3 . While many animal populations seem to dwindle, one species that is moving in the opposite direction of such loss is America’s native wildlife — wood stork.

The wood stork is the only stork that breeds in North America. In 1984, it was declared an endangered species after its population decreased sharply to just 5,000 mating pairs. At the time, scientists predicted that the bird would become completely extinct by 2000. Today, it numbers 10,000 mating pairs, and the Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing a delisting of the wood stork as an endangered species. So how did the population bounce back?

The success is in part down to the resourcefulness of the wood stork. The wood stork’s native home was in the Everglades in Florida, but it migrated north as the Everglades were being destroyed by development of mankind. Wetland preservation and restoration, protection of nesting areas, and management of water flows began with the approval of the wood stork’s first recovery plan in 1986. In the following year, former Savannah Coastal Refuges biologist John Robinette noticed stork nests in Georgia as stork populations moved to safer wetlands.

According to Stephanie Kurose, a senior policy specialist at the Centre for Biological Diversity, the Endangered Species Act is also to thank for this recovery. She said, “The act saved the wood stork and it helped preserve and rebuild vital habitats throughout the southeast, which has improved water quality and benefited countless other species who call the area home.” “The Endangered Species Act has saved 99 per cent of the species that were on the list since 1973. A hundred types of plants and animals have been delisted as their populations become stable again.

If the wood stork is delisted, it will remain protected by other laws and a monitoring plan will be put in place to ensure the population remains stable.

6 . To much of the world, bullfighting has always been distinctly Iberian. But these days, parts of France are laying claim to this tradition. From the Cte Basque to the arenas of Arles and Beziers, it has spread to towns where bullfighting has long been banned, and been embraced with such enthusiasm you’d think the sport had been born there.

The rising passion for blood and sand has been resisted by animal-rights activists. Last month someone set off a bomb near the bullring in Carcassonne. Yet France’s enthusiasts fiercely defend their right to these moral rituals. Bullfighting, they insist, is part of the heritage, an expression of a shared regional culture that should be protected.

The rest of the Continent should take note. The paradox (自相矛盾) of an ever-more-united Europe is that as borders between member states become less important, so do the nations themselves-and regional identities are valued. It’s easy to forget that most European nation-states were created as we know them only during the 19th century, after a long series of bloody conflicts. “If the chances of war had been a little different, all the regions sharing bullfight might have been together,” argues Jean Michel Mariou, a huge fan of bullfighting. On both sides of the Pyrenees there are Basques, there are Catalans, there are common cultures, he says. “Bullfighting is only one expression of it.”

Bullfighting isn’t the only cultural tradition that has begun to go beyond borders, of course. To name but one other: the Celtic revival, built largely around musical groups along the coast of Ireland, Scotland and Cornwall, Brittany and Normandy. But while bagpipes (风笛) may stir the blood, they don’t spill it. And the violence of bullfighting horrifies many people who don’t feel they share in its culture.

“The concept of lasting local tradition doesn’t mean anything anymore,” says Josyane Wuerelle, coordinator of the Federation de Liasions Anti-Corrida in Agde. Bullfighting is about attracting tourists, not honoring local history, she argues. Robert Marge doesn’t see it that way, of course. He recently declined an invitation to organize a bullfighting in Paris’s enormous Stade de France. “We didn’t want to sell our souls by bringing bullfight to a region where it doesn’t exist,” he explains. But he has also got the sense to know that some traditions don’t travel well.

7 . This 3-mile stretch of sand and tide pools beneath a castle of 80-foot cliffs is a California tourism poster if there ever was one. Nothing disturbs the perfect, sunny view, except — once you’re aware of them — microplastic particles (颗粒). But you have to look close-on-your-hands-and-knees close-to see one. And once you do, you see another and another — so many that you may not think of this, or any beach, the same way again. These tiny preproduction plastic balls that manufacturers (生产商) melt down to form everything have been escaping factories, container ships, trains, trucks — and public notice — for decades.

The 2- to 3-millimeter, multicolored balls are a subset (子集) of microplastic-plastic particles less than 5 millimeters in size. Microplastic particles accumulate where water takes them, and they’ve been found on shorelines of every continent.

