Alzheimer's doesn't have to be your brain's destiny, says neuroscientist and author of Still Alice, Lisa Genova. She shares the latest science investigating the disease — and some promising research on what each of us can do to build an Alzheimer's-resistant brain.
Lisa Genova wields her ability to tell a story and her knowledge of the human brain to talk about medical conditions like Alzheimer’s in warmly human terms.
Her writing, often focusing on those who are misunderstood, explores the lives of people living with neurological diseases and disorders. A bestselling author, her work has been transformed into an Oscar-winning film, Still Alice, but the real triumph is Genova’s ability to help us empathize with a person’s journey we otherwise couldn’t even begin to understand.
Her newest book, Inside the O’Briens, is about Huntington’s disease.
Elon Musk discusses his new project digging tunnels under LA, the latest from Tesla and SpaceX and his motivation for building a future on Mars in conversation with TED's Head Curator, Chris Anderson.
Elon Musk is the CEO and product architect of Tesla Motors and the CEO/CTO of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX).
At SpaceX, Musk oversees the development of rockets and spacecraft for missions to Earth orbit and ultimately to other planets. In 2008, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft won the NASA contract to provide cargo transport to space. In 2012, SpaceX became the first commercial company to dock with the International Space Station and return cargo to Earth with the Dragon.
At Tesla, Musk has overseen product development and design from the beginning, including the all-electric Tesla Roadster, Model S and Model X, and the rollout of Supercharger stations to keep the cars juiced up. (Some of the charging stations use solar energy systems from SolarCity, of which Musk is the non-executive chair.) Transitioning to a sustainable energy economy, in which electric vehicles play a pivotal role, has been one of his central interests for almost two decades. He co-founded PayPal and served as the company's chair and CEO.
Scientists say using a Satnav can switch off part of the brain, which could have implications for our health.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and say whether the statements below are true or false.
1 Following the directions of a satnav have deep effects on our brains. 2 Driving around Soho is not difficult. 3 The hippocampus stops working when drivers use a satnav. 4 Seven roads start at Seven Dials in Covent Garden. 5 Taxi drivers in general have the most developed hippocampus. 6 There are around 26,000 places of interest in London. 7 Medical research has proved that underuse of the hippocampus leads to mental diseases.
Some drivers like to follow their nose. Others are more than happy to be told where to go. After 100 yards, bear left... More and more people will not leave home without their trusty sat-nav. It is vital to find places easily. It is, sort of, I suppose takes the stress out of going somewhere that you don't know. But what effect does slavishly following directions have on our brains? Neuro scientists at University College London have published research claiming it’s quite profound. Volunteers like Will here were taken around Soho, one of the most complicated road networks in the world. They were then put in an MRI scanner and, using virtual reality, were asked give directions. So what we did here is look into the human brain, at Will’s brain and many others, to see is there a part of the brain that knows automatically the number of options or the changes in the number of options. But when the volunteers were told the route using a Satnav, scientists noticed the navigational area of the brain, called the hippocampus, stopped working. You’re no longer engaging those bits of your brain that you would do normally if you were using your memory to sort of pick apart the street network as you navigate. So effectively, the Satnav is turning off the engagement of these brain areas. Now this is Seven Dials in Covent Garden, and it’s called that for a reason. There are seven different roads converging so I have lots of options here and my brain is currently trying to work out which road to take. But not just that, which road to take after that, and after that, and after that. It’s processing lots of information to try and get me to my destination as quickly and safely as possible. But, this research suggests, if I were to activate my Satnav here, this will do all the decision-making for me. So that part of my brain just switches off. This research builds on a previous study which found London's black cab drivers have the most developed hippocampus. They have to memorise thousands of roads, routes and landmarks. It is not in your long term memory, it’s in your short term memory. Then the brain very quickly becomes a sponge once again and it clicks on to this road leads to this road that leads to that road, I can’t do that road because it’s one way. And in over a series… an amount of time, it grows and grows and grows. So that said, you know, it’s extremely difficult, not just because you’ve got to know 26,000 roads, and thousands and thousands of places of interest, but it’s… we are remembering how to remember them again. The research team wants to build on the study to explore the wider medical implications, whether underuse of the hippocampus, for example, contributes to the onset of Alzheimer and dementia. But for the first time, there is firm evidence that switching this on switches off an important part of our brain. Marc Ashdown, BBC London news.
