Moon Essays - Observational Astronomy, Lunar Science, Hemispheres

Moon The moon is the only natural satellite of Earth. The moon orbits the Earth from 384,400 km and has an average speed of 3700 km per hour. It has a diameter of 3476 km, which is about ? that of the Earth and has a mass of 7.35e22 kg. The moon is the second brightest object in the sky after the sun. The gravitational forces between the Earth and the moon cause some interesting effects; tides are the most obvious. The moon has no atmosphere, but there is evidence by the United States Department of Defense Clementine spacecraft shows that there maybe water ice in some deep craters near the moon's North and South Pole that are permanently shaded. Most of the moon's surface is covered with regolith, which is a mixture of fine dust and rocky debris produced by meteor impact. There are two types of terrain on the moon. One is the heavily cratered and very old highlands. The other is the relatively smooth and younger craters that were flooded with molten lava. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, visual exploration through powerful telescopes has yielded a fairly comprehensive picture of the visible side of the moon. The hitherto unseen far side of the moon was first revealed to the world in October 1959 through photographs made by the Soviet Lunik III spacecraft. These photographs showed that the far side of the moon is similar to the near side except that large lunar maria are absent. Craters are now known to cover the entire moon, ranging in size from huge, ringed maria to those of microscopic size. The entire moon has about 3 trillion craters larger than about 1 m in diameter. The moon shows different phases as it moves along its orbit around the earth. Half the moon is always in sunlight, just as half the earth has day while the other half has night. The phases of the moon depend on how much of the sunlit half can be seen at any one time. In the new moon, the face is completely in shadow. About a week later, the moon is in first quarter, resembling a half-circle; another week later, the full moon shows its fully lighted surface; a week afterward, in its last quarter, the moon appears as a half-circle again. The entire cycle is repeated each lunar month, which is approximately 29.5 days. The moon is full when it is farther away from the sun than the earth; it is new when it is closer. When it is more than half-illuminated, it is said to be in gibbous phase. The moon is waning when it progresses from full to new, and waxing as it proceeds again to full. Temperatures on its surface are extreme, ranging from a maximum of 127? C (261? F) at lunar noon to a minimum of -173? C (-279? F) just before lunar dawn. The Harvest moon is full moon at harvest time in the North Temperate Zone, or more exactly, the full moon occurring just before the autumnal equinox on about September 23. During this season the moon rises at a point opposite to the sun, or close to the exact eastern point of the horizon. Moreover, the moon rises only a few minutes later each night, affording on several successive evenings an attractive moonrise close to sunset time and strong moonlight almost all night if the sky is not clouded. The continuance of the moonlight after sunset is useful to farmers in northern latitudes, who are then harvesting their crops. The full moon following the harvest moon, which exhibits the same phenomena in a lesser degree, is called the hunter's moon. A similar phenomenon to the harvest moon is observed in southern latitudes at the spring equinox on about March 21.

