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Malcolm Gladwell, re: McDonald's fries

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Listen to "McDonald's Broke My Heart" Season 2 Episode 9 of The Revisionist History Podcast with Malcolm Gladwell.

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Millenials in the Workplace

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Simon Sinek  - Millennials in the Workplace

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BBC China School

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Are Our Kids Tough Enough Chinese School

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Are Our Kds Tough Enough Chinese School | Season 1 Episode 3

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Are Our Kds Tough Enough Chinese School | Season 1 Episode 3 Are Our Kds Tough Enough Chinese School | Season 1 Episode 3 Are Our Kds Tough Enough Chinese School | Season 1 Episode 3

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School Swap Korea

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School Swap: Korea Style, Episode 1 Full BBC Documentary 2016

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ADV 51

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Is there scientific proof we can heal ourselves? | Lissa Rankin, MD | TEDxAmericanRiviera

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This page has been archived and is no longer updated. Find out more about page archiving.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLKTGWH398Q

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ADV 39

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Updated February 17, 2017 18:51:11

We have come to the house of a woman we won't name, in a state we won't name, to talk to her about her desperate wish to have a daughter.

We have agreed to call this woman "Kate", and such is her fear of social backlash that when we interview her, we film her in silhouette.

Several other women had agreed to be interviewed by Lateline, then changed their minds over concerns they would be targeted on social media for their views.

Kate suffers from what is known as gender disappointment.

How seriously you take that concept probably goes a long way to determining how you feel about whether Australia should legalise gender selection - the use of IVF to get the baby of your desired sex.

Gender disappointment is not a medically recognised condition. Critics call it a social construct, but venture into some closed online chat forums and you will find hundreds of Australian women who are sharing their disappointment over the sex of their children.

Kate, 29, already has two boys and is five months pregnant with her third boy - a revelation that left her "gutted".

"I went to the bedroom and cried for a really long time," she says.

"Then my husband came in and he cried as well.

"You feel horrible, because you want to be excited that it's a boy, but part of you was really disappointed."

Kate is desperate for a daughter but she insists she doesn't want a "a ballerina, Barbie girl".

"I'm not wanting someone that I can dress in pink and tie her hair up. I'm not wanting any of that," she says.

"It's just that I always imagined her and she's always existed. I feel the family isn't complete without her."

Kate and others who feel gender disappointment describe it as a guilt-ridden, debilitating depression.

"Unless someone has that desire themselves and feels how it can be all-consuming, they can't understand what it's like," she says.

"It'd be so easy if I could just switch it off and just be happy."

Gender selection is not allowed in Australia, but an ethics committee of the National Health and Medical Research Council has been reviewing the guidelines for assisted reproductive technology and may make a recommendation for change.

"To you she doesn't exist yet, but to us we can't imagine a life without her," Kate wrote in her submission to the committee.

"It's really a personal decision and it's not going to hurt people the way that people seem to think it is.

"It's not going to affect the gender ratio, and it's not going to place these unrealistic ideas on the children that are being born."

Swaying with sex positions, Chinese medicine

With gender selection unavailable to couples in Australia, many hoping for a certain sex try to sway the gender of the child by using specific sexual positions and timing intercourse.

The science of so-called gender "swaying" has never been proven, but many still try it.

"We did diets, supplements, timing, the Chinese calendar, the moon phase, extra exercises, everything we could have thought of, everything we could find online," Kate says.

There is even an elderly woman in Melbourne who claims to have a 100 per cent success rate in gender swaying using Chinese medicine.

Couples are only able to contact the woman via text message and then they are told they need to commit to up to eight face-to-face fortnightly consultations, as well as a strict diet, to get their wish.

Kate cannot afford to go overseas where IVF gender selection is legal, so she is holding out for a reversal in policy here.

Going to extreme measures

For Townsville mother-of-four Sarah Williams, it was the price she had to pay to get the family balance she wanted.

Sarah has two boys, aged nine and seven, and four-year-old twin girls.

"I will talk to people and they go, 'Oh you're so lucky you got the two boys and then you got the two girls', and I will go, 'No, luck had nothing to do with that. I had to do some extreme measures to get my girls'," she says.

After having two boys, Sarah went to California, where gender selection is allowed, to go through an IVF cycle and be implanted only with the female embryos it produced.

Sarah had gone through the same range of emotions Kate is now experiencing.

"It's gut-wrenching. I would be in tears," she says.

"It never crossed my mind that I wouldn't have a daughter, and I wanted that because I was so close to my mum that I wanted to be the mum that was that close to my daughter," she says.

