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#international day of light

noelcollection · 2 years

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For the International Day of Light, we invite you to reflect (pun intended) on this charming juvenile biography of the scientist Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829).

Sir Humphry Davy was a Cornish chemist and inventor with quite the record of scientific achievement:

Developed electrolysis (the process of using electricity to isolate elements)

Discovered the elements barium, boron, calcium, magnesium, potassium, and sodium as well as the compounds hydrogen telluride and hydrogen phosphide

Studied and wrote about the anesthetic effects of nitrous oxide (aka “laughing gas,” a term he also coined)

Proved that diamonds are made of carbon

Served as president of the British Royal Society; inaugural chairman of the Athenaeum Club; and co-founder of the Zoological Society of London

Davy was such a formidable player in the European realm of scientific learning that despite the fact that England and France were at war at the time, Napoleon gave the Englishman special permission to visit France’s leading scientists and have an audience with Empress Marie Louise in 1813.

So what, you may ask, does Sir Humphry Davy have to do with light? In the foregoing summary of the scientist’s life, we have left out his most famous accomplishment: the Davy safety lamp.

Naturally, coal miners working in the dark depths of the earth need artificial lighting by which to do their work. The problem was in early nineteenth-century northern England, the flame of the miners’ candles kept mixing with a natural flammable gas found in the mines, known as “firedamp,” causing a series of devastating explosions that claimed the lives of hundreds of miners. Moved by the suffering of working-class families in northern England, Robert Gray, the rector of Bishopwearmouth, appealed to Davy in a letter in 1815 to develop a method of lighting mines safely. Over the next several months following this charge from the clergyman, Davy developed his famous safety lamp. The safety lamp works by enclosing a flame in a wire mesh cylinder. This cylinder disseminates the heat that would otherwise cause the flame to explode upon contact with a flammable gas.

Henry Mayhew’s semi-fictionalized biography (featured here) of a young Humphry Davy uses a narrative of the chemist’s life to teach readers about the scientific properties of two things that are essential to Davy’s famous invention: heat and light. Along the way, Humphry teaches his younger sister, Kitty, about refraction and reflection and how these light phenomena can be used to trick the eye:

Humphry explains the role that light refraction plays in producing superior mirages. Superior mirages of ships at sea, which make vessels look like they are floating in midair, may be the origin of flying boat legends, such as the Flying Dutchman.

Humphry explains to Kitty the principles of reflection in mirrors.

Humphry debunks a popular trick to play on people looking for a paranormal encounter:

“It is a favourite experiment to place a skull, strongly illuminated, in the outer apartment, and to reflect an image of it amid the smoke, so as to be visible to the spectators in the inner room.”

Images from:

Mayhew, Henry. The Wonders of Science, or, Young Humphry Davy. New York: Harper & Brothers, 1856.

Catalog record: https://bit.ly/3Pdk2F7

#international day of light #humphry davy #history of science #rare books #refraction #reflection #optical illusion

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juliehowlin · 1 year

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International Day of Light

Today is International Day of Light, a worldwide initiative sponsored by UNESCO to celebrate the role of light in scientific innovation, culture, and art. Why today? Because it marks the first successful operation of the laser by Theodore Maiman in 1960.

10 things you might not know about light:

#facts #International Day of Light #Light

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internationaldayoflight · 1 year

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I-HOW: IAU Hands-On Workshops.

Millions of people around the world celebrated the astronomical breakthroughs that have shaped science, technology and culture over the last century. The IAU100 celebrations highlighted the importance of astronomy as a tool for education, development and diplomacy.

The IAU calls for applications for workshops under the IAU Hands-On Workshops (I-HOW) initiative.

Proposals to organise one of these workshops should be submitted using the application form provided for that by email to one of the members of the I-HOW Steering Committee.

The call for workshops in 2024 is open; the deadline is 30 May 2023. See below for the procedure to prepare and submit your proposal.

#Workshops #international day of light #16 may #light science #astronomy

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cherrygazette · 2 months

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she wore here scars as her best attire. a stunning dress made of hellfire

happy women's day to all the women in this world

#quotes #international women's day #international womens day #aesthetic #random #shitpost #light academia #literature #academia #academia aesthetic #dark academia #grunge #women's day #dark moodboard #moodboard #maroon

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binah-beloved · 3 days

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Imagine there is an area in the library you and Binah often come to relax in. And you figured it would be nice to plant something in here to decorate it. And you just "happen" to also plant things she could use in tea making like lavender or mint.

