on 27-Nov-2020 (Fri)

gather up her courage

A tropical cyclone is a storm system characterized by a low-pressure center and numerous thunderstorms that produce strong winds and flooding rain. A tropical cyclone feeds on heat released when moist air rises, resulting in condensation of water vapour contained in the moist air. They are fueled by a different heat mechanism than other cyclonic windstorms such as nor'easters, European windstorms, and polar lows, leading to their classification as "warm core" storm systems.

counterclockwise rotation in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise rotation in the Southern Hemisphere. Depending on their location and strength, tropical cyclones are referred to by other names, such as hurricane, typhoon, tropical storm, cyclonic storm, tropical depression, or simply as a cyclone.

they are also able to produce high waves and a damaging storm surge.^[

They develop over large bodies of warm water,^[42] and hence lose their strength if they move over land.^[43] This is the reason coastal regions can receive significant damage from a tropical cyclone, while inland regions are relatively safe from strong winds.

They also carry heat and energy away from the tropics and transport it toward temperate latitudes, which makes them an important part of the global atmospheric circulation mechanism. As a result, tropical cyclones help to maintain equilibrium in the Earth's troposphere.

Many tropical cyclones develop when the atmospheric conditions around a weak disturbance in the atmosphere are favorable. Others form when other types of cyclones acquire tropical characteristics. Tropical systems are then moved by steering winds in the troposphere; if the conditions remain favorable, the tropical disturbance intensifies, and can even develop an eye.

A tropical cyclone can become extratropical as it moves toward higher latitudes if its energy source changes from heat released by condensation to differences in temperature between air masses.

A polar, sub-polar, or Arctic cyclone (also known as a polar vortex)^[46] is a vast area of low pressure that strengthens in the winter and weakens in the summer.

A polar cyclone is a low-pressure weather system, usually spanning 1,000 kilometres (620 mi) to 2,000 kilometres (1,200 mi), in which the air circulates in a counterclockwise direction in the northern hemisphere, and a clockwise direction in the southern hemisphere.

When the polar vortex is strong, its effect can be felt at the surface as a westerly wind (toward the east). When the polar cyclone is weak, significant cold outbreaks occur.^[49]

Under specific circumstances, upper level cold lows can break off from the base of the Tropical Upper Tropospheric Trough (TUTT), which is located mid-ocean in the Northern Hemisphere during the summer months. These upper tropospheric cyclonic vortices, also known as TUTT cells or TUTT lows, usually move slowly from east-northeast to west-southwest, and their bases generally do not extend below 20,000 feet (6,100 m) in altitude.

A tornado is a violently rotating column of air that is in contact with both the surface of the earth and a cumulonimbus cloud or, in rare cases, the base of a cumulus cloud. Also referred to as twisters, a colloquial term in America, or cyclones, although the word cyclone is used in meteorology, in a wider sense, to name any closed low-pressure circulation.

A subtropical cyclone is a weather system that has some characteristics of a tropical cyclone and some characteristics of an extratropical cyclone. They can form between the equator and the 50th parallel.

They have broad wind patterns with maximum sustained winds located farther from the center than typical tropical cyclones, and exist in areas of weak to moderate temperature gradient.

Although subtropical storms rarely have hurricane-force winds, they may become tropical in nature as their cores warm.

Since they form from extratropical cyclones, which have colder temperatures aloft than normally found in the tropics, the sea surface temperatures required is around 23 degrees Celsius (73 °F) for their formation, which is three degrees Celsius (5 °F) lower than for tropical cyclones.

A polar low is a small-scale, short-lived atmospheric low-pressure system (depression) that is found over the ocean areas poleward of the main polar front in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.

Polar lows dissipate rapidly when they make landfall. Antarctic systems tend to be weaker than their northern counterparts since the air-sea temperature differences around the continent are generally smaller ^{[ citation needed ]}. However, vigorous polar lows can be found over the Southern Ocean.

Because of the Coriolis effect, the wind flow around a large cyclone is counterclockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and clockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.

