【推荐2】Sports Fans and Identity

Many people are crazy about a particular sports team. They are big fans and seem to connect their own identity to their chosen team.

Identity consists of things like gender (性别), personality, abilities, and social groups. The groups we belong to shape our identity. Related to this is the theory developed by Henri Tajfel and John Turner.     1     In knowing who we are, we may more closely identify with our social group than with our gender group. We also decide which group we belong to, based on different aspects of our identity. According to the theory, our self-esteem—how we feel about ourselves—is reflected in the group we belong to.     2     For example, we naturally protect the group we belong to, while making other groups less important. We think highly of the team we support, while we may add negative comments about an opposing team.

Researchers have studied language used by sports fans.     3     By using pronouns like “we”, fans show that they feel connected with the team when it is winning. “We really killed that team. They couldn’t get the ball past us.” However, when their team didn’t do well, the fans would distance themselves from the team, using different pronouns. “They didn’t know what they were doing. They had no planning.”

    4     They have found those fans have more self-confidence and feel more competent. They are quite sure they have the ability to deal with situations successfully or do things to a satisfactory standard.     5     These people will perform better at work and earn and spend more   money,   so experts suggest that a winning team may have a positive   influence on the economy of a city.

【推荐3】Home from the Navy, I started school at Greenville College in my hometown of Illinois. I’d been out of high school for four years, but my high school headmaster, Mr. Gardner, invited me to a Valentine’s day dance party at school. The thought of seeing my former teachers was exciting. So I agreed.

When Friday came, I cleaned up, dressed up and drove to the high school gym. I chatted with my teachers and approached Mr. Gardner to thank him before leaving. Just then, the band started playing and a young girl stood up to sing. One look at and I was crazy—I had never seen such a beautiful girl!

I asked Mr. Gardner who she was, and he answered, “That’s Marilyn Riley, Cut Riley’s daughter.” I was shocked to say the least. They lived just around the corner from me. I walked across the gym floor to introduce myself, “Hi, I’m Jack Joseph.”

“I know who you are,” was her not-too-friendly response.

“Would you like to dance?” I asked. “No! I’m working,” she shot back.

“Can I call you next week for a movie date?” I asked. “No,” was her response.

For the next month I phoned, trying to set up a date. She always had the same answer: No. then one rainy afternoon in March as I was driving home after basketball practice, I saw Marilyn, walking with no umbrella, no raincoat, no hat. I pulled alongside her and asked if she needed a ride, half expecting her to say no. instead, she stepped over the roadside and sat down on the seat next to me. It was only a few blocks to her house, but after pulling into her driveway we talked for 45minutes. It was magic from then on.

【推荐2】The sun is going to expand into the orbit of Mercury (水星) according to scientific calculations, which will result in the entire Earth catching fire, destroying all life. In order to survive, the United Earth Government prepares 10,000 giant engines on Earth to drive it away from its original orbit. The whole trip is expected to last 2,500 years.

This imaginative tale is at the heart of the science-fiction movie The Wandering Earth. The original novel was written by Liu Cixin, one of China’s most outstanding science-fiction writers and a prize winner of the Hugo Award in 2015 for his novel The Three-Body Problem.

Perhaps thanks to Liu’s fame, as well as the huge marketing efforts of the movie team, The Wandering Earth posted ticket sales of 670 million yuan when it was shown on the first day. More importantly, The Wandering Earth is the first “made-in-China” science-fiction movie on the big screen, as the director, Guo Fan, is also Chinese.

As a fan of Liu, having read almost all of his science-fiction books, I should mention the movie follows a rather different form from his novel. Actually, it only borrows from the novel the idea of the Earth having to escape the solar system. That’s just the point. It means Chinese movie production teams have grown enough to develop new ideas on the creative basis of science-fiction writers, while the writers are willing to work together with movie productions so that the film results in the best possible performance.

Liu may be a highly regarded science-fiction writer in China, but he is not the only one. There are many writers with rich imaginations, and their works can be adapted into movies, too. Someone has predicted that 2019 will mark the starting year of success for Chinese science-fiction movies. Only time will tell whether that prediction will come true. But if more professional movie teams and creative writers could work together, we can certainly expect more success for the domestic (国内的) science-fiction movie industry.

