A Ton of Crap
Page 36
LESSON 32D
LANDING ON THE MOON
Apollo 9 On March 3, 1969, Apollo 9 was launched. The manned mission successfully used all of the Apollo lunar hardware in orbit and it was also the first use of the lunar module, a separate part with the purpose of landing, in a manned flight. The operations lasted ten days, and the crew was able to demonstrate all of the mission maneuvers. While in orbit, the crew simulated a landing using the lunar module and safety maneuvers. One of the safety maneuvers, in which the command module is inoperable and the lunar module is used as a lifeboat, was actually used during the recovery of Apollo 13.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
The Globe Theatre Shakespeare’s most well-known plays were performed at the Globe Theatre in London. The theater was built by the brother of Richard Burbage, one of the actors that worked with Shakespeare, who wrote for the troupe. From 1592 to 1593, an outbreak of the plague caused the theater to shut down, and it is during this time that William Shakespeare turned to poetry. In 1594, the Globe Theatre reopened, and Shakespeare and the troupe became extremely popular. The Globe Theatre could seat two to three thousand people, and performances were held in the afternoon using daylight. During a performance of Henry VIII on June 29, 1613, a cannon was fired and it set the roof on fire, burning the Globe Theatre to the ground.
PASCAL’S TRIANGLE
Patterns and Properties The first diagonal row of Pascal’s triangle is made up of ones and the next diagonal row is counting numbers (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc). The third diagonal row is made up of triangular numbers, which follow the rule xn = n(n + 1)/2. The fourth row is made up of tetrahedral numbers. If you add up the horizontal rows, you get multiples of 2:
EARLY HUMANS
Homo Sapiens Homo sapiens, literally meaning “wise man,” began to appear 250,000 years ago and came out of Africa. These humans had much larger brains, and as a result, their skulls extended forward. Homo sapiens is the genus that we are currently in, and these are considered the earliest “modern man.” Homo sapiens were hunters and gatherers, created tools from stone, and even sewed clothing. During this time, Homo sapiens lived side by side with another species, Homo neanderthalensis, who behaved much like Homo sapiens.
SWAHILI
The Written Language Swahili is an extremely easy language to learn because pronunciation is as simple as sounding out the letters. The oldest form of the written language dates back to the eighteenth century. Due to contact with Arab traders, the language was originally written in Arabic script. In the 1930s, the British attempted to standardize Swahili. The dialect found in Zanzibar, called Kiunguja, would be the standard written and spoken language, written with the Latin alphabet.
LESSON 32E
LANDING ON THE MOON
Apollo 10 Apollo 10 was launched on May 18, 1969. The mission of the Apollo 10 was to perform a staging of what the Apollo 11 mission would be like, with the only exception being it would not actually land on the Moon. The Apollo 10 mission was the first time that the complete spacecraft traveled to the Moon, making it to around 14 kilometers above the surface of the Moon, and it was the second mission that orbited the Moon. The mission lasted a total of eight days, and the crew was recovered in the Pacific Ocean.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Shakespeare’s Sexuality Though William Shakespeare married at the age of eighteen, his sexuality has constantly been an issue of controversy. It is believed that Shakespeare had several affairs with women and showed an interest in men, but the only evidence is circumstantial and is taken from analyzing his sonnets. His book of sonnets that was supposed to be private, was a collection of love poems about a young man he referred to as “Fair Lord,” in which he expressed his love for him, and his book was dedicated to “Mr. W.H.”
PASCAL’S TRIANGLE
Formula for Pascal’s Triangle To find a value at any spot along the triangle, the formula is expressed as:
n and k relate back to the lesson in combinations, where it looks like this: nCk
So, Pascal’s triangle can also look like this:
EARLY HUMANS
Neanderthals Homo neanderthalensis was an entirely separate species from Homo sapiens. Neanderthals were much taller and stronger than the Homo sapiens, had larger brains than even current man, and buried their dead (implicating that perhaps this is the first sign of religion). At around 30,000 b.c., the Neanderthals died off, and no one is certain why. Some believe Homo sapiens killed them all, while others believe there was interbreeding between Homo sapiens and Neanderthals, and eventually the one species ceased to exist. In 2010, a study discovered that traces of Neanderthal DNA were found in modern human DNA.
SWAHILI
Swahili Today Swahili is most commonly spoken in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Congo; however, it is also spoken along the eastern coast, and in parts of Somalia, Burundi, Rwanda, Mozambique, and the Comoros Islands. In Tanzania, Swahili is the official language used for government and education, and Kenya and Uganda also follow this policy (along with English). There are fifteen main dialects found in the language, with the dominant dialects being Kiunguja (found in mainland Tanzania and Zanzibar), Kimvita (found in Kenya and Mombasa), and Kiamu (found in coastal areas and the island of Lamu).
