Ancient Wisdom for Healthy Sleep
31 January, 2012 at 07:45 | Posted in Body & Mind, Children, Chinese culture, Science | Leave a commentTags: Body & Mind, Children, Chinese culture, health, Science
People spend almost one-third of their lives sleeping. Good-quality sleep plays a very important role in having a healthy life.
What Happens During Sleep? The body relaxes, restores, and rebuilds itself during sleep. After having a good night, people wake up feeling refreshed. This is because many things take place during sleep that restore and rebuild the body. For example, during sleep, the body produces more growth hormone, which is important in burning fat and developing lean muscles
Sleep is also the time when the body goes through a complicated regulation of immune system functions. Studies show that when people are sleep-deprived or have their sleep chronically restricted, their T-cells go down, and their inflammatory cytokines go up. They become prone to getting colds or the flu.
During the deep level of sleep, muscles relax and blood vessels dilate, promoting better blood circulation, and the brain processes information. Therefore, sleep is not a passive process but an active, integral part of our lives. People who think sleep is a waste of time and try to use artificial means to cut down on sleep will suffer a significant decline in health.
How Much Sleep?
How much sleep we should get depends on our age. The older we get, the less we need. An infant needs 14 to 15 hours of sleep; a toddler needs 12 to 14 hours of sleep; school-age children need 10 to11 hours; adults need anywhere from 7 to 9 hours of sleep.
People who are chronically sleep-deprived, those who chronically have poor-quality sleep, and pregnant woman may need an increased amount of sleep. Older people may have interrupted sleep and need naps during the day.
In general, adults who sleep less than six hours and more than nine hours may have a shorter lifespan.
Early research focused on what happens if someone is sleep-deprived for 48 to 96 hours. Symptoms included sleepiness, hair loss, irritability, agitation, and psychosis.
Today, researchers have shifted their focus to sleep restriction, studying what happens to people who sleep less than six hours nightly. Some people tend to become hyperactive and restless during the day, others tired and sleepy.
Doctors wondered if they should give these patients mental stimulants to keep them calm and alert. Another question is, what have these patients actually lost in terms of their health?
Best Time to Sleep
Current sleep-hygiene guidelines advise people to go to bed at the same time and get up at the same time, yet very few researchers address what time people should go to bed.
Dr. Chritian Gulleminault, of Stanford University, conducted a preliminary study of eight men who spent one week in the sleep laboratory. His research tracked their behavior and level of function while simulating driving and taking memory tests and tests for staying awake. They were allowed to sleep for eight and a half hours for two nights and only four hours for the other seven nights.
One group slept from 10:30 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. for seven nights, the other group from 2:15 a.m. to 6:15 a.m. As you can expect, sleep restriction affected all participants. Results of the wakefulness tests taken the day after eight and a half hours of sleep differed greatly from results on the last day of sleep deprivation.
But the results also differed between the two groups. The early morning sleep group’s score on the wakefulness test was significantly better than the late-night sleep group. The early morning group also had better rates of sleep efficiency (the percentage of time spent sleeping in the four-hour window) and sleep latency (the amount of time spent falling asleep).
These results are not enough to tell when the best time to sleep is, but they do indicate that sleep at different times produces different results.
Part 2:
Classical Chinese medicine is a complete medical system that has been passed down to us. It offers additional information about sleep health.
Sleep is a result of the natural rhythm of energy circulation. At 11 p.m., the yin energy (qi) is at its strongest. This is the ideal time for the body to return to rest, restoration, and replenishment.
People should therefore not stay awake past 11 p.m. This is also the time for the body to build up yang energy (qi), which provides the energy we need for physical and mental activities during the daytime.
The body’s qi and blood pass through and nurture each organ system throughout the day and night. Different times of night have a greater impact on different organs. For example, between 1 a.m. and 3 a.m., blood and qi are strongest in the liver organ and its meridians (an energetic network fulfilling liver function). Therefore, sleeping during this time is critical for liver to be able to function normally.
In Chinese medicine, the liver bears an incredible amount of responsibility— physically, mentally, and emotionally. Liver energy regulates one’s mood, digestion, menstruation, dreaming, the sleep-wake switch, vision, and the smooth flow of energy throughout the body. It is in charge of strategic planning and execution and nurtures all of the connective tissues, from ligaments to nails.
The liver is extremely sensitive to negative emotions such as anger and resentment. If the liver is not being cared for well, people will be very irritable and agitated. Now you can see how serious the consequences to your health will be if you do not sleep at the times you should.
The other important organ system that is nurtured by qi and blood is the lungs (strongest from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m.). The lung system is responsible for providing oxygen to the body, defense against infection, and nourishment to the skin, and for assisting in the regulation of food and water metabolism.
Being emotionally distressed, eating the wrong kinds of food, or exposing oneself to environmental toxicity or infections disturbs the organ systems and meridians and can create sleep disorders.
