrum. Lower energies correspond to higher wavelengths, ie the orange-red part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Lemon in caramel syrup
Although in my country drinking tea is mostly associated with illness, I like to drink it every day. When I drink tea I like to drink it with lemon, and whenever I can I have lemon prepared in caramel syrup. I like this method the most because I like to eat sliced lemon peel, so I get multiple pleasures with this recipe.
To make this syrup you need it
4 lemons
200g sugar
a little bit of water
It should be noted that the amounts are arbitrary and that you can increase the amount of sugar or lemon depending on your taste.
To begin, cut the lemon into longitudinal halves and then into slices as in the picture. This way of cutting proved to me to be the most efficient.
Put sugar in a dry skillet and turn on the hob.
Do not mix the sugar or shake the bowl, just wait for it to start melting. You will notice this on the rim of the bowl as in the photo.
If you like a stronger caramel taste, as I like, allow the sugar to caramelize a little more, but be careful not to burn it.
When the sugar reaches this stage add about 100ml of water. It should be noted that it is not necessary for the whole amount of sugar to be melted and caramelized.
Then add sliced lemon and let it cook.
Be careful as the contents may boil out of the pot if it is not large enough.
This happens because a large amount of foam is created during cooking
If you have leftovers from the previous storage, feel free to add them to the new mixture you are cooking.
The syrup is ready when the fork starts to drip hard, it's a little harder to take photos, but don't be afraid, you can't go wrong here, no matter how much you cook, it will be good.
And finally, this is what the finished syrup looks like, the color depends on how long you let the sugar caramelize.
It should be noted that if you do not want the taste of caramel, when you put sugar in a bowl, immediately add water, this way you will get a light yellow syrup.
Also, you should know that the syrup prepared in this way contains bitterness, I love it, but if you do not like it, then you need to peel the lemon peel and save everything the same without it.
You can also use other citrus fruits, limes, oranges, tangerines, grapefruit to prepare this recipe, and you can also make a combination. In addition to lemon, I like to add kumquat, only I haven't found it in the market these days.
Development of electric batteries - The main task in the coming years
photo source : pixabay
The price of car batteries is falling and will fall even more
Companies that produce sodium-based batteries are entering the race, and hydrogen is at stake - Lithium is no longer without competition, the technology that is cheaper and more practical will win because the value of the battery now makes up a third of the price of an electric car
The automotive industry is already moving in the direction of battery-powered vehicles. There are more and more of them on the streets, the states are subsidizing them - although the technology is not optimal yet and it is not very profitable.
Since Tesla made a model with lithium-ion batteries in 2008, the number of electric cars has increased by eight million.
The problem is that the price of batteries makes up a third of the total price of electric cars, so reducing the cost of their production is a determining condition for them to become competitive with conventional cars.
The prices of almost all raw materials in the automotive industry are rising, batteries are the most expensive part of electric cars, but the prices of lithium-ion batteries have started to fall.
According to the consulting agency Bloomberg, the price of a kilowatt hour of battery in smartphones and other devices is currently 132 dollars, 6 percent lower than the price in 2020 and 89 percent lower than the price in 2010. Experts are currently mentioning the price of batteries for electric cars of 118 dollars per kilowatt hour.
It is certain that the production of batteries will continue to develop. Currently, the average cost for one kilowatt-hour of energy from a lithium-ion battery is $ 130. The goal is 100 dollars, and then electric cars could compete with conventional ones. Battery manufacturers could achieve this goal in the next few years.
Demand for batteries will grow, and their price will be lower and lower, they concluded in the Economist newspaper.
Electric mobility currently depends on lithium, cobalt and copper batteries. But, once again, it has paid off - it pays to invest in research and new technologies.
Sodium as an alternative to lithium in batteries is not new, but the idea was ignored - because there was no technology to eliminate the shortcomings of this metal.
The two alkali metals lithium and sodium are chemically very similar. Sodium does not have the energy density of lithium and is heavier, but sodium is available everywhere and is cheap. The sodium-ion battery has a similar principle of operation as the lithium-ion battery - but it does not need cobalt and copper. However, compared to lithium ions, sodium ions have a larger volume and higher requirements in terms of structural stability and kinetic properties of the material.
The Chinese company KATL, which supplies batteries to Tesla, Daimler, Volkswagen and other electric car manufacturers, presented the first generation of its sodium battery this summer. Such a battery will be cheaper, less flammable, will have a longer lifespan and will be more resistant to low temperatures than lithium-ion - and lithium-ferro-phosphate batteries.
Experts say that sodium-ion batteries can be charged only 1,500 times, compared to two to four times with lithium variants. The company offered a transitional solution - a system for the combined use of lithium and sodium batteries, but also pointed out that it is researching further and expects top results.
According to the Chinese media, it is expected that sodium-ion batteries in the trial phase will cost around 65 euros per kilowatt-hour, and in serial production, the price should be halved. KATL plans to start mass delivery of these batteries - in 2023.
This company has been cooperating with partners in Germany since 2014 and has started building a battery factory in Thuringia.
Other competing firms are working on similar projects. The British company AMTE Power recently announced the production of sodium-based batteries under the license of the British battery manufacturer "Faradion".
Another major battery manufacturer is GAC announced the promotion of an electric car with graphene batteries, which with a charge of eight minutes allow autonomy of movement up to 800 kilometers.
However, there is another electrical solution that is gaining more and more popularity, and it works with hydrogen fuel cell vehicles. Cars that use this technology are also powered by electric motors. Instead of charging the battery with electricity through a plug, these models require a hydrogen charging station, very similar to what we have today with gasoline and diesel. While battery-powered vehicles take at least an hour to charge, depending on the type of battery and charger, fuel cell-powered cars are virtually charged like conventional vehicles in terms of time required. The batteries used by these models are much smaller, and therefore lighter. So the future also offers hydrogen as an energy source to power vehicles, and it should offer a better alternative than battery-powered cars,
When visiting the Tesla car factory under construction in Germany, Elon Musk, when asked whether the future of the car is hydrogen or electric, said - it is definitely electric! Hydrogen, he argues, is a waste of time.
It is certain that in the future we will see more and more models of renowned manufacturers powered by hydrogen, whatever Elon Musk thinks about it. This is claimed by the scientific teams that are developing these projects.
Development in the field of more accessible and safer alternative batteries on naturally occurring elements such as sodium, magnesium, aluminum, calcium and zinc, but also some that we do not have in mind now, is necessary to reach a better, longer-term and cost-effective solution.
So, the big world dilemma and the race over which raw material is a better basis for making batteries, which and what kind of drive - is still going on. The option that is cheaper and more convenient to use will win.
Global trends introduced by the Covid 19
photo pixabay
**Working from home, online classes, fitness without going to the gym and moving out of cities make a new normality for citizens around the world**
Consumer needs changed significantly during the pandemic, so companies around the world will have to plan their strategies accordingly in the future. The five most impressive global trends that were unthinkable before the beginning of this crisis have already been defined. In the first place is work from home, which can already be considered a new normality. It is believed that teleworking will be common for some time after the abolition of restrictions due to Covid 19. That is why many companies are adapting and planning their business in that direction and introducing more innovations, but it is not expected that work from home will be retained in the long run because the question is whether and to what extent he will suffer the job. Another global trend is entertainment that has moved into homes, so in addition to internet access even in the most remote parts, increased supply of consumer electronics and smart devices. Everyone who spent money outside the house for the party has now redirected it to the purchase of technology and equipment for spending time in their own homes. Online teaching brought the most changes because the closure of schools forced millions of students and teachers to rely on digital teaching. This has sharply increased investment in educational technologies to make access to education as easy and accessible as possible for all. Last year, one American startup company provided investments in this area in the amount of 2.2 billion dollars, which is 500 million dollars more than in 2019. Educational institutions are increasingly integrating technologies such as artificial intelligence in order to "change conventional teaching methods, improve cooperation among students, create personalized educational experiences and improve learning outcomes ”. Wellness in every segment of life is the next trend that was present even before the pandemic, but has now flourished. All the technologies, applications and portable devices that serve to take care of health at home, all this has become something that consumers around the world cannot give up. Although this trend was started by the younger generations, it was easily accepted by everyone else, and now everything that enables health control is popular. Finally, the development of suburban settlements was noticed, as people en masse sought a way out of the closed space and the opportunity to isolate themselves. The number of urban households globally continues to expand rapidly, and this is likely to continue after the pandemic is brought under control. Their number is projected to increase by 36 percent over the next 20 years.
An increasing number of consumers, mainly because of comfort, ecology and real estate prices, are choosing to live in suburban areas and smaller cities near the metropolis, giving up the narrowest city centers. This is the case in developed economies, but also in developing countries. Because people are able to do more work and other activities remotely than ever before, cities are no longer considered a necessary place to live. Shopping malls, technology companies and retailers, research shows, will have to branch out towards new living and working conditions for people around the world.
Some foods do not need to be reheated at all!
**If you are cooking food that you plan to reheat for several days, think again. According to the recommendations of the profession, some foods are not suitable for reheating after preparation, because they can be harmful to health. What is the problem?**
**Nitrates**, which are most often found in green leafy vegetables when they are first heat-treated, do not pose a health hazard. When the food is cooled and then heated, nitrates are converted into nitrites, and those into nitrosamines, carcinogenic compounds. The problem is that these compounds affect the ability of the bloodstream to carry oxygen, which leads to respiratory problems.