LESSON 32F
LANDING ON THE MOON
Apollo 11 Apollo 11 was launched on July 16, 1969. On July 20, Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin landed on the Moon and took their very first steps there. The lunar module spent twenty-one hours and thirty-six minutes on the surface of the Moon, and the crew spent two hours and thirty-one minutes outside the craft. Two days after arrival, the crew departed, taking with them 46 pounds of soil and lunar rocks. The mission lasted eight days and landed in the Pacific Ocean. Apollo 11 was the first manned spacecraft to land on another planetary body and return home safely.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Authorship Controversy Since the 1700s, there have been people, known as Anti-Stratfordians, questioning whether William Shakespeare actually wrote all of his plays or whether they had been written by contemporaries of his. There are three main candidates that people feel could have been the true authors of the plays Shakespeare takes credit for: Edward de Vere, Francis Bacon, and Christopher Marlowe. Edward de Vere, the seventeenth Earl of Oxford was a nobleman of Queen Elizabeth I, and many believe his life paralleled content found in Shakespeare’s plays. Perhaps the strongest candidate is Francis Bacon, whose book Promus features 4,400 parallels in terms of thought and expression. Christopher Marlowe was a playwright who was stabbed to death in a bar fight in 1593. Some believe that he was actually a spy and that he faked his own death, and continued to write plays under the pen name, William Shakespeare.
PASCAL’S TRIANGLE
Fibonacci Sequence If you recall from earlier, the first eight numbers in the Fibonacci sequence are: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21. These values can be found in Pascal’s triangle.
1 1 2 3 5 8……
EARLY HUMANS
Homo Sapiens Sapiens Homo sapiens sapiens started to exist 90,000 years ago, and were spread across the world. In Europe, Homo sapiens sapiens were known as Cro-Magnons. It is with the Homo sapiens sapiens that we first see bows and arrows, constructed homes like huts and tents (used when following herds of animals), advanced weaponry, clothing, improved languages, and artwork. It is during this time that the famous cave paintings of Lascaux, France, were created. Anatomically speaking, the Cro-Magnons are almost identical to modern man of today.
SWAHILI
Useful Swahili Phrases Here are some helpful phrases to use when traveling to the eastern coast of Africa:
Hello. Habari.
Good morning. Habari ya asubuhi.
Good afternoon. Habari ya mchana.
Good evening. Habari ya jioni.
Good night. Usiku mwema.
How are you? Habari yako?
I don’t understand. Sielewi.
Cheers! Maisha marefu!
Do you speak English? Unazungumza kiin
gereza?
What’s your name? Jina lako ni nani?
Excuse me. Samahani nipishe.
Sorry. Samahani.
Please. Tafadhali.
How much is this? Hii ni bei gani?
Thank you. Asante.
Where’s the toilet? Choo kiko wapi?
Goodbye. Kwaheri.
LESSON 32 QUIZ
The first successful manned Apollo flight was:
Apollo 5
Apollo 6
Apollo 7
Apollo 8
What was the first mission that traveled to the Moon with the complete spacecraft?
Apollo 8
Apollo 9
Apollo 10
Apollo 11
Which of the following is true?
William Shakespeare wrote tragedies, comedies, and histories.
William Shakespeare wrote comedies, musicals, and horror.
William Shakespeare wrote tragedies, musicals, and histories.
William Shakespeare wrote musicals and horror.
What is blank verse?
A metrical pattern that consists of lines of trochaic tetrameter that rhymes
A metrical pattern that consists of lines of trochaic tetrameter that do not rhyme
A metrical pattern that consists of lines of iambic pentameter that rhymes
A metrical pattern that consists of lines of iambic pentameter that do not rhyme
In Pascal’s triangle, what is the third diagonal row made up of?
Multiples of 2
The Fibonacci sequence
Triangular numbers
Tetrahedral numbers
If you add up all of the horizontal rows in Pascal’s triangle, the values are:
Multiples of 2
The Fibonacci sequence
Triangular numbers
Tetrahedral numbers
Lucy was an important discovery because:
She was the first Australopithecus afarensis ever discovered.
She was proof that Australopithecus afarensis was bipedal.
She was the first female hominid discovered.
She was the tallest Australopithecus afarensis ever documented.
One of the reasons scientists believe the Neanderthals died off is:
They assimilated with the Homo sapiens.
They were killed off by the Homo sapiens.
They got a severe illness that spread throughout the species.
A and B.
Swahili is a combination of:
Persian and Arabic
Arabic, French, and Bantu
Persian, Arabic, and Bantu
Arabic, Italian, and Bantu
How do you say “Good morning” in Swahili?
Habari ya mchana.
Habari ya jioni.
Habari ya asubuhi.
Sielewi.