KEY: 1T 2F 3T 4F (converge) 5F (London's black cab drivers) 6F (26,000 roads) 7F (it’s just a hypothesis)
Carrie Nugent is an asteroid hunter, part of a group of scientists working to discover and catalog our oldest and most numerous cosmic neighbors.
Why keep an eye out for asteroids? In this short, fact-filled talk, Nugent explains how their awesome impacts have shaped our planet, and how finding them at the right time could mean nothing less than saving life on Earth.
Carrie Nugent is part of a team that uses NASA's NEOWISE telescope to search the skies for and catalog asteroids.
Creating genetically modified people is no longer a science fiction fantasy; it's a likely future scenario.
Biologist Paul Knoepfler estimates that within fifteen years, scientists could use the gene editing technology CRISPR to make certain "upgrades" to human embryos — from altering physical appearances to eliminating the risk of auto-immune diseases.
In this thought-provoking talk, Knoepfler readies us for the coming designer baby revolution and its very personal, and unforeseeable, consequences.
Dr. Paul Knoepfler is working to figure out how we use safely stem cells to treat many diseases and how they sometimes turn to the dark side to cause cancer. Over the years he has made key discoveries about how stem cells and cancer are programmed. Now he is especially interested in how to hack these cells to control their behavior, including using powerful CRISPR genetic modification technology.
Knoepfler has also been a leading voice in the discussion about how CRISPR could be used to make designer babies and the risks of going down that path. He is a professor of cell biology and anatomy at UC Davis School of Medicine in California, where he both does research and teaches. In addition, he is a prolific writer including his popular science blog, The Niche, and two books: Stem Cells: An Insider's Guide and GMO Sapiens: The Life-Changing Science of Designer Babies. He is excited about contributing to efforts to build an innovative, global community of interconnected people with a shared passion for biomedical science and battling fake science. Knoepfler’s outspoken, approachable nature in tackling some of the most transformative questions in science has made him a go-to scientist for journalists and ordinary people across the globe.
Astronomers have discovered seven Earth-sized planets orbiting a single star - a record number.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and say whether the statements below are true or false.
1. These planets orbit around a star much stronger than the Sun. 2. The new planets can perfectly be seen from the Earth. 3. Water has been spotted on these planets. 4. In the last 25 years, more than 3,000 planets have been discovered. 5. The planets are 40 million kilometres away. 6. To reach these planets would take around 70,000 years. 7. Huge new telescopes have started operating recently, which makes it possible to have a closer look at the new planets.
An artist's impression of a startling discovery deep in space: Around a faint and distant star much weaker than our Sun, it’s a collection of planets that are surprisingly similar to Earth. In all, seven of these worlds have been spotted. And astronomers think it may change the way we look at the night sky. An array of telescopes kept watch on one point in space, and what the scientists were looking for were tiny clues about the light of a particular start becoming dimmer on a regular basis as planets orbitted in front of it. They can't see these new worlds but they know they're there. We were extremely excited. This is the biggest amount of planets that we’ve found in one go that look like the Earth in composition, size and mass. All seven are close enough to the star and far enough to the star that they could host liquid water and that, that's just incredible. This is the latest revelation in a wave of discoveries over the past 25 years of new worlds that exist in solar systems beyond our own. The total of these distant planets now stands at well over 3,000. What makes this discovery so unusual is the sheer number of new worlds spotted in one go, seven in all, and crucially at just the right temperature for liquid water to exist at the surface. Three of them are in what's called the habitable zone, which raises the tantalizing possibility that they could conceivably host life. But we won't be getting there in a hurry. They're 40 light-years away. To reach them, using the rockets we have now, would take something like 700,000 years. There's so much to find out about these worlds, whether the artist’s impressions are right, whether it's possible that the conditions for life do exist, and astronomers say there'll be a huge effort to try to find out. The more we look, the more planets we find, and the more Earth-like planets we find. But this is especially exciting because this sort of of ultra-cool star that we've discovered, they're quite populous throughout our galaxy and it's the first time we’ve found planets going around a star like this, and we've found seven of them. The best hope lies with huge new telescopes that will come into service soon, improving the chances of getting a really close look at these alien worlds to see, for example, if they do have oceans and maybe, just maybe, discover if there are some hints about life. David Shukman, BBC News.
