tagged w/ UC Berkeley
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The Bay area has a long history of protest. At 1960s UC Berkeley, Vietnam war opponents started as idealistic, flowers in your hair protestors who morphed into building grabbers. Next door, the hard-scrabble neighborhoods of East Oakland are the perfect breeding ground for discontent. It's the right place for the Occupy movement to set up tents. Plenty of people with grievances and lots of rich people to snub. But, Occupy Oakland has a dark side.The Bay area has a long history of protest. At 1960s UC Berkeley, Vietnam war... more
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On November 15th, a man who was brandishing a gun was shot and killed at the Haas School of Business Building at UC Berkeley. This happened during the Occupy Cal protest, which was taking place on campus at the same time but was unrelated to the isolated shooting. According to a UC Berkeley Police report the man appeared to be troubled; family and friends also noticed that the victim’s behavior had changed. According to Captain Margo Bennett of the university police department no one can account for the sudden change of behavior.On November 15th, a man who was brandishing a gun was shot and killed at the Haas... more
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The move away from traditional VCs to Angels features strongly in talk about startup investment. So this seemingly contrary view from the very heart of Silicon Valley is intriguingThe move away from traditional VCs to Angels features strongly in talk about startup... more
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Scientists capture antimatter atoms in particle breakthrough
By Thair Shaikh, CNN
November 18, 2010 12:21 p.m. EST
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
* Antihydrogen atoms were trapped in a magnetic field
* Matter and antimatter annihilate each other on contact
* "It's taken us five years to get here," says Professor Jeffrey Hangst
* CERN's next ambition is to create a beam of antimatter
(CNN) -- Scientists have captured antimatter atoms for the first time, a breakthrough that could eventually help us to understand the nature and origins of the universe.
Researchers at CERN, the Geneva-based particle physics laboratory, have managed to confine single antihydrogen atoms in a magnetic trap.
This will allow them to conduct a more detailed study of antihydrogen, which will in turn allow scientists to compare matter and antimatter.
Understanding antimatter is one of the biggest challenges facing science -- most theoretical physicists and cosmologists believe that at the Big Bang, when the universe was created, matter and antimatter were produced in equal amounts.
However, as our world is made up of matter, antimatter seems to have disappeared.
Understanding antimatter could shed light on why almost everything in the known universe consists of matter.
Antimatter has been very difficult to handle because matter and antimatter don't get on, destroying each other instantly on contact in a violent flash of energy.
It's taken us five years to get here, this is a big milestone
--Professor Jeffrey Hangst
In a precursor to today's experiment, in 2002 scientists at CERN produced antihydrogen atoms in large quantities, but they had an incredibly short lifespan -- just several milliseconds -- because the antihydrogen came into contact with the walls of their containers and the two annihilated each other.
In this latest experiment the lifespan of the antihydrogen atoms was extended by using magnetic fields to trap them and thus prevent them from coming into contact with matter.
The researchers created 38 antihydrogen atoms and held on to them for about a tenth of a second, which is long enough to study them says Professor Jeffrey Hangst, one of the team of CERN scientists who worked on the program.
Hangst and his colleagues produced a magnet field which was strongest near the walls of the trap, falling to a minimum at the center, causing the atoms to collect there in a vacuum.
"We could have held them for much longer... I am just full of joy and relief, it's taken us five years to get here, this is a big milestone," Hangst told CNN.
To trap just 38 atoms, they had to run the experiment 335 times, says Nature which published the report findings.
Hangst added: "This was ten thousand times more difficult than creating untrapped antihydrogen atoms.
"This will help us understand the structure of space and time. For reasons that no one yet understands, nature ruled out antimatter... this inspires us to work that much harder to see if antimatter holds some secret."
Malcolm Longair, professor of natural philosophy at Cambridge University, told CNN that CERN's results were a considerable achievement.
"At the Big Bang we believe the temperatures were very very high and we understand in theory why antimatter disappeared but there is no physical theory to back it up."
Antimatter was first predicted in 1931 by the British physicist Paul Dirac, who theorized that antimatter is ordinary matter in reverse.