100 Exquisite Adjectives

100 Exquisite Adjectives 100 Exquisite Adjectives 100 Exquisite Adjectives By Mark Nichol Adjectives descriptive words that modify nouns often come under fire for their cluttering quality, but often it’s quality, not quantity, that is the issue. Plenty of tired adjectives are available to spoil a good sentence, but when you find just the right word for the job, enrichment ensues. Practice precision when you select words. Here’s a list of adjectives: Adamant: unyielding; a very hard substance Adroit: clever, resourceful Amatory: sexual Animistic: quality of recurrence or reversion to earlier form Antic: clownish, frolicsome Arcadian: serene Baleful: deadly, foreboding Bellicose: quarrelsome (its synonym belligerent can also be a noun) Bilious: unpleasant, peevish Boorish: crude, insensitive Calamitous: disastrous Caustic: corrosive, sarcastic; a corrosive substance Cerulean: sky blue Comely: attractive Concomitant: accompanying Contumacious: rebellious Corpulent: obese Crapulous: immoderate in appetite Defamatory: maliciously misrepresenting Didactic: conveying information or moral instruction Dilatory: causing delay, tardy Dowdy: shabby, old-fashioned; an unkempt woman Efficacious: producing a desired effect Effulgent: brilliantly radiant Egregious: conspicuous, flagrant Endemic: prevalent, native, peculiar to an area Equanimous: even, balanced Execrable: wretched, detestable Fastidious: meticulous, overly delicate Feckless: weak, irresponsible Fecund: prolific, inventive Friable: brittle Fulsome: abundant, overdone, effusive Garrulous: wordy, talkative Guileless: naive Gustatory: having to do with taste or eating Heuristic: learning through trial-and-error or problem solving Histrionic: affected, theatrical Hubristic: proud, excessively self-confident Incendiary: inflammatory, spontaneously combustible, hot Insidious: subtle, seductive, treacherous Insolent: impudent, contemptuous Intransigent: uncompromising Inveterate: habitual, persistent Invidious: resentful, envious, obnoxious Irksome: annoying Jejune: dull, puerile Jocular: jesting, playful Judicious: discreet Lachrymose: tearful Limpid: simple, transparent, serene Loquacious: talkative Luminous: clear, shining Mannered: artificial, stilted Mendacious: deceptive Meretricious: whorish, superficially appealing, pretentious Minatory: menacing Mordant: biting, incisive, pungent Munificent: lavish, generous Nefarious: wicked Noxious: harmful, corrupting Obtuse: blunt, stupid Parsimonious: frugal, restrained Pendulous: suspended, indecisive Pernicious: injurious, deadly Pervasive: widespread Petulant: rude, ill humored Platitudinous: resembling or full of dull or banal comments Precipitate: steep, speedy Propitious: auspicious, advantageous, benevolent Puckish: impish Querulous: cranky, whining Quiescent: inactive, untroublesome Rebarbative: irritating, repellent Recalcitrant: resistant, obstinate Redolent: aromatic, evocative Rhadamanthine: harshly strict Risible: laughable Ruminative: contemplative Sagacious: wise, discerning Salubrious: healthful Sartorial: relating to attire, especially tailored fashions Sclerotic: hardening Serpentine: snake-like, winding, tempting or wily Spasmodic: having to do with or resembling a spasm, excitable, intermittent Strident: harsh, discordant; obtrusively loud Taciturn: closemouthed, reticent Tenacious: persistent, cohesive, Tremulous: nervous, trembling, timid, sensitive Trenchant: sharp, penetrating, distinct Turbulent: restless, tempestuous Turgid: swollen, pompous Ubiquitous: pervasive, widespread Uxorious: inordinately affectionate or compliant with a wife Verdant: green, unripe Voluble: glib, given to speaking Voracious: ravenous, insatiable Wheedling: flattering Withering: devastating Zealous: eager, devoted Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the General category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:How to Punctuate References to Dates and Times"Confused With" and "Confused About"Quiet or Quite?

Grammar Tips What Is a Sentence Fragment - Get Proofed!