For example, when the kidney energy, (our major source of cooling energy) becomes too deficient to balance the heart energy (our major source of heat energy), people cannot fall into sleep due to over-active heat energy. Thus they get insomnia.
When the liver yang energy is not balanced by the liver yin energy, people may get nightmares, sleepwalk, and experience restless leg syndrome. When the spleen and lung qi are deficient, the body accumulates fat as well as phlegm that can block the airway, causing obstructive sleep apnea.
Therefore, from the Chinese-medicine perspective, sleep disorders are a superficial manifestation of underlying imbalances of body energies. These imbalances cause health issues that are often improved by modifying our life style, including getting healthy sleep, eating properly, meditating, exercising, and reducing stress.
For those who have more troublesome symptoms, receiving courses of treatment with acupuncture and herbal medicine is very important and most helpful. The last thing you want to do is to mask the symptoms by simply taking medications.
Dr. Yang is a leading physician, board-certified psychiatrist, and international expert on classic forms of Chinese medicine. He is a fourth-generation teacher and practitioner of traditional Chinese medicine, specializing in acupuncture.
This is Part 1 and 2 of a series.
via Ancient Wisdom for Healthy Sleep Part 1 | Traditional Chinese Medicine | Health | Epoch Times
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Character Development Improves School Performance
30 January, 2012 at 07:33 | Posted in Body & Mind, Children, Science | Leave a commentTags: Body & Mind, Children, psychology, Science
Developing social and emotional character skills in students significantly improves learning outcomes and “overall school quality,” new research finds, after testing a new character development program in Hawaiian elementary schools.
Tested in 20 schools, the program involved a series of organized activities taking one hour per week focused on developing student character as opposed to traditional methods of employing rules to control or punish problem behaviors.
“What we’re finding now is that we can really address some of the concerns in our schools by focusing more on character in the classroom,” said researcher Brian Flay of Oregon State University in a press release.
“A third-grade lesson, for instance, might be helping kids to understand how other people feel, to learn about empathy. That may seem simple, but in terms of educational performance it’s important.”
The research—the latest in a series of studies—suggests that past traditional policies proved ineffective in curbing problem behaviors such as violence and drug abuse due to not addressing underlying issues such as a student’s sense of self and social attachment. The results of the new trials have been promising.
Previous studies revealed 72 percent fewer suspensions, 15 percent less absenteeism, and significantly improved reading and math skills based on national and state tests.
“The current research supports the hypothesis that these programs can generate whole-school change and improve school safety and quality,” the researchers wrote in their research paper.
The findings were published in the January edition of the journal School Health.
Read the research paper here.
via Character Development Improves School Performance | Inspiring Discoveries | Science | Epoch Times
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SCIENCE IN PICS: The Dazzling Glasswinged Butterfly
29 January, 2012 at 07:27 | Posted in Nature | 2 CommentsTags: Nature
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The glasswinged butterfly, Greta oto, is a common species of clearwing butterfly, widely distributed in Central America from Mexico to Panama.
Its wings are famous for their characteristic transparent scales, which look like little windows craftily supported by brownish-orange opaque veins.
The delicate glass-like wings are strong enough to undertake a migratory flight, with the butterfly traveling more than 12 miles (19 km) a day. The wings also provide protective camouflage by allowing the insect to easily merge into its surroundings, thus preventing predatory birds from tracking the butterfly.
Read more: SCIENCE IN PICS: The Dazzling Glasswinged Butterfly | Earth & Environment | Science | Epoch Times
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Plant Uses Underground Leaves to Trap and Digest Roundworms
28 January, 2012 at 07:20 | Posted in Nature, Science | Leave a commentTags: Nature, Science
Scientists have unraveled the mystery behind why Philcoxia—a spiny, purple-flowered plant located in Brazil—grows its leaves underground. The plant, now known to be carnivorous, survives by absorbing and eating tiny worms that it traps on its spiny leaves.
Philcoxia thrives in sand patches located on the Campos Rupestres savanna in Brazil’s central highlands. Until now, scientists have been puzzled as to how Philcoxia was able to survive in such a nutrient-poor environment with only a taproot for taking water and no root system to absorb nutrients.
Plant ecologist Rafael Oliveira of the University of Campinas in São Paulo, Brazil, and colleagues were aware that Philcoxia’s leaves were able to photosynthesize despite being covered by soil, but they got their first hints about how it absorbs nutrients when analyzing its one-millimeter-wide leaves under an electron microscope.
Upon inspection, they found that Philcoxia’s leaves have structures resembling the sticky glands seen in other carnivorous plant species. In addition, tiny round worms called nematodes were seen on the leaves.
To determine what the worms were doing on the leaves, Oliveira’s team grew a bacteria culture containing a nitrogen isotope. The bacteria were fed to nematodes, which in turn were placed near the leaves of several Philcoxia plants.
