Outer space (also called just space) as a name for a region, refers to the relatively empty parts of the Universe, outside the atmospheres of celestial bodies. The term outer space is used to distinguish it from airspace and terrestrial locations. Although outer space is certainly spacious, it is now known to be far from empty, and filled with a tenuous plasma.

As the Earth's atmosphere has no abrupt cut-off, but rather thins gradually with increasing altitude, there is no definite boundary between the atmosphere and space. The Federation Aeronautique Internationale has established the Kármán line at an altitude of 100 km (62 miles) as the working definition for the boundary between atmosphere and space. In the United States, persons who travel above an altitude of 50 miles (80 kilometers) are designated as astronauts. 400,000 feet (75 miles or 120 kilometers) marks the boundary where atmospheric effects become noticeable during re-entry.

 

Satellites belonging to NASA's "Great Observatories" program:

The Space Telescope (ST), now known as Hubble Space Telescope (HST) is the optical Great Observatory. It was launched to great acclaim and soon after discovered to be flawed. Its main mirror contained imperfections in its grinding that resulted from a certain production limitation being accounted for twice. It has now been fitted with the equivalent of spectacles to compensate for this.
The Gamma ray Observatory (GRO), since renamed to The Compton Gamma-Ray Observatory, had to be disposed of after several years of productive life. Its gyroscopes began to fail and when it was down to its last gyroscope, the choice was to risk losing control or destroying the observatory. NASA de-orbited the bus-sized satellite into the Pacific Ocean in 2000.
X-Rays are also represented in the Great Observatories, with the Chandra X-ray Observatory, renamed (from AXAF) in honor of the great Indian astrophysicist Chandrasekhar. This has been used to great effect to study distant galaxies and is still operational.
The Spitzer Space Telescope is the fourth observatory, originally called the Space Infrared Telescope Facility, SIRTF, launched on August 24, 2003.

A large number of observatories have been launched into orbit, and most of them have greatly enhanced our knowledge of the cosmos. Performing astronomy from the Earth's surface is limited by the filtering and distortion of electromagnetic radiation due to the Earth's atmosphere. This makes it desirable to place astrononomical observation devices into space. As a telescope orbits the Earth outside the atmosphere it is subject neither to twinkling (distortion due to thermal turbulences of the air) nor to light pollution from artificial light sources on the Earth. Some terrestrial telescopes (such as the Very Large Telescope) can counter turbulences with the help of their novel adaptive optics.

But space-based astronomy is even more important for frequency ranges which are outside of the optic window and the radio window, the only two wavelength ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum that are not severely attenuated by the atmosphere. For example, X-ray astronomy is nearly impossible when done from the Earth, and has reached its current important stand within astronomy only due to orbiting satellites with X-ray telescopes such as the Chandra observatory. Infrared and ultraviolet are also greatly blocked.

Space observatories can generally be divided into two classes: missions which map the entire sky (surveys), and observatories which make observations of chosen parts of the sky.

Many space observatories have already completed their missions, while others are still operating. Satellites have been launched by NASA, ESA and the Japanese Space Agency.

 

Craps (previously known as crabs) is a popular casino gambling game using dice. Players wager money against the casino on the outcome of one roll, or of a series of rolls of two dice.

Craps can also be played in less formal settings and is said to be popular among soldiers. In such situations side bets are less frequent, with one or several participants covering or "fading" bets against the dice.

The basic game
The basic game of craps is very simple. The most fundamental bet is the "pass line" wager, which almost everyone on a given game may make. On the first roll of the two dice (the come-out roll), the pass line bettors, or "right" bettors win by rolling either a 7 or 11 (a natural). If the shooter, or any other player, has a bet on the pass-line, he would win on the natural. Rolling craps (2, 3, or 12) loses immediately for the pass line bettor. Any other number (4, 5, 6, 8, 9, or 10) is called the point. To win, the pass-line bettor must roll the point number again before rolling a 7. If a 7 comes up before the point number, the shooter has sevened-out and the dice fail to pass. The shooter relinquishes the right to shoot when he or she sevens out, and the player to the left shoots next, beginning a new come-out sequence.

On any come-out roll, the shooter or any other player may also choose to place a don't pass wager, betting against the dice. This method, called "betting wrong," is by no means morally inferior to "right betting." In fact, the don't pass offers a lower house edge than pass line betting, and features the same free odds bet after a point is established. The bet works exactly like the opposite of the pass line wager, with the don't-pass bettor losing on the come-out when a natural is rolled. The don't bettor wins when a craps is rolled on the come-out, except on the roll of a barred craps, where the bet is a stand-off or push. Usually casinos bar the 2 or 12 craps, but beware a house which bars the 3 craps, as this practice doubles the house edge on the don't pass wager. The barred number is where the house derives its advantage by not paying the designated craps roll. Converse to pass-line betting, the wrong bettor wins on 7-outs and loses when a point is made.