An anticyclone (that is, opposite to a cyclone) is a weather phenomenon defined as a large-scale circulation of winds around a central region of high atmospheric pressure, clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and counterclockwise in the Southern Hemisphere.^[

Anticyclones aloft can form within warm core lows such as tropical cyclones, due to descending cool air from the backside of upper troughs such as polar highs, or from large scale sinking such as the subtropical ridge.

Extratropical cyclones, sometimes called mid-latitude cyclones or wave cyclones, are low-pressure areas which, along with the anticyclones of high-pressure areas, drive the weather over much of the Earth. Extratropical cyclones are capable of producing anything from cloudiness and mild showers to heavy gales, thunderstorms, blizzards, and tornadoes.

Extratropical cyclones form anywhere within the extratropical regions of the Earth (usually between 30° and 60° latitude from the equator), either through cyclogenesis or extratropical transition

Category 5 is the highest category of the Saffir–Simpson scale. These storms cause complete roof failure on many residences and industrial buildings, and some complete building failures with small utility buildings blown over or away.

Category 4 hurricanes tend to produce more extensive curtainwall failures, with some complete structural failure on small residences. Heavy, irreparable damage and near-complete destruction of gas station canopies and other wide span overhang type structures are common.

Tropical cyclones of Category 3 and higher are described as major hurricanes in the Atlantic or Eastern Pacific basins. These storms can cause some structural damage to small residences and utility buildings, particularly those of wood frame or manufactured materials with minor curtain wall failures.

Category 1 storms usually cause no significant structural damage to most well-constructed permanent structures; however, they can topple unanchored mobile homes, as well as uproot or snap weak trees.

The Swachh Bharat Mission (SBM), which aims to make India open defecation free (ODF) by October 2019, has now left many people in Haryana reeling under debt.

Under the programme, people can avail reimbursement (Rs 12,000) for constructing toilets in their homes.

Even ASHA workers came outside our homes and sat on a dharna and said no one from here will go to the fields.

The 1995 Basel Ban Amendment, a global waste dumping prohibition, has become an international law after Croatia ratified it on September 6, 2019.

Croatia became the 97^th country to ratify the ban, which was adopted by the parties to the Basel Convention in 1995, to protect human health and the environment against the adverse effects of hazardous wastes, according to Basel Action Network (BAN).

BAN is a Unites States-based charity organisation and is one among the organisations and countries, which created the Basel Ban Amendment — hailed as a landmark agreement for global environmental justice.

The Ban Amendment prohibits all export of hazardous wastes, including electronic wastes and obsolete ships from 29 wealthiest countries of the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) to non-OECD countries.

However, countries like the US, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, South Korea, Russia, India, Brazil, and Mexico are yet to ratify the ban.

Non-adherence to international waste trade rules has allowed unscrupulous US ‘recyclers’ to export many hundreds of containers of hazardous electronic waste each week to developing countries for so-called recycling, according to BAN. Nearly, 40 per cent of e-waste delivered to US recyclers is exported to Asian and African countries.

“With the Ban Amendment now a legal certainty, we hope the countries that have to date refused to ratify will do so and close the sad chapter of toxic colonialism done in the name of recycling.”

The plant, which was developed based on a technology by IIP researchers, can convert one tonne of plastic waste into 800 litres of diesel every day.

The process is also environmentally friendly. IIP and GAIL have planned to roll out the technology nation-wide after six months of operation of the pilot plant.

Vardhan applauded scientists involved in developing the technology and noted that in 2018, he had witnessed the landing of a commercial flight with bio-jet fuel developed by IIP researchers. Of the two engines of the aircraft, one had the bio-jet fuel to an extent of 25 per cent.

Developed with financial support from Petroleum Conservation Research Association, the burner provides better safety by eliminating flame lift and flash back and controlled loss of unburnt fuel to the environment.

South Africa’s Department of Environmental Affairs (DEA) on August 23, 2019, imposed a ban on all forms of liquid waste from being dumped at landfill sites, six years after it was first announced.

According to previous regulations, hazardous liquid waste with calorific values of more than 20 megajoules per kilogram (MJ/kg) such as refinery waste, chemical processed paint waste, hydrocarbon contaminated liquids, sludges and chemical solvents were barred from being disposed in landfills.

