Science vs. creationists
A new battle over teaching about man's origins in US schools goes to court for the first time next week, pitting Christian conservatives against educators and scientists in a trial viewed as the biggest test of the issue since the late 1980s. Eleven parents of students at a Pennsylvania high school are suing over the school district's decision to include "intelligent design" -- an alternative to evolution that involves a God-like creator -- in the curriculum of ninth-grade biology classes
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The placebo effect explained
The activation in the brain of chemical receptors, called mu-opioid receptors,
appears to be involved in producing what is known as the "placebo effect," according to a report in The Journal of Neuroscience. The placebo effect occurs when people are given an inactive drug or therapy, but experience an improvement in their symptoms anyway. Researchers often compare new drugs to placebo to gauge the true benefit of a therapy.
Slimmers eye Tequila's agave
Scientists from Mexico's tequila producing region say juice extracted from the blue agave plant, best known when distilled into the fiery spirit, may help dieters shed pounds and cut cholesterol. Sadly for the world's growing band of tequila lovers, agave's possible health benefits are lost when the plant is distilled into alcohol.
Record numbers of storms
Hurricane Rita, bearing down on the Gulf of Mexico coast, will wreak extensive damage and could herald a record number of ferocious storms over the Atlantic this year, the UN's top expert warned last week. Nanette Lomarda, acting chief of the tropical cyclone program division at the World Meteorological Organization, also noted that the number of category 4 and 5 storms over that ocean had nearly doubled over the past 35 years.
Of mice and men
Scientists have transplanted a nearly entire human chromosome in mice in a medical breakthrough that could reveal new insights into Down's syndrome and other
disorders. The genetically engineered mice carry a copy of the human chromosome 21. It is the smallest of the 23 pairs of human chromosomes with about 225 genes.
Oranges turn green
Greening disease has showed up in 80 municipalities in southeast Brazil, the world's No.1 orange producer, up from 64 cases in August, crop researchers Fundecitrus said last week. Greening has no cure and can cause severe losses in yields in most citrus varieties if left unchecked. It is spread by bacteria carried by a small flying insect and has destroyed millions of hectares in Thailand, China and South Africa.
Buffalo clones on the way
Researchers in the Philippines say they are close to creating the world's first clone of a water buffalo that could eventually help raise productivity levels for millions of impoverished farmers. The aim is to replicate a "super buffalo" that would boost the genetic make-up and milk production of the native water buffalo, the carabao, said Dr. Libertado Cruz, executive director of the government-run Philippine Carabao Center.
Last week Joseph Nye, the well-known China scholar, wrote on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute’s website about how war over Taiwan might be averted. He noted that years ago he was on a team that met with then-president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁), “whose previous ‘unofficial’ visit to the US had caused a crisis in which China fired missiles into the sea and the US deployed carriers off the coast of Taiwan.” Yes, that’s right, mighty Chen caused that crisis all by himself. Neither the US nor the People’s Republic of China (PRC) exercised any agency. Nye then nostalgically invoked the comical specter
Relations between Taiwan and the Czech Republic have flourished in recent years. However, not everyone is pleased about the growing friendship between the two countries. Last month, an incident involving a Chinese diplomat tailing the car of vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) in Prague, drew public attention to the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) operations to undermine Taiwan overseas. The trip was not Hsiao’s first visit to the Central European country. It was meant to be low-key, a chance to meet with local academics and politicians, until her police escort noticed a car was tailing her through the Czech capital. The
April 15 to April 21 Yang Kui (楊逵) was horrified as he drove past trucks, oxcarts and trolleys loaded with coffins on his way to Tuntzechiao (屯子腳), which he heard had been completely destroyed. The friend he came to check on was safe, but most residents were suffering in the town hit the hardest by the 7.1-magnitude Hsinchu-Taichung Earthquake on April 21, 1935. It remains the deadliest in Taiwan’s recorded history, claiming around 3,300 lives and injuring nearly 12,000. The disaster completely flattened roughly 18,000 houses and damaged countless more. The social activist and
Over the course of former President Ma Ying-jeou’s (馬英九) 11-day trip to China that included a meeting with Chinese Communist Party (CCP) leader Xi Jinping (習近平) a surprising number of people commented that the former president was now “irrelevant.” Upon reflection, it became apparent that these comments were coming from pro-Taiwan, pan-green supporters and they were expressing what they hoped was the case, rather than the reality. Ma’s ideology is so pro-China (read: deep blue) and controversial that many in his own Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) hope he retires quickly, or at least refrains from speaking on some subjects. Regardless