Sarah Parcak uses satellites orbiting hundreds of miles above Earth to uncover hidden ancient treasures buried beneath our feet. There's a lot to discover; in the Egyptian Delta alone, Parcak estimates we've excavated less than a thousandth of one percent of what's out there.
Now, with the 2016 TED Prize and an infectious enthusiasm for archaeology, she's developed an online platform called GlobalXplorer that enables anyone with an internet connection to discover unknown sites and protect what remains of our shared human inheritance.
Alan Eustace is a senior Google executive who in 2014 broke the world record for the highest parachute jump.
What goes up must come down, but simply reaching the Earth's stratosphere was the first challenge for Alan Eustace. It took more than two hours to ascend 25 miles and around 15 minutes to parachute back to Earth, at times travelling faster than the speed of sound. Previous explorers used complicated platforms and capsules. Mr Eustace used a balloon and a very special suit.
What was really unique about this was we tried to build a space suit which was equivalent to scuba diving, where the tanks were included, so I didn’t have to disconnect from the capsule, I didn’t have to have a heavy capsule to go up, all I had to do was like scuba diving. I just went up in a suit in an environment that was capable of sustaining me during a period of time.
That suit is now on display at the National Air and Space Museum in Virginia, home to many other artefacts of space exploration which in the 1960’s inspired Mr Eustace.
Everyone I know dreamed of being an astronaut and everybody I know dreamed of being above the atmosphere to be able to look at curviture of the Earth, the darkness of space, the beautiful thin atmosphere. I guess in my case that dream never really went away, even at 57 years old I’m still dreaming.
Remarkably, the record-breaking suit was made relatively cheaply, using existing technology and materials. Mr Eustace and his team simply discovered new ways to apply it, such as how to heat thermal underwear with a water system.
The hot water circulates around my chest and then on my legs and then goes back to be reheated.
Why did you need to keep warm?
Because it’s cold out there. The higher that you go through the troposphere, the colder it gets, and eventually it will get up to -110, 120°F.
And Mr Eustace, a keen skydiver and pilot, didn’t have to spend years at NASA learning how to be an astronaut.
So can anyone do this? Can I do this?
You can certainly do this. The way we design the system was, you know, if everything went wrong, if I was unconscious, they had to be able to get me from 135,000 feet down to the ground safely if I did nothing. So, if you’re capable of doing nothing, I think you can do it.
With many sights set on the Moon and Mars, the Earth’s stratosphere remains largely unexplored, but this suit or something like it puts it within reach of scientists, and one day it might even be adapted to bring people back from the International Space Station.
How are you doing?
I am tired but healthy.
Jane O’Brien, BBC News, Virginia.
This week's talking point is medical science and controversial health issues.
Before getting together with the members of your conversation group, go
over the questions below so that ideas come to mind more easily the day
you get together with your friends and you can work out vocabulary
problems beforehand.
Health issues
Do you think it should be obligatory for parents to vaccinate their children?
Is it ever right to switch off the life support of a patient in a vegetative state? Why? Why not?
Should hospitals be allowed to presume consent for organ donation unless objection has been registered?
Should smoking be made illegal everywhere, including inside people’s homes, in cars and outside?
Should smokers pay the full cost of their medical treatment?
What are the arguments for and against free healthcare for everyone?
Will imposing a sugar tax help curb obesity?
Should marijuana be a medical option?
Do you think alternative medicine (acupuncture, acupressure, chiropractic, homeopathy, hypnosis, hypnotheraphy, herbalism, osteopathy, reflexology) is fraud?
What are the advantages and disadvantages of genetic engineering (designer babies, cloning human beings)?
Medical advances
Rank these medical advances from the most important (1) to the least important (9). Give reasons.
Completion of the sequencing of the human genome project
Stem cell research which may lead to cure diseases and repair damaged tissues
Targeted cancer therapies to interfere with the spread of cancer
Laparoscopic surgery (minimally invasive surgery)
HPV vaccine to protect against cervical cancer and genital warts
Dan Gilbert, author of Stumbling on Happiness, challenges the idea that we'll be miserable if we don't get what we want. Our "psychological immune system" lets us feel truly happy even when things don't go as planned.
Dan Gilbert is a Harvard psychologist who says our beliefs about what will make us happy are often wrong — a premise he supports with intriguing research, and explains in his accessible and unexpectedly funny book, Stumbling on Happiness.
