the-french-artist/wikipedia_20220301.simple_sentence_split huggingface dataset:
1915 – Meg Mundy, English-American actress
1922 – Mart Port, Estonian architect (d. 2012)
1924 – Walter Ris, American swimmer (d. 1989)
1924 – Charles Thone, American politician, 34th Governor of Nebraska (d. 2018)
1925 – Veikko Hakulinen, Finnish skier (d. 2003)
1927 – Barbara Rush, American actress
1929 – Günter Schabowski, East German politician (d. 2015)
1930 – Don Shula, American football coach
1931 – William Deane, former Governor-General of Australia
1932 – Carlos Saura, Spanish director
1932 – Clint Hill, American secret service agent and author
1933 – Norman H. Bangerter, American politician, Governor of Utah (d. 2015)
1933 – Ilia II of Georgia, Patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church
1934 – Zurab Tsereteli, Georgian sculptor
1934 – Hellmuth Karasek, German journalist, author and critic (d. 2015)
1934 – Rudolf Schuster, former President of Slovakia
1935 – Floyd Patterson, American boxer (d. 2006)
1935 – Walter Mahlendorf, German athlete
1936 – Gianni Vattimo, Italian philosopher, author and politician
1937 – Grace Bumbry, American soprano
1937 – Dyan Cannon, American actress, director, screenwriter and producer
1939 – Veniamin Soldatenko, Soviet athlete
1939 – Joseph Bonnel, French footballer (d. 2018)
1940 – Antoni Krauze, Polish screenwriter and director (d. 2018)
1940 – Helmut Jahn, German-American architect
1940 – Brian David Josephson, Welsh physicist
1940 – Gao Xingjian, Chinese-French writer
1941 – Maureen Reagan, American political activist (d. 2001)
1942 – John McLaughlin, English guitarist and songwriter
1945 – Richard R. Schrock, American chemist
1947 – Chris Cutler, British singer and musician
1947 – Doc Neeson, Northern Irish-born Australian singer-songwriter and musician (d. 2014)
1947 – Tim Rooney, American actor (d. 2006)
1947 – Rick Stein, English chef and restaurateur
1948 – Cissé Mariam Kaïdema Sidibé, Prime Minister of Mali
1949 – Mick Mills, English footballer
1951 – Barbara Cochran, American skier
1951 – Ronald Corp, English composer, conductor and priest
1953 – Norberto Alonso, Argentine footballer
1954 – Oleg Romantsev, Russian footballer
1955 – Wolfgang Tiefensee, German politician
1956 – Bernard Sumner, English singer-songwriter, guitarist and producer
1956 – Sarojini Sahoo, Indian feminist writer
1957 – Patty Loveless, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1957 – Vesnaja Zmijanac, Montenegrin-Serbian folk singer
1957 – Gurdas Maan, Indian singer, songwriter, choreographer and actor
1958 – Andy Borowitz, American comedian and actor
1958 – Julian Sands, English actor
1958 – Gary Jones, Welsh-Canadian actor
1960 – Michael Stipe, American singer and musician (R.E.M.)
1960 – April Winchell, American actress
1961 – Kiyotaka Matsui, Japanese footballer
1961 – Oh Se-hoon, South Korean politician
1962 – Robin Guthrie, Scottish guitarist and producer
1962 – Joe Kleine, American basketball player
1962 – Peter Steele, American musician (d. 2010)
1962 – André Rouvoet, French educator and politician
1963 – Dave Foley, Canadian comedian, actor, director and producer
1963 – May-Britt Moser, Norwegian psychologist and neuroscientist, 2014 Nobel Prize winner
1964 – Dot Jones, American actress
1965 – Yvan Attal, Israeli-French actor and director
1965 – Craig Revel Horwood, Australian-English dancer
1965 – Guy Forget, French tennis player
1965 – Beth Gibbons, British musician
1965 – Cait O'Riordan, Irish musician (The Pogues)
1966 – Christian Kern, former Chancellor of Austria
1966 – Deana Carter, American singer
1971 – Katharine Viner, British newspaper editor (The Guardian)
1972 – James Longley, American director and producer
1973 – Harmony Korine, American movie director and screenwriter
1974 – Armin Zöggeler, Italian luger
1977 – David Millar, British cyclist
1977 – Teitur Lassen, Faroese singer-songwriter
1978 – Karine Ruby, French snowboarder (d. 2009)
1978 – Mai Meneses, Spanish singer-songwriter and guitarist
1979 – Kevin Kuske, German bobsledder
1980 – Miguel Monteiro, Portuguese footballer
1980 – Greg Cipes, American actor
1980 – Happy Salma, Indonesian model, actress and writer
1981 – Zhang Jiewen, Chinese badminton player
1982 – Paulo Ferrari, Argentine footballer
1982 – Kang Hye-jung, South Korean actress
1983 – Gemma Hunt, English television presenter
1985 – Al Jefferson, American basketball player
1985 – Jung Sung Ryong, South Korean footballer
1985 – Ross Turnbull, English footballer
1986 – James Milner, English footballer
1986 – Younès Kaboul, French footballer
1986 – Hsieh Su-wei, Taiwanese tennis player
1987 – Nikolaj Misiuk, Lithuanian footballer
1988 – Nabila Jamshed, Indian author
1989 – Labrinth, English singer
1990 – Toni Kroos, German footballer
1990 – Alberto Paloschi, Italian footballer
1991 – Olivia Tennet, New Zealand actress
1991 – Tal Al-Mallohi, Syrian blogger and activist
1992 – Kris Bryant, American baseball player
1993 – Scott Redding, British motorcycle racer
1995 – Maddie Hasson, American actress
1995 – Maria Isabel, Spanish singer
1998 – Coco Jones, American actress and singer
1998 – Liza Soberano, Filipino-American actress and model
2003 – Jaeden Lieberher, American actor