【推荐1】We know that carbon dioxide is a major driver of climate change, so the more that can be taken out of the atmosphere by plants, the better. With the warmer climate leading to a longer growing season, some scientists have suggested that more carbon dioxide would be absorbed by trees. But a new study has turned this theory on its head.

The researchers，led by Deborah Zani at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, studied certain tree species and recorded how much carbon each tree absorbed per season. With data from other projects, the researchers found as the rate of photosynthesis (光合作用)increased with warmer climate, leaves changed color and fell earlier in the year.

Climate-controlled experiments show what could be behind this unexpected result. In the trials, the trees were exposed to full sun, half shade or full shade. The results show there's a limit to the amount of photosynthesis that a tree can carry out over a growing season and that certain trees can only absorb a set amount of carbon each year. Think of it like filling a bucket with water. It can be done slowly or quickly, but once the bucket is full, there's nowhere for any more water to go.

Once that limit is reached，leaves begin to change color. The limit is set by the availability of nutrients，particularly nitrogen，which is a key nutrient that plants need to grow. The amount of available nitrogen often limits total growth. That's why farmers and gardeners use nitrogen fertilizer.

These new findings have significant implications (启示) for climate change modelling. If we accept that warmer weather and longer growing seasons won't allow trees to take up more carbon dioxide, carbon dioxide levels will rise more quickly than previously expected. The only way to change this will be to increase the capacity(容纳能力) of trees to absorb carbon.

【推荐2】Does stress cause gray hair? Many people believe that tension and stress can cause your hair to lose its color. In fact, it is an old-wives’ tale that being upset all the time can result in premature graying. Here is a closer look at this situation and why some believe that this old wives’ tale could be true.

As one ages, the hairs on the head also age. In fact, just about everything on the human body begins to show signs of wear and tear (磨损) after a while. The joints wear and become stiff and skin wears and becomes wrinkled. Hairs on the head grow and eventually die. They are replaced, but in the process something else happens.

When new hairs are replacing the old ones, the color or pigment (色素) is also added to them. However, as one ages, this pigment becomes less and less available. At first, hairs will have a limited amount of pigment and they will appear to be grayish in color. In time, they will lose all of their pigment and will be white. Many things are known to cause graying, and genetics is a very powerful factor. If one of your parents turns gray at an early age, there is a good chance that you will too. Some people begin the graying process in high school, while others may be over the age of forty.

Constant worry and tension can have many harmful effects on the human body. It is a known fact that stressful times can cause one to suffer hair loss. It would make sense that if it can cause these problems, perhaps it also may contribute to graying. However, there is no sound evidence to support this.

On the other hand, many medical professionals believe that there may be a link between graying and a constant state of anxiety or tension. Does stress cause gray hair? There is no scientific evidence to support the theory, but it is best to avoid stressful situations.

【推荐3】Would it surprise you to learn that, like animals, trees communicate with each other and pass on their wealth to the next generation?

UBC Professor Simard explains how trees are much more complex than most of us ever imagined.

Although Charles Darwin thought that trees are competing for survival of the fittest, Simard shows just how wrong he was. In fact, the opposite is true: trees survive through their co-operation and support, passing around necessary nutrition “depending on who needs it”.

Nitrogen (氮) and carbon are shared through miles of underground fungi (真菌) networks, making sure that all trees in the forest ecological system give and receive just the right amount to keep them all healthy. This hidden system works in a very similar way to the networks of neurons (神经元) in our brains, and when one tree is destroyed, it affects all.

Simard talks about “mother trees”, usually the largest and oldest plants on which all other trees depend. She explains how dying trees pass on the wealth to the next generation, transporting important minerals to young trees so they may continue to grow. When humans cut down “mother trees” with no awareness of these highly complex “tree societies” or the networks on which they feed, we are reducing the chances of survival for the entire forest.

“We didn’t take any notice of it,” Simard says sadly. “Dying trees move nutrition into the young trees before dying, but we never give them chance.” If we could put across the message to the forestry industry, we could make a huge difference towards our environmental protection efforts for the future.

【推荐1】Since the first Earth Day in 1970, Americans have gotten a lot “greener” toward the environment. “We didn’t know at that time there even was an environment, let alone that there was a problem with it,” says Bruce Anderson, president of Earth Day USA.