CERN's next ambition is to create a beam of antimatter which they hope will allow them to unpeel more of the mysteries surrounding it.Scientists capture antimatter atoms in particle breakthrough
By Thair Shaikh, CNN... more
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BERKELEY -- Demonstrators are planning a protest today as the UC Berkeley law school professor who gave legal sanction to the Bush administration's views on torture returns to the classroom for the new semester.
The Boalt Hall School of Law class schedule lists courses, such as constitutional law, to be taught by John Yoo. Protesters have challenged Yoo's presence on campus because of legal memos he wrote that were instrumental in the development of military and CIA interrogation techniques that some consider to be torture.
Activist Cindy Sheehan, CodePink's Medea Benjamin and several attorneys will speak to the press, demanding that Yoo be removed from his teaching post, disbarred and prosecuted on war crimes charges. Speakers will announce upcoming events to pursue their demands during the school year, including a week of protests and events in October.
Yoo has said that the Bush administration did not authorize torture and that he did not consider waterboarding torture.
The news conference will be held at noon on the Boalt Hall School of Law steps near Bancroft Way and College Avenue in Berkeley. A procession will follow around 12:30.
http://www.mercurynews.com/breaking-news/ci_15794110?nclick_check=1
http://www.zombietime.com/zomblog/wp-content/images/IMG_3073.JPGBERKELEY -- Demonstrators are planning a protest today as the UC Berkeley law school... more
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UC Berkeley is adding something a little different this year in its welcome package -- cotton swabs for a DNA sample.
In the past, incoming freshman and transfer students have received a rather typical welcome book from the College of Letters and Science's "On the Same Page" program, but this year the students will be asked for more.
The students will be asked to voluntarily submit a DNA sample. The cotton swabs will come with two bar code labels. One label will be put on the DNA sample and the other is kept for the students own records.
The confidential process is being overseen by Jasper Rine, a campus professor of Genetics and Development Biology, who says the test results will help students make decisions about their diet and lifestyle.
Once the DNA sample is sent in and tested, it will show the student’s ability to tolerate alcohol, absorb folic acid and metabolize lactose.
The results of the test will be put in a secure online database where students will be able to retrieve their results by using their bar code.
Rine hopes that this will excite students to be more hands-on with their college experience.
(more @ link)UC Berkeley is adding something a little different this year in its welcome package --... more
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This is a guest post from Dan Ucko. He is formerly an intern for Vanguard and blogs at blog.plugintodan.com. He graduated from Cal Poly Pomona in 2009.
Finally: a step in the right direction toward bringing public higher education in California out of the gutter.
The Governator last week proposed significant legislation calling for a reshaping of priorities, so that California will "never again" spend more on prison uniforms than on caps and gowns.
It will not alleviate the sunshine state's education crisis immediately. But as long as we’re spending more on kids than criminals, we can all sleep a little better at night. Right?
Cuts to public education in this state have caused both outrage and outcry -- near riots at UCLA, "Save the CSU" protest rallies in Long Beach.
No one likes paying more for less, yet that's exactly what many of California's college students have been faced with in the last year.
A former Cal State student myself, I managed to escape (graduate) just as things went south. But I can't imagine what my friends and former classmates are experiencing right now.
So much for paving the way for future generations, eh?
California's public universities have been giving students and teachers fewer days of school to save precious funding through "furlough days."
All this while cutting programs, increasing class sizes and raising tuition as much as 15 to 35 percent.
Today’s students are now burdened with a whole new set of pressures.
And I’m not talking about final exams.
Living on your own? Finding a career? Paying off student loans?
Naw. How about making sure the courses you need to graduate are still being offered? Unlucky freshmen may even find their majors dissolved before they make it to upper division.
Skeptics will write this off as too little too late. But at this point, almost anything is a good thing.
Keep it coming Arnold.
A few links:
Reshaping Priorities from Prisons to Universities (PDF)
Latest state info: http://gov.ca.gov/
Join the California Education Crisis group on Current.
Recently on the Current News Blog:
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- Malaysian firebombings over Allah use
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- UN: Sri Lanka video is evidence of extra-judicial killing
- Christmas, Drug Wars and Juarez - guest post by: Jeff AntebiThis is a guest post from Dan Ucko. He is formerly an intern for Vanguard and blogs at... more
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One of the great things about how Current.com works is that if you seea theme in a set of stories, you can make a group out of them. This new group started by JonRaymond is a great example: Education Crisis. The group has a compilation of articles and videos from the recent strikes and protests against fee hikes in the California state university system. Things were particularly bad at UCLA, where a majority of the videos come from.
