BUONE NOTIZIE
Produttore~Consumatore. In crescita i Mercatini Agricoli
In crisi fast food con boom farmers market. La crisi del fast food con la messa in vendita del colosso statunitense Burger King è la conferma di un cambiamento in atto nelle abitudini alimentari anche negli Usa dove negli ultimi dieci anni sono piu’ che raddoppiati i mercati degli agricoltori dove comprare prodotti locali di grande qualità alternativi ai menu’’ globalizzati. E’ quanto afferma la Coldiretti che, nel commentare le difficoltà che sta incontrando la catena di Fast Food, sottolinea che negli Stati uniti sono aperti 6132 mercati degli agricoltori in aumento del 16 per cento rispetto allo scorso anno. Una tendenza sostenuta dalla stessa amministrazione Obama che ha avviato numerose iniziative contro il cibo spazzatura e a favore di stili di vita sani che – ricorda la Coldiretti – vanno dall’obbligo ad indicare il conto delle calorie nei menu’ offerti da oltre 200mila catene di fast food, ristoranti e take away previsto dalla riforma sanitaria alla coltivazione di un orto alla Casa Bianca nelle cui prossimità è stato aperto anche un farmers market
per favorire l’offerta di cibi freschi e genuini provenienti dalla campagna. Anche in Italia si registra il successo di esperienze di vendita di prodotti locali rispetto a quello delle multinazionali come McDonald’s con il 54 per cento degli italiani preferisce acquistare prodotti alimentari locali e artigianali che battono nettamente le grandi marche, che si fermano al 12 per cento, secondo una indagine Coldiretti/Swg. Secondo l’indagine – continua la Coldiretti – per il 29 per cento degli italiani la scelta tra le due tipologie di prodotto dipende dalla qualità, mentre per il 5 per cento dal prezzo. Si tratta – sottolinea la Coldiretti – di una opinione confermata da un vero boom degli acquisti diretti dai produttori dove compra regolarmente l’11 per cento degli italiani e ben il 47 per cento ha dichiarato di farlo almeno qualche volta durante l’anno. La spesa in cantine, malghe o frantoi per acquistare direttamente dai produttori vini, ortofrutta, olio, formaggi, e altre specialità supererà nel 2010 i 3 miliardi di euro secondo la Coldiretti e coinvolge 63mila imprese agricole attraverso spacci aziendali, chioschi, bancarelle, sagre e oltre 500 mercati degli agricoltori di Campagna Amica. L’acquisto di un alimento direttamente dal produttore – sottolinea la Coldiretti – è una opportunità per conoscere non solo il prodotto ma anche la storia, la cultura e la tradizione che racchiude dalle parole di chi a contribuito a conservare un patrimonio che spesso non ha nulla da invidiare alle bellezze artistiche e naturali del territorio nazionale. Si tratta – conclude la Coldiretti – di un fenomeno in controtendenza rispetto alla crisi generale perché concilia la necessità di risparmiare con quella di garantirsi la sicurezza del cibo. Tra le motivazioni di acquisto dell’indagine Swg/Coldiretti spicca infatti la genuinità (71 per cento) seguita dal risparmio (40 per cento) e dal gusto (26 per cento). fonte: coldiretti.it
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^ SHOPPING ^La Terra dallo spazio: Iceberg gigante entra nello Stretto di Nares
Il satellite Envisat ha seguito gli spostamenti dell’enorme iceberg che il 4 agosto scorso si è staccato dal ghiacciaio Petermann in Groenlandia. Questa sequenza di immagini radar, acquisite fra il 31 luglio e il 1 settembre, mostra l’iceberg che si allontana dal ghiacciaio ed entra nello Stretto di Nares, il tratto di mare che collega l’Oceano Artico e il Mare di Lincoln con la Baia di Baffin. L’iceberg, al momento il più grande dell’emisfero settentrionale, è lungo circa 30 km ed ha una superficie di circa 245 kmq. Il 22 agosto aveva già percorso circa 22 km dal suo punto di origine, fino a raggiungere l’estremità del ghiacciaio Petermann, e nell’immagine del 1 settembre lo si vede fare il suo ingresso nello Stretto di Nares. La stessa immagine mostra anche che l’iceberg ha urtato una piccola isola nello stretto, il che potrebbe rallentarlo per un breve periodo o spezzarlo in blocchi più piccoli. In ogni caso é molto probabile che l’iceberg presto si troverà completamente nello stretto, ma percorso e velocità dipendono da diversi fattori, quali i venti che soffiano dal ghiacciaio, le correnti che attraversano lo stretto e, non ultimo, l’eventuale ghiaccio marino che potrebbe bloccarne il cammino. fonte: esa.int
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^ SHOPPING ^We Are The Aliens…
The Extraordinary Tale of Red Rain, Comets and Extraterrestrials. For years, claims have circulated that red rain which fell in India in 2001, contained cells unlike any found on Earth. Now new evidence that these cells can reproduce is about to set the debate alive. Panspermia is the idea that life exists throughout the universe in comets, asteroids and interstellar dust clouds and that life of Earth was seeded from one or more of these sources.