The current ban, however, includes reactive wastes, recyclable waste oils, whole waste tyres, lamps, lead acid batteries, besides any waste with a calorific value of more than 20 MJ/kg.

The Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur (IIT KGP) will steer Saraswati 2.0 — a Rs 15-crore project funded by the European Union and the Government of India’s departments of Science and Technology and Biotechnology — to develop affordable technologies for treatment of wastewater and provide solutions for its use in both rural and urban India.

Saraswati 2.0, which has been selected under the EU-India Joint Call on Research and Innovation for Water, follows the Saraswati project of 2012-17. The EU will invest up to Rs 323 crore on various projects for four years.

For the project, IIT KGP would collaborate with lead European partner BOKU (University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna). The other Indian partners in the project are IIT Madras, IIT Bhubaneswar, IIT Roorkee, National Institute of Industrial Engineering Mumbai, Malaviya National Institute of Technology Jaipur, TERI School of Advanced Studies.

the Centre also launched a new unified Jal Shakti ministry by merging the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation and Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation.

Scientists from the Indian Institute of Technology-Guwahati (IIT-G) have developed a membrane that promises to help remove oil and dyes simultaneously from industrial water.

India set a deadline for the 12^th time to take water at the household-level. In the past the country has failed miserably to keep this promise. Modi’s new target has raised hopes.

The grand promise comes on the eve of India becoming open-defecation free by October 2019

By April 1, 2018, however, only 20 per cent of rural households could be connected to piped water supply, the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation record showed.

This promise came with enhanced water entitlement for each household. Under Har Ghar Jal, the ministry increased drinking water supply in rural areas to 55 litres per capita per day (lpcd). “But, less than 50 per cent of households receive this amount. The old supply rate was 40 lpcd and almost 80 per cent of households get it,”

According to the CAG report, which analysed the state of rural water supply between 2012 and 2017

While it is not known from where the piped water supply schemes would draw water, currently India majorly depends on groundwater for all water uses.

Dipankar Saha, a former member of the Central Ground water Board, terms India as the world’s largest extractor of groundwater.

nearly 70 per cent of all of the country’s fresh water sources are contaminated. The same agency said 600 million Indians are under water stress due to these reasons.

In the last 25 years when reaching safe drinking water has been a flagship national goal (not to forget the target under the United Nations-mandated Sustainable Development Goals committed for 2030), Indian habitations continue to be haunted by lack of safe drinking water.

They found that the membrane was able to remove around 98 per cent of oil from the water. The membrane’s properties remained unaffected by bending, creasing, twisting, rolling, rubbing with sand paper and treatment with water with extreme salinity. Further, it was found that it can be used for up to ten times.

Scientists tested the membrane on a water sample containing two dyes-methylene blue and crystal violet. Due to their positive charge, the dyes were attracted to and adsorbed on the negatively charged membrane, leaving behind clean water. They then tried it on a sample containing a mix of water and oil.

Dyes are led into water bodies by effluents from textile, printing and cosmetic industries whereas oil enters water due to spillages during oil refinery operations. A single solution to remove both these pollutants was difficult to find since while dyes dissolve in water, oil doesn’t.

Scientists tested the membrane on a water sample containing two dyes-methylene blue and crystal violet. Due to their positive charge, the dyes were attracted to and adsorbed on the negatively charged membrane, leaving behind clean water. They then tried it on a sample containing a mix of water and oil.

They found that the membrane was able to remove around 98 per cent of oil from the water. The membrane’s properties remained unaffected by bending, creasing, twisting, rolling, rubbing with sand paper and treatment with water with extreme salinity. Further, it was found that it can be used for up to ten times.

developing a membrane using graphene oxide, cotton fibre and dopamine, an organic chemical, which is more known for its functions as a hormone and a neurotransmitter in human body.

Swachh Bharat Mission has been one of the key missions of Narendra Modi-led government since its launch in 2014. It aims to make India Open defecation free by October 2019

Nearly 93.1 per cent of rural Indian households have access to toilets and 96.5 per cent of these toilets are in constant usage, according to the findings of second edition of NARSS in 2018-19.