The next day, the worms had crawled onto the leaves and the nitrogen isotope that was fed to the bacteria had been absorbed into the plants’ tissue. Within two days, 15 percent of the isotope had been absorbed, indicating that the nematodes were a major part of Philcoxia’s diet.
“When I first saw the results, I couldn’t believe those underground leaves were actually eating nematodes,” Oliveira said, according to ScienceNOW.
The researchers didn’t identify any other organisms on the leaves, but Oliveira said they “can’t throw out the idea that [Philcoxia] could digest other really small creatures,” and that they next plan to discover how the plant manages to attract the nematodes.
The findings were published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on Jan. 9.
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Why Materialist Science Cannot Explain Near-Death Experiences
27 January, 2012 at 07:11 | Posted in Body & Mind, Culture, Science, Spirituality | Leave a commentTags: Body & Mind, books, Culture, Near-Death Experiences, Science, Spirituality
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In March 1987 Dawn Gillott was admitted to Northampton General Hospital, in the U.K., seriously ill with pneumonia. After being placed in intensive care, the physicians decided to perform a tracheotomy because she could not breathe.
Peter Fenwick and Elizabeth Fenwick quoted her in their book The Truth in the Light: “The next thing I was above myself near the ceiling looking down. One of the nurses was saying in what seemed a frantic voice, ‘Breathe, Dawn, breathe.’ A doctor was pressing my chest, drips were being disconnected, everyone was rushing round.
“I couldn’t understand the panic, I wasn’t in pain. Then they pushed my body out of the room to the theater. I followed my body out of the ITU and then left on what I can only describe as a journey of a lifetime.
“I went down what seemed like a cylindrical tunnel with a bright warm inviting light at the end. I seemed to be traveling at quite a speed, but I was happy, no pain, just peace.
“At the end was a beautiful open field, a wonderful summery smell of flowers. There was a bench seat on the right where my Grandfather sat (he had been dead seven years). I sat next to him. He asked me how I was and the family. I said I was happy and content and all my family were fine.
“He said he was worried about my son; my son needed his mother, he was too young to be left. I told Grampi I didn’t want to go back, I wanted to stay with him. But Grampi insisted I go back for my children’s sake. I then asked him if he would come for me when my time came. He started to answer, ‘Yes, I will be back in four’—then my whole body seemed to jump. I looked round and saw that I was back in the ITU.
“I honestly believe in what happened, that there is life after death. After my experience I am not afraid of death as I was before my illness.”
The near-death experience described above is not rare. Hundreds of similar cases involving people reporting that while seriously ill or injured they left their bodies, observed the surrounding scene, entered a tunnel, emerged in another world where they met deceased friends or relatives before returning to their bodies have been carefully documented in several different countries. The case above is not even a particularly impressive one.
At first glance, such cases seem to indicate that under life-threatening circumstances the conscious part of us is capable of detaching from our physical bodies, and may travel to another world. The overwhelming majority of those who have had such experiences are utterly convinced of the existence of an afterlife.
However, there are those who disagree, and who argue that such experiences simply cannot be what they at first seem to be.
Mind and Body
I began research into my recent book Science and the Near-Death Experience by examining the question of whether or not consciousness depends on the brain. Various materialist theories to that effect were examined, and I found that all the arguments for the dependence of the mental on the physical, such as the effects of age, disease, brain damage, and drugs on the mind, are all based on an unstated assumption.
The implicit assumption made in all the materialist arguments was that the relationship between brain activity and consciousness was always one of cause to effect, and never that of effect to cause. But this assumption is not known to be true, and it is not the only conceivable one consistent with the observed facts mentioned above.
Just as consistent with the observed facts is the idea that the brain’s function is that of an intermediary between mind and body, or in other words, that the brain’s function is that of a two-way receiver-transmitter, sometimes from body to mind, and sometimes from mind to body.
Next … the transmission hypothesis can explain everything …
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Chinese Party Head’s ‘Cultural System Reform’ Foretells More Repression
26 January, 2012 at 08:51 | Posted in China, Culture, human rights, IT and Media, persecution | Leave a commentTags: CCP, censorship, China, Culture, human rights, IT and Media, persecution of dissidents
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For China, 2012 has begun with what Chinese regime leader Hu Jintao calls a “cultural system reform.” It’s not a political reform to grant Chinese people more rights and liberties, just the opposite: it points to a more conservative and closed-minded direction and the launching of another Cultural Revolution style campaign to restrict freedom of speech and oppose citizens’ demands for universal human rights, according to analysts.
Hu announced the decision to “deepen reform of the cultural system” and “build a country with a strong socialist culture” at the Sixth Plenary Session of the Seventeenth National Congress last October.