**Bacteria** are everywhere, and they start attacking prepared food as soon as it cools down enough, and they continue to do so as long as it stands at room temperature. Rapid heating of food cannot completely eliminate bacteria that have multiplied and entered the deeper layers of food.
**Protein** degradation in some protein-rich foods due to enzymes and microorganisms can cause rapid food spoilage. When such food needs to be reheated, toxic substances will be formed.
It is not recommended to heat the food, because dangerous consequences can occur: poisoning, nausea, vomiting, stomach problems, and even botulism. Here is a list of foods that are not recommended to reheat:
**Rice** - freshly prepared or in a bucket!
There are countless recipes with rice and they are all delicious. It is an important source of carbohydrates, but the disadvantage is that rice dishes, in addition to us, are also loved by bacteria. If you do not put it in the refrigerator immediately after cooling, but keep it at room temperature, the spores of bacteria will multiply and create toxins. These toxins can lead to vomiting and diarrhea by consuming standing rice.
Some smart guys will think that this is easily solved by heating the rice, and they will make a mistake there. Toxins in heated rice will not disappear, on the contrary, their concentration will increase.
**Spinach, celery, greens, chard…**
It is not recommended to heat green leafy vegetables headed with spinach due to the formation of nitrite. You have probably already heard from your grandmothers or mothers that spinach is eaten only freshly prepared. If you still want to leave it for later, put it chilled in the fridge and eat cold later. It is especially forbidden to give the mentioned heated food to children!
Soup in which because boiled celery for the same reason you must not reheat. The same goes for all dishes with green leafy vegetables. It is better to prevent than to cure.
**Chicken, turkey and eggs**
Poultry meat, just like eggs, can be infected with salmonella. Poultry meat has a higher protein density than red meat, so heating, in addition to the appearance of bacteria, also causes a problem with the breakdown of proteins. That is why the taste of preheated chicken is always different from a freshly prepared dish. Microwave ovens cannot heat the depth and surface parts of poultry equally as ordinary ovens.
Consuming hot chicken or turkey, as well as egg dishes can result in various digestive problems.
**Potatoes - the problem is with food storage**
Another representative of carbohydrate foods is on this list. Just like rice, potatoes are obviously attacked by bacteria as the food cools and stands at room temperature. Among the dangerous bacteria, clostridia stand out, especially C. botulinum, which has ideal conditions for reproduction, especially if you store potatoes in foil, ie without the presence of oxygen.
Heating will not neutralize this cause of botulism, an infection that can be very dangerous for the brain and nervous system.
**Do not heat the mushrooms either!**
Mushrooms are a healthy, protein food, which is easily decomposed by reheating. So, nitrites are not the problem here, but the decay of the proteins themselves. Mushrooms do not tolerate long storage after preparation and the advice is to consume them as soon as possible. Whether it is mushrooms, oyster mushrooms, porcini mushrooms, chanterelles or some heel mushrooms, take care of the expiration dates and never leave them prepared for later. This will prevent toxins and stomach problems.
Gelatin useful tips for cooking preparation
If someone mentions gelatin, desserts are probably the first thing that comes to mind. However, gelatin is a meat product and as such it goes well with salty dishes and salads. Although almost all types of gelatin are sold in animal origin, there are also vegan variants.
Gelatin has many uses except in desserts. Since gelatin is 85% protein and has very few calories, it is a great choice for diabetics and people on a diet. There are also flavored and sugary gelatins on sale.
Gelatin has an unlimited shelf life as long as it is hermetically sealed and stands in a cool and dry place.
Store dishes prepared with gelatin in the refrigerator.
Never add fresh pineapple to gelatin. This fruit, together with fresh figs, kiwi, ginger and papaya, contains the enzyme bromelain, which causes the breakdown of gelatin, which consequently loses the possibility of thickening. This enzyme is deactivated during cooking, so you are free to use canned fruit.
To avoid lumps, first mix dry gelatin with a little cold water and let it swell for 3-5 minutes before adding hot liquid.
You will get a thicker and tastier soup from veal bones than from beef, because veal contains more collagen, which affects gelling.
Store desserts prepared with gelatin in covered containers to avoid the formation of a thick, rubbery crust on the surface.
Too much sugar can slow down gelling. The more sugar goes into the recipe, the softer the finished product will be.
The firmness varies depending on the ratio of gelatin and temperature. You can successfully dissolve the steamed gelatin and cool it several times before the mixture loses its gelling power.
Gelatin takes twice as long to melt when using milk or sweet sour cream. When using sugar with gelatin, mix them first before you start melting them.
To mix meat, vegetables or fruits with gelatin, first cool them, and then stir little by little.
Be sure to drain the solid ingredients before adding them to the gelatin.
For 2 cups of the jelly mixture, use 1-2 cups of solid, ground or chopped ingredients.
To easily remove the gelled mixture from the mold, lubricate the mold with oil before filling it with the mixture. Then rinse it gently with water. This will remove excess oil, but it will still be enough to keep the mixture from sticking to the mold. Another way is to immerse the mold with the gelled mixture in hot water for 5-10 seconds, carefully separate the mass with a knife or spatula from the edges of the mold and hand it out on a plate. Then return to the refrigerator to reattach.
Use 1 bag of gelatin powder to gel 2 cups of water to get the standard firmness. Reduce or increase the quantities as needed.
1 tablespoon gelatin powder = 4 sheets of gelatin in flakes.
For clear mixtures, it takes about 2 hours of cooling for the gelling process to be completed. If the mixture has additives, then the cooling time is 4 hours.
Mixtures in layers are gelled longer, as each layer must wait before adding the next.
Instead of water, you can use other liquids - fruit juices, clear soup, wine…
Never boil the mixture with gelatin, because then it will lose the possibility of gelling.
Before turning the mixture out of the mold on a plate, rinse the plate under water. It will be easier to center the jelly on a wet plate.
Erythritol - another natural substitute for sugar
**From its use so far, it can be confirmed that erythritol is a safe sweetener, and it is mostly used by diabetics and people on reduction diets.**
Erythritol is a sugar alcohol (polyol) that is a natural alternative to sugar with a negligible caloric value. Erythritol was discovered by the Scottish chemist John Stenhouse back in 1848. It has the chemical formula C4H10O4. It was not until the 1990s that its commercial use began in Japan. This sugar alcohol is naturally present in fruits. It is industrially produced naturally, by the fermentation of glucose in the presence of the yeast moniliela polinis.
Erythritol tastes most similar to dextrose, and has a slightly lower sweetness than ordinary refined sugar (about 70 percent). It is white in color, granular in shape like ordinary sugar.
Since 1990, erythritol has had a history of safe use as a sweetener in food and beverages and has been approved for use by state regulatory agencies in more than 60 countries. It is marked E-968.
It is used as a sweetener for coffee, teas, juices, soft drinks, flavored waters, sweets and chewing gum.
In the body, most erythritol is absorbed into the bloodstream in the small intestine, and the maximum amounts occur in less than two hours. Most of the ingested erythritol (up to 90 percent) is excreted unchanged in the urine within 24 hours. Only 10 percent of the ingested erythritol goes into the large intestine, and from there it is excreted in the feces.
It has been tested in many countries. As a safety test, the scientists evaluated the doses of erythritol in which mild gastrointestinal problems, such as nausea, bloating or abdominal pain, occurred.
With a content of 1.6 percent in drinks, it does not cause a laxative effect. The upper limit of tolerance was 0.78 and 0.71 grams per kilogram of body weight, respectively, in adults and children.
For safe use in children, the scientific panel of the European Food Safety Agency has recommended that the upper limit value for a meal or drink is 0.6 grams per kilogram of body weight.
The labeling of nutritional values of erythritol in food products varies from country to country. Some countries, such as Japan and the European Union (EU), label it as a zero-calorie sweetener. In the United States, it is emphasized that it has a caloric value of 0.2 kilocalories per gram (95 percent less than sugar and other carbohydrates).
From the commercial use so far, it can be confirmed that erythritol is a safe sweetener, and it is mostly used by diabetics and people on reduction diets.
In small doses, it usually does not cause laxative effects, gas or bloating, as often happens after consuming other sugar alcohols (such as maltitol, sorbitol, xylitol and lactitol).
Large doses can cause nausea, bloating and diarrhea. In men, doses greater than 0.66 g per kilogram of body weight, and in women, doses greater than 0.8 g per kilogram of body weight, will have a laxative effect. In rare cases, erythritol can cause urticaria.
Erythritol has no effect on blood sugar levels, nor on blood insulin levels. Because of that, but also because of its easy elimination from the body, it is an effective substitute for sugar in diabetics.
It is not dangerous for tooth enamel. Bacteria in the mouth cannot metabolize it, so it does not contribute to tooth decay. Also, similar to xylitol, it has an antibacterial effect against streptococcal bacteria and reduces dental plaque.
When dissolved in water, it gives a cooling effect, such as dextrose or mint. Other alcoholic sugars also have this cooling effect, e.g. xylitol, but erythritol is stronger.
Are they harmful and how much are cured meat industrial products
Dried meat products are on the menu of most citizens. For those who know a little more about them, this kind of food has been on the black list for a long time. Industrial dried meat products are certainly harmful and according to the general recommendations of a healthy adult, they should not be eaten more than 200 grams per week, or no more than 50 grams per day.
