2 . America's businesses are getting older and fatter, while many new businesses are dying in infancy.

A study last month by the Brookings Institution found that the proportion of older firms has grown steadily over several decades, while the survival rate of new companies has fallen. In addition, young people are starting companies at a sharply lower rate than in the past.

A new report from the National Association of Manufacturers shows a major cause: The cost of obeying government regulations has risen to more than $2 trillion（12.26 trillion yuan） annually, or 12 percent of the GDP, and this cost falls disproportionately on smaller, newer businesses.

It's risky, difficult and expensive to start a business, and getting more so. Governments are imposing various new rules on a seemingly daily basis: health insurance, minimum wage increases and, most recently in California, compulsory paid sick days for even hourly employees. These regulations shift huge social welfare costs directly onto often-struggling small businesses, while being proportionally much less costly for larger companies.

This is partly an unintended issue of resources — established companies can cope with new costs more easily — but it's also deliberate. For instance, big insurance companies got a seat at the table to help write Obama care, but less politically powerful firms — like medical device manufacturers — got squeezed.

Mature, successful corporations can employ ex-lawmakers with connections, distribute campaign contributions and even write regulations for themselves. They are also more likely to want to protect steady revenue streams than revolutionize their industry.

Major companies that have been so ill-managed they would otherwise collapse — airlines, car companies and banks — stagger（蹒跚）on because politicians ride to the rescue with bags of taxpayer money.

The genius of our unique system of government is the determination to protect and defend the rights of the individual over the rights of the nation. As such, the rise of a well-connected oligarchy that protects big business at the expense of small business, and the established over the new, is opposite to American ideals.

Income inequality — which is directly caused by faulty government policy — is being promoted as the reason to impose more of that bad policy. But let's be perfectly clear, we do not have a free market but one where government picks winners and losers through regulations and financial aids.

Politics is, and always has been, about balancing competing interests seeking to benefit themselves, and that's as it should be, but the force of government should never be used to reduce competition, kill innovation or support and extend artificial monopolies（垄断）by harming the consumer, the taxpayer and the economy. Policy must breed our new and small businesses or see the as-yet undreamed of innovations that could be our bright future die in infancy.

Have you ever imagined that your simple T-shirt could cool you down by up to 5℃ on these hot summer days? Thanks to a recent discovery, the possibility is getting closer. While there are     1     that manage to keep the body warm, this amazing invention aims to offer real relief for those who are eager to feel comfortable and fresh in the outdoors on extremely hot days.

Its inventors, engineers Ma Yaoguang of Zhejiang University and Tao Guangming of Huazhong University of Science and Technology in China, took a completely     2     approach. They designed a special textile（纺织物）that can     3     body heat and re-emit（重发出）its energy into space as mid-infrared radiation（MIR）. This textile cools both the objects and their surroundings through a     4     that is known as radiative cooling, Science reveals. This means that even when it looks like you are wearing a regular shirt, you are     5     wearing a device that works like a mirror.

Research conducted at Stanford University in 2017 had already managed to cool the wearer by 3℃, but this     6     trial was limited. So researchers still need to test the new approach to determine how effectively the new fabric cools while the wearers are standing or walking, and not directly facing the sky, like in their trials. They also need to examine and     7     how well it works when T-shirts are not in close contact with the skin.

Inventors Yaoguang and Guangming are now looking out for textile manufacturers（制造商）and clothing brands that are interested in using their fabric. They estimate that the new material will     8     clothing manufacturing costs by just 10 percent. “We can make it with mass production, which means everybody can got a T-shirt and the cost is     9     the same as their old stuff,” Yaoguang said.

So if you are an athlete or simply someone that has to deal with the extremely high temperatures, be patient because your days of feeling hot and     10     may be coming to an end!

4 . Gottfried Wilhelm von Liebniz was a philosopher and mathematician in search of a model. In the late 1600s Leibniz decided there was a need for a new, purer arithmetic than our common decimal（十进制）system. He got his inspiration from the 5000-year-old book that is at the heart of Chinese philosophy：the I-Ching, or Book of Changes.

This ancient text was such an influence on Liebniz that he titled his article on the new arithmetic “Explanation of a new arithmetic and the ancient Chinese figure of Fu X”. Fu Xi was the legendary first author of the I-Ching. The arithmetic that Liebniz described was binary（二进制）code, which is used in almost every modern computer, from iPhones to China’s own Tihane-2 supercomputer.