The Brain with David Eagleman is a BBC series in which Dr David Eagleman takes viewers on an extraordinary journey that explores how the brain, locked in silence and darkness without direct access to the world, conjures up the rich and beautiful world we all take for granted.
What Is Reality? begins with the astonishing fact that this technicolour multi-sensory experience we are having is a convincing illusion conjured up for us by our brains. In the outside world there is no colour, no sound, no smell. These are all constructions of the brain. Instead, there is electromagnetic radiation, air compression waves and aromatic molecules, all of which are interpreted by the brain as colour, sound and smell.
We meet a man who is blind despite the fact that he has eyes that can see. His story reveals that it's the brain that sees, not the eyes. A woman with schizophrenia, whose psychotic episodes were her reality, emphasises the fact that whatever our brains tell us is out there, we believe it.
Visual illusions are reminders that what's important to the brain is not being faithful to 'reality', but enabling us to perceive just enough so that we can navigate successfully through it. The brain leaves a lot out of its beautiful rendition of the physical world, a fact that Dr Eagleman reveals using experiments and street demonstrations.
Each one of our brains is different, and so is the reality it produces. What is reality? It's whatever your brain tells you it is.
A special vault has been built in the Arctic to store thousands of seeds, as scientists fear the impact of climate change and prolonged conflicts could have devastating consequences on food crops around the world.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and answer the questions below.
1 How often do scientists get the deliveries of seeds?
2 How many lines of securities are there?
3 What has the store been designed for?
4 How long can the crops survive?
5 What's the temperature in the last barrier to the store?
6 How many plastic packets with seeds are there?
7 Apart from drought, what other threat is mentioned?
In the punishing cold of an Arctic mountain, in the remote Svalbard islands, a doorway leads to what is meant to be the safest place on earth. Scientists are on their way, approaching through this isolated and hostile terrain. And I am with them. As they are carry a precious cargo of seeds, to be kept out of the way of whatever climate change might bring. How often do you get these deliveries? We have deliveries three times a year. The box of seeds is about to go through the first line of security. There are half a dozen in all. I have just come down the access tunnel that is cut into the mountain. This place is 130 metres above sea level, because if the worst happens and global warming melts all of the polar icecaps, this project will still be safe. The deeper inside the mountain we go, the more the temperature drops. The store is designed to survive any natural disaster. The seeds can last here for a very long time. It depends on what the crop is, but some of the crops may survive for more than 4,000 years. You're really imagining this place functioning, keeping the seeds safe for 4,000 years? It's difficult to say. I'm sure that the pharoahs thought their pyramids would last long, and they did. The last barrier to the store itself. Inside here, it is minus 18 Celsius. The rows of shelves are filling up with seeds from all over the world. There are samples of nearly half of the most important food crops, brought here just in case. Samples of seeds used to be held in glass test tubes. Now they are kept in little plastic packets and there are more than 800,000 of these in this vault. Everywhere you look there are examples of why this place matters. There are seeds from Syria, plants that are good at coping with drought, and some have just been returned to the Middle East. When harvests are ruined by extremes of weather, having backup copies of key seeds is essential. Another threat is flooding, which can damage national stores of seeds. This happened in the Philippines. And with industrial scale farming, most food comes from just a dozen varieties of plants, so keeping different genetic types helps to guarantee supplies. It is for the survival of mankind in the future. We need diversity. All the different kinds of plant material, to get food for the future. We have a lot of problems now, climate change, environmental problems, and to tackle that, we need genetic variation. So, in these remote mountains, this place is meant to be a safeguard against apocalypse, an insurance policy for a warming world. David Shukman, BBC News, in Svalbard in the Arctic. Key: 1 Three times a year 2 Half a dozen (6) 3 To survive any natural disaster 4 (For more than) 4,000 years 5 -18ºC 6 800,00 7 Flooding
Twins Lucy and Maria Aylmer are twins but most people wouldn't believe it based on their appearance. They have the same mom and dad but Lucy has pale white skin with red hair while Maria has a caramel complexion and thick curly black hair.
These pretty teens are best friends and they're also something else, something that may surprise you.
We’re twins.
Believe it or not, they're twins.
Yeah, we’re twins. We’re twin sisters. With same mom and same dad.
You heard right. They have the same mom and dad. What are the odds that one would be black and one white?
A lot of people are just in shock.