The NARSS is a third-party survey that is conducted by the Independent Verification Agency (IVA) under the World Bank support project.

investing funds for behaviour change through IEC (Information, Education and Communication) ­exercise, training masons to promote retrofitting of toilets and panchayat pradhans in what needs to be done to sustain ODF status.

government’s IEC exercise in helping to bring behavioural change among sustained toilet use.

While IEC collects information the use of toilets, BCC talks about underlying factors of why they are not using the toilets and tries to address them through behavioural science.

“BCC and IEC would both address barriers, but the difference is that behaviour change approach focuses on how to put the message across and make environment more conducive for people to access and use toilets,” Saith said.

The carbon tax, launched on June 1, 2019, aims to reduce 34 per cent carbon emissions by 2020 and 42 per cent emissions by 2025.

South Africa, has exceeded the UK and France in terms of pollution and is soon approaching a situation of running out of landfill space; the inevitable “day full” is on our doorstep, Lourens said.

“The initial marginal carbon tax rate will be South African Rand (R)120 per tonne of CO2e (carbon dioxide equivalent). With the below thresholds in mind, the effective tax rate is much lower and ranges between R6 and R48 per tonne,” Lourens said, adding the bill will be implemented in stages.

To help businesses transition and adopt low carbon alternatives, the country has come up with various tax-free allowances including an additional allowance of up to 10 per cent for process emissions, and a carbon offsets allowance of 5 to 10 per cent per cent, depending on sector.

South Africa's recently introduced carbon tax will ensure zero waste to landfill, reduce greenhouse gas emissions as well boost investments for low carbon alternatives

Artificial-diamond manufacturers from Anhui province allegedly dumped waste water and hazardous solid waste.

air pollution in China caused an average of 1.1 million premature deaths each year and costs its economy $38 billion.

After the gas is produced, some solid matter is left behind in the dome, which takes about 20-25 years to get filled, after which the decomposed waste matter can be scooped out and used as manure in the fields. It is better than having a twin pit system or leach pit, toilet structure,” Khengar added.

A toilet-linked biogas (TLBG) system eliminates the task of frequent emptying of faecal sludge from septic tanks or twin pits and dumping it in drains or landfill sites.

Under it, a toilet is connected to a biogas digester using a PVC pipe. Faecal slurry flows into the digester with gravity, following which, cattle dung, water, and kitchen waste is regularly added to it to produce biogas, which is then used by families as cooking fuel or for other purposes like heating water.

The capacity of these plants is 2 cubic metre (m3) per tonne for a family of five to seven people or less and total gas production per day per plant is 1.5 cubic metre. A 2 m3 (production capacity per day) biogas plant will produce total 60 m3 biogas in a month. That is equivalent to 26 kilogram of LPG, 37 litre of kerosene, 88 kg of charcoal, or 210 kg of firewood.

Cocos Keeling Islands, a remote archipelago in the Indian Ocean.

every year, over eight million tonnes of plastic ends up in the oceans, accounting for up to 80 per cent of all litter in the oceans. Studies have shown that this is estimated to rise by 2025, wreaking havoc on marine ecosystems and tourism.

Of the 414 million pieces of plastic pollutants, an estimated 384 million waste was found buried up to 10 centimetres under the surface. About 60 per cent of this comprised of micro-debris that were 2–5 millimetre in size, and could pose significant challenges to wildlife and biodiversity.

A committee appointed by the National Green Tribunal (NGT) identified 12 sites contaminated from illegal dumping of coal tar-bearing gasifier wastewater in Gujarat's Morbi.

The NGT asked a committee including representatives of the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) , GPCB and National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI) to assess the damage, costs associated with it and suggest a resoration plan.