She rejects suggestions sex selection is akin to creating a designer baby.

"I didn't choose any eye colour, I didn't choose a hair colour, I just chose a girl over a boy," she says.

Several years ago Sarah would not have spoken out about gender selection.

These days she is more relaxed.

"We're very glad we did it, and we don't have any regrets no matter what anyone says," she says.

She is adamant that her daughters will not be expected to conform to gender stereotypes.

"I'm not going to force anything on my children," she says.

"They can be gay, they can be bi, they can do whatever they want with their lives.

"I'm a live-and-let-live kind of person.

"I don't judge other people, and I just hope they don't judge me in the same way."

Topics: fertility-and-infertility, reproduction-and-contraception, health, parenting, family-and-children, community-and-society, women, womens-health, australia

First posted February 07, 2017 06:05:54

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Mothers desperate for a daughter break silence on 'gender disappointment'

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Updated February 17, 2017 18:51:11 We have come to the house of a woman we won't name, in a state we won't name, to talk to her about her desperate wish to have a daughter. We have agreed to call this woman "Kate", and such is her fear of social backlash that when we interview her, we film her in silhouette.

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The Gender Equality Paradox - Documentary NRK - 2011

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Language is only the most obvious part of the global communication gap. Different cultures also have distinct approaches to communication during meetings, as described by British linguist Richard D. Lewis, whose best-selling book, " When Cultures Collide," charts these as well as leadership styles and cultural identities.

Lewis, who speaks ten languages, acknowledges the danger of cultural comparisons in his book: "Determining national characteristics is treading a minefield of inaccurate assessment and surprising exception. There is, however, such a thing as a national norm."

In support of cross-cultural studies, he writes: "By focusing on the cultural roots of national behaviour, both in society and business, we can foresee and calculate with a surprising degree of accuracy how others will react to our plans for them, and we can make certain assumptions as to how they will approach us. A working knowledge of the basic traits of other cultures (as well as our own) will minimize unpleasant surprises (culture shock), give us insights in advance, and enable us to interact successfully with nationalities with whom we previously had difficulty."

Lewis' diagrams show how cultures use language to communicate during meetings, with wider shapes showing greater conversational range, obstacles marked in grey, and cultural traits noted as well.

Americans, for instance, tend to launch right into negotiations, respond to discord confrontationally, and resolve with one or both sides making concessions.

Canadians tend to be more low-key and inclined to seek harmony, though they are similarly direct.

We'll go over the rest in brief after a selection of charts taken with permission from the 2005 third edition of " When Cultures Collide." (Click to enlarge.)

And the rest in brief, paraphrasing and quoting from " When Cultures Collide ":

English tend to avoid confrontation in an understated, mannered, and humorous style that can be both inefficient and powerful.

French tend to engage vigorously in a logical debate.

Germans rely on logic but "tend to amass more evidence and labour their points more than either the British or the French."

Spanish and Italians "regard their languages as instruments of eloquence and they will go up and down the scale at will, pulling out every stop if need be to achieve greater expressiveness."

Scandinavians often have entrenched opinions that they have formulated "in the long dark nights," though they are reasonable conversationalists. Swedes often have the most wide-ranging discussions, Finns tend to value concision, and most Norwegians fall somewhere in between.

Swiss tend to be straightforward and unaggressive negotiators, who obtain concessions by expressing confidence in the quality and value of their goods and services.

Hungarians value eloquence over logic and are unafraid to talk over each other.

Bulgarians may take a circuitous approach to negotiations before seeking a mutually beneficial resolution, which will often be screwed up by bureaucracy.

Poles often have a communication style that is "enigmatic, ranging from a matter-of-fact pragmatic style to a wordy, sentimental, romantic approach to any given subject."

The Dutch are focused on facts and figures but "are also great talkers and rarely make final decisions without a long 'Dutch' debate, sometimes approaching the danger zone of overanalysis."

Chinese tend to be more direct than the Japanese and some other East Asians; however, meetings are principally for information gathering, with the real decisions made elsewhere. Hong Kongers negotiate much more briskly to achieve quick results.

Indian English "excels in ambiguity, and such things as truth and appearances are often subject to negotiation."

Australians tend to have a loose and frank conversational style.

Singaporeans generally take time to build a relationship, after which they can be shrewd negotiators.

Koreans tend to be energetic conversationalists who seek to close deals quickly, occasionally stretching the truth.

Indonesians tend to be very deferential conversationalists, sometimes to the point of ambiguity.