To figure out what Liebniz learned in the I-Ching, we need to understand something that most of us have taken for granted. When we listen to an MP3, look at a digital photo or watch the latest TV drama, we are experiencing a digital representation of reality. That representation is basically just a string of binary signals that are commonly known as 1s and 0s. What Liebniz’s gained from the book was that even the most complex reality could be represented in the binary form as 1s and 0s.

In the philosophy of the I-Ching, reality is not entirely real. It is something more like a dream. This dream of reality arises from the binaries of Yin and Yang, as they play out countless combinations, practically everything in the universe. It’s not surprising then, from the l-Ching’s perspective, that anything in the dream of reality can be represented in a string of 1s and 0s, processed by a computer.

The I-Ching was far more ambitious than the current practical applications of binary code. It is claimed that the I-Ching represents nothing less than the basic situation of human life itself. As a system for predicting the future, the I-Ching might disappoint, but as a way of questioning your own unconscious mind, it can be remarkably useful.

The I-Ching’s teachings also contain warnings about our digital revolution. Binary code, powered by modern computers, has an amazing capacity to represent reality. However, the ancient authors of the I-Ching might have understood its potential-and its dangers-even better than we now do.

So when scientific thinkers ask whether computers can create “virtual realities” or “artificial intelligence”, they are missing the point. Of course, we can create ever deeper and more complex layers of the dream of reality. The real question is, can we wake up from the dream we’ re in already?

Whatever happened to the fight of carbon capture?

Debates have been going on around the subject of carbon capture. Scientists, especially engineers and geologists, have strongly criticized green groups who claimed that carbon capture and storage (CCS) schemes are costly mistakes.

The scientists insisted that such schemes are vital weapons in the battle against global heating. They also wan that failure to set up ways to trap and store carbon would make it impossible to meet the emissions target by 2050.“CCS is going to be the only effective way in the short term to prevent our steel industry, cement manufacture and many other processes from continuing to pour emissions into the atmosphere,” said Professor Stuart Haszeldine, of Edinburgh University. “If we are to have any hope of keeping global temperature increases down below 2 degrees Celsius, we desperately need to develop ways to capture and store carbon dioxide.”

Green groups claimed CCS would not make “a meaningful contribution to 2050 climate targets”. They say CCS was not a reliable way to decarbonize the energy system and that CCS has a “history of over-promising and under-delivering”. Instead, they urged the construction of more renewable energy plants to be given priority.

But the claims were dismissed by engineers and geologists, “These claims are quite unfair” said Michael Stephenson, director at the British Geological Survey. “The technology behind carbon capture and storage is fully mature. It offers us a genuine solution to some of the problems we face in trying to deal with global warming.”

A government spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said, “We are committed to meeting our climate change targets in a way that is affordable and provides secure energy to families and businesses. We are considering the role that CCS could play in decarbonization of the UK. But we also need to take government spending into account. CCS had better come down in cost.”

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Tai Chi Can Reduce Falls in Old People

Old people who took part in a structured programme of Tai Chi found that their balance and physical strength improved, reducing the risk of falls, according to a paper in the latest Journal of Advanced Nursing.

Researchers studied a group of fall-prone (易摔跤的) adults, with an average age of 78, living in residential care. 29 people undertook a 12-week Tai Chi programme and the other 30 formed the non-exercise control group. The exercise programme consisted of 10 minutes of warming-up exercises, 20 minutes of Sun-style Tai Chi movement and 5 minutes of cooling down exercises. During the exercise, traditional instrumental music was used. It helped the group maintain slow and continuous movements and provide a comforting effect.

Both groups underwent a series of tests before and after the 12-week exercise programme. They measured their muscle strength, balance and confidence in avoiding falls. Researchers analyzed the data and compared them with those of the non-exercise control group. They found that the physical fitness of the exercise group showed significant improvement, with stronger knee and ankle muscles, improved flexibility and better balance.

Tai Chi, an ancient Chinese martial art (武术), consists of a series of slow, gentle, continuous movements. It is particularly suitable for old people as it helps them to develop stronger muscles and better balance and concentration. “Our study shows that low-intensity exercise such as Tai Chi has great potential for health promotion. It can help old people to avoid falls by developing their balance, muscle strength and confidence,” says Professor Song. “We believe that regular exercise should be a fundamental part of caring for old people living both in the community and in residential care.”

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