The Patna Smart City Private Limited will develop a command control centre and an integrated solid waste management plant, besides installing garbage bins with radio frequency identification microchips like the ones already in use in two Spanish cities — Barcelona and Madrid.

the dumping site should be at least 200 metres away from a residential area but it is closer than that. The site is also very close to the Hindon river floodplains, which means if the river floods it will wash the waste into the nearby areas.

site in sector 123 is not a waste dumping site but a Sanitary Land Fill (SLF) site

as per the E-Waste Management Rules, which were notified in October 2016, manufacturers of electric and electronic equipments must facilitate their collection and return it to authorised dismantlers or recyclers. However, even one and a half years after the law was passed

The Global E-waste Monitor 2017, published by the United Nations University

India generates about 2 million tonnes of e-waste annually and ranks fifth among e-waste producing countries, after the US, China, Japan and Germany.

The 2016 law tasks the state pollution control boards (SPCBs) to make the estimates, but no SPCB has done that as yet.

there is no government data on e-waste generated in the country.

The producers must obtain an Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) authorisation from CPCB which will ensure that they channelise the e-waste to the recycler/dismantler and meet their annual collection targets. The producers have to meet targets, which should be 20 per cent of the waste generated by their sales.

The law states that CPCB and SPCBs have to conduct random checks on those who have been granted authorisations,

The law also says that the responsibility of producers is not confined to waste collection, but also to ensure that the waste reaches the authorised recycler/dismantler. But the annual returns filed by the producers are silent on this. Since there is no monitoring system, there is no guarantee that the waste collected by producers does not go to unauthorised recyclers.

about 95 per cent of India’s e-waste is recycled in the informal sector and in a crude manner.

A 2015 report by the United Nations Environment Programme says that China, India Malaysia and Pakistan are the main destinations for large-scale shipments of hazardous wastes, including e-waste, in Asia.

according to the Hazardous and Other Wastes (Management and Trans-boundary) Rules, 2016, importing e-waste for disposal is banned in India.

Even if the law allows the import of second-hand products for refurbishing, many terms and conditions are attached. They have to be re-exported to the country of origin in 1-3 years.

even the authorised recyclers are outsourcing their e-waste to the informal sector.

over 95 per cent of e-waste recycling is done by the informal sector.

three “mountains of garbage” (landfill sites) at Okhla, Bhalswa and Ghazipur in the national capital.

The Solid Waste Management Rules came into force on or about April 8, 2016. We are two years down the line, but we are shocked to know that more than two-third of the States/UTs in the country have not yet complied with the basic requirement of the Solid Waste Management Rules, 2016,” the bench said.

The bench expressed displeasure when it was informed that around 13 states and several union territories have not yet formulated their policy for solid waste management despite the court order.

India generates 62 million tonnes of waste every year, of which only 20 per cent is processed.

The LG, in his reply to the SC, said the garbage disposal in the city was the job of the civic body and he was in charge of monitoring it. But, the response from the LG was not taken well by the apex court.

They seem less well developed for more abstract concepts, and such abstractions are often where the deepest understanding lies. In that sense, they may even distract from understanding. That said, it's possible I simply need to figure out better ways of using these ideas, much as I needed to figure out Anki. In particular, it may be worth further investigating some of the techniques used by practitioners to form rich associations. As Foer says, quoting a memory expert, there is great value in learning to “think in more memorable ways”

Ed then explained to me his procedure for making a name memorable, which he had used in the competition to memorize the first and last names associated with ninety-nine different photographic head shots in the names-and-faces event. It was a technique he promised I could use to remember people's names at parties and meetings. “The trick is actually deceptively simple,” he said. “It is always to associate the sound of a person's name with something you can clearly imagine. It's all about creating a vivid image in your mind that anchors your visual memory of the person's face to a visual memory connected to the person's name. When you need to reach back and remember the person's name at some later date, the image you created will simply pop back into your mind… So, hmm, you said your name was Josh Foer, eh?” He raised an eyebrow and gave his chin a melodramatic stroke. “Well, I'd imagine you joshing me where we first met, outside the competition hall, and I'd imagine myself breaking into four pieces in response. Four/Foer, get it? That little image is more entertaining—to me, at least—than your mere name, and should stick nicely in the mind.”