Happy international tea day by the way.

i think the Library should have a greenhouse. just for fun

while the Library can technically manifest anything, it requires practice and a stable mind. fresh fruits and leaves and flowers don't do very well, so you've taken to growing your own after getting permission from Angela, scrounging a few seeds from around the Library and clearing out an empty room made of glass. it's slow going at first, with only a few sprouts to your name, but eventually your coworkers catch on and begin giving you any seeds they find and your garden begins flourishing. small tables appear for people to sit at and enjoy the foliage, inhaling the scent of herbs and flowers. you bring occasional bundles of tea supplies to Binah with a broad smile, saying that you had extra, and she looks at you with soft dark eyes and carefully takes them from your hand, brushing her hand against yours

you start finding packets of seeds waiting for you at a table in the corner of the room, tied with a silky black bow and accompanied by a steaming hot cup of tea, always in whatever blend you happened to give Binah that week

#project moon #lobotomy corp #library of ruina #binah #binah lobcorp #binah library of ruina #alas i missed the actual international tea day #but this still counts #i drink tea a lot so everyday could be tea day for me #i need to get a fancy teacup to drink tea out of #binah eventually comes to visit you and sit at one of the tables #the room is always warm and full of sunlight #she enjoys watching you garden during sunset #the fleeting rays of light casting a glow over your face

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flyingbooks42 · 1 year

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Happy International Asexuality Day to Light Yagami

#death note #light yagami #ace #asexual #asexuality #and happy international asexuality day to all Aces Who Kill

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arthistoryanimalia · 9 months

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For #InternationalCatDay 😻:

Cat Night-light China, Qing dynasty, Kangxi reign, made in Jingdezhen, 1690-1722 Porcelain, glazed/painted, H 9.50 x L 14 cm, 0.50 kg British Museum 1936,1012.109

“This moulded porcelain figure of a crouching cat is hollow with no base. It is pierced with large holes for its eyes and mouth and has an opening in its back. Its teeth and tongue are finely made. Different textures of its claws fur and skin are cleverly suggested. Within its erect ears, the soft mottled skin is indicated by a naturalistic pattern of black spots and grey shading. While its fur is depicted using rows of short fine black lines, black patches and stripes around its tail. Inside there are traces of black soot supporting the idea that it was used as a night light.”

#animals in art #cat #cats in art #International Cat Day #animal holiday #Chinese art #East Asian art #Asian art #decorative arts #ceramics #porcelain #17th century art #18th century art #night light #British Museum

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ninja-knox-ur-sox-off · 2 years

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APPARENTLY IT’S INTERNATIONAL FRIENDS DAY AND I JUST HAPPENED TO WRITE A LITTLE FICLET ABOUT MEI AND MK OFF OF AN IDEA I HAD ABOUT THEIR FRIENDSHIP there was more i kinda wanted to add cause it felt slightly off to me and I wasn’t going to post it, BUT HECK IT HAVE SOME BEST FRIENDS CONTENT HAPPY INTERNATIONAL FRIENDS DAY

Hype Man

Mei didn’t think all that highly of herself for a dragon.

Her parents had tried to instill some of that pride in her, a dragon descendant of oceans, she had a tall standing heritage to be proud of, but it mainly just resulted in her feeling inadequate. Like she could never quite reach as amazing as every other one of her ancestors, all dragons. Something about her felt different, felt wrong. Her family came from the ocean, but Mei felt like she was burning from the inside out some days.

She couldn’t seem to connect with her family the way her parents did, some sort of disconnect there that led her to seek connection elsewhere. She started a bit of a gaming channel, didn’t ever show her face, just mostly chatted, looking for some form of connection. She bought bikes, dismantled them, built new bikes with the parts, she stared at her creations and couldn’t bring herself to show her parents, instead keeping them hidden away, because something so important to her couldn’t possibly be important to the family.

They left her alone for the most part. They were more involved when she was younger, but once she became a legal adult, they did seem to withdraw a bit. She figured they just didn’t want to seem overbearing, but their absences just seemed to make things seem more impossible.

Mei would show them things, talk about her accomplishments quietly at dinner, voice getting meeker and milder once she said them out loud. A couple thousand followers compared to a couple thousand dedicated warriors didn’t seem like much. A few races won compared to hundreds of battles won didn’t feel worth sharing, so she mostly let them talk. If they asked she would just say she was filling her time. Sometimes it felt better to say nothing at all than to mention gaming or racing.

Compared to all of her family, sometimes Mei felt like nothing at all.

Then she met Mk.

