Just like what it mentions in its official website and its documentation, the app exactly does its job. Whenever I tried to access any distractive app it is quitted right away and when I intended to open any distractive website, Focus reminds me to keep on track by redirecting me to this page:

I set the Focus app to run 24 hours a day and start again automatically at the start of every day, blocking all the social media apps and all the websites. I also gave myself 60 minutes of break time in total every day. But here is the problem. There are always situations that cannot be predicted. There is this day when I have spent most of my break time on research for a HW and when I realized that I have no more break time to turn in my HW, I panicked, so I was on the way exploring ways to “escape from Focus”. If you, like me, has set yourself long period of “Focus time” and couldn’t access essential functions when you actually need them, this article is for you.

Approaches

There are three main approaches when it comes to escaping from Focus:

1. Bypass / avoid using the default system to browse websites
2. Trick the Focus app
3. Stop the Focus app completely

Bypassing the Default System

There are two ways I thought about that can achieve the purpose. The first way, use a virtual machine.

Using a Virtual Machine

As shown above, while websites cannot be opened through Chrome for MacOS, it can still be accessed through Chrome installed on the Windows 10 running on Parallels.

Besides Parallels, there are also many more affordable alternatives such as VMWare Fusion, Apple Boot Camp (not recommended as it cannot run with the MacOS system at the same time, which is quite inconvenient) VirtualBox (free for personal or education version) Wine and CrossOver (these turn Windows software into Mac apps, the quality of the apps are not guaranteed. e.g. There could be problems such as having confusing codes in apps with Chinese).

Creating a new Mac account

Since Focus is only applied to the current user using the Mac, it does not work on other users or groups. It is also simple to switch between accounts, any file that you want to move from one account to another can be placed in the Application folder as it is shared among all the users.

Click the “+” sign at bottom left to add a user, and click the “-” anytime when you want to remove the user.

Trick Focus

Now this is our second approach. This method helps us to open those apps blocked by Focus. When we were setting which app cannot be opened by the user in preferences of the Focus app, we give the app the address of the app it is going block, for instance, “/Applications/weChat.app”. This means that if we change the address of the app, it will not be able to find the app anymore and therefore the app is unblocked.

There are two main ways to do so. One, copy your app to somewhere else, away from the Applications folder. In this way its address is changed and you can double click to open the app. The second way is much more easier, that is, to change the name of the app, for instance, from weChat to WeiXin. The address of the app will therefore change from “/Applications/weChat.app” to “/Applications/WeiXin.app”. Therefore, the app will not be recognized by the Focus app and can then be opened.

Stop Focus completely

This might not be a great choice for many, since this goes against the purpose of Focus and doesn’t really suit the situation given at the start of the Article, but since it works I will include it here.

The way Focus counts down the Focus time remaining, is through comparing the System time with the time you started focusing. By changing the system time, we can trick Focus into thinking that we are already at the time when the Focus time is passed. Focus will automatically stops counting down and be “unfocused”.

First, go to System Preferences, click on “Date & Time” at the bottom.

Click on the lock at the bottom left to make changes, then uncheck the box that says “Set date and time automatically”. At the calendar below change the time to anything that is after the Focus period. At the same time, the Focus app will stop focusing on its own. Then switch the system time back if you wish by checking the box again.

Thanks for reading and hope this helps. The above methods is only for emergency situations when you cannot access essential functions when you actually need them, and not for getting off track. Always remember that Focus is an app to stop you from getting distracted and use it in the best way to help yourself.

The post Focus App for Mac: How to stop Focus during Emergency appeared first on Nightingale.

So we walked into the nursery. To my surprise, the nursery looked normal: no dead plants, no broken pots, everything were in place as good as when we left it. The nursery was the place at the corner of our school, away from the buildings and just next to the dormitory and the clinic. Very little students might want to go there, partly because it looks so simple that no one would look at it for a second time, and partly because that it looks wet — how could it be not wet if it was designed for Southeast Asia Rainforest plant species? A few simple poles, a large cloth tied onto the poles acting as a roof, and that was the appearance of the nursery. There were sunlight shining through the cloth onto the racks of plants underneath it, the light of life, providing enough food and energy for these Southeast Asia plant species. It is probably because of the rains during the CNY holiday. The only thing is that there was a strong odor of poop — some careless students might come over here during the holiday and knocked over the fertilizer bin.