1066 – Edward the Confessor, Saxon king (b. 1003)
1248 – King Sancho II of Portugal (b. 1207)
1428 – Frederick I, Elector of Saxony (b. 1370)
1564 – Hosokawa Ujitsuna, Japanese military commander (b. 1514)
1584 – Tobias Stimmer, Swiss painter and illustrator (b. 1539)
1752 – Gabriel Cramer, Swiss mathematician (b. 1704)
1761 – Stephen Hales, English physicist and physiologist (b. 1677)
1773 – Anton Losenko, Russian painter (b. 1737)
1786 – Moses Mendelssohn, German philosopher (b. 1729)
1804 – Charlotte Lennox, British writer (b. 1730)
1821 – Elizabeth Ann Seton, American saint (b. 1774)
1825 – Ferdinand I of the Two Sicilies (b. 1751)
1843 – Stevens Mason, American politician, 1st Governor of Michigan (b. 1811)
1874 – Thomas Gregson, Australian politician, 2nd Premier of Tasmania (b. 1798)
1877 – Cornelius Vanderbilt, American businessman (b. 1794)
1880 – Anselm Feuerbach, German painter (b. 1829)
1882 – John William Draper, English-American physician, chemist and photographer (b. 1811)
1895 – Manuel Pavia, Spanish general (b. 1827)
1910 – Léon Delagrange, French aviator and sculptor (b. 1873)
1913 – Hjalmar Johansen, Norwegian explorer (b. 1867)
1915 – Anton von Werner, German painter (b. 1843)
1919 – Georg von Hertling, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1843)
1931 – Louise, Princess Royal (b. 1867)
1931 – Mohammad Ali Jouhar, Indian journalist, activist and scholar (b. 1878)
1941 – Henri Bergson, French philosopher (b. 1859)
1944 – Kaj Munk, Danish minister, poet and activist (b. 1898)
1956 – Savielly Tartakower, Polish-French chess player (b. 1887)
1960 – Albert Camus, French writer (b. 1913)
1961 – Erwin Schrödinger, Austrian physicist (b. 1887)
1965 – T. S. Eliot, American poet (b. 1888)
1967 – Donald Campbell, English motorboat racer (b. 1921)
1975 – Carlo Levi, Italian writer, painter and politician (b. 1902)
1986 – Christopher Isherwood, English writer (b. 1904)
1986 – Phil Lynott, Irish musician (b. 1949)
1990 – Henry Bolte, Australian politician, Premier of Victoria (b. 1907)
1995 – Eduardo Mata, Mexican conductor and composer (b. 1942)
1998 – John Gary, American singer (b. 1932)
1999 – Iron Eyes Cody, American actor (b. 1904)
2004 – Joan Aiken, English writer (b. 1924)
2006 – Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Dubai politician (b. 1946)
2007 – Marais Viljoen, South African politician (b. 1915)
2007 – Sandro Salvadore, Italian footballer (b. 1939)
2009 – Lei Clijsters, Belgian footballer (b. 1956)
2010 – Casey Johnson, American socialite (b. 1979)
2010 – Johan Ferrier, first President of Suriname (b. 1910)
2010 – Tsutomu Yamaguchi, Japanese survivor of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bombs (b. 1916).
2011 – Salmaan Taseer, Pakistani politician (b. 1964)
2011 – Gerry Rafferty, Scottish singer-songwriter (b. 1947)
2011 – Mohamed Bouazizi, Tunisian fruit seller (b. 1984)
2011 – Dick King-Smith, English writer (b. 1922)
2011 – Ali-Reza Pahlavi of Iran (b. 1966)
2012 – Eve Arnold, American photographer (b. 1912)
2013 – Tony Lip, American actor (b. 1930)
2014 – Sergey Kozlov, Russian footballer and manager (b. 1960)
2015 – Stuart Scott, American sportscaster (b. 1965)
2015 – Hank Peters, American baseball executive (b. 1924)
2015 – Stu Miller, American baseball player (b. 1927)
2015 – Lance Diamond, American singer (b. 1946)
2015 – Pino Daniele, Italian singer-songwriter and guitarist (b. 1955)
2015 – Natalino Pescarolo, Italian bishop (b. 1929)
2015 – René Vautier, French movie director (b. 1928)
2016 – Michel Galabru, French actor (b. 1922)
2016 – Tom Allin, English cricketer (b. 1987)
2016 – S. H. Kapadia, Indian judge (b. 1947)
2016 – Jorge Lepra, Uruguayan diplomat and politician (b. 1942)
2016 – John Roberts, Welsh footballer (b. 1946)
2016 – Fernando Barrachina, Spanish footballer (b. 1947)
2016 – Achim Mentzel, German musician and television presenter (b. 1946)
2016 – Leo Rucka, American football player (b. 1931)
2017 – Milt Schmidt, Canadian ice hockey player (b. 1918)
2017 – Ezio Pascutti, Italian footballer (b. 1937)
2017 – Wayne Westner, South African golfer (b. 1961)
2017 – Hisham Al-Otaibi, Kuwaiti politician (b. 1946)
2017 – Heinz Billing, German physicist and computer scientist (b. 1914)
2017 – Abdul Halim Jaffer Khan, Indian sitar player and composer (b. 1927)
2017 – Jordi Pagans i Monsalvatje, Catalan painter (b. 1932)
2017 – Douglas Wass, British civil servant (b. 1923)
2017 – Georges Pretre, French conductor (b. 1924)
2018 – Aharon Appelfeld, Ukrainian-born Israeli writer (b. 1932)
2018 – Johannes Brost, Swedish actor (b. 1946)
2018 – Brendan Byrne, American politician, 47th Governor of New Jersey (b. 1924)
2018 – Bruce Halle, American automobile parts executive (b. 1930)
2018 – Senichi Hoshino, Japanese baseball player (b. 1947)
2018 – Philipp Jenninger, German politician (b. 1932)
2018 – Ray Thomas, English singer-songwriter (b. 1941)
2018 – Vladimir Yankilevsky, Russian artist (b. 1938)
2021 – Tanya Roberts, American actress (b. 1955)
Independence Day (Burma)
Day of the Fallen against Colonial Repression (Angola)
Day of the Martyrs (Democratic Republic of the Congo)
World Braille Day
Autism is the name of a disorder affecting brain development.
