Translation:

Are you traveling with the Bavaria Ticket Single alone or with several people?

• alone
• group of two
• group of three
• group of four
• group of five

In case I didn’t answer “alone”, would the Online Conductor visit me and make me pay the 40€ elevated transport fee²?

1. You can travel with all local and regional public transport in Bavaria for one day for 20€. There’s also the “normal” Bavaria Ticket which is valid for up to five people.
2. This is the nice official expression for the fine for traveling without a valid ticket.

The paramount educational goals are reverence for God, respect for religious persuasion and the dignity of man, selfcontrol, the recognition of and readiness to undertake responsibility, helpfulness, receptiveness to everything which is beautiful, good and true, as well as a sense of responsibility for the natural world and the environment.

For one thing, the priorities are a bit unsettling – third place for respect for human dignity, next to last place being open-minded about everything true. But also one important goal is missing: teaching pupils how to think.

Also interesting is how you educate pupils who don’t believe in god² in reverence for him.

If you know Germany, you may think that this is Bavaria after all, so this shouldn’t come as a surprise. But a comment on Astrodicticum simplex informs that other states have similar provisions. Northrhine-Westphalia, for example, it’s Article 7 of the Constitution.

Things are looking better in Brandenburg. Article 28 of the Constitution is (no offical translation, but I tried my best):

The purpose of eduction³ is to promote the development of character, thinking and acting independently, respect for the dignity, belief and convictions of others, acceptance of democracy and freedom, ambition for social justice, peaceableness⁴ and solidarity in the co-existence of cultures and peoples, and the responsibility for nature and environment.

Independent thinking on second place, no reverence for god, and respect for the dignity of others (in general) before respect for their belief (in particular) – this sounds definitly more sensible.

1. And this despite Article 188 of the Bavarian Constitution, which states that “Every schoolchild shall receive a copy of this Constitution before the end of his compulsory education.” – and I indeed have such a copy lying around in my old home in the Allgäu.
2. Are Allah, YHWH, Krishna, etc. included?
3. I don’t want to go into Erziehung vs. Bildung…
4. Is this a real word?

Where on Google Earth #207.

For any new players to Where on (Google) Earth, simply post a comment with latitude and longitude and write something about the (geologic) features in the picture. If you win, you get to host the next one.

Because I think that this WoGE is quite easy, I invoke Schott’s Rule: former winners have to wait until posting for 1 hour for each WoGE they got right.

Posting time is 20 June, 14:00 CEST (12:00 UTC).

Have fun and good luck!

Fold at Riedberg Pass, detail view. Stick measure for scale, length 1 m.

Follow this link or click on the image to find out more…

74 words

Typing Speed Test

And, opposed to German, I even didn’t mistype anything; but I’m slower in English. Still, I rank 17535 of 252337, with 393 characters per minute.

Oh, sometimes the internet is full of pointless things.

In an older article (German only) at T_EX and friends, I’ve found a useful website:

Detexify² L_AT_EX handwritten symbol recognition by Daniel Kirsch

As the name suggests, you have an entry area where you can scribble your symbol with the mouse. Then you’ll get a list of symbols that approximately match your “drawing”. Also, the tool can be trained by clicking on the symbole you have wanted. Nice stuff!

Ark Theory.

(By Bizarro; found at Pharyngula the other day.)

I’m quite happy that I didn’t yet have to discuss with students the creationst crap the cartoon makes fun of.

Parasite of the Day

Cymothoa Exigua replaces a fish's tongue. (Photo from Parasite of the Day)

(If this isn’t enough for you, there’s still Wikipedia’s list of parasites. And for extra gemütlichkeit, have a look at human parasites.)

It’s interesting (similar to the first survey) that in Germany, geoblogs are limited to the east and north. Is there nobody who likes to write about e.g. the Alps?

So now the picture in its complete context:

Groundwater Map of Bavaria 1:25000, Section 6532 Nürnberg (1970).

The “Woman Holding a Fish” was in fact the spatial presentation of thicknesses and hydraulic conductivities of the upper groundwater storey¹ of this map sheet. The coloured areas and small squares show the structure and conductivity of the single aquifers.

Transmissivity

Colours indicate the transmissivites (thickness times hydraulic conductivity K; in Germany k_f), as is shown in the table in the right margin of the map:

Colour scheme for transmissivities.

Hydraulic conductivity (ranges for k_f at the bottom of the table) is mainly determined by aquifer type (unconsolidated vs. solid rock) and stratigraphy (indicated in the table head). Combined with thickness (in 10m intervals – table rows) you get the transmissivities. Darker colours mean higher transmissivity.

Spatial structure

The relation of the layers to each other is shown by bars and small squares. It is explained on the bottom right of the map:

Explanation of spatial representation.

The middle aquifer (Middle Keuper² – Burgsandstein, Blasensandstein) is represented by the continuous colour fill, with different shades of blue (see above). The Quaternary sediments form the upper aquifer, which is only present in some places (valley fills). This aquifer is shown as horizontal green bars that “float” above the middle aquifer plane. The bottom aquifer consists of the Lehrberg Layers of the Keuper in purple colours, onto which you can see “down” through the cut-out squares, or “windows”. In the west, there is now bottom aquifer (the Lehrberg Layers become clayey and act as an aquiclude), so no windows there. Finally, in a few places you have a perched aquifer on top, indicated by bars with a thick red line below (symbolising the local aquiclude).

Similar spaced-out designs can for example also be found in the (later published) Hydrogeological Map of the GDR 1:50000 (HK50):

Hydrogeological Map of the GDR 1:50000, main map.

1. Is this the correct translation for „Grundwasserstockwerk”, i.e. a group of (vertically stacked) aquifers?
2. Keuper is the Upper (Germanic) Triassic.

The hydraulic processes of groundwater in nature cause great difficulties for calculations. To date, the geologist usually tends to rely on imagination [impression? understanding? concept? How the hell do you translate „Anschauung“?] only, and to disregard calculations completely. The mathematically trained engineer, on the other hand, often lacks the necessary understanding [imagination? etc.] of geologic structure. Especially in this field of groundwater science, progress can only be made by close collaboration of the geologist and the mathematically trained engineer.

W. Koehne (1928): Grundwasserkunde [Groundwater Science]. Schweizerbart, Stuttgart. p. 116–117.

Quite flattering how he denies geologists any mathematical skill. Hopefully this has improved since then. I, however, am a mathematically trained engineer who only needs to be acquainted with the understanding of geologic structure.

Fireworks in Obermaiselstein, view from Oberdorf chapel

1. I don’t even know who most of these 20 to 30 people are…