Hyundai powers EV race with vehicle that can cook dinner

Hyundai Motor Co is pitching its new Ioniq 5 as being able to do more than the average electric vehicle (EV). In a series of promotional videos on YouTube, a camper is shown running on a treadmill hooked up to the vehicle’s battery, listening to their favorite tunes on a bank of speakers and even rustling up a roast chicken dinner in a portable oven. The vehicle can supply up to 3.6 kilowatts of power, enough to run appliances such as refrigerators and stoves. It is part of a push by Hyundai to appeal to a younger audience as it plays catch-up in the EV market. The South Korean automaker is behind EV pioneers such as Tesla Inc and established brands such as Volkswagen AG and BMW AG, only introducing its electric car in 2016. “We looked at the wider meaning of space that would include outdoor and daily activities that consumers can do with their cars,” Heung Soo-kim, a senior vice president and head of product and EV businesses at Hyundai, said in an interview last month. “We are constantly looking into new features that will appeal to users.” Hyundai said that it is the first major EV maker to offer bi-directional charging, which means owners can power electronic devices from the vehicle battery. While conventional vehicle batteries can be used to charge laptops and phones, they drain quickly if hooked up to anything more powerful, such as a portable fridge or sound system, meaning serious campers need to install a dual-battery system or lug around heavy, noisy generators to power their home comforts. The Ioniq 5 also comes with the option to install a solar-panel roof that would charge the battery pack, giving the vehicle an additional driving range of about 1,300km annually. US-based EV start-up Rivian Automotive Inc is also looking to attract

Monkey plays video game ‘Pong’ using only its brain

Elon Musk’s start-up devoted to meshing brains with computers was on Friday closer to its dream, having gotten a monkey to play the video game Pong using only its mind. Musk has long contended that merging minds with machines is vital if people are going to avoid being outpaced by artificial intelligence. A video posted on YouTube by the entrepreneur’s Neuralink Corp start-up showed a macaque named Pager playing Pong by essentially using thought to move paddles that bounce digital balls back and forth onscreen. “To control his paddle, Pager simply thinks about moving his hand up or down,” a voice narrating the video said. “As you can see, Pager is amazingly good at MindPong.” Neuralink devices were implanted on two sides of Pager’s brain to sense neuron activity, then the monkey played the game a few minutes using a joystick to let software figure out the signals associated with hand movements. Pager’s reward was banana smoothly served through a straw when he successfully batted the digital ball from one paddle to the other, according to the demonstration. After a few minutes, the “decoder” program figured out what neuron signals to look for and the joystick was no longer needed to play the game. “A monkey is literally playing a video game telepathically using a brain chip!!” Musk wrote on Twitter. The decoder could be calibrated to enable a person to guide a cursor on a computer screen, potentially letting them type e-mails, text messages or browse the Internet just by thinking, a blog post at neuralink.com said. “Our first goal is to give people with paralysis their digital freedom back,” the Neuralink team said in the post. Members of the team last year shared a “wish list” that ranged from technology returning mobility to the paralyzed and sight to the blind, to enabling telepathy and the uploading of memories

Hundreds of tourists have begun training for space

Several hundred people have already booked their tickets and begun training for a spectacular voyage: a few minutes, or perhaps days, in the weightlessness of space. The mainly wealthy first-time space travelers are preparing to take part in one of several private missions which are preparing to launch. The era of space tourism is on the horizon 60 years after Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first person in space. Two companies, Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin LLC, are building spacecraft capable of sending private clients on suborbital flights to the edge of space lasting several minutes. Glenn King is the director of spaceflight training at the National Aerospace Training and Research Center, a private company based in Pennsylvania that has already trained nearly 400 future Virgin Galactic passengers for their trips. “The oldest person I trained was 88 years old,” King said. The training program lasts two days — a morning of classroom instruction and tests in a centrifuge. This involves putting the trainee in a single-seat cockpit at the end of an 8m-long arm and spinning them around to simulate gravitational force, or G force. A medical team is on hand at all times. NASA’s training for shuttle crew members lasted two years, but the duration has been drastically reduced by the commercial space industry because of the “numbers of people that want to get up in space,” King said. “We can’t take two years to train these people. We’ve got to get this down to a matter of days to get these people up,” he said. “These people aren’t crews, just strictly passengers,” King said. “For a passenger, there isn’t a lot of work for you to do other than just relax, endure the G forces of launch or re-entry, and then once you’re orbital, enjoy the view out the window.” King said the pass rate for

