Epsilon

Epsilon (uppercase Ε, lowercase ε or lunate ϵ; Greek: Έψιλον) is the fifth letter of the Greek alphabet, corresponding phonetically to a close-mid front unrounded vowel /e/. In the system of Greek numerals it has the value five. It was derived from the Phoenician letter He . Letters that arose from epsilon include the Roman E, Ë and Ɛ, and Cyrillic Е, È, Ё, Є and Э.

The name of the letter was originally εἶ (Ancient Greek: [êː]), but the name was changed to ἒ ψιλόν (e psilon "simple e") in the Middle Ages to distinguish the letter from the digraph αι, a former diphthong that had come to be pronounced the same as epsilon.

In essence, the uppercase form of epsilon looks identical to Latin E. The lowercase version has two typographical variants, both inherited from medieval Greek handwriting. One, the most common in modern typography and inherited from medieval minuscule, looks like a reversed "3". The other, also known as lunate or uncial epsilon and inherited from earlier uncial writing, looks like a semicircle crossed by a horizontal bar. While in normal typography these are just alternative font variants, they may have different meanings as mathematical symbols. Computer systems therefore offer distinct encodings for them. In Unicode, the character U+03F5 "Greek lunate epsilon symbol" (ϵ) is provided specifically for the lunate form. In TeX, \epsilon () denotes the lunate form, while \varepsilon () denotes the inverted-3 form.

Epsilon (rocket)

The Epsilon rocket (イプシロンロケット, Ipushiron roketto) (formerly Advanced Solid Rocket) is a Japanese solid-fuel rocket designed to launch scientific satellites. It is a follow-on project to the larger and more expensive M-V rocket which was retired in 2006. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) began developing the Epsilon in 2007. It is designed to be capable of placing a 1.2 tonne payload into low Earth orbit.

Vehicle description

The development aim is to reduce costs compared to the US$70 million launch cost of an M-V. The Epsilon costs US$38 million (£23m) per launch, which is half the cost of its predecessor. Development expenditures by JAXA exceeded US$200 million.

To reduce the cost per launch the Epsilon uses the existing SRB-A3 as a solid rocket booster on the H-IIA rocket as its first stage. Existing M-V upper stages will be used for the second and third stages, with an optional fourth stage available for launches to higher orbits. The J-1 rocket, which was developed during the 1990s, but abandoned after just one launch, used a similar design concept, with an H-II booster and Mu-3S-II upper stages.

Epsilon (film)

Epsilon (also titled Alien Visitor) is a 1995 science fiction film that was directed by Rolf de Heer. It features Ulli Birve and Syd Brisbane (and Aletha McGrath, but in the 1997 version only) . The extended version of the film runs for 92 minutes and was distributed by Miramax.

Plot

The film tells the story of a young female (Birve) that was sent from the planet Epsilon to judge how humans have managed the planet. She crash lands naked in a desert, but is found by a surveyor (Brisbane) who gives her some clothes. She informs the surveyor that other alien races consider humans to be failures that suffer from carelessness and greed. She has the ability to transport herself and the surveyor instantly to any location, and she uses this to demonstrate her point. Eventually the two fall in love.

Production

De Heer came up with the idea for the film while driving to dinner at a friend's house. Filming took over eight months.

References

External links

Rage (collectible card game)

Rage is a collectible card game originally published by White Wolf in 1995 based on the roleplaying game, Werewolf: The Apocalypse. The game is based around packs of werewolves battling each other and various evil monsters while trying to save the world.

Product information

White Wolf

Rage had five sets of cards:

The game was discontinued by White Wolf after Legacy and the license sold to Five Rings Publishing Group (FRPG).

Five Rings

FRPG produced a new version of the game with the same card backs and set in the same world, but with completely different mechanics making it incompatible with the first version of the game. The second version of the game had seven card sets. The first 6 were numbered and released once a month. They were known as Phase 1 through 6. The final set, Equinox, combined together three of the smaller numbered sets (7-9) into one larger set.

Various producers

FRPG was bought out by Wizards of the Coast (the makers of Magic: The Gathering), who were in turn bought out by Hasbro. Hasbro discontinued many of the games it had acquired in the take over, including Rage. The license for the game lapsed back to White Wolf.

Rage (1972 film)

Rage is a 1972 film starring George C. Scott, Richard Basehart, Martin Sheen and Barnard Hughes. Scott also directed this drama about a sheep rancher who is fatally exposed to a military lab's poison gas.

Nicolas Beauvy is featured as the rancher's doomed son in a cast that also includes Paul Stevens and Stephen Young.

Plot

While on a camping trip, sheep rancher Dan Logan (Scott) and his son are inadvertently exposed to a secret Army nerve gas from a helicopter passing overhead. Both end up in a military hospital in which they are kept apart, unable to contact outsiders, and lied to about their condition by a mysterious major (Sheen), who looks at the incident as little more than an opportunity to study the effectiveness of a nerve gas on humans.

Logan tries to hold someone accountable for their actions, but he and his family physician (Basehart) are stone-walled from every angle by military authorities and by bureaucrats staging a cover up -- with those responsible already well insulated by their positions of power. He is hospitalized and put under observation by the government for symptoms related to exposure to nerve agents, and to record his physiological responses to the toxins.

Rage (trick-taking card game)

Rage is a trick-taking card game marketed by Fundex Games that is based on the game Oh Hell. Players bid to take a particular number of tricks, and are awarded bonus points for doing so. The commercial game differs significantly from the traditional version in the use of a proprietary deck with 6 colored suits and the addition of 6 types of special cards that change gameplay.

Deck

Rage uses a deck made up as follows.

There are thus a total of 110 cards in the deck. Fundex states there are 16 Rage cards (though its itemized list adds up to only the 14 listed here) and so some editions of the game may have additional Rage cards.

Setup

The game can be played by 2 to 6 players. One player is the scorekeeper and uses either the special scoresheet printed in the instructions (it can be photocopied freely) or a piece of plain paper to keep score. The entire deck of cards is shuffled and cut.