Point Reyes

At Point Reyes you will find trails, historic buildings and visitor centers where visitors can enjoy all aspects of the unique area. Visitors can enjoy camping, hiking and biking. Point Reyes National Park also features the Point Reyes Lighthouse and visitor center, and at the visitor center you can learn all about the lighthouse (灯塔) and for the very adventurous tourists a trip down the 308 stairs to the lighthouse is a great option.

Big Sur

Big Sur is a region in California with many wonders to offer visitors. The Los Padres National Forest is an excellent destination for hiking. Throughout the forest there are many trails, including trails allowing visitors to walk along the coastline. In addition, Big Sur is also a fantastic destination for wildlife viewing. This region is one of the few places where the majestic bird can be seen.

Yosemite National Park

Located in central California, Yosemite National Park is an amazing destination for recreational enthusiasts, especially rock climbers. Climbers travel from around the world to take on the challenges presented at Yosemite. There are many other recreational activities to enjoy, including biking, hiking, backpacking and many more. Yosemite Valley has a wide range of attractive sights, and waterfalls.

Joshua Tree National Park

Located in southeastern California, Joshua Tree has some amazing sites to see. There are many nature trails, hiking trails, as well as options for mountain biking and rock climbing. Visitors to Joshua Tree can enjoy the beautiful desert ecosystem. At Joshua Tree you can look into the dense star clouds of the Milky Way, and see clearly. These star clouds are especially dense and bright to the south near the horizon.

When Millet was a boy he worked on his needy father's farm. At the rest hour in the fields the other workers would all take naps (打盹儿），but young Millet would spend time drawing. Finally the village where he lived gave him a little money to Paris to study art.

When Millet reached Paris, he had a tough time. Fortunately, when he was almost starving, someone bought one of his peasant paintings, which enabled his family to leave for Barbizon.

Millet's pictures of peasants at work were painted in a unique way. The painter would go out on the farms and watch them carefully, then he would come home and paint what he had seen. So astonishingly accurate was his memory that he could paint at home without models and get all the movements of his figures right. When he did need a figure to go by he would ask his wife to pose for him.

One of his noted artworks is called "The Sower", which shows a man seeding. He reaches into his bag for seed and then swings backward to scatter (撒播） the seed, and with each swing of his hand the sower strides (大步走） forward. In Millet's picture the sower has been working hard, but his swinging step and arm still move smoothly, like a machine. Only the man's head reveals his great tiredness.

Another masterpiece is called "The Gleaners". A gleaner is someone picking up the leftover in the field after the wheat harvest. When farmers near Barbizon are extremely badly-off, even the little the gleaners can find is a help. You can see from Millet's picture what back-breaking work gleaning must be.

Earth's forests are emptying.

Half of their inhabitants(栖息动物) have disappeared in the last 40 years, according to a latest report from the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).

The report tracked populations of 268 species of forest-dwelling birds, mammals, amphibians, and reptiles worldwide between 1970 and 2014(the most recent year for which data is available). The results show that forest animal populations have declined by 53% worldwide, and humans are to blame.

More than 80%of all land animal, plant, and insect species call forests home. However, a combination of habitat destruction, hunting, the spread of invasive species, climate change, and diseases are killing off forest animals, the researchers said.

Without those animals, forests can't perform the functions we rely on, since animals pollinate(授粉) forest plants, spread seeds, and nourish the soil with their waste.

“Forests depend on a complete animal world to perform. functions essential to life,” Susanne Winter, a program director at the WWF, told Eco Watch.

One of the most critical roles forests play is in easing climate change. Trees suck enormous amounts of carbon dioxide out of the air and embed (吸纳) the carbon in their wood and the soil. A recent study found that planting new trees over an area the size of the US could suck away two-thirds of all the carbon dioxide emissions that humans have pumped into the atmosphere.

“Without animals, it is harder for forests to absorb carbon, as tree species important for protecting the climate could be lost without animals,” Winter said. Without them, those trees would have difficulty reproducing and forests would lose their best carbon-storing trees.

“Forests are our greatest natural ally in the fight against global warming,” Winter said. “If we want to reverse the worldwide decline in biodiversity and prevent the climate crisis, we need to protect the forests and the species living there.”

It's generally believed that people act the way they do because of their personalities and attitudes .They recycle their garbage because the care about the environment .They pay $5 for a caramel brulée latte because they like expensive coffee drinks.

It's undeniable that behavior comes from our inner dispositions (性情), but in many instances we also draw inferences about who we are, as suggested by the social psychologist Daryl Bem , by observing our own behavior .We can be strangers to ourselves .If we knew our own minds, why would we need to guess what our preferences are from our behavior? If our minds were an open book, we would know exactly how much we care about the environment or like lattes .Actually , we often need to look to our behavior to figure out who we are.

Moreover, we don't just use our behavior to learn about our particular types of character—we infer characters that weren't there before .Our behavior is often shaped by little pressures around us, which we fail to recognize .Maybe we recycle because our wives and neighbors would disapprove if we didn't .Maybe we buy lattes in order to impress the people around us .We should not mistakenly believe that we always behave as a result of some inner disposition.

Whatever pressures there can be or inferences one can make, people become what they do, though it may not be in compliance (符合) with their true desires .Therefore , we should all bear in mind Kurt Vonnegut's advice: “We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”