Israelis tend to proceed logically on most issues but emotionally on some.

And that's how one respected, well-traveled, and highly multilingual linguist sees the world.

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25 Fascinating Charts Of Negotiation Styles Around The World

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Language is only the most obvious part of the global communication gap. Different cultures also have distinct approaches to communication during meetings, as described by British linguist Richard D. Lewis, whose best-selling book, " When Cultures Collide," charts these as well as leadership styles and cultural identities.

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Making Decisions

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Decision-Making Techniques: How to Make Better Decisions

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Learn how to use more than 40 different decision making techniques to make better decisions, faster.

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Endangered Species

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A weather or sounding balloon is a balloon (specifically a type of high-altitude balloon) which carries instruments aloft to send back information on atmospheric pressure, temperature, humidity and wind speed by means of a small, expendable measuring device called a radiosonde.

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ADV 78 Global Warming Vocab

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Gutenberg Free Books Top 100

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These listings are based on the number of times each eBook gets downloaded. Multiple downloads from the same Internet address on the same day count as one download, and addresses that download more than 100 eBooks in a day are considered robots and are not counted.

Top 100 EBooks yesterday

Top 100 Authors yesterday

Top 100 EBooks last 7 days

Top 100 Authors last 7 days

Top 100 EBooks last 30 days

Top 100 Authors last 30 days

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Project Gutenberg is a library of free eBooks.

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100 Best Books in English

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The 100 best novels written in English: the full list

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Robert McCrum has reached a verdict on his selection of the 100 greatest novels written in English. Take a look at his list

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Many language classrooms are overflowing with visuals. Students are exposed to images related to a great variety of topics; there are images of vocabulary terms, picture prompts to help students express themselves orally, photographs from regions where the TL is spoken, and text books dotted with colourful images.

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The World is Flat - Freidman

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The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century is a book by Thomas L. Friedman that analyzes globalization, primarily in the early 21st century. The title is a metaphor for viewing the world as a level playing field in terms of commerce, wherein all competitors, except for labor, have an equal opportunity. As the first edition cover illustration indicates, the title also alludes to the perceptual shift required for countries, companies, and individuals to remain competitive in a global market in which historical and geographic divisions are, according to the author, becoming increasingly irrelevant.[citation needed ]

Friedman is a strong advocate of those changes[which? ], calling himself a "free-trader" and a "compassionate flatist", and he criticizes societies that resist the changes. He emphasizes the inevitability of a rapid pace of change and the extent to which the emerging abilities of individuals and developing countries are creating many pressures on businesses and individuals in the United States; he has special advice for Americans and for the developing world. Friedman's work is based on much personal research, travel, conversation, and reflection. In his characteristic style, through personal anecdotes and opinions, he combines in The World Is Flat a conceptual analysis accessible to a broad public. The book was first released in 2005, was later released as an "updated and expanded" edition in 2006, and was yet again released with additional updates in 2007 as "further updated and expanded: Release 3.0". The title was derived from a statement by Nandan Nilekani, former CEO of Infosys. The World Is Flat won the inaugural Financial Times and Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award in 2005.

In his book The World Is Flat, Friedman recounts a journey to Bangalore, India, when he realized globalization has changed core economic concepts. In his opinion, that flattening is a product of the convergence of the personal computer with fiber optic microcable with the rise of work flow software. Friedman termed the period Globalization 3.0, thereby differentiating it from the previous, Globalization 1.0, during which countries and governments were the main protagonists, and Globalization 2.0, during which multinational companies led the way in driving global integration.

Friedman recounts examples of companies based in India and China that according to him, by providing labor ranging from that of typists and call center operators to accountants and computer programmers, have become integral parts of complex global supply chains; such companies are Dell, AOL, and Microsoft. Friedman's capitalist peace theory called Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention is discussed in the book's penultimate chapter.

Ten flatteners

Friedman defines ten "flatteners" that he sees as leveling the global playing field:

1. Collapse of the Berlin Wall - 11/9/89: Friedman called the flattener "When the walls came down, and the windows came up." The event not only symbolized the end of the Cold War but also allowed people from the other side of the wall to join the economic mainstream. "11/9/89" is a discussion about the Berlin Wall's coming down, the "fall" of communism, and the impact that Windows-powered PCs (personal computers) had on the ability of individuals to create their own content and connect to one another. At that point, the basic platform for the revolution to follow was created: the IBM PC, Windows, a graphical interface for word processing, dial-up modems, a standardized tool for communication, and a global phone network.

