title: NORAD

text: Canadian NORAD Region Headquarters is at CFB Winnipeg, Manitoba. It was established on 22 April 1983. It is responsible for providing surveillance and control of Canadian airspace. The Royal Canadian Air Force provides alert assets to NORAD. CANR is divided into two sectors, which are designated as the Canada East Sector and Canada West Sector. Both Sector Operations Control Centers (SOCCs) are co-located at CFB North Bay, Ontario. The routine operation of the SOCCs includes reporting track data, sensor status and aircraft alert status to NORAD headquarters. In 1996 CANR was renamed 1 Canadian Air Division and moved to CFB Winnipeg.


title: NORAD

text: Canadian air defense forces assigned to NORAD include 409 Tactical Fighter Squadron at CFB Cold Lake, Alberta and 425 Tactical Fighter Squadron at CFB Bagotville, Quebec. All squadrons fly the McDonnell Douglas CF-18 Hornet fighter aircraft.


title: NORAD

text: To monitor for drug trafficking, in cooperation with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the United States drug law enforcement agencies, the Canadian NORAD Region monitors all air traffic approaching the coast of Canada. Any aircraft that has not filed a flight plan may be directed to land and be inspected by RCMP and Canada Border Services Agency.


title: NORAD

text: The Continental NORAD Region (CONR) is the component of NORAD that provides airspace surveillance and control and directs air sovereignty activities for the Contiguous United States (CONUS). Since the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, CONR has been the lead agency for Operation Noble Eagle, an ongoing mission to protect the continental United States from airborne attacks.


title: NORAD

text: CONR is the NORAD designation of the United States Air Force First Air Force/AFNORTH. Its headquarters is located at Tyndall Air Force Base, Florida. The First Air Force (1 AF) became responsible for the USAF air defense mission on 30 September 1990. AFNORTH is the United States Air Force component of United States Northern Command (NORTHCOM).


title: NORAD

text: 1 AF/CONR-AFNORTH comprises Air National Guard Fighter Wings assigned an air defense mission to 1 AF/CONR-AFNORTH on federal orders, made up primarily of citizen Airmen. The primary weapons systems are the McDonnell Douglas F-15 Eagle and General Dynamics F-16 Fighting Falcon aircraft.


title: NORAD

text: It plans, conducts, controls, coordinates and ensures air sovereignty and provides for the unilateral defense of the United States. It is organized with a combined First Air Force command post at Tyndall Air Force Base and two Sector Operations Control Centers (SOCC) at Rome, New York for the US East ROCC (Eastern Air Defense Sector) and McChord Field, Washington for the US West ROCC (Western Air Defense Sector) manned by active duty personnel to maintain continuous surveillance of CONUS airspace.


title: NORAD

text: In its role as the CONUS NORAD Region, 1 AF/CONR-AFNORTH also performs counter-drug surveillance operations.


title: NORAD

text: NORAD is not responsible for Hawaii, Guam, and other U.S. islands in the Pacific Ocean, which are mostly within the Area of responsibility of United States Pacific Command, which has its headquarters in Hawaii.


title: NORAD

text: United States Pacific Command would make the determination that an inbound missile is a threat to the United States if such a launch occurred within Pacific Command's area of responsibility. Hawaii is the only state in the United States with a pre-programmed Wireless Emergency Alert that can be sent quickly to wireless devices if a ballistic missile is heading toward Hawaii. If the missile is fired from North Korea, the missile would take approximately 20 minutes to reach Hawaii. PACOM would take less than 5 minutes to make a determination that the missile could strike Hawaii and would then notify the Hawaii Emergency Management Agency (HI-EMA). HI-EMA would issue the Civil Defense Warning (CDW) that an inbound missile could strike Hawaii and that people should Shelter-in-Place: "Get Inside, Stay Inside, and Stay Tuned". People in Hawaii would have 12 to 15 minutes before impact.


title: NORAD

text: Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) is not required to be notified for approval to cancel an alert. Signal carriers allow people to block alerts from state and law enforcement agencies, but not those issued by the President. FEMA can send alerts to targeted audiences but has not implemented this as of January 2018. Other states can take as long as 30 minutes to create, enter and distribute a missile alert. The nationwide system for Wireless Emergency Alerts to mobile devices was tested for the first time on 3 October 2018.


title: NORAD

text: The North American Air Defense Command was recommended by the Joint Canadian–U.S. Military Group in late 1956, approved by the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff in February 1957, and announced on 1 August 1957. NORAD's command headquarters was established on 12 September 1957 at Ent Air Force Base's 1954 blockhouse. In 1958, Canada and the United States agreed that the NORAD commander would always be a United States officer, with a Canadian vice commander, and Canada "agreed the command's primary purpose would be…early warning and defense for the Strategic Air Command's (SAC)'s retaliatory forces." In late 1958, Canada and the United States started the Continental Air Defense Integration North (CADIN) for the Semi-Automatic Ground Environment air defense network. The initial CADIN cost-sharing agreement between the two countries was signed off on 5 January 1959. Two December 1958 plans submitted by NORAD had "average yearly expenditure of around five and one half billions", including "cost of the accelerated Nike Zeus program" and three Ballistic Missile Early Warning System (BMEWS) sites.


title: NORAD

text: Canada's NORAD bunker at CFB North Bay with a SAGE AN/FSQ-7 Combat Direction Central computer was constructed from 1959 to 1963, and each of the USAF's eight smaller AN/FSQ-8 Combat Control Central systems provided NORAD with data and could command the entire United States air defense. The RCAF's 1950 "ground observer system, the Long Range Air Raid Warning System", was discontinued and on 31 January 1959, the United States Ground Observer Corps was deactivated. The Cheyenne Mountain nuclear bunker's planned mission was expanded in August 1960 to "a hardened center from which CINCNORAD would supervise and direct operations "against space attack" as well as air attack" The Secretary of Defense assigned on 7 October 1960, "operational command of all space surveillance to Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) and operational control to North American Air Defense Command (NORAD)".


title: NORAD

text: The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) placed the Ent Air Force Base Space Detection and Tracking System (496L System with Philco 2000 Model 212 computer) "under the operational control of CINCNORAD on December 1, 1960"; during Cheyenne Mountain nuclear bunker excavation, and the joint SAC-NORAD exercise "Sky Shield II"—and on 2 September 1962—"Sky Shield III" were conducted for mock penetration of NORAD sectors.


title: NORAD

text: NORAD command center operations moved from Ent Air Force Base to the 1963 partially underground "Combined Operations Center" for Aerospace Defense Command and NORAD at the Chidlaw Building. President John F. Kennedy visited "NORAD headquarters" after the 5 June 1963 United States Air Force Academy graduation and on 30 October 1964, "NORAD began manning" the Combat Operations Center in the Cheyenne Mountain Complex. By 1965, about 250,000 United States and Canadian personnel were involved in the operation of NORAD, On 1 January 1966, Air Force Systems Command turned the COC over to NORAD The NORAD Cheyenne Mountain Complex was accepted on 8 February 1966.


title: NORAD

text: United States Department of Defense realignments for the NORAD command organization began by 15 November 1968 (e.g., Army Air Defense Command (ARADCOM)) and by 1972, there were eight NORAD "regional areas ... for all air defense", and the NORAD Cheyenne Mountain Complex Improvements Program (427M System) became operational in 1979.


title: NORAD

text: On at least three occasions, NORAD systems failed, such as on 9 November 1979, when a technician in NORAD loaded a test tape, but failed to switch the system status to "test", causing a stream of constant false warnings to spread to two "continuity of government" bunkers as well as command posts worldwide. On 3 June 1980, and again on 6 June 1980, a computer communications device failure caused warning messages to sporadically flash in U.S. Air Force command posts around the world that a nuclear attack was taking place. During these incidents, Pacific Air Forces (PACAF) properly had their planes (loaded with nuclear bombs) in the air; Strategic Air Command (SAC) did not and received criticism, because they did not follow procedure, even though the SAC command knew these were almost certainly false alarms, as did PACAF. Both command posts had recently begun receiving and processing direct reports from the various radar, satellite, and other missile attack detection systems, and those direct reports simply did not match the erroneous data received from NORAD.


title: NORAD

text: Following the 1979 Joint US-Canada Air Defense Study, the command structure for aerospace defense was changed, e.g., "SAC assumed control of ballistic missile warning and space surveillance facilities" on 1 December 1979 from ADCOM. The Aerospace Defense Command major command ended 31 March 1980. and its organizations in Cheyenne Mountain became the "ADCOM" "specified" command under the same commander as NORAD, e.g., HQ NORAD/ADCOM J31 manned the Space Surveillance Center. By 1982, a NORAD Off-site Test Facility was located at Peterson AFB. The DEW Line was to be replaced with the North Warning System (NWS); the Over-the-Horizon Backscatter (OTH-B) radar was to be deployed; more advanced fighters were deployed, and E-3 Sentry AWACS aircraft were planned for greater use. These recommendations were accepted by the governments in 1985. The United States Space Command was formed in September 1985 as an adjunct, but not a component of NORAD.


title: NORAD

text: In 1989 NORAD operations expanded to cover counter-drug operations, for example, tracking of small aircraft entering and operating within the United States and Canada. DEW line sites were replaced between 1986 and 1995 by the North Warning System. The Cheyenne Mountain site was also upgraded, but none of the proposed OTH-B radars are currently in operation.


title: NORAD

text: After the September 11, 2001 attacks, the NORAD Air Warning Center's mission "expanded to include the interior airspace of North America."


title: NORAD

text: The Cheyenne Mountain Realignment was announced on 28 July 2006, to consolidate NORAD's day-to-day operations at Peterson Air Force Base with Cheyenne Mountain in "warm standby" staffed with support personnel.


title: NORAD

text: The NORAD command center located under Cheyenne Mountain, Colorado is a setting of the 1983 film "WarGames" and the television series "Jeremiah" and "Stargate SG-1". In the 1996 science fiction film "Independence Day", NORAD was destroyed by the alien invaders. In the 2014 film "Interstellar", NORAD dissolves and its headquarters is converted for NASA.


