Daily Content Archive
(as of Tuesday, February 5, 2019)| Word of the Day | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
discourtesy
| |||||||
| Daily Grammar Lesson | |
|---|---|
Perfective and Imperfective AspectThe perfective aspect highlights actions, states, or events as a whole. The imperfective aspect is used when we focus on the internal structures of an action. What is the continuous aspect? More... | |
| Article of the Day | |
|---|---|
 EntropyIn popular, nontechnical use, entropy is regarded as a measure of the chaos or randomness of a system. In thermodynamics, it is the measure of a system's energy that is unavailable for work or of the degree of a system's disorder. Entropy increases during irreversible processes, such as the spontaneous mixing of hot and cold gases. The concept, first proposed in 1850 by the German physicist Rudolf Clausius, is sometimes presented as the second law of thermodynamics, which states what? More... | |
| This Day in History | |
|---|---|
 Royal Greenwich Observatory Begins Broadcasting Hourly Time Signals (1924)The Greenwich Time Signal, popularly known as "the pips," is a series of six short tones broadcast by many BBC radio stations at the end of each hour to mark the precise start of the following hour. Devised by Astronomer Royal Frank Dyson in 1924, the signal consists of six pips that occur on the five seconds leading up to the hour, with the beginning of the sixth pip marking the actual moment when the hour changes. After nearly 90 years of marking time, why might the pips soon be silenced? More... | |
| Today's Birthday | |
|---|---|
 Adlai Ewing Stevenson (1900)Stevenson was an American politician and lawyer. After serving as assistant to the Secretary of the Navy during WWII and as a member of the US mission to the UN, he was elected governor of Illinois in 1949. Later in his career, he served as ambassador to the UN. Noted for his eloquence and wit, he was the Democratic candidate for president in 1952 and 1956 but lost to Eisenhower both times by a large margin. His grandfather of the same name served as vice president during whose administration? More... | |
| Quotation of the Day | |
|---|---|
 Towns are excrescences, gray fluxions, where men, hurrying to find one another, have lost themselves.E. M. Forster (1879-1970) | |
| Idiom of the Day | |
|---|---|
Were you born in a tent?— Have you no basic manners? (Usually said after someone has left open a door to the outside.) More... | |
| Today's Holiday | |
|---|---|
 Pakistan Kashmir Solidarity Day (2019)On February 5, 1990, Pakistanis protested against Indian rule in an armed uprising. More than 80,000 Kashmiris lost their lives during the demonstrations. Pakistan People's Party Government leader Benazir Bhutto responded by declaring the day a public holiday. Along many of the major roads in the capital city, banners are displayed to show Pakistan's solidarity with the Kashmirs. A five-minute period of silence is observed to remember those who were killed in the uprising. In addition, every province plans their own events, including rallies or processions, seminars, and speeches. More... | |
| Word Trivia | |
|---|---|
Today's topic: presencehoodoo - A person who practices voodoo; the word also describes a person or thing whose presence is supposed to bring bad luck. More... al fresco - Implies the presence of some nearby structure (one does not hike al fresco). More... pyrosis - Heartburn is actually pyrosis, caused by the presence of gastric secretions, called reflux, in the lower esophagus. More... evince - To indicate, to reveal the presence of a quality or feeling. More... | |