It is one of a group of disorders called autism spectrum disorder (ASD).
Asperger syndrome, atypical autism and childhood autism are kinds of autism spectrum disorders.
ASD is a condition that affects the way a person relates to their environment.
The word spectrum is used because not all people with autism have the same traits and difficulties.
Some people find interacting more difficult than others.
Autism may be very apparent in someone or they may show no outward signs of it.
The main areas of difficulty are in social interaction, verbal and nonverbal communication and restricted or repetitive behaviors and interests.
In most cases of autism, motor communication {doing things} is affected.
All these signs develop in the child's first two to three years of age.
People who have autism find it difficult to act in a way that other people think is "normal".
They may find it difficult to talk to other people and to look at other people in the eyes.
Some people with autism do not like being touched.
A person who has autism can seem to be turned inwards.
They may talk only to themselves, rock themselves backwards and forwards, and laugh at their own thoughts.
They might not like any type of change and may find it very difficult to learn a new behavior like going to school.
Autism is caused by the way that the brain develops, both before and after a baby is born.
About one in every 160 children has an autism spectrum disorder.
It has no known cure, and many autistic people do not want a cure.
They want it to be accepted as a difference.
This is known as neurodiversity.
The word “autism” comes from the Greek word “autos”, meaning “self.”
The term describes conditions in which a person is removed from social interaction—hence, an “isolated self”.
The term "autism" was first used by a psychiatrist named Eugen Bleuler in 1911 to describe one group of symptoms of schizophrenia.
Sigmund Freud considered this idea and thought it was related to narcissism.
Three decades later, researchers in the United States began to use the term autism to describe children with emotional or social problems.
Two researchers by the name of Hans Asperger and Leo Kanner were the pioneers of the research study for autism in the 1940s.
In 1943 Leo Kanner (a doctor from Johns Hopkins University) did a study of 11 children.
He found out that they had difficulties such as changing environments, being sensitive to certain stimuli, having speech problems and allergies to food.
Later he named the children’s condition “early infantile autism”, now called autism.
In 1944 Hans Asperger studied separately a group of children and found very similar conditions.
The children in Hans Asperger's group did not repeat words and they had no speech problems like Kanner's did.
However, the children did have problems with fine motor skills such as holding a pencil.
The children he studied seemed to be clumsier than other children.
They also had “[...] a lack of empathy, little ability to form friendships, one-sided conversation, intense absorption in a special interest and clumsy movements”.
Hans Asperger described a "milder" form of autism, his discovery is now called Asperger syndrome.
The refrigerator mother theory
In 1943 and 1949, Kanner described the children he studied in scientific papers.
In these papers, he wrote that he thought the children's parents were not loving them enough.
He wrote that this might be part of the reason why the children had autism.
For example, in 1949 he wrote that the children's parents showed no warmth, or love, to their children.
He thought the parents were so "cold" that he compared them to refrigerators:“[The children] were left neatly in refrigerators which did not defrost.
Their withdrawal seems to be an act of turning away from such a situation to seek comfort in solitude”.
This idea became known as the refrigerator mother theory.
For decades parents were blamed for causing their children's autism by not loving their children enough.
By now, we know this is not true.
Schizophrenia and autism were linked in many researchers’ studies.
Only since the 1960s, did medical professionals begin to have a separate understanding of these two disorders.
Since 1980, Kanner’s so called early infantile autism is listed in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM).
Precisely because of the vague distinction between schizophrenia and autism, the DSM came out with a more accurate definition of autism in 1987.
Since then, early infantile autism is called autism disorder.
For the first time the DSM also introduced standardized criteria to diagnose autism.
The fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders expanded the definition of autism and included milder cases of autism.
But especially the Asperger’s syndrome was added in 1994.
With the release of the fifth edition of the DSM in 2013 the subtypes of autism are summarized into the general term Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
Individuals are now diagnosed on an autism spectrum with varying levels of intensity (mild, moderate and severe).
may like objects over faces as a baby
may not look at faces for more than a second
may prefer being alone, or not interested in making friends
may not react to signs of love e.g. hugging
difficulty in knowing how other people feel
laughing or crying at the wrong times
may not talk or communicate much
may speak "robotically" (i.e. with little change in tone or pitch)
difficulty with words that are spelt or sound the same but have different meanings
trouble with understanding gestures or facial expressions
Restricted behavior
may do the same action repeatedly (stimming)
may have limited interests (referred to as a special interest)
difficulty in coping with changes in routine
Greater sensitivity
Avoiding certain foods because they dislike the textures, or eating things that aren't food
attraction to specific noises
good attention to detail
good balance skills (sometimes)
In 2021, an online survey of 16-90 year-olds showed that autistic men are more likely to be bisexual, while autistic women are more likely to be homosexual.