Grammar Tips What Is a Sentence Fragment - Get Proofed! Grammar Tips: What Is a Sentence Fragment? Being proofreaders, we’re keen on keeping things grammatical. As such, we feel sad when we see a sentence that’s been left incomplete. It’s like the linguistic version of an abandoned puppy. But what is it that makes a sentence complete? And is an incomplete sentence always wrong? Our guide to sentence fragments can answer your questions and help you avoid errors in your work. The Sentence Fragment A sentence fragment is, quite simply, an incomplete sentence. At its most basic, a sentence needs a subject (i.e., something or someone to perform an action) and a verb (i.e., an action or state of being). Subject Verb Phrase The bird†¦ †¦flew away. If a sentence is missing a subject or a verb, it will be incomplete (i.e., a sentence fragment): Fragment (No Subject): Flew away. Fragment (No Verb): The bird. Neither of these is a complete sentence, so we don’t know what the author meant. In other cases, though, sentence fragments may have a subject and a verb while still being incomplete. For example: The bird pecked my. Here, we have the subject â€Å"bird† and verb â€Å"pecked,† but there is something missing after â€Å"my.† This is because â€Å"pecked† is a transitive verb, so it needs an object (i.e., something that is being acted on). The more complex a sentence gets, the easier it is to miss something like this. Are Sentence Fragments Always Wrong? No! Sentence fragments are common. In literature, for example, using a short sentence fragment can be a good way of changing the pace or tone of a piece of writing. Compare the following: No Fragment: The budgie was small, but loud. Fragment: The budgie was small. But loud. In the second, â€Å"But loud† is technically a sentence fragment. But by using a period instead of a comma, the author adds a dramatic pause before the fragment to emphasize how loud the budgie is. I am budgie. Hear me roar. More generally, we all use sentence fragments in our own lives. And you’ll find them used in advertising and pop culture all the time! As long as you can understand them, this isn’t a problem. How to Avoid â€Å"Bad† Fragments Sentence fragments become an issue when it is hard to tell what someone is saying. For example: The canary was singing because. Here, there’s obviously something missing from the sentence, since â€Å"because† is meant to introduce a reason. As such, this fragment would need completing before it makes sense. In other cases, we might understand what the author means by a sentence fragment, but unless there is a good reason for using one, it is still better to write in full sentences. For instance: The study examined several species. Including canaries, budgies and doves. Here, the clause that starts with â€Å"Including† is a fragment, though we can guess that it’s a list of birds included in the study. However, since there’s no reason to use a sentence fragment here, it would be better to remove the period and join the clauses with a comma: The study examined several species, including canaries, budgies and doves. The most important thing is that every sentence has a main clause including a subject and verb, but watch out for other sentences that seem unfinished or ambiguous throughout your work.

Theme Analysis Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Theme Analysis - Research Paper Example She is referred to as a â€Å"debutante† and one who has â€Å"come of age†. This generally happens in high social circles. In other rare circumstances, age is of little consequence. One may refer to a person- young or old, has having â€Å"come of age† when he has surmounted a serious problem and emerged from it victorious. It is to be understood that chronological age does not really matter; it is the mature way the person handles the situation that counts. What is important is the ability to make a wise and sane decision that could change one’s life considerably and even forever. But that choice must be in one’s best interests. This situation, however, is rare and is more the exception than the rule. The Civil War in America left the Southerners swamped with difficulties as a result of the freeing of the slaves – the direst of which was economic in nature. There was much damage to life and property. All that could have contributed to economic recovery was in ruins – plantations, farms, buildings, the transportation system – everything, resulting from the emancipation of a million slaves. The family of Abner Snopes was no exception. Snopes earned the reputation of â€Å"barn burner† simply because he was just that – a barn burner. His younger boy, Sarty was a namesake of Colonel Sartorius Snopes, appears in court with his father who is accused of the aforesaid crime recently committed. The boy hopes he will not be interrogated for he would be forced to testify against his father who is, of course, guilty as alleged. Snopes is described as a wiry figure who was often dressed in a stiff black coat. His voice was cold and harsh, level and without emphasis – a brief but fitting description for a person addicted to crime – more specifically, arson and theft. It might be mentioned here that Sarty has inherited his father’s way of thinking – foremost being that people