But that was not a problem. We started on the works. Our student leader Nancy was quarantined at home due to the novel Coronavirus, but she told us that we had been too kind on the weeds that they were all over the nursery, even on the artificial grass. So that was the work to do for some of us.

For me, the task was to replant several trees of the species Sterculia macrophylla. These trees had been planted by us in black plastic containers as seeds, now that they had grown much bigger and the small plastic container couldn’t hold it anymore, we will need to plant it into another pot.

This was like any other normal works in our service, it was just that this time I realized something else. Rainforest Restoration Project was the first college service I have tried out that interact with the plants in our campus so much. Before I enrolled in the service, I thought what I would learn from it is probably to get out of my comfort zone and be more bearable to muds, dirts and be more tolerable to the harsher environments. Today, I truly understand what it means by the interaction between humans and the environment. It isn’t that the humans could bear to stay with the environment, neither is it that humans could learn to do weeding or other works without feeling disgusted. It is more of how people started to get appealed and attracted by the environment, by its beauty. I won’t feel that way towards nature if I didn’t join the service, since I just feel that it is dirty to touch the muds and the unwashed pots. What really changed my mind was a member that was in the same service with me. She was really fond of biology and was an expert at planting plants.

When we were replanting the Sterculia macrophylla plants together today, while I was reluctant to touch the mud, she calmly lifted the plant out of the plastic container without a second thought, clearing the mud around its roots and, slowly and lightly, placed it into the pot. The way she took the roots out of the mud, how she hold tightly around the branches of the plant without the slightest reluctance, as if what was in front of her wasn’t a muddy wet plant with its curly roots, and instead a pet, a friend that she would be willing to spend lots of time with and put her love into her interaction with it.

In my last school and the school before that one, our class had several attempts in making our classroom greener by planting classroom plants. These plants were always put at the place where everyone could see, not the place where it was the most suitable for the plant. It was always our teachers who watered the plants and asked the reluctant students to do it with her, and no one actually liked the process. When there were weeds that were growing in the pot, no one wanted to clear that away — isn’t our aim making our classroom greener? Now weeds are also green, why shouldn’t we keep it? I mean, these are all perfectly normal, but I feel like what I did in my past schools, planting the plants and watering them, were not actions out of love and adoration. These works were compulsory to do, and we did it not out of our true hearts, and if we felt happiness from doing so, it was because we felt that we were the only class who had done something like this and we did not have to go to academic lessons and did maths or wrote essays. It was never because of something I felt today when I saw that girl ran her fingers on the bark of the plant, putting soil around its roots as if helping it to go to bed, putting the layer of mulch in a ring shape and watering it with a joyful smile.

When I looked at the nursery again, I no longer felt that it was a rainforest that no one cares if they died during the holiday or the term break. We are all taking care of it, all of us, the service students, teachers, the gardener, biology students. We had gently filled the mud in gently for all of them, and undeniably, they are our friends. Plants live in a completely different way compared with us, but we live in the same world and rely on each other. How amazing.

The post Feb 7 Rainforest Restoration Project appeared first on Nightingale.

Photosynthesis – the process by which plants manufacture carbohydrates from raw materials using energy from light.

Transpiration – loss of water vapour from plant leaves by evaporation of water at the surface of the mesophyll cells followed by diffusion of water vapour through the stomata.

Autotroph – Example – plant
Organisms that produce their own food out of non-organic materials such as carbon dioxide and water (notice, water is non-organic). These simple compounds are built into complex substances that might oxidize to produce energy.

Heterotroph –
An organism that does not manufacture its own food and energy and instead take in organic materials. These complex food substances were broken down into simple substances, which could be absorbed or oxidized to release energy.

Glucose is simple sugar while starch is complex carbohydrate that includes a large amount of glucose unit.

Stomata / stoma – The space found between guard cells.

