Category Archives: Deep Mind
Deep in the Jaundiced Heart of Texas – lareviewofbooks
GEORGE STEVENSS 1956 film Giant begins with a stereophonic blast of The Eyes of Texas Are Upon You, the recurring theme of Dimitri Tiomkins score. In the 1952 best seller that is the movies inspiration, its the eyes of author Edna Ferber that are upon Texas. And Ferber was not enchanted with what she saw. Read now (HarperCollins reissued it in 2019 as a Modern Classics paperback), Ferbers novel plays like an early sketch of the ignorance and arrogance that have made Texas a cultural millstone at the bottom of the US, determined to drag all the other states down with it.
If we think about Edna Ferber at all today, and we should, its likely as a writer whose novels were the fodder for works that have become better known than the books they came from, not only Giant, but also Show Boat (1926) and So Big (1924) and Cimarron (1929) and Saratoga Trunk (1941). Ferber belongs squarely to the tradition of the popular writer of big-scale narratives that sprawl over years, an honorable job occupied today at its best by the likes of Amor Towles and Donna Tartt, and for which there is always some critic around to tell us that this is not literature. The question of whether literature can ever be what gets people reading in the first place and, more crucially, keeps them reading, is not one that tends to arise in what Terry Southern once called the Quality Lit Biz.
And yet, in its withering critique of its subject, and in Ferbers sly subversion of genre conventions while still delivering a thoroughly entertaining read, Giant is a fascinating novel, a wasp disguised as a possum. Ferber lures the reader in with a love story, provides the conflicts and bust-ups and reconciliations that mark it as such, all the while refusing almost all the satisfactions one associates with love stories.
On the surface, Giant fits squarely within the romantic tradition of a headstrong man taming a rebellious woman, who ends up all the happier for it. Only, by the time Giant was published, there had already been a couple of decades of pushback undermining that model. Two decades before, screwball comedies like My Man Godfrey (1936) and Bringing Up Baby (1938) and The Lady Eve (1941) had featured romances wherein the male characters are so befuddled that theyre almost relieved to let the heroines run the show.
The biggest blow to the model of dominating man and subservient, adoring woman came in 1936 when Margaret Mitchell published Gone with the Wind. Audiences loved Scarlett OHara, in both the book and movie versions, precisely because she was such a schemer and thus, as much as the conventions of her time would allow, the equal of Rhett Butler. Theirs was less a love story than a partnership of piratical egos, both out for themselves, amused and excited to find their opposite-sex incarnation. For all the outrage about the movie as a piece of Lost Cause propagandizing, film historian James Harvey came closer than anyone to grasping its appeal when he characterized it as a tough comedy. Gone with the Wind is the only Hollywood epic with something of the cheerful cynicism and snappish sarcasm that had characterized the best movies of its decade. Do you know anyone who enjoyed it for Ashley and Melanie?
The relationship in Giant between Virginia-by-way-of-Ohio socialite Leslie Lynnton and Texas cattleman Jordan Bick Benedict isnt the avaricious union of Rhett and Scarlett. It hews more closely to a sweep-her-off-her-feet story. Leslie meets Bick when hes a guest in her family home and, in short order, marries him and relocates to Reata, his enormous Texas ranch. There she raises a family and spends her married years trying and failing to change her husband. She loves him nonetheless for his headstrong, shallow self.
Provincialism in some people is quaint, but Bicks limited worldview has all the charm of a Cadillac outfitted with steer horns on the grille, blasting down a two-lane blacktop at 90 miles per hour. Hes not a bully and only occasionally a boor. But nothing gets in his way and anything that tries to is in danger of getting run over.
Bick doesnt change, but neither does Leslie. She never gives in to Bick. She never blunts her criticism of the awful conditions in which his Mexican workers live, the starvation wages he pays them. Eventually, both improve (under Leslies influence, its implied), but for every appeal Leslie makes to Bicks (extremely limited) sense of decency and fairness, he responds with some variation of those people have their own way of doing things. Leslie doesnt fall for that. She knows poverty and sickness arent folkways. But shes also a bit of a sucker.
The first thing Leslie does when she meets Bick, as her fathers guest in the family home, is to stay up all night reading about Texas, soaking up its history. And she doesnt sugarcoat it when, the next morning at breakfast, she greets Bick with, We really stole Texas, didnt we? I mean. Away from Mexico. Shes not trying to provoke an argument. Shes just stating the facts, and who, she wonders, can dispute facts? But a short while later, shes gushing, Its so fascinating. Its another world, it sounds so big and new and different. I love it. The cactus and the cowboys and the Alamo and the sky and the horses and the Mexicans and the freedom. Its really American, isnt it. Im Im in love with it.
And for all the ways she will challenge Bick to treat his workers as people, to be less dogmatic about the futures he envisions for their children (Bick sees their son, Jordy, who wants to be a doctor, taking over the family cattle business and their daughter, Luz, the one really suited to business, as a Texas wife) Leslie succumbs to the colorful romance of Texas life, both the history and storybook versions, and never wakes up from it. Oh, shell have her moments of revulsion: passing out at a barbecue in her honor when she sees the guests reaching into a mesquite-grilled calves head to scoop out the solid gelid brains and placing them on fresh pieces of bread with a bit of salt sprinkled on top. And she never accepts that a woman shouldnt have a say in the mens business of politics. But the romantic hold that her husband and, through him, Texas itself has on her finally overwhelms the common sense of the life she left behind. She does get Bick to agree to build a human-scaled house for the two of them, something airier and more pleasant than the dark manse filled with hunting trophies and paintings of Herefords and chairs the size of couches and furniture adorned with horns.
But if you read carefully, you realize that, other than the new house, Leslie never gets one thing she wants, not even the books she wants to order from Brentanos to supplement Reatas library, which consists of issues of The Cattlemans Gazette, a Websters Dictionary, copies of A Girl of the Limberlost and The Sheik. (The particularized poverty of those selections a trade journal, an unconsulted reference book, a childrens classic, and a racy best seller conveys the withering wit Ferber cushions in what appear to be plain descriptions.) Oh, you wont do much reading out here, Bick says when Leslie asks for some new volumes. Here in Texas theres so much more to do. You wont have time to read.
But she does have time to become something like the author of her own romance. She translates what shes read and the sheer size of what she sees everything, from the land itself to the platters of food borne out for every meal, exists on a mammoth scale into a kind of romance in which Bick is a hero big enough to belong in such vastness. She doesnt abandon her principles, but her stubbornness never turns into rebellion. Eventually, having won the man who fires her imagination and desire, she settles into domestic comfort, known for being outspoken but no real threat to the order of things.
In her 1978 biography of her Great Aunt Edna, Ferbers niece Julie Goldsmith Gilbert quoted the author talking about her initial visit to Texas:
The whole region was as virile and fascinating as it was vast. It was all drawn on a scale larger than life. There was about it a tremendous vitality. It was incredible that a whole people could possess such energy, such self-complacency, such enthusiasm for living in the midst of this hurly-burly of heat, dust, glare, great distance and much discomfort.
I mean no disrespect to Ferber when I say that that has to be one of the greatest pieces of public relations any writer has ever come up with, even though she does manage to slide self-complacency in among the other adjectives. In any event, Texas didnt buy it. Texas reviewers hated the book, seeing it, quite correctly, as a slam on their home state. And theres no doubt that the book does have more than a touch of the condescension so often shown by the literary establishment to Texans (and Southerners in general).
Ferber was a member of the Algonquin Round Table, but she was not a woman born to privilege. Her father was a poor Hungarian Jewish storekeeper in Michigan, where she was born, and she grew up in Chicago; Ottumwa, Iowa; and Appleton, Wisconsin, where she graduated from high school, briefly attended college, and began her writing career as a reporter. Still, she was a true sophisticate (you didnt get to co-author plays with George S. Kaufman if you werent), and it is a sophisticates cold eye that informs Giant.
