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lumber
Collective term for harvested wood, whether cut into logs, heavy timbers, or members used in light-frame construction. Lumber is classified as hardwood or softwood (see wood). The term often refers specifically to the products derived from logs in a sawmill. Conversion of logs to sawed lumber involves debarking, sawing into boards or slabs, resawing into thinner boards of varying sizes, edging, crosscutting to square the ends and remove defects, grading according to strength and appearance, and drying in the open air or in kilns. Drying below the fiber-saturation point results in shrinkage and generally greater strength, stiffness, and density and better prepares the wood for finishing. Preservatives are often applied to protect the wood from deterioration and decay.


amber
Fossil tree resin that occurs as irregular nodules, rods, or droplike shapes in all shades of yellow with nuances of orange, brown, and, rarely, red. Milky-white opaque varieties are called bone amber. Hundreds of species of insects and plants are found as fossils in amber. Deeply colored translucent to transparent amber is prized as gem material, and numerous ornamental carved objects and beads are made from amber. Amber has been found throughout the world, but the largest deposits occur along the shores of the Baltic Sea.


bomber
Military aircraft designed to drop bombs on surface targets. Aerial bombardment can be traced to the Italo-Turkish War (1911), in which an Italian pilot dropped grenades on two Turkish targets. In World War I the Germans used zeppelins as strategic bombers. In the 1930s dive bombers were developed; they caused great destruction in the Spanish Civil War. World War II saw further development of heavy bombers, incl. the U.S. B-29, which could carry 20,000 lbs (9,000 kg) of bombs. Bombers were a major factor in the Allied victory. After the war, jet-propelled bombers carrying nuclear bombs were important to Cold War strategy, but from the 1960s strategic bombers began to be replaced by nuclear-armed ballistic missiles. Late-20th-cent. efforts to evade increasingly sophisticated radar systems culminated in the development of stealth bombers, but their enormous cost (and the end of the Cold War) raised questions about their worth compared to missiles.


Buber
German Jewish religious philosopher and biblical translator. Brought up in Lemberg (now Lviv, Ukraine), he studied in Vienna, Berlin, Leipzig, and Zurich. F. Nietzsche's heroic nihilism led Buber, a nonobservant Jew, to Zionism. He advocated Jewish-Arab cooperation in Palestine and saw Hasidism as a healing power for the malaise of modern Judaism. Under Nazi pressure, he emigrated to Palestine in 1938, and he taught at Hebrew Univ. until 1951. I and Thou (1923) expresses Buber's belief that the human (I) encounters God (Thou) as a distinct being, rather than merging in mystical union. The Bible was for Buber derived from ...

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