The general recommendation of the nutritionist is that children up to the age of 4 should not eat pate, hot dogs, salami and any other meat products. They are also not recommended in the diet of asthmatics, pregnant women or nursing mothers. Older children and adolescents are not advised to eat dried meat products more than once a week (and when they eat to choose the best quality, the best home-made: dried meet, prosciutto, home-made sausage, bacon) with nutritious food: integral roll, young cheese, seasonal vegetables and probiotic yogurt.
Cured meat products that are industrially produced contain additives that make it dangerous. These are primarily nitrates, nitrites and polyphosphates, as well as flavor enhancers (glutamate), salt and saturated fats. All this adversely affects the level of cholesterol in the blood and leads to obesity. Due to the high content of salt and flavor enhancers, dried meat products increase the risk of hypertension. Hot dogs also contain a significant amount of water (40 percent), so they provide fertile ground for bacterial colonies.
Daily consumption of dried meat products, even in several meals a day, results in an excessive intake of additives. The three are the worst.
* **Sodium nitrate (NaNO3)** is an additive marked E251 and is added to meat products as a preservative. A small amount decomposes into sodium nitrite. Studies have shown a link between high nitrate levels and higher mortality from Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, diabetes, cancer of the colon, stomach and esophagus.
* **Sodium nitrite (NaNO2)**, a nitrite salt, is an additive labeled E250 and it gives dried meat products a distinctive red color. Sodium nitrite is used to salt meat faster and prevent the growth of bacteria. It interferes with the transport of oxygen in cells and blood in a larger amount. Nitrite reacts with foods rich in proteins (ie meat, soy) and spices, forming carcinogenic nitrosamines.
* **Carrageenan is a polyphosphate**, an additive marked E470. It is obtained from seaweed, is sticky and is used in cooked meat products such as salami. Polyphosphates make meat juicier. They serve to bind water, which gives the product weight and loses weight. Carrageenan is deposited in the colon, where it sticks to the mucous membrane, causing its inflammation, and later colon cancer.
It is generally known that white meat is healthier than red, however, you will find a lot of additives in dried meat products from poultry, so it is not easy to give an answer.
The least harmful are domestic products that contain the highest percentage of meat, such as prosciutto, dried meet, pancetta, bacon, home-made sausages, because they are salted only with sodium chloride (kitchen salt) aged on a draft in an attic after a couple of "rounds" of smoking. The smoke they smoke is certainly carcinogenic, but they contain the least additives.
As the daily intake is limited to 50 grams, choose the highest quality products, the best homemade. Industrial products are a story in themselves, so the longer the declaration, the more harmful it is. Probably the worst products are tea, hot dogs and pate, or meat spreads. The content of saturated fats in such products is high, which raises the level of bad cholesterol and reduces the level of good.
As always in the diet should be moderate and of course well informed. Be sure to read the declarations and eat quality home-made products.
Canada is a warning - people will not be able to survive the heat in some parts of the world
Simon Lewis, a professor at University College London, warns that extreme hot flashes are now much more probable and emphasized that areas are being created in certain parts of the planet where it is impossible to survive due to the high temperature. He also explained the concept of "wet bulb" temperature.
The climate crisis has brought summer with increasingly dangerous heat, Lewis stated in the text "Canada is a warning: More and more parts of the world will soon become too warm for life", which was published in the British "Guardian", reports Sputnik.
Temperatures reached a shocking 47.9 degrees in British Columbia in Canada and caused more than 100 deaths across the country and North America. The heat wave raised the temperature to 50 degrees in five countries in the Middle East in June, and in Pakistan, 20 children ended up in hospital due to heat stroke.
Additional warming due to greenhouse gas emissions means that such extreme waves are now more likely and scientists can calculate an increase in their probability.
As an example, the professor stated that the European hot wave from 2019, which killed 2,500 people, was five times more probable then than it would have been before global warming.
In most places, extreme heat waves will create problems, from economic disruptions to widespread mortality, especially among young and old, Lewis pointed out.
He warned, as Sputnik reports, that in some places in the Middle East and Asia, something really frightening is appearing - areas are being created where it is impossible to survive due to the high temperature.
As he explained, although people can survive temperatures of more than 50 degrees when the humidity is low, when both temperatures and humidity are high, neither sweating nor bathing can help keep the body cool.
The so-called the temperature of the "wet bulb", which is shown by a thermometer covered with a wet cloth, and which measures the temperature at which the organism cools down due to sweating or watering. People cannot survive long-term exposure to "wet bulb" temperatures above 35 degrees, because there is no way to cool the body - neither in the cold, nor with unlimited water, he added.
It was once thought that a "wet bulb" temperature of 35 degrees was impossible, but scientists reported last year that some places in the Persian Gulf and Pakistan's Indus Valley have already reached that threshold, albeit only for an hour or two, and only at small surfaces.
As temperatures are rising due to climate change, it is predicted that in the coming decades, the heat and accompanying temperatures that cannot be survived will last longer and occur in larger areas and new places, including parts of Africa and the southeastern United States, he said. Professor Lewis.
The mysteries of color mixing
One of the greatest mysteries of the average man occurs in his head when he is told that the basic colors are red, green and blue and that by mixing them white is created. Of course, in art classes we learn and prove exactly how the basic colors are red, yellow and blue (ie magenta shade of red, yellow and cyan shade of blue) and that by mixing them we get black, more precisely, some shade of dirty-gray-brown-black . We all mixed tempera and saw that these colors really give some dirty, weird hue, and by no means white. And ... since when is green the primary color?
**Therefore, a distinction should be made between basic colors in painting and basic colors in optics, in light.**
The paints used in painting are some pigments - natural or synthetic, mixed with a binder (resins, waxes, oils, once upon a time the binder could be an egg) in an emulsion, usually a kind of paste or chalk or stick ( in colored chalk, dry pastels, wooden crayons, etc.). Pigments are not light - they are minerals or substances of organic origin (plant, animal) that absorb light of a certain wavelength, ie. they absorb a certain part of the electromagnetic spectrum, while they reject some part of the spectrum.
The leaves are green because the plant pigment chlorophyll absorbs sunlight in the spectrum of blue, red, yellow, orange and purple light (not color!), And reflects only that part of the EM spectrum that belongs to green light . The red rose or red apples are red because the petals have a pigment that reflects exclusively the light of the red part of the spectrum .
**Thus, bodies either emit light or absorb it**
Your clothes absorb light, but the screen of your monitor, TV, mobile phone emits light, ie. they represent sources of electromagnetic radiation. Among other things, that is the reason that monitors consume so much battery because they need to convert electricity into light, that is. energy of electromagnetic radiation. So, red on your monitor and red rose are not the same thing - red on the screen is really light of a certain frequency, and red rose is unabsorbed light.
For example, the yellow light on the screen is the result of a combination of red and green light, while the yellow color of the lemon is the result of the lemon peel having a pigment that absorbs red, orange, green, blue and purple light and reflects yellow light.
An RGB system (yes, an acronym for red-green-blue) is used to display colors on monitors, which is based on the principle of additive color mixing. The basic colors of this system are red, green and blue and mixing them creates white light, as you can see in the first photo in this text. This is about mixing light of different wavelengths, not mixing pigments that repel some parts of the spectrum and absorb others. These colors are the basic colors for the additive system, each pixel is defined with 3 data representing the value of these 3 basic colors. Monitors emit light and colors are obtained on the monitor by an additive combination of pixel colors.
The pigment system is what we learned in school, in art classes - that by mixing red and yellow we get orange, blue and red purple, and yellow and blue green, while by mixing these colors we get black in equal proportions. Pigments do not emit light, but reflect it, more precisely reflect light of a wavelength. This is a subtractive system, ie. a color system created by subtracting rather than adding color. In fact, the basic colors in this system are magenta, yellow and cyan and their combination creates black, but the press uses the CMYK system (cyan-magenta-yellow-key, where the "key" is black, so that CMY is not wasted unnecessarily to create black).
The real, pigmented system used in painting - red-yellow-blue (RYB) also belongs to the subtractive systems, but it is actually historicism, some beginning of modern color theory, and not exactly a “real situation”. However, red, yellow and blue are still considered basic colors in painting, while cyan, magenta and yellow are considered basic colors in print, and red green and blue are considered basic colors in additive mixing.
Listening and hearing in love
**Even in the most harmonious partnership, there are disagreements, they are normal, and when they appear, each side should understand - above all by listening to him carefully - why the other thinks or wants differently.**
The test for a partnership is not a situation in which he and she agree on something, but it is a situation in which they do not agree. That is why the way partners try to resolve their conflicts is one of the main factors that determine the quality of a relationship or marriage.
Conflicts in the sense that one person wants one thing and the other person wants another, are an integral part of every relationship, even the relationship of two people who love each other. It is impossible that she and he always, from moment to moment, want the same thing. Although there are couples in which there is seemingly no conflict because one side always accepts what the other side wants, it is an illusion: the side that accepts everything actually suppresses its own desires in order to avoid a quarrel in the relationship. This strategy contributes to peace in the relationship, but it is not good in the long run because the person who submits is chronically separated from his desires, and that means alienated from himself.
For a relationship or marriage to work in the long run, both partners must accept the fact that in many situations they will think differently and want differently. The next thing they have to accept is the fact that these differences are normal and have nothing to do with the relationship of love that exists between them. When disagreements arise within a harmonious relationship or marriage, the partners try to understand why the other person thinks or wants differently. And in order to understand that, they have to listen to the other and then hear what he is telling them. In the process, they can help him with sub-questions to better explain what he is basing his opinion on.
Only when they understand why the partner thinks what he thinks, when you understand his logic, do they understand the partner. They may then agree or disagree with his thinking. If they do not agree with him, then they can "attack" the logic on which he bases his opinion or desires with arguments.
**Disagreement is not rejection**
Some authors call this type of partner listening, which leads to an understanding of his logic on which he bases his different opinions or desires, "deep listening". When partners approach each other in this way, then they both have the impression that others hear them and understand them, even when they do not agree with them. In other words, such relations are much better and closer, and thus more stable and long-lasting.
What prevents one person from not listening and not hearing, and therefore from understanding the other person in a love affair? There are several misconceptions that hinder "deep listening" in a relationship or marriage.
In the first place are people who do not tolerate different opinions from the person they love. They believe that both must always think the same. Therefore, when a difference appears, they "won't even hear", so they interrupt the floor, start shouting and the like. They often mistakenly think that if a partner thinks differently, he is telling them that he is smarter and that they are stupid. That is why they are sometimes offended when there is a difference of opinion.
There are those who do not distinguish between understanding and agreement. This means that if they understand, then they automatically agreed with the partner, that is, they accepted his opinion. This is very wrong because understanding only means knowing why the partner is thinking in a certain way, which by no means means that they will agree with his way of thinking. They do not know the rule that the better they understand their partner, the better they will get to know him.
There are also those who do not distinguish themselves from their thinking about something. The consequence is that, when the partner disagrees with them about the matter, when he rejects some of their arguments, they mistakenly think that the partner has rejected them as persons. And they experience that as the cessation of love, so that they either withdraw from the relationship and ignore their partner for days, or by insulting, trying to "equalize" in rejection.
**Do not avoid "unpleasant" conversation**
What you also need to know is that different opinions or desires, especially when it comes to a topic that is very important to a person, cause him discomfort. This inconvenience often motivates the person to stop the unpleasant conversation and to avoid it later. This is a wrong course of action because this inconvenience should be faced and endured until the partner explains his position.
There are more and more marriages where divorce occurs not because of violence or alcohol, but because one partner feels alienated, misunderstood, which does not feel close to the other for a long time. And "deep listening" can prevent all that.
Courtship or harassment
These relationships between people are too complex to be regulated by one law, and problems arise when one person likes another, but another does not like it and perceives seduction procedures as aggressive and unpleasant.
Is there a time when a man will not be able to look a woman in the eye? A few years ago, the term "eye rape" was coined, which refers to the measurement of a woman by a man. As far as I understand the announcements on social networks, this will also be incorporated into the new laws that have recently been given a new function, and that is to change the consciousness of the people.
Laws should reflect the existing morality in a given society, and their new role is to impose new rules and new morals. When it starts to touch the language, interpersonal relationships, both in the family and those in the public sphere, things become problematic.
**Social engineering and experiment**
The big question is to what extent these laws will succeed in building a society that is in line with the ideas of the legislator, and how much these experiments and social engineering will only complicate different areas of life.
We can focus the analysis on a situation in which one person - who likes another person - tries to establish contact and communication with another person. The goal of this contact is for the first person to determine if the other person also likes them so that they can have an intimate relationship. By intimate relationship we mean an emotional relationship, but also any other form of relationship in which two people enter into sexual exchanges with mutual consent.
If people like each other and want to enter into an intimate relationship, then there is no problem. Problems arise when one person likes the other, but the other person does not like the first. It is a situation of conflict between the desires of the first person and the unwillingness of the second person.
There are different motives for one person to express affection for another person, and therefore different names for the same behavior. Courtship is a form of nice behavior of one person who wants to provoke affection towards another person, with the goal of achieving an emotional connection. Courtship should be distinguished from complimenting, when one person praises another but does not want to have a relationship with him. Also, seduction should be distinguished from courtship, when the person who seduces has some hidden motive. For example, he offers marriage and only wants sexual intercourse or has some other hidden goal. The more a person is able to distinguish the nature of expressing the affection of the other party, the greater his erotic intelligence, which is part of social intelligence.
Courtship is never one event, but a process of reciprocal evaluation of two people and gradual rapprochement. At any point in this process, either party has the right to waive the relationship. What is known from the confessions of different people is that someone who was negatively evaluated at the beginning became very positively evaluated during the courtship process, which eventually led to an emotional relationship and marriage.
Courtship is a very important social phenomenon because it allows people to establish emotional connections and, perhaps, to get married. When the laws begin to regulate this subtle area, then the question arises where is the line between courtship and sexual harassment. In order for social life to take place in this area as well, it is necessary to define the rules.
One of the rules is that sexual harassment is a form of unwanted courtship. In other words, it is a situation when the interested person does not accept the rejection of the other person, but continues to court and thus becomes aggressive.
**Respect for the other person**
Why does an interested person ignore another person's negative signal? Sometimes there is not enough clear signal or the person misinterprets it. Sometimes the signal is too harsh: "get off", which is a call for some other kind of interaction. Sometimes a person is simply in love and it is unacceptable for him to be left without the "love of his life". Sometimes a person perceives rejection as a negation of their value: What, I'm not good enough for you, huh? Sometimes a person thinks that he has been rejected only because he has not shown enough of his affection, so that he intensifies his expression.
All this is too complex to be regulated by one law. The solution is to educate young people at the age at which they are interested in mating: how to approach, how to accept rejection and how to refuse, all from a position of self-esteem and respect for the other person. And that cannot be regulated by law.
The need to travel
The harder the everyday life, the monotony, the more responsible, the fuller the sacrifices and sacrifices, the stronger the need to change the environment, and the memory of beautiful experiences from previous travels and fantasizing about the future give hope and strength to endure.
One study on what people miss the most during a very limited life in this epidemic, which lasts more than a year, showed that these are trips. Even those who were suspicious of vaccines decided to get vaccinated so they could travel. The answer to the question why travel is so important to people is that it satisfies their numerous psychological and emotional needs.
Traveling somewhere means changing the environment and going from a normal routine to a different, better place. The harder the everyday life, the more monotony, the more responsible, the fuller the sacrifices and sacrifices, the stronger the need to change the environment. People can live frustrated for a while, but if it gets too long, then they either sink into lethargy and apathy or start to "burn out". Burnout syndrome manifests as loss of life energy, development of unconscious resistance to normal activities, lethargy and often turns into depression. A person who works from home for a year, who studies with children, takes care of old parents and who has no time for himself, neither for rest, nor for fun, lives in chronic stress and is prone to "burnout".
**Light at the end of the tunnel**
The part of us that suffers the most in these strong limitations is our "inner child" who has the need for freedom, play, fun and socializing with other people. One-year life according to the "house-work" or "work from home" system endangers our "inner child" who suffers frustration, who is stressed and who begins to "burn out". And the way it can defend itself from that is to remember beautiful experiences from previous trips or to fantasize about future trips. Those fantasies are the "light at the end of the tunnel" that gives hope and strength to endure.
Because of all that, there are many people who have decided to go to the sea or some other interesting destination at any cost this summer. Although much is uncertain, the decision is firm and it is just a question of how and how much price needs to be paid to make it happen. What is known from the research is that people look forward to traveling in advance, so that even eight weeks earlier than the day of the trip, they start to feel much better.
How much tourist travel is actually a great anti-stress program is best seen when people return from travel. Most feel rested, stating that they have much more life energy, that they are in better shape, that headaches and various back pains that are actually the result of chronic stress have stopped. According to various tests, people are happier and happier. We often hear that someone has "charged the batteries" and is ready for a new work cycle, and research shows that such people are more productive.
**Mental "reset"**
When someone goes on a trip, then everything is new and interesting for him there. This means that a person absorbs new stimuli, that new performances fill his mental currents, displacing the old ones that are related to obligations and worries. All this leads to the mental apparatus being "reset". This is also reflected in the emotions that are connected with the new environment: new landscapes, people, customs, food.
People who travel to different places more regularly become richer as personalities because they spread their knowledge about the world and people. St. Augustine said that the world is like a book, and that people who live constantly in one place read only one of its stations over and over again.
One of the strong arguments in favor of tourist travel is that they have a positive effect on health. For example, several studies have shown that people who go on vacation live longer and have a lower risk of cardiovascular disorders. Men who do not go on vacation for several years have a 30 percent higher risk of heart attack. In some cases, even one missed year can significantly increase the risk. Women who did not travel on vacation for six or more years were eight times more likely to develop some heart disease. So, traveling and changing environments are very good for the heart.
Travel and vacations are also good for those who have trouble sleeping and insomnia. In the second environment, the biorhythm returns to normal.
In the conditions of the epidemic, which has not been extinguished, travel is a nightmare for epidemiologists. We will soon find out what will be the result of this collision of a strong collective need for travel and the still present virus.
An infantile father
image source: nashipoezda
Infantilism is the immaturity, childishness and underdevelopment of the psyche.
An infantile person is a person dominated by inappropriate behavior, inability to take responsibility for their actions, inability to make independent decisions, lack of life goals, any aspirations.
This condition involves the presence of an adult in behavior and character, as well as in a child. Infantilism is quite common in the practice of psychologists, which leads to the appearance of other problems in an individual's life. A person can fight this manifestation, however, he will need constant work on himself.
**An infantile father**
Unwilling for a new role, he does not accept the change in the relationship brought about by the birth of a child, perceives the loss of a woman's attention and love as rejection and often reacts with jealousy.
When a woman gives birth to a child, she naturally turns to the baby and pays attention to it. It is a natural process because the mother enters into a symbiosis with the child, which means that she acts as if the child is a part of her personality. While during pregnancy the child was a part of her body, she, after giving birth, continues to act as if the child is a part of her, as a part of her Self. Psychic symbiosis means that the mother and the baby, that is, a small child, act as if they are a whole, as if they are one person. The intensive phase of symbiosis lasts until the child's third or fourth year.
An emotionally mature man accepts the symbiotic relationship between mother and child as something that is natural and takes care to satisfy the needs of both mother and child. If the husband was in the first place with the wife before the birth of the child in terms of her attention, now he accepts that the child is in the first place, and he is in the second place.
**Unconscious emotions**
Unlike an emotionally mature man, that is, a husband and father, an infantile man is unprepared for the role of father. He does not accept the change in the relationship brought about by the birth of a child. He perceives the woman's turning towards the child as a loss of her attention and love, as a rejection. That is why it is often that he reacts to the appearance of a child with jealousy. Instead of reacting like a father, he actually reacts like an older brother who now has to share love with a younger brother or sister.
An infantile father may be aware of this jealousy, but it may also be on an unconscious level. Here is an example of unconscious jealousy towards a child: after the birth of a child, the husband began to experience that the wife loved him less, which he explained to himself by saying that she certainly has a lover. After spying on her looking for who could be her lover, he began drowning his suffering in alcohol, which led to alcoholism and then to divorce.
The attitude of the infantile father towards the child is usually ambivalent, which means that he accepts the child on one level, while he does not accept and reject him on another. This is best seen in the reduced tolerance of the child's actions, so that he very quickly becomes irritated by the child's behavior, after which he either withdraws from communication or reacts verbally rudely and punishes the child inappropriately.
When we look at the way of raising a child by an infantile father, then we find elements of neglect of the child, but also occasional acts of abuse.
Another problem an infantile father has after a mother turns to a small child is boredom. While before the birth of the child, he enjoyed the relationship with his partner, because they practiced various forms of entertainment together, life with a woman facing a small child became extremely boring for him. Here is one example: after the birth of a child, the husband stopped leaving the house, moved to the couch, watched television and drank beer, believing that his presence in the house showed his wife solidarity. After a year, that led him to the conclusion that "marriage is not for him" and the request for divorce.
Most infantile fathers run away from boredom and start running away from home. Considering that the upbringing and education of a small child is a "woman's thing", they start going out on their own, having fun, sometimes with alcohol and drugs, often with other women. And this behavior leads to quarrels and often to divorce.
If an infantile father wants to divorce, mainly because he has found a new love, divorce is relatively unproblematic. But if his wife wants that, he feels rejected, which is why he protests violently and is stubborn. It is typical for her to threaten to take her children away from the court and to launch a campaign of denigrating a woman among friends and relatives.
**Good for fun, bad for marriage**
How does an infantile father treat a child after a divorce? At the time when he sees a child or behaves like an older brother who brings gifts and plays with the child or barely lasts an hour or two in company with the child, after which the child leads his parents who as grandparents actually take care of the child in his terms.
Infantile men are very fun and active, so they are a great choice for fun. But they are a bad choice for a serious relationship and marriage. Girls and young women often have the fantasy that an infantile man will mature emotionally when he gets married and has a child. Unfortunately, with rare exceptions, they do not change so quickly. Many need a decade to mature, and some never change. All this makes the divorce the most probable result of such a choice of a man.
Pi - new hope for crypto beginners or another scam?
A project about which I received a lot of questions in the previous months, mostly in the context of "does this make sense" and "can I earn something here". I have to say that, since I heard about Pi exclusively from people who are either relatively new or entering the world of cryptocurrencies for the first time, my first impression was that something was suspicious, because if the project was unequivocally good I would have heard about it earlier through channels that follow leading cryptocurrencies. But before we draw any conclusions, let's see what it's all about.
**"What is Pi"? "What is written on their website and in the white paper, and does what it says make sense?"**
One good starting point for analyzing a project, especially if you have some previous experience in early investing in crypto-projects, is their site. Home page - at first glance, everything looks great, especially with messages that say that Pi is a process of mining, ie. mining "easy" and that "revolutionary technology allows you to mine on your phone without draining the battery". At the very beginning, we see information that should be our first line flag if we approach investing in crypto in a responsible way, for the following reasons:
The process of mining, ie. mining, at least for the currently leading cryptocurrencies on the market such as Bitcoin (BTC) , is extremely energy demanding, primarily because the process is heavier in proportion to the number of participants in the mining process, who compete with their computers. mining machines in solving a mathematical problem on a blockchain on which miners. This means that the mining reward depends solely on the work invested (in the case of Bitcoin), and a participant in a system with more hardware power in its mining machine will complete the process of creating a new block of transactions faster, thus increasing its chances of being first and foremost. take the reward for creating a new blockchain block. In the case of the Pi network, the team promises "battery-free mining" which is not theoretically possible, as this would mean that the application does not participate in the standard mining process that serves to confirm, execute and write transactions between network participants because they do not exist. processes that would use the phone's processing power and consequently drain the battery. On the other hand, if you download the app to your phone and start "mining", you will start getting Pi coins on your digital wallet. How is this possible if there is actually no mining?
Pi coins were created in advance by the founders of the Pi network, ie. the team developing the project itself. Unlike Bitcoin, where new coins are created only when one of the miners invests a certain amount of work in order to process a certain amount of transactions on the network and create a new block, on the Pi network the coins are "mined", ie. created before the network itself was actually launched. With a little research - primarily Reddit and Quora in addition to the site and the white paper of the project itself - we can see that users are asked to open the application once every 24 hours and press a button to "confirm that they are human and not (ro) bot" - and that that is, the user allegedly "miners" Pi coins. In fact, every time the user presses a button, the Pi network takes the predicted amount from the pile of already existing Pi coins and assigns it to the user. Pi also does not currently have a blockchain implemented, but only a mobile application in which users click a button and receive Pi coins that are currently worthless and cannot be classified as a cryptocurrency. The development team - if we can call them that, since not much is written on this page about the project that has existed since 2019 - promises that one day they will actually implement Pi on the blockchain, specifically as a variant, that is. the so-called fork of Stellar XLM, and that it will then really assign users real Pi coins that would then really be a cryptocurrency in relation to how many "Pi coins" users have in the mobile application at that time.
The app itself serves commercials, and the entire Pi ecosystem currently looks like this:
A large number of users who probably think they have a Pi cryptocurrency that may one day have some value, when in fact they have virtual Pi coins in a mobile app.
A large number of advertisements that are served to a large number of users at least once a day when they open the application to click the required "mining button".
Revenue from serving advertisements to users that completely goes into the hands of the owner, ie "Development team" and is not shared in any way among users. On the other hand, legitimate decentralized systems that are currently successful in the market mainly share the network's earnings with the participants, ie. primarily to miners, at least in a certain percentage, since they actually process and execute transactions, and thus create value for other users and the entire network, and in return are adequately rewarded.
There are no transactions because there is no need for transactions because Pi coins, in addition to not actually existing yet, cannot be used for anything, nor is there any form of real or any other value for the user - except the promise that one day the Pi network get out of the test phase and launch the main net on which it is then possible to create Pi coins as a cryptocurrency that really exists, but the big question is whether and how much it will be worth when / if it really happens. And of course, there is no "breakthrough tech (which) allows you to mine on your phone without draining the battery" because we see that nothing happens in the process of "mining" that does not exist.
If we go a step further on the site and look at the business plan of the Pi project, which in the world of cryptocurrency is initially presented as a whitepaper or white paper under the newly adopted Law on Digital Property and should present the project in as much detail as possible, , primarily because of the way they form the narrative. It is also important to know that the Pi project does not appear practically anywhere in credible publications, portals, news, etc. from the world of cryptocurrencies, which in combination with my personal experience that I was mostly asked about Pi by people who do not have (too much) experience with crypto but have a desire to become part of that world shows that Pi mostly targets its marketing activities of people who are either completely inexperienced or have only recently been in the world of cryptocurrencies, because they can create a narrative that sounds very tempting but is essentially incomprehensible to someone who has little experience with cryptocurrencies and investing in cryptocurrencies. The idea that it is possible to become a part of the crypto-revolution without any cost to someone who does not know much but has a great desire to become a part and learn more about cryptocurrencies, this narrative of the Pi network sounds very tempting, and yet difficult to verify.
We don't even have to delve too much into Pi white paper - if you want it here - and we see at the beginning that the mission and vision of the project are poorly defined, that is. undefined, to use explanations with terms that sound very convincing to inexperienced users without any or with insufficient explanations, as well as quoting completely incorrect statements that support the Pi narrative - the best example of this is stating the fact that, since the total number of bitcoins is limited to 21,000,000 , there is not enough bitcoin for all people on the planet (~ 7,500,000,000) so due to that lack of supply one bitcoin is worth as much as it is worth. It is true that the limited amount of bitcoin is an important factor in shaping its price as well as its mining process, but the statement "there is not enough Bitcoin to go around" is extremely misleading because bitcoin is divisible to its eighth decimal, which means that the smallest part of bitcoin that someone can own 0.00000001 BTC or 1 Satoshi, and we clearly see that there is more than enough bitcoin for all the people on the planet if they want to buy all or part of bitcoin. To someone who doesn't know about the divisibility of bitcoin, this statement sounds a bit scary and further reinforces the well-known FOMO (fear of missing out) in the crypto-world. the feeling that they have to become a part of something as soon as possible because soon that opportunity (for potentially big profit with little or no work) will pass - in such a situation people invest their money, time or other resources in projects based on emotions and not rational thinking and preferably thorough analysis, and then the biggest mistakes and losses are made in investing in cryptocurrencies.
Another worrying factor of the Pi project is their referral system, ie. a way to expand the community and bring in new users. Namely, as far as I can see, the only way to become a part of the Pi network is to receive an invitation from one of the "verified" users, which means to log in to the network via a link from someone who is already a user. Although there is a strong emphasis in the narrative on the fact that "Pi's mission is to be inclusive as possible", it is unusual to restrict access to the application to users in this way. So, new users are forced to become part of another user's network, which is again part of another user's network because that's the only way he could get access to the application, and Pi looks more and more like one of the variants of the Ponzi / MLM / Pyramid scheme.
It is also important to note that this, as expected, reminded me of one of the most famous scams in the world of cryptocurrencies, which turned out to be an MLM scheme - One Coin, and on Reddit I came across a thread that discusses Pi and mentions it. a project that is relatively similar to the Pi network with a very similar working principle (and a different topic that is inherently dear to humans - bees) - Bee Network on bee.com.
***To make everything a little clearer let’s take a look at Bee.com for a moment***
*The problem is that the bee.com application collected, stored and sent data from users who installed it on their devices back to China, where the team that developed the Bee "network" is located. This includes information such as the user's GPS location, data that uniquely identifies the device, lists of all applications installed on the device, and other sensitive device and user data. To make matters worse, this information is sent via sockets with inadequate cryptography, which in practical terms means that it is very easy to intercept and read such data while traveling on the Internet. To make matters worse, the Bee app would do all this even if the user just installed it and never used it, or doesn't use it on a regular basis. A detailed report on the application's functionalities can be found here. This probably means that all this user data has been sold several times so far to various companies or groups of people around the world, without any consent or compensation of the users for their data, some of which are extremely sensitive.*
**Now that we know all this, what does it mean for the Pi network? Without investing in a direct comparison of the Pi and Bee platforms, the potential - and probably realistic and already existing - risks of using the Pi network and application are as follows:**
- In the best case, the Pi network and application are currently a project without a clear goal, and it really doesn't cost you anything to try, maybe one day Pi Coin will really be worth something. It is not impossible for Pi, even if it is a kind of fraud at the moment, to one day become a "legitimate" project, at least to a certain extent. In this sense, “legitimate” would mean that the platform actually has to offer some value (product or service) to users, as it does not currently exist as we have concluded.
- In order to become a "verified" user on the Pi network, as they say, and have access to inviting more people, higher rewards for "mining" and the like, it is necessary to go through a process called **know your customer, ie. KYC** - this usually involves sending documents (passport or ID card) in combination with a photo or video call to the service we use so that the service knows who we are, so that in the event of the arrival of a regulatory body in the country where the service is located they know who their users are, and are obliged to submit the same data on certain users at the valid request of regulatory bodies if there is a justifiable reason supported by the legal framework, such as the Law on Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing. This is a practice that is analogous to identification when opening a bank account, and is a normal practice for all legitimate crypto exchange offices and stock exchanges - i this process is called personal user verification. And that process makes sense because the crypto exchange or stock exchange is to a certain extent responsible for the services it offers to its users, that is. which users it offers, such as the bank and the standard FIAT exchange office on the street. And that is fine if the platform that performs such verification can offer the user several or many services that have a real value for him, which justifies the time spent for verification and providing sensitive personal data.
In the case of the Pi network, the user receives practically nothing (except for now fictitious Pi coins), and in return gives the company behind the Pi network a large amount of sensitive personal data, ie. everything that can be found in your passport or ID card. This kind of information is very valuable to different companies in different markets (white, gray, black and everyone in between) - of course, provided they really do, since we still don't have a report from a legitimate source as in the case of Bee Network, but red flags definitely exist. Even if this is not the case, the fact that the Pi network offers the user nothing but promises and requests personal data in return should be enough for most rational users to at least wait and see how the Pi network will develop before they become part of it, but it's hard when you feel like you're missing out on a potentially big profit in a short time doing practically nothing. Unfortunately, this is not the end of the data story, as personal data of this type can be even more valuable in combination with some other information, as in the case of the Bee network.
- We have seen what an application similar to the Pi network does on the device on which it is installed (Bee network). For now, there is no news that Pi is doing the same or something similar, but when it would work, why is it important for you as potential users? The amount and type of information collected in this way, continuously or periodically - your location, other applications you have on your phone, sensitive data such as your bank account or card stored in applications that another application can access (there are ways), unique identifier of your device and potentially much more - combined with your personal passport data they give an incredibly accurate picture of you as a consumer of various products and services, your habits and patterns of behavior that you may not be aware of and that affect your daily decision the question of where, how and when you will spend your money.
The information was literally (digital) gold worth to a large number of companies from around the world. Coincidentally, through its marketing activities (not through any value it actually offers on the market), Pi has become a project that is globally present, and thus potentially has such data packages for groups of people in countries around the world. The fact that the Bee network paid its bee.com domain $ 2.5M to make it look more credible is probably negligible compared to the earnings they made by selling their users ’data god ask who. Is this violation of privacy and trust of users, in addition to enriching the owners of the platform and sharing not the slightest part of the profit with users who are the only ones actually creating some value in the whole system and getting nothing in return worth promising that cryptocurrency may one day be worth something? Judge for yourself. In the case of the Pi network we don’t know if this is really happening, but even then I wouldn’t recommend using the app, at least until the project really proves itself in the market with a clear goal and starts creating real value for its users or at least until we have more transparent information about what is happening in the application and confirmation of whether the application collects any data that it should not.
**The conclusion of this story**
Finally, the current situation is this - you as users create value for the Pi network, the Pi network creates value for various companies that need behavioral and other data on user behavior in order to better sell them more products or services, and you as a user currently you get absolutely nothing but undefined promises about the future of Pi cryptocurrency. I personally did not install the app because for me who have decent experience investing in crypto and the ecosystem in general this is a very dubious story, and there are plenty of other coins and tokens that are legitimate and have the potential for rapid and / or great growth. Of course, they also carry their own risks, but these are the expected and real risks of cryptocurrency trading, and not the risks of various types of crypto fraud. On the other hand, maybe Pi as a project will one day find its way, create some value for users, actually legitimize itself in some way and then Pi as a cryptocurrency could actually be worth something - it is extremely unlikely that something like this will happen, but and weirder things were happening in the world of cryptocurrencies. If Pi turns out to be some kind of fraud, the biggest "loser" will be only the cryptocurrency market and the pace of mass acceptance of decentralized technologies such as blockchain, because one part of the new wave of people who wanted to really become part of the crypto revolution will have a bitter feeling. in the mouth, without actually entering the crypto world - because Pi, at least for now, is not a cryptocurrency.
Pseudoscience
By connecting the world and expanding the number of information and platforms that transmit it to us, we are witnessing an increasing number of false news and sensationalist announcements. All this is happening due to too much crowd in the information market, where too many platforms are trying to take as much space as possible. Sometimes sensations and fake news can be considered harmless and fun, but with the advent of the Covid virus, things have gotten pretty out of hand in some parts of the world.
Unfortunately, the complete situation regarding such performances cannot be a little funny or amusing, but extremely dangerous for the entire society and the human race itself.
What all these harmful performances and the promotion of wrong attitudes have in common is that everyone refers to science, but is that exactly the case and is it all exactly true? Of course it is not !! It is a classic replacement of theses and we can call it all by a common name, which is pseudoscience.
image source: Skeptical Cat
By the term "pseudoscience" we mean all those speculations that are "disguised" as science. This means that they use terms from science or even terms that do not exist in science but sound "scientific". The term is pejorative, and means something that mimics science, but is actually about opinions and practices that are not based on a scientific method or hypothesis testing, practices that are not backed by statistical indicators and that official science rejects.
Distinguishing science from pseudoscience is extremely important in everyday life - especially in the areas of health, environmental science and climate change, when testifying in court and in education. If decisions at the state level were made in accordance with pseudo-scientific claims, then our health would be based on alternative and healing practices, energy policy would be much simpler because we would produce energy by pseudo-scientific methods, and in schools we would learn that the Earth is a 6,000-year-old flat plate. years. Pseudoscience is a belief, but it is not a science.
**How to determine that something is science and something is pseudo-science: examine how the evidence was arrived at**
image source : library.earlham.edu
However, when we see that some such practices and opinions are breaking into the system, it is a sign that the system is weak, corrupt and rotten. All this is a sign that society is slowly slipping out of secular waters and falling into the abyss of dogma and pseudoscience. The system is so corrupt and health care is degraded so much that citizens are trying to find salvation in pseudo-scientific methods of treatment. There are advocates of pseudoscience in orderly countries and highly functional systems, but they are on the sidelines.