Almost 70 years have made it easy to see whats missing from Giant specifically, any sense that the state could produce anything beyond the self-satisfied and largely ignorant characters who strut through it as exemplars of outsized vitality. If, when Giant was published, the book was all you knew of Texas culture, youd have no idea that, in the years to come, the state would produce musicians like Buddy Holly and Ornette Coleman, Freddy Fender and Willie Nelson; scholars like Annette Gordon-Reed; politicians like Barbara Jordan and, above all, Lyndon Baines Johnson, the only tragic modern president, praised by Ralph Ellison in 1965 as the greatest American President for the poor and for Negroes.
But if what Ferber shows us in Giant isnt all of Texas, its certainly not too little to draw the portrait she does, and the strength of the book is that she doesnt suspend her sophisticated worldview by treating the characters as common folk somehow exempt from criticism. It doesnt take long to realize that the title of the book is intended to be ironic. Size seems to be all that anyone talks of, and the main thing used to glorify the state: the acreage of ranches, the number of cattle, the mockery of distances that elsewhere would seem considerable (Far! Bick says of Reatas distance from the train station. Its only ninety miles.) In Ferbers treatment, the bigness seems finally to denote emptiness more than anything else. The characters seem not so much equal to the landscape as puffed up by it, braggarts at home in a place that suits them. There is nothing here but size. The only time anyone is conscious of competing with a city like New York is when Bick mentions to Leslie that he hears that Neiman Marcus makes Saks and Bergdorf look like a trading post.
Just as Bick cant envision a desire for books, so no one can seem to see the need for any kind of culture. To complain that the Texas of Giant offers no symphony, no museums, no theater would be playing right into the hands of those who were ready to call it a snobbish book. But its cities dont offer the chance to see a touring musical or even go to the movies. Texans in Giant are entertained by and interested in only Texas. Nothing else seems necessary.
It might be too easy, too convenient, to see, in the prejudices and ignorance of Ferbers characters, their not giving a damn for the way things are done anywhere else, the very things that have allowed present-day Texas to be so arrogant as to pass an anti-abortion law that attempts to circumvent judicial review or one of the most restrictive voter-suppression laws in the country. But the parallels are too strong to ignore just because they are easy to see. Ferber ends the novel with Bick and his cohorts scheming to suppress the votes of the largely Mexican field hands who have come to the region to work the jobs offered by the oil boom.
Stevens ended his film (a wonderful film, maybe the most intelligent and purely enjoyable of all 50s epics) quite differently than Ferber did her novel. In the movie, Bick loses a fight to a short-order cook who will not serve Bicks Mexican daughter-in-law and his Mexican American granddaughter. A white man becoming indignant about racism only when he is suddenly exposed to its reality is exactly the kind of scene progressive thought today would claim as itself an example of racism. But Stevens, a classic Hollywood liberal, knew that change is a political process that only comes when people who are not directly affected by oppression or prejudice see the moral necessity of joining with those who are demanding redress. Lyndon Baines Johnson knew that as well, saying in his great 1965 speech in support of the Voting Rights Act:
There is no Negro problem. There is no Southern problem. There is no Northern problem. There is only an American problem. And we are met here tonight as Americans not as Democrats or Republicans we are met here as Americans to solve that problem. [] Their cause must be our cause too. Because it is not just Negroes, but really it is all of us, who must overcome the crippling legacy of bigotry and injustice. And we shall overcome.
The key to Giant comes early on, when Bick and Leslie return to the ranch after their honeymoon. Leslie has been kind to the Mexican boy sent to meet them, and Bick tells her, Making a fuss over that Mexican boy. We dont do that here in Texas. When she says, this still is the United States, Bick answers, Youre a Texan now. Please remember that. A little later, theres talk of Texas law containing a provision allowing the state to secede from the union if it ever wants to. The thing is, the Texas depicted in Giant never really belonged to the United States in the first place.
What Ferber saw in Texas was not just a state eager to keep women and racial minorities in their place but one that proudly considered itself separate from better than America. And thus, she unknowingly grasped one of the key truths at the heart of Trumpism the other great pandemic of our present moment. For the truth is that Trumpers hate America: they hate its precepts, its principles, the way it has worked steadily and bravely (albeit imperfectly and with frustrating slowness) to include in its promised freedoms the people not considered by those who wrote its founding documents.
Its a clich to say that the America Trumpism pines after, the nation for whose restored greatness it is willing to countenance any brutality, is a place where to be anything other than white, heterosexual, Christian, and preferably male is to be considered a threat, unworthy of legal protection, and ripe for persecution if you make true Americans feel uneasy. But partly because so many people assume that snobbish condescension is the same thing as deserved contempt for willful ignorance, there has been a reluctance to acknowledge that Trumpism, by working to make the law an extension of its various bigotries, is empowering contempt for the basic virtues of the American project. Its well past time to acknowledge that there are some things worth being snobbish about. We cant pretend that the sympathy we show for people never given the chance to learn, held back by socioeconomic conditions or systemic racism, is somehow violated when we show contempt for those Hillary Clinton aptly and correctly dubbed deplorables.
There is now a populist political movement, and not just in America, that tells anyone who ever feels resentful toward the educated, anyone who distrusts any new idea, that they have been right all along. Thats the movement that Giant, in its depiction of a self-satisfied (white) empire with no interest in anything outside itself (and for only some of the people inside), seems to catch in its nascent form. The lines that best serve to describe this novels afterlife, the way the cultural mindset it depicts is lived now, were written by Ferber herself in her 1938 autobiography, A Peculiar Treasure, when she describes what she saw in 1930s Europe: It was a fearful thing to see a continent a civilization crumbling before ones eyes. It was a rapid and seemingly inevitable process to which no one paid any particular attention. As well as anything Ive read, those lines sum up what it feels like to live in America today, the almost complete lack of urgency about the ongoing attempts on the right to make it into a fascist state.
Writing after World War II, Cyril Connolly said of the war not merely the regimes that had been defeated but the war itself, the undeniable and degrading necessity of having to engage in it and to experience its brutal inhumanity that it was opposed to every reasonable conception of what life is for, every ambition of the mind or delight of the senses. The anti-achievement of the spiritual descendants of those who inhabit the Texas of Giant is to have made this opposition obscenely alive in peacetime.
Charles Taylor is the author ofOpening Wednesday at a Theater or Drive-In Near You. He lives and writes in New York.
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Deep in the Jaundiced Heart of Texas - lareviewofbooks
Meditation Can Be Used To Calm Your Mind And Help You Sleep. Heres How. – BuzzFeed News
If you have to deal with difficult decisions and stressful situations on the daily, not to mention the dumpster fire that is the news cycle at any given moment, its not unusual to have anxiety and intrusive thoughts that keep you awake at night.
There are things you can do that help. For example, you can try cognitive behavioral therapy, which aims to transform your negative habits and thoughts about sleep into positive ones.
However, theres another sleep-promoting technique you might consider: meditation. Its a safe and accessible way to calm your ruminating mind, and there are plenty of free apps you can use to make it easier to do.
Meditation can really help with navigating stress in terms of calming the body down, said Cassandra Carlopio, a licensed psychologist in Australia and a meditation teacher focusing on sleep. It can help with shifting focus away from anxiety about sleep, or what we affectionately call bedtime thought, which can be very stressful.
Meditation helps you connect to the present moment and clear your head of worrying or stressful thoughts, and it can help you manage emotions that may cause daytime fatigue and disturb your ability to sleep at night.
Still, meditation is not a wonder drug that fixes all sleep issues, which are very nuanced and complicated, Carlopio told BuzzFeed News.