A casino craps table is run by four casino employees: a boxman who guards the chips and supervises the dealers; two dealers who stand to either side of the boxman and collect and pay bets; and a stickman who stands directly across the table from the boxman and announces the results of each roll and then collects the dice with an elongated wooden stick. For clarity, the number 11 is referred to as "yo" so as not to be confused with the number 7.

A new shooter, who must bet the table minimum on either the pass line or the don't pass line to play, is given five dice by the stickman and picks two.

When the shooter rolls the dice, the dealers will usually insist that the dice be rolled with one hand and that they bounce off the wall surrounding the table. These requirements are meant to retard cheating attempts by switching the dice or making a "controlled shot." If a die leaves the table, the shooter will usually be asked to select another die from the remaining three but can request using the same die if it passes the boxman's inspection. This requirement is used in an effort to reduce cheating the game by substituting loaded dice for the regulation dice.

 

 A conversation is civil communication by two or more people, often on a particular topic. William F. Buckley's Firing Line, the Dick Cavett Show, and many other television programs described as "talk shows" are exercises in conversation. Conversations are the ideal form of communication from at least one point of view, since they allow people with different views of a topic to learn from each other. A speech, on the other hand, is an oral presentation by one person directed at a group.

Conversers naturally relate the other speaker's statements to themselves, and insert themselves (or some degree of relation to themselves, ranging from the replier's opinions or points to actual stories about themselves) into their replies. For a successful conversation, the partners must achieve a workable balance of contributions. A successful conversation includes mutually interesting connections between the speakers or things that the speakers know. For this to happen, conversers must find a topic on which they can relate in some sense.

 

Dr. Kattassery Joseph Yesudas (born January 10, 1940), is a noted South Indian musician. He was born in Fort Kochi, Kerala to Augustine and Elizabeth Joseph. His father Augustine Joseph, who was his first guru (teacher), was a well known Malayalam classical musician and stage actor of his time.

Yesudas is a Malayali singer, and exponent of carnatic music. He joined the Music Academy in Thirupunithura and won a gold medal for music at a local competition in Fort Kochi at age 7.

In his career he has sung more than 30,000 songs for thousands of Indian films in many languages such as Tamil, Kannada, Tamil, Gujarati, Telugu and Bengali. He was also invited by the Soviet Government to perform music concerts in various cities of the U.S.S.R in 1965.

The President of India conferred on him the title of Padmashree in 1973.

Dr. Yesudas and his wife Prabha have three sons, Vinod, Vijay and Vishal. The family is currently settled in Madras, India.

 

Philosophy literally means 'love of wisdom' from the Greek 'philo' and 'sofia'. It is now widely used to designate the pursuit of knowledge or wisdom about fundamental matters concerning life, death, meaning, reality, being and truth. The term may also refer to the collective works of major philosophers; it can mean the academic exploration of various questions raised by philosophers; it can also mean a certain critical, creative way of thinking. In its academic sense 'philosophy' is highly ambiguous, particularly between the two broad traditions in Western philosophy of 'analytic' and 'continental' philosophy. The former tradition is commonly focused on conceptual analysis and the use of logical constructions and notations to establish proofs. The latter tradition is distinctive for its associations with movements such as existentialism, deconstructivism, phenomenology and fundamental ontology. Eastern philosophy is yet another, quite distinct discipline. None of these meanings can be considered distinctly. Philosophy, in brief, has several connotations in common speech, but this article will focus on philosophy as a field of study.

 

A useful characteristic upon which to base a definition of life is that of descent with modification: the ability of a life form to produce offspring that are like its parent or parents, but with the possibility of some variation due to chance. Descent with modification is sufficient by itself to allow evolution, assuming that the variations in the offspring allow for differential survival. The study of this form of heritability is called genetics. In all known life forms (assuming prions are not counted as such), the genetic material is primarily DNA or the related molecule, RNA. Another exception might be the software code of certain forms of viruses and programs created through genetic programming, but whether computer programs can be alive even by this definition is still a matter of some contention.

 

This is a poem i wrote:
Scince the first day i saw you
I knew you were the one.
The one who'd make my heart pound
every time I see you.
The one I eat,sleep and breathe for.
The ones whos gentle hands would
caress my hands when im down.
The one who'd make me smile every time I see your face.
The one who makes me blush every time our eyes meet
and now that your gone I can never feel these ways.
I wont be able to see your tender eyes.
Now that your gone my heart aches
every time I hear your name.
Even though your gone
the way I feel for you will never change
and i want you to know that you are the one
my one and only true love.
by krystal