He was… silly. A little odd at first. Nothing at all like the tall white and jade pillars of home, or the endless empty hallways. Mk was loud. He was animated. He was waving his hands about and filled every second like a firework, like he could like he didn’t have a moment left to lose.

It was a contagious sort of energy. Mei had always felt a little too energetic herself compared to her composed, poised parents, still and calm in their movements; hopping from foot to foot in place when she was excited compared to their subtle nods of their heads. But next to Mk it felt natural to bounce around a bit, talk loud, laugh louder.

He was a little jumpy at first. Something she wasn’t sure she wanted to look too far into considering what it might’ve been, but after an initial stiffness Mk relaxed into contact like a cat soaking up the warmth of the sun. Throwing an arm over his shoulder became almost as easily as breathing.

If Mei didn’t know any better, she’d say he was a little touch starved, leaning into every shoulder bump after he was more comfortable around her, seeking her out for a hug even when he wouldn’t outright hug her first until later.

She made sure to maybe hug a little more than she usually would, just because it seemed to make him smile and a little giddy, and soon that too felt just as natural, and she couldn’t help the breathless grin when he slammed into her to initiate a hug for the first time. And from then on, hugging him, holding his hand, bumping into him, felt natural.

As comfortable as she was around Mk, Mei still didn’t talk about herself all that much. After all, what was a new drifting turn trick in a race compared to turning into an actual dragon?

She did eventually let something slip.

“Wait, you're a gamer?”

Mei halted and stared at him like a deer in headlights.

Mk backtracked immediately. “I mean--I know you, like, game, like pshh, yeah obviously, we’re literally in the arcade right now. But I meant more like, gaming like, consols, VR, all that fancy stuff, and like, streaming it, you said you had a livestream--I mean you might not even be a gamer, that could have been a different kind of livestream, which in that case, this is kinda awkward and now I’m going to apologize for assuming--”

“No no,” she waved her hands a bit, then stopped and let them drop. “It’s… uh… yeah it’s a gaming channel.”

Then the enormously unexpected. “That’s so cool.”

It was?

Mei blinked. He knew she was a dragon and thought… gaming was still cool?

“How many followers do you have?” He was looking at her so excitedly, she couldn’t exactly not tell him, but it still felt weird to say it aloud.

“Uh, I dunno, like… 80k… I think? Last time I checked?”

Mk gaped at her.

“I mean it’s a big city,” she felt the need to add. She knew so many channels with millions of followers, her’s honestly wasn’t that big in comparison. “Lots of people watch streamers, so it’s not… like a super high number but--”

Then he was shaking her, hands on her shoulders and pulling her back and forth. “80k? Mei that’s so freaking cool, that’s so many followers--ohmegosh wait, what if I follow you already?”

“Cool?” Mei stammered out.

“Um yeah!” He said it like the most obvious thing in the world. He was pulling out his phone that had a Monkey King charm hanging from it and an art piece decorating the back of the case. “What’s your channel? I wanna see if I’ve watched you before.”

He had, as it turned out, been subscribed to her channel for around two years.

“Mei,” he whined, clinging to her arm.

“What,” she laughed for the twelfth time.

“Mei you don’t understand, you’re so good at video games. You’re so funny and clever, you’re so cool, how do I know such a cool person. How is this legal? How am I meant to survive?”

It made her laugh hard enough her face turned a little red.

“I’m not that cool,” she told him fondly as she got on her bike.

“YOU DRIVE A MOTORCYCLE?”

“Um…” she glanced down at her helmet, then back up at him. “Yes?”

He grabbed her face and bonked their foreheads together, squishing her cheeks. “Mei, I need you to be real with me for a second.”

“O-okay?” she managed to say, voice a little muffled by the way her face was being squished.

“I need you to tell me you didn’t build this.”

She blinked.

He stared directly into her eyes.

“Um…”

Then he was back to shaking her. “Mei. Mei you don’t understand, how are you this cool?”

“It’s just a bike--” she tried to say.

“Just the coolest looking bike I’ve ever seen,” Mk said, even louder.

“Okay, okay,” she laughed, pulling her face out of his hands. There was a heat to her cheeks and a warmth to core of her chest. She looked away. “Okay, so it’s kinda cool.”

“Extremely cool,” he corrected.

“Extremely cool,” Mei amended. “I actually did some repairs this morning after yesterday’s race--”

She stopped short at the look on his face.

“What?”

Mk put his hands together in a praying motion, pressed them against his mouth, crouched down next to her bike, one leg stretched out, leaning back on the other and looked up at her.