A major cause of sleeplessness is arousal in the brain triggered by the release of cortisol, adrenaline, and other stress-related hormones, according to Deirdre Conroy, director of the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Clinic at the University of Michigan.
Meditation targets this primal fight-or-flight response that causes our hearts to pound, minds to race, and muscles to tense.
With the help of deep, slow, and controlled breathing that accompanies most meditation techniques, as well as the calm environment and general stillness you create when meditating, you can lower your heart rate and blood pressure and activate your parasympathetic nervous system, which is associated with resting and digesting rather than fighting or fleeing, Conroy told BuzzFeed News.
Often we're just going, going, going. We're not really focused on our heart rate until we get into bed at night and learn that our heart is racing and that were very tense, Conroy said. If we practice meditation more often, we're training our brain to be able to calm itself, like a self-management strategy.
In one 2019 study, 40 healthy university students with no meditation experience had a bigger drop in saliva cortisol levels after 30 hours of meditation training over a four-day period compared to a control group with no training.
Another study included 54 adults with chronic insomnia who had meditation training over eight weeks that focused on either coping with stress or insomnia. The practice helped reduce the amount of time participants spent awake at night by an average of about 44 minutes post-treatment and about 50 minutes six months later. Meditation helped lower presleep arousal and insomnia severity too, according to the 2014 study published in the journal Sleep.
Some research also suggests meditation can even physically change your brain in ways that could improve sleep quality by giving you the power to better regulate your emotions.
In a 2012 study published in the journal Frontiers in Human Neuroscience, researchers compared brain images of 50 adults who had meditated routinely for years or even decades with 50 adults who didnt meditate regularly. They found that those who practiced long-term meditation had more gyrification, or folds in the cerebral cortex, the brains outer layer. The more area in these grooves, the more brain surface and neurons that process information, although the study couldnt determine if meditation had led to the brain changes.
A separate study published in 2012 found meditation may affect how your amygdala the part of the brain that processes emotions is activated not only during the practice, but also after its done.
People with certain medical conditions that make it harder to sleep well have also benefited from meditation, including those with diabetes, fibromyalgia, and breast cancer.
Aside from aiding sleep, meditation has also been associated with reducing pain caused by some illnesses, the craving to smoke cigarettes, and stress-induced inflammation that can contribute to a number of diseases and conditions such as irritable bowel syndrome, ulcerative colitis, and high blood pressure.
There are two main ways you can use meditation to improve your sleep, according to Carlopio, the meditation expert.
First, you can practice it throughout the day to help manage your stress and anxiety so youre more relaxed by the time you go to bed. Carlopio said you can do this anytime, like during your lunch break at work.
You can also meditate at night right before you go to sleep, either on the floor next to your bed or even lying in it. If youre up for it, you can guide your own practice or get help from an app or video.
Most techniques and traditions start with focusing on the breath because it happens in real time, Carlopio said. Doing so keeps your attention away from random thoughts and on the pure sensation of inhaling and exhaling.
Many people believe meditation requires you to think of nothing, which isnt actually the case. Instead, as thoughts arrive and your attention wanders, you try to observe them without judgment or emotion and gently return your mind to your breath or whatever else you choose to focus on, like sounds or other sensations.
Another type of self-guided meditation is a body scan. You can start at the crown of your head or tip of your toes and slowly relax each body part as your focus moves up or down, like a flashlight from body part to body part, Carlopio said. You should pay attention to any temperatures, tingles, or other sensations. (I like to imagine dozens of flowers sprouting and filling each limb as I shift my attention.)
Some people also enjoy guided imagery, Carlopio said, though she admits its not for everyone. Guided imagery involves picturing yourself in a comforting place; maybe its a dense forest clouded in misty fog or a sunny beach with waves crashing at the shore. It should involve all five senses, she added.
You start to drift from this tangible world that we're in to a little bit more of a dreamlike land, and you're not focused on the things that you're worried about, she said. But while some people are more imagery-orientated, others may find the technique distracting.
Listening to guided meditations is another way to doze off, said Carlopio, who added its helpful as a sleep aid because you can follow instructions while focusing your attention on the present moment.
But not all guided meditation is created equal, she warned. Some are designed to make you more focused, which is great during the day but not so great if you want to fall asleep at night. Carlopio suggests finding guided meditations that are sleep-specific. Apps you can download on your phone are a good start.
There are plenty of options to choose from, such as Aura, Insight Timer, Headspace, and Calm, many of which offer a range of meditations with teachers who have diverse accents, techniques, and backgrounds. You can also watch guided meditations on YouTube or directly seek out an experts help either solo or in group sessions.
If you plan on using your phone to play the meditations, Carlopio recommends having it set up before you settle down so you dont have to scroll through your phones bright screen in the dark. (Blue light from digital screens can actually make it harder to fall asleep.) You may also want to put your phone on silent, set the volume low, and turn off notifications to reduce distractions.
She also recommends setting realistic goals when starting out. For most people, that means meditating for about five minutes a day, but it may take longer depending on the type of technique youre using and the reason youre using it.
If you take away anything from this article, let it be this: Meditation takes practice, and you may not get it right the first time because theres no specific way to do it; its deeply personal. There are as many ways to meditate as there are people, Carlopio said.
She likens trying meditation for the first time to trying a new sport. You dont just pick up a bat and expect to hit the ball perfectly, Carlopio said. Youve had your mind functioning a specific way for your entire life, and then all of a sudden you want to learn this new skill. It could be quite a rude awakening at the beginning.
In fact, one study found that advanced-level meditators spent more time in REM sleep which is important for learning and memory woke up less during the night, and spent less time in lighter sleep stages compared to beginner and nonmeditators, suggesting it may take some practice before you can reap the benefits of meditation for sleep.
You may even feel a bit uncomfortable during your first tries because you start to notice tension and certain thoughts that are hard to process. Thats totally normal, Carlopio said.
I always encourage people to approach meditation with a sense of curiosity, kindness, and understanding, she said. Its about consistency and not expecting yourself to be really good at meditation.
Even Buddhist monks whove been trained in meditation since they were children, and who dont deal with common stressors like traffic, for example, cant maintain perfect clarity for more than a minute or two, Carlopio said. For us to expect that well be able to sit in pure equanimity with a quiet mind for any period of time is completely unrealistic.
How well youre able to benefit from meditation for sleep also depends on whats behind your sleep issues. If you had a stressful day at work, you may be more likely to see an immediate improvement in mood and anxiety levels after meditating, Carlopio said. However, if youre dealing with joblessness or other long-term issues, it may take longer for the practice to have an impact. It takes time to build up resilience to manage ongoing, very real stresses, Carlopio said.
Sitting still while calming your mind doesnt suit everyone, and it can feel particularly difficult in a society that values productivity over quiet contemplation. For some people with sleeping difficulties, exercising or talking with a therapist may be a better alternative.
Meditation also may not help you sleep if you have a health condition like obstructive sleep apnea, a disorder that causes repetitive blockages in airflow during sleep, or a noise problem like loud neighbors or late-night construction outside your home.
Conroy of the University of Michigan said its important to assess whether your sleep problems are interfering with your ability to get through your day. If so, you may need a different approach than meditation.
Its not always an obvious, easy fix. There's so much more than what meets the eye with sleep difficulties, Carlopio said. Dont get disheartened about it and just keep seeking support until you get the issue addressed because it can make such a difference in being able to sleep well.
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Meditation Can Be Used To Calm Your Mind And Help You Sleep. Heres How. - BuzzFeed News
On My Mind: The Fed Takes The Red Pill – Seeking Alpha
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By Sonal Desai, Ph.D., Chief Investment Officer, Franklin Templeton Fixed Income
The Fed struck a hawkish tone at its latest meeting, but Franklin Templeton Fixed Income Chief Investment Officer Sonal Desai believes it still underestimates how far rates will likely need to riseand so do the markets. She discusses what it will take to get inflation back under control, and how fixed income investors can position for the volatile rising-rate environment ahead.