EDITORIAL: Questions remain over US ties

Taiwan-US relations are said to be entering a new stage after Washington on Friday released new diplomatic guidelines, but some sensitive issues still require delicate negotiations. In its announcement, the US Department of State said the new guidelines “liberalize guidance on contacts with Taiwan” and show that the nation is a vibrant democracy, and important security and economic partner. However, the department also reiterated the US’ “one China” policy and used the word “unofficial” twice to describe the relations. While the US has repeatedly said that its commitment to Taiwan is “rock solid,” Washington is taking steps to bring bilateral relations back into a rules-based order by setting limits to the ecstatic, risky developments under the previous US administration. After then-US secretary of state Mike Pompeo on Jan. 9 announced the cancelation of previous guidelines shortly before leaving office, Taiwan’s diplomats were excited to see the realization of what they had for decades strived to achieve. Overseas representative offices posted on social media photographs of meetings with their US counterparts in a third country, while Representative to the US Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) posted photographs showing meetings with US officials on their premises. Pompeo’s lifting of limits was thrilling, but also brought about more anxiety. Over the past three months, Taiwanese lawmakers and commentators have been asking whether diplomats could start raising the national flag on official premises in the US without provoking Washington, as occurred in 2015, and whether the president, vice president, premier, vice premier and ministers of defense and foreign affairs could visit Washington. The questions remain, as the new guidelines were not publicized, while the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the questions were not covered in the document. Judging from the ministry’s news release yesterday, which said that the new guidelines reflect the closeness of bilateral interactions in the past few years and aim to

Blood donation rules too restrictive

Article 3 of the Ministry of Health and Welfare’s Standards on Assessing Donor Suitability for Blood Donation (捐血者健康標準) states that people should wait at least two months between donations of 250ml and at least three months for those giving 500ml. However, it also says that men should give a maximum of 1,500ml per year and women should give a maximum of 1,000ml. In other words, when a donor has reached the limit for annual blood donations, even if they waited the required interval between them, they would still have to wait until after their next birthday before giving blood. The Taiwan Blood Services Foundation says the limits to the amount of blood people can donate is set out of a concern for donors’ iron levels. When a man has donated 2,000ml blood, he might have lost 1,000mg iron and needs time to replenish it. However, regular blood donors have a good idea about how to look after their bodily health. If donors judge that there is no problem with their health, as long as they have fulfilled the three-month waiting period, they should be allowed to donate another 500ml. Besides, Taiwan has become an aged society. The population of young people is falling, and there are certain restrictions as to who can donate blood. Under these conditions it will become more of a challenge to maintain a balance between supply and demand of blood. If the limit on blood donations could be conditionally relaxed when the Taiwan Blood Services Foundation announces low stocks of blood or when there is a major disaster, such as last week’s Taroko Express train crash, it would help meet an urgent demand for blood. This small adjustment to the rules would enable many regular blood donors to roll up their sleeves and give blood when it is most needed. Fu Yen-wen is

Beijing cannot halt Uighur policies

Interrupting the assimilation of Xinjiang’s Uighur population would result in an unmanageable national security threat to China. Numerous governments and civil society organizations around the world have accused China of massive human rights abuses in Xinjiang, and labeled Beijing’s inhumane and aggressive social re-engineering efforts in the region as “cultural genocide.” Extensive evidence shows that China’s forceful ethnic assimilation policies in Xinjiang are aimed at replacing Uighur ethnic and religious identity with a so-called scientific communist dogma and Han Chinese culture. The total assimilation of Uighurs into the larger “Chinese family” is also Beijing’s official, central purpose of its ethnic policies in the region. Consequently, numerous Western actors are escalating their political, economic and diplomatic pressure on Beijing to coerce it into stopping the program. In the US, last year’s Uyghur Human Rights Policy Act condemns gross human rights violations of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang, and calls for an “end to arbitrary detention, torture, and harassment of these communities inside and outside China.” During his presidential campaign, US President Joe Biden referred to the crackdown on Uighurs as “genocide,” and in the past few months imposed numerous political and economic sanctions on Beijing. The UK has imposed sanctions on Chinese officials, and British lawmakers are discussing a genocide trade bill that, if passed, would seriously restrict trade with China. Political parties in northern Europe are asking to end the EU’s free trade talks with China. The list of measures goes on. A consequence of the growing public outcry against Beijing’s assimilation policies in Xinjiang is the probable partial boycott of next year’s Beijing Winter Olympic Games. After all, how could a country send its athletes to an event organized by a genocidal regime? Numerous representatives of Western governments have added their support for the boycott. Canadian lawmakers have called for the relocation of the

