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Two-Nation Theory (Pakistan)
The two-nation theory (Urdu: دو قومی نظریہ‎ do qaumī nazariya) is the basis of the creation of Pakistan . According to this theory Muslims and Hindus are two separate nations by definition; Muslims have their own customs, religion, and tradition, and from social and moral points of view, Muslims are different from Hindus; and therefore, Muslims should be able to have their own separate homeland in which Islam is the dominant religion, being segregated from Hindus. The two-nation theory advocated by the All India Muslim League is the founding principle of the Pakistan Movement (i.e. the ideology of Pakistan as a Muslim nation-state in the northwestern and eastern regions of India) through the partition of India in 1947. There are varying interpretations of the two-nation theory, based on whether the two postulated nationalities can coexist in one territory or not, with radically different implications. One interpretation argued for sovereign autonomy, including the right to secede, for Muslim-majority areas of colonial India, but without any transfer of populations (i.e. Hindus and Muslims would continue to live together). A different interpretation contends that Hindus and Muslims constitute "two distinct and frequently antagonistic ways of life and that therefore they cannot coexist in one nation." In this version, a transfer of populations (i.e. the total removal of Hindus from Muslim-majority areas and the total removal of Muslims from Hindu-majority areas) is a desirable step towards a complete separation of two incompatible nations that "cannot coexist in a harmonious relationship". Opposition to the two-nation theory came from both nationalist Muslims and Hindus, being based on two concepts. The first is the concept of a single Indian nation, of which Hindus and Muslims are two intertwined communities. The second source of opposition is the concept that while Indians are not one nation, neither are the Muslims or Hindus of India, and it is instead the relatively homogeneous provincial units of the Indian subcontinent which are true nations and deserving of sovereignty; this view has been presented by the Baloch, Sindhi, Bengali, and Pashtun sub-nationalities of Pakistan, with Bengalis seceding from Pakistan after the Bangladesh Liberation War in 1971 and other separatist movements in Pakistan are currently in-place. The state of India officially rejected the two-nation theory and chose to be a secular state, enshrining the concepts of religious pluralism and composite nationalism in its constitution; however, in response to the separatist tendencies of the All India Muslim League, many Hindu nationalist organisations worked to try to give Hinduism a privileged position within the country.
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  • 05 Aug 2025
Biography
John Cioffi
John Cioffi (born November 7, 1956) is an American electrical engineer, educator and prolific inventor who has made contributions in telecommunication system theory, specifically in coding theory and information theory. Best known as "the father of DSL,"[1] Cioffi's pioneering research was instrumental in making digital subscriber line (DSL) technology practical and has led to over 400 publicati
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
First Grinnell Expedition
The First Grinnell Expedition of 1850 was the first American effort, financed by Henry Grinnell, to determine the fate of the lost Franklin Polar Expedition. Led by Lieutenant Edwin De Haven, the team explored the accessible areas along Franklin's proposed route. In coordination with British expeditions, they identified the remains of Franklin's Beechy Island winter camp, providing the first solid clues to Franklin's activities during the winter of 1845 before becoming icebound themselves.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Early Germanic Law
Early Germanic law was the form of law followed by the early Germanic peoples. It was an important element of early Germanic culture. Several Latin law codes of the Germanic peoples written in the Early Middle Ages after the Fall of the Western Roman Empire (also known as leges barbarorum "laws of the barbarians") survive, dating to between the 5th and 9th centuries. They are influenced by Roman law, canon law, and earlier tribal customs. Central and West European Germanic law differed from North Germanic law. Germanic law was codified in writing under the influence of Roman law; previously it was held in the memory of designated individuals who acted as judges in confrontations and meted out justice according to customary rote, based on careful memorization of precedent. Among the Franks they were called rachimburgs. "Living libraries, they were law incarnate, unpredictable and terrifying." Power, whose origins were at once said to be magical, divine, and military, was, according to Michel Rouche, exercised jointly by the "throne-worthy" elected king and his free warrior companions. Oral law sufficed as long as the warband was not settled in one place. Germanic law made no provisions for the public