A guiding principle for master cellist Yo-Yo Ma is that “the intersection(交汇) of cultures is where new things appear.” Certainly his biography is an intersection of cultures. He was born to Chinese parents in Paris, France; both his parents were musicians. When he was seven, his family moved to the United States. Gifted for his age, Ma attended Juilliard, the world famous music institute. He then chose to earn a liberal arts degree at Harvard rather than focusing only on music.

    Even in his earliest performing years, Yo-Yo Ma had a strong belief that it was important to share music with all kinds of people. Stories are told about how he once performed in the hallway of a large building for people who were unable to get tickets to his concert. He remained interested in making music accessible to diverse audiences and furthered his interest in different cultures when he visited the Bushmen of the Kalahari. He developed a vehicle to further these ideals when he founded the Silk Road Project.

    As he has said, the Silk Road is a metaphor(隐喻) for a number of things: as the Internet of ancient times, the routes were used for trade, by religious people, adventurers, scientists, storytellers. Everything from algebra to Islam moved along the Silk Road. It's the local-global thing. In the cultural world, you want to make sure that voices don't get lost, that rich traditions continue to live, without becoming common.

    This lesson explores the philosophy behind Yo-Yo Ma's founding of the Silk Road Ensemble(乐团), his belief that the arts, and particularly music, can make the world better, and that through cooperation, one can both preserve tradition and shape cultural evolution. Students also explore their own attitudes toward the arts, writing reflective essays on how the arts have played a role in their own lives.

    When seeing the doctor, you feel better to know you will get some medicine. But the doctor knows that medicine is not always needed. Sometimes all a sick person needs is some reassurance (安想) that all will be well. In such cases the doctor may prescribe a placebo.

    A placebo is a sugar pill, a harmless shot, or an empty capsule. The patient thinks it is medicine and begins to get better. How does this happen?

    The study of the placebo opens up new knowledge about the way the human body can heal itself. It is as if there was a doctor in each of us. The doctor will heal the body for us if we let it. But it is not yet known just how the placebo works to heal the body. Some people say it works because the human mind fools itself. These people say that if the mind is fooled into thinking it got medicine, then it will act as if it did, and the body will feel better.

    Placebos don't always work. The success of this treatment seems to rest a lot with the relationship between the patient and the doctor. If the patient has lots of trust in the doctor and if the doctor really wants to help the patient, then the placebo is more likely to work. So in a way, the doctor is the most powerful placebo of all.

    A placebo can also have bad effects. If patients expect a bad reaction to medicine, then they'll also show a bad reaction to the placebo. Some doctors still think that if the placebo can have bad effects it should never be used. They think there is still not enough known about it.

    The strange power of the placebo does seem to suggest that the human mind is stronger than we think it is. There are people who say you can heal your body by using your mind. And the interesting thing is that even people who swear this is not possible have been healed by a placebo.

    Staying positive through the cold season could be your best defense against getting ill,a new American study suggests.

    In an experiment that exposed healthy volunteers to a cold or flu virus,researchers found that people with a generally sunny character were less likely to fail ill.The findings,published in the journal Psychosomatic Medicine, build on evidence that a “positive emotional style” can help ward off the common cold and other illness.

    Researchers believe the reasons may be both objective―as in happiness improving immune function―and subjective―as in happy people being less troubled by a sore throat or runny nose.“People with a positive emotional style may have different immune responses to the virus,” explained lead study author Dr Sheldon Cohen of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.“And when they do get a cold,they may interpret their illness as being less severe.”

    Cohen and his colleagues has found in a previous study that happier people seemed less likely to catch a cold, but some questions remained as to whether the emotional quality itself had the effect.

    For the new study,the researchers had 193 healthy adults complete standard measures of personality qualities, physicals health,and emotional “style”.Those who tended to be happy,energetic and easy –going were judged as having a positive emotional style,while those who were often unhappy,tense,and hostile had a negative style.

    Afterwards,the researchers gave them nose drops containing either a cold virus or a particular flu virus.Over the next six days,the volunteers reported on any aches,pains,sneezing they had,while the researchers collected objective data.Cohen and his colleagues found that happy people were less likely to develop a cold.

    What's more,when happy folks did develop a cold,their symptoms were less severe than expected based on objective measures.

    On the contrary,people with negative characters were not at increased risk of developing a cold based on objective measures,though they did tend to get down about their symptoms.

    “We find that it's really positive emotions that have the big effect,” Cohen said,“not the negative ones.”