St Vincent awaits new volcanic blast

‘THE FIRST BANG’: The government ordered mandatory evacuations after scientists detected seismic activity at La Soufriere volcano close to the island’s northern tip Cots, tents and respirator masks poured into the eastern Caribbean island of St Vincent as officials expected to start distributing them yesterday, a day after a powerful explosion at La Soufriere volcano uprooted the lives of thousands of people who evacuated their homes under government orders. Nations ranging from Antigua to Guyana offered help by either shipping emergency supplies to their neighbor or agreeing to temporarily open their borders to the about 16,000 evacuees fleeing ash-covered communities with as many personal belongings as they could stuff into suitcases and backpacks. The volcano, which last erupted in 1979, kept rumbling as experts said that explosive eruptions could continue for days or possibly weeks. A previous eruption in 1902 killed about 1,600 people. “The first bang is not necessarily the biggest bang this volcano will give,” Richard Robertson, a geologist with the University of the West Indies’ Seismic Research Center, told a news conference. St Vincent and the Grenadines Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves asked people to remain calm, have patience and keep protecting themselves from COVID-19 as he celebrated that no deaths or injuries were reported after the eruption in the northern tip of St Vincent, part of an island chain that includes the Grenadines and is home to more than 100,000 people. “Agriculture will be badly affected, and we may have some loss of animals, and we will have to do repairs to houses, but if we have life, and we have strength, we will build it back better, stronger, together,” he said in an interview with NBC Radio, a local station. Gonsalves has said that depending on the damage caused by the explosion, it could take up to four months for life to return to normal. As of Friday, 2,000 people were staying in 62 government shelters, while four empty cruise ships floated nearby, waiting to

COVID-19: Virus lockdowns return as vaccine efforts stumble

DISARRAY: Indian states had on average about five days of vaccine stock left, while France swapped the second dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine with a different brand Fresh lockdowns and curfews were imposed on tens of millions of people from India to Argentina yesterday, as COVID-19 infections surged again, and vaccine rollouts were hampered by shortages and scares over side effects. In India, the worst-hit state of Maharashtra was running out of vaccines as the health system buckled under the weight of the contagion, which has killed 2.9 million people worldwide. Having let its guard down with mass religious festivals, political rallies and spectators at cricket matches, the world’s second-most populous nation has added more than 1 million new infections since late last month. Every weekend from yesterday until the end of this month, Maharashtra’s 125 million people are to be confined to their homes unless traveling or shopping for food or medicine. “I’m not for the lockdown at all, but I don’t think the government has any other choice,” media professional Neha Tyagi, 27, told reporters in Maharashtra’s megacity, Mumbai. “This lockdown could have been totally avoided if people would take the virus seriously.” The crisis is being exacerbated by a shortage of vaccines. India has inoculated 94 million of its 1.3 billion people, but The Times of India on Friday reported that states on average had just more than five days of stock left, citing Indian Ministry of Health data, with some regions already grappling with severe shortages. Stay-at-home orders were also set to come into force for the 8 million inhabitants of Bogota, as the Colombian capital battled a third wave of infections, adding to curfews already covering 7 million across four other major cities. Elsewhere in South America, Argentina on Friday entered a nighttime curfew running from midnight to 6am every day until the end of this month. It would be in force in the country’s highest-risk areas, mainly urban centers, where bars and restaurants are to close at 11pm. Both Argentina and