The Federal Reserve (Fed) has finally acknowledged the reality of the inflation problem. The uncertainty raised by the Russia-Ukraine war did not stop it from raising rates at its March policy meeting, though it capped this first hike to just 25 basis points (bps). Connecting the dots points to an expected total of seven rate hikes this year, and Fed Chair Jerome Powell indicated that quantitative tightening (shrinking the Feds bloated balance sheet) will start sooner than expected, likely in May.
This might all sound rather hawkish. I had stressed in previous writings that inflation had become a major social and political problem, and in this months press conference, Powell tried to channel former Fed Chair Paul Volcker, signaling the Fed is aggressive and determined to bring inflation under control.
But compared to the magnitude of the inflation challenge, I believe the Feds stance is nowhere near as hawkish as it should bethough it sounds very hawkish compared to its previous implausibly accommodative line.
In previous tightening cycles, the Fed has had to lift the policy rate above inflation to bring price dynamics back under control. Today, the policy rate is barely above zero while headline Consumer Price Index (CPI) inflation is close to 8% and the Feds preferred core Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) measure stands at 5.2%.1 Thats a long way to go, and another six rate hikesif this includes just one 50 bps bump in a series of predictable 25 bps incrementswill leave the policy rate under 2% (the Federal Open Market Committee [FOMC] median projection is 1.875%).
The Fed expects the policy rate to peak at 2.75% in 2023 (median FOMC projection); only then, in the Feds view, would the policy rate exceed core PCE, which the Fed projects would drop to 2.6%.
The Feds hawkish stance, in other words, is mostly wishful thinking. It still assumes that this inflation surge will self-correct and that inflation will come back to target even as the real interest rate remains negative throughout this year and for part of next year as well. In substance, this does not differ that much from the previous mantra that inflation was transitory.
BEA, Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, Fed, Macrobond
Here is an update of the unpleasant inflation arithmetic that I like to use in my inflation-themed pieces: headline CPI inflationwhich is what matters for consumer behavior and wage-settingaveraged 0.7% month-on-month (M/M) for the last six months, and 0.6% for the last 12. Lets be optimistic and assume it will average just 0.4% from March through December. Headline inflation would end the year at 5.6%three times higher than the projected end-year policy rate. Core PCE averaged 0.4% M/M over 2021; if it keeps that pace, it will end the year at 5%. If headline CPI keeps the pace of the last 12 months, it will end the year close to the latest reading, at 7.7%. Real interest rates would remain deep in negative territory.
How can we expect inflation to behave in the coming months? Lets take the pulse of the underlying macro situation. The US labor market remains extremely tight and cost of living adjustments (COLA), where wages are automatically indexed to past inflation, are making a comebackbecause inflation has consistently outstripped policymakers and private sector forecasts for too long. The Fed itself expects the labor market to get even tighter, pushing the unemployment rate down to 3.5% (from the current 3.8% in February).
Geopolitical uncertainty has caused energy prices to surge, has put pressure on other raw materials, and has caused further disruptions to supply chains. (As I noted in my last On My Mind, the Russia-Ukraine war also marks another retreat from globalization, and the rising preference for self-sufficiency in key industries will become a significant long-term inflationary factor.) Companies have discovered they have pricing powerand with input costs rising, they have little choice but to exercise it.
In other words, a number of self-sustaining inflationary forces have been set in motionabetted by the continuation of an exceptionally loose monetary policy that, in combination with a record surge in government spending, has proved to be a major policy mistake (something I believe should have been clear months ago).
To be clear, inflationary supply shocks are playing a role herebut they are certainly not alone. When a supply shock pushes up inflation, a central bank must assess the risk that it will trigger second round effects, price and wage increases that will propagate and amplify the shock. Only if this risk is significant should the central bank react and raise rates; otherwise, it should wait for the supply shock to fade. In the current case, extremely loose fiscal and monetary policy had already been fueling inflation since the post-pandemic recovery started; they are an important source of inflation by themselves, and moreover, they make it inevitable that any supply shock will quickly trigger second round effects that make its inflation push self-sustaining.
To expect that inflation will now come back to target on its owneven if higher prices and geopolitical uncertainty cool off economic activityis foolhardy.
To bring inflation under control, in my view, the Fed will need to implement a much more aggressive policy tightening than it currently envisions. To see it through, it will most likely need the courage to withstand substantially higher volatility in asset markets, which might include painful corrections. Thats when the Feds anti-inflation mettle will be tested. If inflation remains high, its social and political costs will rise even further, and the Fed might have little choice but to tough it out.
The Fed has taken the red pill and seen the inflationary reality we live in; but like Neo in The Matrix movie, it will take longer to fully come to terms with realityand recognize what it will take to bring inflation under control.
Financial investors also face challenging times. Markets expect a short hiking cycle, with fed funds peaking at around 2.75%, followed by rate cuts by 2024. Some analysts see this as indicating an early end to the current economic expansion; the flattening Treasury yield curve, which could invert with further rate hikes, would signal an upcoming recession partly due to monetary tightening. I do not think the yield curve currently represents a reliable recession signal because there are other factors at play, especially the massive role the Fed still plays in the market. The 10-year term premium has barely budged even as inflation spiked to 8%, suggesting that long-dated yields are probably still capped by the Feds record-high balance sheet. Or maybe investors think the Fed will blink and ease policy again once asset prices start a meaningful correction. In either case, I think markets are still underestimating the magnitude of the monetary policy tightening ahead.
How can fixed income investors position for this challenging environment? Long duration assets could have a volatile and difficult period ahead as rates climb; shorter duration looks more attractive to us. Fixed income investors should also consider asset classes that are naturally aligned to rising rates, such as bank loans. We have now started to see credit spreads widening, and this creates some interesting pockets of opportunity in high yield credit markets. Finally, rising commodity prices imply a stronger outlook for commodity-rich emerging markets, not only in the energy space.
All investments involve risks, including possible loss of principal. The value of investments can go down as well as up, and investors may not get back the full amount invested. Bond prices generally move in the opposite direction of interest rates. Thus, as prices of bonds in an investment portfolio adjust to a rise in interest rates, the value of the portfolio may decline. Investments in lower-rated bonds include higher risk of default and loss of principal. Floating-rate loans and debt securities tend to be rated below investment grade. Investing in higher-yielding, lower-rated, floating-rate loans and debt securities involves greater risk of default, which could result in loss of principala risk that may be heightened in a slowing economy. Interest earned on floating-rate loans varies with changes in prevailing interest rates. Therefore, while floating-rate loans offer higher interest income when interest rates rise, they will also generate less income when interest rates decline. Changes in the financial strength of a bond issuer or in a bonds credit rating may affect its value.
1. Sources: BEA, BLS. CPI = Consumer Price Index; PCE = Personal Consumption Expenditures
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On My Mind: The Fed Takes The Red Pill - Seeking Alpha
ALDO NOVA Digs Deep Into The Life And Times Of Eddie Gage With Newly Released Single And Video – Sonic Perspectives
Multi-platinum GRAMMY Award-winning singer, songwriter, producer, guitarist and multi-instrumentalist ALDO NOVA has today released a new performance video for The King Of Deceit. Its the latest single from his forthcoming larger-than-life rock opera The Life and Times of Eddie Gage, which is out next week (April 1). Watch the video below.
Says ALDO: The King Of Deceit is a pivotal character in the story of Eddie Gage. He is the antagonist, or the villain, and although there are many villains in Eddies lifetheyre all under the thumb of M. F. Stophalis, The King Of Deceit.