title: NORAD

text: In season 25 episode 4 of the TV series South Park, NORAD is hacked into by Mr Mackey using late 1980s computer hardware.


title: NORAD

text: As a publicity move on 24 December 1955, NORAD's predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD), informed the press that CONAD was tracking Santa Claus's sleigh, adding that "CONAD, Army, Navy and Marine Air Forces will continue to track and guard Santa and his sleigh on his trip to and from the U.S. against possible attack from those who do not believe in Christmas", and a Christmas Eve tradition was born, known as the "NORAD Tracks Santa" program. Every year on Christmas Eve, "NORAD Tracks Santa" purports to track Santa Claus as he leaves the North Pole and delivers presents to children around the world. Today, NORAD relies on volunteers to make the program possible.


title: 99 Problems

text: "99 Problems" is the third single released by American rapper Jay-Z in 2004 from "The Black Album". It was released on April 27, 2004. The chorus hook "I got 99 problems, but a bitch ain't one" is taken from the Ice-T single "99 Problems" from the album "Home Invasion" (1993). The hook was coined during a conversation between Ice-T and Brother Marquis of Miami-based 2 Live Crew. Marquis used the phrase in the 1996 2 Live Crew song "Table Dance".


title: 99 Problems

text: In the song, Jay-Z tells a story about dealing with rap critics, racial profiling from a police officer who wants to search his car, and an aggressor. The song reached number 30 on the "Billboard" Hot 100.


title: 99 Problems

text: The track was produced by Rick Rubin, his first hip hop production in many years. Rubin provided Jay-Z with a guitar riff and stripped-down beat that were once his trademarks. In creating the track Rubin used some classic 1980s sample staples such as "The Big Beat" by Billy Squier, "Long Red" by Mountain, and "Get Me Back On Time" by Wilson Pickett. Featuring the same Billy Squier drum beat sample, Dizzee Rascal released "Fix Up, Look Sharp" in August 2003 prior to "The Black Album"'s release.


title: 99 Problems

text: The title and chorus are derived from Ice-T's "99 Problems" from his 1993 album "Home Invasion". The song featured Brother Marquis of 2 Live Crew. The original song was more profane and describes a wide range of sexual conquests. Ice-T would re-record his version of the song with the Rubin/Jay-Z guitar riff for Body Count's 2014 album "Manslaughter" in order to "reclaim" the hook from being mis-attributed to Jay-Z. Portions of Ice-T's original lyrics were similarly quoted in a song by fellow rapper Trick Daddy on a track also titled "99 Problems" from his 2001 album "Thugs Are Us". Jay-Z begins his third verse directly quoting lines from Bun B's opening verse off the track "Touched" from the UGK album "Ridin' Dirty".


title: 99 Problems

text: The second verse, describing Jay-Z's traffic stop, has received much more attention than the rest of the song.


title: 99 Problems

text: The second verse was based on an actual experience of Jay-Z in the 1990s in New Jersey. He wrote that in 1994 he was pulled over by police while carrying cocaine in a secret compartment in his sunroof. He refused to let the police search the car and the police called for drug-sniffing dogs. However, the dogs never showed up and the police had to let him go. Moments after he drove away, he saw a police car with the dogs drive by. In a discussion at the Celeste Bartos Forum at the New York Public Library, Jay-Z described the second verse of the song as representing "a contest of wills" between the car's driver who is "all the way in the wrong" for carrying illegal drugs, and a racist police officer who pulls over the driver not for any infraction but for being African-American. "Both guys are used to getting their way" and thus reluctant to back down, Jay-Z notes, and the driver "knows a bit about the law because he's used to breaking it" and asserts his legal rights.


title: 99 Problems

text: In 2011 Southwestern Law School Professor Caleb Mason wrote an article with a line-by-line analysis of the second verse of the song from a legal perspective referencing the Fourth Amendment to the United States Constitution, citing it as a useful tool for teaching law students search and seizure law involving search warrants, "Terry" stops, racial profiling, the exclusionary rule, and the motor vehicle exception. Mason writes that some of Jay-Z's lyrics are legally accurate and describe prudent behavior (e.g., identifying when police ask for consent to search, specifically asking if one is under arrest, and complying with the police order to stop rather than fleeing which would certainly result in a search of the car and might authorize police to use lethal force to stop a high speed chase). However, Mason also notes the song lyrics are legally incorrect in indicating that a driver can refuse an order to exit the car and that police would need a warrant to search a locked glove compartment or trunk—in fact, police would only need probable cause to search a car. In 2012, Professor Emir Crowne of the University of Windsor Faculty of Law wrote an article concluding that Jay-Z's lyrics may be legally correct under Canadian law.


title: 99 Problems

text: While the song's meaning is widely debated, the chorus "If you're having girl problems, I feel bad for you son/I've got 99 problems but a bitch ain't one" was defined in Jay-Z's book, "Decoded", as referring to something different in each verse. In verse two, it refers to a police dog.


title: 99 Problems

text: The song garnered widespread acclaim. The song came in at No. 2 on "Rolling Stone"s top 100 songs of the '00s. On the updated list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time, the song was added and came in at No. 172. In 2019, they ranked the song number four on their list of the 50 greatest Jay-Z songs. The song was listed at No. 14 on Pitchfork Media's top 500 songs of the 2000s (decade) and in October 2011, "NME" placed it at number 24 on its list "150 Best Tracks of the Past 15 Years".


title: 99 Problems

text: Jack White has hailed the song, describing it as "the story of America ... in a nutshell, [it's] the story of all the struggles in America, black or white, [and of] class systems".


title: 99 Problems

text: In 2008, the song was memorably covered by Barry Chuckle of British children's comedy duo The Chuckle Brothers as part of BBC Radio 1's Scott Mills show. Mills described the cover as "superior, in essence, to the original".


title: 99 Problems

text: On January 21, 2009, Jay-Z performed the song as part of his set at the Staff Ball, the last official event of Barack Obama's inauguration. The ball was exclusively for 4,000 staffers who had worked on Obama's campaign. Jay-Z tweaked the lyrics to suit the historic atmosphere, and the crowd sang along: "I got 99 problems but a Bush ain't one", replacing "bitch" with the name of the former President. At a rally for President Barack Obama in November 2012 Jay-Z changed the lyrics of the song to "If you having world problems I feel bad for you son / I got 99 problems but Mitt ain't one." President Obama quipped in his monologue at the White House Correspondents' Dinner on April 27, 2013: "Some things are beyond my control. For example, this whole controversy about Jay-Z going to Cuba. It's unbelievable. I've got 99 problems and now Jay-Z is one."


title: 99 Problems

text: Eminem referenced the lyrics in his song "So Much Better" track, part of "The Marshall Mathers LP 2" album, with "I got 99 problems and a bitch ain't one/ She's all 99 of 'em; I need a machine gun".


title: 99 Problems

text: Danger Mouse famously remixed this song with samples from "Helter Skelter" by The Beatles as part of his oft-bootlegged album "The Grey Album". The track was also remixed with Linkin Park for the EP "Collision Course", being mixed with the Linkin Park songs "Points of Authority" and "One Step Closer". The thrash metal group Body Count combined the lyrics of Ice-T's "99 Problems" with the guitar riff from Jay-Z's "99 Problems" for the song "99 Problems BC" on the album "Manslaughter". Big Sean referenced the lyrics in Drake's "All Me" with the line "I got 99 problems, getting rich ain't one". Iggy Azalea referenced the lyrics in Ariana Grande's "Problem" with the line "I got 99 problems but you won't be one". In 2009, fellow rapper and collaborator Kid Cudi, referenced the song in the opening verse of his song "Soundtrack 2 My Life" with the line "I got 99 problems and they all bitches". The singer Hugo recorded a bluegrass cover of the song in 2011. There have been several remixes of the track including versions by The Prodigy and Linkin Park. In particular, Jay-Z had been quoted as saying that The Prodigy remix is one of his favorites by keeping the main guitar riff but heavier and darker which in turn was the inspiration for The Prodigy track 'Spitfire' written by Liam Howlett and released in 2005.


title: 99 Problems

text: The music video premiered in April 2004 and was directed by Mark Romanek. It received praises from critics such as Armond White, and was nominated for four MVPA awards in 2005, of which it won three. It also won the MTV Video Music Awards for Best Rap Video, Best Director, Best Editing and Best Cinematography, as well as gaining nominations for Video of the Year and Best Male Video. It was criticized, however, by the Humane Society of the United States for scenes in the video that glorified dog fighting.


title: 99 Problems

text: The video accompanied "The Black Album" which, at the time, was to be Jay-Z's final release. Jay-Z has stated that he wanted the video to be as auto-biographical as the rest of the album. The goal for the video was to create a portrait of where Jay-Z grew up. In a conversation with the video's director, Jay-Z stated that he wanted the video to "make a pissy wall look like art". The job of directing this video was originally intended for Quentin Tarantino, however Rick Rubin suggested that Jay-Z offer the job to Mark Romanek. Due to the research and influence of Romanek and the videos cinematographer, Joaquin Baca Asay, the video borrows visual characteristics from many New York street photographers and black and white photographs (Martin Dixon and Eugene Richards to name a few). The video is shot entirely on black-and-white film. It consists mainly of scenes filmed in close proximity to Jay-Z's childhood home, The Marcy Houses in Bedford Stuyvesant. These include:


title: Kokoro

text: Along with Osamu Dazai's "No Longer Human", "Kokoro" is one of the best-selling novels of all time in Japan, having sold more than seven million copies in the country as of 2016.


title: Kokoro

text: The work deals with the transition from the Japanese Meiji society to the modern era, by exploring the friendship between a young man and an older man he calls "Sensei" ("teacher" or "master"). It continues the theme of isolation developed in Natsume's immediately preceding works, here in the context of interwoven strands of egotism and guilt, as opposed to shame. Other important themes in the novel include the changing times (particularly the modernization of Japan in the Meiji era), the changing roles and ideals of women, and intergenerational change in values, the role of family, the importance of the self versus the group, the cost of weakness, and identity.