Lucy and Maria Aylmer live in Gloucester, England. Maria has a caramel complexion, brown eyes and thick curly black hair. Lucy has pale white skin with ginger red hair, blue eyes, and freckles. Most people have the same reaction when they hear they are twins.
They say, ‘How did it happen? We don’t believe you.’
So how did it happen? Their mom, Donna, is half black and half white. The twins' dad, Vince, is white. The couple was thrilled when a sonogram revealed they were expecting twins.
I just cried. It was shock.
Mom did a double take when she delivered one black and one white baby.
I’m so glad mom dressed us in such cute little outfits.
Mom dressed her adorable twin daughters in matching outfits, just like twins everywhere, but by age 10, Lucy says she didn’t feel like a twin, so why dress like one?
We don’t look alike. So why should we have to wear the exact same thing.
Maria says she once wished for Lucy’s straight hair.
I used to cry about it. I hate my curly hair.
And Lucy says she was sometimes taunted at school.
They thought I was adopted. They called me a ghost.
Now 18, the twins not only look different. They have very different personalities.
We’re completely different.
Maria loves getting dressed up in chic clothing. She is very outgoing.
I love meeting people. I’m not scared to approach people or anything so...
Whereas I am. I’m terrified of like going up to random strangers.
Lucy prefers casual clothes, but they've come to embrace their uniqueness as black and white twins.
If I have kids one day, they might come out looking like Lucy.
This CBS 60 Minute segment deals with the increasing role that robots are playing in our lives and, above all, in the job market. This is the way reported Steve Kroft introduced the segment.
'One of the hallmarks of the 21st century is that we are all having more and more interactions with machines and fewer with human beings. If you've lost your white collar job to downsizing, or to a worker in India or China you're most likely a victim of what economists have called technological unemployment. There is a lot of it going around with more to come.
As we reported earlier this year, at the vanguard of this new wave of automation is the field of robotics. Everyone has a different idea of what a robot is and what they look like but the broad universal definition is a machine that can perform the job of a human. They can be mobile or stationary, hardware or software, and they are marching out of the realm of science fiction and into the mainstream.
The age of robots has been anticipated since the beginning of the last century. Fritz Lang fantasized about it in his 1927 film "Metropolis." In the 1940s and 50s, robots were often portrayed as household help.'
Self-study activity:
Watch the video two or three times and explain leap years in your own words.
You probably know that this year, 2012, is a leap year, and that means that this year we get an extra day on February 29th. So instead of having 365 days this year there'll be 366. Great, an extra day, who really cares? Well, people born on February 29th on some previous leap year, also known as leaplings, they care because they finally get to celebrate their real birthday. But for the rest of us it's just a day like any other day -whoop dee doo!
So why do we go to all the trouble to have a leap year? Well, I'll explain. Now we all understand a day. One full day is actually how long it takes for the Earth to spin around exactly once. And a year is how long it takes for the Earth to orbit the sun exactly once.
So while the Earth orbits around the sun in a full year it spins around 365.25 times. In other words, one full year equals 365.25 days. This is called the astronomical year. But here's the problem: Our calendar year is only 365 days, and that's because there's really no way to have a .25 day. And so those extra .25 days, they just keep accumulating, and what they do is make it so that the stars slowly drift out of sync with our calendar.
So this is where Leap Year comes in to save the day. Every year we set aside those .25 days, until the fourth year when they equal one full day. And then on that fourth year we put that extra day on February 29th and we call it Leap Day. Bam! We're back in sync. That's why February 29th exists. Cool.
But the real interesting thing is how we humans figured this all out. It really was the Egyptians who first figured out Leap Year. They noticed by watching the stars, specifically the Sirius star, that the astronomical year was actually 365.25 days, and they noticed this by seeing the Sirius star slowly drifting out of sync.
But the western world wasn't so fast to figure this all out. It wasn't until many centuries later when Julius Caesar, with the help of an astronomer, discovered just like the Egyptians first did that the year is really 365.25 days.
And they created the Julian Calendar with the Leap Year that we know and love to fix that problem. Well done, Julius.
Well...not so fast. You see, if you want to get really exact about it, the astronomical year is actually 365.2422 days which is 11 minutes 14 seconds shorter than the Julian Calendar. And that means in 128 years from now, if we use the Julian Calendar, we'll be off again by one full day.