I know many people who try Anki out, and then go down a rabbit hole learning as many features as possible so they can use it “efficiently”. Usually, they're chasing 1% improvements. Often, those people ultimately give up Anki as “too difficult”, which is often a synonym for “I got nervous I wasn't using it perfectly”. This is a pity. As discussed earlier, Anki offers something like a 20-fold improvement over (say) ordinary flashcards. And so they're giving up a 2,000% improvement because they were worried they were missing a few final 5%, 1% and (in many cases) 0.1% improvements. This kind of rabbit hole seems to be especially attractive to programmers.

Procedural versus declarative memory: There's a big difference between remembering a fact and mastering a process. For instance, while you might remember a Unix command when cued by an Anki question, that doesn't mean you'll recognize an opportunity to use the command in the context of the command line, and be comfortable typing it out. And it's still another thing to find novel, creative ways of combining the commands you know, in order to solve challenging problems. Put another way: to really internalize a process, it's not enough just to review Anki cards. You need to carry out the process, in context. And you need to solve real problems with it. With that said, I've found the transfer process relatively easy. In the case of the command line, I use it often enough that I have plenty of opportunities to make real use of my Ankified knowledge of the command line. Over time, that declarative knowledge is becoming procedural knowledge I routinely use in context. That said, it'd be good to better understand when the transfer works and when it doesn't. Even better would be a memory system that integrates into my actual working environment. For instance, it could query me on Unix commands, while placing me at an actual command line. Or perhaps it would ask me to solve higher-level problems, while at the command line. I've tried one experiment in this vein: miming the action of typing commands while I review my Anki cards. But my subjective impression was that it doesn't work so well, and it was also quite annoying to do. So I stopped.

Getting past “names don't matter”: I'm a theoretical physicist by training. There is a famous story in physics, told by Richard Feynman, dismissing the value of knowing the names of things. As a child, Feynman was out playing in a field with a know-it-all kid. Here's what happened, in Feynman's telling*: One kid says to me, “See that bird? What kind of bird is that?” I said, “I haven't the slightest idea what kind of a bird it is.” He says, “It'a brown-throated thrush. Your father doesn't teach you anything!” But it was the opposite. He [Feynman's father] had already taught me: “See that bird?” he says. “It's a Spencer's warbler.” (I knew he didn't know the real name.) “Well, in Italian, it's a Chutto Lapittida. In Portuguese, it's a Bom da Peida… You can know the name of that bird in all the languages of the world, but when you're finished, you'll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird! You'll only know about humans in different places, and what they call the bird. So let's look at the bird and see what it's doing — that's what counts.” (I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.) Feynman (or his father) goes on to a thoughtful discussion of real knowledge: observing behavior, understanding the reasons for it, and so on. It's a good story. But it goes too far: names do matter. Maybe not as much as the know-it-all kid thought, and they're not usually a deep kind of knowledge. But they're the foundation that allows you to build up a network of knowledge. This trope that names don't matter was repeatedly drilled into me during my scientific training. When I began using Anki, at first I felt somewhat silly putting questions about names for things into the system. But now I do it enthusiastically, knowing that it's an early step along the way to understanding. Anki is useful for names of all kinds of things, but I find it particularly helpful for non-verbal things. For instance, I put in questions about artworks, like: “What does the artist Emily Hare's painting Howl look like?” Answer: I put that question in for two reasons. The main reason is that I like to remember the experience of the painting from time to time. And the other is to put a name to the painting*. If I wanted to think more analytically about the painting – say, about the clever use of color gradients – I could add more detailed questions. But I'm pretty happy just committing the experience of the image to memory.

What do you do when you get behind? Anki becomes challenging when you get behind with cards. If you skip a day or two – or fifty – the cards begin to back up. It's intimidating to come back to find you have 500 cards to review in a day. Even worse, if you fall out of the Anki habit, you can get a very long way behind. I largely stopped using Anki for a 7-month period, and came back to thousands of backlogged cards. Fortunately, it wasn't that hard to catch up. I set myself gradually increasing quotas (100, 150, 200, 250, and eventually 300) of cards per day, and worked through those quotas each day for several weeks until I'd caught up. While this wasn't too difficult, it was somewhat demoralizing and discouraging. It'd be better if Anki had a “catch up” feature that would spread the excess cards over the next few weeks in your schedule. But it doesn't. In any case, this is a gotcha, but it's not too difficult to address.

