San Diego librarians receive Mental Health First Aid training | incl. VIDEO

Mental Health | Homelessness | Public Libraries

BY: Amanda Brandeis

Most of the librarians have been trained in traditional first aid, but they will soon learn how to address the hidden wounds.

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 SAN DIEGO (KGTV) - The job description of a librarian goes far beyond recommending books and organizing shelves -- they're often the first responders when someone needs help in the library.

"I think there's a misperception of what librarians would be. Everybody has a bun in their hair and a pocket pen protector," said Joe Miesner, access services librarian at San Diego Central Library.

Miesner has been working at San Diego libraries for 26 years. He and his colleagues say they got into the field to help the community.

"We're a great community link where everybody is welcome," said Miesner.

Most of the librarians have been trained in traditional first aid, but they will soon learn how to address the hidden wounds.

Staff with the San Diego Public Library are taking part in the Mental Health First Aid course, learning skills to provide initial help and support to someone who may be developing a mental health issue or substance abuse problem or experiencing a crisis. Read more...

10,000 New Yorkers. 2 Decades. A Data Trove About ‘Everything.’

Linked Data | Internet of Everything | Privacy

By MARC SANTORAJUNE 4, 2017

Paul W. Glimcher, a neuro-economist at New York University who created the Human Project, which will track thousands of New Yorkers over two decades or more. Credit Todd Heisler/The New York Times 

 

 

 

Your phone, in all likelihood, knows more about you than your doctor. Your credit card company knows your likes and dislikes better than your closest friend. Google knows your thoughts, and even completes your sentences. Your telephone service provider knows where you are at all times. Facebook, for many, knows more than the rest combined.

But Paul W. Glimcher, a neuro-economist at New York University, looks at all that data and sees a “train wreck.”

For all of Silicon Valley’s cheerleading of “big data,” Mr. Glimcher said it had yet to be used to effectively solve some of society’s most vexing problems.

So he was intrigued when Miyoung Chun, the executive vice president for science programs at the Kavli Foundation and a leader of the Obama administration’s Brain Initiative, approached him five years ago about what the future of big data might look like. Read more...

Secret Mexican diary sheds light on Spanish Inquisition |

Spanish Inquisition | Jewish history | Rare books & Manuscripts

by Natasha Pizzey, Mexico City
4 June 2017

Luis de Carvajal used gold leaf from Bibles to decorate the diary 

 

 

A story of torture, betrayal and persecution is captivating Mexicans almost 500 years after it happened.

The dramatic life and death of the Carvajal family in 16th-Century Mexico is in the spotlight after a decades-long search for a national treasure came to an unexpected happy ending.

Luis de Carvajal "The Young" came to Mexico - then known as New Spain - with his large, well-to-do family during the early colonisation of the Americas. 

His family governed part of northern Mexico and soon made enemies, including a power-hungry viceroy keen to topple them from power.

The ambitious viceroy discovered that Luis de Carvajal was a practising Jew, a crime punishable by death in the times of the Spanish Inquisition. 

Older relatives had urged Luis de Carvajal to convert to Catholicism for his own safety, but he staunchly stuck to his faith.  Read more...