350 Is The Upper Limit "If humanity wishes to preserve a planet similar to that on which civilization developed and to which life on earth is adapted... CO2 will need to be reduced from its current 385 ppm to at most 350 ppm." Jim Hansen, NASA
Here’s a topic that’s bothered many people for over a thousand years. Why does Easter move around so much? And why do Orthodox Christians celebrate it at a different time from those in the West? For the answer we have to start looking about 2000 years ago.
Easter celebrates the rising from the grave of Jesus of Nazareth. If we zoom in a bit on that event, we see that it occurred around the celebration of the Jewish Passover. So it follows that the date we celebrate Easter is tied to the date of the Passover. And since Jewish holidays are not determined by the Gregorian calendar, but by the Hebrew calendar, the dates for Easter each year seem to vary.
There is some historical contention concerning the actual date Easter should be celebrated each year. Generally speaking, two schools of thought have evolved over the past two centuries. Although there are several distinct areas where they disagree, they can be distinguished most easily by one major difference. The Eastern thought still ties the Easter celebration to the Passover, explicitly stating that Easter cannot occur before the observance of Passover. Western faiths do not include this limitation.
In 2008 the differences in the way the dates are figured means that over a month will pass between the Western and Easter celebrations. In 1997, The World Council of Churches proposed a reform in the way the date is calculated, based exclusively on astronomical observations. This would have removed the disparity in the dates used by the Western and Orthodox faiths, but in the end, none of the member churches adopted the reform.
So where did Peter Cottontail, the Easter bunny come from? I have no idea. Same with Easter Eggs. Nevertheless, here’s a little bunny puzzle for your Easter enjoyment.
Happy Easter Folks
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This year, those of us in the West will celebrate Easter March 23rd. Eastern Christians will celebrate Easter on April 27th. For those who are interested, my son and I will be joining my family at my mom’s house. She’s planning to serve lamb as a traditional entre, and I think she’s planning a ham as well. I’m pretty sure there will be some deviled eggs, potato salad, and an asparagus casserole you’d spend your last dime on just to taste. Cake and pie for desserts and really great coffee, as long as we keep my niece, Stesha away from it…. she really likes some strong coffee.(I love you Stesha!)
So, enjoy the puzzle, check out the links, learn about Easter and astound your friends with Easter trivia! As for me,
I am Jon, and I’ll be here all weekend.
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(edit: I noticed that most of those SnapShots display the same text. The links go to different locations on a huge Wiki page. Even though the SnapShots are identical, the links are different. Thanks. Jon
So there you are, at the gamebeachparking lot of a super secret facility just out enjoying the night sky doing absolutely nothing wrong and you think to yourself, Wouldn’t it be great to have a telescope right now! I can remember when I was young, my brothers and I would make “play telescopes” out of toilet paper cardboard… remember that? I don’t remember them working very well, though. Real telescopes were just a fancy fancy.
Thanks to the folks over at Metacafe for pointing us to the following video. All you need to make the telescope are 2 empty 2-liter bottles, two easily found magnifying glasses and some tape. For tools you’ll need some scissors and a screwdriver. I suppose in a pinch a single knife would do the job of both.
I absolutely hate talking to machines on the phone. Thanks to Christopher Null:The Working Guy, I’ve learned how to get a human on the phone. All I have to do is remember to check with the guys over at GetHuman.com, where I’ll find a list of commonly called companies and the phone keystrokes to get a human.
These guys are all about customer service. The home page actually has all these numbers right there without making you jump through hoops. Two of the three-man team listed on the “About Us” page have their phone numbers listed. The “Caller Tips” page actually has good tips. For instance:
“To obtain company and government phone numbers at no charge, the best solutions are either 1-800-GOOG-411 (Google) or 1-800-CALL-411 (Microsoft). These work great from a mobile phone since they are hands-free and they even complete the call for you at no charge. They both also deliver the number to your cellphone as a text message. Note that even though these numbers are not toll-free, they become free to the caller by going through either the Google or the Microsoft services.”
(emphasis added)
So now you know how to make those particular kinds of long distance calls for free, by getting Google or Microsoft to pay for them. You should head over to GetHuman and add it to your marks.
Another thing I like about these guys is their sense of humor. Check out the video found via their “Press” page, below…
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