1.
Jimmy Carter
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James Earl Jimmy Carter Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States from 1977 to 1981. In 2002, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work with the Carter Center, Carter was a Democrat who was raised in rural Georgia. He was a farmer who served two terms as a Georgia State Senator from 1963 to 1967, and one as the Governor of Georgia from 1971 to 1975. He was elected President in 1976, defeating incumbent President Gerald Ford in a close election. On his second day in office, Carter pardoned all evaders of the Vietnam War drafts, during Carters term as President, two new cabinet-level departments, the Department of Energy and the Department of Education, were established. He established an energy policy that included conservation, price control. In foreign affairs, Carter pursued the Camp David Accords, the Panama Canal Treaties, the round of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks. On the economic front he confronted persistent stagflation, a combination of inflation, high unemployment. The end of his tenure was marked by the 1979–1981 Iran hostage crisis, the 1979 energy crisis, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident. In response to the Soviet move he ended détente, escalated the Cold War, Carter won the 1980 primary with 51. 13% of the vote but lost the general election in an electoral landslide to Republican nominee Ronald Reagan, who won 44 of 50 states. His presidency has drawn medium-low responses from historians, with many considering him to have accomplished more with his post-presidency work and he set up the Carter Center in 1982 as his base for advancing human rights. He has also traveled extensively to conduct negotiations, observe elections. Additionally, Carter is a key figure in the Habitat for Humanity project, since surpassing Herbert Hoover in September 2012, he has been the longest-retired president in American history. He is also the first president to mark the 40th anniversary of his election and inauguration, in reference to current political views, he has criticized some of Israels actions and policies in regards to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and has advocated for a two-state solution. James Earl Carter, Jr. was born on October 1,1924, at the Wise Sanitarium in Plains and he is a descendant of English immigrant Thomas Carter, who settled in Virginia in 1635. Numerous generations of Carters lived as farmers in Georgia. Carter is also a descendant of Thomas Cornell, an ancestor of Cornell Universitys founder and of Richard Nixon, Plains was a boomtown of 600 people at the time of Carters birth. His father, James Earl Carter, Sr. was a local businessman who ran a general store and had begun to invest in farmland
2.
Yamaha Corporation
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It is one of the constituents of Nikkei 225 and is the worlds largest piano manufacturing company. Yamaha was established in 1887 as a piano and reed organ manufacturer by Torakusu Yamaha as Nippon Gakki Company, Limited in Hamamatsu, the companys origins as a musical instrument manufacturer are still reflected today in the groups logo—a trio of interlocking tuning forks. The YA-1, of which 125 were built in the first year of production, was named in honour of the founder and it was a 125cc, single cylinder, two-stroke, street bike patterned after the German DKW RT125. In 1955, the success of the YA-1 resulted in the founding of Yamaha Motor Co. Ltd, in 1989, Yamaha shipped the worlds first CD recorder. Yamaha purchased Sequential Circuits in 1988 and it bought a majority stake of competitor Korg in 1987, which was bought out by Korg in 1993. In the late 1990s, Yamaha released a series a portable battery operated keyboards under the PSS, in 2002, Yamaha closed down its archery product business that was started in 1959. Six archers in five different Olympic Games won gold medals using their products and it acquired German audio software manufacturers Steinberg in January 2005, from Pinnacle Systems. K. Ltd, the UK piano sales & manufacturing arm was unaffected, on December 20,2007, Yamaha made an agreement with the Austrian Bank BAWAG P. S. K. Group BAWAG to purchase all the shares of Bösendorfer, intended to place in early 2008. Yamaha intends to continue manufacturing at the Bösendorfer facilities in Austria, the acquisition of Bösendorfer was announced after the NAMM Show in Los Angeles, on January 28,2008. As of February 1,2008, Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH operates as a subsidiary of Yamaha Corp, Yamaha Corporation is also widely known for their music teaching programme that began in the 1950s. Yamaha electronic have proven to be successful, popular, and respected products, for example, the Yamaha YPG-625 was given the award Keyboard of the Year and Product of the Year in 2007 from The Music and Sound Retailer magazine. Other noteworthy Yamaha electronics include the SHS-10 Keytar, a keytar which offered MIDI output features normally found on much more expensive keyboards. Other companies in the Yamaha group include, Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH, Vienna, Yamaha Motor Company Yamaha Fine Technologies Co. Ltd. Yamaha Golf Cart Company Yamaha Livingtec Corporation Yamaha Metanix Corporation Yamaha Music Communications Co. Ltd, Yamaha Pro Audio Kandō is a Japanese word used by Yamaha to describe their corporate mission. Kandō in translation describes the sensation of profound excitement and gratification derived from experiencing supreme quality, some reasonable English synonyms are emotionally touching or emotionally moving. The Yamaha Music Foundation is an established in 1966 by the authority of the Japanese Ministry of Education for the purpose of promoting music education. It continued a program of music classes begun by Yamaha Corporation in 1954, Yamaha expanded into many diverse businesses and product groups
3.
