Intellect PlusCards starting with S
3,033 cards. Page 33 of 51.
Sony owns the Columbia record label almost everywhere except JapanSony Music puts out records under the Columbia name around the world, with one exception: its home country. In Japan the Columbia trademark belongs to an unrelated firm, Nippon Co…
Sony's Betamovie was a masterclass in clever engineering that ultimately backfiredThe Betamovie camcorder represents a fascinating moment in consumer technology history. While it showcased Sony's impressive engineering capabilities, the product ultimately faile…
Sony's MiniDisc was a brilliant, resilient audio format that arrived just a decade too late.Launched in 1992 to replace the analog cassette, the MiniDisc combined the convenience of a compact disc with the editing power of a hard drive. Despite its shock-resistant design…
Sony's name blends Latin for sound with American slang for a young ladSony's founders wanted a short name Americans could say. Their initials, TTK, already belonged to a railway, and Totsuko tangled American tongues. So they combined sonus, the Lati…
Sony's PSP ran its processor at two-thirds speed to save the batteryThe PlayStation Portable was the most powerful handheld of its day, yet for years Sony throttled its chips to stretch battery life and fought a spinning optical disc that drained …
Sooke is a coastal municipality on Vancouver Island with a rapidly growing populationLocated on the southern tip of Vancouver Island, Sooke has transformed from a quiet regional centre into a bustling community. Known for its proximity to rugged wilderness trails …
Sophie de Condorcet: The Philosopher Who Shaped Revolutionary Thought From Her SalonLong overshadowed by her husband, Sophie de Condorcet was a formidable intellectual force in her own right. A translator, painter, and salonnière, she navigated the perils of the …
Sophie Germain posed as Monsieur Le Blanc to trade mathematics with GaussLocked indoors as a teenager while revolution raged through Paris, Sophie Germain read how Archimedes died absorbed in geometry and decided the subject deserved her life. Barred f…
Sophie Hunter is a versatile director shaping avant-garde theatre across Europe and North AmericaBeyond her public profile, Sophie Hunter is a prolific theatre director and playwright with a career spanning international stages. From experimental puppetry to opera, her work e…
Sophie Scholl and the White Rose: A Symbolic Stand Against Nazi TyrannyIn the heart of Nazi Germany, a small group of students dared to distribute anti-regime leaflets. Sophie Scholl, a devout Christian and philosophy student, became the face of this…
Sophie Taeuber-Arp bridged the divide between fine art and functional design with geometric precision.A central figure of the Dada movement, Sophie Taeuber-Arp was a polymath who seamlessly integrated textile craft, modern dance, and abstract sculpture. By applying the logic of pa…
Sophie's World, a novel teaching teenagers philosophy, sold over 40 million copiesA former Bergen high school teacher wrote a novel in which a Norwegian girl receives mysterious lessons in the history of philosophy. Jostein Gaarder's Sophie's World, published i…
Sophist once meant a master craftsman before it became an insultCalling someone a sophist today accuses them of slippery, dishonest argument. In ancient Greek the root word praised skill: charioteers and sculptors could be called wise in their…
Sophocles' Ajax: A timeless exploration of honor, madness, and the changing face of war.Written in the 5th century BCE, Sophocles' tragedy depicts the legendary warrior Ajax after he is denied the armor of the fallen Achilles. Driven to madness by the goddess Athena,…
Sophocles' Electra is a masterclass in dramatic tension and the psychology of revengeIn this ancient Greek tragedy, a daughter mourns her father while plotting the murder of her own mother. Sophocles uses a simple, brilliant device—delaying the recognition between…
Sophrosyne: The Ancient Greek Ideal of Perfect Self-Control and Mental BalanceSophrosyne is the ancient Greek virtue of sound-mindedness and moderation. More than mere restraint, it represents a harmonious alignment of our desires with reason. From Homeric …
Sophus Lie chased a grand dream for equations and built modern physics' toolkitSophus Lie wanted to do for differential equations what Galois had done for polynomial ones: sort them all by their symmetries. That dream never fully came true. But the continuou…
Soprano or baritone depends less on range than on where singing feels easyChoirs sort singers by how high or low they can reach. Opera judges soloists differently, by tessitura, the stretch of notes where a voice sits comfortably most of the time. That …
Sor Juana became a nun so nothing could curtail her freedom to studyBarred from Mexico City's university, a teenage prodigy chose convent life because it left her free to read. From her cell Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz built a library of more than 4…