Different studies resulted in different numbers of the frequency of autism spectrum disorders.
One study stated ten cases of classical autism, 2.5 cases of Asperger's syndrome and 15 cases of mild autism (PDD-NOS) in 10,000 people - tendency: increasing.
Other sources speak about 60 autism spectrum disorder cases in 10,000 people.
However, the number of autism cases is not equal in men and in women.
Here, the results of studies vary highly.
Researchers in general say that 3-4 men are diagnosed for every woman that is diagnosed.
This ratio decreases for severe cases to 1:1.
It increases for high-functioning cases and in Asperger's syndrome reaches a ratio of 8:1.
Recently, the awareness has increased that this ratio may be so high because studies are simply missing female autistic people.
This could be because tests for autism typically focus on male autism traits.
Another possible explanation is that autistic females may be better at adapting to social expectations and hiding their social problems.
Studies have suggested that the brains of autistic females may rather be like neurotypical men’s (non-autistic men) brains of the same age.
These could be reasons why it is not so easy to realise whether a woman is autistic - and therefore, why more men than women are diagnosed.
== Types of Autism Spectrum disorders ==
Over the past years, individuals have been using the terms "autism" and "autism spectrum disorder" like they mean the same thing.
Autism is a spectrum disorder.
This means that some people who have autism are only mildly affected.
These people may go to regular schools, go to work, and have partners and families.
Some people are affected worse than others.
These people may be able to take care of most of their own needs at home like dressing and getting food, but not be able to have a regular job or travel alone.
A person who has severe autism may need to be cared for all their life.
Few people with autism are extraordinarily gifted or talented.
These people are said to have savant syndrome.
They are often very good at just one thing in particular, like mathematics, playing the piano or remembering football scores.
The overall category of the Autism Spectrum Disorder is called Pervasive Developmental Disorder.
The name describes medical conditions with developmental problems in a number of fields.
In most cases, when referring to the Autism Spectrum Disorder, we are referring to the most common disorders:
The different categories, the so-called “International Classification of Diseases” (ICD), are defined by the World Health Organization.
As shown in the table, the diseases vary in several points.
These are the age of onset, social interaction, communication and behaviour.
An individual belongs to a certain category, depending on the areas of impairment.
All three may seem similar in symptoms, yet are not the same.
Still, people within one group show similar symptoms.
The groups can be used to search for an underlying cause of the disease and to provide a better treatment.
Scientists do not know exactly what causes autism.
There may be many different causes for the different types of Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Scientists do know about some things that make a person more likely to have an Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Genetics and heritability
The autism spectrum disorders are highly heritable disorders.
This means that it is very likely (over 90%) that the child of an autistic person will also be on the autism spectrum.
The reason for this are certain genes.
These genes are linked to autism and are passed on from a parent to the child.
Already Leo Kanner and Hans Asperger noticed that fathers of autistic children often preferred being on their own over being with people.
Therefore, Kanner and Asperger suspected a genetic cause.
Studies with families with a child on the autism spectrum were done to investigate this theory.
They found that sometimes the children’s parents (fathers as well as mothers) also show social difficulties, shyness and problems with understanding contextual information when talking to someone.
Some studies have found this in only 10 out of 100 families, some in as much as 45 out of every 100 families.
Other than the studies done on children who had autistic parents, recently a couple of studies were done on children who either had a sibling or a twin showing autistic signs.
Similar to the outcomes in the autistic parents studies, most children having autistic siblings/ twins were found out to be showing autistic signs.
According to a recent study, around fifty percent of infants with autistic siblings showed some kind of atypical behaviour, around one forth of them showed delays and deficits in achieving infancy milestones and around 17% of all were later diagnosed with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder).
Moreover, twin studies showed that it is much more likely that identical twins are both on the autism spectrum than that non-identical twins are both on the autism spectrum.
Identical twins have nearly the same DNA.
Therefore, it is highly probable that they are either both autistic or both not autistic.
Non-identical twins share only half of their genes which makes it less likely that they both have the disorder.
Scientists have shown that the recurrence risk (the likelihood that a child is on the autism spectrum if it has a sister or a brother that is autistic as well) is 20 to 80 times higher than the probability for having the disorder in the average population.
However, it is not a single gene that increases the risk for autism spectrum disorders.
Several genes have been linked to the disorder.
All of the identified genes can in sum only explain one or two out of every ten autism cases.
None of the genes that have been found to play a role in autism can explain more than one out of every 100 cases.
mutations,
genetic syndromes (e.g. Fragile X syndrome),
de novo (newly occurring in a family) as well as inherited copy number variations (CNV) - a CNV is the duplication or deletion of a gene - and
single nucleotide variants (SNV) - an SNV is a change in one nucleotide that occurs with very low frequency.
the interaction between brain cells and synaptic functioning,
neuronal growth and neuronal migration (the wandering of a neuron from its birthplace to its final location in the brain) and
inhibitory and excitatory neurotransmission.
Neural correlates
Researchers have not found a single neuronal correlate for autism spectrum disorders, i.e. no abnormal functioning of the brain is the only cause of autism.