Southern Baptist Convention
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The Southern Baptist Convention is a Christian denomination based in the United States. It is the worlds largest Baptist denomination and the largest Protestant body in the United States and this also makes it the second-largest Christian body in the United States, after the Catholic Church. Members at a convention held in Augusta, Georgia, created the SBC in 1845. After the American Civil War, another split occurred when most freedmen set up independent congregations, others joined new African-American denominations, chiefly the African Methodist Episcopal Church. Since the 1940s, the SBC has moved away from some of its regional and historical identification, especially since the late twentieth century, the SBC has sought new members among minority groups and become much more diverse. In addition, while still heavily concentrated in the Southern US and it should be noted that some State convention comprise more than one State - for example the New England Baptist Convention is comprise of the six New England states. North and South Dakota comprise the Dakota Baptist Convention, in addition - Northern New Jersey is part of the Baptist Convention of New York and Southern New Jersey is part of the Baptist Convention of Pennsylvania. At its annual convention in 2012, the SBC elected as president Fred Luter Jr. the first African American to hold the position, an SBC presidential term is for one year, with a term limit of two terms. Each president is elected by Messengers sent by local church at the SBC annual meeting. Since Luter ran unopposed, per the by-laws of the convention, because of the historic nature of the vote, the assembly was asked to rise in support of the vote, which the messengers did enthusiastically. Luter was re-elected president for a term at the 2013 meeting. The current president in 2016 is Steve Gaines, Southern Baptists emphasize the significance of the individual conversion experience which is affirmed by the person having complete immersion in water for a believers baptism. As a result, they reject the practice of infant baptism, SBC churches are evangelical in doctrine and practice. Specific beliefs based on biblical interpretation can vary due to their congregational polity which allows autonomy to each individual local church. Most early Baptists in the British colonies came from England in the 17th century, the oldest Baptist church in the South, First Baptist Church of Charleston, South Carolina, was organized in 1682 under the leadership of William Screven. A Baptist church was formed in Virginia in 1715 through the preaching of Robert Norden, the Baptists operated independently of the state-established Anglican churches in the South, at a time when non-Anglicans were prohibited from holding political office. By 1740, there were about eight Baptist churches in the colonies of Virginia, North Carolina, as a result, black congregations and churches were founded in Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia before the American Revolution. Some black congregations kept their independence even after whites tried to exercise more authority after the Nat Turner slave rebellion of 1831
4.
