Paper

Paper is a thin sheet material produced by mechanically or chemically processing cellulose fibres derived from wood, rags, grasses or other vegetable sources in water, draining the water through fine mesh leaving the fibre evenly distributed on the surface, followed by pressing and drying. 　Although paper was originally made in single sheets by hand, almost all is now made on large machines—some making reels 10 metres wide, running at 2,000 metres per minute and up to 600,000 tonnes a year. 　It is a versatile material with many uses, including printing, painting, graphics, signage, design, packaging, decorating, writing, and cleaning. 　It may also be used as filter paper, wallpaper, book endpaper, conservation paper, laminated worktops, toilet tissue, or currency and security paper, or in a number of industrial and construction processes. 　The papermaking process developed in east Asia, probably China, at least as early as 105 CE, by the Han court eunuch Cai Lun, although the earliest archaeological fragments of paper derive from the 2nd century BCE in China. 　The modern pulp and paper industry is global, with China leading its production and the United States following.

Tell (archaeology)

In archaeology, a tell or tel (borrowed into English from Arabic: تَلّ, tall, 'mound' or 'small hill'), is an artificial topographical feature, a species of mound consisting of the accumulated and stratified debris of a succession of consecutive settlements at the same site, the refuse of generations of people who built and inhabited them, and of natural sediment. 　Tells are most commonly associated with the ancient Near East, but they are also found elsewhere, such as Southern and parts of Central Europe, from Greece and Bulgaria to Hungary and Spain and in North Africa. 　Within the Near East, they are concentrated in less arid regions, including Upper Mesopotamia, the Southern Levant, Anatolia and Iran, which had more continuous settlement. 　Eurasian tells date to the Neolithic,[dubious – discuss] the Neolithic/Chalcolithic, and the Bronze Age/Iron Age era. 　In the Southern Levant the time of the tells ended with the conquest by Alexander the Great, which ushered in the Hellenistic period with its own, different settlement-building patterns.　[citation needed] Many tells across the Near East continue to be occupied and used today.

German

Look up German, Germans, german, or germans in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. 　German(s) may refer to: Germany (of or related to) Germania (historical use) Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law Germanic peoples (Roman times) German language any of the Germanic languages German cuisine, traditional foods of Germany

German (mythology)

German (GER-man, pronounced [ˈɡerman]) is a South Slavic mythological being, recorded in the folklore of eastern Serbia and northern Bulgaria. 　He is a male spirit associated with bringing rain and hail. 　His influence on these precipitations can be positive, resulting in the amount of rain beneficial for agriculture, or negative, with a drought, downpours, or hail. 　Rituals connected with German included making a doll intended to represent this personage. 　This effigy of German, made of rags, fired clay, or dried fruits, was rather large, usually with a distinct representation of the male genitals. 　It was produced and used in rituals exclusively by girls or young women. 　In Eastern Serbia, when a drought developed, girls would make such a doll, and bring it to a river bank. 　Depending on the regional custom, they would either bury it by the river, or put it in a little coffin and let it float down the river. 　Two of the girls would then start lamenting for the doll. 　Asked by the others why they were crying, they would answer, "We are crying for German; because of the drought German has died so that the rain may fall." 　If the amount of rain falling should then become excessive, the doll would be dug up again. 　In northern Bulgaria, the rituals with German usually followed immediately after the Dodola rituals, but could be performed independently from them. 　In some villages they were carried out on the Feast of Saint Germanus. 　Girls would make the doll, 20 to 50 cm long, and lay it on a slate or in a little coffin. 　Having adorned it with flowers, they would bury it with funeral observances. 　After three, nine, or forty days, the doll was dug up and thrown into water. 　People would also try to ward off destructive summer hailstorms by placating German with a ritual performed on Christmas Eve. 　This ritual was recorded in the area around Pirot at the beginning of the 20th century. 　Immediately before the start of the Christmas Eve dinner, the head of the household would go out to his woodpile, to invite German to dinner. 　He would take with him a loaf of bread called "good luck", prepared particularly for this ritual, slivovitz, wine, and a wax candle. 　At the woodpile, he would shout three times, "German, German, wherever you are, come to dinner right now, and in the summer do not let me see your eyes anywhere!" 　He would then light the candle, take a sip of slivovitz, taste some bread, drink wine, and go back into his house. 　Asked how he had fared in his encounter with German, he would answer, "He came, so we dined and drank amply of slivovitz and wine, and then we parted." 　German, who dies so that the nature may regenerate with the falling of rain, can be understood as a spirit of vegetation, dying and then resurrecting with the revival of vegetation. 　His distinctly represented male genitals symbolize fertility. 　The doll of German is presumably a metaphorical replacement of the former human sacrifice. 　It can be included among the Slavic sacrificial dolls, together with the dolls of Yarilo, Kostroma, and Morena. 　In Christianized folk beliefs German is identified with Saint Germanus. 　This saint is associated with the protection from hail, and occasionally from lightning, though the latter was generally ascribed to Saint Elijah.