Qiushi magazine, the communist party’s core publication and journal of the Central Committee, which translates as “Seeking Truth,” published parts of Hu’s 5,000-word speech on Jan. 1. Hu warned, that “hostile forces are intensifying strategic attempts to westernize and divide China,” and that, “ideology and cultural fields are the focal areas of the hostile forces’ long term infiltration effort.”
Publishing the article on New Years’ Day serves propaganda purposes for this year’s 18th party congress, according to economist Cheng Xiaonong, a former aide to the late, ousted, liberal party leader Zhao Ziyang. It also highlights the communist party’s attitude toward China’s current situation and future development, Cheng told The Epoch Times.
“After the 18th party congress, the CCP will continue to hold on to its traditional practices, and will be more conservative and closed-minded, and people’s input will even more so fall on blind eyes and deaf ears,” Cheng said.
Media Control
Since Jan. 1 the regime’s broadcasting watchdogs started implementing new regulations to restrict certain television entertainment programs.
Under a regulation by the State Administration of Radio, Film and Television, taking effect on Jan. 1, two-thirds of entertainment shows on China’s 34 satellite channels were cut. The total number of entertainment programs scheduled for prime time broadcasting in one week dropped from 126 to 38. Each satellite channel can broadcast no more than two entertainment shows per week. At the same time, the number of “news” programs has been increased by 33 percent.
Western-style reality and talk shows have become very popular entertainment on Chinese satellite television. As these shows provide people with an opportunity to express their feelings and thoughts about personal and social problems, they apparently are making communist party leaders anxious.
Shutting down these entertainment shows and replacing them with political propaganda programs “is part of the CCP’s wider campaign to reinforce socialist principles, while Chinese citizens are calling for values such as freedom of expression and democracy,” New Tang Dynasty Television said in a Jan. 5 report.
In one province authorities have also begun tightening their control over journalists during the end of last year.
Zhejiang Provincial Press and Publication Bureau conducted assessments of 182 correspondent stations in the province. Fourteen media received orders to undergo disciplinary reorganization, four state media correspondent stations didn’t pass the year-end review, and another four media correspondent stations were dismissed, according to a Nov. 15, 2011 China Press and Publication News report.
In October the regime started cracking down on the Internet to prevent the spreading of “rumors.”
Beijing and Guangdong Province went one step further in December to start implementing real name registration for microblogs, with many dissidents’ microblogs being censored.
Using Culture as a Weapon
An article on Hong Kong’s Cheng Ming magazine compared Hu’s cultural reform with Hitler’s ethnic cleansing and Mao’s Cultural Revolution. It is even campaigned like the Cultural Revolution, the magazine said.
Chinese propaganda officials began a massive media campaign in mid-October to promote Hu’s “culture reform.” Meanwhile, Hu dispatched a central government propaganda team to different cities to preach the key points to local officials.
This kind of effort to organize “major propaganda activity” to get the central government’s message across the country, was only seen in the Cultural Revolution era, Cheng Ming magazine said.
Zhang Weiguo, editor-in-Chief of Hong Kong’s Dong Xiang magazine, concurs. “It certainly looks like the CCP has launched a Cultural Revolution style campaign, using culture as a weapon to oppose and resist the western world’s universal values,” he told Voice of America.
Forcing Intellectual Elite into Exile
Qiushi magazine also quoted Hu as saying, “We have firmly pushed forward reform of the cultural system, articulated new cultural development concepts, liberated and developed cultural productive forces, given impetus to the all–around flourishing of cultural programs.”
In fact, Hu has been pushing his “cultural system reform” as early as 2002, during the sixteenth party congress. He later proposed a “deepening reform of the cultural system” during the seventeenth party congress in 2007.
While Hu “firmly pushed forward” his cultural systems reform–a disguise for maintaining social stability–many intellectuals, including outspoken veteran party members, journalists, dissidents, and lawyers have become the targets of communist authorities’ oppression.
Li Gongzhen, a professor at Wuhan University in Hubei Province, recently warned the Chinese regime to not follow in Hitler’s footsteps and create refugees of China’s intellectual elite. Hitler’s ethnic cleansing forced a group of elite intellectuals, including Einstein, into exile in America. This eventually helped establish a new scientific and cultural center in the U.S. and aided America’s rise as a superpower, Li said.
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Beyond Spirituality: the Role of Meditation in Mental Health
25 January, 2012 at 17:18 | Posted in Body & Mind, meditation, Science, Spirituality | 2 CommentsTags: Body & Mind, health, meditation, psychology, Science, Spirituality
By Jonathan Krygier and Andrew Kemp,
The University of Sydney
Meditation has traditionally been associated with Eastern mysticism but science is beginning to show that cultivating a “heightened” state of consciousness can have a major impact on our brain, the way our bodies function and our levels of resilience.
Clinicians are increasingly looking for effective, preventative, non-pharmacological options to treat mental illness. And meditation techniques – such as quietening the mind, understanding the self and exercising control – show promise as an alternative tool to regulate emotions, mood and stress.