title: Kokoro

text: "Kokoro" is written as three parts. The first two are told from the perspective of the narrator, relating his memories of Sensei, an older man who was a friend and mentor during his university days. Part three, which makes up the latter half of the novel, is a long confessional letter written by Sensei to the narrator. In this letter Sensei reveals, in keeping with an earlier promise, the full story of his past.


title: Kokoro

text: The narrator has been left on his own in Kamakura after his friend, who invited him to vacation there, is called home by his family. One day, after finishing his usual swim in the sea, he takes notice of a man in the changing house who's there with a foreign guest, preparing to head for the water. He sees the same man each day thereafter, though no longer with his foreign companion. After some days, he finds occasion to make the man's acquaintance. As they grow closer, he comes to refer to the man as “Sensei.”


title: Kokoro

text: On parting in Kamakura, as Sensei prepares to return home to Tokyo, the narrator asks if he can call on Sensei at his home sometime. He receives an affirmative, though less enthusiastic than hoped for, response. Several weeks after his own return to Tokyo, he makes an initial visit, only to find Sensei away. On his next visit, when he again finds Sensei away, he learns from Sensei's wife that Sensei makes monthly visits to the gravesite of a friend.


title: Kokoro

text: Over subsequent months and years, through periodic visits, the narrator comes to know Sensei and his wife quite well. At the same time, Sensei insists on maintaining a certain distance. He refuses to talk of his deceased friend and is reluctant to explain his own reclusion and lack of occupation. He also cautions the narrator that intimacy and admiration will only lead to future disillusionment and disdain. However, he does promise that one day, when the time is right, he will divulge in full the story of his past.


title: Kokoro

text: The narrator returns home to the country after graduation. His father, who had been in ill health, is up and about, enjoying a respite from his illness. They set a date for a graduation celebration, only to have their plans put on hold by news of the Meiji Emperor falling ill. As the weeks go by, the narrator's father gradually loses his vigor and becomes bedridden. From his bed, he follows the papers as the Emperor declines and then passes away.


title: Kokoro

text: After the Emperor's passing, the narrator is pressured by his mother to secure employment to put his father at ease. At the same time, his father's condition holds him close to home in the country. At his mother's urging, he writes to Sensei to request assistance in finding a position in Tokyo. While not expecting any favorable response on the matter of employment, he does at least expect some reply and is disappointed when none arrives. Summer wears on, and the rest of the family is summoned home in anticipation of the father's final hour. All are moved when news comes of the suicide ("junshi") of General Nogi Maresuke, who takes his own life to follow his Emperor (the Meiji Emperor) in death.


title: Kokoro

text: Shortly thereafter, a telegram from Sensei arrives, summoning the narrator to Tokyo. Unable to leave his father, the narrator refuses Sensei's request, first by telegram and then by a letter detailing his situation. Some days later, a thick letter arrives by registered mail from Sensei. Stealing away from his father's bedside, the narrator opens the letter to find it's the previously-promised accounting of Sensei's past. Leafing through the pages, a line near the end catches his eye. “By the time this letter reaches you, I’ll be gone from this world. I’ll have already passed away.”


title: Kokoro

text: Rushing to the station, the narrator boards the first train for Tokyo. Once on board, he takes out Sensei's letter and reads it through from the start.


title: Kokoro

text: This latter part of the novel is related by Sensei in the form of his long written testament that the narrator is reading aboard the train as he steams toward Tokyo. Sensei begins by explaining his reticence over the summer as he wrestled with the problem of his own continued existence. He then explains the motivation for his current actions. The remainder of the letter is an accounting of Sensei's life.


title: Kokoro

text: Sensei grows up in the countryside and loses both of his parents to illness while still in his late teens. As an only child, he inherits the family's considerable wealth, which his uncle steps in to help manage during the years over which, as previously planned, he pursues his education in Tokyo. Each summer Sensei returns home to the country. On each such return, his uncle suggests that Sensei should marry soon and establish himself in the community as the family heir. Uninterested yet in marriage, Sensei declines to commit. As the years go on, pressure from the uncle intensifies. Then finally, the uncle proposes his own daughter, Sensei's cousin, as the bride. After Sensei's continued refusal, it comes to light that the uncle's businesses are struggling, and much of Sensei's wealth has been poured into losing ventures. Sensei, now learning the truth of his situation, salvages what remains, arranges for the sale of his house and possessions, visits his parents’ gravesite one last time, and turns his back on his home town, severing all ties with his relations.


title: Kokoro

text: Back at his studies in Tokyo, and now with his own assets in hand, Sensei decides to trade his boisterous student lodgings for calmer quarters. Walking the surrounding hills, he's referred by a local shop owner to the home of a widow looking to take in a boarder. The household is quiet, with just the widow, her daughter, and a maidservant. After a brief interview, the widow accepts Sensei as her boarder. Sensei is smitten with the daughter at first sight, but at the same time the deceit of his uncle has left him generally distrustful. The widow takes to him and treats him as family, helping to sooth his nerves and draw him out. After some time, he thinks to ask the widow for her daughter's hand but still holds back for fear that the widow, or the widow and her daughter in collusion, are playing him just as his uncle had.


title: Kokoro

text: Sensei has a friend and classmate, whom he refers to simply as K, who hails from the same home town and with whom he shared a common dormitory during his first years of study in Tokyo. K is the second son of a Buddhist priest but was sent to the family of a prominent local physician as an adoptive son. His adoptive family funds his study of medicine in Tokyo, but contrary to their wishes, K pursues his own passions of religion and philosophy. After his third year in Tokyo, he confesses his deception and is disowned as a result. Sensei feels some obligation to assist his friend, who is struggling to maintain an aggressive course of study while at the same time supporting himself. K views himself as an ascetic and strongly declines any form of financial assistance. Finally, Sensei convinces K to join him in his lodgings, arguing that K's presence there will serve toward his own spiritual betterment. After some persuasion on Sensei's part to win the widow's approval, K joins Sensei in the widow's home as a second boarder. After a while, with Sensei working behind the scenes, K warms to his new surroundings, emerges from his ascetic shell, and grows more sociable. Sensei is pleased with the improvement he's worked in his friend's demeanor but also begins to see K as a rival for the daughter's affection.


title: Kokoro

text: In the summer before their final year of studies, Sensei and K set out together on a walking tour of the Boshu peninsula. They follow the shoreline from village to village, trudging under the hot sun and cooling themselves from time to time in the sea. All the while, Sensei is tormented by suspicions. He wonders if K might not have his eye on the daughter, and he fears that the daughter may in fact favor K. He longs to divulge to K his feelings for the daughter, but he lacks the courage to do so. Sensei and K return to Tokyo, blackened by the sun and haggard from days of trekking.


title: Kokoro

text: Autumn comes and classes begin again. Sensei returns home at times to find K and the daughter conversing amiably, and he worries they’re growing close. He thinks again to ask the widow for her daughter's hand, but again holds back, this time for fear that K holds the daughter's affection. Finally, during the New Year's holiday, things come to a head when the widow and her daughter leave home for the day to call on a relative. K comes into Sensei's room, joins him at his hibachi, and after a pained silence forces out a confession of his love for the daughter. Sensei, shocked and dismayed, is unable to muster a response.


title: Kokoro

text: Sensei kicks himself for not at least having countered K's confession with his own. Through subsequent conversation, though, he finds some solace in learning that K's sentiments are known only to the two of them and not to the ladies. In the days that follow, K either cannot or will not articulate his intentions, and Sensei's anxiety persists. Finally, K seeks out Sensei's counsel, confiding that he's torn between his long-held ideals and his newfound passion. Sensing K's vulnerability, and at the same time seeking to serve his own interest, Sensei berates K, throwing back at him his own words on discipline and servitude to a cause. K asks that Sensei speak no more on the subject and withdraws into reticence. Sensei fears that K is preparing to shift his life's course out of love for the daughter. Resolving to preempt K's actions, he feigns illness, staying home for time alone with the widow. After confirming that K has not yet approached her, Sensei asks the widow for her daughter's hand. She acquiesces, and the matter is easily settled. That same day, the widow talks to her daughter. Within the household, only K remains unaware of what's transpired.


title: Kokoro

text: Days pass, with Sensei loathe to disclose to K what he's done. Finally, it comes to light that the widow has spoken to K and been surprised by his reaction. She scolds Sensei for leaving his friend in the dark. Sensei resolves to talk with K the next morning, but he never gets the chance. During the night, K takes his own life. K leaves behind a note, but absent is the rebuke that Sensei dreads. K's feelings for the daughter, along with Sensei's betrayal of his friend's trust, are forever safe from the world.


title: Kokoro

text: Sensei notifies K's family and proceeds to settle affairs as requested in K's final note. He suggests that K be interred in the nearby Zoshigaya cemetery, and K's family agrees. Sensei and the ladies relocate shortly thereafter to a new house. Sensei finishes his studies, and half a year later weds the daughter. Sensei makes monthly pilgrimages to K's grave. His betrayal of K, and K's death, continue to cast a shadow over his married life, yet he remains unable to burden his wife with his secret. Having lost faith in humanity in general, and now in his own self, Sensei withdraws from the world to lead an idle life. As the years pass and he reflects further on K, he comes to realize that K's suicide was less about lost love and more about alienation and disappointment in oneself. Sensei feels himself drawn, more and more, to follow K's path. With the ending of the Meiji era and the passing of General Nogi, Sensei decides that he's outlived his time and must part from the world. His final request to the narrator is that his wife never know his story, that it be held private until after she's gone.


title: Kokoro

text: Although Sensei feels guilt for having caused his friend's death, he comes to believe that K's death was not a direct consequence of his unhappiness in love, but rather the same loneliness from which Sensei himself suffers. Similarly, in the view of most critics, "psychological guilt [is] less important than philosophical isolation". McClellan traces the theme of seeking relief from isolation through Sōseki's earlier works of "The Gate" and "Kojin" to its solution in Sensei's suicide in "Kokoro".