It should be noted that pseudoscience uses the vocabulary of science, including terms such as "scientific method", "experiment", "study", "proof", "argument", and even adds the name "science" to some teachings, such as "creationist science".
**So how do you distinguish pseudoscience from science?**
image source: Overgrow the system
Although proponents of various forms of pseudoscience may mention the scientific method and “studies” that have shown that their claims and beliefs are correct, the scientific method is something that is harder to falsify and imitate. To come up with an explanation in a scientific way involves several steps: observing the phenomenon, gathering information, creating a working and null hypothesis, creating an experiment (or other research tool, such as a survey), performing an experiment and drawing conclusions from experimental results.
The history of science remembers many intertwining of pseudoscience and science. Even some sciences arose from pseudosciences: astronomy arose from astrology, and chemistry / chemistry from alchemy / alchemy. However, most of the pseudo-practices were and remain that: charlatanry or just fun for the masses.
Personal data of 553 million Facebook users leaked. Are they yours too ?!
During the Cambridge Analytics scandal, 8 million personal data of Facebook social network users were sold. It calmed down a bit when we were greeted by something even worse - 553 million personal Facebook data were sold!
Namely, for this weekend, hackers posted personal data of 553 million Facebook users on one hacker forum for free. These data include telephone numbers, email addresses, name and surname, date of birth, location… of users from 106 countries. Specifically, 32 million users from the USA, 11 million from the UK and 6 million from India were hacked.
Security experts checked this data by comparing phone numbers with Facebook profile identification numbers on a single sample. They also confirmed by comparing the email address with the part of the phone number that appears when the user requests a password reset.
Facebook has not yet officially announced this problem, but we know that the data date from 2019.
"These are outdated data dating back to 2019. The problem was found and fixed in 2019, ”Liz Bourgeois from Facebook stated on her Twitter account.
Despite the fact that the data is outdated, for most users it is still valid and can be used for various malicious purposes.
**Has your data been leaked?**
To find out if your data was leaked in this (or any other) attack, follow these steps:
1. Go to haveibeenpwned.com
2. In the field in the middle of the screen, enter the email address or mobile number you use on Facebook
3. Press the "Pwned?" Key
You will now see all the databases where your email address or mobile number is located. These bases have been sold / leaked online from various attacks in the past. This service inserts these databases into its own so that users can check if they are in them.
**Note: "Have I been pwned" is a serious and transparent service. It does not store your data that you enter in that field on the site, it only compares it with the database.**
How look when you data is safe
And how look when your mail (and other data) is listed in some unwanted place
When you scroll down you can see where is you data listed
From this case it must be clear to us that no matter how much data has been protected, we see that unwanted things are happening. What we can do about the security of our data is that we have different access codes on each account and that we have active 2fa protection. In addition, we absolutely never click on the link that arrives in our mail, as well as do not open attachments, unless we have asked for them.
Steps in recognizing fake news and misinformation
So what is "fake news"?
It is any form of intentional dissemination of inaccurate information, very often for the purpose of harming the reputation of a person or institution or for the purpose of gaining a certain benefit, creating panic and causing confusion. Such news is usually of sensationalist headlines and content, dishonest, fabricated, and does not rely on facts. Often the headlines of such news items do not match the content, which seems to get readers "hooked" to click on the link and thus increase the number of page views (so-called "click-bit" headlines "). that is, fraud.
However, a big problem is propaganda articles, videos, news that spread panic among the population, and concern, say, medicine and science. Our entire civilization is based on the fact that scientific achievements, especially those used in medicine, are not lies, but work.
This type of propaganda is most often aimed at seriously ill people and their families, and at new parents who need to vaccinate all their children in order to protect them from certain infectious diseases that are not at all harmless. Thus, prescriptions for fake cancer drugs and various pseudo-scientific practices are spreading on the Internet, practices for which there is no evidence that they are effective or there is evidence that they are not effective. Some of them are expensive, while others are not so expensive, but they delay the patient's departure to the right doctors and the start of therapy. Steve Jobs thus believed in alternative therapies, and when he was forced, in the advanced stage of pancreatic cancer to go for the right therapy, then it was already too late.
Some of this news says that vaccines are unnecessary or even dangerous. Precisely because people have succumbed to this manipulation and propaganda, epidemics of diseases that we have not had for a long time are breaking out today, and the number of infected people is growing. Some of these diseases can have severe complications and be fatal. Sometimes the victims of these infections are quite young children. That is why we must approach the news carefully, which causes us to panic. Those who write such things count on our fear because fear is a very strong emotion.
Here's what we can do, I know it's not easy to take time for all this every time, but if something really interests us and is important in our lives, we should find time for all these steps.
1) Check the news source and the background of the source
2) Read the whole text and not just the title which may have been sensationally written
3) Check who the authors of the news are and whether those people even exist
4) If additional sources and links are offered, take the time to check them out, you will be surprised how many times the links offered have nothing to do with what you are reading about in the article
5) Check to see if this might be a satirical site
6) Always reconsider your views and opinions, having an opinion on something does not mean you are right
7) Check the date of the news, events that happened a long time ago are often used to spread misinformation
8) Always consult with experts, but the right one for the area you are interested in, popular people on social networks are not the right address for that
Peter Pan Syndrome
Although this term was introduced into the professional literature back in 1983
for men who never really grew up, but remained eternal boys, it seems that it is
even more relevant today.
As is well known, Peter Pan is a boy who never grew up. He lived in the country of
Never Never Land, where it was possible, and where he led a group of "lost boys". Because
of his characteristics, the "Peter Pan syndrome" was created, which describes men
who have never really grown up, who have remained eternal boys. Although this
syndrome was introduced into the literature in 1983, it seems that today there are
more and more men whose behavior deserves to be classified in this syndrome.
Why are more and more men unwilling to grow up? For the same reason that women do
not want to grow up, and that is because they have a negative image of adulthood.
When they enter those years in which they should both grow emotionally and, for
example, enter into serious relationships and accept responsibility for starting a
family, they retreat, withdraw, and continue to behave at a “younger” emotional
and social level.
**An idea of adulthood**
Children and young people get an idea of adulthood by observing parents and the
older generation. Seen through the eyes of a child, adulthood is not attractive at
all. Parents work a lot, they are constantly in obligations, duties, they have
little or no fun, especially if they give up a lot or sacrifice in order to make
their children as comfortable as possible and to make them as happy as possible.
If parents try to make the child have a happier childhood, fairytale and magic,
then the difference between childhood and adulthood is very large and frightening
for a young person. That is why she wants to prolong her "childhood" as long as
possible and to become an adult as late as possible, if possible.
When a young person does not want a parent of the same sex to be a role model, she
looks for role models elsewhere. The largest selection of new models is offered by
various media: films, television, literature. It is the media that are full of
various "new male stereotypes" that, despite their age, offer a youthful lifestyle
that abounds in entertainment, hedonism, individualism and an unconventional
lifestyle. Wealth, fame and power are offered as ideals. The role models are
usually individuals without a family and children, without people to whom they are
emotionally attached, with whom they are in a relationship of love.Even when these
role models are presented as heroes who enter risky situations to save others,
these others are often some abstract community, and by no means, for example, a
family.
When there are more and more real people in the generation who live according to
the principle of Peter Pan, then such behavior becomes the generational norm, that
is, normal behavior "because others live that way" and "what they lack". Then, the
role models are no longer just characters from the screen, but specific people who
"revived" the life scenarios they saw in the media.
Each person carries within himself that part of the personality that we call the
"inner child", that is, the self as it was in childhood. From this inner "free
child" spring desires, play, wit, fun and creativity - in a word: life energy. We
say that a person is not old as long as he raises this child in himself. But it’s
all a matter of proportion and balance. When this child becomes the dominant part
of the personality, then it is not an adult who knows how to have fun, but a
childish, infantile "adult".It is an adult with a child mentality: irresponsible
to himself and others; in a position of dependence on a parent or “parent”;
preoccupied with fun and pleasures; egocentric and without developed empathy for
others; without work and other habits.
**Negative character**
Although the character of Peter Pan is mostly known from Disney's cartoon, it is
only a modified version of the original character created by the Scottish writer
J. at the beginning of the 20th century. M. Bari. It is interesting that in the
first versions, Peter Pan was portrayed as a negative character, and that in the
Disney version from 1953, he was presented as a positive character. That change
probably reflected the "spirit of the times" and the new attitude towards
childhood and adulthood.
The Disney version offered a character that children could better identify with
and wish they never grew up and never left their comfortable childhood. Peter Pan
syndrome was defined in 1983 by Dan Kylie in the book of the same name, with the
subtitle: About men who never grow up. It seems that this book is more relevant
today than it was forty years ago when it was written.
Because of all the above, it is important to recognize men who have this syndrome,
and not only the obvious ones, but also the hidden infantile ones that hide behind
the mask of adulthood.
Negotiation skills
The goal is for a person to achieve their goals as much as possible with someone else's consent. The goal is not for one side to get everything and the other for nothing, but both sides should be satisfied
The more skilled someone is in what we call negotiation, or more precisely negotiation, the better relationships they will have with other people. Every time a conflict of interest or desire arises between two or more people, the need to negotiate arises. That is why people who negotiate skillfully actually resolve conflicts with other people better and reach agreements better.