Near Riots At UCLA Over Proposed Tuition Hike
Students ended their protest on Friday, but many said their fight against a 32% hike in fees was not yet over. In the Bay Area yesterday, students demanded an audience with the President of the UC system and while they didn't get it, it does look like an investigation into allegations of police brutality at Friday's Berkeley protest will take place.
To follow this story as it develops - join JonRaymond's Education Crisis group. Kudos Jon!
Recently on the Current News Blog:
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- Who killed 30 people in the Philippines?
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- Poll: GOP voters think ACORN stole election for ObamaOne of the great things about how Current.com works is that if you seea theme in a... more
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"Corporate Water-Boarding Services" >> http://ow.ly/18wV0
The Truth shall set us all Free
The act of "Water-Boarding" has been ruled on by Bush and Cheney's legal lap-dogs ** "John C. Yoo and Jay S. Bybee" as safe & humane technique for man woman & child.... So because of these legal lap dogs personal subversion of legal argument and the fabric of law, Now, Water-Boarding is 100% Legal in the USA.
This currently being the case... As entrepreneurs, we all need to take a good look at this new business model. As entrepreneurs, it is our responsibility to take this business model to the next level. Our objective is to bring water-boarding back home to the American People and make it a viable profitable business and most of all.... make it assessable to all citizens!
As I discovered first hand.... "The Judicial System is Corrupt to the Core. Today... we have the best justice money can buy. Because of corporate legal corruption, our right to justice is either... not administered equally or, with a wink and a nod... denied altogether. ( As it was in my case. http://ow.ly/13Hy8 )
By design... our right to justice was stolen from us. We have lost "equal justice under the law". Currently our legal system doesn't work for the little guy anymore, only for the corporate lawyers.
Because of that, I now am now open to try something new, something to balance the scales of justice. Something exciting and something ruled by the US Justice Department as safe and legal.
There is a saying where I come from. "Give people enough rope to hang themselves." So, in our case... with Water-Boarding... We can now legally give people enough water... to make them drink their own words!
At this point, I would like to welcome you to a new and exciting business model...
"Corporate Water-Boarding Services" >> http://ow.ly/18wV0
** http://current.com/18l8s4c
."Corporate Water-Boarding Services" >> http://ow.ly/18wV0
The... more
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Jon Stewart's interview with Bush's former Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Yoo, about his book "Crisis and Command" was an uncomfortable one. It was a fascinating fencing match between the two: Stewart seemed uncharacteristically stymied, while Yoo retreated into legal hairsplitting. Stewart's argument was that Bush had been asking his Attorney General's staff for a new definition of torture, one that gave the government broader powers in recruiting methods for questioning suspected terrorists. Yoo countered that he was simply interpreting treaties and the Constitution to show the legal extent to which the American government could go in pressing suspected terrorists for answers. The interview that aired last night was edited down, but the entire piece is now available online.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/01/12/jon-stewart-questions-joh_n_419754.htmlJon Stewart's interview with Bush's former Deputy Assistant Attorney General... more
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This is a guest post from Dan Ucko. He is formerly an intern for Vanguard and blogs at blog.plugintodan.com. He graduated from Cal Poly Pomona in 2009.
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Finally: a step in the right direction toward bringing public higher education in California out of the gutter.
The Governator last week proposed significant legislation calling for a reshaping of priorities, so that California will "never again" spend more on prison uniforms than on caps and gowns.
It will not alleviate the sunshine state's education crisis immediately. But as long as we’re spending more on kids than criminals, we can all sleep a little better at night. Right?
Cuts to public education in this state have caused both outrage and outcry -- near riots at UCLA, "Save the CSU" protest rallies in Long Beach.
No one likes paying more for less, yet that's exactly what many of California's college students have been faced with in the last year.
A former Cal State student myself, I managed to escape (graduate) just as things went south. But I can't imagine what my friends and former classmates are experiencing right now.
So much for paving the way for future generations, eh?
California's public universities have been giving students and teachers fewer days of school to save precious funding through "furlough days."