Abolition Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Abolition - Research Paper Example Various activities supported this principle aimed at achieving that goal. The concept is historical because all countries in the world have abolished slavery, as many international organizations among them the United Nations require member countries to ratify abolitionism. Abolitionism was a major reform movement in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The doctrine to end slavery was to free millions of black people detained and used as slaves across the world. Other terms refer to abolitionism among them abolition movement and antislavery movement. The movement started by Africans resisting slave trade and slavery, eighteenth century notions regarding universally acceptable human rights, changing ideas in interpreting Christian morality, and changes in the economy status of the world (Oakes, 2013). This led to abolitionists dividing into two extremes with one group advocating for immediate end to slavery and slave trade while others fought for gradual end to the same. In the mid nineteenth century, the terminology abolitionism referred to the struggle to end slavery immediately. Early stages In the entire America and Western Europe, abolitionism was a rights movement whose proponents wanted to end set slave trade and in the process set slaves free. Bartholomew de las Casas, a Dominican priest influenced Spain to become the first European nation to legislate laws that legally abolished slavery by 1542. However, three years down the line, pressure from the bourgeoisie who were the beneficiaries forced the same country to weaken the laws reversing the gains made by early abolitionists. Evangelical Christians and Quakers fought hard against slave trade and slavery in the seventeenth century terming them un-Christian acts. The movement gained momentum in eighteenth century when rational thinkers among the elite in the society accused the beneficiaries calling the entire process a violation of human rights. It is important to note that although early abolitionis ts put in a lot of effort, the gains were not immediate as centers of slavery still existed. Centers were in Countries in South America and United States as well West Indies. The movement started in England after the Somerset’s case of 1772. Eight years later the state of Pennsylvania enacted laws that aimed at the gradual end to slavery within its area of jurisdiction (Wilson, 1990). Although there was no official law abolishing slavery in Massachusetts, the promulgation of the Massachusetts constitution ended slavery. The European colonization of countries in America increased the dependence on race-based slavery where Africans and their descendants were forced to work the farms. The process reached its apex in the sixteen century. This degree reached Great Britain’s North American colonies in the mid seventeen century. These countries later become the United States. Antislavery movements started because of the rights denied to slaves and other inhumane acts. In the United States for instance, slaves lost customary rights, passed their un-free status over to their children and respective descendants, and served for life. Individual efforts of the enslaved to free from slavery included self-purchase, escape, rebellion, and seeking redress from courts. Some of the early major revolts were in America as early as the first decade of the eighteenth century in South Carolina and New York City. Major efforts towards resistance to abolish slavery and slave trade from organizations in the United States came from Quakers, the Society of Friends who believed and spread the idea that slavery was physically dangerous and sinful to both the victim and the beneficiary. Leaders of the society including Antony Benezet from Pennsylvania and John Woolman from New Jersey

Literary Analysis: Clay and The Dead Essay -- Essays Papers

Literary Analysis: Clay and The Dead In the fifteen Dubliners stories, city life, religion, friends and family bring hope to individuals discovering what it means to be human. Two stories stood out in James Joyce’s Dubliners. One story attempts to mislead readers as it is hard to follow and the other story is the most famous story in the book. In the stories â€Å"Clay† and â€Å"The Dead,† James Joyce uses escape themes to deal with the emotions of the characters, Maria and Gabriel living in the Dublin society. Both stories take place during the winter on Halloween and Christmas, which are the holiday seasons and the season of death. In â€Å"Clay,† the main character, Maria is a patient, old woman and a former maid for rival brothers Joe and Alphy Donnelly. Now that they’re all grown up, she seems to be â€Å"lost† in her life, childless and unmarried, and is now an employee at a Laundromat. Maria has struggled for what seems like most of her life both financially and socially. Maria lives on a small but independent income from a job that earns her the respect of co-workers and bosses. Glimpses of poverty are seen in this story when Maria becomes concerned that she lost the cake that she bought for the Donnelly family. â€Å"Maria said she had brought something special for papa and mamma, something they would be sure to like, and she began to look for her plumcake† (99). Maria’s loss of the cake is painful because she paid a big price for it. Maria was trying to treat her loved ones despite her limited income. Although Gabriel from â€Å"The Dead† isn’t poor like Maria, he isn’t very wealthy either unlike his aunts. Gabriel is just an average writer. He doesn’t hold annual parties like his aunts do every year to make him seem snobbish to others. J... ... U.S.A: Pearson Custom Publishing, 2002. Langbaum, Robert â€Å"The Epiphanic Mode in Wordsworth and Modern Literature.† New Literary History Vol. 14 (1983): 335-358. JSTOR. University of Dayton, Roesch Library. 18 February 2004 . Munich, Adrienne â€Å"Form and Subtextt in Joyce’s ‘The Dead’† Modern Philology Vol. 82 No.2 (Nov. 1984) 173-184. JSTOR University of Dayton, Roesch Library.20 February 2004 Norris, Margot â€Å"Narration under a Blindfold: Reading Joyce’s ‘Clay.’† PMLA Vol. 102 (1987): 206-215. JSTOR. University of Dayton, Roesch Library. 18 February 2004 . Orfe Literature. Ed. James Joyce. 17 February 2004. . Owens, Coilin. â€Å"Clay (3): The Mass of Mary and All the Saints.† James Joyce Quarterly 28 (1990): 257-266.

Influential factors Essay

When it’s time to develop a new program, the first thing that must be considered is the decision on what programming language to utilise. This is important because changing the program midway through completion is very difficult to achieve, and will often require a vast rewriting of code. There are a number of issues that will influence this decision, and these are:   Organisational policy, suitability of the language, the availability of trained staff, how reliable the program is, cost of development and maintenance, expandability of the language, and interoperability with other languages Table of Contents Task Brief 1 Overview of Report 1 Organisational Policy 1 Suitability 2 Availability of Trained Staff 2 Reliability 2 Development and Maintenance Costs 2 Expandability 3 Interoperability 3 Summery 3 Bibliography 4 Organisational Policy All organisations will have policies (methods of practice) dictating that they will operate under specified conditions. A policy of developing applications using one particular language may come from historical use, and a foundation of previous development tools (such as IDEs) for that one language. (M Fishpool, 2007, p. 156) To deviate to using another language may in that instance not make sense to the hierarchy of the organisation. This may ring particularly true if the organisation has established a relationship with a particular vendor, such as Microsoft. Maintaining a link with this company may be rewarded with better support and discounts. (Anderson, 2010, p. 166) On the other hand, maintaining the use of a particular piece of software (such as Microsoft’s IDE Visual Studio) would limit language choice to those that suit that company’s interests. Another choice they may pursue is to utilise open source software, which brings its own benefits and disadvantages. Open-source software does not offer personalised technical support and relies on an unpaid, potentially unreliable enthusiast community to provide these solutions, but is usually free to use. Suitability Building a program in a language unsuitable for its intended task will cause big problems down the line, which is why understanding the application’s technical requirements is important. The first thing to consider when making a program is what the intended platform will be. This could be computer setups such as Windows, OS X, a Linux-based OS, a web-based application, a smart phone-based app or the option to be platform agnostic could also be desired. Languages that are built to be natively run on one platform (like C++) will be more effective in completing intensive tasks, but building a program in Java means that the application will work the same way on any OS with the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) software installed (Oracle, 2011). The complexity of the program will also affect whether a procedural or object-oriented language will be chosen, as is whether appropriate features are included in the chosen IDE. (Anderson, 2010, p. 166) Availability of Trained Staff If a language is popular and used widely (such as Java, C, or C++ (TIOBE, 2011)), then there will be more professionals that are able to code in it than there are for less popular languages. Therefore, choosing a popular language will make it easier to recruit personnel for a new project. Also, looking at what languages the organisation has historically used, the kind of hardware installed, and what skill sets existing employees have will have an impact in this decision. Reliability. A program becomes unreliable when how it will deal with data becomes unpredictable, and this is what can cause programs to crash. This is why some languages, like Ada, are created with an emphasis on features that make them less likely to crash. (Anderson, 2010, p. 166) The best way of ensuring that code is predictable and reliable is to use a strict language, which is one with a strong type system. A strong type system specifies restrictions on how values of different data types (such as integers and strings) are allowed to be intermixed, and stops the source code from compiling if it thinks data is being incorrectly mixed. This provides a guarantee about how the program will behave when it starts running. (Wikipedia 2, 2011) Development and Maintenance Costs Part of the idea of planning the development of a program also includes the costing of the entire project. In order to do so, we take into account the length of time each development stage will take, and what resources will be needed at which point. A lot of resources are spent before the first