Sorbitol is a versatile sugar substitute that does more than just sweeten your foodFound in everything from chewing gum to rocket fuel, sorbitol is a sugar alcohol with a complex personality. While it serves as a common, safe alternative to sugar in your diet, i…
Sorghum, first tamed in Sudan, weeds its own fields with chemistrySorghum releases a compound called sorgoleone that holds back competing weeds, one reason smallholder farmers can grow it with no fertiliser or other inputs. Domesticated in easte…
Sorghum's genome map traces how grasses evolvedResearchers who sequenced the roughly 730-megabase genome of sorghum, an African grass grown for food, feed, fibre and fuel, mapped almost all of its genes onto their chromosomes.…
Sorong: The Gateway to the World's Most Biodiverse Coral ReefsLocated on the western tip of New Guinea, Sorong has evolved from a colonial oil outpost into a thriving logistics hub. As the capital of Southwest Papua, this Indonesian city ser…
Sorrento once had a temple to the Sirens, unique in the Greek worldSorrento, perched above the Bay of Naples, was known in antiquity for wine and fish rather than the lemons that now flavour its limoncello; citrus had not yet reached Italy. Legen…
Sorsogon City is the vital gateway connecting the southern Philippines to the island of Luzon.Located at the southernmost tip of the Bicol Peninsula, Sorsogon City has transformed from a historic settlement into a bustling economic hub. As a critical transshipment point, t…
Sōseki fled London mad and invented modern Japan’s novelistGovernment scholar Natsume Sōseki spent two wretched London years (1900–02) until a telegram warned "Natsume has gone mad." Back home, I Am a Cat (1905) made him famous; quitting …
Sotheby's sold books for over a century before it handled paintingsSotheby's began in London in 1744 as a bookseller's auction room, and handled Napoleon's exile library long before it bothered with fine art. Its first big painting sale, a Frans …
Sōtō Zen: How a radical practice of silent meditation became a Japanese institution.Sōtō is the largest Zen sect in Japan, defined by shikantaza—meditation without objects or specific goals. While today it is synonymous with the teachings of its founder, Dōgen, t…
Sotomayor’s 2.45-meter leap still owns the men’s recordHigh jumpers clear a bar without knocking it down, taking off from one foot. Cuba’s Javier Sotomayor set the men’s world record at 2.45 meters in 1993—the longest-standing mark in…
Souk Ahras: The Ancient Numidian Market of Lions That Shaped Western ThoughtBuilt upon the ruins of the ancient city of Thagaste, Souk Ahras is more than a modern Algerian municipality. It is a historic crossroads where Berber, Roman, and Numidian civiliz…
Soul food was born from scraps and turned into a badge of prideThe cuisine of Black Americans grew from what enslaved people were allowed to eat: cornmeal, a few pounds of pork, and the parts of the animal plantation owners discarded. Only in…
Soul fused gospel heat with secular R&B pride in the sixtiesSoul music arose in African-American communities in the late 1950s and early 1960s, mixing gospel, rhythm and blues, and jazz. Handclaps, call-and-response, tense vocals, and impr…
Soumitra Chatterjee: The Bengali icon who redefined Indian cinema through fourteen legendary collaborations.Soumitra Chatterjee was a titan of Indian film and theatre, best known for his transformative partnership with director Satyajit Ray. From his debut as the adult Apu to his portra…
Sound crawls through air but races through steel at almost 6 km a secondA sound wave is just a travelling squeeze in some material, and the material decides its pace. In warm air it covers about 343 metres a second; in steel, nearly 6,000; in solid at…
Sound is not a thing, but a traveling disturbance in matterWe often think of sound as something that moves through the air, but the particles of the air aren't actually traveling with the noise. Instead, sound is a mechanical wave—a rhyth…- Sound is not just what you hear, but a physical pulse moving through matter.A longitudinal wave is a mechanical disturbance where energy travels in the same direction as the wave itself. Think of a coiled spring being pushed and pulled; air molecules beha…
Soup began as the bread, not the broth poured over itThe word soup once named a slice of bread soaked in liquid, not the liquid itself. That old pairing survives in croutons and in the cheesy baguette floating on French onion soup. …
Sour cream is a complex colloidal gel engineered through precise bacterial fermentation and physicsBeyond its role as a tangy condiment, sour cream is a marvel of food science. Its thick, creamy texture is not accidental; it is the result of carefully controlled acidification, …
