The caduceus (from Greek κηρύκειον kērukeion "herald's staff" ) is the staff carried by Hermes in Greek mythology. The same staff was also borne by heralds in general, for example by Iris, the messenger of Hera. It is a short staff entwined by two serpents, sometimes surmounted by wings. In Roman iconography it was often depicted being carried in the left hand of Mercury, the messenger of the gods, guide of the dead and protector of merchants, shepherds, gamblers, liars and thieves. As a symbolic object it represents Hermes (or the Roman Mercury), and by extension trades, occupations or undertakings associated with the god. In later Antiquity the caduceus provided the basis for the astrological symbol representing the planet Mercury. Thus, through its use in astrology and alchemy, it has come to denote the elemental metal of the same name. By extension of its association with Mercury/Hermes, the caduceus is also a recognized symbol of commerce and negotiation, two realms in which balanced exchange and reciprocity are recognized as ideals. This association is ancient, and consistent from the Classical period to modern times. The caduceus is also used as a symbol representing printing, again by extension of the attributes of Mercury (in this case associated with writing and eloquence). The caduceus is sometimes mistakenly used as a symbol of medicine and/or medical practice, especially in North America, because of widespread confusion with the traditional medical symbol, the rod of Asclepius, which has only a single snake and no wings. The Homeric hymn to Hermes relates how Hermes offered his lyre fashioned from a tortoise shell as compensation for the cattle he stole from his half brother Apollo. Apollo in return gave Hermes the caduceus as a gesture of friendship. The association with the serpent thus connects Hermes to Apollo, as later the serpent was associated with Asclepius, the "son of Apollo". The association of Apollo with the serpent is a continuation of the older Indo-European dragon-slayer motif. Wilhelm Heinrich Roscher (1913) pointed out that the serpent as an attribute of both Hermes and Asclepius is a variant of the "pre-historic semi-chthonic serpent hero known at Delphi as Python", who in classical mythology is slain by Apollo. A simplified variant of the caduceus is to be found in dictionaries, indicating a “commercial term” entirely in keeping with the association of Hermes with commerce. In this form the staff is often depicted with two winglets attached and the snakes are omitted (or reduced to a small ring in the middle). The Customs Service of the former German Democratic Republic employed the caduceus, bringing its implied associations with thresholds, translators, and commerce, in the service medals they issued their staff. The rod of Asclepius is the dominant symbol for healthcare professionals and associations in the United States. One survey found that 62% of healthcare professionals used the rod of Asclepius, while 76% of commercial healthcare organizations used the caduceus. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caduceus

Symbols of ancient Rome http://www.ancient-symbols.com/roman_symbols.html
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blue blindness, blue-yellow blindness popular names for imperfect perception of blue and yellow tints; see tritanopia and tetartanopia .
color blindness 1. popular name for color vision deficiency. 2. see monochromatic vision.
complete color blindness monochromatic vision.
day blindness hemeralopia.
flight blindness amaurosis fugax due to high centrifugal forces encountered in aviation.
green blindness imperfect perception of green tints; see deuteranopia and protanopia.
legal blindness that defined by law, usually, maximal visual acuity in the better eye after correction of 20/200 with a total diameter of the visual field in that eye of 20 degrees.
letter blindness alexia characterized by inability to recognize individual letters.
music blindness musical alexia.
night blindness failure or imperfection of vision at night or in dim light.
object blindness, psychic blindness visual agnosia.
red blindness popular name for protanopia.
red-green blindness popular name for any imperfect perception of red and green tints, including all the most common types of color vision deficiency. See deuteranomaly, deuteranopia, protanomaly, and protanopia.
snow blindness dimness of vision, usually temporary, due to glare of sun upon snow.
text blindness alexia.
total color blindness monochromatic vision.
word blindness alexia.
Dorland's Medical Dictionary for Health Consumers. © 2007 by Saunders, an imprint of Elsevier, Inc. All rights reserved. http://medical-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/word+blindness

Glen Whitney left his job as an algorithms specialist and manager at Renaissance Technologies LLC, a quantitative hedge fund started by Jim Simons, and created the nonprofit Museum of Mathematics. This year, he found a 19,000-square-foot space on East 26th Street in Manhattan and plans to open the doors in 2012. “I started this museum because I wanted people to have a chance to see the beauty, excitement and wonder of mathematics,” said Whitney, 42, speaking in the empty space under construction. When it opens, MoMath won’t display slide rules or other relics initially. It will offer math experiences for visitors of all ages: logic puzzles and games like Rubik’s Cube and a hyper hyperboloid, a sculpture made of lines of red thread that create the illusion of being in a curved cage of strings. One planned exhibit features a square-wheeled tricycle that can ride on a special path as smoothly as one with round wheels. http://www.businessweek.com/news/2011-11-01/harvard-grad-starts-math-museum-helped-by-google-hedge-funder.html