Negotiation is not the same as persuasion. When someone persuades another to do something, that something may or may not be good for the other. In persuasion, there is a vertical relationship in which the persuader takes a higher position of someone who knows better, while the persuaded party has a lower position of the one who does not know. In negotiating or negotiating, both parties have an equal position.
**Traps of blackmail and extortion**
The metaphor for negotiation is bargaining in the markets. In the sales relationship, the buyer wants to buy at the lowest possible price, and the seller wants to sell at the highest possible price. The result of bargaining is the price that is acceptable to both the buyer and the seller. Today, in the time of fixed prices, bargaining is considered to be something that is unworthy and that is why many do not learn the skill of bargaining. Those who are not ashamed to ask: Can you give me a better price, often really get a better price. When children haggle over the exchange of toys or pictures, they learn about other children, their motivation and their ability to influence others, which will be useful to them in later life.
Although many associate negotiation with the activity of business people or politicians, it is much more present in everyday life: with a partner, children, friends. The better someone is at negotiating, the less aggressive he is when others refuse to fulfill his wishes. Therefore, developing negotiation skills is considered a good way to reduce peer violence.
The goal of negotiation is for a person to achieve their goals as much as possible with someone else's consent. The goal is not for one side to get everything and the other for nothing, but the goal is for both sides to be satisfied. This is reflected in the words "bargain" and "settlement", in which the root is "bargain", that is, to be satisfied with the result of the agreement. A good result of negotiations is a solution in which both sides have the feeling that they have won, that they have done well or at least that they have not lost.
A skilled negotiator knows well which result suits him, but he tries to convince the other side why it is good for her to agree to the solution he offers. He does not wait for the other side to decide for himself what is best for him, but during the negotiations he tries to direct its mental flows by presenting his proposal as something that is in the best interest of the other side. Negotiating flexibility is important, which helps him offer the other party something extra that would satisfy him.
There is a difference between blackmail and negotiation. Blackmailing someone means influencing them to accept the price that does not suit them and that they do not really want to agree to. In that sense, emotional blackmail or, more precisely, extortion is typical. To extort means to force someone to offer what they do not want to offer. A typical form of emotional extortion is intimidation. For example, an older child says to a younger child: If you don't give me that toy, I will tell my mother that you got a deuce at school on Wednesday. The fear of the younger child to be revealed to his mother additionally motivates him to give a toy that he would not otherwise give. As it exists between children, so there are various forms of emotional extortion between adults: rejection, ignoring, accusing and provoking feelings of guilt, duty, etc.
**Maximum and minimum requirements**
A skilled negotiator prepares for negotiations with other people. The first thing he does is agree with himself on his negotiating position. Basically, it comes down to determining its maximum and minimum requirements - the lower limit below which it does not agree to the agreement. One of the founders of the "Harvard School of Negotiation", William Yuri, in his book "How to Negotiate with Yourself and Others", points out that an agreement with oneself is the first step in successful negotiations with others.
Negotiation skills are social skills. This means that a good negotiator has neither the fear nor the shame of starting to communicate with others. He approaches others, clearly says what he wants and what he is ready to offer in return.
Fall in love, benefit or harm ?
One of the most beautiful feelings has a dark side: it is a source of strong suffering, feelings of rejection, jealousy, desire for death and all kinds of tragedies.
**Dangerous idealization**
Today, there is Valentine's Day, which is celebrated globally, but which no one knows exactly when it originated (probably in England in the 16th century), nor on which St. Valentine's Day is referred. Despite that, the masses celebrate falling in love. Today, falling in love is considered one of the most beautiful feelings - a form of great happiness in life.
Infatuation also has its dark side: forbidden infatuation, as well as unrequited infatuation, which is a source of strong suffering, feelings of rejection, jealousy, desire for death and all kinds of tragedies.
Falling in love is also a temptation. Those who are busy, who are in a serious relationship or marriage are also falling in love. Those who are in unsatisfactory marriages will probably go with the person they fell in love with. But for those who are in satisfying relationships and marriages, falling in love with a third party causes a serious internal conflict: to enter into something new and uncertain, or to stay in what is known and good enough.
It is interesting that in this internal struggle, the part of the person in love does not win as often as one might expect. There are a large number of those who decide to stay in a relationship or marriage and reject their infatuation. Then the problem arises how to end this unwanted infatuation: how to stop thinking about a given person often, how to stop imagining how life could have been with her, how not to follow what is happening in her life on social networks?
In order for a person in love to "fall out of love", they must first understand the feeling of being in love. This feeling is based on the psychic mechanism of idealization. It simply means that only those people who believe that there is an ideal partner with whom they will be happy for the rest of their lives can fall in love. Those who don't believe in it just can't fall in love.
**Disappointment in the end**
As there are no ideal partners in reality, falling in love, as a rule, does not lead to love, but, when idealization stops, to greater or lesser disappointment. So previously enchanted and enchanted, they eventually become disappointed.
We often hear from a person in love that "chemistry" has happened or that they are not choosing, but choosing their "heart". In fact, she only follows her unconscious processes which, based on unknown criteria, chose the "right person" for her. The type of person someone falls in love with speaks more about the person in love than about those they choose. That's why it's good to know why someone falls in love with that type of person. Thus, a person gets to know himself and neutralizes the influence of his unconscious part of the personality on the choice of a partner.
Not only is it not accidental why someone falls in love with a certain type of person, but it is also not accidental why a person fell in love at that very moment in their life. Although such people are satisfied with the relationships and marriages in which they find themselves, they are often actually "hungry" for fun, excitement, passion, something new that is different from the routine in which they find themselves.
In the case of unwanted falling in love, one should not fall into the trap of a person believing that falling in love with a third party is "proof" that he no longer loves the other. Infatuation and love are two different feelings according to their psychic mechanisms, and that is why it is possible to be in love with one person and to love another person. Many of those who struggle with unwanted infatuation know this intuitively and therefore stay with those they love.
Emotional knots on our life line
They diminish the life energy of a person who carries painful memories from childhood and youth, such as various accidents, failures, rejections, betrayals, disappointments and breakups, which are associated with anger, shame, fear, anxiety, inferiority, jealousy, disappointment and therefore we must do our best to unravel them as best we can
Trans action analysis went a step further because it claims that every adult carries his "inner child", as well as that that child, based on his experiences and messages received from his parents, creates a kind of scenario for his future life. However, there are many examples that someone had a terrible childhood and grew into a positive person. In other words, one's unfavorable past has an impact, but it is by no means the direct cause nor is it a justification for one's negative traits. The negative events that someone has experienced in their past are not as important as the distorted conclusions that a given person has drawn from these experiences.
It is these conclusions about oneself, others and the world, which the person "learned" that serve as the rules by which he later lives. When during adult life people reject conclusions that they are convinced are wrong, and replace them with correct ones, then their unfavorable past ceases to define them as persons.
**Life line**
Anyone who looks back and looks at the line of their past life can recognize various events and situations in which they felt bad. These can be accidents, failures, rejections, betrayals, disappointments, breakups, divorces, etc. Each of these situations is associated with some unpleasant feeling: anger, shame, fear, anxiety, feelings of inferiority, jealousy, disappointment, etc. That is why each of these painful memories creates a kind of "emotional knot" on the line of life.
As emotions are a kind of psychic energy - the name comes from lat. e- and movere, which means "to start" - each of these nodes binds to itself a certain energy which it takes away from the life energy or elan of a given person. Therefore, the more of these emotional nodes there are in one’s past, the less vital life a person has.
In the depths of the psyche, these emotional nodes function as psychic complexes. Each complex is composed of a certain belief and emotional charge. Complexes make everyday life difficult by being activated every time something similar to the contents of the complex appears in modern life. The resemblance reminds a person of the past, the emotional charge from the past is released, and his reaction to the present becomes either too intense or inappropriate in some other way. Whether we interpret this as a psychic projection or a regression of a person into some past state, complexes interfere with functioning in the present.
As emotional nodes bind and distract life energy and obscure the view of reality, they are something that should be prevented or, if created, untangled.
The best way to prevent the formation of these emotional knots is to talk to other close people. Unpleasant feelings focus the awareness on the problem, due to which the one who experiences them loses the breadth and depth of perceiving the problem. Others are there for the person to "digest" the given situation with them, to look at it wider and deeper, not to attach too much importance to it. One can learn something useful from every negative situation, but this new knowledge must not be such as to limit or narrow the choices in new life situations.
All this is especially true for children. Parents, by the nature of things, know their children well and can notice that the child feels bad, that something is bothering him. Their task is then to find out what is bothering the child and to use their knowledge and adult thinking to help him "digest" the given situation so that an emotional knot does not form.
**Conversation helps**
When it comes to adults who have emotional knots, it is always best to talk to someone professional. Psychotherapy is not only for the disturbed, but also for people who take care of mental hygiene. Talking to a counselor or a competent coach has the same effect. By turning his experiences into words, a person begins to think much more clearly about painful memories.
If there is no good interlocutor, the person can help himself. By returning and re-examining their emotional nodes from the past, a person can look at them in a new way, wider and deeper, and thus take away their importance, thus reducing the energy of the "captured" emotion. This is what is called "working on yourself". All those who are tormented by occasional memories of events that are older than a year and a half, should focus on resolving their emotional knots.
@milanlukic