As Eddie is good and is light, The King Of Deceit represents darkness and evil, ALDO elaborates. Even though the physical side of Eddies life is slightly based on mine, the rock opera really has its roots in religion and theology, and all the names of the characters must be decoded so that it all makes sense. Everythingthe whole storythe characters and their actions are in the lyrics, and the lyrics are set to music that represent them. Eddies not just a rockstar but a messenger, who, through his music, convey a message of faith and hope, and make them believe in themselves, and The King Of Deceit will do anything to stop this. I chose to do a theatrical video, in makeup and costume, because I wanted to bring the character to life. to paint a picture of what evil looks like, at least in Eddies eyes.
Up first this year for ALDO who has spent more than four decades in music with dozens of classic songs and hundreds of showsis the release of the first 10 tracks (nine songs, one bonus cut) from The Life and Times of Eddie Gage rock opera. It tells the story of Eddie Gage, a prodigious ingnue who breaks into the music industry only to be preyed upon by a nefarious suit Andy Christos, manipulated by a corporate overlord M.F. Stophalis, and tempted by a succubus Rati Ayida. Drugs, alcohol, and excess plunge him into despair until he realizes redemption on his own terms. The just released single Free Your Mind is a high-energy rocker packed with ALDOs thunderous guitar work, soaring vocals and lyrics about fictional rocker Eddie Gage. Listen to it below.
ALDO explains, The date is July the 1st of 1982, when only three months after the release of his 1st album, simply titled Eddie Gage, Eddie has achieved superstar status. This is him playing in front of 10,000 fans and singing about the fact that its time for people to expand their minds towards a more spiritual side of reality because society has become corrupt, a direction that his record company, Daedalus Records did not want him to take. The lyrics say it all, and Eddie and his band show a level of musicianship far above the norm.
The musical journey of The Life and Times of Eddie Gage began in 2008, when ALDO started to assemble what would become 25 songs (which ALDO will eventually release). Throughout the work, ALDO distills his often-unbelievable musical journey into the allegory of the rock opera, which he wrote, produced, arranged, engineered, and mixed entirely. The recording includes a 40-piece orchestra, a full gospel choir, Lee Levin on drums and mastering from the legendary Bob Ludwig. In addition, a one song bonus disc will accompany the collection with the soaring instrumental song Les Anges.
I feel really comfortable in my own skin, and my music is who I am, ALDO says. The record was done from pure inspiration he says, I felt like was connected somewhere. I was truly channeling some place away from myself. It was almost as if something above connected to me and gave me these songs.
Following the release of The Life and Times of Eddie Gage, ALDO will turn the page on the next chapter of this story with the three-disc Aldo Nova 2.0 Reloaded. The three-disc recording features nine classics from his catalog new recordingsnot only as the 2.0 versions of the songs, but also as alternate versions with no lead vocal track and another with no lead guitar track so fans can finally either sing along or play with him.
Nobodys ever done this, ALDO says. You can basically sing with me as your backing band or play along as a backing track. No other artist has given his tracks to fans in this way. I want to encourage kids to improvise and learn. You can play the record if you want, or you can be a part of it. Its a new concept.
Ultimately, ALDO is no stranger to new concepts, and he continues to break ground.
When you hear any of this, I want you to feel like I took it to another level, he leaves off. I didnt just come back and do the same thing. I didnt stay stagnant. Im sixty-five-years-old, but I feel like Im thirty-years-old. Im bringing everything to a whole new universe. Im comfortable. Im happy in my independence. I am who I am. Im Aldo Nova, because my real name is too hard to say, he laughs.
1. Hey Ladi Dadi2. Free Your Mind3. Follow The Road4. King Of Deceit5. The Bitch In Black6. On The Way To The Psycho Ward7. When All Is Said And Done8. Say A Little Prayer9. Burn Like The SunBonus Track: Les Anges-Composed, Arranged and Performed by Aldo Nova
Disc One:
1. Blood On The Bricks 2.0 Reloaded2. Monkey On Your Back 2.0 Reloaded3. Under The Gun War Suite 2.0 Reloaded4. Foolin Yourself 2.0 Reloaded5. Ball And Chain 2.0 Reloaded6. Paradise 2.0 Reloaded7. Modern World 2.0 Reloaded8. Fantasy 2.0 Reloaded9. Im A Survivor 2.0 Reloaded
Disc Two:
1. Blood On The Bricks 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal2. Monkey On Your Back 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal3. Under The Gun War Suite 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal4. Foolin Yourself 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal5. Ball And Chain 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal6. Modern World 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal7. Fantasy 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal8. Im A Survivor 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Vocal
Disc Three:
1. Blood On The Bricks 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar2. Monkey On Your Back 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar3. Under The Gun War Suite 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar4. Foolin Yourself 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar5. Ball And Chain 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar6. Paradise 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar7. Modern World 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar8. Fantasy 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar9. Im A Survivor 2.0 Reloaded No Ld Guitar
Born Aldo Caporuscio, he opened this channel forty years ago with his 1982 double-platinum top ten self-titled debut, Aldo Nova, and its definitive Hot 100 smash single Fantasy. On the heels of the platinum-selling Subject Aldo Nova and Twitch, he emerged as a trusted collaborator for some of the biggest stars in the world. He co-wrote the song Mr. Big Time for the soundtrack of the movie, Armageddon, and worked closely with Jon on his soundtrack album for the film, Young Guns 2, writing the signature riff from Jon Bon Jovis Blaze of Glory. Bon Jovi returned the favor by collaborating on ALDOs 1991 Blood on the Bricks. Working closely with Cline Dion, he penned A New Day Has Come, Your Light, I Cant Fight the Feeling, and You and I, even garnered a GRAMMY Award in the category of Album of the Year for co-writing and producing 3 songs from her diamond-selling album Falling Into You. Not to mention, his discography also includes writing songs for everyone from Faith Hill, Carole King, and Clay Aiken to Garou and Blue yster Cult.
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ALDO NOVA Digs Deep Into The Life And Times Of Eddie Gage With Newly Released Single And Video - Sonic Perspectives
Great minds don’t think alike: bringing sciences and the humanities together – Big Think
Sciences and the humanities inhabit parallel universes. Their pursuits of knowledge are mostly disconnected.
It was with the above in mind that in the fall of 2016, I joined neuroscientist Antonio Damasio and philosopher David Chalmers on the stage of the 92nd Street Y in Manhattans Upper East Side. We engaged in a conversation on the Mystery of Consciousness.
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This was the first in a series of public dialogues that I conducted for the following five years in theaters and universities across the United States. They were part of the activities of the Institute for Cross-Disciplinary Engagement at Dartmouth, which I founded with generous funding from the John Templeton Foundation. Our mission was to bring scientists and humanists together in what I call constructive engagement.
We discussed some of the most challenging questions of our times. The topics could be quite abstract, such as physicist Sean Carroll and Buddhist teacher Alan Wallace discussing What is the Nature of Reality? Or they could tend to the more practical, like when neuroscientist Ed Boyden and writer Mark OConnell led a session titled What is the Future of Humanity in the Age of AI? (All conversations were videotaped and are available here.)
The recently published book Great Minds Dont Think Alike is a curated edition of these conversations, with added commentary. The volume includes eight of these conversations, which in some cases include questions from the audience. The topics are broad and timely, and the list of contributors is impressive. It includes Pulitzer and Templeton Prize winners, Guggenheim Fellowship and MacArthur Genius Grant awardees, and well known public intellectuals.I based this essay on my introduction to the book.
We live in times when civil discourse is seriously threatened by bigotry and tribal entrenchment. My hope with the different activities related to the institute and with the conversations registered in this book was to show how people can engage in a fruitful exchange of ideas, even when there is disagreement.
