The Square

    Jack Dorsey, the co-inventor of Twitter, is promoting his latest invention called the Square. The square is a small plug-in attachment to your mobile phone that allows you to receive credit card payments.

    The idea starting from Dorsey's friend Jim McKelvey who was unable to sell some glass work to a customer because he couldn't accept a particular card being used.

    Accepting credit card payments for something you're selling isn't always easy, especially if you are mobile like a tradesman, or delivery service at a trade show.

    This latest invention uses a small scanner that plugs into the audio input item on a mobile device. It reads information on a credit card when it is swiped(刷卡). The information is not stored on the device but sent over secure channels to banks. It basically makes any mobile phone a cash register for accepting card payments.

    As a payer, you receive a receipt via email that can be instantly accessed securely online. You can also use a text message to authorize payment in real time. Retailers can create a payer account for their customers which speeds the payment process. For example, a cardholder can assign a photo to their card so their photo will appear on the phone for visual identity confirmation. Mobile devices with touch screens will also allow you to sign for goods.

    There are no contracts, monthly fees, or hidden costs to accept card payments using Square and it is expected the plug-in attachment will also be free of charge.

    As with Twitter, it's expected that Dorsey will direct the company based upon feedback from users. Square Inc. has offices in San Francisco, Saint Louis and New York and is currently beta testing the invention with retailers in the United States.

    There have always been a lot of commonly believed but false ideas about being fat and doing exercise. Some people believe that they can't help putting on weight as they get older, while others hold that if they stop exercising, their muscles will turn into fat. Here are some more myths：

    I'll never lose weight—I come from a fat family

    Wrong! While we can't change the body type we are born with, we can't blame our genes for making us fat. There's plenty of evidence that fatness runs in families, and the main reason is that they share the same habits of eating too much and exercising too little.

    I am fat because I burn calories slowly

    Wrong! Fatness is not caused by a slow metabolism(新陈代谢). In fact, although fat people consume more energy than slim people, they also fail to realize how much they eat! Keeping a diary can help you work out your daily food intake more accurately.

    Exercise is boring

    Wrong! Anything will become boring if you do it repetitively. The key is to develop a balanced and varied programme that's fun as well as progressive. If you enjoy a Sunday walk, take a different route. If you do yoga, try a tai chi class. If you like swimming, set yourself a distance or time challenge.

    No pain, no gain

    Wrong! Exercise is not meant to hurt. Indeed, pain is your body telling you something's wrong, and continuing to exercise could lead to serious injury. You may experience mild discomfort as you begin to exercise regularly, but this is your body adapting to the positive changes in your lifestyle and the aches should disappear relatively quickly. If they don't, rest and seek medical advice.

    I became a magician by accident. When I was nine years old, I learned how to make a coin disappear. I'd read The Lord of the Rings and gone into the adult section of the library to be buried in fantasy literature but young enough to still hold out hope that you might find a book of real, actual magic in the library. The book I found taught basic techniques, and I tried to practice.

    At first the magic wasn't any good. It was just a trick—a bad trick. I spent hours each day running through the secret moves in front of the mirror. I dropped the coin over and over, a thousand times in a day, and after two weeks my mom got a carpet and placed it under the mirror to muffle (消音) the sound of the coin falling again and again.

    One day I made the coin disappear on the playground. We had been playing football and were standing in the field behind the school. A dozen people were watching. I showed the coin to everyone. Then it disappeared. The kids screamed. Everyone went crazy.

    A few years later, I staged an underwater escape in the river that flowed through the middle of the campus of the University of Iowa, where I went to school. I stood on a boat in the middle of the river wearing nothing but biking shorts. The sky was dead and gray, and the water was cold at the surface, and colder in the depths below.

    Technically, I succeeded. I jumped into the water, sank to the bottom, and escaped from the locks and the chains before swimming to the surface. But it didn't feel like a success.

    Depression and suicidal thoughts have doubled in young Americans, according to a new study from the American Psychological Association.

    Likely triggers? Cell phones and social media.