Nevertheless, scientists found some differences between the brains of autistic people and the typical human brain.
These differences lie in the anatomy of the brain, the activity in certain brain regions as well as in the connections between brain regions.
It is a general tendency that autistic people use the same brain regions as other people but show different activity.
In some areas the activity is less, in others it is stronger.
However, this may only be true for male autists.
Throughout the last years, studies have shown that brains of autistic women might be like normal men's brains.
Researchers say that building a Theory of mind is one of the main problems for autistic people.
This makes it difficult for them to interact with others.
Problems in social interaction are probably worsened by low preference for social stimuli, such as faces.
This tendency has been found in studies tracking the person’s eye movements and in EEG studies.
EEG studies showed lower than normal activity in the fusiform face area (FFA), a brain region that is usually active when seeing faces.
However, the results of other studies could not show this.
Also, scientists measured brain activity of people on the autism spectrum with fMRI while they were thinking about their own emotions.
They found activity in the same brain regions as in non-autistic people.
The difference was that some regions which are important for thinking about oneself and emotions (especially the anterior insula) were less active in autistic people.
Other brain regions were much more active.
These findings may explain the difficulties people with autism experience when trying to understand complex facial expressions and emotions (such as shame, jealousy).
Executive function
People on the autism spectrum show a lower ability for executive function.
Executive function means physical, emotional and cognitive self-control.
This includes planning actions, focusing, shifting attention and flexibility of behaviour and thinking.
Autistic people's ability can improve but it will remain below non-autistic people's ability in executive function.
Problems with executive function are probably caused by large networks in the brain.
Grey matter and white matter irregularities have a negative influence on the way different brain regions work together (functional integration).
A smaller corpus callosum leads to abnormalities in working memory (an active process of keeping a memory until it is needed) and planning actions.
Central coherence
Central coherence is the ability to build wholes out of parts.
It is weak in people with autism.
This means that autistic people focus more on details.
They cannot build wholes out of them.
Not being able to pay attention to wholes results in difficulties with perception and language.
Therefore, people with autism usually need more time for dealing with information coming from their surroundings.
As a consequence, they typically also need more time for responding.
However, performance varies between people on the autism spectrum.
Moreover, the term central coherence may include many interacting aspects.
This makes it difficult to find the cause for it in the brain.
Neural correlates for central coherence are not yet known.
Familial risk factors
The risk for autism spectrum disorders can be increased if the mother uses thalidomide, valproic acid or drinks too much alcohol during pregnancy.
The risk for autism also increases with the age of father and mother at the time of pregnancy.
Scientists do know for sure that vaccines do not cause autism.
Vaccines do not even make a person more likely to have autism - even if they are already at a high risk for autism before they get their vaccines.
In 1997 A. Wakefield and others found autism signs one month after the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine was applied.
They released a paper in which they claimed that autism is caused by the MMR vaccine.
However, the study had several flaws:
they did not exclude children of whom a genetic cause was known,
they did not assess the children's abilities before the vaccine was given,
neuropsychological and endoscopic assessments were not blind,
they did not have control subjects.
Also, no plausible biological mechanism could explain how the MMR vaccine leads to autism.
Since then many case-control studies have been done to investigate the relationship between vaccines and autism.
This means, they compared a group which was vaccinated with a group that was not vaccinated but apart from that identical.
They did not find MMR vaccines to be the cause of autism.
Neither did they find an increased risk for autism by the vaccination.
Parents also worried that thiomersal (US: thimerosal - a substance that makes vaccines and other medicines usable for a longer time) might cause autism because it contains mercury.
No harm from the amount of ethylmercury in vaccines was known.
Yet, vaccines for infants containing mercury were taken from the market.
Nevertheless, thiomersal as a cause for autism is biologically also not biologically.
Mercury poisoning triggers clearly different symptoms than autism.
Still, researchers did studies about this topic.
They did not find a connection between thiomersal and autism.
Finally, a third theory was suggested.
It was stated that many vaccines at the same time would weaken the immune system of infants.
However, autism is not a disorder that is related to the immune system.
Furthermore, single and also many vaccines do not weaken the immune system.
Diagnosing autism is difficult since there is no medical test like a blood test.
Instead, an evaluation is made by a team of doctors and other health professionals who are experienced in autism and know the individual.
Diagnosis in children
A reliable diagnosis can first be given at the age of two.
At the age of 18 and 24 months, children should get a check-up.
If anything wrong is noticed, a further evaluation is done.
In this, a team of professionals will interview the child’s guardians about the child’s behaviour and see what they are like in different settings.
This may also include behavioural or physical assessments as well as intelligence tests or developmental tests.
A good, detailed, history of the child is often very useful in receiving a diagnosis.
Diagnosis in adults
Adults can be diagnosed in adults as well as children.
This can be difficult because autism has symptoms that can overlap with other disorders, such as OCD, that may have appeared by adulthood.
An expert will usually ask the adult about concerns, challenges in life (such as socially or behaviourally) as well as standardised testing in these areas.
They also often ask for a developmental history.
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5)
In 2013, the American Psychiatric Association published the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-V).
In order to be diagnosed with autism, a person must fulfill two standardized criteria.
It is important that individuals must show symptoms from early childhood, even if those symptoms are recognized later.
These symptoms have to limit everyday functioning.
Additionally, these symptoms cannot be explained by an intellectual disability or a developmental delay.
Co-occurring conditions
Autism spectrum disorder includes a wide range of symptoms, skills and levels of disability.
