If Confucius (孔子) were still alive today and could celebrate his September 28 birthday with a big cake, there would be a lot of candles. He'd need a fan or a strong wind to help him put them out.

    While many people in China will remember Confucius on his special day, few people in the United States will give him a passing thought. It's nothing personal. Most Americans don't even remember the birthdays of their own national heroes.

    But this doesn't mean that Americans don't care about Confucius. In many ways he has become a bridge that foreigners must cross if they want to reach a deeper understanding of China.

    In the past two decades, the Chinese studies programs have gained huge popularity in Western universities. More recently, the Chinese government has set up Confucius Institutes in more than 80 countries. These schools teach both Chinese language and culture. The main courses of Chinese culture usually included Chinese art, history and philosophy (哲学). Some social scientists suggest that Westerners should take advantage of the ancient Chinese wisdom to make up for the drawbacks of Westerners philosophy. Students in the United States, at the same time, are racing to learn Chinese. So they will be ready for life in a world where China is an equal power with the United States. Businessmen who hope to make money in China are reading books about Confucius to understand their Chinese customers.

    So the old thinker's ideas are still alive and well.

    Today China attracts the West more than ever, and it will need more teachers to introduce Confucius and Chinese culture to the West.

    As for the old thinker, he will not soon be forgotten by people in the West, even if his birthday is.

    Hello, Listeners. Welcome to Henton Hospital Radio. Before our music program at four, I'm going to repeat some of our hospital rules.

    The hospital can sleep 800 patients. There're 8 beds in each ward (病房). The visiting hours are in the afternoon from 2:30 to 3:30 and in the evening from 7:00 to 8:00. But remember only two people can see you at the same time. Sorry about that, but you can see what would happen if we didn't have these rules.

The other rules are about our hours. We start quite early—you might not be used to that. We wake you at 6 o'clock, and breakfast is at 8 o'clock, lunch is at noon.

    There's tea at 3:30 and supper is at 6 o'clock.

    You can see the non-smoking sign –-- we don't allow smoking in the wards. I'm sure you understand why. However, if you do need to smoke, there are some smoking rooms where it is allowed.

    You will find the radio switch (开关) on the wall near your bed, with your own headphones, if you want to listen. It's our own hospital radio wishing you a quick recovery (康复).

    Global GDP in 2030 will be 14% higher as a result of AI (Artificial Intelligence), thanks to improving labor productivity and increasing consumer demand, says a report.

    The report could increase the enthusiasm of economic policymakers and the public, and show the power of technology in changing not only people's daily lives, but also economic activities. However, history tells us that, while technological advancements have brought us benefits, they have also led to great social disorders, by changing the production and labor structures, and forcing many workers to either adapt to the changes or lose their jobs. In the 18th century, for instance, skilled workers rose up to resist the Industrial Revolution, destroying machinery in the early 19th century. We may not see similar protests today, but history should serve as a warning against the application of AI technology.

    While we may gain a lot of benefits from AI, we must work out plans to reduce its negative effect on society, especially for workers. AI can raise productivity and expand GDP, but it can also make non-adaptive workers jobless. In India, some technology personnel have already felt the negative effect of information technology. As technology industries across the world seek increasing support from automation（自动操作）, robotics and big data analysis, some technology workers have already lost their jobs.

    In their 2013 research study, Michael Osborne and Carl Frey from Oxford University estimated 47% of the jobs in the United States are “at risk” of being automated in the next 20 years. They said jobs in transportation and office and administrative support are at high risk of being automated. And Kaifu Lee recently said that robots could take away about 50% of all jobs from humans in the next decade.

    Those estimates may sound sensational and the impact of technological advancements may not be that serious, as they will also create jobs in new industries. However, policymakers should consider how to better embrace the technological wave to bring benefits while taking action to minimize its negative effects. The government therefore needs to work together with business leaders and social organizations, to promote training programs for potentially helpless workers, in order to make them more capable of adapting to the structural changes in industries and job markets in the future.

                                                                                        How Important Is Fashion?