Our motivation was the essential realization that certain big questions are too complex to be addressed one-dimensionally. Neither the sciences nor the humanities can answer these questions alone. As with many of the matters that define our time, they call for a pluralistic approach that combines different ways of knowing. (There are, of course, many questions that sit within the sole province of either the sciences or the humanities. For obvious reasons, these were not part of our dialogues.)
The selection of topics discussed is certainly not comprehensive. But hopefully it illustrates that the sciences and the humanities have much to say to one another in matters of great import to our collective future.
I believe the intellectual life of the whole of western society is increasingly being split into two polar groups.
So wrote the British physicist and novelist C. P. Snow in his famous The Two Cultures Rede Lecture delivered at Cambridge University in 1959. Snow was mostly concerned with the divisions that marked his own personal and professional experience, for example those between the literary intellectuals and physical scientists. But the two-culture split has come to symbolize a wider and growing gulf in academia between the sciences and the humanities. The split is especially palpable in most universities. So is the strife it generates. It cuts directly to the heart of the liberal arts curricula of schools across the globe and to the widespread yet markedly wrong perception that the humanities are an anachronism in a world driven by technology.
The success of scientific enterprise and the consequent technologization of society have widened this divide between the two cultures. But its origins reach back beyond the Enlightenment and its discontents. The 17th century marked a turning point in human intellectual history. What we now call the sciences started to chart their own path away from the Greek philosophical tradition. Kepler, Galileo, Descartes, Newton, Boyle, and many others took off as natural philosophers, concerned with the workings of nature as their Greek and Islamic forefathers had been.
However, now they were armed with a powerful new methodology: Direct experimentation and data analysis empowered them to describe a variety of terrestrial and celestial phenomena with mathematical precision. Their spectacular success changed the way we understand the cosmos and our place in it. As a byproduct, that success carved a deep spiritual rift that has never been healed. If the human mind can understand the workings of the world without apparent limitations, what room then for mystery or spiritual questioning? If the world truly works like a machine, operating under strict mathematical logic, what room then for doubt, for free will?
As influential thinkers promoted science as the sole source of truth, the humanities lost some of their clout. The rift between the two cultures gained momentum.
Literary intellectuals at one pole at the other scientists, and as the most representative, the physical scientists. Between the two a gulf of mutual incomprehension sometimes (particularly among the young) hostility and dislike, but most of all lack of understanding, wrote Snow.
Experts hid behind the jargon of their respective fields. They either talked past each other or worse, didnt talk to each other at all. The frontiers of knowledge broadened, and academic departments multiplied. With them, walls began to separate experts into ever narrower subdisciplines.
Perhaps the greatest virtue of Snows essay was to describe science as a culture. And that it surely is, both within its practices and practitioners and as a driver of profound changes in humanitys collective worldview. The relentless ascent of scientific thinking brought the contempt of many humanists who considered themselves as the only worthy intellectuals. Scientists are technicians, went their view; humanists are intellectuals. Most scientists returned the disdain, considering the humanities to be worthless for their intellectual pursuits. Philosophy is useless, well-known scientists have proclaimed. Religion is dead.
We can see the tension most clearly when science encroaches on territory that has long been the province of humanists. It is common to hear that science is about nature, while the humanities deal with values, virtue, morality, subjectivity, and aesthetics concepts that are harder to quantify, leaving traditional science with little or nothing to add. For example, to describe love as a set of biochemical reactions resulting from the flow of a handful of neurotransmitters through certain regions of the brain is important. Yet it does very little to describe the experience of being in love.
Such polarizations are deeply simplistic and are growing less relevant every day. Developments in the physical, biological, and neurosciences now leave such narrow-minded antagonism looking problematic and corrosive. It limits progress and inhibits creativity. Many of the key issues of our times the questions explored in the book are an illustrative sample call for a constructive engagement between the two cultures.
It is our contention that the split between the sciences and the humanities is largely illusory and unnecessary. We need a new integrative approach.
We must reach beyond traditional disciplinary boundaries and create truly cross-disciplinary ways of thinking. It is no longer enough to read Homer and Einstein or Milton and Newton as disjoint efforts to explore the complexities of the world and of human nature.
The new mindset proposes that the complexities of the world are an intrinsic aspect of human nature. In other words, we process this complexity as we experience reality. We cannot separate ourselves from the world of which we are a part. Any description or representation, any feeling or interpretation, is a manifestation of this embedding. Who we are and what we are form an irreducible whole.
It is more than just academic questions that call for the sciences and humanities to come together. Consider for instance the future of humanity as we move toward a more thorough hybridization with machines. To take one example, we currently extend our physical existence in space and time through our cell phones. Many scientists and humanists consider futuristic scenarios where we will transcend the body, becoming part human, part machine. Some even speculate that a singularity point will arrive when machines will become smarter than we are. (They are vague, however, on the meaning of smarter.)
The implications of this progress call into question the wisdom of certain scientific advances. They elicit issues related to machine control; the ethics of manipulating humans and all life forms; the impact of robotization and artificial intelligence in the job market and in society; and our predatory relationship to our home planet.
There is a new culture emerging, inspired by questions old and new that reside at the very core of our pursuit of knowledge. The choices we make now as we shape our curricula, create academic departments and institutes, and engage in discussions with the general public, will shape the nature of intellectual cooperation for decades to come.
This article is an excerpt adapted from the book Great Minds Dont Think Alike. It is republished with permission of the author.
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Great minds don't think alike: bringing sciences and the humanities together - Big Think
DeepMind’s new AI model helps decipher, date, and locate ancient inscriptions – The Verge
Machine learning techniques are providing new tools that could help archaeologists understand the past particularly when it comes to deciphering ancient texts. The latest example is an AI model created by Alphabet-subsidiary DeepMind that helps not only restore text that is missing from ancient Greek inscriptions but offers suggestions for when the text was written (within a 30-year period) and its possible geographic origins.
Inscriptions are really important because they are direct sources of evidence ... written directly by ancient people themselves, Thea Sommerschield, a historian and machine learning expert who helped created the model, told journalists in a press briefing.
Due to their age, these texts are often damaged, making restoration a rewarding challenge. And because they are often inscribed on inorganic material like stone or metal, it means methods like radiocarbon dating cant be used to find out when they were written. To solve these tasks, epigraphers look for textual and contextual parallels in similar inscriptions, said Sommerschield, who was co-lead on the work alongside DeepMind staff research scientist Yannis Assael. However, its really difficult for a human to harness all existing, relevant data and to discover underlying patterns.
Thats where machine learning can help.
The new software, named Ithaca, is trained on a dataset of some 78,608 ancient Greek inscriptions, each of which is labeled with metadata describing where and when it was written (to the best of historians knowledge). Like all machine learning systems, Ithaca looks for patterns in this information, encoding this information in complex mathematical models, and uses these inferences to suggest text, date, and origins.
In a paper published in Nature that describes Ithaca, the scientists who created the model say it is 62 percent accurate when restoring letters in damaged texts. It can attribute an inscriptions geographic origins to one of 84 regions of the ancient world with 71 percent accuracy and can date a text to within, on average, 30 years of its known year of writing.
These are promising statistics, but its important to remember that Ithaca is not capable of operating independently of human expertise. Its suggestions are ultimately based on data collected by traditional archaeological methods, and its creators are positioning it as simply another tool in a wider set of forensic methods, rather than a fully-automated AI historian. Ithaca was designed as a complementary tool to aid historians, said Sommerschield.
Eleanor Dickey, a professor of classics from the University of Reading who specializes in ancient Greek and Latin sociolinguists, told The Verge that Ithaca was an exciting development that may improve our knowledge of the ancient world. But, she added that a 62 percent accuracy for restoring lost text was not reassuringly high when people rely on it they will need to keep in mind that it is wrong about one third of the time and that she was not sure how the software would fit into existing academic methodologies.
For example, DeepMind highlighted tests that showed the model helped improve the accuracy of historians restoring missing text in ancient inscriptions from 25 percent to 72 percent. But Dickey notes that those being tested were students, not professional epigraphers. She says that AI models may be broadly accessible, but that doesnt mean they can or should replace the small cadre of specialized academics who decipher texts.
It is not yet clear to what extent use of this tool by genuinely qualified editors would result in an improvement in the editions generally available but it will be interesting to find out, said Dickey. She added that she was looking for to trying the Ithaca model out for herself. The software, along with its open-source code, is available online for anyone to test.
Ithaca and its predecessor (named Pythia and released in 2019) have already been used to help recent archaeological debates including helping date inscriptions discovered in the Acropolis of Athens. However, the true potential of the software has yet to be seen.
Sommerschield stresses that the real value of Ithaca may be in its flexibility. Although it was trained on ancient Greek inscriptions, it could be easily configured to work with other ancient scripts. Ithacas architecture makes it really applicable to any ancient language, not just Latin, but Mayan, cuneiform; really any written medium papyri, manuscripts, she said. Theres a lot of opportunities.
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DeepMind's new AI model helps decipher, date, and locate ancient inscriptions - The Verge
Art Forms A Window to The Mind – Wanderer
The arts touch even the most jaded soul with beauty, intellectual stimulation and moments of sheer joy. Thus on March 2 as Jill Sanford prepared to give the third in a series of presentations focused on early American art, a wave of sweet anticipation ran through the audience.
Through her study of art and her ability to speak with complete fluidity and purpose, Sanford has been providing educational art presentations for a number of years to schools and other venues. To say one walks away with clear understanding of whatever style of painting she is speaking on is not enough people of all ages learn what the images are saying beyond the obvious. Sanford calls her presentations Art For Your Mind, presentations that ask you to enter with her into the mind of the artist.
In delving into early American art, Sanford focused on several specific painters to highlight not only how primitive some early American works were, given that painters were self-taught (folk artists), but also the rise of genre paintings previously not explored in European art. Genre painting, subjects depicting ordinary people doing everyday things, would later influence classic themes in Europe while European painting techniques would inform American painters.
Sanford explained that American painter Charles Wilson Peale was a self-taught artist whose painting of Washington, while less technically executed than those by the classically trained William Russel Birch, are nonetheless perfect in their own way. She said that Peale enjoyed a close personal relationship with Washington, including crafting many sets of false teeth for the nations first president. Its those precious little personal details peppered throughout a Sanford presentation that brings the artists to life.
While our young nation struggled towards a democratic society, there werent any schools of art for people who aspired to become painters. That does not mean art wasnt happening, to the contrary. People sought to represent life, everyday events, farms and animals and families in homely settings known as genre art.
Americans were looking at their world and attempting to memorialize what they saw through painting. Though most of these works demonstrated a lack of perspective and distancing, there has been, over the centuries since they were created, appreciation for their innocent beauty. Flat farm scenes where distant hills appear stacked atop plowed fields atop farm animals in corrals and people carrying produce hold a sweet and even clear picture of what life was like during those early decades of nation building people simply getting on with the work of living.
As time went on, American painters sought out technical training either by traveling to the art centers of the world or by seeking artists who had been trained in such places as Paris. But back to Peale for a moment: Sanford said that he would go on to study in England and later still found the Philadelphia Academy of Art in 1805. His private life would find him fathering 17 children from three wives and supporting them all through his art.
Engravings became a popular way to spread painted images throughout the country. An entire engraving industry began due to the thirst people had for art to enjoy in their homes, even if they could only afford a black-and-white engraving.
Sanford talked about a genre painter named Edward Hicks, whose paintings have gone on to be famous and well respected in the art world. His painting titled Peaceable Kingdom is filled with animals harmoniously gathered together with cherubs and angels, while in the background on the left humans including Native Americans and white settlers appear to be holding their own gathering to discuss peaceful coexistence.
Sanford asked the attendees to study the left side of the painting for clues on how the artist captured the human gathering. She noted that the left-side gathering was in reverse from its original painting, thus Hicks had used an engraving of that image for his painting.
Bringing the presentation to its closure, Sanford discussed how quickly American artists became great painters in the traditional sense, painters like Winslow Homer, Eastman Johnson and Henry Tanner, a black artist whose gentle depictions of black family life and portraiture brought him international acclaim.
Art For Your Mind is far more than an educational opportunity to study selected pieces of art with an expert. It is also an opportunity to join the artist as they planned what to place upon a board or canvas and why getting deep into the mind of the artist with a hostess of exceptional talent herself.
Sanfords fourth installment of Art For Your Mind American Painting is scheduled for Wednesday, April 6, at 12:30 pm at the Mattapoisett Council on Aging.
By Marilou Newell
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Art Forms A Window to The Mind - Wanderer
Inside the mind-blowing plan to dig Earths deepest hole and unleash limitless energy – New York Post
An energy company has plans to dig deeper into the Earth than ever before to bring renewable energy to the masses.
Quaise Energy has made a name for itself in the energy world since it launched in 2020 as a Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) spin-off.
Now the Boston-based company has said that it wants to use its pioneering drilling practices based on technology developed by Paul Woskov ofMIT to tap into Earths natural geothermal energy.
The company specified that it wants to drill deeper down into the earths center than ever before, where rock temperatures are at around 932 F (or 500 C).
Should Quaise succeed in its mission, the end result would be completely renewable, inexhaustible, and easily accessible energy resources for the population at large.
Geothermal does not require any fuels and does not produce any waste. Its truly renewable, abundant, and equitable for all, even in the most challenging energy environments, the companys website writes.
To date, the deepest hole humans have drilled reached a depth of 40,318 ft (12,289 m), in a process that took 20 years.
However, Quaise said that its hybrid drilling rig, which utilizes a traditional rotary head to get through softer material and a high-energy beam to melt tougher stuff, can drill up to 12.4 miles in just 100 days.
For context, a depth of 12 miles can easily provide access to long-term green energy supply to any location in the world, according to a report byNew Atlas.
Deep geothermal uses less than 1% of the land and materials of other renewables, making it the only option for asustainable clean energy transition, Quaise writes on its website.
Quaise CEO and Co-Founder Carlos Araque told New Atlas that while solar and wind energy is easier to access, the problem is that there is not enough of it to power the civilization we have created with fossil fuels.
He added that accessing geothermal energy instead is a solution that can work for 95 percent of humanity.
Quaise recently raised more than $63 million in funding and is hoping to get its drilling devices operating in the field within the next two years.
Longer-term plans consist of having a working system producing power by 2026.
And by 2028, the company hopes to be able to transform coal-fueled power stations into steam-fueled facilities, according toScience Alert.
This article originally appeared on The Sun and was reproduced here with permission.
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Inside the mind-blowing plan to dig Earths deepest hole and unleash limitless energy - New York Post
Aromatherapy: These Indian Fragrances Will De-Stress And Calm Your Mind – News18
Stress is a common phenomenon, which is experienced often by each one of us, but have you ever come across a scent that might calm you a bit? Many studies prove that aromatherapy carries several benefits in terms of wellness and stress relief. Many researchers have given the conclusion that aromatherapy does indeed have an effect on your brainwaves and can drastically alter your behaviour.