welfare, the res publica of Romans. The language of all these continental codes was Latin; the only known codes drawn up in any Germanic language were the Anglo-Saxon laws, beginning with the Laws of Æthelberht (7th century). In the 13th century customary Saxon law was codified in the vernacular as the Sachsenspiegel. All these laws may be described in general as codes of governmental procedure and tariffs of compositions. They all present somewhat similar features with Salic law, the best-known example, but often differ from it in the date of compilation, the amounts of fines, the number and nature of the crimes, the number, rank, duties and titles of the officers, etc. In Germanic Europe in the Early Middle Ages, every man was tried according to the laws of his own ethnicity, whether Roman, Salian or Ripuarian Frank, Frisian, Burgundian, Visigoth, Bavarian etc. A number of separate codes were drawn up specifically to deal with cases between ethnic Romans. These codes differed from the normal ones that covered cases between Germanic peoples, or between Germanic people and Romans. The most notable of these are the Lex Romana Visigothorum or Breviary of Alaric (506), the Lex Romana Curiensis and the Lex Romana Burgundionum.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Biography
David R. Bennion
David Ralph Bennion was a leading California winemaker who was the founder and winemaker at Ridge Vineyards in California from 1959 to 1969. From an early period, Bennion labeled Ridge Vineyards wines by vineyard, district and appellation, a first for California Zinfandel and a practice later followed by nearly every winery in the state. Bennion started his career at Stanford Research Institu
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Spaced Retrieval
Spaced retrieval, also known as expanded retrieval, is a learning technique, which requires users to rehearse information to be learned at different and increasing spaced intervals of time. In testing this type of learning, people are instructed to rehearse a given set of information at a certain time, and each new rehearsal is expected to have a longer period of time between itself and the previous rehearsal or an equal amount of time between rehearsals. At the end of every trial period there is a test phase. Landauer and Bjork first studied this technique of learning in 1978. The study required participants to learn names from flash cards. Prior to learning participants were placed into five different rehearsal types: uniform short, uniform moderate, uniform long, expanding, and contracting. These all indicate the amount and spacing of trials between each test. Uniform trials involve a number of trials between each test stage, but the trial numbers are fixed (e.g. 2-test-2-test-2-test). Contracting rehearsals involve larger intervals of time between the first few trials and the test phase, but eventually the trials decrease in number. Expanding involves starting with trials and tests close together, and as they progress the person would have more time between each trial and test (e.g. 1-test-2-test-3-test). The effectiveness of the rehearsal types was measured by seeing how accurately participants responded during a test phase. Expanding was proven to be the most important because it produced the highest amount of recall during the test period. The data behind this initial research indicated that an increasing space between rehearsals (expanding) would yield a greater percentage of accuracy at test points. Spaced retrieval with expanding intervals is believed to be so effective because with each expanded interval of retrieval it becomes more difficult to retrieve the information because of the time elapsed between test periods; this creates a deeper level of processing of the learned info in long term memory at each point. Another reason that the expanding retrieval model is believed to work so effectively is because the first test happens early on in the rehearsal process. The purpose of this is to increase retrieval success. By having a first test that followed initial learning with a successful retrieval, people are more likely to remember this successful retrieval on following tests. Although expanding retrieval is commonly associated with spaced retrieval, a uniform retrieval schedule is also a form of spaced retrieval procedure. Spaced retrieval is typically studied through the use of memorizing facts. Traditionally speaking, it has not been applied to fields that required some manipulation or thought beyond simple factual/semantic information. A more recent study has shown that spaced retrieval can benefit tasks such as solving math problems. In a study conducted by Pashler, Rohrer, Cepeda, and Carpenter, participants had to learn a simple math principle in either a spaced or massed retrieval schedule. The participants given the spaced retrieval learning tasks showed higher scores on a final test distributed after their final practice session. This is unique in the sense that it shows spaced retrieval can be used to not only remember simple facts or contextual data, but it can also be used in fields, such as math, where manipulation and the use of particular principles or formulas (e.g. y = mx + b) is necessary. These researchers also found that it is beneficial for feedback to be applied when administering the tests. When a participant gave a wrong response, they were likely to get it correct on following tests if the researcher gave them the correct answer after a delayed period. Spaced retrieval is a useful tool for learning that is relevant to many domains such as fact learning or mathematics, and many different tasks (expanding or uniform retrieval). Many studies over the years have contributed to the use and implementation of spaced retrieval, and it still remains a subject of interest for many researchers.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Celestial Coordinate System