Some autistic people also have learning disabilities, mental health issues or other conditions.
This means that autism can also co-occur with other conditions and symptoms of the following disorders:
Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder
Intellectual Developmental Disorder
Intellectual Disability
In the DSM-V, a diagnosis of autism excludes making a formal diagnosis of other psychiatric disorders.
Therefore, other mental health conditions may be undiagnosed in an autistic person, because it is impossible to make a comorbid clinical diagnosis.
Since autism is a spectrum, every person with autism is different.
Different treatments help different people.
There are a few different categories of treatment.
The main ones are medication, different therapies and diets.
The treatment is fitted depending on what a person with autism needs.
It is still unclear what causes autism.
There may be a few causes.
At the moment, it is only possible to lower the symptoms of autism.
A full recovery from autism is not possible.
If therapies cannot reduce the symptoms of autism, medications are used additionally.
Often, several medications are used at the same time to treat different symptoms of autism.
Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRI)
They can be used to treat repetitive behaviour, aggression, hyperactive behaviour and outbursts of anger.
The SSRIs can have many side-effects.
Usually the medication is better tolerated by adults than by children.
Examples of SSRIs are Clomipramine, Fluvoxamine, Sertraline, Venlafaxine, Trazodone and Mirtazapine.
Antipsychotic medication
Dopamine is a chemical messenger in the brain.
It helps to do movements, release hormones and strengthen cognitive abilities.
Researchers found that increasing the amount of dopamine in the brain will worsen the symptoms of autism.
Substances that help to reduce symptoms of autism are the antipsychotic drugs.
There are two types of antipsychotic medications.
One of the types are typical antipsychotics.
They block the sites where dopamine would bind to a cell.
Atypical antipsychotic drugs on the other hand block the sites where dopamine or serotonin would bind to a cell.
Antipsychotic medicine is the most successful treatment for excitability in autism.
It can also help to reduce aggression, self-injury, hyperactivity and repetitive, although it may have many side-effects.
Originally, antipsychotic medications were used to treat mental disorders like depression, bipolar disorder or schizophrenia.
Examples of antipsychotic drugs are Haloperidol, Clozapine, Risperidone and Paliperidone.
Psychostimulants
In the beginning, psychostimulants were only used for patients with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
Researchers found out that they can also help patients with autism.
The medication can reduce hyperactivity and inattention in people with autism.
The medication can have many side-effects.
Examples are Methylphenidate, Clonidine and Guanfacine.
People with autism often have problems with their digestive organs like the stomach or gut.
These problems could be inflammations, abdominal pain, gas, diarrhea or bacterial overgrowth.
The reasons may be malnutrition, food intolerances or allergies.
Specific food products causing these problems are excluded from the diet.
In many cases, products containing gluten or casein, the main protein occurring in dairy products, are excluded.
In many cases vitamins, minerals as well as essential fatty acids are additionally provided.
A big problem is that many autistic people cannot tell that they have pain.
Therefore, many problems concerning the digestive organs stay undetected.
Therapies
Therapy can be used to minimize distress caused by sensory overload.
Individual therapy plans are created.
The therapist tries to help the autistic person in many different aspects.
One part of this is sensory integration.
The therapist will help the patient to make sense of different sensory inputs.
For example, they may ask a child patient to play with finger paints or collect objects from a bad of dried beans.
Another part is the training of daily life activities.
The therapist may help the patient to get used to things like getting dressed, eating, hygiene, shopping and financial management.
These may be done one step at a time if the activity involves multiple steps, such as cooking.
Play therapy is also helpful, especially for children.
It can be useful to learn about certain emotions, which can be hard for autistic people.
This can also be used to help learn social conventions, such as shaking hands instead of hugging when meeting a stranger.
Therapy with animals
Often animals are used to help autistic people.
Most often dogs or horses are used.
The people diagnosed with autism can care for these animals, pet them and, in the case of the horse, even ride on them.
Studies showed that the interaction between an autistic person and animals can increase communication, reduce stress, fear, aggression and reduce the severity of the symptoms of autism.
Music therapy consists of two parts: One is an active listening part.
Here, the therapist is making music himself or playing music from a record.
In the other part, the autistic person can make music himself like playing an instrument or singing.
Music therapy will improve different aspects of communication.
Here, different materials and techniques are used to draw pictures.
The aim of art therapy is to make the autistic person more flexible and relaxed and to improve communication skills, self-image and learning skills.
The effects of the therapy can be long lasting and transferred to the school, work or home setting.
Workout Therapy
These are just little Workouts for the Left and Right Hemisphere based on whether your child is having Left or Right brain weakness.
Bear crawls help develop body awareness, improve coordination and motor planning, and build strength in the trunk and upper body.
Throwing weighted objects like medicine balls can increase core strength and balance and help improve coordination.
It may also have therapeutic benefits and can stimulate brain centers responsible for short-term memory.
In a study published in Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, the authors found that movements similar to those exhibited by those with autism may help provide needed feedback to the body.
This may reduce repetitive behaviors such as arm flapping or clapping.
Arm circles are a great upper-body exercise that helps increase flexibility and strength in the shoulders and back and can be done anywhere with no equipment.
Nonverbal learning disorder (common in people with autism spectrum disorders)
Asperger Syndrome (a form of autism spectrum disorder)
Imprinted Brain Theory
from AutismSpeaks.org
National Autistic Society http://www.autism.org.uk
What’s the relationship between Autism and ADHD?