    So can a bad-tempered person fight a cold by deciding to be happy?

    What will people die of 100 years from now? If you think that is a simple question, you have not been paying attention to the revolution that is taking place in bio-technology(生物技术). With the help of new medicine, the human body will last a very long time. Death will come mainly from accidents, murder and war. Today's leading killers, such as heart disease, cancer, and aging itself, will become distant memories.

    In discussion of technological(技术的) changes, the Internet gets most of the attention these days. But the change in medicine can be the real technological event of our times. How long can humans live? Human brains were known to decide the final death. Cells are the basic units of all living things, and until recently, scientists were sure that the life of cells could not go much beyond 120 years because the basic materials of cells, such as those of brain cells, would not last forever. But the upper limits will be broken by new medicine. Sometime between 2050 and 2100, medicine will have advanced to the point at which every 10 years or so, people will be able to take medicine to repair their organs（器官）. The medicine, made up of the basic building materials of life, will build new brain cells, heart cells, and so on—in much the same way our bodies make new skin cells to take the place of old ones.

    It is exciting to imagine that the advance in technology may be changing the most basic condition of human existence, but many technical problems still must be cleared up on the way to this wonderful future.

    Many youths want to learn how to drive cars. This year one sixth of undergraduates in Beijing have registered at driving school. The students, mostly from majors such as business management or imitational trade, will finish their driving courses within 20 days or so.

    Training costs have dropped to 4, 500 yuan for students, according to the Haidian Driving School in Beijing. The price is not really low, but students will accept it, seeing it as an investment (投资) in their future. Familiarity with the operation of computers and fluent English are the basic skills graduating students need to find a job. But a driver s permit has become another factor (因素).

    "In the job market, owning a driver's permit sometimes strengthens a graduating student's competitiveness for a good position," says Li Hua, an undergraduate at the China University of Political Science and law.

    Cars will become a necessary part of many people's lives in the coming years, and it is difficult to get a permit out of campus because of the pressures on working people's time. "Having a full-time job after graduation offers limited time to learn to drive. We senior students have plenty of spare time, plenty of oppurtunity to learn," says another undergraduate at the university.

    Wu Dong, an official at the driving school, said undergraduates were very able and serious, and could grasp in an hour what ordinary people took four hours to learn. In this driving school, middle-aged people, young women and college students are the main customers.

    From March 1, 2018, to get a driver's permit, a beginner is now required to have at least 86 hours' practice before the final road test.

    Everyone at Pacsafe is always eager to get out in the world and enjoy new cultures, food, and experiences. With that in mind we asked a few of our top travel bugs for their best travel destination recommendations for 2019. They also included their favorite Pacsafe bag to take on the trip. Enjoy and hopefully get some ideas for your own globe - trotting adventure.

    Sri Lanka - Alison Hanko, Global Marketing Director

    I'm going to Sri Lanka this summer holiday and can't wait. It's close to Hong Kong where I live and I've always wanted to go. The food is supposed to be amazing. It seems really relaxing and I really want to do the Kandy to Badulla train ride, which looks just stunning. We've booked a good mix of beaches, some time in a safari tent to hopefully see elephants in the wild.

    For my bag, I'll most likely take the Quiksilver 40L Pack because it has the built-in wet pack for my bikinis. It's also a great size for a week-long trip in a warm climate.

    Japan - Ben Barras, Creative Director

    Japan is definitely my best travel destination recommendation. The culture, the streets, the architecture, the inspiration you get from all of that is amazing. The food is also fascinating. It's where I'm most planning to go. Tokyo obviously, but also visiting the mountains. You can go snowboarding, which I haven't done for years.

    I have a Vibe 25L Backpack which you can pack a lot in. The thing I like most about it is that it's compact, but still fits plenty in. I'll pair that up with a larger travel bag for the rest of my things and use the backpack to get around day to day.

    Berlin - Phil Hayes, Executive VP of Global Design

    For me, it's definitely Berlin. I'm particularly excited about the fashion, which I hear is pretty full on. Also the art galleries and history. Food, nightlife. Everything I've heard about Berlin is pretty cool, so I'm going to suck as much as I can out of it. World's Global Style Network had the Berlin shopping list that came out recently, so I'm going to follow that through as well.

    Bag wise, it will be the Quiksilver X Collab Bag. It's the 25L Anti-theft Backpack. It's normally my go-to bag for city trips because it's super easy to lock on the plane and in bars, and it's just the right amount of space.