Body
Meditation influences the body in unexpected ways. Experienced meditators, for instance, can speed or slow their metabolism by more than 60% and raise their body temperature by as much as 8°C.
Even a little training in meditation can make people calmer, less stressed and more relaxed. As little as 20 minutes a day leads to physical changes, such as reduced blood pressure, lower heart rate, deeper and calmer breathing. Improvements in blood pressure as a result of meditation have also been linked to a lower risk of heart attack.
Meditation is also beginning to prove effective as a treatment for chronic and acute pain. One experiment showed that four days of mindfulness meditation substantially reduced the participant’s experience of unpleasantness and the intensity of their pain.
Mind, braind and beyond
Meditation increases left-sided, frontal brain activity, an area of the brain associated with positive mood. Interestingly, this increase in left-brain activity is also linked with improvements in immune system activity. And the more you practise meditation, the greater your immune function is likely to be.
Studies have shown that long-term meditators have increased volumes of grey matter in the right orbito-frontal cortex and hippocampus regions of their brain which are responsible for regulating emotion. Similar changes have also been found in non-meditators who completed an eight-week course in mindfulness training.
So even a limited stint of meditation has the potential to change the structure of the brain.
Ageing
The cortex in the brain usually thins as we age – a type of atrophy related to dementia. Intriguingly, those who have meditated around an hour a day for six years display increased cortical thickness. Older meditators also show decreased age-related decline in cortical thickness compared to non-meditators of the same age.
Read more: Beyond spirituality: the role of meditation in mental health – Science Alert
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Blogs May Benefit Socially Distressed Teenagers
25 January, 2012 at 07:03 | Posted in Body & Mind, Children, IT and Media, Science | Leave a commentTags: Body & Mind, Children, health, IT and Media, psychology, Science
Blogging may help teenagers who suffer from social anxiety improve their self-esteem and relate better with their friends, according to a new study.
“Research has shown that writing a personal diary and other forms of expressive writing are a great way to release emotional distress and just feel better,” said study lead author Meyran Boniel-Nissim of Israel’s University of Haifa in a press release.
“Teens are online anyway, so blogging enables free expression and easy communication with others.”
Troubled teens who expressed their concerns through a blog appear to benefit more than from writing in a private diary, according to the study. And blogs that allowed comments from readers seem to enhance the positive effects.
“Although cyberbullying and online abuse are extensive and broad, we noted that almost all responses to our participants’ blog messages were supportive and positive in nature,” co-author Azy Barak said in the release.
Randomly selected high school students in Israel were asked to fill out a survey about their feelings on the quality of their social relationships. Those showing signs of social anxiety or distress were selected for the study.
Four groups of students were asked to run a blog for 10 weeks, posting at least twice a week. Two of the groups were told to focus on their social problems when posting, with one group not accepting comments and the other open to comments.
The other two groups could write about whatever they wanted, and similarly one group was open to comments. There were two control groups: one group writing in a private diary about their social problems and the other group doing nothing.
Students were judged to have poor social and emotional conditions if they wrote too much about their personal or relationship problems or showed signs of low self-esteem.
The bloggers improved significantly in self-esteem and showed more positive social behavior compared to the control groups. Bloggers who were asked to write specifically about their problems and had their posts open to comments improved the most.
The study was published online in the journal Psychological Services.
via Blogs May Benefit Socially Distressed Teenagers | Inspiring Discoveries | Science | Epoch Times
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Happy New Year of the Dragon!
24 January, 2012 at 08:44 | Posted in China, Chinese culture | Leave a commentTags: China, chinese astrology, Chinese culture
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Water-Dragon (born in 1952 and 2012)
Water has a calming effect on the dragon’s fearless temperament. Water makes it easier for the dragon to control their enthusiasm. Unlike the other dragons, who want to be in the limelight, water-dragon has easier to take a step back and reevaluate the situation. Therefore, they take smart decisions and can meet people face to face. But they can do wrong if they do not do research or do not finish one project before starting a new one.
Translated from Vad kineserna säger om drakens år
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Livestock in China Given Too Many Antibiotics
24 January, 2012 at 08:41 | Posted in Body & Mind, China, Environmental issues, Food, sustainable development | 2 CommentsTags: Body & Mind, China, environmental issues, Food, health, sustainable development
The abuse of antibiotics is rampant in China’s animal husbandry industry, with nearly half of the 210,000 tons of antibiotics produced in China annually being deployed on animals, according to recent reports.
Southern Daily reported on Dec. 21 that chickens, ducks, eggs, fish and meat in China are all contaminated due to widespread use of antibiotics. The paper reported that residual antibiotics in the food are also impacting humans.
The push to use antibiotics was driven by the development of high-density livestock farming in China in recent years, which led to diseases. Adding more drugs to the forage eaten by the animals became the common way of addressing the disease problems, and was especially notable in the aquaculture industry.