title: Kokoro

text: Even though guilt comes into play, taking responsibility for one's actions and mistakes is paramount in the Confucian and Japanese ideology portrayed in the novel, and Sensei understands those traditions. Sensei clearly feels responsible for K's suicide, displayed in his constant trips to the cemetery at Zoshigaya to visit K's grave, his belief that he is being punished by heaven, or is destined for misery and loneliness, his belief that he must never be, or can never be, happy, because of this betrayal of K. Thus, as is often the case in Japanese culture (particularly in the Tokugawa period, but also certainly carried on beyond it), Sensei's suicide is an apology and an attempt to show penitence, or to do something about one's mistakes. He writes on several occasions that he has long known he must die, but has not the strength to kill himself just yet. He is constrained by weakness, and has not the strength to hold to either those traditional Japanese values, or the new modern Western ones that were fast replacing them throughout the Meiji era.


title: Kokoro

text: Jun Etō attributes the focus on isolation in Sōseki's work to a philosophical crisis which the author underwent while studying in London. His contact with the more individualistic ideas of the West shattered his faith in the Confucian scholar-administrator model of traditional Japan, but he retained enough of his traditional upbringing to preclude a wholehearted embrace of Western thinking; leaving him, "a lonely, modern man". The fallen man of Soseki's conception could only escape through madness or suicide, or live on and continue to suffer.


title: Kokoro

text: Doi Takeo provides a contrasting interpretation of the novel, in which the psychological dominates and which sees Sensei's life as a descent into "first" madness, "then" suicide. Noting inconsistencies in Sensei's account of his uncle's fraud, he argues that Sensei's perception of his uncle's behaviour was a schizophrenic delusion created by changes in Sensei himself. He finds further confirmation of this assessment in Sensei's belief that he is being first persecuted, then entrapped by the family he goes to live with, and in the voice which Sensei says talked to him in the years after K's suicide. Sensei's own end he interprets as a homoerotic act, "loyally following his beloved into death".


title: Kokoro

text: Although Sensei's story is the climax of the novel, about half its length is devoted to the story of the narrator. Many commentators have noted the similarity between the narrator and the younger Sensei. The narrator is at an earlier stage in his own transition from a simplistic celebration of life in the opening pages to his own growing separation from mankind. The extent of the latter becomes apparent when he returns home to find that he is no longer in sympathy with his own family.


title: Kokoro

text: This second part of the novel, in which Sensei is physically absent, also serves as a contrast between the unthinking contentment of the narrator's father and the thoughtful discontent of Sensei. McClellan compares the "strength and dignity" of K's and Sensei's suicides with the physical indignity of the father's death, while still noting the tranquility the father manages to retain. Doi Takeo in his psychological readings sees the narrator's preference for Sensei over his real father — culminating in the abandonment of his dying father for the already dead Sensei — as a case of "father transference".


title: Kokoro

text: There has been much debate over the reasons for Sensei's eventual suicide. Eto Jun ascribes to it a "dual motivation": a personal desire to end his years of egoistic suffering, and a public desire to demonstrate his loyalty to the emperor. This position is supported by Sensei's own statement (albeit in jest) that his suicide would be, "through loyalty to the spirit of the Meiji era", while earlier in the book he had explicitly connected his isolation with the times he lived in: "loneliness is the price we have to pay for being born in this modern age, so full of freedom, independence, and our own egotistical selves". Isamu Fukuchi, however, contests both these points. He argues that suicide to end his own suffering would make no sense after having already endured the suffering for many years, while a distinction is to be made between loyalty to the Meiji emperor and loyalty to the "spirit" of the Meiji era. He sees the latter as being the conflict between, "modern ideals and traditional morality". Sensei's suicide is therefore a recognition that the end of the Meiji era has rendered as anachronisms those who, like him, are torn between modernity and tradition.


title: Kokoro

text: "Kokoro" has been translated into English in 1941 by Ineko Kondo, in 1957 by Edwin McClellan, and in 2010 by Meredith McKinney.


title: Kokoro

text: The novel has also been repeatedly adapted for television. Additionally, it has been adapted into an anime film (Aoi Bungaku series), mangas (Nariko Enomoto and the Manga de Dokuha series) and satirised in a comic strip ("Step Aside Pops", Kate Beaton).


title: Ephraim

text: Ephraim (; "ʾEp̄rayīm", in pausa: "ʾEp̄rāyīm") was, according to the Book of Genesis, the second son of Joseph ben Jacob and Asenath. Asenath was an Ancient Egyptian woman whom Pharaoh gave to Joseph as wife, and the daughter of Potipherah, a priest of ʾĀwen. Ephraim was born in Egypt before the arrival of the Israelites from Canaan.


title: Ephraim

text: The Book of Numbers lists three sons of Ephraim: Shuthelah, Beker, and Tahan. However, 1 Chronicles 7 lists eight sons, including Ezer and Elead, who were killed in an attempt to steal cattle from the locals. After their deaths he had another son, Beriah. He was the ancestor of Joshua, son of Nun ben Elishama, the leader of the Israelite tribes in the conquest of Canaan.


title: Ephraim

text: According to the biblical narrative, Jeroboam, who became the first king of the Northern Kingdom of Israel, was also from the house of Ephraim.


title: Ephraim

text: The Book of Genesis related the name "Ephraim" to the Hebrew root פָּרָה (pārā), meaning "to be fruitful". This referring to Joseph's ability to produce children, specifically while in Egypt (termed by the Torah as "the land of his affliction"). The name Ephraim can therefore be translated as "I will be fruitful", with the prefix of aleph (א) indicating the first person, singular, future tense.


title: Ephraim

text: In the biblical account, Joseph's other son is Manasseh, and Joseph himself is one of the two children of Rachel and Jacob, the other being Benjamin. Biblical scholars regard it as obvious, from their geographic overlap and their treatment in older passages, that originally Ephraim and Manasseh were considered one tribe – that of "Joseph". According to several biblical scholars, Benjamin was originally part of the suggested Ephraim-Manasseh single "Joseph" tribe, but the biblical account of Joseph as his father became lost. A number of biblical scholars suspect that the distinction of the "Joseph tribes" (including Benjamin) is that they were the only Israelites which went to Egypt and returned, while the main Israelite tribes simply emerged as a subculture from the Canaanites and had remained in Canaan throughout. According to this view, the story of Jacob's visit to Laban to obtain a wife originated as a metaphor for this migration, with the property and family which were gained from Laban representing the gains of the Joseph tribes by the time they returned from Egypt; according to textual scholars, the Jahwist version of the Laban narrative only mentions the Joseph tribes, and Rachel, and does not mention the other tribal matriarchs at all.


title: Ephraim

text: In the Torah, the eventual precedence of the tribe of Ephraim is argued to derive from Jacob, blind and on his deathbed, blessing Ephraim before Manasseh. The text describing this blessing features a hapax legomenon – the word שכל ("sh-k-l") – which classical rabbinical literature has interpreted in esoteric manners; some rabbinical sources connect the term with "sekel", meaning "mind"/"wisdom", and view it as indicating that Jacob was entirely aware of who he was actually blessing; other rabbinical sources connect the term with "shikkel", viewing it as signifying that Jacob was "despoiling" Manasseh in favour of Ephraim; yet other rabbinical sources argue that it refers to the power of Jacob to "instruct" and guide the holy spirit. In classical rabbinical sources, Ephraim is described as being modest and not selfish. These rabbinical sources allege that it was on account of modesty and selflessness, and a prophetic vision of Joshua, that Jacob gave Ephraim precedence over Manasseh, the elder of the two; in these sources Jacob is regarded as being sufficiently just that God upholds the blessing in his honour, and makes Ephraim the leading tribe.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Ezra is a 2017 Indian Malayalam-language supernatural horror thriller film written and directed by Jay K. starring Prithviraj Sukumaran, Priya Anand, Tovino Thomas, Sujith Shankar, Vijayaraghavan Pillai, and Sudev Nair in the leading roles. Principal photography began in late-June 2016. Major filming locations were Fort Cochin and Sri Lanka. The movie grossed 50 crore at the box-office. It was remade in Hindi in 2021 as "Dybbuk".


