:: Authentic Happiness :: Using the new Positive Psychology
Develop insights into yourself and the world around you through these scientifically tested questionnaires, surveys, and scales. These questionnaires measure character strengths and aspects of happiness. All are yours to use at no charge. For each one, you’ll immediately receive your score and see how it compares to the scores of others who have used this website. Happiness 101
Month: January 2007
LiveLeak.com – Redefining the Media
LiveLeak.com – Redefining the Media
Welcome to LiveLeak.com. Ogrish.com has been incorporated into Liveleak to ensure you get all the uncensored media you are used to along with so much more.
If you weren’t familiar with Ogrish.com, it was the notorious web-site hosting grisly Arab TV news coverage and other gory accident & war videos. This is not for the squeamish, faint-of-heart or easily offended. Click on this picture “eaten alive” for an example of what is in store for you.
Or see a video of stoning an adulterer to death.
Or popular Chinese Torture methods.
Or 16th Century French sport of Cat Burning
The Internet TV charts track the most popular videos from the leading internet TV sites All the best online video clips, on one page.
The Cloud Appreciation Society
The Cloud Appreciation Society
At The Cloud Appreciation Society we love clouds, we’re not ashamed to say it and we’ve had enough of people moaning about them.Read our manifesto and see how we are fighting the banality of ‘blue-sky thinking’.
You can search the gallery of our members’ fantastic photos by cloud type, and photographer’s name. And don’t miss the collection of clouds that look like things.
MYTH: More Foreign Aid Will End Global Poverty
ABC News: MYTH: More Foreign Aid Will End Global Poverty
In the past 40 years, Western governments have given Africa more than half a trillion dollars. Yet Africa is even poorer than it was before the foreign aid began.
Two studies by World Bank economists say foreign aid is one of the problems because “higher aid levels erode the quality of governance.”
Former World Bank economist William Easterly agrees. His new book, “The White Man’s Burden,” argues that Western efforts to cure poverty in the rest of the world have done more harm than good.
“Aid has the perverse effect that it makes [African] politicians much more oriented toward what will get them more money from the West than it does to making them meet the needs of their own people, which is really a scandal,” he said.
Fifty years ago, countries in East Asia were as poor as Africa. Now many are rich, despite much lower levels of aid because their governments created understandable laws so people could trade, borrow and start their own businesses. Continue reading “MYTH: More Foreign Aid Will End Global Poverty”
‘Fame Junkies’ is hooked on celebrity behavior
‘Fame Junkies’ is hooked on celebrity behavior – USATODAY.com
Author Jake Halpern argues that some people, particularly young girls, are literally addicted to celeb trivia. (This could explain why Paris Hilton was the most Googled name in 2006.) “We become addicted to things that have a mood-altering effect — drinking, pornography, chocolate,” says the 31-year-old freelance journalist and NPR commentator. The pictured example is of a life-size statue of Britney Spears giving birth on a bear skin rug, pointed out by Caroline Collier.
The results from a survey Halpern conducted of 653 middle-school students in the Rochester, N.Y., area:
•Given a choice of becoming the CEO of a major corporation, the president of Yale or Harvard, a Navy SEAL, a U.S. senator or “the personal assistant to a very famous singer or movie star,” almost half of the girls — 43.4% — chose the assistant role.
•When given an option to become stronger, smarter, famous or beautiful, boys in the survey chose fame almost as often as intelligence, and girls chose it more often.
•The teens who regularly watch certain celebrity-oriented TV shows were more likely than others to believe that they themselves will be famous someday.
Eddie Vedder and Laird Hamilton in Maui
Part of a documentary of Eddie Vedder from Pearl Jam visiting in Maui with Laird Hamilton, big-wave waterman extraordinaire. Thanks to Randy Marks for forwarding this video of 2 innovators. The Sundance Channel is showing this and has a link to a clip on the bottom-right of this linked page.