    "More US adolescents and young adults in the late 2010s, vs the mid-2000s, experienced serious psychological distress, major depression and more attempted suicide (自杀)", says lead researcher Jean Twenge, professor of psychology at San Diego State University. "These trends are weak or non-existent among adults 26 years and over, suggesting a generational shift in mood disorders instead of an overall increase across all ages."

    Twenge believes this trend is partially due to the explosion of digital culture over the past decade, which may have twisted modes of social interaction enough to affect mood disorders.

    The study analyzed data from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, which tracked drug and alcohol use and mental health issues in more than 200,000 youths aged 12 to 17 from 2005 to 2017 and almost 400,000 adults from 2008 to 2017.

    Major depression in the last 12 months increased by 52 percent in kids from 2005 to 2017 and 63 percent in young adults aged 18 to 25 from 2009 to 2017. There was also a 71 percent jump in young adults experiencing serious psychological distress in the previous 30 days from 2008 to 2017.

    So what's so different now? Twenge says research shows young people just aren't getting as much shuteye as they did in previous generations.

    Whereas older Americans might have established more stability in their lives, sleep-disrupting social stressors are likely at their peak for teens and young adults in this digital era, she says. Older adults are also less likely to let devices interfere (干预) with sleep.

    These results suggest a need for more research to understand how digital communication versus face-to-face social interaction influences mood disorders and to develop specialized interventions for younger age groups.

    Her suggestion? Put your phone down at least an hour before bedtime.

    There was once a man who had a donkey and a beautiful lapdog. The donkey was kept in a barn and had plenty of corn and hay to eat. Indeed, he was just as lucky as any donkey could be. The little dog stayed in the house and was well liked by the master. He was always playing and jumping about in an funny way and was allowed  to lie in his master's lap (膝盖). Meanwhile, the donkey had plenty to do. He pulled wood all day long and had to take his turn at the mill during the night. He often complained about his problems, and it bored him to see the lapdog living such an easy life, while he had to work so hard. Finally he thought to himself that if he acted the same way as the lapdog to his master, he would be treated the same way. So, one day he ran out of his barn and went fast into the house, where he began to kick about in a very strange way. Then, swaying his tail and imitating the funny behavior of the pet lapdog, he knocked over the table where his master was eating. He also broke all the dishes into very small pieces and did not stop until he jumped onto his master, trying to lick and paw him with his rough feet.

    Seeing their master in great danger, the servants thought it was time to help him. They beat the foolish donkey with sticks until he could not get up again. As he was about to die, he cried, "Why couldn't I have remained satisfied the way I was? Why did I try to imitate a creature who was nothing but a lazy puppy after all?"

    Curiosity is what drives us to keep learning, keep trying, keep pushing forward. But how does one generate (产生) curiosity, in oneself or others? George Loewenstein, a professor of psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, offered an answer in the classic1994 paper, "The Psychology of Curiosity."

    Curiosity arises, Loewenstein wrote, "when attention becomes focused on a gap in one's knowledge. Such information gaps produce the feeling of deprivation (匮乏) labeled curiosity. The curious individual is motivated to obtain the missing information to reduce the feeling of deprivation." Loewenstein's theory helps explain why curiosity is such a force: it's not only a mental state but also an emotion, a powerful feeling that drives us forward.

    Scientist Daniel Willingham notes that teachers are often "so eager to get to the answer that we do not devote enough time to developing the question." Yet it's the question that stimulates (刺激) curiosity; being told an answer stops curiosity before it can even get going.

    In his 1994 paper, George Loewenstein noted that curiosity requires some basic knowledge. We're not curious about something we know absolutely nothing about. But as soon as we know even a little bit, our curiosity is aroused and we want to learn more. In fact, research shows that curiosity increases with knowledge: the more we know, the more we want to know. To get this process started, Loewenstein suggests, take steps with some interesting but incomplete information.

    Language teachers have long used communication in exercises that open an information gap and then require learners to communicate with each other in order to fill it. For example, one student might be given a series of pictures for the beginning of the story, while the student's partner is given a series of pictures showing how that same story ends. Only by speaking with each other (in the foreign language they are learning, of course) can the students fill in each others' information gaps.