Costa Rica Creates Department of Peace

IMAGINE PEACE: "Costa Rica’s justice ministry was created to oversee the country’s penitentiary systems and supervise research on criminal behavior, but had no responsibility for crime prevention. A 1998 executive decree addressed this lapse by creating the National Directorate for the Prevention of Crime. The recent legislation takes crime prevention in a new direction, replacing the old directorate with the newly formed Directorate for the Promotion of Peace and the Peaceful Coexistence of Citizens.

“While we talk about prevention of violence, we are experiencing its effects every day. Changing the language and speaking about ‘promotion of peace’ lead[s] us to the roots of the problem,”

The ministry will take on new responsibilities, including peace promotion, violence prevention (for example, by targeting a recent increase of juvenile offenders), and an emphasis on conflict resolution.

“With this change in name, the focus on prevention of violence has been shifted to promotion of peace,” says Kelly Isola of the Rasur Foundation, the Costa Rican nongovernmental organization that proposed the law in 2005. Having a department of peace, she said, will enable Costa Rica “to benefit from international experiences, which demonstrate that a culture of peace has positive effects in the reduction of violence and crime.”"

How to make people less likely to want to enhance your life

It's very easy. Simply do what most people do: when someone tells or gives you something or sends you a link or a photo or anything you already have or have read or seen, first thing say, "Oh, I saw / knew / have that."

Me, I see a lot but you'll never, ever hear me saying that. Why? Because the instant you deflate the other person's bubble of joy at giving you something they think you'll like, you make it much more likely that next time they'll reflexively think, "the heck with him/her, why bother?" And you'll be sure to miss out on something that would've indeed been a wonderful surprise as a result of your having been so full of yourself you just had to show how up to the minute you were.

Common courtesy demands graciousness, perhaps an increasingly lost art but still one worth cultivating, not only for your own good but that of those around you. A simple "thank you" works beautifully. Always has, always will.

via bookofjoe

ah, but, you probably already knew that.

The Smart(er) Car

Traveling in an urban environment can be daunting, particularly if you’re sightseeing in a new place. If you’re lucky enough to be in Paris, where rental bikes dot the landscape (or in the future, where these awesome energy-generating rental bikes live), you’ve got it made. But for the rest of us? We can either drive, try to learn the mass transit system, or hoof it.

Thanks to a group of tireless researchers at MIT, we might have another option in the future. These nifty stackable cars, dubbed CityCars, could one day be available to rent, just like those Parisian bikes. They’re electric, so there’s no need to worry about filling them up. You just grab the first fully-charged one on the rack and go. The racks would be located outside of tourist spots and mass transit stops, making it much easier to fill in the gaps in a city’s transit system. And since the project is getting stylistic input from legendary architect Frank Gehry, you know you’re going to look ultra cool riding around in one.

via Stackable Robot Cars: The Future of Green Mass Transit

Yonge & Adelaide tangled up in great swarms of these things would be like an adult version of those electric mini-car derbies they have in the malls for the toddlers! Seriously, though, can you imagine if Toronto closed off all traffic except delivery/emergency arteries and left the rest to the likes of these mutant golf-carts? Set up whole regions as "No Combustion" roadway zones and you can bet your bippie the other auto-makers would rapidly join GM in rolling out special purpose and custom-taste variations of the electro urban-podcar, and who cares if hydro/electric is limited by charge and the lightweight frames limited in speed: It's only really a few km from Steeles to Front St (just seems light-years away) and Toronto trafficbarely ever beats 40km/hr anyway!

Saturn Eclipse

via smithsonianmag.com

A Cassini photo show sent back from the 7th Heaven.