2. Netscape - 8/9/95: Netscape went public at the price of $28. Netscape and the Web broadened the audience for the Internet from its roots as a communications medium used primarily by "early adopters and geeks" to something that made the Internet accessible to everyone from five-year-olds to ninety-five-year-olds. The digitization that took place meant that everyday occurrences such as words, files, films, music, and pictures could be accessed and manipulated on a computer screen by all people across the world.

3. Workflow software: This is Friedman's catch-all for the standards and technologies that allowed work to flow. It is the ability of machines to talk to other machines with no humans involved. Friedman believes the first three forces have become a "crude foundation of a whole new global platform for collaboration". This is complemented by the emergence of software protocols (SMTP - simple mail transfer protocol; HTML - the language that enabled anyone to design and publish documents that could be transmitted to and read on any computer anywhere). The emergence of such software is the "Genesis moment of the flat world" and means "that people can work with other people on more stuff than ever before". This created a global platform for multiple forms of collaboration, on which the next six flatteners depend.

4. : Uploading involves communities that upload and collaborate on online projects. Examples are open source software, blogs, and Wikipedia. Friedman considers the phenomenon "the most disruptive force of all" and also talks about how this gives individuals the possibility to replace news and the traditional music industry, because of individuals possibility of blogging and podcasting.</ref> The World is Flat</ref>

5. Outsourcing: Friedman argues that outsourcing has enabled companies to split service and manufacturing activities into components that can be subcontracted and performed in the most efficient, most cost-effective way. This process became easier with the mass distribution of fiber-optic cable during the introduction of the World Wide Web.

6. Offshoring: This is the internal relocation of a company's manufacturing or other processes to a foreign land to take advantage of less costly operations there. China's entrance into the World Trade Organization allowed for greater competition on the playing field. Now such countries as Malaysia, Mexico, and Brazil must compete against China and one another to have businesses offshore to them.

7. Supply-chaining: Friedman compares the modern retail supply chain to a river by describing Wal-Mart as the best example of a company that uses technology to streamline item sales, distribution, and shipping.

8. Insourcing: Friedman uses UPS as a prime example for insourcing, whereby the company's employees perform services - beyond shipping - for another company. For example, UPS repairs Toshiba computers on behalf of Toshiba. The work is done at the UPS hub by UPS employees.

9. Informing: Google and other search engines and Wikipedia are the prime examples. "Never before in the history of the planet have so many people - on their own - had the ability to find so much information about so many things and about so many other people", writes Friedman. He states that the growth of search engines is tremendous; for example, Friedman states, Google is "now processing roughly one billion searches per day, up from 150 million just three years ago".

10. "The Steroids": The steroids are wireless, Voice over IP (VoIP), and file sharing and are used on personal digital devices like mobile phones, iPods, and personal digital assistants; on instant messaging; and on VoIP phones. Digital, mobile, personal, and virtual as well as all analog content and processes (from entertainment to photography, to word processing) can be digitized and therefore shaped, manipulated, and transmitted; and these processes can be done at high speed with total ease; mobile can be done anywhere and anytime by anyone, and can be done to anyone.

Proposed remedies

Friedman believes that to fight the quiet crisis of a flattening world, the US workforce should keep updating its work skills. Making the workforce more adaptable, Friedman argues, will keep it more employable. He also suggests that the government make it easier for people to switch jobs by making retirement benefits and health insurance less dependent on one's employer and by providing insurance that would partly cover a possible drop in income when changing jobs. Friedman also believes there should be more inspiration for youth to become scientists, engineers, and mathematicians because of a decrease in the percentage of those professionals who are American.

Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention

The Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention, also known as simply the Dell Theory, is a capitalist peace theory and an updated version of Friedman's previous " Golden Arches Theory of Conflict Prevention". According to Friedman:

The Dell Theory stipulates: No two countries that are both part of a major global supply chain, like Dell's, will ever fight a war against each other as long as they are both part of the same global supply chain.

That is, as long as corporations have major supply chain operations in countries other than that corporation's home country, those countries will never engage in armed conflicts. This is because of the economic interdependence between nations that arises when a large corporation (such as Dell) has supply chain operations in multiple global locations and when developing nations (in which supply chain operations commonly take place) are reluctant to give up their newfound wealth.

In his previous book The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Friedman argued that no two nations with a McDonald's franchise had ever gone to war with one another; this was known as the Golden Arches theory. Later, Friedman upgraded that theory into the "Dell Theory of Conflict Prevention" by saying that people or nations do not just want to have a better standard of living as symbolized by a McDonald's franchise in their downtown but also want to have that lump of the labor sector that is created by globalization. That is, developing nations do not want to risk the trust of the multinational companies that venture into their markets and include them in the global supply chain.