Individualism
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Individualism is the moral stance, political philosophy, ideology, or social outlook that emphasizes the moral worth of the individual. Individualism is often defined in contrast to totalitarianism, collectivism, authoritarianism, communitarianism, Individualism makes the individual its focus and so starts with the fundamental premise that the human individual is of primary importance in the struggle for liberation. Classical liberalism, existentialism, and anarchism are examples of movements that take the individual as a central unit of analysis. Individualism thus involves the right of the individual to freedom and self-realization and it has also been used as a term denoting The quality of being an individual, individuality related to possessing An individual characteristic, a quirk. A more positive use of the term in Britain came to be used with the writings of James Elishama Smith, who was a millenarian and a Christian Israelite. Although an early Owenite socialist, he rejected its collective idea of property. Without individualism, Smith argued, individuals cannot amass property to increase ones happiness, an individual is a person or any specific object in a collection. From the 17th century on, individual indicates separateness, as in individualism, individuality is the state or quality of being an individual, a person separate from other persons and possessing his or her own needs, goals, and desires. The individualist does not follow one particular philosophy, rather creates an amalgamation of elements of many, on a societal level, the individualist participates on a personally structured political and moral ground. Independent thinking and opinion is a trait of an individualist. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, claims that his concept of general will in the contract is not the simple collection of individual wills. Societies and groups can differ in the extent to which they are based upon predominantly self-regarding behaviors, the principle of individuation, or principium individuationis, describes the manner in which a thing is identified as distinguished from other things. For Carl Jung, individuation is a process of transformation, whereby the personal and it is a completely natural process necessary for the integration of the psyche to take place. Jung considered individuation to be the process of human development. Thus, the atom is replaced by a never-ending ontological process of individuation. Individuation is an incomplete process, always leaving a pre-individual left-over. The philosophy of Bernard Stiegler draws upon and modifies the work of Gilbert Simondon on individuation and also upon similar ideas in Friedrich Nietzsche, for Stiegler the I, as a psychic individual, can only be thought in relationship to we, which is a collective individual. The I is constituted in adopting a collective tradition, which it inherits, methodological individualism is the view that phenomena can only be understood by examining how they result from the motivations and actions of individual agents
5.
Progressive Era
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The Progressive Era was a period of widespread social activism and political reform across the United States, from the 1890s to the 1920s. The main objectives of the Progressive movement were eliminating problems caused by industrialization, urbanization, immigration, the movement primarily targeted political machines and their bosses. By taking down these corrupt representatives in office a further means of democracy would be established. They also sought regulation of monopolies and corporations through antitrust laws and these antitrust laws were seen as a way to promote equal competition for the advantage of legitimate competitors. Many progressives supported prohibition in the United States, ostensibly to destroy the power of local bosses based in saloons. At the same time, womens suffrage was promoted to bring a purer female vote into the arena, many activists joined efforts to reform local government, public education, medicine, finance, insurance, industry, railroads, churches, and many other areas. Progressives transformed, professionalized and made scientific the social sciences, especially history, economics, in academic fields the day of the amateur author gave way to the research professor who published in the new scholarly journals and presses. The national political leaders included Theodore Roosevelt, Robert M, La Follette, Sr. and Charles Evans Hughes on the Republican side, and William Jennings Bryan, Woodrow Wilson and Al Smith on the Democratic side. Yet, leaders of the movement also existed far from presidential politics, jane Addams, Grace Abbott, Edith Abbott and Sophonisba Breckinridge were among the most influential Progressive Era reformers. Initially the movement operated chiefly at local levels, later, it expanded to state, Progressives drew support from the middle class, and supporters included many lawyers, teachers, physicians, ministers and business people. Some Progressives strongly supported scientific methods as applied to economics, government, industry, finance, medicine, schooling, theology, education, reformers felt that old-fashioned ways meant waste and inefficiency, and eagerly sought out the one best system. S. Magazines were not a new medium but they became more popular around 1900. It was an age of Mass media, thanks to the rapid expansion of national advertising, the cover price fell sharply to about 10 cents. One cause was the coverage of corruption in politics, local government and big business. They were journalists who wrote for magazines to expose social and political sins. They relied on their own investigative journalism reporting, muckrakers often worked to expose social ills and corporate, the journalists who specialized in exposing waste, corruption, and scandal operated at the state and local level, like Ray Stannard Baker, George Creel, and Brand Whitlock. Other like Lincoln Steffens exposed political corruption in many large cities, Roosevelt gave these journalists their nickname when he complained they were not being helpful by raking up all the muck. The Progressives were avid modernizers, with a belief in science and they looked to education as the key
6.
