Word: symbolics
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Look at the black and yellow symbol on the right. Is it a fan? A propeller? No. It's a trefoil, the international sign used to warn people away from potentially deadly sources of radiation. If you didn't recognize the degree of danger that is supposed to be conveyed by the three-bladed symbol, which represents radiation emitting from an atom, you're not alone. Over the last two decades, at least 20 people have died and more than 400 have been injured after accidentally exposing themselves to radioactive sources, such as radiography units dumped in scrap heaps. Experts...
...help reduce these avoidable deaths, the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna unveiled a new warning symbol on Feb. 15 to label potentially fatal radiation sources, such as those found in food irradiators or machines for cancer treatment. Unlike the original trefoil, which was first developed by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, in the 1940s, the new warning was tested to ensure it's universally understood. Starting in 2001, researchers showed a series of motifs to 1,650 adults and children, many of them illiterate, in 11 different countries. The red background conveys danger; a skull and crossbones...
...important to Trachtenberg as the ideas being expressed—but it leaves the reader feeling out of the loop and overwhelmed. In Trachtenberg’s hands, a bridge ceases to be a work of architecture and becomes a “cultural text,” a symbol that reveals aspects of the society that created it. Trachtenberg opens his essay on the Brooklyn Bridge by considering the bridge as viewed by little-known contemporaneous architectural critic Montgomery Schuler. Trachtenberg uses him as a launching point from which he examines the various artistic representations of the bridge throughout...
...something so truthful about him, it's plausible he can succeed at even this impossible task. If he can go from being famous for making his butt talk to being famous for being a Jimmy Stewart nice guy to perhaps getting people to believe him as a threatening sex symbol in The Number 23, then maybe he can be a guru. "It's not any of that that people have liked about me," he says of his humor and characters. "It's not what I do or what I say. I don't believe it was this genius routine...
...pressure is on to find the perfect gift for that special someone. But perhaps this year, that new diamond ring may be more than just a flashy accessory. The Spanish company Algordanza has come up with a way to give turn that gemstone into more than just a symbol of your affection. Algordanza, meaning “remembrance,” doesn’t mess around with traditional mining techniques: the creative company uses a synthetic process to convert the ashes of a lost loved one into a diamond in a Swiss lab. A mere half kilogram of your...