Elements and Compounds

Nitrates – compounds found in fertilisers used for making amino acids which can then be built up into proteins
to make lot’s of amino acids ~

Phosphate – compounds found in fertilisers, needed for energy production (ATP), a component of cell membranes and DNA
a component of DNA~ (and cell membrane~)

Magnesium – mineral ion used for making chlorophyll molecules
help with photosynthesis~ (by making chlorophyll!)

Potassium – From fertilizers. Substance needed to make the enzymes involved in respiration and photosynthesis
help with photosynthesis~ (and respiration~ by producing enzymes)
Too much for lyrics ?

Fertilizers – products that contain minerals sucha s nitrogen (not nitrate), potassium and phosphorus, which help plants to grow and increase crop yields.

Xylem – vessel present in plants that transports water and nutrients from soil to stems and leaves, and provides mechanical support to plants.

Phloem – vessel present in plants that transport glucose made in the leaves to all other parts of the plant. For storage or cell respiration.

Upper epidermis – a single layer of cells containing no chloroplasts. It is thin and transparent to allow the maximum amount of light to pass through to the palisade mesophyll layer. (contains the waxy cuticle)

Lower epidermis – A single layer of cells containing no chloroplasts and many stomata (it does not need chloroplast since sun light cannot reach the underneath of the leaves)

Spongy mesophyll – A layer of cells in the interior of leaves, consisting of loosely arranged, irregularly shaped cells that have chloroplasts. Air spaces allow carbon dioxide to diffuse through the leaf and increase the surface area.

Palisade Mesophyll – A layer of cells located right below the upper epidermis and waxy cuticle. They contain many chloroplasts for maximum light absorptions. Their main role is to do photosynthesis.

Plant nutrition

Definition of photosynthesis – the process by which plants manufacture carbohydrates from raw materials using energy from light

Word equation – Carbon dioxide + water → glucose + oxygen

Chlorophyll transfers light energy into chemical energy in molecules, for the synthesis of carbohydrates （叶绿素为了碳水化合物的合成将光能转换成化学能，储存在分子里，稍后再用）

Plants subsequently store the product of photosynthesis as carbohydrates and use it later.

Appropriate amounts of carbon dioxide, light, chlorophyll is necessary for photosynthesis.

Investigate and describe the effect of varying light intensity and temperature on the rate of photosynthesis (e.g. in submerged aquatic plants, cabomba)

Parts of a leaf:

• chloroplasts
• cuticle
• Guard cells
• stomata
• Upper epidermis
• Lower epidermis
• palisade
• mesophyll
• Spongy mesophyll
• Vascular bundle
• xylem
• Phloem
• dicotyledonous – 双子叶植物

Starch Test:

If a plant is left without sunlight, regardless of other factors, it is going to be brown and orange
If a plant is exposed in sunlight without Carbon dioxide, it is going to be brown?
If a plant is blocked from sunlight but has carbon dioxide, it is going to be brown, blue, or black?

A blue or black color shows that a plant contains starch.

textbook

Leaves that has different colors for different parts (for example green and white) are called variegated leaves. Some parts of their leaves have chlorophyll while some do not.

Scientists put Sodium hydroxide to absorb Carbon dioxide so that plants cannot absorb it.

Describe the significance of features of a leaf in terms of functions, to include:

• Palisade mesophyll and distribution of chloroplast – photosynthesis
• Stomata, spongy mesophyll cells and guard cells – gas exchange
• Xylem for transport and support
• Phloem for transport

Describe the importance of:

• Nitrate ions for making amino acids
• Magnesium ions for making chlorophyll

Explain the effects of nitrate ion and magnesium ion deficiency on plant growth

First we have,
phosphate,
a component of DNA
Potassium, Magnesium
Both help with photosynthesis,
Nitrate is,
The complex one
combines with glucose,
to make lots of amino acids

No Nitrates,
plants won’t grow
no phosphate then discolored leaves,
Potassium,
Magnesium
Without them then yellow leaves

Let it grow
Let it grow…

Transportation in Plants

State the functions of xylem and phloem

Identify the position of xylem as seen in sections of roots, stems and leaves, limited to non-woody dicotyledonous plants

Identify root hair cells, as seen under the light microscope, and state their functions

Phloem is always on the outside xylem is on the inside, whether it is down on the roots or up on the stems. When in the leaves, phloem is always underneath xylem, imagine the stem and roots being split up.