All this while cutting programs, increasing class sizes and raising tuition as much as 15 to 35 percent.
Today’s students are now burdened with a whole new set of pressures.
And I’m not talking about final exams.
Living on your own? Finding a career? Paying off student loans?
Naw. How about making sure the courses you need to graduate are still being offered? Unlucky freshmen may even find their majors dissolved before they make it to upper division.
Skeptics will write this off as too little too late. But at this point, almost anything is a good thing.
Keep it coming Arnold.
A few links:
Reshaping Priorities from Prisons to Universities (PDF)
Latest state info: http://gov.ca.gov/
Join the California Education Crisis group on Current.This is a guest post from Dan Ucko. He is formerly an intern for Vanguard and blogs at... more
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“Regardless of what one thinks about the events of last night, the minor vandalism that occurred cannot be viewed outside the context of the physical violence inflicted by police on student activists and the broader assault on public education,” said Callie Maidhof, a student organizer with Live Week.
“When everyone is running, you don’t think that clearly. My friends and I were trying to leave because things were getting out of hand,” said Jobert Poblete, a Cal alumni who participated in the march.
“They were simply at the wrong place at the wrong time,” said a student who observed the chaos when police arrived at the chancellor’s house and declined to give their name. “Not all of the protesters were students at Cal – but the issue here is larger than tuition hikes anyway. It’s about the state of public education and neoliberalism in the US and abroad.”
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/12/13/BASN1B3D59.DTL
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger condemned the attack Saturday as a form of terrorism.
"California will not tolerate any type of terrorism against any leaders, including educators," Schwarzenegger said. "The attack on Chancellor Birgeneau's home is a criminal act and those who participated will be prosecuted under the fullest extent of the law."
http://liveweek.net/?p=69“Regardless of what one thinks about the events of last night, the minor... more
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http://liveweek.net/?p=52
This morning, on the fifth and final day of a weeklong “Open University” held at UC Berkeley’s Wheeler Hall, University of California Police stormed into the building around 5am, arresting 65 people without provocation, witnesses said.
“People were not given a final warning – police burst in while people were sleeping and immediately started locking doors and arresting people. Many students have papers due today, and finals to take starting tomorrow,” said Elias Martinez, an undergraduate from Political Science. “There had been cops in here all week, they were acting like it was okay. We had no idea.”
Students and faculty supporters who gathered on the scene shortly after raid alerts went out say they saw the students, some of them without shoes and wearing only their underwear, being loaded onto Alameda County Sheriff’s buses headed to Santa Rita Jail in Dublin.
“We’ll be shuttling people out there all day on caravans to do jail support and camp out there until the protesters are released,” said Melissa Barker, an undergraduate of Interdisciplinary Studies and parent. “The fact that the cops drove 65 people all the way to Dublin makes me think that the charges will be way more than misdemeanor trespassing. We’re worried, but we’ll do everything it takes to support our folks. We’ll be there all weekend if it takes.”
Students have been holding public events, including teach-ins on the UC budget, study-ins, and live music shows as part of a “Live Week” of Open University events since Monday.
http://liveweek.net/?p=52http://liveweek.net/?p=52
This morning, on the fifth and final day of a weeklong... more
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The University of California at Berkeley is being sued for statements on their Understanding Evolution Web site that some religious beliefs contradict science–like the idea that the Earth and living things were finished up in six days. The plaintiffs argue that a government-funded state university cannot claim that “some religious denominations are better than others,” though I certainly can’t find anyplace where Berkeley does so.
Can they be serious, this a University of California and they are still trying to debunk evolution!
I suppose next under the gun will be NASA for its estimate that the universe is 13.7 billion years old, or the US Geological Survey for finding the age of the Earth to be a potentially unholy 4.5 billion years…The University of California at Berkeley is being sued for statements on their... more
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One of the great things about how Current works is that if you seea theme in a set of stories, you can make a group out of them. This new group started by JonRaymond is a great example: Education Crisis. The group has a compilation of articles and videos from the recent strikes and protests against fee hikes in the California state university system. Things were particularly bad at UCLA, where a majority of the videos come from.