Five Very Different and Major Psych Disorders Have Shared Genetics - from Science World Report (February 28, 2013) (shows genetic links between autism, ADHD, bipolar disorder, depression, and schizophrenia)
5 Disorders Share Genetic Risk Factors, Study Finds - from The New York Times (February 28, 2013)
Psychiatric Disorders Linked Genetically - from the Wall Street Journal (February 27, 2013)
Pervasive developmental disorders
The Italian language is a Romance language spoken in Italy.
Other countries that use Italian as their official language are San Marino, Vatican City and Switzerland.
Slovenia, and Croatia also use Italian as an official language, but only in some regions.
Italian is spoken by about 70 million people in several countries, including some parts of Monaco, Malta, Albania, Montenegro, Dodecanese (Greece), Eritrea, Libya, Ethiopia, Somalia, Tunisia.
The standard version from Tuscany is used for most writing but other dialects are sometimes written.
It is mostly derived from Latin, with some words from Greek, Etruscan and elsewhere.
It is called an inflected language - that means that the meaning of words can be changed by changing their endings.
Italian nouns are either masculine or feminine in gender (these usually have little to do with natural genders).
= male cat
= female cat
= male cats
= female cats
The ending of verbs are quite complicated because of conjugation.
The endings depend upon the tense of the verb (past, present, future and so on) and on the person of the verb (I, you, they etc.).
Because Italian grammar uses endings for these inflections, the personal pronoun is not always needed (in the following example it is in parenthesis).
(io) parlo = I speak
(noi) parliamo = we speak
(lui) parlava = he was speaking
(loro) parlarono = they spoke
(io) parlerò = I will speak
parliamo!
= let's speak!
There are very many of these endings to learn - it is one of the more difficult parts of the Italian Grammar.
But pronunciation is simple - there are just a few rules to learn, and hardly any difficult sounds.
Many Italian words for food have entered the English language, such as: pizza, spaghetti and ravioli.
Many technical words in music are Italian, such as forte and allegro.
Many musical instrument names are also Italian, such as cello and tuba.
Mafia and vendetta come from the darker side of Italian culture .
Italian grammar and interactive course
Italian proverbs
Italian Learning Tips
Italian Grammar Primer
Italian Online Dictionaries and Glossaries
A dictionary of Italian orthography and pronunciation
English-Italian Dictionary and English-Italian Dictionary on http://www.wordreference.com/
The Republic of Namibia is a country in southern Africa on the Atlantic coast.
It is bordered by Angola, Zambia, and Zimbabwe to the north, Botswana to the east, and South Africa to the south.
It gained independence from South Africa in 1990.
Before that it was called South West Africa.
Its capital is Windhoek.
Before World War I Namibia was a German colony.
German is still widely spoken in the country, although English is the official language.
The name of the country is from the Namib Desert.
This is said to be the oldest desert in the world.
The dry lands of Namibia were lived in since early times by Bushmen, Damara and Nama.
About the 14th century AD, Bantu came to the area from central Africa.
From the late 18th century onwards, Orlam clans from the Cape Colony crossed the Orange River.
They moved into the area that today is southern Namibia.
The nomadic Nama tribes were largely peaceful.
The missionaries with the Orlams were well received by them, the right to use waterholes and grazing was given.
On their way further north, the Orlams met clans of the Herero tribe.
They were not as friendly.
The Nama-Herero War started in 1880.
They did not stop until Imperial Germany sent troops.
The first Europeans to explore the region were the Portuguese navigators Diogo Cão in 1485 and Bartolomeu Dias in 1486.
Like most of Sub-Saharan Africa, Namibia was not largely explored by Europeans until the 19th century.
At this time traders and settlers arrived, mostly from Germany and Sweden.
German rule
Namibia became a German colony in 1884.
This was to stop the British.
The country was called German South-West Africa.
From 1904 to 1907, the Herero and the Namaqua took up arms against the Germans.
In the following Herero and Namaqua genocide, 10,000 Nama (half the population) and about 65,000 Hereros (about 80% of the population) were killed.
South African rule
South Africa began to rule the land in 1915.
They defeated the German force during World War I.  It was a League of Nations mandate territory from 1919.
In 1946 the League was replaced by the United Nations.
South Africa would not give up their rule of the land.
Many people thought the land should be independent from South Africa.
In 1971 South Africa was told their hold on the country was illegal.
They still did not leave.
The country officially became independent on 21 March 1990.
Sam Nujoma became the first President of Namibia.
Namibia is divided into 14 regions and subdivided into 121 constituencies.
Regional councillors are directly elected through secret ballots.
Henties Bay
Karasburg
Karibib
Omaruru
Otjiwarongo
Outjo
Usakos
Windhoek (capital)
Tourism is a major contributor (14.5%) to Namibia's economy.
It creates tens of thousands of jobs (18.2% of all employment).
There are over a million tourists per year.
The country is among the main tourist places in Africa.
It is known for ecotourism which features Namibia's extensive wildlife.
There are many lodges and reserves for tourists.
Sport Hunting is also a large, and growing part of the Namibian economy.
It was 14% of total tourism in the year 2000.
Namibia has numerous species wanted by international sport hunters.
In addition, extreme sports such as sandboarding and 4x4ing have become popular.
Many cities have companies that provide tours.
The most visited places include the Caprivi Strip, Fish River Canyon, Sossusvlei, the Skeleton Coast Park, Sesriem, Etosha Pan and the coastal towns of Swakopmund, Walvis Bay and Lüderitz.