line of code is even written to make sure that the language and IDE we choose will be the most suitable and acceptably reliable, because choosing an â€Å"unreliable solution means more money spent in maintenance costs. † (M Fishpool, 2007, p. 155) Also, rather than simply creating error fixes, maintenance is also about how the program evolves post-deployment, as suggested by Lehman’s Laws. (Wikipedia 1, 2011) Therefore, how much of the overall budget will go towards the evolution of the application needs to be taken into account. Expandability Expandability is about planning the long term future of the program. Programs in active use will rarely cease to be updated following its first release. It will usually evolve beyond its original specification and require more features to be added, or be asked to process more data. If this is the case and the program is not easily expandable, a lot more time and money than necessary will need to be spent on rewriting code or porting it to a different language. For this reason, object oriented languages are popular because new features can be ‘bolted on’ as additional classes. (M Fishpool, 2007, p. 156) If this is not a concern, a procedural language can be used instead. Interoperability The presence of several languages may dictate whether a language needs to be interoperable. Interoperability is achieved when programs coded in different languages are able to work with each other through a common set of standards. (Wikipedia 3, 2011) One way this is done is through the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) specification, which is implemented using Mono and Microsoft’s . NET. These allow any language that meets the CLI specification to be able to be run by their virtual machine. The most common language is C#, which was especially created to be used in . NET, but dialects of popular languages have been created to be used in a similar fashion (examples include C++/CLI and VB. NET). Summery In this report, we discussed what factors are influential in choosing a programming language for a project. We discovered that companies will have organisational policies which restrict employees to only use certain languages or certain company’s’ software. We also learned that all languages have pros and cons, so that understanding what task our program needs to do will ensure we pick the language that is most suitable. We also need to make sure that there are actually people available to employ to code for us, so we should choose a popular language to make it easier to recruit employees. Reliability is also an area of importance, but for programs where reliability must be guaranteed, we learned that there are languages such as Ada which cater to this specific requirement. Budgets are also an issue as development and maintenance costs will differ between languages, and an unreliable solution means more money spent in maintenance costs. If we need our software to be expanded in the future, it is also best to choose a language that can support this from the start. Finally, we learned about interoperability and how programs coded in different languages are able to work with each other through a common set of standards. Bibliography Anderson, J. K. L. M. P. a. S. , 2010. BTEC National Level 3 IT Student Book 1. 1st ed. Edexcel. M Fishpool, B. F. , 2007. BTEC Level 3 National in IT. 2nd ed. Hodder Education. Oracle, 2011. Java Runtime Environment (JRE). [Online] Available at: HYPERLINK â€Å"http://java. sun. com/j2se/desktopjava/jre/† http://java. sun. com/j2se/desktopjava/jre/ [Accessed 1 October 2011]. TIOBE, 2011. TIOBE Index. [Online] Available at: HYPERLINK â€Å"http://www. tiobe. com/content/paperinfo/tpci/index. html† http://www. tiobe. com/content/paperinfo/tpci/index. html [Accessed 01 October 2011]. Wikipedia 1, 2011. Software Maintenance. [Online] Available at: HYPERLINK â€Å"http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Software_maintenance† http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Software_maintenance [Accessed 2 October 2011]. Wikipedia 2, 2011. Strong Typing: Wikipedia. [Online] Available at: HYPERLINK â€Å"http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Strongly_typed_programming_language† http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Strongly_typed_programming_language [Accessed 14 October 2011]. Wikipedia 3, 2011. Interoperability. [Online] Available at: HYPERLINK â€Å"http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Interoperability† l â€Å"Software† http://en. wikipedia. org/wiki/Interoperability#Software [Accessed 27 September 2011].