Daily Content Archive
(as of Thursday, August 11, 2016)| Word of the Day | |||||||
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subterfuge
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| Article of the Day | |
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 YakuzaYakuza are members of traditional organized crime groups in Japan. Although yakuza membership declined in the 1990s following an anti-gang law passed by the Japanese government, there are thought to be nearly 90,000 active yakuza members in Japan today. Though, as a matter of principle, yakuza do not recognize direct theft as a legitimate enterprise, they frequently engage in a form of extortion known as sokaiya. How does it work? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
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 Weimar Constitution Signed into Law (1919)Written immediately after World War I, the Weimar Constitution was the document that governed the short-lived Weimar Republic of Germany. It declared the nation a federal republic governed by a president and parliament and was a strong attempt to establish a liberal democracy in Germany. However, it was adopted during a time of civil conflict and failed with the ascent of the Nazi Party in 1933. How did Hitler manage to subvert the Weimar Constitution after he came to power? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
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 Christiaan Eijkman (1858)While seeking a bacterial cause for the nutritional disorder beriberi, Eijkman, a Dutch pathologist, noticed a resemblance between a nerve disorder in his laboratory chickens and the symptoms of beriberi. He traced the chickens' disorder to a change in their feed—it had been switched from brown to white rice—and surmised that white rice lacked a dietary component found in brown rice. This eventually led to the discovery of vitamins and earned him a 1929 Nobel Prize, which he shared with whom? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
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 Life is a luminous halo, a semi-transparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of consciousness to the end.Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
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get the gist— To understand the central, essential, or general matter of something, such as an argument, speech, concept, process, etc., without being proficient in the more specific details. More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
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 Battle of FlowersFirst held in 1902 as part of the celebration for the coronation of Edward VII and Queen Alexandra, the Battle of Flowers takes place on Jersey in the British Channel Islands every August. It begins with a parade of floats covered in flowers, many of which are quite elaborate and take months to prepare. Spectators no longer engage in a flower-throwing melee after the parade—these days the "battle" consists of a competition for the finest floats. A moonlight parade Friday night displays the floats with their illuminations and concludes with a fireworks finale. More... | |
| In the News | |
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Humans First Used Tools to Eat Meat 250000 Years Ago. Here's What the Discovery Means.If you're a developing species with dreams of dominating your home planet one day, you're going to have to do two things first: grow a big brain and get yourself a nice set of opposable thumbs. With a big brain you can figure out how to use tools and ... More... | |