But not all scents have an equal or similar impact on physiology or behaviour. Some Indian scents can help in uplifting your mood, and arousing your emotions. With that being said, lets dive into a list of Indian fragrances that will help you in de-stress and rejuvenation:
Jasmine
Well known as the sweetest smelling flower, the beautiful fragrance of Jasmine carries antidepressant properties. It is extremely helpful in elevating the mood above all the clutter and disorganisation surrounding it. It is also known to induce sleep, which is why the scent of jasmine is widely used in hair oils.
Rose
Rose is one of the most preferred and popular fragrances in the world. But rarely have you been informed about the benefits of its fragrance, which relaxes your mind and body, fights anxiety, and relieves stress. The soft and pungent fragrance of rose or the Indian desi gulab is extremely comforting to mind.
Sandalwood
The nostalgic and overwhelming scent of sandalwood promotes better sleep, calmness and lowers the levels of stress. Often, the fragrance of sandalwood sends Indians in the nostalgia of their childhood home. Recognised by its fragrance of earthy nature, sandalwood is a widely used scent in perfumes, globally.
Vetiver
Otherwise called as oil of tranquillity, the vetivers fragrance is deeply calming, and balancing. The scent that helps you in keeping your head clear, promotes deep sleep and relaxes your mind and body.
Lemon
Needless to say, the citrus-filled fragrance not just improves your skin, but also calms your mind, rejuvenates your brain, makes you feel energised, and resets your mind.
Tags: Aromatherapy, sandalwood, fragrances
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Aromatherapy: These Indian Fragrances Will De-Stress And Calm Your Mind - News18
When My Heart Broke, My Father Used Google to Save Me – The New York Times
After I came home from the hospital, my mother and father took turns sitting on my bed every night to make sure I was still breathing. My mother would rest her head on my chest and say a prayer. My father would whisper, I love you, and touch my cheek.
I noticed it all. They thought I was asleep as they did this, but I was awake, unable to sleep. I hadnt been able to sleep well for months but didnt want to take drugs to help with that because I enjoy staying awake in the darkness, my mind running wild, even if my mother tells me not to think so much.
This was nearly two years ago, when I was 17, in Cotonou, Benin, West Africa, where I grew up and was in my second year in the university. I had been visiting my parents and decided to help them with chores. While sweeping the house and listening to a song, I collapsed. I was standing and then I was on the floor.
As I lay there semiconscious, my heart heavy my father frantically typed into Google what to do when someone collapses and isnt breathing well, and then revived me by doing chest compressions.
The next day, he took me to a cardiovascular center nearby, where I sat in front of the doctor, my hands folded, heart ramming against my chest, as she brought out a few pieces of equipment and then led me to a bed.
Waiting for the results, I bit my fingernails, tapped my feet, bobbed my head. When my doctor looked up from her laptop and tried to smile, I could see pity in her eyes. She said Id had a mild heart attack and told me I had coronary heart disease the arteries supplying blood to my heart were blocked by fatty substances.
How could that be? I was a teenager.
My doctor has said its hereditary: My mother has high blood pressure, and my grandfather also had heart issues. Throw in the irregular heartbeat I have, and this is how I ended up with my condition.
I would have to leave school and move back in with my parents, which was not easy moving never is, and I was not supposed to exert myself. But it had to be done. My father was traveling more, which meant that I would now spend more time with my mother. It wasnt ideal, but it was better for my health.
I come from a family of three, just my parents and me, but throughout my childhood our house was always filled with extended family, which I enjoyed because, as an only child, I needed people around me. Living with my mother now would mean seeing my cousins and grandmother regularly. And with that came a lot of talk about my love life.
One night, one of my older cousins tapped me and said, When do you plan on getting a girlfriend? Or are you gay?
I could feel all eyes on me.
Then another cousin said, You know, you are sick and an only child; what if something happens to you tomorrow?
I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I knew what they were implying. Being an only child meant I was the one to continue my fathers lineage, and they were beginning to wonder why I had no girlfriend.
Their questions continued for a few more weeks until Id had enough of it and decided to come out of the closet.
When I was 14, I promised myself I would never come out to the family. I was going to keep my being gay a secret until death because homophobia was rife around me and there were even legal risks. But I was now spending more time with my mother, and the words my cousins kept throwing around made the decision to come out easier.
I never told people how my mother reacted the first time she saw porn on my phone. I was 13 and confused about my sexuality when a Google search led me to a porn site. I drifted off while watching it, and the following day, I saw that my mother had my phone.
There was a knowing look in her eyes, but she didnt say anything. It happened twice after that; still, she didnt say anything. Maybe that is what gave me the courage to come out to her. Perhaps thats why a part of me knew that she wasnt going to react as the average parent in my country might.
Mom, Im gay, I said last August as she was sitting on her bed. When she didnt say anything, I swallowed hard and repeated myself.
After a few seconds, she took my hand, smiled, and said, I have always known and will continue to love you. There was worry in her eyes, but she wrapped me in her arms and began to cry, making me cry too.
The first time I had a full-blown heart attack, five months later, I was back in school. We were learning how data worked when I excused myself to use the toilet. I have tried to read how heart attacks work to be able to describe it, but I cant. It just happens. You think everything is going well, and the next thing you know, youre on the floor, your legs outstretched, your heart pounding.
Heart attacks are vicious; Ive had approximately five one full-blown and the rest mild. Each one, no matter how mild, leaves you scared and wondering when the next one might happen.
After the diagnosis, I started exercising and reducing my intake of fatty foods. I also take a medication whenever I have respiratory problems which is all the time.
But I have gotten used to the idea of having mild heart attacks at any time of day. Sometimes its terrible; other times, it isnt. Sometimes I just want to give up because the thought of living like this forever scares me.
And there are times I wonder if this is a punishment for deviating from the Christian life I knew growing up, for all the times I scrolled through naked pictures of men while sitting at the back of the church, or for reading erotica during Sunday school.
But my mother always assures me that all will be well and nothing happening to me is a punishment.
I dont want to die. Im scared, I told her a few months ago.
She smiled and held my hands like she always does. She didnt say anything, but her eyes said enough. After my first heart attack, she took time off work and spent a few weeks with me. She would sit on the couch facing me with a smile, asking if I was OK.
You know you dont have to, Id tell her.
Shed laugh and say, I am your mother. Let me be the one to worry about you.
Though my condition isnt yet considered life-threatening, sometimes I wonder about how my mother will cope if I have a heart attack and dont survive. How devastated she will be if her only child is gone. But when I look at her and hear her say a prayer, I tell myself everything will be all right.
I see that none of your boyfriends have visited you, she jokingly said to me one morning last June, after another mild heart attack.
I rolled my eyes at her, and she laughed. Im single, Mom, I said, and she rolled her eyes at me.
The thing about heart attacks is they leave you on edge, wondering what the next one will be like. Will it be mild? Will I be eating or watching a show when it happens? What if no one is around to notice that Im slipping away?
There was a point where I avoided all books and movies with characters who had heart issues. I also muted terms like heart attack, heart failure and cardiovascular on social media because I couldnt stop worrying.
It made me irritated at the people around me. It made me angry when my mother massaged my chest. I have told my mother to adopt a child because this fear never seems to leave my mind. I ask her to go and leave me, but she never agrees.
What if Im not here anymore? I say, and she replies, One thing I know is that my son cant die before me, and I am not dying anytime soon.
I still get scared sometimes, but knowing that my mother will always be by my side keeps me going. When the pain, anger and frustration build up, I close my eyes and say quietly, Keep going for Mom. Works every time.
You are the best, I told her recently as she sat on my bed after my father did his nightly routine of whispering, I love you, to me.
Its been almost two years since my diagnosis, but my parents havent stopped coming to my bed every night.
Thank you for taking care of me, I said. The room was dark, but I could see her smile.
Thats why I am your mother. She kissed my forehead before leaving the room.
See original here:
When My Heart Broke, My Father Used Google to Save Me - The New York Times