Gentry
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Gentry are well-born, genteel and well-bred people of high social class, especially in the past. In the United Kingdom, the term refers to the social class of the landed aristocracy or to the minor aristocracy whose income derives from their large landholdings. The idea of gentry in the sense of noblesse is extinct in common parlance in modern day Britain. Though the untitled nobility in modern day Britain are normally termed gentry, the older sense of nobility is that of a quality identical to gentry. The fundamental social division in most parts of Europe in the Middle Ages was between the nobiles, i. e. the tenants in chivalry, and the ignobles, i. e. the villeins, citizens and burgesses. The division into nobles and ignobles in smaller regions of Europe in the Middle Ages was less due to a more rudimentary feudal order. After the Reformation, intermingling between the class and the often hereditary clerical upper class became a distinctive feature in several Nordic countries. Besides the gentry there have been other analogous traditional elites, the Indo-Europeans who settled Europe, Western Asia and the Indian subcontinent conceived their societies to be ordered in a tripartite fashion, the three parts being castes. Castes came to be divided, perhaps as a result of greater specialisation. The classic formulation of the system as largely described by Georges Dumézil was that of a priestly or religiously occupied caste, a warrior caste. Dumézil divided the Proto-Indo-Europeans into three categories, sovereignty, military, and productivity and he further subdivided sovereignty into two distinct and complementary sub-parts. One part was formal, juridical, and priestly, but rooted in this world, the other was powerful, unpredictable, and also priestly, but rooted in the other, the supernatural and spiritual world. The second main division was connected with the use of force, the military, finally, there was a third group, ruled by the other two, whose role was productivity, herding, farming, and crafts. This system of roles can be seen in the castes which flourished on the Indian subcontinent. Emperor Constantine convoked the First Council of Nicaea in 325 whose Nicene Creed included belief in one holy catholic and apostolic Church, emperor Theodosius I made Nicene Christianity the state church of the Roman Empire with the Edict of Thessalonica of 380. In this power vacuum, the Church rose to become the dominant power in the West, the classical heritage flourished throughout the Middle Ages in both the Byzantine Greek East and Latin West. During the Middle Ages it was customary to classify the population of Christendom into laboratores, bellatores, the last group, though small in number, monopolized the instruments and opportunities of culture, and ruled with almost unlimited sway half of the most powerful continent on the globe. The clergy, like Platos guardians, were placed in authority, in the latter half of the period in which they ruled, the clergy were as free from family cares as even Plato could desire
7.
Chivalry
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Chivalry, or the chivalric code, is a code of conduct associated with the medieval institution of knighthood which developed between 1170 and 1220. The code of chivalry that developed in medieval Europe had its roots in earlier centuries, the term chivalry derives from the Old French term chevalerie, which can be translated to horse soldiery. Gautier states that emerged from the Moors as well as the Teutonic forests and was nurtured into civilization. Over time, its meaning in Europe has been refined to emphasise social and moral virtues more generally, in origin, the term chivalry means horsemanship, formed in Old French, in the 11th century, from chevalier, from Medieval Latin caballārius. In English, the term appears from 1292, thus, chivalry has hierarchical meanings from simply a heavily armed horseman to a code of conduct. Based on the three treatises, initially chivalry was defined as a way of life in which three essential aspects fused together, the military, the nobility, the religion. Gautiers Ten Commandments of chivalry are, Thou shalt believe all that the Church teaches, Thou shalt respect all weaknesses, and shalt constitute thyself the defender of them. Thou shalt love the country in which thou wast born, Thou shalt not recoil before thine enemy. Thou shalt make war against the infidel without cessation and without mercy, Thou shalt perform scrupulously thy feudal duties, if they be not contrary to the laws of God. Thou shalt never lie, and shalt remain faithful to thy pledged word, Thou shalt be generous, and give largesse to everyone. Thou shalt be everywhere and always the champion of the Right, though these ten commandments are often accepted to be what knights would use, these would not necessarily be what a knight actually followed in the medieval era. This code was created by Leon Gautier in 1883, long after the knight had ceased to exist in its traditional form. Chivalry in a sense was more of a subjective term. It is a version of the myth of the Golden Age, from Jean Charles Léonard de Sismondi, We must not confound chivalry with the feudal system. The feudal system may be called the life of the period of which we are treating, possessing its advantages and inconveniences, its virtues. Chivalry, on the contrary, is the world, such as it existed in the imaginations of the Romance writers. Its essential character is devotion to woman and to honour, Sismondi alludes to the fictitious Arthurian romances about the imaginary Court of King Arthur, which were usually taken as factual presentations of a historical age of chivalry. He continues, The more closely we look into history, the more clearly shall we perceive that the system of chivalry is an invention almost entirely poetical and it is impossible to distinguish the countries in which it is said to have prevailed
8.
Counterculture of the 1960s
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Many key movements related to these issues were born or advanced within the counterculture of the 1960s. This embracing of creativity is particularly notable in the works of British Invasion bands such as the Beatles, in addition to the trendsetting Beatles, many other creative artists, authors, and thinkers, within and across many disciplines, helped define the counterculture movement. Several factors distinguished the counterculture of the 1960s from the movements of previous eras. Post-war affluence allowed many of the generation to move beyond a focus on the provision of the material necessities of life that had preoccupied their Depression-era parents. The counterculture era essentially commenced in earnest with the assassination of John F. Kennedy in November 1963, poor outcomes from some of these activities set the stage for disillusionment with, and distrust of, post-war governments. In the US, President Dwight D, the Partial Test Ban Treaty divided the establishment within the US along political and military lines. In the UK, the Profumo Affair also involved establishment leaders being caught in deception, leading to disillusionment and serving as a catalyst for liberal activism. The Cuban Missile Crisis, which brought the world to the brink of war in October 1962, was largely fomented by duplicitous speech. The assassination of US President John F. Kennedy in November 1963, many social issues fueled the growth of the larger counterculture movement. On college and university campuses, student activists fought for the right to exercise their constitutional rights, especially freedom of speech. The availability of new and more effective forms of control was a key underpinning of the sexual revolution. With this change in attitude, by the 1990s the ratio of children out of wedlock rose from 5% to 25% for Whites. The end of censorship resulted in a reformation of the western film industry. Communes, collectives, and intentional communities regained popularity during this era, Some of these self-sustaining communities have been credited with the birth and propagation of the international Green Movement. The emergence of an interest in expanded spiritual consciousness, yoga, occult practices, in 1957, 69% of US residents polled by Gallup said religion was increasing in influence. By the late 1960s, polls indicated less than 20% still held that belief, the Generation Gap, or the inevitable perceived divide in worldview between the old and young, was perhaps never greater than during the counterculture era. Ultimately, practical and comfortable casual apparel, namely updated forms of T-shirts, many began to live largely clandestine lives because of their choice to use such drugs and substances, fearing retribution from their governments. The confrontations between college students and law enforcement officials became one of the hallmarks of the era, many younger people began to show deep distrust of police, and terms such as fuzz and pig as derogatory epithets for police reappeared, and became key words within the counterculture lexicon
9.
New Left
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Sections of the New Left rejected involvement with the labor movement and Marxisms historical theory of class struggle, although others gravitated to variants of Marxism like Maoism. In the United States, the movement was associated with the hippie movement, the origins of the New Left have been traced to several factors. It was from this French new left that the First New Left of Britain borrowed the term, the German-Jewish critical theorist Herbert Marcuse is referred to as the Father of the New Left. He rejected the theory of class struggle and the Marxist concern with labor, according to Leszek Kołakowski, Marcuse argued that since all questions of material existence have been solved, moral commands and prohibitions are no longer relevant. He regarded the realization of mans nature as the true liberation of humanity. Another prominent New Left thinker, Ernst Bloch, believed that socialism would prove the means for all beings to become immortal. The writings of sociologist C. Wright Mills, who popularized the term New Left in a 1960 open letter, Mills biographer, Daniel Geary, writes that his writings had a particularly significant impact on New Left social movements of the 1960s. As a result of Nikita Khrushchevs Secret Speech denouncing Joseph Stalin many abandoned the Communist Party of Great Britain, some joined various Trotskyist groupings or the Labour Party. The Marxist historians E. P. Thompson and John Saville of the Communist Party Historians Group published a dissenting journal within the CPGB called Reasoner. Refusing to discontinue the publication at the behest of the CPGB, Thompson was especially important in bringing the concept of a New Left to the United Kingdom in the Summer of 1959 with a New Reasoner lead essay, in which he described. A generation nourished on 1984 and Animal Farm, which enters politics at the point of disillusion where the middle-aged begin to get out. But their enthusiasm is not for the Party, or the Movement and they do not mean to give their enthusiasm cheaply away to any routine machine. They expect the politicians to do their best to trick or betray them and they prefer the amateur organisation and amateurish platforms of the Nuclear Disarmament Campaign to the method and manner of the left wing professional. They judge with the eyes of the first generation of the Nuclear Age. We have made no sustained critique of the economics of capitalism in the 1950s, but we still have a long way to go, and there are far too many timeless militants for whom the mixture is the same as before. In 1960, The New Reasoner merged with the Universities and Left Review to form the New Left Review and these journals attempted to synthesise a theoretical position of a Marxist revisionism, humanist, socialist Marxism, departing from orthodox Marxist theory. This publishing effort made the ideas of culturally oriented theorists available to a reading audience. In this early period, many on the New Left were involved in the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, under the long-standing editorial leadership of Perry Anderson, the New Left Review popularised the Frankfurt School, Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser and other forms of Marxism
10.
Hallucinogen
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A hallucinogen is a psychoactive agent which can cause hallucinations, perceptual anomalies, and other substantial subjective changes in thoughts, emotion, and consciousness. The common types of hallucinogens are psychedelics, dissociatives and deliriants, although hallucinations are a common symptom of amphetamine psychosis, amphetamines are not considered hallucinogens, as they are not a primary effect of the drugs themselves. While hallucinations can occur when abusing stimulants, the nature of stimulant psychosis is not unlike delirium, a debate persists on criteria which would easily differentiate a substance which is psychedelic from one hallucinogenic. Sir Thomas Browne in 1646 coined the term hallucination from the Latin word alucinari meaning to wander in the mind, the term psychedelic is derived from the Ancient Greek words psychē and dēloun, or mind-revealing. A hallucinogen and a psychedelic may refer correctly to the same substance, hallucinations and psychedelia may both refer to the same aspects of subjective experience in a given instance. A hallucinogen in this sense refers to any substance which causes changes in perception or hallucinations. In contrast to Hollisters original criteria, adverse effects may predominate with some hallucinogens with this application of the term, the word psychedelic was coined to express the idea of a drug that makes manifest a hidden but real aspect of the mind. One explanatory model for the experiences provoked by psychedelics is the reducing valve concept, in this view, the drugs disable the brains filtering ability to selectively prevent certain perceptions, emotions, memories and thoughts from ever reaching the conscious mind. This effect has been described as mind expanding, or consciousness expanding, many designer drugs and research chemicals are hallucinogenic in nature, such as those in the 2C and NBOMe families. Dissociatives produce analgesia, amnesia and catalepsy at anesthetic doses, dissociative symptoms include the disruption or compartmentalization of. the usually integrated functions of consciousness, memory, identity or perception. p. 523 Dissociation of sensory input can cause derealization, the perception of the world as being dream-like or unreal. The primary dissociatives achieve their effect through blocking the signals received by the NMDA receptor set and include ketamine, methoxetamine, phencyclidine, dextromethorphan, however, dissociation is also remarkably administered by salvinorin As potent κ-opioid receptor agonism. Some dissociatives can have CNS depressant effects, thereby carrying similar risks as opioids, DXM in higher doses can increase heart rate and blood pressure and still depress respiration. Inversely, PCP can have unpredictable effects and has often been classified as a stimulant. While many have reported that they feel no pain while under the effects of PCP, DXM and Ketamine, this does not fall under the usual classification of anesthetics in recreational doses. Rather, true to their name, they process pain as a kind of far away sensation, pain, although present, becomes a disembodied experience, as for probably the most common dissociative, nitrous oxide, the principal risk seems to be due to oxygen deprivation. Injury from falling is also a danger, as nitrous oxide may cause loss of consciousness. Because of the level of physical activity and relative imperviousness to pain induced by PCP
11.