Burmese envoy calls for embargo

Myanmar’s ambassador to the UN on Friday urged “strong action” against the junta as reports emerged of scores killed in the military’s latest crackdown. The country has been in turmoil since the military on Feb. 1 ousted Burmese State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi, with protesters refusing to submit to the junta regime and continuing to demand a return to democracy. During a UN Security Council meeting on Friday, Burmese Ambassador to the UN Kyaw Moe Tun pushed for more concrete action — proposing a no-fly zone, an arms embargo and more targeted sanctions against members of the military and their families. “Your collective, strong action is needed immediately,” Kyaw Moe Tun told the meeting. “Time is of the essence for us,” he said. “Please, please take action.” An independent analyst with the International Crisis Group told the council that Myanmar was “at the brink of state failure.” “The vast majority of the population does not want military rule and will do whatever it takes to prevent that outcome. Yet the military seems determined to impose its will,” Richard Horsey said. “Its actions may be creating a situation where the country becomes ungovernable. That should be of grave concern to the region and to the broader international community.” At least 618 civilians have been killed in the military’s crackdown on protests, said the Assistance Association for Political Prisoners, a local monitoring group. News emerged yesterday morning of more violence in the city of Bago, 65km northeast of Yangon — the site of a day-long crackdown that forced residents into hiding in nearby villages. Footage verified by Agence France-Presse shot early on Friday showed protesters hiding behind sandbag barricades wielding homemade rifles, as explosions could be heard in the background. A resident told reporters that the military crackdown killed at least 40 protesters and authorities refused to let rescue

Taiwan in Time: The ill-fated Taiwanese leftists

April 12 to April 18 Hsieh Hsueh-hung (謝雪紅) stuffed her suitcase with Japanese toys and celebrity photos as she departed from Tokyo in February 1928. She knew she would be inspected by Japanese custom officials upon arrival in Shanghai, and hoped that the items would distract them from the papers hidden in her clothes. Penned with invisible ink on thin sheets, it was the charter of the Taiwanese Communist Party (台灣共產黨, TCP), which Hsieh and her companions would launch on April 15 under the directive of the Soviet-led Communist International with the support of their Chinese, Japanese and Korean counterparts. The ruse worked. The young and homesick Japanese inspector stared longingly at the photos, upon which Hsieh said, “You can have these if you want.” She was cleared immediately. The short-lived party was ill-fated from the very start. Just 10 days after its formation, the Japanese police raided its headquarters in the French Concession, arresting several members, including Hsieh, and confiscated the charter. The TCP later regrouped in Taiwan and continued their mission, but it was plagued by factionalism and government suppression. In June 1931, having finally obtained the list of members, the Japanese authorities launched a massive crackdown on the party, essentially destroying it within a few months. A total of 49 people were convicted. IMPORTANT MISSION After training for nearly two years at the Communist University of the Toilers of the East in Moscow, whose alumni include Deng Xiaoping (鄧小平), Chiang Ching-kuo (蔣經國) and Ho Chi Minh, Hsieh and classmate Lin Mu-shun (林木順) departed for Shanghai on Nov. 13, 1927 with big plans. A month earlier, Japanese Communist Party (JCP) cofounder Sen Katayama approached Hsieh and Lin on behalf of the Communist International and tasked them with launching the TCP. Hsieh was to lead the operation with

Why cities emptied by COVID-19 are perfect for modern flaneurs

Charles Baudelaire, whose 200th birthday yesterday was celebrated with stamp issues, new editions of his poetry and virtual events, is arguably more famous for his concept of the flaneur — an aimless stroller or ambler — than for his writing. That’s partly because reading his volumes Les Fleurs du Mal or Le Spleen de Paris requires a degree of application, but also because the idea of an individual moving through the city streets and finding aesthetic pleasure in the teeming crowds, appeals to us and continues to chime. At least, it did until spring last year, when the crowds were told to stay at home. But even in a ghost city, it’s possible to think and walk like a flaneur. Rainer Hanshe has translated several of Baudelaire’s books into English — including Belgium Stripped Bare, about the French author’s visit to Brussels just before it was struck by a cholera epidemic. He notes: “The flaneur is a figure who, while immersed in the urban throng, is simultaneously separate from it. If more empty than not, our streets are still to some degree populated, and we can engage in the form of communion that Baudelaire referred to as a mysterious intoxication.” This involves trying to get inside the heads of others — an act of ecstatic empathy that “peoples” the solitary walker’s imagination. It’s a radical idea that envisions the mind as a sponge or, perhaps, a social media channel. Baudelaire’s most memorable phrase for the flaneur was “a kaleidoscope gifted with consciousness.” Some of his ideas need updating. The flaneur might be “a prince enjoying his incognito wherever he goes,” but what about the princesses? Janet Wolff of the University of Manchester has written of the “invisible flaneuse,” of “respectable” women’s absence from public arenas in modern cities. In her 2016 book Flaneuse:

Caving in the Heart of Kaohsiung

Over a million years in the making, the outdoor playground that is Kaohsiung’s Shoushan (壽山), commonly known as “Monkey Mountain,” is a rich geological and ecological resource that visitors to the city should be sure not to miss. Many are familiar with the area’s hiking trails and resident monkey population, but even locals may be surprised to learn of the extensive system of caves here, full of classic examples of speleothems like stalactites, stalagmites, draperies and flowstones, as well as cave-dwelling fauna. These caves are the result of hundreds of thousands of years of erosion slowly dissolving the mountain’s limestone. There are hundreds of such cavities, some extending dozens of meters into the mountain. To this day, no complete survey has ever been done. The stone itself was laid down by corals in nascent Taiwan’s shallow coastal waters over a million years ago, before being driven upwards by tectonic action. Indeed, marine fossils are common all over the mountain. NATIONAL PARK In 2011, Monkey Mountain, along with a few other nearby hills, became protected as Shoushan National Nature Park. With the establishment of the Park, the “Wild West” days of Monkey Mountain came to an end, and the vast system of limestone caves on the mountain, formerly a spelunking free-for-all, became mostly off limits. Currently, public access is officially limited to four caves, only between the months of November and April, and only when accompanied by a park-certified guide (details below). The other hundred-odd caves are not gated in any way to prevent access, but according to the law such access is now forbidden. Our group was led through all four caves last month by cave guide Chin Nan. WALKING UNDERGROUND Our first stop was Orangutan Cave (猩猩洞), named after several ape-shaped rocks found inside. The high ceiling and flat floor make this the safest

Man recovers phone one year after dropping it in Sun Moon Lake — and it still works 乾旱奇「機」！日月潭水位大降 沉沒哀鳳失而復得

With the nation in the middle of a long period of drought, the water level at Sun Moon Lake has dropped significantly, exposing numerous objects that had been sitting at the bottom of the lake. One visitor who incautiously dropped his iPhone into the lake one year ago was recently reacquainted with his long-lost gadget as a result of the severe drought. The tourist, surnamed Chen, shared the news on the Facebook group “Baofei Commune.” Chen says he took part in a stand up paddle board activity one year ago at Sun Moon Lake. Chen says that he fell into the water many times and on one of these occasions, while his attention was averted, the iPhone that was hung around his neck fell into the lake. Chen says that after he realized he had lost his phone he felt so dejected that he had no desire to continue paddle boarding. However, one year later Chen was astounded to receive a message from the paddle boarding company informing him that his phone had been found. Chen was shocked and overjoyed, calling it a miracle. Because Chen had placed the iPhone inside a waterproof protective case, not only had the phone not been damaged by water, but, after connecting the charging cable, Chen was able to turn it on and use the device as if nothing had happened. Chen was so surprised that he decided to share the experience on Facebook. The Nantou County Sun Moon Lake Water Tourism and Recreation Development Association has confirmed Chen’s account, stating that the lake’s water level has recently fallen significantly because of the severe drought. Water has drained out of the stand up paddle boarding recreation area, which necessitated the association to rearrange the rows of kickboards and canoes moored on floating docks on the shoreside sandbanks.

Photo News: Water rationing begins this week due to severe drought 從照片看新聞︰中台灣水情嚴峻 本週起限水

SPEAK UP ! 雙語會話

A: What an idiot I am! There’s nothing wrong with the air conditioner. It’s the remote that’s not working. B: Is the remote faulty, or are the batteries dead? A: I changed the batteries, but it’s still not doing anything. See, I bought this new one online. B: Wow, nice! And you even bought the right model! A: The seller was really patient, and told me exactly which model I needed to buy. But I think that remotes die so quickly, and you have no choice but to throw them away. It’s really not very environmentally friendly. A: 我真是豬頭啊，冷氣機根本沒壞，是遙控器壞了！ B: 遙控器到底是壞了，還是電池沒電？ A: 我換了電池還是沒反應。所以你看，我就上網買了這個新的遙控器！ B: 哇，厲害！虧你還買對了型號！ A: 那個賣家很有耐心，詳細告訴我買哪一支才是對的。不過我覺得遙控器動不動就壞，最後只能丟掉，真的很不環保。 （Translated by Paul Cooper, Taipei Times／台北時報林俐凱） English 英文: Chinese 中文: