Lighthouse, Oil lamps

In 1782 a Swiss scientist, Aimé Argand, invented an oil lamp whose steady smokeless flame revolutionized lighthouse illumination. The basis of his invention was a circular wick with a glass chimney that ensured an adequate current of air up the centre and the outside of the wick for even and proper combustion of the oil. Eventually, Argand lamps with as many as 10 concentric

Monarchianism

A Christian heresy that developed during the 2nd and 3rd centuries. It opposed the doctrine of an independent, personal subsistence of the Logos, affirmed the sole deity of God the Father, and thus represented the extreme monotheistic view. Though it regarded Christ as Redeemer, it clung to the numerical unity of the Deity. Two types of Monarchianism developed: the Dynamic

Mole Cricket

Any member of the orthopteran insect family Gryllotalpidae (about 65 species), sometimes considered part of the family Gryllidae. This cricket lives underground, its common name deriving from its molelike appearance and habits. The mole cricket has forelegs modified for shovelling, a cylindrical body, a pointed head, and a velvety coat of hairlike setae.

Humanism, François Rabelais (c. 1490–1533)

Rabelais ranks with Boccaccio as a founding father of Western realism. As a satirist and stylist (in his hands French prose became a free, poetic form), he influenced writers as important as Jonathan Swift, Laurence Sterne, and James Joyce and may be seen as a major precursor of modernism. His five books concerning the deeds of the giant princes Gargantua and

Arab

Arabic  singular masculine 'arabi,  singular  feminine 'arabiyah,  plural  'arab,   one whose native language is Arabic. (See Arabic language.) Before the spread of Islam and, with it, the Arabic language, “Arab” referred to any of the largely nomadic Semitic inhabitants of the Arabian Peninsula. In modern usage, it embraces any of the Arabic-speaking peoples living in the vast region from Mauritania, on the Atlantic coast of Africa, to southwestern Iran,

Biblical Literature, Song of Solomon

The Song of Solomon (also called Song of Songs and Canticle of Canticles) consists of a series of love poems in which lovers describe the physical beauty and excellence of their beloved and their sexual enjoyment of each other. The Hebrew title of the book mentions Solomon as its author, but this seems improbable, primarily because of the late vocabulary of the work.

Anastasius Sinaita, Saint

Theologian and abbot of the Monastery of St. Catherine, on Mt. Sinai, whose writings, public disputes with various heretical movements in Egypt and Syria, and polemics against the Jews made him in his day a foremost advocate of orthodox Christian doctrine, specifically on the person and work of Christ, and provided key documents for the history

Carnivore, Natural history

Canids are basically meat eaters, although some vegetable matter is taken. The gray or timber wolf (Canis lupus), the African hunting dog (Lycaon pictus), and the dhole, or wild dog of India (Cuon alpinus), are strictly carnivorous. The various foxes and jackals, coyotes, and the raccoon dog eat whatever food is abundant—small mammals, birds, insects, crustaceans, mollusks, fruits,

Algebra, The structural approach dominates

After the late 1930s it was clear that algebra, and in particular the structural approach within it, had become one of the most dynamic areas of research in mathematics. Structural methods, results, and concepts were actively pursued by algebraists in Germany, France, the United States, Japan, and elsewhere. The structural approach was also successfully applied to redefine

Syrinx

The vocal organ of birds, located at the base of the windpipe (trachea), where the trachea divides into the bronchi (tubes that connect the trachea with the lungs). The syrinx is lacking in the New World vultures (Cathartidae), which can only hiss and grunt, but reaches great complexity in the songbirds, in which it consists of paired specialized cartilages and membranes