Panspermia holds that we are all extraterrestrials. While this is certainly not a mainstream idea in science, a growing body of evidence suggests that it should be carefully studied rather than casually disregarded. For example, various bugs have been shown to survive for months or even years in the harsh conditions of space. And one of the more interesting but lesser known facts about the Mars meteorite that some scientists believe holds evidence of life on Mars, is that its interior never rose above 50 degrees centigrade, despite being blasted from the Martian surface by an meteor impact and surviving a fiery a descent through Earth’s thick atmosphere. If there is life up there, this evidence suggests that it could survive the trip to Earth. All that seems well established. Now for the really controversial stuff. In 2001, numerous people observed red rain falling over Kerala in the southern tip of India during a two month period. One of them was Godfrey Louis, a physicist at nearby Cochin University of Science and Technology. Intrigued by this phenomena, Louis collected numerous samples of red rain, determined to find out what was causing the
contamination, perhaps sand or dust from some distant desert. Under a microscope, however, he found no evidence of sand or dust. Instead, the rain water was filled with red cells that look remarkably like conventional bugs on Earth. What was strange was that Louis found no evidence of DNA in these cells which would rule out most kinds of known biological cells (red blood cells are one possibility but ought to be destroyed quickly by rain water). Louis published his results in the peer-reviewed journal Astrophysics and Space in 2006, along with the tentative suggestion that the cells could be extraterrestrial, perhaps from a comet that had disintegrated in the upper atmosphere and then seeded clouds as the cells floated down to Earth. In fact, Louis says there were reports in the region of a sonic boom-type noise at the time, which could have been caused by the disintegration of an object in the upper atmosphere. Since then, Louis has continued to study the cells with an international team including Chandra Wickramasinghe from the University of Cardiff in the UK and one of the leading proponents of the panspermia theory, which he developed in the latter half of the 20th century with the remarkable physicist Fred Hoyle. Today Louis, Wickramasinghe and others publish some extraordinary claims about these red cells. They say that the cells clearly
reproduce at a temperature of 121 degrees C. “Under these conditions daughter cells appear within the original mother cells and the number of cells in the samples increases with length of exposure to 121 degrees C,” they say. By contrast, the cells are inert at room temperature. That makes them highly unusual, to say the least. The spores of some extremophiles can survive these kinds of temperatures and then reproduce at lower temperatures but nothing behaves like this at these temperatures, as far as we know. This is an extraordinary claim that will need to be independently verified before it will be more broadly accepted. And of course, this behaviour does not suggest an extraterrestrial origin for these cells, by any means. However, Wickramasinghe and co can’t resist hinting at such an exotic explanation. They’ve examined the way these fluoresce when bombarded with light and say it is remarkably similar to various unexplained emission spectra seen in various parts of the galaxy. One such place is the Red Rectangle, a cloud of dust and gas around a young star in the Monocerous constellation.It would be fair to say that more evidence will be required before Kerala’s red rain can be satisfactorily explained. In the meantime, it looks a fascinating mystery. - Growth and replication of red rain cells at 121 oC and their red fluorescence. Abstract: We have shown that the red cells