So today, we use a revised version of the Julian Calendar. It's called the Gregorian Calendar because Pope Gregory initiated it. The Gregorian Calendar is just like the Julian Calendar, but it's got a few more rules.
So while every fourth year is a leap year, every year that's divisible by 100 are now no longer leap years. And that means that years 1700, 1800 and 1900, those were not leap years, even though they normally would be.
And here's another rule: If the year is also divisible by 400, then it is still a leap year, which means that the year 2000… that was a leap year.
And with all those complicated rules, our calendars can stay in sync with the stars for millennia to come.
But... one more thing. Did you know that the earth's rotation is slowing at a rate of .005 seconds per year? And that means in about 2 billion years we're gonna have to have to add one more leap year to keep us in sync. But don't worry, we've got plenty of time to revise the calendar and fix that.
Listen to a report on seven famous Hungarian inventors and choose the heading A to I which goes with each extract. There are two headings you do not need to use.
A - An existing object was made safer
B - Some arts have greatly benefited from this invention
C - The inventor came up with his invention accidentally
D - The inventor contributed to the construction of a lethal weapon
E - The inventor was a religious person
F - The inventor was an immigrant
G - The inventor was attributed the invention after his death
H - The inventor was helped by a relative
I - The inventor won a very important award
Extract 1 The computer was invented by János Neumann in 1944. Today’s modern computers are based on his work. In 1943, Neumann, a mathematician, began working on the Manhattan Project, where he tackled the immense calculations required for construction of an atomic bomb. As he was faced with such a daunting task, he became interested in using machines for the calculation and the resolution of specific mathematical problems. During and after the war, his interest in computers grew, and he contributed extensively to the construction of the first modern computers.
Extract 2 The soda water and the dynamo were both invented by Ányos Jedlik, in 1826 and 1861 respectively. Ányos Jedlik was a Hungarian inventor, engineer, physicist and Benedictine priest and also a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences.
Extract 3 The modern ballpoint pen (also called biro or ballpen) was invented by László Bíró in 1931. Bíró was born in 1899. While working as a journalist, he noticed that the ink used in newspaper printing dried quickly, leaving the paper smudge-free. First, he tried to use the same ink in a fountain pen, but it didn’t work. Later a new tip was developed by Bíró and his brother György, a chemist. This new tip consisted of a ball that was free to turn in a socket and pick up ink from the cartridge and then roll to place it on the paper. The first ballpoint pen was presented at the Budapest International Fair in 1931.
Extract 4 The Ford Model T was designed by József Galamb, a mechanical engineer in 1908. The Model T, whose production continued until 1927, was wildly popular in the United States and is considered the first mass-produced automobile. In 1902 Galamb sailed to the United States to attend the World’s Fair in St. Louis, and joined the Westinghouse Corporation as a toolmaker. In 1905 he travelled to Detroit for a short visit, where he met Henry Ford, who convinced him to work for Ford Motor Company as a draftsman.
Extract 5 Binoculars were invented in 1840 by József Petzvál, a mathematician, inventor, and physicist best known for his work in optics. Petzval is considered to be one of the main founders of geometrical optics, modern photography and cinematography. Among Petzval's other works are the invention of opera glasses, work that led to the perfection of the telescope and microscope (1843) and efficient binoculars, and the construction of new floodlights (1847).
Extract 6 Vitamin C was discovered in 1932 by Albert Szent-Györgyi, a physiologist, who also won the Nobel Prize in medicine in 1937. The Budapest-born researcher first isolated the crucial vitamin, which boosts the immune system and is an antioxidant, from paprika. He is one of the most important scientists of the twentieth century. He worked at some of the world's leading academic research centers, including the University of Groningen, Cambridge University, and the Mayo Clinic. In 1930 Szent-Györgyi returned to Hungary as a professor of medicinal chemistry. He joined the anti-Nazi resistance movement in Hungary during World War II and his life was in constant danger. He left Hungary in 1947 to join the staff of the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods Hole, Massachusetts.
Extract 7 The safety match was invented in 1836 by János Irinyi, a chemist. In the 19th century, scientists discovered that matches could be made to light reliably by adding potassium chlorate. When a match is struck, heat is produced due to friction. But these matches were still dangerous, as potassium chlorate tends to be explosive. In 1836, Janos Irinyi replaced potassium chlorate with another substance, lead dioxide, which works in the same way, but is less explosive. Irinyi sold the invention to Istvan Romer, who set up the first commercial match factories, and these were a great success.
