CULTURAL QA06-2022-09 BEING ACOMPILATION THERE MAY BE ERRORS
Q1 Why are kangaroos being spotted inIndia? A1 By Andrew Clarance BBC News, Delhi Published 23 May The rescuedKangaroos at the Bengal Safari ParkImage source, Bengal Safari Park;Imagecaption,Wildlifeofficials say kangaroos are among the exotic animals smuggled into India When villagerswalking along a road on the edge of a forested village in eastern India firstsaw three confused, weak and hungry animals, they couldn't believe what theywere witnessing. The animals lookednothing like anything they had seen before. They alerted West Bengal state's forest officials, whotold them that the animals were kangaroos - native to Australia but not foundin India. The animals wererescued and sent to a wildlife park to be treated. One died later. Thevillagers were still confused and surprised with what they had seen. Soon,videos of the kangaroos in India went viral. "How on Earth are kangaroos turning up in WestBengal," a Twitter user asked. Debal Ray, the chief wildlife warden of West Bengal, tells the BBC that theanimals were most likely left in the open during an anti-smuggling operation byhis team. When he received atip-off that some exotic animals were being smuggled into the state, heimmediately alerted his team. Acting quickly, the officers started checkingvehicles along one of the main routes to enter the state. "Thesmugglers probably got wind of it, and abandoned the animals on thehighway," Mr Ray said. "They probablyended up here from private breeding farms in southeast Asia," Agni Mitra,deputy director of the regional Wildlife Control Bureau, told the BBC, addingthat smugglers often bringnon-native, exotic animals to India's border states through Myanmar. Q2 Can Personality Be Changed? A2 Psychologists have long debated howflexible someone’s “true” self is. The Atlantic Scott Barry Kaufman. Read when you’ve got time to spare. Almost everyone hassomething they want to change about their personality. In 2014, a study thattraced people’s goals for personality change found that the vast majority ofits subjects wanted to be more extraverted, agreeable, emotionally stable, andopen to new experiences. A whopping 97 percent said they wished they were moreconscientious. These desiresappeared to be rooted in dissatisfaction. People wanted to become more extraverted if they weren’thappy with their sex lives, hobbies, or friendships. They wanted tobecome more conscientious if they were displeased with their finances orschoolwork. The findings reflect the socialpsychologist Roy Baumeister’s notion of “crystallization of discontent”: Oncepeople begin to recognize larger patterns of shortcomings in their lives, hecontends, they may reshuffle their core values and priorities to justifyimproving things. Each year,Americans spend billions of dollars on self-improvement books, CDs, seminars,coaching, and stress-management programs to become better, more sociable,effective, compassionate, and charismatic versions of themselves. But beneaththeories on what drives people to change, there’s a more fundamental questiondebated by psychologists: Canpersonality even be changed in the first place? * * * There are so manycommon misconceptions of what having a personality actually entails. In hiscontroversial 1968 book, Personality and Assessment, Walter Mischel, the socialpsychologist best known for leading the famous Stanford marshmallow experiment,argued that any notion of consistency among personalities is largely a myth. Aperson’s actions in a given moment depend more on their situation, hecontended, than on some enduring essence of who that person is. His researchsuggested a correlation about .30 (out of 1.0) between one behavior and thenext. In 1979, thepsychologist Seymour Epstein conducted a series of studies in which he observedpeople’s behaviors onseveral occasions—from impulsivity to happiness, to nurturance, to problemsolving. He found that Mischel was right that understanding someone’s behavior at any given moment requires accountingfor the situation they’re in more than anything else. But what Mischel didn’t consider, Epstein contended,was that beyond individual moments, a person’s general character still could begleaned from the average of their many behaviors over time. In four studies,Epstein showed that when comparing behaviors over the course of two weeks, thestability of personality shattered the .30 barrier—sometimes reaching .90. More recentresearch has confirmed Epstein’s findings. The best way to think aboutpersonality traits, it seems, is as various “density distributions”: Throughout the course of theday, everyone fluctuates in their “true” selves quite a bit. Actingout of character is more the rule than the exception. Yet at the same time, itstill makes sense to talk about differences in personality between people,because when whole distributions of behavior are considered, there are veryconsistent individual differences. For instance, almost everyone craves atleast some solitude throughout the day, but some need a lot more than others. What this newunderstanding of personality means is that people are only introverted,agreeable, conscientious, emotionally stable, and open to new experiences tothe extent that their repeated patterns say they are. Genes