Mei leaned away from him a little, nervously laughing. “What?”

He inhaled.

“BOI--”

“So, let me see if I got this all right,” he said after the bike ride to Pigsy’s noodles. His hair was a mess after wearing her helmet all the way there, sticking up in every direction, some of it smooshed against his head in odd shapes, and his cheeks still flushed from whooping so loudly and screaming at sharp turns. Mei nodded along, stirring the ice in her soda bought from the vending machine down the street with her straw. “You’re a dragon.”

“Correct.”

“Like a literal descendant of the Dragon of the West, a direct descendant of the White Horse Dragon in Journey to the West…”

“Yup,” Mei said, ending the word with a pop and then leaning down a bit to sip from her soda.

“You have a million subscribers--”

“Not a million yet.”

“A million subscribers,” he said again, stressing the words and widening his eyes, as though daring her to argue, then sat back in his seat, waving his hand and gesturing to himself. “Of which, yours truly is proud to be one.” He slammed his hands down on the table. “Which is for good reason since you’re one of the best gamers out there--”

“I’m not even in the top hundred, Mk.”

“Only because every other streamer shows their face which adds to the experience of watching them game.” He aggressively slurped up some noodles before continuing.

“Not only that but you’re a freaking racer. You race a bike which you built yourself.”

Mei hummed around her straw, looking away tapping her fingers on her phone lightly, a heat to her face.

“And on top of all that you destroy arcade games like you’re going for a walk in the park.” He finally slumped back in his seat. “Did I get all that?”

Mei tapped her staw against the edge of her cup and slurped up the bits of soda from the bottom of the straw. “Yup.”

He went limp as a noodle and slumped all the way down, sliding until she could only see his hair, his knees bumping into hers.

“You’re so cool, Mei,” he whined. “Why are you so cool? I’m like… I deliver noodles.”

She laughed and lightly bumped her leg against his. “Hey, delivering noodles is cool.”

“You built yourself a motorcycle,” he hissed back.

She found herself grinning. “Okay, so it is… pretty cool.”

He popped back up just so he could slam his hands down on the table again. “Extremely cool.”

“Extremely cool,” she grinned wider.

And that… was kinda how things went.

Mei did a new trick on her bike? Mk was there across the street in the empty stands yelling about how cool it looked.

Mei beat own high score on an arcade game? He was right there jumping up and down.

When Mei hit a million subscribers she was racing to Mk’s apartment above the noodle shop in the middle of the night to tell him about it before she could even think about how a million subscribers was nothing next to a million subjects in a kingdom, and Mk opened the window with his Monkey King themed pajamas and was awake in seconds to squeal with her.

Her ancestry was still a massive thing to try and live up to, and something that was still immensely important to her. And although her accomplishments now seemed like nothing compared to their great feats… every dragon started somewhere. And right now, winning that race was a big feat, because it was her feat. Something she did.

Even if she wasn’t a full fledged dragon, Mk was right there next to her to remind her of just how amazing she was.

#KNOX WRITES (me)#jUST A LITTLE SILLY SOMETHING I HAD WHILE THINKING ABOUT HOW THEIR FRIENDSHIP WROKS #Monkie Kid #LEGO Monkie kid #Mei #Mk #I LOVE THEM A LOT OKAY #THEY'RE JUST #BEST FRIENDS AND LOVE EACH OTHER SO MUCH AND LIKE #WOW MK THINKS MEI IS SO COOL AND HYPES UP EVERUYTHIGN SHE DOES #AND MEI IS JUST ALWAYS THERE FOR MK WHEN HE NEEDS HER IN ALL THIS CRAZY MONKIE WORLD AND THEY TRUST EACH OTHER SO IMPLICITLY #WAILS #really if i knew it was international friends day this morning i might've tried to write something for the traffic light trio and how #red son becomes part of the group i'm |;A;/#i love them sm i swear #ANYWAY I GOT SOMEHWERE TO BE SO ENJOY THIS SILLY LI'LL THING WITH A BUNCHA MY HC'S CRAMMED IN I ADORE THIS SHOW #one of these days i'll finish my actual Mei fic #which is really freaking cool already #gosh kay i'm scatterbrained today so this fic is gonna have some holes ut i'm okay with that GOTTA SPEED CYA

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internationaldayoflight · 1 year

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Superlasers for the real world.

Join the celebration of the International Day of Light 2023 in Czech Republic. Date: 20/05/2023 - 20/05/2023. Location: Dolni Brezany, Czech Republic.