Religious ecstasy
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Although the experience is usually brief in time, there are records of such experiences lasting several days or even more, and of recurring experiences of ecstasy during ones lifetime. A persons sense of time and space disappear during a religious ecstasy forsaking any senses or physical cognizance in its duration. Among venerated Catholic saints who dabble in Christian mysticism, a physical stature, human sensory, or perception is completely detached to time. In Sufism, the term is referred to as wajd and the experience is referred to as either jazbah or majzoobiyat, the adjective religious means that the experience occurs in connection with religious activities or is interpreted in context of a religion. Thus we find experiences given such names as nature, religious, aesthetic, neo-platonic, ecstasies enjoyed by accepted religious mystics are usually called religious experiences no matter what the nature of the ecstasy or the trigger inducing it. Religious people may hold the view that true religious ecstasy occurs only in their religious context, an ecstatic experience may take place in occasion of contact with something or somebody perceived as extremely beautiful or holy. It may also happen without any known reason, the particular technique that an individual uses to induce ecstasy is usually one that is associated with that individuals particular religious and cultural traditions. As a result, an experience is usually interpreted within the particular individual religious context. Athletes may follow rituals in preparing for contests, which are dismissed as superstition, Yoga provides techniques to attain an ecstasy state called samādhi. According to practitioners, there are stages of ecstasy, the highest being Nirvikalpa Samadhi. Bhakti Yoga especially, places emphasis on ecstasy as being one of the fruits of its practice, in Buddhism, especially in the Pali Canon, there are eight states of trance also called absorption. The first four states are Rupa or, materially-oriented, the next four are Arupa or non-material. These eight states are preliminary trances which lead up to final saturation, in Visuddhimagga, great effort and years of sustained meditation are practiced to reach the first absorption, and that not all individuals are able to accomplish it at all. It is possible to experience the absorptions in a less intense state with much less practice, in the Dionysian Mysteries, initiates used intoxicants and other trance-inducing techniques to remove inhibitions and social constraints, liberating the individual to return to a natural state. In the monotheistic tradition, ecstasy is usually associated with communion, however, such experiences can also be personal mystical experiences with no significance to anyone but the person experiencing them. Some charismatic Christians practice ecstatic states and interpret these as given by the Holy Spirit, the firewalkers of Greece dance themselves into a state of ecstasy at the annual Anastenaria, when they believe themselves under the influence of Saint Constantine. In modern Pentecostal, charismatic and spirit-filled Christianity, numerous examples of religious ecstasy have transpired and these occurrences however, have changed significantly since the time of the Toronto Blessing phenomena and several other North American so-called revivals and outpourings from the mid 1990s. It is said to be a prophetic action bringing spiritual blessings from God into the world, many believe spiritual birthing to be highly demonic in nature and more occult-like than Christian