What you Ankify is not a trivial choice: Ankify things that serve your long-term goals. In some measure we become what we remember, so we must be careful what we remember*. This is always true, but Anki makes it especially true. With all that said, one fun pattern is to go back to my old, pre-Anki notes on books, and to Ankify them. This can often be done quickly, and gives me a greater return on the time I've invested in now mostly-forgotten books*

Something I haven't yet figured out is how to integrate Anki with note taking for my creative projects. I can't replace note taking with Anki – it's too slow, and for many things a poor use of my long-term memory. On the other hand, there are many benefits to using Anki for important items – fluid access to memory is at the foundation of so much creative thought. In practice, I find myself instinctively and unsystematically doing some things as notes, others as Anki questions, and still other things as both. Overall, it works okay, but my sense is that it could be a lot better if I applied more systematic thought and experimentation. Part of the problem is that I don't have a very good system for note taking, period! If I worked more on that, I suspect the whole thing would get a lot better. Still, it works okay.

Avoid the yes/no pattern: One bad habit I sometimes slide into is having lots of Anki questions with yes/no answers. For instance, here's a not-very-good question I added when learning about graphical models in machine learning: Is computing the partition function intractable for most graphical models? The answer is “yes”. That's fine, as far as it goes. But it'd help my understanding to elaborate the ideas in the question. Can I add a question about for which graphical models the partition function is tractable? Can I give an example of a graphical model for which the partition function is intractable? What does it mean for computing the partition function to be intractable anyway? Yes/no questions should, at the least, be considered as good candidates for question refactoring*

But for creative work and for problem- solving there is something special about having an internalized understanding. It enables speed in associative thought, an ability to rapidly try out many combinations of ideas, and to intuit patterns, in ways not possible if you need to keep laboriously looking up information.

Fluency matters in thinking. Alan Kay and Adele Goldberg have proposed* the thought experiment of a flute in which there is “a one-second delay between blowing a note and hearing it!” As they observe, this is “absurd”. In a similar way, certain types of thoughts are much easier to have when all the relevant kinds of understanding are held in mind. And for that, Anki is invaluable.

f personal memory systems are so great, why aren't they more widely used? This question is analogous to the old joke about two economists who are walking along when one of them spots a $20 bill. They say: “Look! There's $20 on the ground!” The other replies: “Impossible! If it were really there, someone would have picked it up already.” The analogy is only partial. In fact, Anki seems like a continual supply of $20 bills lying on the ground. And it's reasonable to ask why it's not more widely used. One of the most cited papers in the relevant research literature* is a discussion of why these ideas aren't more widely used in education. Although written in 1988, many of the observations in the paper remain true today. My own personal suspicion is that there are three main factors: In experimental research on memory, people consistently underestimate the gains that come from distributing their study in a manner similar to Anki. Instead, they prefer last-minute cramming, and believe it produces better results, though many studies show it does not. The psychologist Robert Bjork has suggested* the “principle of desirable difficulty”, the idea that memories are maximally strengthened if tested when we're on the verge of forgetting them. This suggests that an efficient memory system will intrinsically be somewhat difficult to use. Human beings have a complex relationship to difficult activities, and often dislike performing them, unless strongly motivated (in which case they may become pleasurable). Systems such as Anki are challenging to use well, and easy to use poorly. It is interesting to consider developing systems which may overcome some or all