Dr McReynolds is an environmental scientist who’s now joined a global movement studying their trail into the environment. Establishing a baseline count of the presence of microplastic particles — and, more broadly, any microplastics — is the focus of Dr McReynolds’ scientific study here. Charting the count, noting tide, current, and weather conditions will show if amounts are increasing, and perhaps at what rate and why. That knowledge, he says, can inform solutions to plastic pollution such as regulation of their use.

“What are you doing? Picking up trash?” asks a steady stream of beach walkers whenever Dr McReynolds’ crew walks onto the beach and sets up equipment. These are teachable moments for Dr McReynolds.

One recent morning he told some beach walkers how microplastic particles are believed to absorb toxic chemicals, and — because they resemble fish eggs — are eaten by fish and birds and enter the food chain. Almost right on time, a seagull hopped up to a plastic-coated photo of microplastic particles and hungrily pecked (啄食) at it.

Will his work help save the world? Dr McReynolds waves a finger at that idea, “I won’t ever use that word — I won’t save the world from this pollution problem. Preserve it, yes. We want to take care of it.”

8 . “Bike buses”—adult-led group bike rides to school — are taking over neighborhoods. Many families are abandoning cars and starting a sweatier morning ride with friends, biking in organized groups led by grown-up volunteers. The effort is a call to fight against climate change, encourage exercise and reduce school drop-off traffic. And both parents and kids say it just makes the children happier.

Minneapolis dad devil Olson organized a bike bus for his local school zone. Olson says cycling create connectivity between all walks of life.

Six years ago, Olson partnered with Minneapolis Public Schools to run a 2- mile bike bus that dropped off students at two elementary schools. So far, Olson has led 11 semi-annual bike buses that have grown from about 60 participants to nearly 150. “We meet at 8 am. To play soccer and football, and eat do nuts,” said Olson. “Then we review safety measures and start our ride. It’s nothing but laughing, shouting and pure joy.”

The group makes about eight stops along the way to pick up children, many of whom are accompanied by parents. “We want kids to celebrate going to school,” explained Olson, adding that the kids who participate enjoy opportunities to communicate with students in different graded.

In San Francisco, lake Bornheimer co-runs SF Bike Bus, which organized city-wide school routes, with the goal of inspiring people around the country to start bike buses. “Our first 3- mile ride included more than 100 kids, families, and adults in one trip to school,” said Bornheimer. The bike bus experience has reassured parents who were otherwise nervous about their children biking around traffic. “Our hope is to create a bike bus for every school in San Francisco,” he said.

10 . For much of human history, ethical (道德的) behavior has been guided by the Golden Rule: do to others as you would have them do to you. But the rule is imperfect. What you want in a given situation may not be what another person desires at all.

In the medical field, making or influencing choices for others can make all the difference. Such choices impact people’s quality of life and even their chances of survival. As health care becomes more individualized, the time seems right for a new ethical guideline—the “platinum (白金) rule” proposed by professor Harvey Max Chochinov: do to others as they would want done to themselves.

Chochinov describes this principle in his essay published last year. He begins with a story about a health crisis affecting his sister Ellen, who was severely disabled. The care doctor, after seeing her twisted (扭曲的) body, was weighing whether to insert a breathing tube when he asked Chochinov a strange question: Did Ellen read magazines? “The question was frightening.” Chochinov writes, “this was not an attempt to get to know Ellen … but rather a way to decide if hers was a life worth saving.” Ellen read widely and enjoyed many simple pleasures of life, but the gap between her life as a person who uses a wheelchair and the doctor’s sense of what he would want in her situation was too vast to be bridged by the Golden Rule. “That’s when judging from where you stand what another might need or want begins to break down,” Chochinov explained.

Time is a limited resource in the health-care system, and there’s no denying that getting to know a patient as an individual means investing additional minutes or hours. Still, Chochinov believes such investment is cost-effective. There are benefits for doctors as well. “When they emotionally connect to their patients, they do a better job.”

In certain cases, doctors may find it hard to apply the platinum rule. But there is value in the effort: at the very least, their trying to work through it will ensure that they have sufficient modesty about the wisdom of their choices.