found in the Red Rain (which fell on Kerala, India, in 2001) survive and grow after incubation for periods of up to two hours at 121 oC . Under these conditions daughter cells appear within the original mother cells and the number of cells in the samples increases with length of exposure to 121 oC. No such increase in cells occurs at room temperature, suggesting that the increase in daughter cells is brought about by exposure of the Red Rain cells to high temperatures. This is an independent confirmation of results reported earlier by two of the present authors, claiming that the cells can replicate under high pressure at temperatures up to 300 oC. The flourescence behaviour of the red cells is shown to be in remarkable correspondence with the extended red emission observed in the Red Rectangle planetary nebula and other galactic and extragalactic dust clouds, suggesting, though not proving, an extraterrestrial origin. Authors: Rajkumar Gangappa (Univ. of Glamorgan UK) Chandra Wickramasinghe (Cardiff Univ. UK), Milton Wainwright (Univ. Sheffield UK), A. Santhosh Kumar (Cochin University India), Godfrey Louis (Cochin University India). Sources: technologyreview.com & arxiv.org ~ Red rain in Kerala; From July 25 to September 23, 2001, red rain sporadically fell on the southern Indian state of Kerala. Heavy downpours occurred in which the rain was colored red, staining clothes pink. Yellow, green, and black rain was also reported.Colored rain had been reported in Kerala as early as 1896 and several times since then. It was initially thought that the rains were colored by fallout from a hypothetical meteor burst, but a study commissioned by the Government of India concluded that the rains had been colored by airborne spores from locally prolific terrestrial algae.It was not until early 2006 that the colored rains of Kerala gained widespread attention when the popular media reported that Godfrey Louis and Santhosh Kumar of the Mahatma Gandhi University in Kottayam proposed a controversial hypothesis that the colored particles were extraterrestrial cells.Extraterrestrial hypothesis; In 2003 Godfrey Louis and Santhosh Kumar, physicists at the Mahatma Gandhi University in Kottayam, Kerala, posted an article entitled “Cometary panspermia explains the red rain of Kerala” in the on-line, non-peer reviewed arXiv web site. While the CESS report said there was no apparent relationship between the loud sound (possibly a sonic boom) and flash of light which preceded the red rain, to Louis and Kumar it was a key piece of evidence. They proposed that a meteor (from a comet containing the red particles) caused the sound and
flash and when it disintegrated over Kerala it released the red particles which slowly fell to the ground. However, they omitted an explanation on how debris from a meteor continued to fall in the same area over a period of two months while unaffected from winds.Their work indicated that the particles were of biological origin (consistent with the CESS report), however, they invoked the panspermia hypothesis to explain the presence of cells in a supposed fall of meteoric material. Additionally, using ethidium bromide they were unable to detect DNA or RNA in the particles. Two months later they posted another paper on the same web site entitled “New biology of red rain extremophiles prove cometary panspermia”in which they reported that “The microorganism isolated from the red rain of Kerala shows very extraordinary characteristics, like the ability to grow optimally at 300°C (572°F) and the capacity to metabolize a wide range of organic and inorganic materials.” These claims and data have yet to be verified and reported in any peer reviewed publication. In
2006 Louis and Kumar published a paper in Astrophysics and Space Science entitled “The red rain phenomenon of Kerala and its possible extraterrestrial origin” which reiterated their hypothesis that the red rain was biological matter from an extraterrestrial source but made no mention of their previous claims to having induced the cells to grow. One of their conclusions was that if the red rain particles are biological cells and are of cometary origin, then this phenomenon can be a case of cometary panspermia. On August 2008 Louis and Kumar again presented their case in an astrobiology conference. The abstract for paper states that “The red cells found in the red rain in Kerala, India are now considered as a possible case of extraterrestrial life form. These cells can undergo rapid replication even at an extreme high temperature of 300 deg C. They can also be cultured in diverse unconventional chemical substrates. The molecular composition of these cells is yet to be identified”. ~ GoodNews International
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^ SHOPPING ^Walking Keeps the Brain Young!
Plasticity of brain networks in a randomized intervention trial of exercise training in older adults. Attention, couch potatoes! Walking boosts brain connectivity, function. Moderate walking three times per week for a year increased brain connectivity and brain function in older adults, the researchers found. A group of “professional couch potatoes,” as one researcher described them, has proven that even moderate exercise – in this case walking at one’s own pace for 40 minutes three times a week – can enhance the connectivity of important brain circuits, combat declines in brain function associated with aging and increase performance on cognitive tasks. The study, in Frontiers in Aging Neuroscience, followed 65 adults, aged 59 to 80, who joined a walking group or stretching and toning group for a year. All of the participants were sedentary before the study, reporting less than two episodes of physical activity lasting 30 minutes or more in the previous six months. The researchers also measured brain activity in 32
younger (18- to 35-year-old) adults. Rather than focusing on specific brain structures, the study looked at activity in brain regions that function together as networks. “Almost nothing in the brain gets done by one area – it’s more of a circuit,” said University of Illinois psychology professor and Beckman Institute Director Art Kramer, who led the study with kinesiology and community health professor Edward McAuley and doctoral student Michelle Voss. “These networks can become more or less connected. In general, as we get older, they become less connected, so we were interested in the effects of fitness on connectivity of brain networks that show the most dysfunction with age.” Neuroscientists have identified several distinct brain circuits. Perhaps the most intriguing is the default mode network (DMN), which dominates brain activity when a person is least engaged with the outside world – either passively observing something or simply daydreaming. Previous studies found that a loss of coordination in the DMN is a common symptom of aging and in extreme cases can be a marker of disease, Voss said. “For example, people with Alzheimer’s disease tend to have less activity in the default mode network and they tend to have less connectivity,” she said. Low connectivity means that the different parts of the circuit are not operating in sync. Like poorly trained athletes on a rowing team, the brain regions that make up the circuit lack coordination and so do not function at optimal efficiency or speed, Voss said. In a healthy young brain, activity in the DMN quickly diminishes when a person engages in an activity that requires focus on the external environment. Older people, people with Alzheimer’s disease and those who are schizophrenic have more difficulty “down-regulating” the DMN so that other brain networks can come to the fore, Kramer said. A recent study by Kramer, Voss and their
colleagues found that older adults who are more fit tend to have better connectivity in specific regions of the DMN than their sedentary peers. Those with more connectivity in the DMN also tend to be better at planning, prioritizing, strategizing and multi-tasking. The new study used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to determine whether aerobic activity increased connectivity in the DMN or other brain networks. The researchers measured participants’ brain connectivity and performance on cognitive tasks at the beginning of the study, at six months and after a year of either walking or toning and stretching. At the end of the year, DMN connectivity was significantly improved in the brains of the older walkers, but not in the stretching and toning group, the researchers report. The walkers also had increased connectivity in parts of another brain circuit (the fronto-executive network, which aids in the performance of complex tasks) and they did significantly better on cognitive tests than their toning and stretching peers. Previous studies have found that aerobic exercise can enhance the function of specific brain structures, Kramer said. This study shows that even moderate aerobic exercise also improves the coordination of important brain networks. “The higher the connectivity, the better the performance on some of these cognitive tasks, especially the ones we call executive control tasks – things like planning, scheduling, dealing with ambiguity, working memory and multitasking,” Kramer said. These are the very skills that tend to decline with aging, he said. This study was supported by the National Institute on Aging at the National Institutes of Health. Editor’s note: To contact Art Kramer, e-mail a-kramer@illinois.edu. To reach Michelle, e-mail mvoss@illinois.edu. The paper, “Plasticity of Brain Networks in a Randomized Intervention Trial of Exercise Training in Older Adults,” is available online. Diana Yates, Life Sciences Editor. News from: illinois.edu
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^ SHOPPING ^Commentary: Where Can We Find Hopeful News?
This is the Way: Faithful Wounds or Cruel Blows
Cruel blows from enemies are only designed to inflict pain and suffering upon us. That sort of brutality and cruelty usually springs from hard-heartedness and weakness. The blows of a friend may seem cruel, but they lead to health and a better life. Knowing the difference lets us respond correctly. Pain can be positive.
Ancient brewers tapped Antibiotic Secrets
A chemical analysis of the bones of ancient Nubians shows that they were regularly consuming tetracycline, most likely in their beer. The finding is the strongest evidence yet that the art of making antibiotics, which officially dates to the discovery of penicillin in 1928, was common practice nearly 2,000 years ago. The research, led by Emory anthropologist George Armelagos and medicinal chemist Mark Nelson of Paratek Pharmaceuticals, Inc., is published in the American Journal of Physical Anthropology. “We tend to associate drugs that cure diseases with modern medicine,” Armelagos says. “But it’s becoming increasingly clear that this prehistoric population
was using empirical evidence to develop therapeutic agents. I have no doubt that they knew what they were doing.” Armelagos is a bioarcheologist and an expert on prehistoric and ancient diets. In 1980, he discovered what appeared to be traces of tetracycline in human bones from Nubia dated between A.D. 350 and 550, populations that left no written record. The ancient Nubian kingdom was located in present-day Sudan, south of ancient Egypt. Armelagos and his fellow researchers later tied the source of the antibiotic to the Nubian beer. The grain used to make the fermented gruel contained the soil bacteria streptomyces, which produces tetracycline. A key question was whether only occasional batches of the ancient beer contained tetracycline, which would indicate accidental contamination with the bacteria. Nelson, a leading expert in tetracycline and other antibiotics, became interested in the project after hearing Armelagos speak at a conference. “I told him to send me some mummy bones, because I had the tools and the expertise to extract the tetracycline,” Nelson says. “It’s a nasty and dangerous process. I had to dissolve the bones in hydrogen fluoride, the most dangerous acid on the planet.” The results stunned Nelson. “The bones of these ancient people were saturated with tetracycline, showing that they had been taking it for a long time,” he says. “I’m convinced that they had the science of fermentation
under control and were purposely producing the drug.” (The yellow film in the flask above shows tetracycline residue from dissolved bones.) Even the tibia and skull belonging to a 4-year-old were full of tetracycline, suggesting that they were giving high doses to the child to try and cure him of illness, Nelson says. The first of the modern day tetracyclines was discovered in 1948. It was given the name auereomycin, after the Latin word “aerous,” which means containing gold. “Streptomyces produce a golden colony of bacteria, and if it was floating on a batch of beer, it must have look pretty impressive to ancient people who revered gold,” Nelson theorizes. The ancient Egyptians and Jordanians used beer to treat gum disease and other ailments, Armelagos says, adding that the complex art of fermenting antibiotics was probably widespread in ancient times, and handed down through generations. The chemical confirmation of tetracycline in ancient bones is not the end of the story for Armelagos. He remains enthused after more than three decades on the project. “This opens up a whole new area of research,” he says. “Now we’re going to compare the amount of tetracycline in the bones, and bone formation over time, to determine the dosage that the ancient Nubians were
getting.” - Emory University, a top 20 research university located in Atlanta, Georgia, is an inquiry-driven, ethically engaged and diverse community whose members work collaboratively for positive transformation in the world through courageous leadership in teaching, research, scholarship, health care and social action. The university is recognized internationally for its outstanding liberal arts college, superb professional schools and one of the Southeast’s leading health care systems. This is a time of dynamic change on campus, where the future is being guided by an ambitious strategic plan, Where Courageous Inquiry Leads. Emory maintains an uncommon balance for an institution of its standing: it generates more research funding than any other Georgia university, while maintaining its traditional emphasis on teaching. The university is enriched by the legacy and energy of Atlanta, and by collaboration among its schools, units and centers, as well as with affiliated institutions. News from: Emory University emory.edu
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^ SHOPPING ^A World Held Captive: Soon to Be Set Free!
Coming Soon: The Magnificent Millennium
Has America Lost Its Way?
The "American Century": What Was Really Behind It?
Could Jesus Christ Return Tomorrow?
Ezekiel's Vision of the Valley of Dry Bones: What Does It Mean?