    Is looking fashionable more important than being comfortable? Many people seem to think so, judging by the things they wear. But fashion is not everything. It is more important to be a healthy and good person.

    People go to great lengths to be fashionable. Some people think they have to have a certain body type, so they go on extreme, unhealthy diets in order to change their bodies. In addition, many women wear uncomfortable fashions, such as high-heeled shoes that create blisters(水泡), tight body shapers that limit blood flow, and sticky false eyelashes(假睫毛). Men and women alike spend time and money on produces that change their natural hair color and use hot irons and blow dryers to curl or straighten their hair. Some people spend several hours a day in front of a mirror. Is fashion important enough to spend so much time and effort on changing how you look like?

    If the purpose of fashion is to make a person feel good, it does not make sense that he or she would go through so much discomfort to be fashionable. Fashion should not come first. People should prioritize(优先考虑)being healthy and positive. What people wear does not indicate anything about their personalities. Instead of going on strict diets and starving, why not eat some healthy foods and then exercise? By doing these things, you can keep a healthy lifestyle and truly grow as a person.

    Most high school students would rather spend their summer vacations far away from the classroom. But Vineet Kosaraju and Nikhil Cheerla are choosing to go back to school, and this time they are the teachers.

    "I think it's really nice that I can help the community by spending just a little bit of time every week helping just a few students here and there try and learn programming," Kosaraju said.

    Friends since they were young boys, Kosaraju and Cheerla always shared a love of computer science. They learned the skills from their parents and school, but recognized that not all children have that chance.

    "Programming isn't taught in that many schools, especially low income (收入) schools, because there isn't that much money to support it," Kosaraju said.

    So he and Cheerla developed "Math and Coding," an after-school program for kids of all ages to learn the basics of computer programming.

    Between applying for college and doing their own homework, the two boys now spend a few hours every week going to different libraries teaching classes that cover everything from building basic games to developing apps.

    The friends started the program a little over a year ago and already, it's spread to more than a dozen libraries across the Bay Area in California. They are even training volunteers to teach these very same classes in other US states and Canada.

    Maryann Mitchell brought her 8-year-old granddaughter, Gabriella, to a class on coding at the Alum Rock Library in San Jose, California.

    "It's a chance for her to learn," Mitchell said. "It's the way of the future, and it's a good way for her to get grounded and be ready for what the future holds."

    "I think the most rewarding thing is having people come up and thank you and say they really learned a lot from this class," Cheerla said. "It doesn't get any better than that."

    I have a pair of pants. Tell me: How many different ways can I put a pair of pants to use?

    Now imagine you're Lady Gaga. Bill Gates. A scuba diver. An architect. You still have the pants. What other uses come to mind?

    What you just practiced—the conscious act of "wearing" another self—is an exercise that, according to psychiatrist Srini Pillay, MD, is essential to being creative.

    One problem about our understanding of creativity is that we tend to connect it to our concept of self: Either we're "creative" or we aren't, without much of a middle ground. "I'm just not a creative person!" a frustrated student might say in art class.

    Dr. Pillay, an assistant professor at Harvard University, has spent a good part of his career challenging these ideas. He believes that the key to unlocking your creative potential is to reject the old advice that urges you to "believe in yourself." In fact, you should do the opposite: Believe you are someone else.

    Dr. Pillay points to a 2016 study where the authors – educational psychologists Denis Dumas and Kevin Dunbar-divided their college-student subjects into three groups, instructing one group to think of themselves as "poets" and another to imagine they were "librarians" (the third group was the control). The researchers then presented all the participants with ten ordinary objects, including a fork, a carrot, and a pair of pants, and asked them to come up with as many different uses as possible for each one.

    Those who were asked to imagine themselves as poets came up with the widest range of ideas, whereas those in the librarian group had the fewest. Meanwhile, the researchers found only small differences in students' creativity levels across academic majors. In fact, the physics majors pretending to be poets came up with more ideas than the art majors did.

    These results, write Dumas and Dunbar, suggest that creativity is not an individual trait but a "product of context and perspective." Everyone can be creative, as long as he or she feels like a creative person.