Thomas Friedman also warns that the Dell theory should not be interpreted as a guarantee that nations that are deeply involved in global supply chains will not go to war with each other. It means, rather, that the governments of those nations and their citizens will have very heavy economic costs to consider as they contemplate the possibility of war. Such costs include long-term loss of the country's profitable participation in the global supply chain.

This theory relates with how conflict prevention occurred between India and Pakistan in their 2001-2002 nuclear standoff, wherein India was at risk of losing its global partners. The relationship between the People's Republic of China and Taiwan was also cited as an example of that theory: both countries have strong supply relations with each other. However, a war between the two seems increasingly likely today.[citation needed ]

The World Is Flat received generally positive popular and critical reception as well as some negative criticism, peppered with doubt.

The Washington Post called the book an "engrossing tour" and an "enthralling read". The review closed with, "We've no real idea how the 21st century's history will unfold, but this terrifically stimulating book will certainly inspire readers to start thinking it all through".

An opposing viewpoint was found in a 2007 Foreign Policy magazine article in which Professor Pankaj Ghemawat argued that 90% of the world's phone calls, Web traffic, and investments are local, suggesting that Friedman has grossly exaggerated the significance of the trends he describes: "Despite talk of a new, wired world where information, ideas, money, and people can move around the planet faster than ever before, just a fraction of what we consider globalization actually exists."

Some critics have pointed out that the book is written from an American perspective. Friedman's work history has been mostly with The New York Times, and that may have influenced the way the book was written - some would have preferred a book written in a more "inclusive voice".

Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz has been critical of Friedman's book:

Friedman is right that there have been dramatic changes in the global economy, in the global landscape; in some directions, the world is much flatter than it has ever been, with those in various parts of the world being more connected than they have ever been, but the world is not flat ... Not only is the world not flat: in many ways, it has been getting less flat.

Richard Florida expresses similar views in his 2005 article "The World Is Spiky".

John Gray, formerly a School Professor of European Thought at the London School of Economics and Political Science, wrote another critical review of Friedman's book called "The World Is Round". In it, Gray confirms Friedman's assertion that globalization is making the world more interconnected and, in some parts, richer but disputes the notion that globalization makes the world more peaceful or freer. Gray also declares, "least of all does it make it flat".

Geographers on the whole have been particularly critical of Friedman's writings, views influenced by the large body of work within their field demonstrating the uneven nature of globalization, the strong influence place still has on people's lives, and the dependent relationships that have been established between the have and have-not regions in the current world-system. Geographer Harm de Blij detailed those arguments for the general public in Why Geography Matters: Three Challenges Facing America (2005) and The Power of Place: Geography, Destiny, and Globalization's Rough Landscape (2008).

[The original jacket illustration, reproducing the painting I Told You So by Ed Miracle, depicting a sailing ship falling off the edge of the world, was changed during the print run due to copyright issues. These issues were settled in March 2006.]

The World is Flat (Audiobook ed.). Audio Renaissance. 2005. ISBN 1-59397-668-2.

The World is Flat: Updated and Expanded (Release 2.0) (2nd ed.). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 2006. ISBN 0-374-29279-5.

The World is Flat: Further Updated and Expanded (Release 3.0) (2nd revised and expanded ed.). Farrar, Straus and Giroux. 2007. ISBN 978-0-374-29278-2.

Flat Classroom Project

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The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century is a book by Thomas L. Friedman that analyzes globalization, primarily in the early 21st century. The title is a metaphor for viewing the world as a level playing field in terms of commerce, wherein all competitors, except for labor, have an equal opportunity.

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ADV 20 Vocab

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Sam Harris AI Dangers

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Can we build AI without losing control over it? | Sam Harris

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10 Things Back to the Future 2 Got Right

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We're going back to the future! In Back to the Future Part 2 Doc and Marty travel to the future-October 21, 2015. Yup, we're living their future! But while we might not have flying cars, hoverboards, or self-fitting shoes, a lot of their predictions about the future weren't that far off.

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Apparently that *is* used terminology (apologies). I tend to use the phrases used in the article (long days, the sun doesn't set, 24 hours of sunlight etc.

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Published/Revised June 29, 2016 By This post may contain promotional and affiliate links. EuropeUpClose may receive commissions for purchases made through links in this post. Please read our disclosure for more info.