Britain is on the brink of a technological revolution. Machines and
artificial intelligence are beginning to replace jobs like never before.
In this BBC Panorama episode reporter Rohan Silva looks at the workplaces already using this new
technology and asks whether we should feel threatened by it, or whether
it will benefit all of us.
Are we ready for one of the biggest changes
the world of work has ever seen?
Ingrid Newkirk is the co-founder and president of PETA, the world's largest animal-rights organization. She answers questions from Time magazine readers in this interview.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and say whether the statements below are true or false. The activity is suitble for Advanced students.
Note: In the course of the interview the name Michael Vick comes up. Michael Vick was a quarterback for the Atlanta Falcons football team, who was discovered to have a dog fighting ring with over seventy dogs, some of which showed signs of injuries. The case drew publicity to the issues of animal abuse and dog fighting. It also drew attention to unlawful gambling and drug activities which authorities claim often accompany dog fighting.
1 Our diet makes a great difference to animals. 2 PETA advocates for human milk to be used in the making of ice-cream. 3 Michael Vick feels sorry for what he did. 4 Ingrid claims that people at PETA have a good time doing their job. 5 Not all PETA members agree with the campaigns. 6 Baboons and pigs are still used by car manufacterers in car-crash tests. 7 PETA approves of both cloning animals for meat and using an in-vitro technique to get meat. 8 In-vitro meat is healthier. 9 Some people have a wrong idea about PETA.
I’m Albert Cruz here for Time.com and we’re here with Ingrid Newkirk, president and co-founder of People for the Ethical Treatment of animals, otherwise known as PETA. Ingrid has a new book coming out called One Can Make a Difference, and she’s here to answer questions from Time readers. Thank you for being with us today. My pleasure. Our first questions is from James Dodds in Katonah, New York, and James asks, is there an effective, fairly simple way that people can help animals in their everyday lives? Everybody can make a difference. If you just change to one vegetarian day a week, that’s a wonderful step that will save animals’ lives. If you just choose clothing that isn’t made from animals, that makes a difference. There are alternatives to dissection if you’re in school or you have a child in school, so yes, you can just choose one thing and that one thing means the world. It means you’ve chosen something kind instead of something cruel. That’s fanastic. PETA recently tried to advocate for the use of human breast milk in Ben and Jerry’s ice-cream as opposed to cow milk, and Erica Cole from Westford, Massachusetts asks that… or she says that doesn’t seem very feasible. What was the point of this…? It isn’t feasible at all, but it’s great fun to suggest that the Ben and Jerry’s, who also knew it was a joke. But the thing that was serious is that television stations listened to why we said that making anything out of cow’s milk is unkind, and that’s because they take the calves away from their loving mothers when they’re just a few hours old, winch them away with a chain and a tractor and put them in a stall for veal. We drink the milk that’s meant for those little calves and as a result those little calves suffer greatly. So we were very glad when people started to come to the website, watch the footage and actually show the footage on television. Bobby Mullins from Norfolk, Virginia, asks if you think that the punishment that Michael Vick received was fair. I can’t really comment on the punishment. I do… have spoken to Michael and I do know that he’s contrite. And I still talk to him. He came to our office, he didn’t have to, it wasn’t going to get him anywhere with the judge and I told him that and I told the judge that, and he attended an empathy class. And I do believe that he learned a lot about dogs and other animals that no one had ever shown him as he grew up. And his eyes were opened, and I believe when we see him emerge that he’s going to have strong message for inner city youth, for anyone who’s dog-fighting, that that was not the way to go. Sidney Jorgenson from Ridgefield, Connecticut, has a question about fun versus seriousness. He wants to know if you ever have fun fighting for animals’ rights. Oh, Sydney, come and look at our website, peta.org. At the moment, we are repositioning fish as sea kittens so that children will wonder why it’s all right to eat them. But, of course, at the heart of it, it’s a very sad situation for animals. But yes, we would all probably have jumped off a ledge if we hadn’t had fun along the way. Max Wilson from Seattle has a question about some of the campaigns that you were on, and he wants to know if you think any of them have been counterproductive. I don’t think so. Honestly, I think that they haven’t… they may have caused many of our members to leave us and they may have caused people to dislike us, but we’re not here to win a popularity contest. We’re here to get people to find out the facts about various ways in which