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: The film opens with the death of the last Malabar Jew in Cochin. An antique seller steals antique items including a strange looking box with Jewish inscriptions from the Jew's house. An unseen force from the box mauls and kills a worker in his shop at night. A.C.P Shafeer Ahammed (Tovino Thomas) is assigned the case but is unable to reach a lead.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Ranjan Mathew (Prithviraj Sukumaran), a nuclear waste management specialist based in Mumbai, is transferred to Kochi with wife Priya Raghuram (Priya Anand). Being both a Marathi and a Malayali, Priya finds it hard to adjust to the shift from Mumbai to Kerala. On a retail therapy, Priya buys the strange box from the antique shop. Upon opening it, paranormal experiences begin.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Ranjan's uncle Father Samuel (Vijayaraghavan), who had looked after Ranjan as an orphan, is invited to Ranjan's house. Samuel feels that something is amiss and he tells Ranjan that the box from the antique shop is a Dybbuk box, with the name “Abraham Ezra” written on it in Hebrew. At his behest, Ranjan finds more about the Dybbuk from a Rabbi David Benyamin (Babu Antony) in Mumbai. He tells Ranjan that the Dybbuk only possesses people with mental instability or children under 3 years, and whoever exorcises the Dybbuk becomes its worst enemy. The next day, Rabbi Benyamin dies and Ranjan learns that Priya is pregnant and realizes his child will be possessed by the dybbuk. Ranjan requests Rabbi Benyamin's son, Rabbi Marques (Sujith Shankar) for help. Marques arrives in Kochi and finds the Dybbuk is named Abraham Ezra.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Ranjan and Marques find an ex-Jew named Joshua Yehudi, a former friend of Marques' father, and get a historical book from him, which reveals the story of Abraham Ezra in 1941 in Thiru-Kochi. The film moves to the historical era, where a rich Jewish boy Abraham Ezra (Sudev Nair) and a poor Christian girl Rosy (Ann Sheetal) fall in love during Ezra's visits to Thiru Kochi, and eventually Rosy becomes pregnant. Rosy is not able to tell Ezra that she is pregnant. Ezra's father Yakoob Ezra refuses to let him marry Rosy, since she is not a Jew, and that marrying a woman of a lower social status is unacceptable. Rosy does not reveal to her father nor Yakoob that Ezra is her unborn child's father. Months later, a depressed Ezra writes to Rosy telling her to end the relationship and Rosy commits suicide in heartbreak. Rosy's father finds Ezra's letter and he with the villagers confronts the father-son duo when they arrive in Thiru Kochi. In the ensuing scrimmage, Rosy's father is killed and Ezra is left paralysed. When the doctors said that Ezra will be in this state for the rest of his life, Yakoob decides to take revenge on the town using black magic. He euthanises and puts his son's soul into a Dybbuk box, which on opening will release Ezra's spirit that will possess and destroy. A wooden dummy is buried in place of Ezra's body. Yakoob takes the corpse and dumps it in the sea. Thus is created the Dybbuk box which eventually finds its way to Ranjan.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: The story comes back to Ranjan. Marques and Samuel take Shafeer into confidence, both confirm that Abraham Ezra's story is true by exhuming the wooden mannequin.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: The film then takes a twist when it is revealed that it is not Priya, but Ranjan who has now been possessed by the spirit when Ranjan would be searching for Priya one night. Fr. Samuel tells them that Ranjan, as an orphan, had mental problems. Hence he was probably vulnerable to the Dybbuk. It is understood that the spirit left Priya and possessed Ranjan when it noted that Ranjan handles nuclear waste and he could be controlled into using that to destroy the city. At last, Ranjan is exorcised and the dybbuk is sent back into the box by Marques, using Jewish exorcism rituals. The box is then taken to the ocean by Marques and Shafeer and dumped, just as Ezra's body was disposed.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Later, Priya gives birth to a healthy baby and she and Ranjan share the news with Marques. In a mid-credit scene, the Dybbuk box is found by two young men along the seashore in Mumbai. They carry it away, planning to open it.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: In February 2016, Jay K, who was an associate director to Rajeev Ravi, announced that he will make his directorial debut through a film called Ezra. It was announced that the film will be a horror thriller involving a love story and will explore the history of Jewish culture in Kerala. Jay K said that the film is not made to frighten the spectators, but has a strong plot. He also confirmed that the film will be dubbed in Tamil and Telugu languages. Mukesh R. Mehta, C. V. Sarathy and A. V. Anoop produce the film under the banner of E4 Entertainment and AVA Productions. Rahul Raj and Tirru were roped in for the music and cinematography respectively. But both of them left the project for reasons unknown. While Tirru left in the early stage of production, Rahul Raj left after giving the song "Lailakame".


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: The film grossed 1.6 crore in the opening day and 2.5 crore on second day from Kerala box office. It grossed 15.02 crore in its first week from Kerala . The film grossed around 40 crore from Kerala box office. It grossed 50 crore from worldwide box office.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: K R Rajeesh of nowrunning has given a 3.5/5 and praised it for the extensive paranormal research and visuals.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Indian Express rated it at 3/5. Ezra not only tries to frighten the audience but it has got an extraordinary storyline, too.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: It also tells the history of the Jews who once lived in Kerala. The remarkable flashback stays as a feeling of sorrow in the audience. It describes how the caste system and discrimination of the society spoils the relationships between people.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: Rahul Raj was signed as the composer of the film. He composed the song "Lailakame" and left the project for reasons unknown. Sushin Shyam, who had worked in "Sapthmashree Thaskaraha" was then selected to compose the background score in addition to two songs ("Thambiran" & "Irul Neelum").


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: The song "Lailakame" became a smash hit, prompting several cover versions, including one by Rahul Raj himself.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: An album containing the background score for the film was released separately by Muzik247 in 2017. It contains instrumental pieces by Sushin Shyam backing the narrative horror of the film.


title: Ezra (2017 film)

text: In April 2019, it was officially confirmed that the Hindi remake of the film "Ezra" has been commissioned by the production company Panorama Studios and has signed Emraan Hashmi to star in the lead role. Jay K. was signed to direct the remake as well. The film started shooting in Mauritius on 18 July 2019. The film titled as "Dybbuk" premiered on Amazon Prime Video on 29 October 2021.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banking is retail and commercial banking organized on a cooperative basis. Cooperative banking institutions take deposits and lend money in most parts of the world.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banking, as discussed here, includes retail banking carried out by credit unions, mutual savings banks, building societies and cooperatives, as well as commercial banking services provided by mutual organizations (such as cooperative federations) to cooperative businesses.


title: Cooperative banking

text: A 2013 report by ILO concluded that cooperative banks outperformed their competitors during the financial crisis of 2007–2008. The cooperative banking sector had 20% market share of the European banking sector, but accounted for only 7% of all the write-downs and losses between the third quarter of 2007 and first quarter of 2011. Cooperative banks were also over-represented in lending to small and medium-sized businesses in all of the 10 countries included in the report.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Credit unions in the US had five times lower failure rate than other banks during the crisis and more than doubled lending to small businesses between 2008 and 2016, from $30 billion to $60 billion, while lending to small businesses overall during the same period declined by around $100 billion. Public trust in credit unions stands at 60%, compared to 30% for big banks and small businesses are 80% less likely to be dissatisfied with a credit union than with a big bank.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banks are owned by their customers and follow the cooperative principle of one person, one vote. Co-operative banks are often regulated under both banking and cooperative legislation. They provide services such as savings and loans to non-members as well as to members, and some participate in the wholesale markets for bonds, money and even equities. Many cooperative banks are traded on public stock markets, with the result that they are partly owned by non-members.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banking systems are also usually more integrated than credit union systems. Local branches of co-operative banks select their own boards of directors and manage their own operations, but most strategic decisions require approval from a central office. Credit unions usually retain strategic decision-making at a local level, though they share back-office functions, such as access to the global payments system, by federating.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Some cooperative banks are criticized for diluting their cooperative principles. Principles 2-4 of the "Statement on the Co-operative Identity" can be interpreted to require that members must control both the governance systems and capital of their cooperatives. A cooperative bank that raises capital on public stock markets creates a second class of shareholders who compete with the members for control. In some circumstances, the members may lose control. This effectively means that the bank ceases to be a cooperative. Accepting deposits from non-members may also lead to a dilution of member control.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Credit unions have the purpose of promoting thrift, providing credit at reasonable rates, and providing other financial services to its members.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Its members are usually required to share a common bond, such as locality, employer, religion or profession, and credit unions are usually funded entirely by member deposits, and avoid outside borrowing.


title: Cooperative banking

text: In some countries they are restricted to providing only unsecured personal loans, whereas in others, they can provide business loans to farmers, and mortgages.


title: Cooperative banking

text: The special banks providing Long Term Loans are called Land Development Banks (LDBs). The first LDB was started at Jhang in Punjab in 1920. This bank is also based on cooperative. The main objective of the LDBs are to promote the development of land, agriculture and increase the agricultural production. The LDBs provide long-term finance to members directly through their branches.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Building societies exist in Britain, Ireland and several Commonwealth countries. They are similar to credit unions in organisation, though few enforce a common bond. However, rather than promoting thrift and offering unsecured and business loans, their purpose is to provide home mortgages for members. Borrowers and depositors are society members, setting policy and appointing directors on a one-member, one-vote basis. Building societies often provide other retail banking services, such as current accounts, credit cards and personal loans. In the United Kingdom, regulations permit up to half of their lending to be funded by debt to non-members, allowing societies to access wholesale bond and money markets to fund mortgages. The world's largest building society is Britain's Nationwide Building Society.


title: Cooperative banking

text: The most important international associations of cooperative banks are the Brussels-based European Association of Co-operative Banks which has 28 European and non-European members, and the Paris-based International Cooperative Banking Association (ICBA), which has member institutions from around the world too.


title: Cooperative banking

text: In Canada, cooperative banking is provided by credit unions ("caisses populaires" in French). As of September 30, 2012, there were 357 credit unions and "caisses populaires" affiliated with Credit Union Central of Canada. They operated 1,761 branches across the country with 5.3 million members and $149.7 billion in assets.


title: Cooperative banking

text: The "caisse populaire" movement started by Alphonse Desjardins in Quebec, Canada, pioneered credit unions. Desjardins opened the first credit union in North America in 1900, from his home in Lévis, Quebec, marking the beginning of the Mouvement Desjardins. He was interested in bringing financial protection to working people.


title: Cooperative banking

text: British building societies developed into general-purpose savings and banking institutions with ‘one member, one vote’ ownership and can be seen as a form of financial cooperative (although many de-mutualised into conventionally owned banks in the 1980s and 1990s). Until 2017 the Co-operative Group included The Co-operative Bank, although despite its name, the Co-operative Bank was not itself a true co-operative as it was not owned directly by its members. Instead it was part-owned by a holding company which was itself a co-operative – the Co-operative Banking Group. It still retains an insurance provider, The Co-operative Insurance, noted for promoting ethical investment.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Important continental cooperative banking systems include the Crédit Agricole, Crédit Mutuel, Banque Populaire and Caisse d'épargne in France, in Spain, Rabobank in the Netherlands, BVR/DZ Bank in Germany, Banco Popolare, UBI Banca in Italy, Migros and Coop Bank in Switzerland, and the Raiffeisen system in several countries in central and eastern Europe. The cooperative banks that are members of the European Association of Co-operative Banks have 130 million customers, 4 trillion euros in assets, and 17% of Europe's deposits. The International Confederation of Cooperative Banks (CIBP) is the oldest association of cooperative banks at international level.


title: Cooperative banking

text: In Scandinavia, there is a clear distinction between mutual savings banks (Sparbank) and true credit unions (Andelsbank).