Eddie Miller, 23, is the founder of Heritage Lawn Mowing, a company that rents out sheep — yes, sheep — as a landscaping aid. For a small fee, Mr. Miller, whose official job title is “shepherd,” brings his ovine squad to the yards of area homeowners, where the sheep spend anywhere from three hours to several days grazing on grass, weeds and dandelions. The results, he said, are a win-win: the sheep eat free, saving him hundreds of dollars a month in food costs, and his clients get a freshly cut lawn, with none of the carbon emissions of a conventional gas-powered mower. (There are, of course, other emissions, which Mr. Miller said make for “all-natural fertilizer.”) Mr. Miller, a 2010 graduate of Boston University, started his business last year, when several post-college grant applications fell through and no other job opportunities presented themselves. He moved back home to Ohio and acquired two Jacob sheep, a small, sturdy breed that dates to biblical times. Recently, he added two more to his flock, which he keeps in a pen in the backyard when not in service. Customers pay $1 per sheep per day, but Mr. Miller also accepts barter payments, which have so far included karate lessons, jugs of maple syrup and the use of one homeowner’s truck. He has done around 20 homes so far, and has so many requests he can’t keep up with them. Read more about urban farming and agricultural start-ups at: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/03/garden/sheep-lawn-mowers-and-other-go-getters.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

Scribble specialists The Postal Service has money troubles. It's closing post offices, axing staff. One-day delivery may end. Saturday delivery may end. Email is the prime culprit: 104 billion first-class letters were mailed in 2001, 78 billion in 2010. Still, the service is obliged to complete its appointed rounds. If the handwriting is atrocious, no matter. Postal inspectors don't police penmanship. Which is why Postal clerk Gary Oliver can look at an envelope hand-addressed to "GALLERY303FIFTHAVESUITE1603NYNY" and see in it: "Job security." The National Postal Museum's curator, Nancy Pope, calls his scribble-disentangling responsibility "the last vestige of human intelligence versus machine intelligence in the sorting race." The race—to modernity—began with a hand-cranked canceller in 1875, then a device known as the "hamper-dumper." After World War II, thought was given to sending mail by missile. Postmaster General Arthur Summerfield said at the time he would try anything, "Yes, even ballpoint pens." But machines could barely read print in 1965. By the '80s, they were able to detect handwriting—and then give up. "Peek-and-poke" clerks in postal plants were still sliding envelopes into pigeonholes when, in 1994, the Postal Service hired Siemens and Lockheed Martin to teach machines to read scribbling. In late afternoon, when volume peaks at the Salt Lake center, a blinking panel showed 67,000 letters awaiting attention—from San Juan, Paducah, Los Angeles, Kokomo. A clerk wearing a headset had hit a patch of pen-pal letters from pupils in Memphis. She was decrypting them at a rate of 800 per hour, down from the desired 1,100. "We ought to teach kids how to address letters," said Bruce Rhoades, a manager looking over her shoulder. His boss, Karen Heath, stood watching beside him and sighed, "A lost art." If a clerk broods over an envelope for 30 seconds, it gets snatched away for another clerk. Scribble-reading isn't everyone's gift: Up to 20% of new hires quit within five weeks. Barry Newman http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204394804577012122145910692.html

Is a Patent a Monopoly? —Antitrust Considerations by Arnold B. Silverman
The term “monopoly” is often misused in the context of patent law, but has a better-defined meaning in antitrust laws. Under patent law, a patent does not give one a monopoly in the sense of having the absolute right to practice the protected invention. It gives one the right to keep others from making, using, offering for sale, selling, and importing the claimed invention, and thereby provides a meaningful exclusionary right. To the extent that one is engaged in conduct permitted by patent laws, one is immunized from antitrust laws. To determine what conduct is included within this shield, one must look to statutes and court rulings. Read more at:
http://www.tms.org/pubs/journals/JOM/matters/matters-0404.html

A different view on monopoly Antitrust law frowns on monopolies. Patent law grants them to inventors. The tensions between the two bodies of law, long apparent to scholars, are coming to a head in technology's hottest area: handheld devices. Any smartphone, e-reader or tablet touches on hundreds or thousands of patents, and technology companies have unleashed a blizzard of patent-infringement lawsuits, seeking to derail rival devices or win big licensing fees. The free-for-all raises a basic legal question: In an industry susceptible to monopolies, are companies abusing patent rights to stifle competition? Court documents filed last week by retailer Barnes & Noble Inc. offer a rare public glimpse into the fierce lobbying some companies are doing to get the government to act against competitors. They show that the bookseller, which is defending itself in a patent suit brought by Microsoft, had asked the Justice Department to open an antitrust probe into whether the software giant was trying "to use patents to drive open source software out of the market." Read full article by Thomas Catan at: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203503204577036003036334374.html