With regular dose increases, bacteria become resistant to drugs. Within a decade veterinary antibiotics have been upgraded from the basic penicillin, chloramphenicol, and terramycin to more powerful categories of enrofloxacin, florfenicol, sulfonamide family, cephalosporins, and quinolones.
Experts quoted in the Southern Daily report warned that consumption of food containing antibiotics would result in allergies in minor cases or toxicity in serious cases.
Critically, “super-bacteria” resistant to drugs may be produced by the long term abuse of antibiotics, which poses a greater risk. Doctors have already encountered bacteria-infections that are incurable, the report said.
Read the original Chinese article.
via Livestock in China Given Too Many Antibiotics | Society | China | Epoch Times
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Eastern Dragons Manifest as Auspicious Figures
23 January, 2012 at 08:14 | Posted in China, Chinese culture | Leave a commentTags: China, Chinese culture
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Jan. 23 marks this year’s Chinese New Year. After a Rabbit year, the upcoming year stands under the sign of the Dragon. Unlike Western dragons, in the Chinese tradition, dragons have a good reputation.
In Chinese culture, a dragon has been described as a divine creature with a giant body in the shape of a silkworm, scales like a carp, a head like a camel, horns like a deer, eyes like a ghost, claws like an eagle, palms like a tiger, and ears like an ox.
Despite their complicated features, dragons have been popularly depicted in more or less the same way in temples, palaces, books, paintings, and sculptures throughout history. The ancient Chinese revered the dragon so much that it became the only celestial creature in the Chinese zodiac.
Although the dragon was often associated with mythical realms, according to Chinese historical records, dragons had appeared on earth from time to time. The oldest record of a dragon arguably dates back to Fu Xi, the creator of Chinese civilization, who was believed to be half-human and half-dragon.
According to legends, dragons would appear in the sky on the dates of the birth or death of historic Chinese figures such as the Yellow Emperor (circa 2600 B.C.), Emperor Yao (circa 2300 B.C.), Emperor Shun (circa 2200 B.C.), and Yu the Great (circa 2100 B.C.), serving as the embodiment of the great sage emperors.
It was said that the Yellow Emperor made a big Ding (an ancient tripod with two loop handles, used to worship heaven) at the foot of Qiao Mountain, Guangdong Province, in 2598 B.C. When it was set up, the gate of heaven opened and a yellow dragon came down. The Yellow Emperor ascended to heaven with 70 of his chancellors by riding the yellow dragon.
In some other legends, Eastern dragons were depicted as creatures with magical powers that could assist emperors in suppressing revolts in wartime. Over time, people came to interpret the appearance of dragons in the sky as an indication that something important would soon happen or as a sign of good fortune.
via Eastern Dragons Manifest as Auspicious Figures | Culture | China | Epoch Times
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Exoplanets Are the Norm for Milky Way Star Systems
23 January, 2012 at 08:10 | Posted in Science | Leave a commentTags: astronomy, Science
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Extrasolar planets may be more abundant in our galaxy than previously thought, according to new research to be published in Nature on Jan. 12.
Using a technique called gravitational microlensing, astronomers from the European Southern Observatory (ESO) spent six years surveying millions of stars in the Milky Way and found that a star will probably be orbited by more than one planet.
Previously, two methods have been used to find exoplanets: detection of the planet’s gravitational pull on its host star, and observing the planet dimming its star’s light as it passes in front of it.
However, these techniques are best for locating planets that are massive or circling their stars closely. Consequently, many other exoplanets may be missed. In contrast, gravitational lensing can find planets with a wide range of masses, as well as those orbiting their suns at a distance.
“We have searched for evidence for exoplanets in six years of microlensing observations,” said study lead author Arnaud Cassan at France’s Institut d’Astrophysique de Paris in a press release. “Remarkably, these data show that planets are more common than stars in our galaxy.”
“We also found that lighter planets, such as super-Earths or cool Neptunes, must be more common than heavier ones.”
The gravitational field of a star can act as a lens, magnifying the brightness of a background star. If a planet is circling the lensing star, it adds to the magnifying effect. The scientists looked for this effect in data from the PLANET (Probing Lensing Anomalies NETwork) and OGLE (Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment) surveys.
Despite the technique’s power, its planet-hunting potential is limited by the coincidence of two factors: the chance that a background and lensing star will align correctly is very rare, and the planet’s orbit needs to be aligned too.
Three exoplanets were discovered during the six-year search—a super-Earth and two planets with masses similar to Neptune and Jupiter. This is a good outcome for such a fine-tuned technique, suggesting that the astronomers were either very lucky or exoplanets are commonplace in our galaxy.
In their statistical analysis, the scientists included seven other exoplanets, and the many non-detections from the observations, to determine that one in six of the stars surveyed hosts a Jupiter-like planet, half of them have Neptune-mass planets, and two-thirds have super-Earths.