Military

A military, also known collectively as armed forces, is a heavily armed, highly organized force primarily intended for warfare. 　It is typically authorized and maintained by a sovereign state, with its members identifiable by their distinct military uniform. 　It may consist of one or more military branches such as an army, navy, air force, space force, marines, or coast guard. 　The main task of the military is usually defined as defence of the state and its interests against external armed threats. 　In broad usage, the terms armed forces and military are often treated as synonymous, although in technical usage a distinction is sometimes made in which a country's armed forces may include both its military and other paramilitary forces. 　There are various forms of irregular military forces, not belonging to a recognized state; though they share many attributes with regular military forces, they are less often referred to as simply military. 　A nation's military may function as a discrete social subculture, with dedicated infrastructure such as military housing, schools, utilities, logistics, hospitals, legal services, food production, finance, and banking services. 　Beyond warfare, the military may be employed in additional sanctioned and non-sanctioned functions within the state, including internal security threats, population control, the promotion of a political agenda, emergency services and reconstruction, protecting corporate economic interests, social ceremonies and national honour guards. 　The profession of soldiering as part of a military is older than recorded history itself. 　Some of the most enduring images of classical antiquity portray the power and feats of its military leaders. 　The Battle of Kadesh in 1274 BC was one of the defining points of Pharaoh Ramses II's reign, and his monuments commemorate it in bas-relief. 　A thousand years later, the first emperor of unified China, Qin Shi Huang, was so determined to impress the gods with his military might that he had himself buried with an army of terracotta soldiers. 　The Romans paid considerable attention to military matters, leaving to posterity many treatises and writings on the subject, as well as many lavishly carved triumphal arches and victory columns.

Nothing

Nothing, the complete absence of anything, has been a matter of philosophical debate since at least the 5th century BC. 　Early Greek philosophers argued that it was impossible for nothing to exist. 　The atomists allowed nothing but only in the spaces between the invisibly small atoms. 　For them, all space was filled with atoms. 　Aristotle took the view that there exists matter and there exists space, a receptacle into which matter objects can be placed. 　This became the paradigm for classical scientists of the modern age like Newton. 　Nevertheless, some philosophers, like Descartes, continued to argue against the existence of empty space until the scientific discovery of a physical vacuum. 　Existentialists like Sartre and Heidegger (as interpreted by Sartre) have associated nothing with consciousness. 　Some writers have made connections between Heidegger's concept of nothing and the nirvana of Eastern religions. 　Modern science does not equate vacuum with nothing. 　Indeed, the vacuum in quantum field theory is filled with virtual particles. 　The quantum vacuum is often viewed as a modern version of an aether theory.