The large surface area of root hairs increases the rate of absorption of water and ions

The pathway water takes from the root to the stem and finally to the leaf is root hair cells, root cortex cells, xylem and finally mesophyll cells.

What does different parts of a leaf do?

Lower epidermis – this layer has guard cells which control the opening and closing of stomata

Waxy cuticle – This layer decreases water loss. It is transparent so that light can pass through

Spongy mesophyll layer – loosely-packed cells covered with a thin film of water allows diffusion of carbon dioxide. Large air spaces.

Upper epidermis – Supports the leaf when the cells are turgid. Covered by waxy cuticle.

Vascular bundle – Composed of xylem and phloem. Provide transport and support.

Xylem – Cell wall thickened with lignin. Conducts water and mineral salts and gives mechanical support.

Phloem – Transports sugar made during photosynthesis. Sieve plates separate adjacent cells.

Palisade mesophyll – cells are tightly-packed and contain many chloroplasts for maximum light absorption

Water is transported from roots to leaves through the xylem vessels

?? How does water actually moves up ??

Water move upwards in the xylem because of the transpiration pull, helping to create a water potential gradient that draws up a column of water molecules, held together by cohesion.

Investigate and describe the effects of variation of temperature and humidity on transpiration rate.

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Everything is normal, except — why are we not allowed to wear masks if we are not sick? Isn’t wearing masks the best way to prevent being affected? To my surprise, our school also posted an announcement later today, saying that if we wear masks in school, we would be taken as being infected by the virus and would be sent home because of this. That was probably a common rule now for schools in Singapore. However, what is the point of this rule?

To be honest, I don’t really know, and the news article on the official Singapore government website didn’t mention it either. There were two possible reasons that I can think of. One of them could simply be, to let more people be aware of those potential virus carriers.

The effect of this rule was soon experienced by a neighbor of my sister’s classmate, not long after the article appeared on the newspaper. So my sister’s classmate’s mum was, I think, washing her car downstairs. Since washing a car might have water splashing everywhere (that’s the case for me when I was washing my horse) and it might smell bad, the mum wore a mask, the normal kind of mask, not N95. She went upstairs by the lift of her apartment, and when the door of the lift opened there was an old gentleman standing outside, seeing her mask, too shocked to say anything and out of the mum’s surprise, he fell down just next to her feet.

Well, you may ask, who will wear a mask then, if everyone will be scared of him/her and keep away from him/her if he/she do so? Exactly. It is likely that no one will want to wear a mask anymore if they can choose not to.

Since the second and third case was confirmed in Singapore, there have been long queues and empty shelves at several retail outlets islandwide. Everyone wants to stay safe, and my family was no exception. The night when the 2nd case was confirmed, mum was searching in all online stores in Singapore for masks, and after all of these searching and shopping, we got more than 500 masks delivering to our home. This might seems like a lot in a normal family, but for our family, my 4 grandparents, daddy mummy Ariel and me, our 2 helpers, there are 10 people together. If this novel Coronavirus lasts for 2 months, it is not an unusual thing for us to use 1 or even less a day. Think about this, normally a family will think of buying 500 masks, what about 10 families, 100 families, 1000? As a small island, Singapore apparently does not produce its own masks. These masks that people are trying to get from the retail outlets must be imported from a close and reliable source. Some mask before the virus might be imported in China, but right now, as the place with the most number of people infected, China probably won’t export masks anymore since mask is already short for its own use.

So in a nutshell, the reason why the government wanted to stop people from wearing masks if they are not sick, might be:

1. letting people to be more aware of those around them since they could be potential virus carriers
2. Save masks as they are already short in supply in Singapore

Well, it is still undeniable that masks are useful and helpful when preventing infections. There are still risk of no wearing a mask, but since the article is already posted on the newspaper, I guess the advantages of doing so still outweigh the disadvantages. Just be careful everyone ?

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The exams of all subjects are coming in December. Today, we got a chemistry class, and one of the questions in the test confuses me a lot. The question asks: Why do people add Chlorine in drinking water?

