24 March 2010

Last Supper paintings supersize the food

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Last Supper paintings supersize the food
AP

In this March 16, 2010 photo provided by Cornell University, Prof. Brian Wansink, holds a plate illustrating how food portion size has grown over the AP – In this March 16, 2010 photo provided by Cornell University, Prof. Brian Wansink, holds a plate illustrating …

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By MARILYNN MARCHIONE, AP Medical Writer Marilynn Marchione, Ap Medical Writer – Tue Mar 23, 7:52 am ET

Has even the Last Supper been supersized?

The food in famous paintings of the meal has grown by biblical proportions over the last millennium, researchers report in a medical journal Tuesday.

Using a computer, they compared the size of the food to the size of the heads in 52 paintings of Jesus Christ and his disciples at their final meal before his death.

If art imitates life, we're in trouble, the researchers conclude. The size of the main dish grew 69 percent; the size of the plate, 66 percent, and the bread, 23 percent, between the years 1000 and 2000.

Supersizing is considered a modern phenomenon, but "what we see recently may be just a more noticeable part of a very long trend," said Brian Wansink, a food behavior scientist at Cornell University.

The study was his idea. For biblical context, he sought help from his brother, Craig Wansink, professor of religious studies at Virginia Wesleyan College in Norfolk, Va., and an ordained Presbyterian minister.

The Bible says the Last Supper took place on a Passover evening but gives little detail on specific foods besides bread and wine.

"There's nothing else mentioned. They don't say there's a fruit cup or carrot cake," though other foods such as fish, eel, lamb and even pork have appeared in paintings through the years, Brian Wansink said.

For the study, he used paintings featured in the book "Last Supper," published in 2000 by Phaidon Press. They include perhaps the most famous portrayal of the meal, by Leonardo da Vinci. Computer technology allowed them to scan, rotate and calculate images regardless of their orientation in the paintings.

Details are in the April issue of the International Journal of Obesity.

The study is "not very meaningful science," said Martin Binks, a behavioral health psychologist and a consultant at Duke University Medical Center. "We have real life examples of the increase in portion size — all you have to do is look at what's being sold at fast-food restaurants."

A more contemporary test would be to analyze portion sizes in Super Bowl commercials, he suggested.

"That would be a much more meaningful snapshot of how this society's relationship to food has changed," Binks said.

18 March 2010

SARMISEGETUZA VANDALIZATĂ

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SARMISEGETUZA VANDALIZATĂ
Dosar: Diverse — incappucciato @ 18:28

Încep prin a spune că în locul acestui articol urma să fie, aşa cum am scris în numărul 31 al revistei noastre, continuarea serialului despre Legile Universale ale Kybalionului.
O ştire ce mi-a fost trimisă printr-o adresă de internet a schimbat priorităţile şi veţi vedea de ce. Drept urmare articolul „Legea Mentalismului” ce trebuia să apară în acest număr va fi reprogramat pentru numărul din aprilie. Acum să intrăm direct în subiectul la care face referire şi titlul pe care l-aţi citit. Este vorba despre Sarmisegetuza. Şi dacă am mai scris despre sanctuarul dacic aflat acolo sus în munţi, fără să atingem corzi sensibile, de data aceasta vom spune lucrurilor pe nume pentru că altfel nu se mai poate!
Odată cu prezentul articol sperăm să stârnim o alarmă de gradul 0, cum se spune, deoarece după ce veţi citi şi vă veţi dumiri despre ce este vorba, cu siguranţă nu veţi rămâne pasivi. Cum spuneam, am primit o adresă de internet de la un coleg de redacţie, ce ducea spre site-ul unui cotidian central bucureştean, car eîn ediţia sa de Transilvania semnala un fapt extrem de îngrijorător. De altfel fotografiile alăturate vorbesc singure despre ce s-a întâmplat la Sarmisegetuza, străvechea capitală spirituală a Daciei. Am realizat o serie de investigaţii pe mai multe siteuri de internet care au preluat ştirea despre sanctuarul dacic, şi punând informaţiile cap la cap s-a conturat un tablou care demonstrează că în mod dirijat şi coordonat se atentează la originea şi spiritualitatea strămoşilor noştri geto-dacii. În urmă cu aproximativ 10 zile Nunu Brilinsky, vicepreşedintele Fundaţiei „Renaşterea Daciei” a urmărit un reportaj difuzat de o televiziune centrală din Bucureşti despre un grup de persoane care urcaseră sus la sanctuar. Vă daţi seama, o adevărată nebunie pe vremea asta de iarnă! Reportajul i s-a părut suspect şi Nunu s-a dus până la Sarmisegetuza ca să verifice dacă totul este în regulă. Ajuns acolo a rămas stupefiat. Unul dintre stâlpii calendarului sacru fusese pur şi simplu carbonizat pe dinăuntru, aşa cum puteţi vedea îb forografie, iar alţi 5 stîlpi scoşi şi distruşi de parcă nemernicii care făcuseră asta ar fi pregătit lemne de foc. (continuarea în revista COSMOS nr.32)

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15 March 2010

NASA finds shrimp dinner beneath Antarctica

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NASA finds shrimp dinner beneath Antarctica

Video could cause scientists to rethink life in harsh environments

Image: Lyssianasid amphipod
This video frame grab image provided by NASA, taken in Dec. 2009, shows a Lyssianasid amphipod, which is related to a shrimp.
NASA via AP

By Seth Borenstein

updated 48 minutes ago
WASHINGTON - In a surprising discovery about where higher life can thrive, scientists for the first time found a shrimp-like creature and a jellyfish frolicking beneath a massive Antarctic ice sheet.
Six hundred feet below the ice where no light shines, scientists had figured nothing much more than a few microbes could exist.
That's why a NASA team was surprised when they lowered a video camera to get the first long look at the underbelly of an ice sheet in Antarctica. A curious shrimp-like creature came swimming by and then parked itself on the camera's cable. Scientists also pulled up a tentacle they believe came from a foot-long jellyfish.

"We were operating on the presumption that nothing's there," said NASA ice scientist Robert Bindschadler, who will be presenting the initial findings and a video at an American Geophysical Union meeting Wednesday. "It was a shrimp you'd enjoy having on your plate."
"We were just gaga over it," he said of the 3-inch-long, orange critter starring in their two-minute video. Technically, it's not a shrimp. It's a Lyssianasid amphipod, which is distantly related to shrimp.
The video is likely to inspire experts to rethink what they know about life in harsh environments. And it has scientists musing that if shrimp-like creatures can frolic below 600 feet of Antarctic ice in subfreezing dark water, what about other hostile places? What about Europa, a frozen moon of Jupiter?
"They are looking at the equivalent of a drop of water in a swimming pool that you would expect nothing to be living in and they found not one animal but two," said biologist Stacy Kim of the Moss Landing Marine Laboratories in California, who joined the NASA team later. "We have no idea what's going on down there."

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Microbiologist Cynan Ellis-Evans of the British Antarctic Survey called the finding intriguing.
"This is a first for the sub-glacial environment with that level of sophistication," Ellis-Evans said. He said there have been findings somewhat similar, showing complex life in retreating ice shelves, but nothing quite directly under the ice like this.
Ellis-Evans said it's possible the creatures swam in from far away and don't live there permanently.
But Kim, who is a co-author of the study, doubts it. The site in West Antarctica is at least 12 miles from open seas. Bindschadler drilled an 8-inch-wide hole and was looking at a tiny amount of water. That means it's unlikely that that two critters swam from great distances and were captured randomly in that small of an area, she said.

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