A fine video by QualiaSoup.
A fine video by QualiaSoup.
V in the evening sun
Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 7 in D major, Op. 10, No. 3, was dedicated to the Countess Anne Margarete von Browne, and written in 1798. This makes it contemporary with his three string trios of opus 9, the violin sonatas of opus 12 and the violin romance that became his opus 50 when later published. (The year also saw the premiere of a revised version of his second piano concerto, whose original form had been written and heard in 1795.[1])
It is divided into four movements:
- Presto – cut time
- Largo e mesto – 6/8 in D minor
- Menuetto: Allegro – 3/4 in D major – G major – D major
- Rondo: Allegro – common time
Fairly well this year, as long as we keep up with watering!
Le jardin chez Arbourist et Intransigentia
I was excited. I was hopeful. I very much wanted it to be true. But I’m not at all surprised (a bit depressed though) that solar roadways are a bad idea. Three main categories of problems have been illustrated by many.
One is cost. This one is tough as the solar roadway people haven’t been all that forthcoming on how much each panel might be, but estimates based on what little we do know show roadways costing somewhere between 20 and 56 trillion dollars.
Two is solar efficiency. Solar panels are angled to best capture sunlight, the really good ones tilt to follow the sun. Lying flat on the road is just a bad place to collect solar energy. And as everything these roads are supposed to do is based on them collecting massive amounts of solar energy, this is a huge problem.
Three is durability. Rock erodes glass. Rock being ground in by untold tonnes of traffic erode glass fast. Those super expensive modules wouldn’t last too long.
And these are only very brief summations of entire categories of problems that have been pointed out about the roadways.
Now, if the solar roadway people are earnest in their efforts (and I have no reason to suspect they aren’t) they now have over 2 million dollars to get this idea as far as it can possibly go. While that won’t be a fraction of how far they envisioned or how far I had hoped, they should be able to learn something. Whatever they find, doubtless there is an easier and cheaper way we could be learning it, but as is so often the case, we’re doing it the hard way. Salvage what we can and move on.
If nothing else, more people are thinking about roadway improvements, which is a good thing. Someone will look back at this and think, “Boy, that was a horrible idea, the REAL way to improve roads is by…” and they will probably be wrong too. But they will be slightly less wrong. So plods on progress.
Susan Brownmiller has a remarkable talent for framing slippery sociological concepts. This quote is from the introduction to her book “Femininity” and it lucidly describes the nature of the viscous catch-22 women experience for the crime of being born female.
“Femininity always demands more.
It must constantly reassures its audience by a willing demonstration of difference, even when one does not exist in nature, or it must seize and embrace a natural variation and compose a rhapsodic symphony upon the notes. Suppose one doesn’t care to, has other things on her mind, is clumsy or tone-deaf despite the best instruction and training? To fail at the feminine difference is to appear not to care about men, and to risk the loss of their attention and approval. To be insufficiently feminine is viewed as a failure in core sexual identify, or as a failure to care sufficiently about oneself, for a woman found wanting will be appraised (and will appraise herself) as mannish or neutered or simply unattractive, as men have defined these terms.
We are talking, admittedly, about an exquisite esthetic [sic]. Enormous pleasure can be extracted from feminine pursuits as a creative outlet or purely as relaxation; indeed, indulgence for the sake of fun, or art, or attention, is among femininity’s great joys. But the chief attraction (and the central paradox, as well) is the competitive edge that femininty seems to promise in the unending struggle to survive, and perhaps to triumph. The world smiles favorably on the feminine woman: it extends little courtesies and minor privilege. Yet the nature of the competitive edge is ironic, as beset, for one works at femininity by accepting restrictions, by limiting one’s sights, by choosing an indirect route, by scattering concentration and not giving one’s all as a man would to his own, certifiably masculine, interests. It does not require a great deal of imagination for a woman to understand the feminine principle as a grand collection of compromises, large and small, that she simply must make in order to render herself a successful woman. If she has difficulty in satisfying femininity’s demands, if its illusions go against her grain, or if she is criticized for her shortcomings and imperfections, the more she will see femininity as a desperate strategy of appeasement, a strategy she may noe have the wish of the courage to abandon, for failure looms in either direction.”
-Susan Brownmiller. Femininity p. 15-16
Never say we don’t care about your intellectual development here at DWR:
See, you’re more knowledgeable already. You’re welcome. :)
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