1 . When it came to imaging the future, Arthur C. Clarke stubbornly refused to take credit for any predictions. The Internet, 3-D printers, email: he may have described them all long before they existed. As a science fiction writer, he came up with the idea of a “personal transceiver” that is small enough to be carried about, able to contact with anyone in the world and perform global positioning, making getting lost a thing of the past. Elsewhere, he predicted everything from online banking to reusable spacecraft. His best remembered fictional work of all is 2001: A Space Odyssey. It also happened to forecast the iPad, computer software that is able to read lips, and space stations.

Interestingly, his vision of the future has barely aged. For example, life in Sri Lanka inspired his 1979 novel, featuring a “space elevator”, a planet-to-space transportation system that would do away with the need for rocket travel. Those human settlements on Mars or Venus are decidedly behind schedule(we humans were expected to have set foot on both by 1980), and we’re still looking for the key that should have fully unlocked the languages of whales and dolphins by 1970.

It’s a way of thinking that was likely fuelled by his inability to be anything other than utterly absorbed in all that interested him. At the very start of his career, he shared a flat on London’s Gray’s Inn Road with fellow science fiction writers who nicknamed him “Ego” because of his talent for turning out (关掉) distraction. Once he’d become a big enough name to be interviewed, he’d send journalists home loaded with research papers.

He once said, “Trying to predict the future is a discouraging and risky occupation.” If a prediction sounds at all reasonable, technological progress is sure to leave it seeming “ridiculously conservative”. But if, by a miracle, a person were to be able to describe the future exactly as it will unfold, “His predictions will sound so absurd and far-fetched that everybody would laugh him to scorn (轻蔑).”

2 . As the U. K. and nations across the world mourn (哀悼) the death of Queen Elizabeth II, several aspects of the queen’s 70-year reign have been resurfacing over the past few days. From her personal life to her colonial legacy to her beloved dog — many are attracted by the life of the monarch (君主) . According to some experts, part of people’s attention towards the Royal Family not only comes from their respect for the queen but also from the trend of celebrity worshipping (名人崇拜) .

The idea of the British Royal Family taps into a collective desire for something that seems extraordinary, as opposed to the banality (平庸) of one’s own life, Cheryl Thompson, an assistant professor at the School of Performance at Toronto Metropolitan University, told Global News.

Thompson said the fairytaleish aspect of the British Royal Family is what attracts people, adding that many are attracted by their lavish weddings, seemingly perfect lives and the media attention that follows. “People have grown up hearing about fairy tales with princes and kings and queens,” she said. “So, you would imagine the castle has to be amazing compared to the two-bedroom apartment that you live in with your family … that whole idea of having servants upstairs, the luxuriousness of the dinner table — just brings all of that back into people’s imagination.”

Cele Otnes, head of the Department of Business Administration at the University of Illinois, said the Royal Family is “a complex brand” that is different from what one would normally associate with celebrities.

“They are a global brand that people love all over the world”, explained Otnes.

“They’re luxury”, she said. People far and wide are “very interested in the drama and the tension that happens in the Royal Family.”

“I think another one of the reasons the queen was so popular is that although everyone knew she was extremely wealthy, she didn’t show off her wealth.”

3 . One of the biggest concerns in science is that scientists themselves may influence the outcomes of experiments. Scientists have come up with all sorts of strategies to try to get rid of this problem.

But gathering the data and running an experiment is not the only part of the process that can go wrong. The methods chosen to analyse the data can also influence results. This point was dramatically demonstrated by two recent papers published in a journal called Surgery. Despite being based on the same data set, they drew opposite conclusions about whether using a particular piece of kit during appendix (阑尾) removal surgery reduced or increased the chances of infection.

A new paper, from a large team of researchers headed by Martin Schweinsberg, a psychologist at the European School of Management and Technology, in Berlin, helps cast some light on why. Dr Schweinsberg gathered 49 different researchers by advertising his project on social media. Each was handed a copy of a data set consisting of 3.9m words of text from nearly 8,000 comments made on Edge. org, an online forum (论坛) for chatty intellectuals.

In the end, 37 analyses were regarded sufficiently detailed to include. As it turned out, no two analysts employed exactly the same method, and none got the same result. The problem was not that any of the analyses were “wrong” in any objective sense. The differences arose because researchers chose different definitions of what they were studying, and applied different techniques.

Truth, in other words, can be a slippery customer, even for simple-sounding questions. What to do? One conclusion is that experimental design is critically important. Dr Schweinsberg hopes that platforms such as Data Explained can help solve the problem as well as revealing it, by allowing scientists to specify exactly how they chose to perform their analysis, allowing those decisions to be reviewed by others. It is probably not practical, he admits, to check and re-check every result. But if many different analytical approaches point in the same direction, then scientists can be confident that their conclusion is the right one.

6 . Bruce Lee not only made kungfu popular among Westerners but he continues to inspire millions of people worldwide 47 years after his death.

“There were not many Asian role models in the media then, let alone an Asian person admired so much by non-Asians,” Steve Aoki, a music producer and musician, said during the preview show of a new documentary about Bruce Lee on ESPN on Sunday night.

The documentary Be Water, which was released as part of ESPN’s 30 for 30 series on Sunday, is named after one of Lee’s philosophies (人生哲学) that are essential to his outlook on life and martial arts. “Now water can flow or it can crash. Be water, my friend. Always be yourself; express yourself; have faith in yourself. That’s what I always learn when I look around.”

NBA Hall of Famer Kareem Abdul-Jabbar said in a TV program on Friday that training with Lee played a key role in the durability (耐久力) and longevity that allowed him to become the NBA’s all-time leading scorer. “Bruce always emphasized the effectiveness of stretching,” he said. “So before we worked out, we stretched all the time. I even took that to another level by studying yoga and that really was the best practice in the off season.”

Critics call the documentary a “must-watch” for fans of the late movie star, writer, cultural icon and martial artist who developed Jeet Kune Do (截拳道). Some consider him as a civil rights fighter in the 1960s in the United States. Eric Francisco of Inverse. com, wrote: “In his brief lifetime, Bruce Lee never walked alongside Martin Luther King Jr. or Malcolm X. But as an Asian-American, he used his art of unarmed combat and his philosophy to influence many races and cultures. Lee was a civil rights figure in his own terms. He’s a true star with ever-lasting influence.”

7 . In Brazzaville, where art stalls can be found everywhere, local artist Andre N'Kitengue finds his inner peace on canvas in spite of traffic noise. At his _______studio，Andre starts his day as usual in front of his paint stand. Unlike other artists who see silence and_______during making art, he_______to take the inspiration from the_______street.“ The noise here actually gives me the strength to stay_______,”he says.

Though coloring his canvas and dealing with_______are his bread and butter, Andre insists that he is always an artist, not a businessman, as he_______ a sense of responsibility for his local community. With cases rising in Africa, he now_______paintings that serve as prevention_______for local community.“As cars pass by my studio, drivers and passengers would be able to see my ________about the virus and be aware of the fact that the pandemic is not over yet," he says. He________that it is in this hard time that we need to stay________ and that by________ the real life, he wants to________the image of his country to the world.

“Brazzaville is an artistic city because of its unique history and we need to pass it on to our younger generations," he says. Andre is also an active teacher who________students during school vacations.________, Elvis, Andre's son, is on his way to become a professional like his father. Impressive________keep coming out of this father-son studio.

Andre is ________ to see that more Chinese visitors and artists have ________here. He says he is looking forward to the________ of the artists from two countries.