Come inside the Arctic Circle, where during most of the summer, the sun never sets. Northern European countries that lie inside the Arctic Circle provide some very interesting White Nights experiences. Because the sun does not set throughout the night, you can take the opportunity to change the way you travel...take a chance, do something you haven't done before, stay up late (really late.) Start your day at midnight and see what happens!

White Nights Travel Tips

Go Hiking
Lapland is the best place in Sweden to see the world-famous white night phenomena, a time when the night is just a dimmer version of day. Hiking in the untamed mountains of Lapland during this season is a rare adventure as the glowing light illuminates the trees and casts a glow over everything it reaches.

Hit the trails at midnight and let the magical light illuminating the landscape make what would be just a hike, extraordinary. From Reykjavik, Iceland, for example, you can take a White Nights Hike with GoEcco Outdoor Adventures. This hike takes you into the wild, past areas of geothermal steam, and offers an opportunity to bathe in a secret wilderness outdoor river.

Fishing
The area between Björkliden and Riksgränsen, Sweden is blessed with more than 600 lakes and large numbers of small rivers and brooks, called 'jokkar'. This area is easy to hike and and is stunningly beautiful. The fishing is a bit challenging as the local species are mainly Arctic char, brown trout, whitefish and burbot.

Culture
The Stars of the White Nights Festival in St. Petersburg, Russia is an annual summer international arts festival. The White Nights Festival, St Petersburg's premier cultural event, offers a series of classical ballet, opera and music events, including: performances by Russian dancers, singers, musicians and actors, as well as famous international guest stars.

Cruise
And, for a more relaxed vacation, there are several cruise lines that offer Midnight Sun Cruises. On these cruises you can experience the effects of the special light from the sun on the open sea.

Come to Northern Europe this summer, where White Nights mean summer fun and magical adventures.
Written by Terri Fogarty for EuropeUpClose.com

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The Wonder of White Nights in Northern Europe

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Come inside the Arctic Circle, where during most of the summer, the sun never sets. Northern European countries that lie inside the Arctic Circle provide some very interesting White Nights experiences. Because the sun does not set throughout the night, you can take the opportunity to change the way you travel...take a chance, do something you haven't done before, stay up late (really late.)

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Good list of examples/ contexts of when to use present perfect

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Good list of examples/ contexts of when to use present perfect

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The present perfect is a verb tense which is used to show that an action has taken place once or many times before now. The present perfect is most frequently used to talk about experiences or changes that have taken place, but there are other less common uses as well. Read on for detailed descriptions, examples, and present perfect exercises.

Present Perfect Forms

The present perfect is formed using has/have + past participle. Questions are indicated by inverting the subject and has/have. Negatives are made with not.

Statement: You have seen that movie many times.

Question: Have you seen that movie many times?

Negative: You have not seen that movie many times.

Complete List of Present Perfect Forms
Present Perfect Uses

USE 1 Unspecified Time Before Now

We use the present perfect to say that an action happened at an unspecified time before now. The exact time is not important. You CANNOT use the present perfect with specific time expressions such as: yesterday, one year ago, last week, when I was a child, when I lived in Japan, at that moment, that day, one day, etc. We CAN use the present perfect with unspecific expressions such as: ever, never, once, many times, several times, before, so far, already, yet, etc.

Examples:

I have seen that movie twenty times.

I think I have met him once before.

There have been many earthquakes in California.

People have traveled to the Moon.

People have not traveled to Mars.

Have you read the book yet?

Nobody has ever climbed that mountain.

A: Has there ever been a war in the United States?
B: Yes, therehas been a war in the United States.

How Do You Actually Use the Present Perfect?

The concept of "unspecified time" can be very confusing to English learners. It is best to associate present perfect with the following topics:

TOPIC 1 Experience

You can use the present perfect to describe your experience. It is like saying, "I have the experience of..." You can also use this tense to say that you have never had a certain experience. The present perfect is NOT used to describe a specific event.

Examples:

TOPIC 2 Change Over Time

We often use the present perfect to talk about change that has happened over a period of time.

Examples:

You have grown since the last time I saw you.

The government has become more interested in arts education.

Japanese has become one of the most popular courses at the university since the Asian studies program was established.

My English has really improved since I moved to Australia.

TOPIC 3 Accomplishments

We often use the present perfect to list the accomplishments of individuals and humanity. You cannot mention a specific time.

Examples:

Man has walked on the Moon.

Our son has learned how to read.

Doctors have cured many deadly diseases.

Scientists have split the atom.