But what began as nothing important in public affairs has grown into a social movement .Business people, political leaders, university professors, and especially millions of grass-roots Americans are taking part in the movement. “The understanding has increased many， many times,” says Gaylord Nelson, the former governor from Wisconsin, who thought up the first. According to US government reports, emissions (排放)from cars and trucks have dropped from 10.3 million tons a year to 5.5 tons .The number of cities producing CO beyond the standard has been reduced from 40 to 9. Although serious problems still remain and need to be dealt with, the world is a safer and healthier place. A kind of “Green thinking” has become part of practices.

Great improvement has been achieved. In 1988 there were only 600 recycling programs; today in 1995 there are about 6,600. Advanced lights, motors, and building designs have helped save a lot of energy and therefore prevented pollution.

Twenty –five years ago, there were hardly any education programs for environment. Today, it’s hard to find a public school, university, or law school that does not have such a kind of program. “Until we do that, nothing else will change!” says Bruce Anderson.

【推荐2】Each country has its own set of national stereotypes (刻板印象), but perhaps the most famous is Britain’s love of tea.

According to the BBC, they drink over 60 billion cups each year. The most popular tea type in the UK is black tea. It’s a simple recipe: You find a mug, add a tea bag, pour boiling water, add milk and sugar (according to your taste) and finish by stirring.

Usually, the only debate is whether milk should be added before or after the boiling water. But a recent popular video has outraged (使愤怒) Britons after completely changing this long-established method.

American TikTok user, Sophie, posted her version of “British tea”, which involved microwaving cold water, then adding milk, sugar and an instant teabag containing powdered lemonade, cinnamon and clove (丁香) leaves.

Mainstream media called the method “profoundly disturbed”, and a Twitter user even wrote, “I would rather see tea dumped (倾倒) into the Boston harbor than drink this abomination (可恶的东西).”

As you can tell, tea is a precious part of British life, whether you’re having afternoon tea at a fancy hotel or drinking it in a takeaway cup.

“Rosie Lee” – a common slang term for tea – first came to Britain in the mid-1600s from China. Since then, the country’s love for it has not declined.

Types of tea can even indicate someone’s social class, according to anthropologist (人类学家) Kate Fox. In her book, she notes that “teas get progressively weaker as one goes up the social ladder”, like black tea served during afternoon tea. At the opposite end, you have “builder’s teas”, which are standard black teas that are brewed (煮) stronger and include more milk and sugar.

Fox added, “Taking sugar in your tea is a lower-class indicator: More than one and you are lower-middle at best; more than two and you are definitely working class.”

Despite the disputes (争论) on what makes a perfect “cuppa”, Britons can at least agree on the saying, “No matter what is happening in your life, you always offer tea.”

【推荐3】One evening, when I asked my 17-year-old son, Ray, for help with dinner, his response took me by surprise. “What’s a colander (漏勺)?” he asked.

I could only blame myself. In the family, nobody’s hands went in the sauce except my own. But as I explained with a touch of panic that a colander is the thing with holes in it, I wondered what else I hadn’t prepared Ray for. Suddenly it hit me: He’d be leaving the house in a year to attend college. No way was I going to send a spoiled prince into the world.

As parents,while we focus on our children’s character,we are also raising someone’s future roommate, husband, or father. I’d raise a boy who would never ask the woman in his life, “What’s for dinner?” So, I came up with a plan to offer Ray a private home economics course. Gladly, he didn’t say no.

For two hours, three days a week, Ray was all mine. One day, as his tomato sauce reduced on the stove, he washed and seasoned a chicken for roasting. Then he rolled out the piecrust and filled it with apples, all while listening to my explanation on the importance of preheating an oven.

One day we covered Advanced Laundry, in which I taught him never to mix a red sweatshirt with white. I knew that he would rather have been shooting hoops in the driveway than learning to mend socks with his mother - he tried to beg off sewing lessons - but it couldn’t be denied that he was learning, and more than just housekeeping. “I appreciate what you do as a mom,” he told me one day.

Ray now understands the finer points of cooking, and more importantly, he realizes there s nothing masculine (男子气概的) about being helpless. Not only can he make his own dinner, but also he can make a big meal for his family. That’s what I call a man.