Mauritania: L’aviazione militare sposa la causa verde e sparge semi
L’aviazione militare mauritana è stata impegnata oggi in un’insolita operazione. Per oltre cinque ore, gli aerei dell’esercito hanno sorvolato vaste aree del Paese, non per monitorare i movimenti di qualche banda criminale, bensì per spargere tonnellate di sementi. Questo nel quadro degli sforzi intrapresi dalle autorità di Nouakchott per fermare il deserto che avanza inesorabilmente, come riferisce l’agenzia di stampa locale indipendente ‘Al-Akhbar’. Questa operazione di ‘semina aerea’, che si svolge in questa stagione già da vari anni, ha interessato una superficie di ben 9.240 chilometri quadrati e ha privilegiato quelle aree della Mauritania che è più difficile raggiungere via terra, in particolare nelle regioni di Adrar, Trarza, Inchiri e la zona a nord della capitale Nouakchott. Quanto alle specie vegetali seminate, si tratta soprattutto di alberi selezionati per la loro capacità di adattamento al clima delle aree interessate dal progetto, come ha spiegato il ministro con delega all’Ambiente e allo Sviluppo sostenibile, Ba Hassinou Hamadi. Alcune settimane fa, le autorità mauritane avevano annunciato l’intenzione di piantare entro la fine dell’anno 200mila alberi per creare una ‘cintura verde’ attorno alla capitale, stretta tra l’oceano da un lato e il deserto dall’altro. Un programma questo che si inscrive nel quadro del più ampio progetto della ‘Grande Muraglia Verde’, inaugurato nel 2005 dall’Unione africana allo scopo di creare una barriera arborea lunga 7.000 chilometri e larga 15, che si estenderà dal Senegal a Gibuti. Fonte: AFRICA rivista dei Padri Bianchi Missionari
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^ SHOPPING ^“Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have” – Anon
THE HAPPINESS EQUATION: THE SURPRISING ECONOMICS OF OUR MOST VALUABLE ASSET. Why is marriage worth £200,000 a year? Why will having children make you unhappy? Why does happiness from winning the lottery take two years to arrive? Why does time heal the pain of divorce or the death of a loved one – but not unemployment? Everybody wants to be happy. But how much happiness – precisely – will each life choice bring?
Should I get married? Am I really going to feel happy about the career that I picked? How can I decide not only which choice is better for us, but how much it’s better for us? The results of new, unique research, The Happiness Equation brings to a general readership for the first time the new science of happiness economics. It describes how we can measure emotional reactions to different life experiences and present them in ways we can relate to. How, for instance, monetary vales can be put on things that can’t be bought or sold in the market – such as marriage, friendship, even death – so that we can objectively put them in order of preference. It also explains why some things matter more to our happiness than others (like why seeing friends is worth more than a Ferrari), while others are worth almost nothing (like sunny weather). Nick Powdthavee – whose work on happiness has been discussed on both the Undercover Economist and Freakonomics blogs – bring cutting-edge research on how we value happiness to a general audience, with a style that wears its learning lightly and is a joy to read. Dr. Nattavudh Powdthavee. Lecturer. Department of Economics & Related Studies,University of York. News from: powdthavee.co.uk
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^ SHOPPING ^Bible FAQ: Do Leviticus 19:19 and Deuteronomy 22:11 condemn wearing mixed fabrics?