In astronomy, a celestial coordinate system (or celestial reference system) is a system for specifying positions of satellites, planets, stars, galaxies, and other celestial objects relative to physical reference points available to a situated observer (e.g. the true horizon and north cardinal direction to an observer situated on the Earth's surface). Coordinate systems can specify an object's position in three-dimensional space or plot merely its direction on a celestial sphere, if the object's distance is unknown or trivial. The coordinate systems are implemented in either spherical or rectangular coordinates. Spherical coordinates, projected on the celestial sphere, are analogous to the geographic coordinate system used on the surface of Earth. These differ in their choice of fundamental plane, which divides the celestial sphere into two equal hemispheres along a great circle. Rectangular coordinates, in appropriate units, are simply the Cartesian equivalent of the spherical coordinates, with the same fundamental (x, y) plane and primary (x-axis) direction. Each coordinate system is named after its choice of fundamental plane.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Khitan Scripts
The Khitan scripts were the writing systems for the now-extinct Para-Mongolic Khitan language used in the 10th-12th century by the Khitan people who had established the Liao dynasty in Northeast China. There were two scripts, the large script (Chinese: 契丹大字; pinyin: qìdān dàzì) and the small script (Chinese: 契丹小字; pinyin: qìdān xiǎozì). These were functionally independent and appear to have been used simultaneously. The Khitan scripts continued to be in use to some extent by the Jurchen people for several decades after the fall of the Liao dynasty until the Jurchens fully switched to a script of their own. Examples of the scripts appeared most often on epitaphs and monuments, although other fragments sometimes surface. Many scholars recognize that the Khitan scripts have not been fully deciphered and that more research and discoveries would be necessary for a proficient understanding of them. The Khitan scripts are part of the Chinese family of scripts. Knowledge of the Khitan language, which was written by the Khitan script, is quite limited as well. Although there are several clues to its origins, which might point in different directions, the Khitan language shares an ancestor with the Mongolian languages but is not one.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Veritatis Splendor
Encyclical Veritatis splendor (Latin: The Splendor of the Truth) is an encyclical by Pope John Paul II. It expresses the position of the Catholic Church regarding fundamentals of the Church's role in moral teaching. The encyclical is one of the most comprehensive and philosophical teachings of moral theology in the Catholic tradition. It was promulgated on 6 August 1993. Cardinal Georges Cottier, Theologian emeritus of the Pontifical Household and Cardinal-Deacon of Santi Domenico e Sisto the University Church of the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas was influential in drafting the encyclical, as was Servais-Théodore Pinckaers, a professor of moral theology at the University of Fribourg, while others stress its lasting validity and importance.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
Topic Review
Acute Stress Reaction
Acute stress reaction (also called acute stress disorder, psychological shock, mental shock, or simply shock) is a psychological condition arising in response to a terrifying or traumatic event, or witnessing a traumatic event that induces a strong emotional response within the individual. It should not be confused with the unrelated circulatory condition of shock/hypoperfusion. Acute stress reaction (ASR) may develop into delayed stress reaction (better known as Posttraumatic stress disorder, or PTSD) if stress is not correctly managed. ASR is characterized by re-living and avoiding reminders of an aversive event, as well as generalized hypervigilance after initial exposure to a traumatic event. ASR is differentiated from PTSD as a disorder that precedes it, and if symptoms last for more than one month, it will develop into PTSD. It can thus be thought of as the acute phase of PTSD.
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  • 02 Dec 2022
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