title: Cooperative banking

text: Credit unions in the United States had 96.3 million members in 2013 and assets of $1.06 trillion. The sector had five times lower failure rate than other banks during the financial crisis of 2007–2008 and more than doubled lending to small businesses between 2008 and 2016, from $30 billion to $60 billion, while lending to small businesses overall during the same period declined by around $100 billion. Public trust in credit unions stands at 60%, compared to 30% for big banks and small businesses are five times less likely to be dissatisfied with a credit union than with a big bank.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banks serve an important role in the Indian economy, especially in rural areas. In urban areas, they mainly serve to small industry and self-employed workers. They are registered under the Cooperative Societies Act, 1912. They are regulated by the Reserve Bank of India under the Banking Regulation Act, 1949 and Banking Laws (Application to Cooperative Societies) Act, 1965. Anyonya Sahakari Mandali, established in 1889 in the province of Baroda, is the earliest known cooperative credit union in India.


title: Cooperative banking

text: The Cooperative Credit System in India consists of Short Term and Long Term credit institutions. The short-term credit structure which takes care of the short term (1 to 5 years) credit needs of the farmers is a three-tier structure in most of the States viz., Primary Agricultural Cooperative Societies (PACCS) at the village level, District Central Cooperative Banks at the District level and State Cooperative Bank at the State level and two-tier in some States voz., State Cooperative Banks and PACCS. The long term credit structure caters to the long term credit needs of the farmers (up to 20 years) is a two-tier structure with Primary Agriculture and Rural Development Banks (PARDBs) at the village level and State Agriculture and Rural Development Banks. The State Cooperative Banks and Central Cooperative Banks are licensed by Reserve Bank of India under the Banking Regulation Act. While the StCBs and DCCBs function like a normal Bank they focus mainly on agricultural credit. While Reserve Bank of India is the Regulating Authority, National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) provides refinance support and takes care of inspection of StCBs and DCCBs. The first Cooperative Credit Society in India was started in 1904 at Thiroor in Tiruvallur District in Tamil Nadu


title: Cooperative banking

text: Primary Cooperative Banks which are otherwise known as Urban Cooperative Banks are registered as Cooperative Societies under the Cooperative Societies Acts of the concerned States or the Multi-State Cooperative Societies Act function in urban areas and their business is similar to that of Commercial Banks. They are licensed by RBI to do banking business. Reserve Bank of India is both the controlling and inspecting authority for the Primary Cooperative Banks.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Ofek (Hebrew: אופק) is a cooperative initiative founded in mid-2012 that intended to establish the first cooperative bank in Israel.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Since the 19th century, Italy has had hundreds of "banche popolari" (popular banks) and "banche di credito cooperativo" (cooperative credit banks) which are different kinds of cooperative societies (governed by an assembly where every shareholder/member has one vote). As of 2016, the biggest was Banca Popolare di Milano (founded in 1865).


title: Cooperative banking

text: Starting in 2016, due to a new law, several cooperative banks will be forced to merge and/or be converted to società per azioni.


title: Cooperative banking

text: The more recent phenomena of microcredit and microfinance are often based on a cooperative model. These focus on small business lending. In 2006, Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, won the Nobel Peace Prize for his ideas regarding development and his pursuit of the microcredit concept. In this concept the institution provides micro loans to people who couldn't otherwise secure loans through conventional means.


title: Cooperative banking

text: However, cooperative banking differs from modern microfinance. Particularly, members’ control over financial resources is the distinguishing feature between the cooperative model and modern microfinance. The not-for-profit orientation of modern microfinance has gradually been replaced by full-cost recovery and self-sustainable microfinance approaches. The microfinance model has been gradually absorbed by market-oriented or for-profit institutions in most underdeveloped economies. The current dominant model of microfinance, whether it is provided by not-for-profit or for-profit institutions, places the control over financial resources and their allocation in the hands of a small number of microfinance providers that benefit from the highly profitable sector.


title: Cooperative banking

text: Cooperative banking is different in many aspects from standard microfinance institutions, both for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. Although group lending may seemingly share some similarities with cooperative concepts, in terms of joint liability, the distinctions are much bigger, especially when it comes to autonomy, mobilization and control over resources, legal and organizational identity, and decision-making. Early financial cooperatives founded in Germany were more able to provide larger loans relative to the borrowers’ income, with longer-term maturity at lower interest rates compared to modern standard microfinance institutions. The main source of funds for cooperatives are local savings, while microfinance institutions in underdeveloped economies rely heavily on donations, foreign funds, external borrowing, or retained earnings, which implies high-interest rates. High-interest rates, short-term maturities, and tight repayment schedules are destructive instruments for low- and middle-income borrowers which may lead to serious debt traps, or in best scenarios will not support any sort of capital accumulation. Without improving the ability of agents to earn, save, and accumulate wealth, there are no real economic gains from financial markets to the lower- and middle-income populations.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Prometheus (recorded as WPN-114) was the oldest known non-clonal organism, a Great Basin bristlecone pine ("Pinus longaeva") tree growing near the tree line on Wheeler Peak in eastern Nevada, United States. The tree, which was at least 4,862 years old and possibly more than 5,000, was cut down in 1964 by a graduate student and United States Forest Service personnel for research purposes. Those involved did not know of its world-record age before the cutting, and the circumstances and decision-making process remain controversial.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: The tree's name refers to the mythological figure Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods and gave it to man. The designation WPN-114 was given by the original researcher, Donald Rusk Currey, and means it was the 114th tree he sampled in his research in Nevada's White Pine County.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Prometheus (WPN-114) was a living member of a population of bristlecone pine trees near the tree line on the lateral moraine of a former glacier on Wheeler Peak, in Great Basin National Park, eastern Nevada. Wheeler Peak is the highest mountain in the Snake Range, and the second highest mountain in the state of Nevada. The bristlecone pine population on this mountain is divided into at least two distinct sub-populations, one of which is accessible by a popular interpretive trail.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Prometheus, however, grew in an area reachable only by off-trail hiking. In either 1958 or 1961, a group of naturalists who admired Prometheus's grove gave names to a number of the largest or most distinctive trees, including Prometheus.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Currey originally estimated the tree was at least 4844 years old. A few years later, this was increased to 4862 by Donald Graybill of the University of Arizona's Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research. These ring counts were done on a trunk cross-section taken about 2.5 m (8 feet) above the original germination point of the tree, because the innermost rings were missing below that point. Adjusting Graybill's figure by adding the estimated number of years required to reach that height, plus a correction for the estimated number of missing rings (not uncommon in trees at the tree line), it is probable that the tree was at least 5000 years old when it fell. That made it the oldest known unitary (i.e. non-clonal) organism at the time, exceeding even the Methuselah tree of the White Mountains' Schulman Grove, in California, though Methuselah was later redated to 4850 years old.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: In 2010, a reportedly living bristlecone pine in California's White Mountains was measured by Tom Harlan to be 5062 years old. This pine has not been found after Harlan's death in 2013, and its core has not been located at the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Whether Prometheus should have been considered the oldest organism ever known depends on the definition of "oldest" and "organism". Certain sprouting (clonal) organisms, such as creosote bush or aspen, may be considered older if the entire clonal organism is considered. By that standard, the oldest living organism is a grove of quaking aspens in Utah known as Pando, at perhaps as much as 80,000 years old, although likely much less. In a clonal organism, however, the individual clonal stems are not nearly so old, and no part of the organism is particularly old at any given time. Until 2012, Prometheus was thus the oldest "non-clonal" organism yet discovered, with its innermost, extant rings exceeding 4862 years of age.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: In the 1950s, dendrochronologists were making active efforts to find the oldest living tree species. They intended to analyze the rings for various research purposes, such as evaluation of former climates, dating of archaeological ruins, and addressing the basic scientific question of maximum potential lifespan. Bristlecone pines in California's White Mountains and elsewhere were discovered by Edmund Schulman to be older than any species yet discovered. This spurred interest in finding very old bristlecones, possibly older than the Methuselah tree, aged by Schulman in 1957 at over 4,700 years.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Donald R. Currey was a graduate student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Currey was studying climate dynamics of the Little Ice Age using dendrochronology techniques. In 1963, he became aware of the bristlecone populations in the Snake Range in general, and on Wheeler Peak in particular. Based on the trees' size, growth rate and growth forms, he became convinced that some were very old, cored some of them, and found trees exceeding 3,000 years in age, but Currey was not able to obtain a continuous series of overlapping cores from WPN-114.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Here, stories diverge. It is not clear whether Currey requested, or Forest Service personnel suggested, that he cut down and section the tree in lieu of coring it. There is also some uncertainty as to why a core sample could not be obtained. One version has it that he broke or lodged his only long increment borer and could not obtain another before the end of the field season; another claims he broke two of them, while another implies that a core sample was too difficult to obtain and also would not provide as much definitive information as a full cross-section of the tree. Currey said that the tree cores were too small and difficult to read so he used a chain saw and cut the tree down.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: In addition, there are conflicting views of Prometheus's uniqueness in the Wheeler Peak grove. It is reported that Currey and/or the Forest Service personnel who authorized the cutting believed the tree was just one of many large, very old trees in the grove. Others, at least one of whom was involved in the decision-making and tree cutting, believe that the tree was clearly unique — obviously older than other trees in the area.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: At least one person involved says that Currey knew that to be true at the time, although there is no known admission from Currey that he did, and others have disputed that the tree, based on observation alone, was obviously much older than the others.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Another uncertainty is that it is not clear why the felling of such an old tree was necessary given what Currey was studying. Since the Little Ice Age had started no more than 600 years ago, many trees could presumably have provided the information he was seeking for that time period. In Currey's original report in the journal "Ecology" (Currey, 1965), however, he refers to the Little Ice Age as encompassing the period from 2000 BC to the present, thus defining the Age over a much longer time period than is currently accepted. Whether this was a common view at the time is not known. In the article, Currey indicates that he sectioned the tree as much to determine whether the oldest bristlecones were necessarily confined to California's White Mountains (as some dendrochronologists had been claiming) as from its usefulness in regard to studies of the Little Ice Age.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: Whatever the rationale, the tree was cut down and sectioned in August 1964, and several pieces of the sections were hauled out to be processed and analyzed, first by Currey, then by others in later years. Sections or pieces of the tree have ended up in various places, some of them publicly accessible, including the Great Basin National Park visitor center (Baker, Nevada), the Ely Convention Center (Ely, Nevada), the University of Arizona Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research (Tucson, Arizona), and the U.S. Forest Service's Institute of Forest Genetics (Placerville, California).