certainly influence patterns of behavior (wehave what Brian Little refers to as a “biogenic” nature), but there is nothingsacrosanct about being a certain way. With enough adjustments tothese patterns over time, it seems that people can change who they are. * * * This is all good intheory, but what does it mean in practice? It’s worth noting that, even withoutany conscious effort, personality does appear to evolve quite a bit throughouta person’s life. Research shows that people tend to become more mature and well-adjustedas they age: The typical 65-year-old is more self-disciplined thanabout 85 percent of early adolescents, and more agreeable than about 75 percentof them. Social roles matter, too. As someone becomes more investedin a job, they often become more conscientious; likewise, when someone becomesmore invested in a long-term relationship, they tend to become more emotionallystable and have higher self-esteem. In fact, the more the commitment is part ofa person’s identity in any context, the more it appears to cause personalitychange. But these aren’tthe kind of changes that most people who buy self-development books are mostinterested in. They want to know whether they can change their personalitiesbecause they want to. Instead of changing jobs, entering a long-termrelationship, or adopting a new identity, can people change their personalitiesintentionally? Some studies hintat this possibility. One 2006 study found that college students who wereconcerned that they were becoming boring people increased their binge-drinking behavior in the hopes that they would become amore interesting person (I wouldn’t recommend this method!). Another study, from 2011, found that studentsstrategically chose extracurricularactivities that they thought would boost certain desirable characteristics,such as leadership. More recently,Nathan Hudson and Chris Fraley, researchers at Michigan State University andUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, respectively, looked at a sample ofundergraduates who declared their goals to change their personality across avariety of dimensions (e.g., “I want to be more talkative”) at the beginning ofa 16-week semester. Then, each week, they took personality tests to measurepersonality growth over time. To help certainparticipants with their goals, the researchers randomly assigned half of thestudents to engage in a “goal-setting” intervention. In this condition, theresearchers reminded the students of the traits they most wanted to change andasked them to come up with specific and concrete steps (e.g., “Call Andrew andask him to lunch on Tuesday) and to generate “if … then” implementation plans(e.g., “If I feel stressed, then I will call my mom to talk about it”). Theparticipants were also warned that very broad goals, such as “I want to be moreself-disciplined and self-controlled,” were too vague to cause any lastingchange. Over the course ofthe semester, the student’s goals to change their extraversion, agreeableness,and emotional stability appeared to inspire actual growth in the desireddirection. For example, people who said they wanted to be emotionally stable“more than they currently are” actually increased their emotional stabilityeach month. What’s more, people who came up with concrete plans for reachingtheir goals showed much greater changes in extraversion, conscientiousness, andemotional stability than those in the control group. However, the intervention did not boost growth in agreeableness beyondmerely wanting to be more agreeable. As promising asthese results sound, it’s important to point out that the effects were moderatein size. The changes happened slowly over the course of the semester, andresulted in some, but not radical, change. Rather than a knock against Hudsonand Fraley’s methods, this finding points toward a commonly misunderstood truthabout personal growth. According to Janet Polivy and Peter Herman, atUniversity of Toronto, many people fail in reaching their personal-developmentgoals because they have unrealistic expectations about the speed, amount, ease,and consequences of attempts at self-change—a phenomenon they call “false hopesyndrome.” According to theirtheory, first, people are motivated to adopt a difficult, or even impossible,personal growth goal (e.g., “I want to be thin”). After some initial progress,they ultimately don’t reach it. But after failing, they interpret their failurein a way that makes it seem like it wasn’t inevitable; for instance, thefailure was a result of just not working hard enough. So they convincethemselves that with a few minor adjustments, they can still achieve success.Finally, with renewed determination, but with only minor changes to their planor their expectations about the rate of change, they set out again, propelledby their hope for the future, only to once again be disappointed. This cyclecan continue forever. The first step to making real, lasting personalityadjustments, then, it seems, is to be critical of any self-development programthat touts instant, or even radical, change. Just as ittakes many years to develop patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors, itwill take some time—perhaps many years—to alter them. But the good news is thatchange is possible. Scott Barry Kaufman is a