Sour little crabapples quietly keep the world's apple orchards workingWalk through a commercial apple orchard and every sixth or seventh tree may be a crabapple. Nobody grows them for fruit, which is mostly too sour to eat. They are there as pollen …
Sourav Ganguly returns to television to host the third season of Bigg Boss BanglaAfter a decade-long hiatus, the Bengali reality franchise Bigg Boss has returned to screens with a retro-themed house and a new digital-first strategy. Hosted by cricket legend So…
Source code is the human-readable blueprint that breathes life into digital and physical machines.Beyond just software, source code is the original, editable file behind everything from typography to 3D-printed hardware. While computers only understand machine code, humans wri…- Sourdough is not just bread; it is a living, ancient microbial ecosystem in your kitchen.Long before industrial yeast, humanity relied on a bubbling mixture of flour and water to leaven bread. This ancient technique creates a stable, symbiotic culture of wild yeast an…
Sourdough's Secret: How to Naturally Leaven Perfect PanettoneCreating authentic, rich panettone requires more than just baking; it demands a precise, time-intensive fermentation process. Utilizing a 'sweet' starter, this traditional Italian…
Sousse: A Mediterranean Crossroads Where Ancient Phoenician Roots Meet Modern Tunisian TourismFrom its origins as a Phoenician trading post to its role as a premier modern resort, Sousse has endured centuries of conquest and transformation. Today, this Tunisian city balanc…
South Africa boasts twelve official languages, reflecting a complex history of migration and policy.Beyond English and Afrikaans, South Africa recognizes ten indigenous languages as official, including Zulu and Xhosa. This linguistic tapestry is shaped by colonial legacies, the …
South Africa is a study in contrasts, blending ancient traditions with modern global influences.South Africa is a land of stark juxtapositions, where high-tech office buildings stand near homes without electricity. This complex society, shaped by a history of segregation and…
South Africa is the only nation to build nuclear weapons and then voluntarily dismantle them.During the apartheid era, South Africa secretly developed a nuclear arsenal not for battlefield combat, but as a high-stakes diplomatic bluff. The goal was to force Western powers…
South Africa manages the world's largest HIV treatment programme amid complex social challengesSouth Africa faces one of the world's most significant public health crises, with approximately 8 million people living with HIV as of 2022. While the nation hosts the largest tre…
South Africa prepares for a pivotal municipal election amidst rising coalition politicsOn 4 November 2026, South Africans will head to the polls to elect councils across nine provinces. With 620 parties competing for 10,526 seats, the outcome will test new legislati…
South Africa: GDP per person then and nowIn 1960, GDP per person in South Africa was $532. In 2025 it was $6,598.
South Africa: infant mortality then and nowIn 1976, infant mortality in South Africa was 108.9 deaths per 1,000 live births. In 2024 it was 24.2 deaths per 1,000 live births.
South Africa: internet users then and nowIn 1990, internet users in South Africa was 0.0%. In 2024 it was 78.4%.
South Africa: life expectancy then and nowIn 1960, life expectancy in South Africa was 52.6 years. In 2024 it was 66.3 years.
South Africa: population then and nowIn 1960, population in South Africa was 16.4 million. In 2025 it was 64.7 million.
South Africa: urban population then and nowIn 1960, urban population in South Africa was 46.7%. In 2025 it was 63.8%.
South Africa's 1994 election was a technical disaster that became a political triumph.Millions of citizens queued for days to cast their first-ever democratic ballots in April 1994. While the process was marred by logistical chaos, missing materials, and allegation…
South Africa's 2019 general election saw the ruling party's lowest vote share since 1994The 2019 South African general election marked a pivotal moment for the nation's political landscape. While the African National Congress retained its governing status, it faced a…
South Africa's cricketers needed 17 years to win a Test, then found the googlySouth Africa's first eleven Tests produced ten defeats and a single draw, the worst start of any current Test nation. What turned things around was a quartet of spin bowlers who m…
South Africa's largest nation began as a minor clan named for heavenAround 1574 a man called Zulu kaMalandela founded a small clan in what is now northern KwaZulu-Natal. His name meant heaven or weather. Some 250 years later, Shaka turned that mod…
South Africa's largest province is a vast, arid landscape defined by diamonds and desertCovering more than 140,000 square miles, the Northern Cape is South Africa's most sparsely populated province. This rugged, sun-baked region is a land of extremes, where the Orang…