How important is long-term memory, anyway? Long-term memory is sometimes disparaged. It's common for people to denigrate “rote memory”, especially in the classroom. I've heard from many people that they dropped some class – organic chemistry is common – because it was “just a bunch of facts, and I wanted something involving more understanding”. I won't defend bad classroom teaching, or the way organic chemistry is often taught. But it's a mistake to underestimate the importance of memory. I used to believe such tropes about the low importance of memory. But I now believe memory is at the foundation of our cognition. There are two main reasons for this change, one a personal experience, the other based on evidence from cognitive science. Let me begin with the personal experience. Over the years, I've often helped people learn technical subjects such as quantum mechanics. Over time you come to see patterns in how people get stuck. One common pattern is that people think they're getting stuck on esoteric, complex issues. But when you dig down it turns out they're having a hard time with basic notation and terminology. It's difficult to understand quantum mechanics when you're unclear about every third word or piece of notation! Every sentence is a struggle. It's like they're trying to compose a beautiful sonnet in French, but only know 200 words of French. They're frustrated, and think the trouble is the difficulty of finding a good theme, striking sentiments and images, and so on. But really the issue is that they have only 200 words with which to compose. My somewhat pious belief was that if people focused more on remembering the basics, and worried less about the “difficult” high-level issues, they'd find the high-level issues took care of themselves. But while I held this as a strong conviction about other people, I never realized it also applied to me. And I had no idea at all how strongly it applied to me. Using Anki to read papers in new fields disabused me of this illusion. I found it almost unsettling how much easier Anki made learning such subjects. I now believe memory of the basics is often the single largest barrier to understanding. If you have a system such as Anki for overcoming that barrier, then you will find it much, much easier to read into new fields.

As part of Swachh Survekshan Grameen, 6,980 villages in 698 districts across India will be covered. 34,000 public places namely schools, anganwadis, public health centres, haat/bazaars/religious places in these 6,980 villages will be visited during the survey.

Weightage given to different elements of the SSG:

1. Direct observation of sanitation in public places: 30 per cent
2. Citizen’s feedback on sanitation parameters: 35 per cent
3. Service-level progress on sanitation progress in the country as per SBMG-MIS: 35 per cent

Many people's model of accomplished mathematicians is that they are astoundingly bright, with very high IQs, and the ability to deal with very complex ideas in their mind. A common perception is that their smartness gives them the ability to deal with very complex ideas. Basically, they have a higher horsepower engine. It's true that top mathematicians are usually very bright. But here's a different explanation of what's going on. It's that, per Simon, many top mathematicians have, through hard work, internalized many more complex mathematical chunks than ordinary humans. And what this means is that mathematical situations which seem very complex to the rest of us seem very simple to them. So it's not that they have a higher horsepower mind, in the sense of being able to deal with more complexity. Rather, their prior learning has given them better chunking abilities, and so situations most people would see as complex they see as simple, and they find it much easier to reason about.

In a bold step to move towards a circular economy, the European Council recently adopted a stringent waste package for its member states, a plan which sets new rules for waste management and establishes legally binding targets for recycling.

According to the targets, 50 per cent of plastic packaging will have to be recycled in the EU and 55 per cent by 2030. Currently, only 30 per cent of plastic packaging is recycled in the EU. The new rules come after a gap of four years when a revision of targets was proposed in 2014.

The report also said that although the Union government has banned the import of e-waste for disposal and has not given any permission in the last five years for the import for re-cycling as per Hazardous and Other Wastes (Management and Transboundary Movement) Rules, 2016, it allows the import of second-hand electrical and electronic equipments for refurbishing. This is where the problem lies. The customs department, the report said, is ill-quipped in terms of manpower and infrastructure to distinguish between the second-hand products and waste.

E-waste Management Rules, 2016 mandate that every producer furnish the returns under Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR).

This is exactly what the Art of Living Foundation’s solid waste management project is doing in collaboration with entities such as Coal India.

Black plastics are more dangerous than plastics in general as it cannot be properly recycled due to the low sensitivity of black pigments to infrared radiation, used in conventional plastic sorting facilities, says the study published in Environmental International. Apart from affecting human health, this also affects the marine and coastal environment either as litter or as micro plastics.

black plastic, used in electronics design, as well as inefficient handling of e-waste introduces toxic chemicals

India is among the top five e-waste generating countries in the world besides China, the US, Japan and Germany, according to a report

The National Green Tribunal had temporarily allowed the Noida Authority to dump waste at the site in Sector123

These are substances, first discovered in plants, that damage the corpora allata thus preventing juvenile hormone (JH) from doing its normal job. Applied to early larval stages, precocenes induce premature or precocious metamorphosis (like that induced by the surgical removal of the corpora allata [View]).