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: It has been argued that the cutting down of Prometheus was an important factor in the movement to protect bristlecones in general, and the Wheeler Peak groves in particular. There had been a movement to protect the mountain and contiguous areas as a national park before the incident, and 22 years later the area gained national park status.


title: Prometheus (tree)

text: In August 2014, marking the fiftieth anniversary of the tree's cutting, a two-day memorial for Prometheus was held in Great Basin National Park by artist Jeff Weiss.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Belfast International Airport is an airport northwest of Belfast in Northern Ireland, is the main airport for the city of Belfast. Until 1983, it was known as "Aldergrove Airport", after the nearby village of Aldergrove. In 2018, over 6.2 million passengers travelled through the airport, a 7.4% increase compared with 2017. The majority of flights from Belfast International are operated by easyJet, Northern Ireland's biggest airline. It features flights to some European metropolitan and several leisure destinations.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Belfast International has a CAA Public Use Aerodrome Licence that allows flights for the public transport of passengers or for flying instruction. The airfield was previously shared with the Royal Air Force base RAF Aldergrove, which closed in 2008. The base is now known as Joint Helicopter Command Flying Station, Aldergrove, and both runways are now owned by the airport. The airport is owned and operated by VINCI Airports which was previously owned by ADC & HAS.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: The airport lies within the parish of Killead, between the small villages of Killead (to the east) and Aldergrove (to the west). The site for the airport was established in 1917, when it was selected to be a Royal Flying Corps training establishment during the First World War. The airport remained open at the end of the war for RAF activity.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Civil traffic began in 1922, when flights were conducted to fly newspapers from Chester. The first scheduled passenger service was started in 1933 by the Scottish airline Midland & Scottish Air Ferries. This service consisted of two daily flights each way between Aldergrove and Renfrew Airport, Glasgow. This was subsequently augmented by a twice-daily, return service to Croydon, at that time London's airport, with stops at the Isle of Man, Liverpool and Birmingham.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: During the Second World War, Aldergrove remained an RAF station particularly for the Coastal Command. So that the airport could accommodate larger, long-range aircraft, a major works programme was undertaken to replace the four existing runways with two new long paved runways, thereby forming the basis of the layout that still exists at the airport today.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: One of the outcomes of the wartime airfield construction programme was the building of Nutts Corner Airport, just from Aldergrove. On 1 December 1946, the new site replaced Belfast Harbour Airport (now George Best Belfast City Airport) as Northern Ireland's civil airport, as the Harbour Airport was considered unsuitable.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: By the 1950s civil air traffic had outstripped the facilities at Nutts Corner and, in addition, aircraft were being regularly diverted to Aldergrove because of adverse weather conditions. In July 1959 the decision was made to move civil flights to Aldergrove to take advantage of the large airfield and this took place in October 1963.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: A new terminal and apron were built, with the necessary passenger facilities, and the complex was opened by Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother on 28 October 1963. The first regular jet service to London–Gatwick started in 1966, and in 1968 Aer Lingus and BOAC introduced scheduled services to New York City via Shannon and Glasgow-Prestwick respectively.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In 1971, Northern Ireland Airports Limited was formed to operate and develop the airport and its facilities. A major programme of airfield upgrades was undertaken, resulting in improvements to runways, taxiways and the parking apron.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: A new International Pier was built together with lounge facilities and car parks, while an additional apron was provided to separate the smaller general aviation aircraft from large commercial jets. In the meantime, British Airways launched the first Belfast to Heathrow shuttle service and the first Boeing 747 operated from the airport on a charter service to Toronto via Shannon. The first scheduled service to a European city was started by NLM Cityhopper (now KLM Cityhopper) flying to Amsterdam.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In 1983 the airport, renamed Belfast International, was regularly accommodating the largest civil aircraft in service and with the installation of new technology was capable of all-weather operations. In 1985 passenger numbers reached 1.5 million and BMI went into competition with British Airways on the Heathrow service. Further developments to the terminal occurred throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, extending the terminal's landside and airside area. A new Executive Aviation Terminal was also opened in 1987 and the new cargo centre opened in 1991.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: The airport was privatised in 1994. TBI became the new owner of the airport on 13 August 1996, by which time annual passenger numbers had reached 2.5 million.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In 1998, easyJet started operations from the airport with flights to London Luton. Since then the airline has established a large base at Belfast International and a further twelve domestic routes and twenty-three direct European scheduled routes have been added to the network, making the airline the largest user of the airport.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In 2005, Continental Airlines launched the first ever nonstop scheduled service to Newark; this continued to operate under the United Airlines brand until its termination in January 2017.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In July 2013, it was confirmed that abertis would sell Belfast International Airport, Stockholm Skavsta Airport & Orlando Sanford International Airport to ADC & HAS based in the United States. In February 2015 the airport re-opened the viewing gallery that had been closed for 10 years which provides a view of the apron and the runways that serve the airport. It also includes live ATC, arrival and departure boards, and a live flight radar screen. However, this was later closed again in October 2019.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Ryanair opened a base at the airport in 2016, initially operating flights to nine destinations. The airline said it would carry 1.1 million passengers a year out of the airport. In 2017 and 2018, Norwegian Air Shuttle operated long-haul services to Newburgh and Providence.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: In April 2018, Vinci Airports, a subsidiary of Vinci SA, acquired an airport portfolio held by Airports Worldwide (previously named ADC & HAS), with the transaction expected to close later that year, Vinci Airports became the new owner of Belfast International Airport.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Thomas Cook Airlines had a seasonal base at the airport, until their collapse in September 2019. They operated routes to Europe and some other destinations, operated by an Airbus A321 aircraft. Every July, they operated long-haul flights from Belfast to Cancun and Orlando, operated by their Airbus A330 aircraft. In August 2021, Ryanair announced they would be ending its operations at both of Belfast's airports. In July 2022, Ryanair announced that they will be returning to Belfast International Airport, in addition to opening a base.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: The following airlines operate regular scheduled and charter flights to and from Belfast International:


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Woodgate Aviation has a base at the airport, featuring a private jet terminal, with facilities to accommodate small aircraft. Woodgate Aviation is Belfast International Airport’s only FBO to provide hangarage. Their 33,000 sq ft hangar was constructed in 2015, and at the time of completion, access to hangar floor was through Europe’s largest hydraulic door.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Belfast International Airport welcomed Global Trek Aviation, as the third FBO on the airfield, during 2015. This was part of the Airports commercial drive to develop the non-scheduled, Military and GA development at the airport. This had notable success with an increase in growth across these movement types at Belfast International Airport.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Belfast International handled over 2.3 million passengers in 2021. The airport's busiest year over operation was in 2019 when it handled over 6.27 million passengers. The airport is the busiest in Northern Ireland and the 8th-busiest airport in the UK by passenger traffic in 2021.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Travellers by car can reach the airport from Belfast via the M2 motorway. The airport operates four car parks, three on-site car parks and one off-site car park. The on-site short-stay and main car parks are situated within easy walking distance of the terminal building, and an on-demand courtesy bus operates to and from the on-site long-stay car park. The off-site short- or long-stay car park, called 'Park and Fly', is located just before the main entrance to the airport, and is also serviced by a courtesy bus.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: Translink operates an express bus service 300 to the airport from its Europa Buscentre in Belfast City Centre. This runs 24 hours a day, every 15 minutes at peak times. Translink also offers bus connections to Antrim railway station. The airport can be reached from Derry and the northwest by the Airporter. The 109A bus service operates between 6am and 6pm from Lisburn bus centre in Lisburn City Centre, calling at Lisburn railway station, Ballinderry, Glenavy, Crumlin, Belfast International Airport, and Antrim Train and Bus Centre Providing connections with Northern Ireland railways to Belfast Great victoria street station and Derry/Londonderry station.


title: Belfast International Airport

text: The nearest railway station is Antrim railway station, from the airport in Antrim, and serviced by a bus (the 109A Ulsterbus service) to and from Antrim bus/railway station from there connections to Derry and Belfast by train can be made. There are connections to Belfast, Lisburn and Derry. Antrim station is on the Belfast–Derry railway line. Trains to and from Dublin are via Belfast Central railway station. A new station serving the airport could be constructed on the mothballed Lisburn-Antrim railway line, as set out in the airport master plan. This line remains in serviceable condition and passes close to the airport terminal. It has also been listed in a public review of the future of Northern Ireland railways.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The tree of life or universal tree of life is a metaphor, model and research tool used to explore the evolution of life and describe the relationships between organisms, both living and extinct, as described in a famous passage in Charles Darwin's "On the Origin of Species" (1859).