Students ended their protest on Friday, but many said their fight against a 32% hike in fees was not yet over. In the Bay Area yesterday, students demanded an audience with the President of the UC system and while they didn't get it, it does look like an investigation into allegations of police brutality at Friday's Berkeley protest will take place.
To follow this story as it develops - join JonRaymond's Education Crisis group. Kudos Jon!
FROM THE NEWS BLOG: http://blogs.current.com/news/2009/11/24/californias-education-crisis-join-the-group-on-current/
EDUCATION CRISIS GROUP: http://current.com/groups/education-crisis/
IMAGE: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2009/11/24/BAQ71AP9IO.DTL&object=%2Fc%2Fpictures%2F2009%2F11%2F23%2Fba-UC24_la074_0500878733.jpg
(From the Monday demonstration)One of the great things about how Current works is that if you seea theme in a set of... more
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Students barricaded themselves inside the English Department at Wheeler Hall. The UC regents, on Thursday in Los Angeles, voted 20-1 to raise undergraduate tuition from $7,788 to $10,302 next fall, a 32% tuition hike with a midyear increase of 15 percent starting in January.
Raw Video: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/object/article?f=/c/a/2009/11/20/BA611ANSAB.DTL&o=11
Story: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/11/20/BA611ANSAB.DTL&tsp=1Students barricaded themselves inside the English Department at Wheeler Hall. The UC... more
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After the UC Regents approved the 32% hike in tuition fees yesterday, Berkeley students are taking action:"About 50 to 100 student demonstrators have taken over Wheeler Hall, a major building on the UC Berkeley campus, in protest of Thursday's 32 percent student fee increase passed by the UC Board of Regents.
Two students were arrested this morning at around 6 a.m., said Will Heegaard, a sophomore peace and conflict studies major and one of the protest's organizers. He said one of their immediate demands is for the police to free those students, and for the campus to rehire the janitors who were fired this school year. UCPD could not be reached for comment.
Heegaard, 19, said that he and others moved into the building shortly after 9 p.m. Thursday night, using ropes, a car ratchet and other gear. Calling from his cell phone at around 9:30 a.m. Friday, he said that the police's attempts to enter the ground floor, using wedges and crowbars, had forced the demonstrators to move to the second floor of the building...." A live blog of the event can be followed here at dailycal.org
http://www.dailycal.org/article/107611/protesters_in_wheeler_hall_say_activists_are_stayiAfter the UC Regents approved the 32% hike in tuition fees yesterday, Berkeley... more
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UC Berkeley measurements show increased seismic activity on the San Andreas Fault after 2004 Sumatra EarthquakeUC Berkeley measurements show increased seismic activity on the San Andreas Fault... more
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San Francisco (CA) - Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang has predicted that GPU computing will experience a rapid performance boost over the next six years. According to Huang, GPU compute is likely to increase its current capabilities by 570x, while 'pure' CPU performance will progress by a limited 3x.
Huang - who made his comments at the Hot Chips symposium in Stanford University - explained that such advances could enable the development of realtime universal language translation devices and advanced forms of augmented reality.
Huang also discussed a number of "real-world" GPU applications, including energy exploration, interactive ray tracing and CGI simulations.
NVIDIA GPU ray tracing
In addition, Jen-Hsun fielded a number of questions at the end of the keynote speech, including a query submitted by Professor David Patterson of UC Berkley. Patterson asked if the CEO would still partition the CPU and GPU into separate chips if he had to "do it all over again."
Huang answered that there were three primary constituents: programmers, OEMs/ODMs and chip designers. He explained that each had various requirements which made it difficult to "bet on" the integration of new and very rapidly developing architectures into one device. As such, separating the functions actually allowed each to develop at its own pace, while providing the flexibility to address multiple market opportunities.San Francisco (CA) - Nvidia CEO Jen-Hsun Huang has predicted that GPU computing will... more
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Barcelona, Spain has one of the highest concentrations of Pakistani immigrants in Europe. This is a snapshot of this growing, dynamic, little-known community, revolving around the story of a Barcelona radio station set up by Pakistani immigrants.
Ultimately, it is a story of immigration, the struggle between the homeland's traditions and Western values, in a country itself just learning to respond to a rapidly increasing immigrant population.Barcelona, Spain has one of the highest concentrations of Pakistani immigrants in... more
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manal
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added this
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2 years ago
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