animals suffer and the choices they have to make. Because when you rile people up, when you antagonise people, they have to come and look for more, and that’s when they think, oh, maybe these people have a point. Laura Sanders from Greensburg, Pennsylvania, and she wants to know what you would say has been PETA’s greatest victory for animals to date. It’s probably the most intangible, which is changing people’s outlook and putting animals’ rights on the map. But really I look back on things like stopping car-crash tests on baboons and pigs. Whenever you see the mannequins on TV, think PETA. We stopped all the car companies in the world from car tests on animals. They were crude, they were cruel, didn’t need them. We do have a question here from Eric Myers from Scranton, Pennsylvania, who wants to know what PETA standing on cloning animals for food or in-vitro meat is. Well, cloning animals for meat is just rubbish. The animals suffer greatly in the cloning process and who wants it anyway? We’re all suspect of it. But we do… We have offered one-million-dollar reward for the first scientist to come up with in-vitro, which is tissue-culture meat. And that will mean you take just a couple of cells from animals and you grow meat in a laboratory. And that process has already begun. The first conference has taken place. And if someone can market it by 2012, the first in-vitro chicken, it will taste and look and have texture like chicken, then we’ll give them a million dollars. So you would be able to grow a steak in a dish without having to kill an animal? There will be lines and lines of dishes, and you can eliminate diseases like salmonella and campylobacter because you’re growing it in culture. You can make it clean meat. So there’s no suffering, no disease. You can even make sure that the cholesterol level is reduced. Will in-vitro meat even come close to approximating the taste of a good sirloin or…? There is no reason to believe that with our scientific prowess today, that we can’t a meat that if you want it to taste exactly like the decomposing corpse of a small tortured animal. What would you say is the biggest misconception that people have about PETA? I think they think that we want to give dogs the right to vote or giraffes the right to ride a car or something. I’m not really sure why they’re so upset when all we’re asking for is consideration for the basic interests of animals. Animals don’t need very much. They need a little air. They need fresh water. They need patience and understanding. They need some nutritious food. Well, they need to be left alone in peace. Is that really too much to ask? Key: 1T 2F 3T 4T 5T 6F 7F 8T 9T
Robots at a Japanese amusement park hotel carry out a number of functions humans have been performing so far.
Self-study activity:
Watch the video and answer the questions below. The activity is suitable for Intermediate 2 students.
1 What functions do the robots fulfill at the Henn-na Hotel?
2 What kind of business does Hideo Sawada manage?
3 What two characteristics do robots have that make them unbeatable?
4 How do guests access their rooms at the Henn-na Hotel?
5 How much does a room cost at the Henn-na Hotel?
Welcome... Welcome to the Henn-na Hotel. If you want to check in, please… Welcome to the Robot Hotel, where robots are at your service. (1) They check guests in, carry bags and operate locker rooms. It's known locally as the Henn-na Hotel, which translates from Japanese to the weird hotel. It's brain child of Hideo Sawada - the CEO of the (2) low-cost travel agent H.I.S. He said, of course these robots can't just replace all human labour, but (3) in terms of being friendly and polite, they are unbeatable. That's why he asked developers to make robots for this hotel. Other technological innovations in the hotel include (4) facial recognition allowing guests to access their rooms without a hotel key. Electricity will be partly powered by solar energy aimed at reducing costs. Sawada said the concept is aimed at travelers on a budget, explaining that he thinks low-cost hotels will become a trend just as low-cost airlines did. (5) Room rates begin at 7000 yen, around £35 per night, but will be auctioned to the highest bidder during peak season. The company also runs the Huis Ten Bosch theme park, where the hotel is located. The weird hotel will open to the public on tomorrow.
Mathematics and sex are deeply intertwined. From using mathematics to reveal patterns in our sex lives, to using sex to prime our brain for certain types of problems, to understanding them both in terms of the evolutionary roots of our brain, Dr Clio Cresswell shares her insight into it all.
Dr Clio Cresswell is a Senior Lecturer in Mathematics at The University of Sydney researching the evolution of mathematical thought and the role of mathematics in society. Communicating mathematics is her field and passion. Dr Clio Cresswell has appeared on panel shows commenting, debating and interviewing; authored book reviews and opinion pieces; joined breakfast radio teams and current affair programs; always there highlighting the mathematical element to our lives. She is author of Mathematics and Sex.
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