psychology professor at the Universityof Pennsylvania and the scientific director of theImagination Institute. He is the co-author of Wired to Create: Unraveling theMysteries of the Creative Mind. My note- In nutshell personality can be changedby self efforts to certain extent. Some persons have differentpersonalities in different occasions. Some have very bad personalities because they don’t want tochange . Q3 How to Harvest Basil All SeasonWithout Killing It A3 Enjoy the fresh flavor throughoutthe entire summer. ByElizabeth Yuko 5/21/22 9:00AM Although freshbasil is now available in supermarkets year-round, it’s not the same as beingable to go into your own backyard (or turn to the planter on your windowsill)and picking a few leaves when you need them. But it’s one thing to clear a stemor two for some cocktails: What about picking a majority of the plant to makepesto? Basil’s growingseason is already limited to summer weather, so you may be concerned abouttaking too many of your plants’ leaves early on and being left with nothingcome July and August. But fear not: Harvesting the leaves of a basil plant is actuallyimportant for its growth. Here’s what to know. How (and when) toharvest basil Although there’s nospecific day or month marking the beginning of basil season, you’ll notice thatonce the temperatures start hitting80°F on a regular basis, your plant will start—in the words of theFamers’ Almanac—“leafingout.” And when it gets to be around six to eight inches tall, it’stime to start harvesting the leaves. If you’re planningto use the basil leaves right away—like as you’re cooking a meal—go ahead andpick them when you need them. But if you’re going to store the basil to uselater, it’s best to pick the leaves first thing in the morning when they areplump and at their juiciest. How to ensure you have fresh basil all season You may be worriedthat if you pick all (or most) of the leaves off your basil plant early in thesummer, you’ll run out quickly. But in reality, the exact opposite is true,according to the Famers’ Almanac: Regularly picking the leaves off your basil plant only encourages it togrow. Think of harvestingbasil leaves as part of its regular maintenance in the summer, along withmaking sure it’s getting enough water and sunlight. In fact, you should pickthe leaves regularly, even if you don’t plan on using them right away (in whichcase, freeze them). My note- We in India consider basil as Holy basil. Agood percentage of basil leaves are used in pooja, making garlands in temples.Of late after creating basil fields, in India also the leaves areharvested and used to make cough syrup like “Krishnathulasi cough syrup” in Kerala All the above QA are based on information from yahooopening page on 8-6-2022 Q4 Why do diesel engines have two fuelpumps? Are they really necessary? A4 Andrew McGregorOwned several dieselvehicles.Jun 1 Say you’redesigning a diesel car.You know you are also doing petrol models. You also know that diesel and petrol engines requiredifferent fuel injection pressures, and petrolengines vary, but one common thing is that all the high pressure pumps arequite bad at sucking fuel in, and would really like a consistent low pressureinput. But the fuel is in a tank some distance from the engine,and usually lower down than the pressure pump needs to be. So… you put a pump in the bottom ofthe tank, that is good at collecting fuel at ambient pressure, andcan maybe supply the lowest injection pressure any of your engines need. Sosome of the petrol models only need this pump. And then the engines that need high pressure have asecond pump that can take the pressure up from what the tank pump suppliesto what you need for injection. Q5 Why did Iran become a poor countrydespite having oil? A5 Nadhiya Athaide Iranian Historian& CuratorSun Iran was actually doing pretty good 10–15 years ago, alot of people were very optimistic I remember that myfather (who was still working then, he’s now retired) had gotten a prettysizable wage increase and we were then able to purchase a much bigger apartmentwhich was desperately needed for the 6 of us. 2 years after that, he purchaseda new car. It was no fancy corvette, but it was far better then the old “nightmare”as my mom called it. Things started to go downwards after, particularlybecause of 2 things. Number 1, the crash in oil prices, and number 2, theinfamous sanctions As aresult, wages decreased, pensions were cut, inflation soared and the currencydevaluated. Luckilymy father had retired before his industry had wage cuts and he also saved agood amount of money. But many of his partners who hadn’t saved any money werehit pretty bad. Long story short, Iran got screwed in the last few years.Things weren’t perfect then either, but they were much better than what theyare now. Further evidence that sanctions don’t hurt politicians, they hurtaverage civilians who’re trying to make a living in a rich man's world. The above two QA are from Quora website on 07 -06- 2022. Quora answers/Yahoo information need not be 100% correct . Compiled and posted by R. Gopala krishnan on08-06-2022 -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Thatha_Patty" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/thatha_patty/1470671050.1080584.1654759017107%40mail.yahoo.com.