ANSWER KEY: c, c, a, d, c, a, b, d, c, c
Lesson 33
HISTORY: The Cultural Revolution in China
Mao Zedong, Great Leap Forward, Break from the Soviets, The Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen Incident, End of the Cultural Revolution
LANGUAGE ARTS: Victorian Literature
Style of Victorian Literature, The English Novel, Children’s Literature, Poetry, Scientific and Philosophical Writing, Late Victorian Period
MATH: Group Theory
What Is Group Theory?, Permutation Groups, Matrix Groups, Transformation Groups, Abstract Groups, Rubik’s Cube
SCIENCE: Gas Laws
Properties of Gas, Boyle’s Law, Charles’s Law, Gay-Lussac’s Law, Avogadro’s Law, Graham’s Law
FOREIGN LANGUAGE: Pashto
The Origins, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Dialects, Writing System, Useful Pashto Phrases
LESSON 33A
THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA
Mao Zedong Mao Zedong was born in 1893. He founded the People’s Republic of China, and when he was younger, he was one of the original members of the Chinese Communist Party. Mao was elected chairman of the Soviet Republic of China in 1931 and became one of the most important Communist leaders of the time. Following the Second Sino-Japanese War, the Communists and a political party called the Kuomintang fought in a civil war, and by 1949, the Communists had taken most of mainland China. The People’s Republic of China was established, and Mao became chairman.
VICTORIAN LITERATURE
Style of Victorian Literature The Victorian era is the transitional period between the romantic period and the twentieth century, during the reign of Queen Victoria in Britain (1837–1901). Literature produced during this time dealt with the issues of daily life. With the rise of industrialism, reform movements involving child labor, women’s rights, emancipation, and the concept of evolution heavily influenced the work, and the Victorian age is considered to be one of pessimism and doubt. Works had moral purposes, and featured ideals like love, justice, and truth.
GROUP THEORY
What Is Group Theory? As you recall from earlier, groups are an abstract term that have to satisfy four basic rules: closure, associativity, identity, and inverses. Group theory is the study of the different systems that follow these laws. For example, in the problem a × b = c, group theory is not concerned with the numbers or the multiplication process, but the rule that fits that problem and understanding how those properties relate to other systems. Essentially, group theory is a study of symmetry, and has many real-world applications, especially in chemistry and physics.
GAS LAWS
Properties of Gas Gases have three properties. Gases are easily compressed, they can easily expand, and they take up more space than any liquids or solids. Gases exert pressure, and because the molecules are spread over a wide area, gas has a low density. Many properties of gas are based on five postulates that make up the kinetic molecular theory. The kinetic theory states:
Gas is composed of molecules, and the size of these molecules is negligible compared to the distance between molecules.
Molecules move at random in straight lines, in any direction and at a wide variety of speeds.
Forces of repulsion and attraction between molecules is weak, except when colliding.
There is no kinetic energy lost when molecules collide, making the collisions elastic.
The absolute temperature of a molecule is proportional to its average kinetic energy.
PASHTO
The Origins Pashto, an Eastern Iranian language, which also goes by the name Afghan in the Farsi language and Pathan in Punjabi, is part of the Indo-Iranian language family. Pashto originated as the native language of the Pashtun people, who live between Afghanistan and Pakistan. The first written records of Pashto date back to the sixteenth century, and by the seventeenth century, the national poet of Afghanistan, Khushhal Khan Khattak, wrote in Pashto. Parts of the language borrow from Greek, dating back to the third century b.c.
LESSON 33B
THE CULTURAL REVOLUTION IN CHINA
Great Leap Forward In 1958, Mao Zedong attempted to modernize the economy of China so that it could rival America’s. Mao believed industry and agriculture were to be the focus of the development project, and his plan was called the Great Leap Forward. Mao believed that in order for industry to grow, workers must be well-fed, and in order for agriculture to grow, new tools were needed. Mao believed the best way to make this happen was by making China into a series of many communes. By 1958, there were 26,578 communes and 700 million people placed into them. The Great Leap Forward was a dismal failure, and it is believed that 20 to 30 million people died from famine.
VICTORIAN LITERATURE
The English Novel During the nineteenth century, the novel became the most popular form of literature. Novels focused on portraying the difficulty of real life, where ultimately it is love, perseverance, and hard work that win out. An especially important part of the novel during this time was the depiction of the emerging and expanding middle class, a break from the aristocratic portrayals found in earlier novels. Most of the novels were published serially in j
ournals, with the latest chapter or section appearing with each new issue and featuring intricate plots and plot twists to keep readers interested.
GROUP THEORY
Permutation Groups If you recall, permutations are rearrangements. If you have abc, a permutation of that is bca. One of the most important types of groups are permutation groups. Permutation groups are important because any group can be represented as a permutation group. If there is a group G, the elements of set M are permutations, and the group operation is the composition of the permutations in group G. Two permutations make up a group when one is the identity element, and the second one is a permutation that is the inverse of itself.