TOPIC 4 An Uncompleted Action You Are Expecting

We often use the present perfect to say that an action which we expected has not happened. Using the present perfect suggests that we are still waiting for the action to happen.

Examples:

James has not finished his homework yet.

Susan hasn't mastered Japanese, but she can communicate.

Bill has still not arrived.

The rain hasn't stopped.

TOPIC 5 Multiple Actions at Different Times

We also use the present perfect to talk about several different actions which have occurred in the past at different times. Present perfect suggests the process is not complete and more actions are possible.

Examples:

The army has attacked that city five times.

I have had four quizzes and five tests so far this semester.

We have had many major problems while working on this project.

She has talked to several specialists about her problem, but nobody knows why she is sick.

Time Expressions with Present Perfect

When we use the present perfect it means that something has happened at some point in our lives before now. Remember, the exact time the action happened is not important.

Sometimes, we want to limit the time we are looking in for an experience. We can do this with expressions such as: in the last week, in the last year, this week, this month, so far, up to now, etc.

Examples:

Have you been to Mexico in the last year?

I have seen that movie six times in the last month.

They have had three tests in the last week.

She graduated from university less than three years ago. She has worked for three different companies so far.

My car has broken down three times this week.

NOTICE

"Last year" and "in the last year" are very different in meaning. "Last year" means the year before now, and it is considered a specific time which requires simple past. "In the last year" means from 365 days ago until now. It is not considered a specific time, so it requires present perfect.

Examples:

USE 2 Duration From the Past Until Now (Non-Continuous Verbs)

With non-continuous verbs and non-continuous uses of mixed verbs, we use the present perfect to show that something started in the past and has continued up until now. "For five minutes," "for two weeks," and "since Tuesday" are all durations which can be used with the present perfect.

Examples:

I have had a cold for two weeks.

She has been in England for six months.

Mary has loved chocolate since she was a little girl.

Although the above use of present perfect is normally limited to non-continuous verbs and non-continuous uses of mixed verbs, the words "live," "work," "teach," and "study" are sometimes used in this way even though they are NOT non-continuous verbs.

ADVERB PLACEMENT

The examples below show the placement for grammar adverbs such as: always, only, never, ever, still, just, etc.

Examples:

You have only seen that movie one time.

Have you only seen that movie one time?

ACTIVE / PASSIVE

Examples:

Many tourists have visited that castle.

That castle has been visited by many tourists.

More About Active / Passive Forms
Present Perfect Exercises

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The present perfect is a verb tense which is used to show that an action has taken place once or many times before now. The present perfect is most frequently used to talk about experiences or changes that have taken place, but there are other less common uses as well.

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Black Mirror - Season 3 | Official Trailer [HD] | Netflix

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In English grammar, the passive infinitive is an infinitive construction in which the agent (or performer of the action) either appears in a prepositional phrase following the verb or is not identified at all. Also called the present passive infinitive.

The passive infinitive is made up of the marker to + be + a past participle (also known as the ): "The case is to be decided by a judge."

See Examples and Observations below.

Examples and Observations

"Everybody wanted to be told over and over again the things which had happened to her."

"The answer to that mystery was not likely to be revealed to me anytime soon."

"'Hold your tongue,' said the King, very crossly. 'I intend you to behave prettily to her. So now go and make yourself fit to be seen, as I am going to take you to visit her.'"

"He had come home feeling heroic, and ready to be rewarded. Playing in the big leagues again had rejuvenated him."

"The foundation of imitation among us comes from the desire to be transported out of ourselves."

Easy-to-Please and Eager-to-Please Constructions
"With adjectives, passive infinitives are generally only used in PDE [present-day English] when an active infinitive may lead to ambiguity, as in the case of likely or fit, cf. you are not fit to be seen vs you are not fit to serve. Another adjective which has retained the option of using a passive infinitive is ready. Thus the well-known ambiguity of (113) can be avoided by using the variant in (114):

(113) The lamb is ready to eat.

(114) The lamb is ready to be eaten
Other adjectives still allowing the passive infinitive tend to be like ready in that they can occur in both the easy-to-please construction (where the matrix subject is understood to be interpretable as the object of the infinitive) and the eager-to-please construction (where it is to be interpreted as the subject of the infinitive)."