Namibia has required free education for 10 years between the ages of 6 and 16.
Most schools in Namibia are state-run.
There are a few private schools.
There are four teacher training colleges, three colleges of agriculture, a police training college, a Polytechnic at university level, and a National University.
The most popular sport in Namibia is football.
The Namibia national football team qualified for the 2008 Africa Cup of Nations.
They have yet to qualify for any World Cups.
The Namibian rugby team has been in four separate World Cups.
Namibia were participants in the 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2011 Rugby World Cups.
Cricket is also popular.
The national team played in the 2003  Cricket World Cup.
Inline Hockey was first played in 1995.
It has become more and more popular in the last years.
The Women's Inline Hockey National Team were in the 2008 FIRS World Championships.
Namibia is the home for one of the toughest footraces in the world, the Namibian ultra marathon.
The most famous athlete from Namibia is certainly Frankie Fredericks, sprinter (100 and 200 m).
He won four Olympic silver medals (1992, 1996).
He also has medals from several World Athletics Championships.
He is also known for humanitarian activities in Namibia and further.
Republic of Namibia - Namibian Governmental Portal
Jubal Anderson Early  (November 3, 1816 – March 2, 1894) was a Confederate general in the American Civil War.
He commanded a corps in Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia.
He invaded the north in 1864.
After the war, he was one of the major defenders of the Confederate.
Confederate Army generals
Lewis Carroll was the pen name of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Daresbury, Cheshire, 27 January 1832 – Guildford, Surrey, 14 January 1898).
Dodgson was an Oxford don, a logician (mathematics expert), a writer, a poet, an Anglican clergyman, and a photographer.
He is most famous for his story Alice's Adventures in Wonderland which he told to a young friend, Alice Liddell, when he took the girl and two sisters on a boat trip.
Alice enjoyed the story and asked Dodgson to write it down.
Carroll then wrote a second story about Alice called Through the Looking-Glass.
Both stories are still popular all over the world.
Dodgson was a Fellow of Christ Church, Oxford, specialising in logic and mathematics.
He wrote a number of books and pamphlets on the subject.
He died of pneumonia in Guildford, Surrey.
Literary works
La Guida di Bragia, a ballad opera for the marionette theatre (around 1850)
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865)
Phantasmagoria, and other poems (1869).
A collection of poems.
Through the Looking-Glass, and what Alice found there (includes "Jabberwocky" and "The Walrus and the Carpenter") (1871)
Pillow Problems
The Hunting of the Snark (1876)
Rhyme?
and Reason? (
1883) A collection of poems, including Phantasmagoria and The Hunting of the Snark
A Tangled Tale (1886)
Sylvie and Bruno (1889)
Sylvie and Bruno Concluded (1893)
Three Sunsets and other poems
What the Tortoise said to Achilles (1895)
Mathematical works
A syllabus of Plane Algebraic Geometry (1860)
The Fifth Book of Euclid treated algebraically (1858 and 1868)
The Alphabet Cipher.
An elementary treatise on determinants, with their application to simultaneous linear equations and algebraic equations
Euclid and his modern rivals (1879), both literary and mathematical in style
Symbolic Logic Part I
Symbolic Logic Part II (published posthumously)
The Game of Logic
Some popular fallacies about vivisection
Curiosa Mathematica I (1888)
Curiosa Mathematica II (1892)
The Theory of Committees and Elections, collected, edited, analyzed, and published in 1958, by Duncan Black
Bowman, Isa 1899.
The Story of Lewis Carroll, told by the real Alice in Wonderland.
Dent, London
Cohen, Morton N. 1995.
Lewis Carroll: a biography.
Clark, Ann 1979.
London: J.M. Dent)
Collingwood, Stuart Dodgson 1898.
The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll.
London: T. Fisher Unwin
De La Mare, Walter 1932.
Lewis Carroll.
Faber & Faber, London.
Dodgson, Charles L. The Pamphlets of Lewis Carroll, v.1 The Oxford Pamphlets (1993) ; v.2 The Mathematical Pamphlets (1994) ; v.3 The Political Pamphlets (2001) ; v.4 The Logic Pamphlets (2010)
Lennon, Florence Becker 1947.
Cassell, London.
Williams et al 1979.
The Lewis Carroll handbook.
Dawson, Kent.
List of literature by and about Dodgson.
1832 births
1898 deaths
English children's writers
English photographers
April 15 – Roerich Pact signed in Washington D.C.
June 5 - Lucy the Mouse cartoons by Walt Disney and Roy Oliver Disney on 20th Century Fox and for Twentieth Century Pictures.
Lucy the Mouse cartoon character and the mascot of 20th Century Fox.
January 8 – Elvis Presley, musician (d. 1977)
February 5 – Hank Aaron, professional baseball player
March 31 – Herb Alpert, musician
July 17 – Donald Sutherland, actor
August 30 - John Phillips, American guitarist (The Mamas & the Papas) (d. 2001)
September 29 – Jerry Lee Lewis, muisican
October 12 - Luciano Pavarotti, opera singer (The Three Tenors) (d. 2007)
December 1 – Woody Allen, movie maker
Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine won by Hans Spemann, a German doctor and zoologist.
"Lullaby of Broadway" – by Al Dubin and Harry Warren, from the movie Gold Diggers of 1935, won the Academy Award for the best song.
Belize (), formerly known as British Honduras, is a country in Central America.
It used to be called British Honduras, but changed its name in 1973.
Long before that it was part of the Mayan Empire.
Belize is the only English-speaking country in Central America.