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: Tree diagrams originated in the medieval era to represent genealogical relationships. Phylogenetic tree diagrams in the evolutionary sense date back to the mid-nineteenth century.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The term phylogeny for the evolutionary relationships of species through time was coined by Ernst Haeckel, who went further than Darwin in proposing phylogenic histories of life. In contemporary usage, "tree of life" refers to the compilation of comprehensive phylogenetic databases rooted at the last universal common ancestor of life on Earth. Two public databases for the tree of life are "TimeTree", for phylogeny and divergence times, and the "Open Tree of Life", for phylogeny.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: Although tree-like diagrams have long been used to organize knowledge, and although branching diagrams known as "claves" ("keys") were omnipresent in eighteenth-century natural history, it appears that the earliest tree diagram of natural order was the 1801 "Arbre botanique" (Botanical Tree) of the French schoolteacher and Catholic priest Augustin Augier. Yet, although Augier discussed his tree in distinctly genealogical terms, and although his design clearly mimicked the visual conventions of a contemporary family tree, his tree did not include any evolutionary or temporal aspect. Consistent with Augier's priestly vocation, the Botanical Tree showed rather the perfect order of nature as instituted by God at the moment of Creation.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 1809, Augier's more famous compatriot Jean-Baptiste Lamarck (1744–1829), who was acquainted with Augier's "Botanical Tree", included a branching diagram of animal species in his "Philosophie zoologique". Unlike Augier, however, Lamarck did not discuss his diagram in terms of a genealogy or a tree, but instead named it a "tableau" ("depiction"). Lamarck believed in the transmutation of life forms, but he did not believe in common descent; instead he believed that life developed in parallel lineages advancing from more simple to more complex.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 1840, the American geologist Edward Hitchcock (1793–1864) published the first tree-like paleontology chart in his "Elementary Geology", with two separate trees for the plants and the animals. These are crowned (graphically) with the Palms and Man.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The first edition of Robert Chambers' "Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation", published anonymously in 1844 in England, contained a tree-like diagram in the chapter "Hypothesis of the development of the vegetable and animal kingdoms". It shows a model of embryological development where fish (F), reptiles (R), and birds (B) represent branches from a path leading to mammals (M). In the text this branching tree idea is tentatively applied to the history of life on earth: "there may be branching".


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 1858, a year before Darwin's "Origin", the paleontologist Heinrich Georg Bronn (1800–1862) published a hypothetical tree labelled with letters. Although not a creationist, Bronn did not propose a mechanism of change.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: Charles Darwin (1809–1882) used the metaphor of a "tree of life" to conceptualize his theory of evolution. In "On the Origin of Species" (1859) he presented an abstract diagram of a theoretical tree of life for species of an unnamed large genus (see figure). On the horizontal base line hypothetical species within this genus are labelled A – L and are spaced irregularly to indicate how distinct they are from each other, and are above broken lines at various angles suggesting that they have diverged from one or more common ancestors. On the vertical axis divisions labelled I – XIV each represent a thousand generations. From A, diverging lines show branching descent producing new varieties, some of which become extinct, so that after ten thousand generations descendants of A have become distinct new varieties or even sub-species a, f, and m. Similarly, the descendants of I have diversified to become the new varieties w and z. The process is extrapolated for a further four thousand generations so that the descendants of A and I become fourteen new species labelled a to z. While F has continued for fourteen thousand generations relatively unchanged, species B,C,D,E,G,H,K and L have gone extinct. In Darwin's own words: "Thus the small differences distinguishing varieties of the same species, will steadily tend to increase till they come to equal the greater differences between species of the same genus, or even of distinct genera." This is a branching pattern with no names given to species, unlike the more linear tree Ernst Haeckel made years later (figure below) which includes the names of species and shows a more linear development from "lower" to "higher" species. In his summary to the section, Darwin put his concept in terms of the metaphor of the tree of life:


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The meaning and importance of Darwin's use of the tree of life metaphor have been extensively discussed by scientists and scholars. Stephen Jay Gould, for one, has argued that Darwin placed the famous passage quoted above "at a crucial spot in his text", where it marked the conclusion of his argument for natural selection, illustrating both the interconnectedness by descent of organisms as well as their success and failure in the history of life. David Penny has written that Darwin did not use the tree of life to describe the relationship between groups of organisms, but to suggest that, as with branches in a living tree, lineages of species competed with and supplanted one another. Petter Hellström has argued that Darwin consciously named his tree after the biblical Tree of Life, as described in Genesis, thus relating his theory to the religious tradition.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: Ernst Haeckel (1834–1919) constructed several trees of life. His first sketch, in the 1860s, shows ""Pithecanthropus alalus"" as the ancestor of "Homo sapiens". His 1866 tree of life from "Generelle Morphologie der Organismen" shows three kingdoms: Plantae, Protista and Animalia. This has been described as "the earliest 'tree of life' model of biodiversity". His 1879 "Pedigree of Man" was published in his 1879 book "The Evolution of Man". It traces all life forms to the Monera, and places Man (labelled "") at the top of the tree.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 1990, Carl Woese, Otto Kandler and Mark Wheelis proposed a "tree of life" consisting of three lines of descent for which they introduced the term domain as the highest rank of classification. They also suggested the terms bacteria, archaea and eukaryota for the three domains.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The model of a tree is still considered valid for eukaryotic life forms. Trees have been proposed with either four or two supergroups. There does not yet appear to be a consensus; in a 2009 review article, Roger and Simpson conclude that "with the current pace of change in our understanding of the eukaryote tree of life, we should proceed with caution."


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 2015, the first draft of the Open Tree of Life was published, in which information from nearly 500 previously published trees was combined into a single online database, free to browse and download. Another database, "TimeTree", helps biologists to evaluate phylogeny and divergence times.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: In 2016, a new tree of life, summarizing the evolution of all known life forms, was published, illustrating the latest genetic findings that the branches were mainly composed of bacteria. The new study incorporated over a thousand newly discovered bacteria and archaea.


title: Tree of life (biology)

text: The prokaryotes (the two domains of bacteria and archaea) and certain animals such as bdelloid rotifers have the ability to transfer genetic information between unrelated organisms through horizontal gene transfer. Recombination, gene loss, duplication, and gene creation are a few of the processes by which genes can be transferred within and between bacterial and archaeal species, causing variation that is not due to vertical transfer. There is emerging evidence of horizontal gene transfer within the prokaryotes at the single and multicell level, so the tree of life does not explain the full complexity of the situation in the prokaryotes.


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: "My Girl" is a soul music song recorded by the Temptations for the Gordy (Motown) record label. Written and produced by the Miracles members Smokey Robinson and Ronald White, it became the Temptations' first U.S. number 1 single, and is currently their signature song. Robinson's inspiration for writing "My Girl" was his wife, Miracles member Claudette Rogers Robinson. The song was included on the Temptations 1965 album "The Temptations Sing Smokey". In 2017, the song was selected for preservation in the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or artistically significant".


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: The recorded version of "My Girl" was the first Temptations single to feature David Ruffin on lead vocals. Previously, Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams had performed most of the group's lead vocals, and Ruffin had joined the group as a replacement for former Temptation Elbridge Bryant. While on tour as part of the Motortown Revue, a collective tour for most of the Motown roster, Smokey Robinson caught the Temptations' part of the show. For their set, the group had included a medley of soul standards, one of which, the Drifters' "Under the Boardwalk", was a solo spot for Ruffin. Impressed, Robinson decided to produce a single with Ruffin singing lead. Robinson saw Ruffin as a "sleeping giant" in the group with a unique voice that was "mellow" yet "gruff". Robinson thought that if he could write just the perfect song for Ruffin's voice, then he could have a smash hit. The composition was to be something that Ruffin could "belt out" yet something that was also "melodic and sweet".


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: After some persuasion from Ruffin's bandmates, Robinson had the Temptations record "My Girl" instead of the Miracles, who were originally going to record the song, and recruited Ruffin to sing the lead vocals. According to Robinson, he allowed the group to create their own background vocals "because they were so great at background vocals". Consequently, the Temptations came up with boosts like "hey hey hey" and a series of "my girls" that echo David's vocal." The opening bass notes are recognized around the world. As Smokey Robinson says, "I can be in a foreign country where people don't speak English and the audience will start cheering before I even start singing "My Girl." They know what's coming as soon as they hear the opening bass line. [He sings the famous line created by bassist James Jamerson:] 'Bah bum-bum, bah bum-bum, bah bum-bum.'" The signature guitar riff heard during the introduction and under the verses was played by Robert White of the Funk Brothers. This part can be heard without vocals on the 2004 deluxe edition of the soundtrack from the 2002 documentary "Standing in the Shadows of Motown".


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: "My Girl" was later sampled for "Stay", a single from the Temptations' 1998 album "Phoenix Rising". The single was re-released in 1992, following the November 1991 release of the film of the same name, which featured the song. It did not reach the "Billboard" charts, but did reach number 2 in the UK Singles Chart.


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: "My Girl" climbed to the top of the U.S. pop charts on January 16, 1965, after its Christmas time 1964 release, making it the Temptations' first number 1 hit. The single was also the first number 1 hit on the reinstated "Billboard" R&B Singles chart, which had gone on a fifteen-month hiatus from 1963 to 1965. The single also gave the Gordy label its first number 1 on the Hot 100.


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: Over time, "My Girl", with its signature introduction and unrestrained expression of joy, would become one of Motown's best-known and most successful singles. "My Girl" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1998.


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: "Cash Box" described the single as "a pulsating, shuffle-wobble ballad" performed "in very tempting style" and with a "striking arrangement." In 2004, "My Girl" was ranked number 88 on "Rolling Stone"s list of "The 500 Greatest Songs of All Time".


title: My Girl (The Temptations song)

text: In 1965, Otis Redding recorded the song for his album "Otis Blue". Released as a single, it was the first version to be successful in the United Kingdom, reaching No.11 in the UK Singles Chart.


title: Pale lager

text: Pale lager is a very pale-to-golden-colored lager beer with a well-attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness.


title: Pale lager

text: The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid-19th century, when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale brewing and malt making techniques back to the Spaten Brewery in Germany and applied them to existing lagering methods, resulting in a less dark, red-colored beer. This technique was applied by Josef Groll, the famous Bavarian brewmaster, hired by Měšťanský pivovar in the city of Pilsen, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary (now Czech Republic) with local ingredients, resulting in the first pale lager Pilsner Urquell in 1842.


title: Pale lager

text: The resulting Pilsner beers—pale-colored, lean and stable—gradually spread around the globe to become the most common form of beer consumed in the world today.


title: Pale lager

text: Bavarian brewers in the sixteenth century were required by law to brew beer only during the cooler months of the year. In order to have beer available during the hot summer months, beers would be stored (lagered) in caves and stone cellars, often under blocks of ice.