Sources

Frances Hodgson Burnett, A Little Princess, 1905

Terry Phillips, Murder at the Altar. Hye Books, 2008

Andrew Lang, "The Little Good Mouse." The Red Fairy Book, 1890

Cynthia Hartwick, Ladies With Prospects. Berkley Publishing, 2004

Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Emile, 1762

Olga Fischer and Wim van der Wurff, "Syntax." A History of the English Language, ed.

by Richard M. Hogg and David Denison. Cambridge University Press, 2006

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In English grammar, the passive infinitive is an infinitive construction in which the agent (or performer of the action) either appears in a prepositional phrase following the verb or is not identified at all. Also called the present passive infinitive.

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cerebral | Origin and meaning of cerebral by Online Etymology Dictionary

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Meaning: "pertaining to the brain," from French cérébral (16c.), from Latin cerebrum "the brain" (also "the understanding"), from PIE... See more definitions.

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By vs Until - Common Mistakes and Confusing Words in English - Learn English Mistakes

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Learn English Mistakes - Some common English mistakes - By vs Until

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Wolf Hall

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More info: http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/latestnews/2014/wolf-hall-damian-lewis Wolf Hall, based on the novels by Hilary Mantel, coming soon to BBC Two.

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Project Gutenberg's Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases, by Greenville Kleiser

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Project Gutenberg's Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases, by Greenville Kleiser

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Fifteen Thousand Useful Phrases by Grenville Kleiser

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Free kindle book and epub digitized and proofread by Project Gutenberg.

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RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) - South Korea's women won the Olympic team archery title - for the eighth time in a row. Jin Jong-oh, meanwhile, took gold in the men's 50-meter pistol in Rio de Janeiro - for the third straight games.

Some in the small Asian country have an easy, long-cherished explanation for the success: The nation is simply better than everyone else at doing the little things, the things that require laser-like concentration on a small, sometimes tedious and hard-to-master skill.

But South Korea's domination in some of the smaller Olympic sports can more accurately be linked to a decades-long concentration of time, effort and money, often sponsored by the government, on training and nurturing athletes from a very young age in these specialized sports; this, in turn, has created intense competition among athletes who know that success will win them serious benefits.

Still, the perception of an innate national facility for these sports lingers, even among the athletes.

The woman seen as partly responsible for the archery boom in South Korea, Kim Jin-ho, won the country's first archery gold in an international sporting event in 1978. She said she and her teammates always assumed that Koreans had a special level of sensitivity that allowed them to shoot arrows more accurately than their Western rivals.

Like much about modern South Korea, its tumultuous modern history plays a part in its supremacy in these sports.

Until democracy finally came in the late 1980s, South Korea was ruled by dictators who wanted to use sports as a way to promote a strong national identity and generate loyalty.

So the authoritarian government pumped money into programs for athletes who had better chances of winning medals, often in these lesser known sports, rather than building up an overall sports infrastructure for the general public. Those selected athletes trained together at government-run facilities and were awarded benefits such as good pensions and, for the men, exemptions from mandatory military service if they performed well in international competitions like the Olympics.

As athletes in those sports succeeded internationally, the sports got more public attention. More popularity meant more steady civilian and business sponsorships. This meant more money, better training facilities and more young athletes taking up and sticking with the sports.

That system is still largely in place. Hence the success.

"I doubt that South Koreans are exclusively gifted with a delicacy of skill that produces real changes in competition," said Roh Hee-tae, a physical education professor at South Korea's Dong-A University.

South Korea began seriously investing in archery in the late 1970s, reacting to public excitement created when Kim won.

The training and investment have grown tremendously in the years since.

Kim, now 55 and a professor with Seoul's Korea National Sport University, said South Korean archers today benefit from stronger financial and administrative support and a larger number of state-of-the-art training facilities. She said that South Korean coaches do a better job than their counterparts in other countries at finding the right training methods and motions for each archer based on their physical traits and shooting style.

There is growing popular recognition that all athletes, regardless of where they're from, must focus intensely on the little details to win. Still, the idea of Korean superiority persists.

"Some of my colleagues joked the other day that if you took a K-pop singer, in her first try she would be able to shoot arrows more accurately than most archers from other countries," said Hong In-he, a 37-year-old office worker in Seoul. "South Koreans are better in areas that require accurate and delicate skills."

___

Kim reported from Seoul. AP writers Hyung-jin Kim and Youkyung Lee in Seoul contributed to this report.

___

Follow Foster Klug at www.twitter.com/apklug

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Time, effort and money help South Korea rule obscure sports

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RIO DE JANEIRO (AP) - South Korea's women won the Olympic team archery title - for the eighth time in a row. Jin Jong-oh, meanwhile, took gold in the men's 50-meter pistol in Rio de Janeiro - for the third straight games.