Add Chlorine to drinking water?

1

Is water with Chlorine drinkable?

My first uncertainty to this question is that: Is water with Chlorine drinkable? From my understanding of the element Chlorine, it is toxic. Chlorine in gas form was used as a chemical weapon during WWII, causing thousands of deaths. How could chlorine be added into drinking water?

I did some research online. There was an experiment in the 1980s about the effects of chlorine on human bodies. Both the animal experiments and human experiments performed directly with chlorine-treated water in this experiment showed high safety. No adverse effects were observed at a dose of 0.34 mg of chlorine per kg of body weight (This dose was the highest used in the experiment, so it was not clear that what dosage would be high).

As long as not too much Chlorine is added, it is safe for human body

But this doesn’t mean that Chlorine is safe for human body. After Chlorine enters a human body, a large amount of hypochlorous acid will be produced after a chemical reaction: Cl2 + H2O –> HCl + HClO), which causes the oxidation of tissues. Hydrochloric acid stimulates inflammatory swelling of the mucous membranes, making the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract swell and secretes a large amount of mucus, causing breathing difficulties. So therefore, the obvious symptom of chlorine poisoning is a severe cough. When the symptoms are severe, pulmonary edema can occur, making circulation difficult and possibly causing death.

Recently, I read an article from Singapore Eye: 罕见！新加坡5岁女孩游泳后全身红肿，刺痛无比……. The little girl in the article, after swimming, got a lot of bumps on her body of different shapes and sizes. They looked like mosquito bites, but they ranges from her upper body to the thigh, looking scary.

What caused such scary symptoms? Yes, it was Chlorine.

I still feel a bit scared after reading this. It was very lucky that the girl did not drink water from the pool. From the symptoms described in the article, her skin was stimulated by the Hydrochloric acid after the reaction of chlorine, but fortunate what swelled was her skin and not her throat, or else the consequences would be deadly.

2

Why do people add Chlorine in drinking water?

Simple answer: Sterilization

Bacteria is affected by hypochlorous acid in the same way (not sure if bacteria will be affected by hydrochloric acid, maybe through osmosis, but absolutely not because of a swelling throat). Since hypochlorous acid molecules are small in volume and do not have charges, it is very easy from them to go through the cell membranes. Hypochlorous acid is also a strong oxidant that can harm cell membranes, allowing protein and nuclei to fall out from bacteria (sounds disgusting), causing its death.

All in all, the amount of chlorine added to the water must not be too much, otherwise, let alone drinking the water, even pool water will cause great harm to people. However, as long as not too much Chlorine is added, human bodies will not be harmed.

Chemistry test – correct answer – sterilization.

The post Why do people add Chlorine in drinking water? appeared first on Nightingale.

I was revising for Chemistry as we have a test tmr.

I started with a practice test paper and got stuck on a question about balancing the equation. The reactants are almost the same as the products, except there is one less hydrogen atom than the right-hand side.

I thought about it for about an hour, and I gave up. I searched it up on the web, and finally found out the difference of a few letters: It was Ammonium, NH4 on the left-hand side, and Ammonia, NH3 on the right-hand side. It’s 10 already and I was really freaking out.

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Economics is a very new subject to me. I had use this word in many essays, in English and Humanities, but never went into the subject. Now that I get into Grade 9, I start this mysterious subject. Our first task was to give examples of economics in daily life, for example, when we are choosing the GCSE subjects.

We were to analyse the things that we should think about before deciding on choosing a subject. Although mine isn’t very into the detailed things, but from the size of the poster that we were required to make and the economic terms that we were supposed to include, I’m sure I am doing mine quite well

Economics here we go!

Full Screen

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This cartoon could be just out of the illustrator’s creativity, without any meaning, but these are what I gain from it:

1. Always be aware of those special things hidden around you. They could be surprises, could be beauty, could be inspirations. Do not miss these details, these essences of life and live with passion.

2. It is ok to different with others. It is not because that you are odd, it could be that you are the creative one. Live the style you like and do not stop because of other people’s opinions on you.

The post The Chair appeared first on Nightingale.