“We used to think that the Earth might be unique in our galaxy,” concluded study co-lead author Daniel Kubas at the ESO in the release. “But now it seems that there are literally billions of planets with masses similar to Earth orbiting stars in the Milky Way.”
via Exoplanets Are the Norm for Milky Way Star Systems | Space & Astronomy | Science | Epoch Times
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Eastern Dragons Differ From Western Dragons
23 January, 2012 at 07:20 | Posted in China, Chinese culture | 5 CommentsTags: ancient chinese legends, China, Chinese culture
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In both the East and the West, the dragon is often associated with fantasy and mythical realms. Yet the outer appearances and common perceptions of the dragon differ greatly in these two parts of the world.
In China, as well as in South Asia, the dragon is commonly the symbol of nobility, solemnness, holiness, and good fortune. Throughout the history of China, Korea, and Japan, the dragon (or the concept of the dragon) has been a part of people’s daily lives. The dragon has existed wherever Chinese culture existed, and the Chinese eventually began calling themselves the descendants of the dragon.
Despite the differences between the Eastern and Western dragons, they are both intimately connected to people’s beliefs.
The Eastern dragon is portrayed as an auspicious creature with magical power that coexists in heaven with gods. When Buddhists or Taoists achieve perfection,they ascend to heaven by riding an Eastern dragon.
In Western culture, the dragon represents evil and darkness. Unlike the celestial image of the Eastern dragon, the Western dragon has sharp teeth and strong legs. It is said to bring harm, suffering, and fear to human beings.
The Book of Revelation, the last book of the New Testament, speaks about the devil, Satan, taking the form of a red dragon and fighting Archangel Michael. Satan, the deceiver of the world, was defeated and cast to the earth.
via Eastern Dragons Differ From Western Dragons | Culture | China | Epoch Times
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Communist Party Head Says Western Culture Invading China
22 January, 2012 at 17:59 | Posted in China, human rights, persecution | Leave a commentTags: CCP, China, human rights, persecution of dissidents
Ever since China opened to the West for economic development some 30 years ago, Communist Party leaders have been concerned that western ideology and values would transform Chinese society and the regime’s one-party political system.
But a speech by Party head Hu Jintao reveals a new level of anxiety within the Chinese Communist Party CCP about the threat from western ideology and culture infiltrating China.
Qiushi magazine, the CCP’s core publication and the journal of the Central Committee, recently published a speech given by Chinese leader Hu Jintao during the 6th session of the 17th National Congress of the communist party last October.
The National Congress usually doesn’t discuss cultural policy, but did broach the subject in this session. Two months later, Qiushi magazine published an abridged version of Hu’s 5,000-word speech, in which he sounds the alarm about a Western cultural invasion.
“Hostile forces are intensifying strategic attempts to westernize and divide China,” Hu said. “Ideology and cultural fields are the focal areas of the hostile forces’ long term infiltration effort.”
‘Hostile Forces’
Some analysts pointed out the irony of Hu‘s statement—communism is itself an import from the West.
Zhao Pei, a commentator at New Tang Dynasty, an independent Chinese-language television network with headquarters in New York, said communist ideology, a foreign import, infiltrated China 90 years ago,and has been “communizing” mainland China for the past 62 years.
The interesting part of Hu’s speech is his mention of “hostile forces,” Zhao said.
“These words expose the hostile attitude of the communist regime towards the free world. The CCP has talked about openness and reforms and wanting to connect with the international community, but this is all deceptive talk,” Zhao said. “The ultimate thought of this dictatorship is to maintain its authoritarian rule.”
Zhao also mentioned the commotion created in Chinese society by U.S. Ambassador Gary Locke’s plain and simple traveling and living style, which was criticized by some state media as an attempt to divide China.
“For the Chinese people, Gary Locke’s western style has been a long-awaited dream,” Zhao said. “Chinese netizens argued that if Gary Locke was to go out with a police escort, drink Maotais [an expensive Chinese liquor], play with mistresses, and engage in corruption, he’d be promoting the CCP’s values.”
Maintaining Stability
Chinese netizens have become more outspoken and critical of the regime since last year’s revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa. With a withering economy, mass protests have also increased.
The regime has been clamping down harder, arresting many rights activists and lawyers and controlling Internet content ever more closely during 2011. It’s security budget, used to control Chinese citizens, is said to be higher than it’s military budget.
After Hu’s speech, many big cities in China have been enforcing a real-name registration system for users of the popular Weibo micro blog.
Lin Heli, a current affairs commentator, told Radio France Internationale that the CCP has tightened the cultural and Internet policy after the 6th session of the 17th National Congress, and cyber-dissidents have also suffered a new round of suppression.
In the long run, controlling the micro blogs and Internet media is a difficult proposition. But in order to achieve its goal of “maintaining stability,” the CCP promises to increase funding and manpower.
via Communist Party Head Says Western Culture Invading China | Special Section | China | Epoch Times
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Venetian Art Exhibit Portrays Evolution of Renaissance Painting
22 January, 2012 at 07:33 | Posted in Culture, picture of the day | Leave a commentTags: Culture, picture of the day
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NEW YORK—The eye-opening aspect of one of the current exhibits at the Metropolitan Museum of Art does not lie in the beauty and perfection of the paintings. Instead, carefully selected and arranged pieces allow visitors to witness the striking evolution of Renaissance painting.
Bartolomeo Vivarini’s “Death of the Virgin” (1485) boldly experiments with perspectives. Painted as an altarpiece for a chapel in the Certosa at Padua, Italy, it presents a traditionally pious scene.
On a throne, Christ holds a miniature Virgin Mary, which represents her soul to be carried to heaven by eight angels. Eleven apostles surround Mary’s body lying in state. They gaze up at the spiritual figures.
Foreshortening is a technique to create an illusion of depth in two dimensions. Objects closer to the viewer appear larger, and images recede into the distance. In Bartolomeo’s painting, with exaggerated foreshortening, the apostles’ faces appear squished in cartoon-like distortions. Starkly outlined figures, painted in bright tempera, add to the vivid but slightly crude result.
Depth and perspectives are hallmark innovations of Renaissance art. Paintings, such as Bartolomeo’s remind us that these kinds of advances did not occur overnight. Bartolomeo was influenced by artists like Andrea Mantegna, a painter well-known for experimenting with creative perspectives.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s exhibit, Art in Renaissance Venice, 1400–1515, benchmarks these types of developments, leading to the High Renaissance. The 44 drawings and paintings embody the influences in Venice of artists from Florence, Padua, and other Italian cities, according to Alison Nogueira, the assistant curator in the Robert Lehman Collection who organized the exhibit.
Artists traveled to Venice to work on commissions, including at the Doge’s Palace, the symbolic seat of Venetian power. The confluence of artists fertilized change.
Influential Artist Families
Although they were both powerful families in the art world, the Bellinis historically overshadowed the Vivarinis (Bartolomeo’s origin).
Jacopo Bellini is often called the father of painting — Alison Nogueira
“Jacopo Bellini is often called the father of painting,” Nogueira said. “He was the father of Giovanni and Gentile, who were both extremely successful. But also philosophically, he was the founder of a new school of painting that introduced the Renaissance style.”
The Bellini family ran the most successful painting workshop in Venice, Nogueira said. Art historian Giorgio Vasari, in “The Lives of the Artists,” noted that Jacopo convinced his daughter, Nicolosia, to marry Mantegna. Giovanni and his brother-in-law, Mantegna, learned from one another and widely influenced artists throughout the region.
Jacopo initiated the half-length Madonna sitting behind a ledge. Unlike a life-size model, the waist-up Madonna provided a close-up, intimate relationship with the viewer. This perspective suited well the Bellinis’ commissioned paintings for private devotional uses. The painting’s information card notes that the window-like frame of the parapet referenced the Virgin as the “window of heaven” through which God shed light on the world.
The exhibit’s sequence of Jacopo’s “Madonna and Child” followed by Giovanni’s three paintings of the same subject directly illustrates developments in Renaissance art. Jacopo’s painting (circa 1440s) evokes Byzantine icons. Flat, gold halos circle faces with aquiline noses. Christ sits in a full-frontal position.
Giovanni’s “Madonna Adoring the Sleeping Child” (1460s) bears strong resemblance to his father’s work, from the painted arched top to the face of the Madonna. Giovanni’s “Madonna and Child” (circa 1470) uses a similar composition, but in blended tempera and oil. This hybrid medium shows a midway transition, pushing through a stiff opaqueness toward a more refined depiction of beauty and virtue.
In the fourth piece, Giovanni painted “Madonna and Child” (late 1480s) fully in oil. The oil paint allowed gradients of rich colors, luminosity, and softly modeled features.
The work of Jacopo’s mentor, Gentile de Fabriano, hangs in the gallery dedicated to an earlier period of Gothic, Venetian art. But Nogueira noted that Fabriano’s painting “Madonna and Child with Angels,” even dating back to 1410, “marks an increased sense of naturalism.”
She pointed to its drapery of cloth and muscles on the Christ child as examples of stylistic influences in the Bellinis’ later works. And after all, according to Vasari, Bellini named his son, Gentile, after Fabriano.
The intertwining of the artists’ lives affected styles, techniques, and ideas across time and geographic distances. This exhibit demonstrates how painting as an art form dynamically evolved to reflect a civilization.
The exhibit Art in Renaissance Venice is at the Metropolitan Museum of Art through Feb. 5.
Betsy Kim has worked as a lawyer and a TV reporter. She is now a writer living in New York City.
Related Articles: The Parthenon Marbles at the British Museum
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