London

London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. 　It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a 50-mile (80 km) estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a major settlement for two millennia. 　The City of London, its ancient core and financial centre, was founded by the Romans as Londinium and retains its medieval boundaries. 　The City of Westminster, to the west of the City of London, has for centuries hosted the national government and parliament. 　Since the 19th century, the name "London" has also referred to the metropolis around this core, historically split between the counties of Middlesex, Essex, Surrey, Kent, and Hertfordshire, which since 1965 has largely comprised Greater London, which is governed by 33 local authorities and the Greater London Authority. 　As one of the world's major global cities, London exerts a strong influence on its arts, entertainment, fashion, commerce and finance, education, health care, media, science and technology, tourism, and transport and communications. 　Its GDP (€801.66 billion in 2017) makes it the largest urban economy in Europe, and it is one of the major financial centres in the world. 　With Europe's largest concentration of higher education institutions, it is home to some of the highest-ranked academic institutions in the world—Imperial College London in natural and applied sciences, the London School of Economics in social sciences, and the comprehensive University College London. 　London is the most visited city in Europe and has the busiest city airport system in the world. 　The London Underground is the oldest rapid transit system in the world. 　London's diverse cultures encompass over 300 languages. 　The mid-2018 population of Greater London of about 9 million made it Europe's third-most populous city, accounting for 13.4% of the population of the United Kingdom and over 16% of the population of England. 　The Greater London Built-up Area is the fourth-most populous in Europe with about 9.8 million inhabitants at the 2011 census. 　The London metropolitan area is the third-most populous in Europe with about 14 million inhabitants in 2016, granting London the status of a megacity. 　London has four World Heritage Sites: the Tower of London; Kew Gardens; the combined Palace of Westminster, Westminster Abbey, and St Margaret's Church; and also the historic settlement in Greenwich, where the Royal Observatory, Greenwich defines the prime meridian (0° longitude) and Greenwich Mean Time. 　Other landmarks include Buckingham Palace, the London Eye, Piccadilly Circus, St Paul's Cathedral, Tower Bridge, and Trafalgar Square. 　London has many museums, galleries, libraries and cultural venues, including the British Museum, National Gallery, Natural History Museum, Tate Modern, British Library, and numerous West End theatres. 　Important sporting events held in London include the FA Cup Final (held annually at Wembley Stadium), Wimbledon Tennis Championships and the London Marathon. 　In 2012, London became the first city to host three Summer Olympic Games.

Role

A role (also rôle or social role) is a set of connected behaviors, rights, obligations, beliefs, and norms as conceptualized by people in a social situation. 　It is an expected or free or continuously changing behavior and may have a given individual social status or social position. 　It is vital to both functionalist and interactionist understandings of society. 　Social role theory posits the following about social behavior: The division of labour in society takes the form of the interaction among heterogeneous specialized positions, we call roles. 　Social roles included appropriate and permitted forms of behavior and actions that recur in a group, guided by social norms, which are commonly known and hence determine the expectations for appropriate behavior in these roles, which further explains the place of a person in the society. 　Roles are occupied by individuals, who are called actors. 　When individuals approve of a social role (i.e., they consider the role legitimate and constructive), they will incur costs to conform to role norms, and will also incur costs to punish those who violate role norms. 　Changed conditions can render a social role outdated or illegitimate, in which case social pressures are likely to lead to role change. 　The anticipation of rewards and punishments, as well as the satisfaction of behaving pro-socially, account for why agents conform to role requirements. 　The notion of the role can be and is examined in the social sciences, specifically economics, sociology and organizational theory.

Island

An island or isle is a piece of sub-continental land completely surrounded by water. 　Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. 　An island in a river or a lake island may be called an eyot or ait, and a small island off the coast may be called a holm. 　Sedimentary islands in the Ganges Delta are called chars. 　A grouping of geographically or geologically related islands, such as the Philippines, is referred to as an archipelago. 　There are two main types of islands in the sea; continental and oceanic. 　There are also human-made islands.

Association (ecology)

In phytosociology and community ecology an association is a type of ecological community with a predictable species composition and consistent physiognomy (structural appearance) which occurs in a particular habitat type.　: 181  The term was first coined by Alexander von Humboldt: 16  and formalised by the International Botanical Congress in 1910.: 182  An association can be viewed as a real, integrated entity shaped either by species interactions or by similar habitat requirements, or it can be viewed as merely a common point along a continuum. 　The former view was championed by American ecologist Frederic Clements, who viewed the association as a whole that was more than the sum of its parts, and by Josias Braun-Blanquet, a Swiss-born phytosociologist. 　On the other end of the argument was American ecologist Henry Gleason,: 182–183  who saw these groupings of plant species as a coincidence produced by the "fluctuation and fortuitous immigration of plants, and an equally fluctuating and variable environment".

Association (psychology)

Association in psychology refers to a mental connection between concepts, events, or mental states that usually stems from specific experiences. 　Associations are seen throughout several schools of thought in psychology including behaviorism, associationism, psychoanalysis, social psychology, and structuralism. 　The idea stems from Plato and Aristotle, especially with regard to the succession of memories, and it was carried on by philosophers such as John Locke, David Hume, David Hartley, and James Mill. 　It finds its place in modern psychology in such areas as memory, learning, and the study of neural pathways.

Result

A result (also called upshot) is the final consequence of a sequence of actions or events expressed qualitatively or quantitatively. 　Possible results include advantage, disadvantage, gain, injury, loss, value and victory. 　There may be a range of possible outcomes associated with an event depending on the point of view, historical distance or relevance. 　Reaching no result can mean that actions are inefficient, ineffective, meaningless or flawed. 　Some types of result are as follows: in general, the outcome of any kind of research, action or phenomenon in games (e.g. cricket, lotteries) or wars, the result includes the identity of the victorious party and possibly the effects on the environment in mathematics, the final value of a calculation (e.g. arithmetic operation), function or statistical expression, or the final statement of a theorem that has been proven in statistics, any information analyzed, extracted or interpolated from polls, tests or logs in computer sciences, the return value of a function, state of a system or list of records matching a query (e.g. web search). 　The result type is the data type of the data returned by a function. 　in science, the outcome of an experiment (e.g. see null hypothesis) in forensics and justice, the proof of guilt or innocence of a suspect after evaluating evidence in a criminal investigation in economics and accounting, the profit or loss at the end of a fiscal period. 　in democracy, the election of a representative or the outcome of a vote on a subject In management and related fields, a result is a piece of information that has certain properties in absolute terms or in relation to previous results or settings In a chemistry mix, the result is the final item

Education

Education is a purposeful activity directed at achieving certain aims, such as transmitting knowledge or fostering skills and character traits. 　These aims may include the development of understanding, rationality, kindness, and honesty. 　Various researchers emphasize the role of critical thinking in order to distinguish education from indoctrination. 　Some theorists require that education results in an improvement of the student while others prefer a value-neutral definition of the term. 　In a slightly different sense, education may also refer, not to the process, but to the product of this process: the mental states and dispositions possessed by educated people. 　Education originated as the transmission of cultural heritage from one generation to the next. 　Today, educational goals increasingly encompass new ideas such as the liberation of learners, skills needed for modern society, empathy, and complex vocational skills. 　Types of education are commonly divided into formal, non-formal, and informal education. 　Formal education takes place in education and training institutions, is usually structured by curricular aims and objectives, and learning is typically guided by a teacher. 　In most regions, formal education is compulsory up to a certain age and commonly divided into educational stages such as kindergarten, primary school and secondary school. 　Nonformal education occurs as addition or alternative to formal education. 　It may be structured according to educational arrangements, but in a more flexible manner, and usually takes place in community-based, workplace-based or civil society-based settings. 　Lastly, informal education occurs in daily life, in the family, any experience that has a formative effect on the way one thinks, feels, or acts may be considered educational, whether unintentional or intentional. 　In practice there is a continuum from the highly formalized to the highly informalized, and informal learning can occur in all three settings. 　For instance, homeschooling can be classified as nonformal or informal, depending upon the structure. 　Regardless of setting, educational methods include teaching, training, storytelling, discussion, and directed research. 　The methodology of teaching is called pedagogy. 　Education is supported by a variety of different philosophies, theories and empirical research agendas. 　There are movements for education reforms, such as for improving quality and efficiency of education towards relevance in students' lives and efficient problem solving in modern or future society at large, or for evidence-based education methodologies. 　A right to education has been recognized by some governments and the United Nations. 　For example, 24 January is the International Day of Education. 　At UN - level, several observance years and decades have been dedicated to education, such as 1970 International Education Year. 　Education is also one of the 17 Global Goals, where global initiatives aim at achieving Sustainable Development Goal 4, which promotes quality education for all.

Society

A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. 　Societies are characterized by patterns of relationships (social relations) between individuals who share a distinctive culture and institutions; a given society may be described as the sum total of such relationships among its constituent of members. 　In the social sciences, a larger society often exhibits stratification or dominance patterns in subgroups. 　Societies construct patterns of behavior by deeming certain actions or concepts as acceptable or unacceptable. 　These patterns of behavior within a given society are known as societal norms. 　Societies, and their norms, undergo gradual and perpetual changes. 　So far as it is collaborative, a society can enable its members to benefit in ways that would otherwise be difficult on an individual basis; both individual and social (common) benefits can thus be distinguished, or in many cases found to overlap. 　A society can also consist of like-minded people governed by their own norms and values within a dominant, larger society. 　This is sometimes referred to as a subculture, a term used extensively within criminology, and also applied to distinctive subsections of a larger society. 　More broadly, and especially within structuralist thought, a society may be illustrated as an economic, social, industrial or cultural infrastructure, made up of, yet distinct from, a varied collection of individuals. 　In this regard society can mean the objective relationships people have with the material world and with other people, rather than "other people" beyond the individual and their familiar social environment.

Yet

Look up yet in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. 　Yet is a common English word that, when used as a conjunction, is equivalent to the words "but" or "nevertheless". 　However, used as an adverb, yet defines an action's persistence in time. 　The word can define an action in the past, present or future: I have never yet been late. 　I yet stand. 　I will yet arrive. 　"yet" in questions: What do you have yet to learn? 　(in the future) 　Have you done it yet? 　<=> Have you already done it? 　(in the past) 　The above use of "yet" is illogical, but very common and thus considered correct. 　Yet, or YET, may also refer to: YET, the IATA code for Edson Airport, Alberta, Canada YET, the National Rail code for Yetminster railway station in Dorset, UK "Yet" (song) by the American band Exile Yett, sometimes spelt yet is a local dialect term in lowland Scotland and Cumbria for a reinforced door or gate

Language

Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. 　It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and written forms, and may also be conveyed through sign languages. 　The vast majority of human languages have developed writing systems that allow for the recording and preservation of the sounds or signs of language. 　Human language is characterized by its cultural and historical diversity, with significant variations observed between cultures and across time. 　Human languages possess the properties of productivity and displacement, which enable the creation of an infinite number of sentences, and the ability to refer to objects, events, and ideas that are not immediately present in the discourse. 　The use of human language relies on social convention and is acquired through learning. 　Estimates of the number of human languages in the world vary between 5,000 and 7,000. 　Precise estimates depend on an arbitrary distinction (dichotomy) established between languages and dialects. 　Natural languages are spoken, signed, or both; however, any language can be encoded into secondary media using auditory, visual, or tactile stimuli – for example, writing, whistling, signing, or braille. 　In other words, human language is modality-independent, but written or signed language is the way to inscribe or encode the natural human speech or gestures. 　Depending on philosophical perspectives regarding the definition of language and meaning, when used as a general concept, "language" may refer to the cognitive ability to learn and use systems of complex communication, or to describe the set of rules that makes up these systems, or the set of utterances that can be produced from those rules. 　All languages rely on the process of semiosis to relate signs to particular meanings. 　Oral, manual and tactile languages contain a phonological system that governs how symbols are used to form sequences known as words or morphemes, and a syntactic system that governs how words and morphemes are combined to form phrases and utterances. 　The scientific study of language is called linguistics. 　Critical examinations of languages, such as philosophy of language, the relationships between language and thought, how words represent experience, etc., have been debated at least since Gorgias and Plato in ancient Greek civilization. 　Thinkers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–1778) have argued that language originated from emotions, while others like Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) have argued that languages originated from rational and logical thought. 　Twentieth century philosophers such as Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951) argued that philosophy is really the study of language itself. 　Major figures in contemporary linguistics of these times include Ferdinand de Saussure and Noam Chomsky. 　Language is thought to have gradually diverged from earlier primate communication systems when early hominins acquired the ability to form a theory of mind and shared intentionality. 　This development is sometimes thought to have coincided with an increase in brain volume, and many linguists see the structures of language as having evolved to serve specific communicative and social functions. 　Language is processed in many different locations in the human brain, but especially in Broca's and Wernicke's areas. 　Humans acquire language through social interaction in early childhood, and children generally speak fluently by approximately three years old. 　Language and culture are codependent. 　Therefore, in addition to its strictly communicative uses, language has social uses such as signifying group identity, social stratification, as well as use for social grooming and entertainment. 　Languages evolve and diversify over time, and the history of their evolution can be reconstructed by comparing modern languages to determine which traits their ancestral languages must have had in order for the later developmental stages to occur. 　A group of languages that descend from a common ancestor is known as a language family; in contrast, a language that has been demonstrated to not have any living or non-living relationship with another language is called a language isolate. 　There are also many unclassified languages whose relationships have not been established, and spurious languages may have not existed at all. 　Academic consensus holds that between 50% and 90% of languages spoken at the beginning of the 21st century will probably have become extinct by the year 2100.

Site

Look up site in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. 　Site most often refers to: Archaeological site Campsite, a place used for overnight stay in an outdoor area Construction site Location, a point or an area on the Earth's surface or elsewhere Website, a set of related web pages, typically with a common domain name It may also refer to: Site, a National Register of Historic Places property type SITE (originally known as Sculpture in the Environment), an American architecture and design firm Site (mathematics), a category C together with a Grothendieck topology on C The Site, a 1990s TV series that aired on MSNBC SITE Intelligence Group, a for-profit organization tracking jihadist and white supremacist organizations SITE Institute, a terrorism-tracking organization, precursor to the SITE Intelligence Group Sindh Industrial and Trading Estate, a company in Sindh, Pakistan SITE Centers, American commercial real estate company SITE Town, a densely populated town in Karachi, Pakistan S.I.T.E Industrial Area, an area in Karachi, Pakistan Satellite Instructional Television Experiment, an experimental satellite communications project launched in India in 1975 Google Sites, web based website editor

Type (biology)

In biology, a type is a particular specimen (or in some cases a group of specimens) of an organism to which the scientific name of that organism is formally attached. 　In other words, a type is an example that serves to anchor or centralizes the defining features of that particular taxon. 　In older usage (pre-1900 in botany), a type was a taxon rather than a specimen. 　A taxon is a scientifically named grouping of organisms with other like organisms, a set that includes some organisms and excludes others, based on a detailed published description (for example a species description) and on the provision of type material, which is usually available to scientists for examination in a major museum research collection, or similar institution.

Election

An election is a formal group decision-making process by which a population chooses an individual or multiple individuals to hold public office. 　Elections have been the usual mechanism by which modern representative democracy has operated since the 17th century. 　Elections may fill offices in the legislature, sometimes in the executive and judiciary, and for regional and local government. 　This process is also used in many other private and business organisations, from clubs to voluntary associations and corporations. 　The global use of elections as a tool for selecting representatives in modern representative democracies is in contrast with the practice in the democratic archetype, ancient Athens, where the elections were considered an oligarchic institution and most political offices were filled using sortition, also known as allotment, by which officeholders were chosen by lot. 　Electoral reform describes the process of introducing fair electoral systems where they are not in place, or improving the fairness or effectiveness of existing systems. 　Psephology is the study of results and other statistics relating to elections (especially with a view to predicting future results). 　Election is the fact of electing, or being elected. 　To elect means "to select or make a decision", and so sometimes other forms of ballot such as referendums are referred to as elections, especially in the United States.

Title

A title is one or more words used before or after a person's name, in certain contexts. 　It may signify either generation, an official position, or a professional or academic qualification. 　In some languages, titles may be inserted between the first and last name (for example, Graf in German, Cardinal in Catholic usage (Richard Cardinal Cushing) or clerical titles such as Archbishop). 　Some titles are hereditary.

Fire

Fire is the rapid oxidation of a material (the fuel) in the exothermic chemical process of combustion, releasing heat, light, and various reaction products. 　At a certain point in the combustion reaction, called the ignition point, flames are produced. 　The flame is the visible portion of the fire. 　Flames consist primarily of carbon dioxide, water vapor, oxygen and nitrogen. 　If hot enough, the gases may become ionized to produce plasma. 　Depending on the substances alight, and any impurities outside, the color of the flame and the fire's intensity will be different. 　Fire in its most common form can result in conflagration, which has the potential to cause physical damage through burning. 　Fire is an important process that affects ecological systems around the globe. 　The positive effects of fire include stimulating growth and maintaining various ecological systems. 　Its negative effects include hazard to life and property, atmospheric pollution, and water contamination. 　If fire removes protective vegetation, heavy rainfall may lead to an increase in soil erosion by water. 　Also, when vegetation is burned, the nitrogen it contains is released into the atmosphere, unlike elements such as potassium and phosphorus which remain in the ash and are quickly recycled into the soil. 　This loss of nitrogen caused by a fire produces a long-term reduction in the fertility of the soil, but this fecundity can potentially be recovered as molecular nitrogen in the atmosphere is "fixed" and converted to ammonia by natural phenomena such as lightning and by leguminous plants that are "nitrogen-fixing" such as clover, peas, and green beans. 　Fire is one of the four classical elements and has been used by humans in rituals, in agriculture for clearing land, for cooking, generating heat and light, for signaling, propulsion purposes, smelting, forging, incineration of waste, cremation, and as a weapon or mode of destruction.

Design

A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. 　The verb to design expresses the process of developing a design. 　In some cases, the direct construction of an object without an explicit prior plan (such as in craftwork, some engineering, coding, and graphic design) may also be considered to be a design activity. 　The design usually has to satisfy certain goals and constraints; may take into account aesthetic, functional, economic, or socio-political considerations; and is expected to interact with a certain environment. 　Typical examples of designs include architectural and engineering drawings, circuit diagrams, sewing patterns and less tangible artefacts such as business process models.

Car

A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. 　Most definitions of cars say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people (rather than goods). 　Cars were invented in 1886, when German inventor Carl Benz patented his Benz Patent-Motorwagen. 　Cars became widely available during the 20th century. 　One of the first cars affordable by the masses was the 1908 Model T, an American car manufactured by the Ford Motor Company. 　Cars were rapidly adopted in the US, where they replaced horse-drawn carriages. 　In Europe and other parts of the world, demand for automobiles did not increase until after World War II. 　The car is considered an essential part of the developed economy. 　Cars have controls for driving, parking, passenger comfort, and a variety of lights. 　Over the decades, additional features and controls have been added to vehicles, making them progressively more complex. 　These include rear-reversing cameras, air conditioning, navigation systems, and in-car entertainment. 　Most cars in use in the early 2020s are propelled by an internal combustion engine, fuelled by the combustion of fossil fuels. 　Electric cars, which were invented early in the history of the car, became commercially available in the 2000s and are predicted to cost less to buy than gasoline cars before 2025. 　The transition from fossil fuels to electric cars features prominently in most climate change mitigation scenarios, such as Project Drawdown's 100 actionable solutions for climate change. 　There are costs and benefits to car use. 　The costs to the individual include acquiring the vehicle, interest payments (if the car is financed), repairs and maintenance, fuel, depreciation, driving time, parking fees, taxes, and insurance. 　The costs to society include maintaining roads, land use, road congestion, air pollution, noise pollution, public health and disposing of the vehicle at the end of its life. 　Traffic collisions are the largest cause of injury-related deaths worldwide. 　Personal benefits include on-demand transportation, mobility, independence, and convenience. 　Societal benefits include economic benefits, such as job and wealth creation from the automotive industry, transportation provision, societal well-being from leisure and travel opportunities, and revenue generation from taxes. 　People's ability to move flexibly from place to place has far-reaching implications for the nature of societies. 　There are around one billion cars in use worldwide. 　Car usage is increasing rapidly, especially in China, India, and other newly industrialized countries.

Police

The police are a constituted body of persons empowered by a state, with the aim to enforce the law, to ensure the safety, health, and possessions of citizens, and to prevent crime and civil disorder. 　Their lawful powers include arrest and the use of force legitimized by the state via the monopoly on violence. 　The term is most commonly associated with the police forces of a sovereign state that are authorized to exercise the police power of that state within a defined legal or territorial area of responsibility. 　Police forces are often defined as being separate from the military and other organizations involved in the defense of the state against foreign aggressors; however, gendarmerie are military units charged with civil policing. 　Police forces are usually public sector services, funded through taxes. 　Law enforcement is only part of policing activity. 　Policing has included an array of activities in different situations, but the predominant ones are concerned with the preservation of order. 　In some societies, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, these developed within the context of maintaining the class system and the protection of private property. 　Police forces have become ubiquitous in modern societies. 　Nevertheless, their role can be controversial, as they may be involved to varying degrees in corruption, brutality, and the enforcement of authoritarian rule. 　A police force may also be referred to as a police department, police service, constabulary, gendarmerie, crime prevention, protective services, law enforcement agency, civil guard, or civic guard. 　Members may be referred to as police officers, troopers, sheriffs, constables, rangers, peace officers or civic/civil guards. 　Ireland differs from other English-speaking countries by using the Irish language terms Garda (singular) and Gardaí (plural), for both the national police force and its members. 　The word police is the most universal and similar terms can be seen in many non-English speaking countries. 　Numerous slang terms exist for the police. 　Many slang terms for police officers are decades or centuries old with lost etymologies. 　One of the oldest, cop, has largely lost its slang connotations and become a common colloquial term used both by the public and police officers to refer to their profession.