Recently, I read a report on a research project investigating the relationship between playing violent video games and aggressiveness. The report had lots of strength, but it also has a few drawbacks. (As I am just a beginner at Social Sciences, I am not going to talk about the technical things)

Link of the original report published on scirp.org: http://www.scirp.org/journal/PaperInformation.aspx?PaperID=49551&utm_campaign=NEWSPAPER2&utm_source=e_cp&utm_medium=psych_20140912_chengyuanyuan 

Download as PDF (Size:3423KB)

Manipulation

In the experiment, there was an important independent variable, which is to play violent video games or to play non-violent video games. The manipulation of the independent variable was done quite well. The experimenter has assigned an experimental group that was asked to play 16 hours of violent video games in the experiment, and a control group that was required to play 16 hours of non-violent video games. This is a good experimental design, as the students that went to the experimental and control group had similar characteristics at the beginning. By assigning two groups and exposing them in different conditions, it will be easy to find out the impact of violent video games on these students. However, based on the design of the experiment, there were still two drawbacks. Firstly, it might not be enough to just have two groups. The questionnaire and the EEG test the participants took before they started playing the video games might cause them to be expecting the result of the research study. Thus, they might be more aware of themselves being more aggressive and the group playing non-violent video games might be more aggressive than expected. Therefore, it might be better to have two more groups that do not take questionnaires (only EEG tests) before playing video games, one playing violent video games and the other playing non-violent video games. In this way, the impacts of video games on university students measured would be more accurate.

Secondly, as indicated in the report, male participants were more affected after playing the video games, which is partly because the main characters in the games are all male and it might be easier for male participants to identify themselves with the character. The experiment could be improved by having four gender-mixed groups: a group that plays a violent game with a male main character, a group that plays a violent game with a female main character, a group that plays a non-violent game with a male main character and a group that plays a non-violent game with a female character. In this way, it will be easier to see the effects of violent video games on both genders.

Measuring Instrument

Two measuring instruments are used in the research study, the questionnaire and the EEG. The questionnaire, in my opinion, is not quite reliable. One reason for it is that a questionnaire depends on how the participants felt about themselves, which is not accurate as being aggressive isn’t a good thing. The answers of the participants would be rather neutral and there would be fewer answers at the two ends of the scale, including “Strongly agree” and “Strongly disagree”.

The other measuring instrument used in the research study, EEG, was a very accurate type of measurement. (Although I don’t know how it exactly works,) By using EEG, the research study not only depends on how the participants felt about themselves, which the questionnaire does, but also has science-based shreds of evidence. This provides stronger and more reasonable support for the hypothesis that playing violent video games increases aggressiveness.

External Validity and Sampling Method

The external validity is very low in this research study. Firstly, the sampling method used in this research study is convenience sampling. All the participants in the research study are university students from local universities in Japan. This causes a great issue, as mentioned in the report: The results of the experiment can only be used to explain the effects of playing violent video games on university students in Japan at about the year 2014. This does not conform to the final result of the research study, playing violent video games causes aggressiveness, as the final result of the research study is universalistic.

Secondly, the procedure of the experiment could cause a severe threat. Although the experimental and control groups are randomly selected, the participants were still able to see that there were two groups. This formed a setting threat due to artificiality. The participants were likely to guess what the independent variable is (to play or not play violent video games) as the effects of playing violent video games were gradually becoming a more serious concern, and react to the fact that there was another group in the research study by having their own expectations of the results.

Thirdly, there are considerable differences between the participants. For instance, there were more male participants than female participants. This could lead to the possibility that the female participants are less representative than male participants. Another great difference was their ages. The age of the participants ranged from 18 to 29. 11 years of age difference could cause this group of participants to have lots of differences both physically and mentally. These are all variables that were supposed to be fixed in the experiment and not fully considered, causing the result being less accurate in descri

The post Analysis: Relationship between Video Game Violence and Long-Term Neuropsychological Outcomes appeared first on Nightingale.

I am not saying that the books are bad. They are great books indeed, including Heart of Darkness and Catch-22. It is just that they are books that require higher maturity that I had not reached yet :-p I will just continue on the books that my classmates are reading.

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