Kamasutra in versione audiolibro & Tactile mind, il libro erotico per i non vedenti
KAMASUTRA: L’ANTICA GUIDA AL SESSO ORA ANCHE IN VERSIONE AUDIOLIBRO. A breve un’edizione audio anche in italiano? Un editore inglese ha deciso di pubblicare un testo vecchio 1600 anni in formato audiolibro, ed è pure convinto che lo acquisteranno in migliaia. Un folle? Non proprio, se si considera che l’antico testo in questione è il Kamasutra, da molti considerata la guida al sesso per eccellenza. L’editore in questione si chiama Simon Petherick e, attraverso la sua casa editrice, la Beautiful Books, si appresta a mettere in catalogo una versione audiolibro del Kamasutra al prezzo di 8,99 sterline (poco meno di 13 euro). In più, per levare ogni dubbio sull’utilizzo che si dovrà fare di questo file audio, ha scelto di citare Sting, auto-proclamatosi divinità del sesso tantrico: “Dove sarebbe Sting ora, senza il Kamasutra?” si legge in calce alla pagina web dell’audiolibro. Del resto sono in molti a considerare il Kamasutra nient’altro che una antichissima guida al sesso, in 64 comode (si fa per dire) posizioni. In realtà è un’opera letteraria e
filosofica di tutto rispetto, da alcuni definita “la più importante opera letteraria sull’amore scritta in Sanscrito”. Il nome Ka-ma Su-tra (questa la dicitura corretta) significa, letteralmente “aforismi sull’amore”, e nelle intenzioni del suo autore, Vatsyayana, doveva essere una sorta di guida al rapporto ‘corretto’ tra uomini e donne. Non solo posizioni funamboliche, dunque, ma riflessioni su tutte quelle situazioni che mettono in relazione i due sessi. Non a caso, dei 36 capitoli del Kamasutra, solo 10 sono dedicati all’unione sessuale, gli altri 26 trattano invece di seduzione, filosofia dell’amore, comportamenti da tenere in presenza di mogli e cortigiane. Nonostante ciò, è chiaro che l’audiolibro verrà utilizzato prevalentemente a scopo “pratico”, e molti dei suoi acquirenti concentreranno l’attenzione proprio su quei 10 capitoli. Ad ammetterlo è lo stesso Simon Petherick: “Le possibilità sono infinite. Alcuni potrebbero considerare l’utilizzo dell’audiolibro con un manuale per migliorare passo per passo la prestazione in camera da letto, questo senza bisogno di fermarsi in continuazione per sfogliare il libro. Basterà premere play e seguire le indicazioni.” A dare voce alle parole millenarie della bibbia del sesso sarà Tanya Franks, attrice inglese che interpreta il ruolo di Rainie Cross nel celebre telefilm londinese Eastenders. Ancora non è prevista un’edizione audio italiana, ma si accettano previsioni sulla celebre voce a cui verrà affidato il compito di snocciolare le millenarie regole dell’amore. – TACTILE MIND: IL LIBRO EROTICO PER NON VEDENTI. La denuncia: “i ciechi sono emarginati in una cultura satura di immagini sessuali” In una società basata sull’immagine i non vedenti sono
discriminati anche nel mondo dell’erotismo. A loro sono negate, o si potrebbe dire risparmiate, le visioni di tutte quelle discinte ragazze che invadono, con le loro prorompenti bellezze, muri, vicoli e palazzi… È proprio da qui che nasce l’idea di Tactile Mind, il primo libro erotico per non vedenti. Diciassette immagini in rilievo, in 2D, che mostrano altrettanti corpi nudi di uomini e donne dai volti coperti o a mezzobusto: è questo il contenuto di Tactile Mind, disegnato da Lisa Murphy, fotografa canadese con un attestato in grafica tattile ottenuto al Canadian National Institute for the Blind, e destinato a riempiere un tassello mancante nell’editoria erotica: quello rivolto al pubblico dei non vedenti. In passato solo la storica rivista Playboy, tra gli anni ’70 e ’90, aveva fatto qualcosa di simile mandando in edicola alcune riviste per ciechi scritte in linguaggio Braille. Ma si trattava solo di testo: fino ad ora, a nessuno era certo venuto in mente di disegnare anche le immagini in rilievo. “Non esistono libri di immagini di nudo tattili per adulti, nonostante il mondo sia pieno di immagini erotiche – spiega la Murphy sul suo sito e aggiunge – È un’anomalia che nell’epoca delle immagini pornografiche non si era ancora pensato al mercato dei non vedenti.” La realizzazione, ha raccontato la Murpy al Daily Telegraph, è stata tutt’altro che semplice. Lisa ha raccolto alcuni amici, li ha fotografati e dopo aver ingrandito le foto, ha iniziato a elaborare le stesse con la creta: un processo da 40-50 ore ad immagine. Tactile Mind sarà in vendita per ora oltre Oceano e in rete a 225 dollari (165 euro circa). fonte: disabili.com
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^ SHOPPING ^This is the Way: Silence Is Golden
There are some people who are very nervous when silence appears. They feel a need to fill the gaps. Obviously the silence that is golden is not the kind that makes everyone uncomfortable, but rightly used, it has great value. The Bible tells us to be slow to speak and quick to hear (James 1:19). It’s important for us all to remember that sometimes the best thing to say is nothing.