Impulsive Behavior Linked to Risk of Alcoholism
Impulsive Behavior Linked to Risk of Alcoholism – Forbes.com
The brain signal in question is linked with the inability to inhibit matters that are irrelevant, and it appears to be present in people who become alcoholics, Porjesz explained. “It may make them more vulnerable to becoming an alcoholic,” she said.
Porjesz also found that even non-alcoholics with impulsive behaviors have the reduced frontal lobe brain activity while doing tasks that require focusing and using the frontal lobes. “We see these same brain wave disorders in children who have attention deficit disorder and antisocial personality disorder.”
Although this condition is probably genetic, Porjesz is quick to note that poor impulse control is not a cause of alcoholism. “There is no alcoholism gene,” she said.
Florida’s offer of free ice getting the cold shoulder
Florida’s offer of free ice getting the cold shoulder
In an effort to prepare for what forecasters initially predicted would be an active hurricane season, the state purchased the ice for $1.8 million.
The intent was to get the ice to areas impacted by a storm within 24 hours, said division spokesman Mike Stone. But no storm came, and with the season over, it’s costing taxpayers $90,000 a month to store.
First, the ice has a shelf life of just 6 to 10 months. Yes, even ice goes bad (think of those shriveled, yellow cubes you’ve seen in the freezer).
Second, it is stored in two facilities – Jacksonville and Bartow in central Florida.
Third, the minimum that can be picked up is 360 bags. Deliveries are possible, but only by the truckload – that’s 22 pallets or 39,600 pounds.
This is a one-time offer. The state is getting out of the ice-storage business.
“We will be working with our private-sector partners we have brought in and use those supply chains that are pre-existing,” Stone said. Among local nonprofits, the interest is non-existent. The county’s emergency operations folks say they would have the same problem as the state … it’s cost-prohibitive to store.
The Worst Predictions of 2006 – YouTube, etc.
PREDICTION: “There’s just not that many videos I want to watch.” — Steve Chen, co-founder of YouTube, worrying in March, 2005, about his startup’s potential popularity
THE REALITY: As Chen was expressing this anxiety, YouTube had roughly 50 videos available. Today more than 100 million are viewed daily on YouTube, which was acquired by Google (GOOG) on Nov. 14 for $1.65 billion.
PREDICTION: The national median home price will rise about 6.1% in 2006. Over a full year, it “has never declined since good record-keeping began in 1968.” — National Association of Realtors, Dec. 12, 2005
THE REALITY: Through October, the median price of residential properties was down 3.5% from a year earlier.
PREDICTION: “A very active hurricane season is looming.” — National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration, May 22, 2006
THE REALITY: Of the up to six “major” hurricanes in the North Atlantic that were predicted by NOAA, only two materialized. Number that reached U.S. shores: zero.
Do you need to turn off your PC at night?
Do you need to turn off your PC at night?
| • | Turning your PC off uses more energy than leaving it on. Not true. The small surge of power you use when turning it on — which varies per PC make and model — is still much smaller than the amount you use in keeping it on for lengthy periods. |
| • | Turning your PC on and off wears it out. A decade ago, there was something to this, but not today, say Hershberg and others. It used to be that PC hard disks did not automatically park their heads when shut off, and that frequent on/off cycling could damage the hard disks. Today’s PCs are designed to handle 40,000 on/off cycles before a failure, and that’s a number you likely won’t reach during the computer’s five-to-seven-year life span. |
| • | Screen savers save energy. Not true. Screen savers, at a minimum, can use 42 watts; those with 3D graphics can use as much as 114.5 watts, according to Don McCall, a Dell product marketing manager who does power measurement studies for the PC manufacturer. “It’s absolutely wrong thinking that a screen saver will save energy,” he says. |
| • | Your computer uses zero energy when “off.” That’s true only if it is unplugged. Otherwise, the PC utilizes “flea power,” or about 2.3 watts, to maintain local-area network connectivity, among other things, McCall says. In “hibernate” mode, your PC uses the same 2.3 watts; in “sleep” mode, your PC uses about 3.1 watts. Monitors do use zero energy when turned off
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