A Ton of Crap (111 page)

VIETNAM WAR

A Split in Vietnam
Ngo Dinh Diem became president of the government of the Republic of Vietnam in 1956, and quickly claimed that the Communists of the North were attacking to reclaim the South. In 1957, Diem, with the aid of the U.S. military, counterattacked the North. Diem’s presidency was oppressive and corrupt and was opposed by the Vietnamese people. From 1956 to 1960, the North attempted to peacefully unite the two Vietnams; however, following Diem’s attacks, it was understood that a more violent overthrow was necessary. In 1960, the Communists created the National Liberation Front.

CHARLES DICKENS

A Christmas Carol
Though Dickens’s
A Christmas Carol
is a celebration of Christmas, at its heart the novel is a social commentary on the division of the rich and poor in Victorian England. At the time of its writing, the British government enforced what were known as the Poor Laws, which made the poor labor in horrible factories and stay in debtor’s prisons. When Dickens was twelve years old, his own family was moved to a debtor’s prison, and Dickens was forced to work in a shoe polish factory.

THE NUMBER e

The Natural Base
When looking at the graphs of the exponential functions
y
 = 
f
 (
x
) = 2
x
and
y
 = 
g
 (
x
) = 3
x
, we see a couple of things. The function that equals 2
x
begins with a higher value than the function that equals 3
x
, but the value of the 3
x
function starts to get higher than the 2
x
function when
x
= 0. As the values of the function get larger, they grow faster and the curves get steeper. When comparing the average growth rates of the functions, the average rates of
f
lag behind the value of the function, and the average rates for
g
are always slightly higher. Both curves do not coincide with the average growth rates; however, 3
x
is closer. This means that the base of the exponential function lies somewhere between 2 and 3, which is
e
. The exponential function
y
=
ex
has an equal rate of growth to its value.

PLASMA

Degree of Ionization
In order for plasma to exist, there must be ionization, where an atom is converted into an ion by removing and adding charged particles. Even a gas that has 1 percent ionized particles will exhibit properties of plasma. The degree of ionization, which is mostly controlled by temperature, is the ratio of ions to the total number of molecules. To find the degree of ionization, the formula is:

α = 
n
_i
/(
n
_i
 + 
n
_a
)

n
_i
represents the ion density and
n
_a
is the density of atoms that are neutral.

AFRIKAANS

Phonetics and Grammar
Though Afrikaans is a daughter of the Dutch language, and as such, there are many phonetic similarities between the two, Afrikaans has grown to have several differences from Dutch. Afrikaans is a phonetic language, and one of the only Germanic languages that features nasal vowels. Afrikaans is also a simpler language than Dutch. Unlike Dutch, there aren’t any long consonants or aspirations after letters
p
,
t
, and
k
, and there is no distinction of gender for nouns and no declensions. To indicate plural, an
e
or an
s
is added to words.

VIETNAM WAR

The Kennedy Years
A team sent to Vietnam by President Kennedy in 1961 to report on what was happening there stated that there was a need for military, economic, and technical aid, as well as advisors to stabilize Diem’s regime and destroy the NLF. Kennedy agreed to send advisors and machines, but not troops. The plan did not work, and the NLF was becoming more successful. Another plan, called the Strategic Hamlet Program, that would place villagers into hamlets to isolate them from the NLF, also backfired. In 1963, Diem’s brother raided a Buddhist pagoda, which led to massive protests in which Buddhist monks performed self-immolation. Pictures of the monks spread worldwide and created outrage, and the United States decided to support a coup. On November 1, 1963, Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother were captured and executed.

CHARLES DICKENS

Oliver Twist
Oliver Twist
was published serially in 1837. The story was his second novel (the first being
The Pickwick Papers
, which was met with great success), but it was the first of his stories that focused on social commentary and critiquing how public institutions dealt with the poor. Dickens revisited this theme again in
Nicholas Nickleby
. One reason Dickens wrote
Oliver Twist
was because of the Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834, which stripped citizenship rights from the poor, who had to give up their political rights for financial aid and work in factories.

THE NUMBER e

Numerical Series
The numerical value of
e
goes on for infinity. To find the values of
e
, you can use several different equations:

PLASMA