周二(12/31) 1.激勵自己 2.天才的條件

  周二聚會點  丹提咖啡 寶慶店  晚上7:00~9:30
台北市延平南路107號
(西門捷運站3號出口 往前走30公尺 向左看到全家便利商店巷進入 / 在中山堂對面)
連絡電話: 0976217450   Billy
說吧!英文讀書會  完全免費  練習英文  交流知識  交友談心的平台  我們歡迎  老朋友
新朋友 不設限  只要您想學英文   100%歡迎您  直接到聚會地點參加   地址在本會網頁上
只要您有熱誠  說一口流利英文不是問題
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©  All copy rights reserved. Neither this material nor its presentation may be published, broadcast,


rewritten or redistributed.

本次聚會  為2013年 最後一次聚會  2013年中  也許您面對許多困難來自工作中或生活中
 讓我們來找一些激勵自己的方法 讓新的一年  生活更有活力    Billy 在此祝福好友們 新年的一年天天好心情 活力百倍
      
激勵自己

Ways to Inspire Yourself at Work (Dave Kerpen)

1) Read a book.

There are thousands of great, time-tested books available for inspiration and motivation. I'm currently reading another amazing, timeless, inspirational book that is having a profound impact: How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.

2) Exercise.

Sometimes you just need to get the blood flowing. Go for a walk, or a run, or a workout. There are two great advantages of exercise: First, it's healthy for your body. Second, it forces you to spend time thinking - time when you can't be on your smartphone or otherwise distracted.

3) Write a thank you note.

Not a thank you email, or a thank you text, or even a thank you phone call - a physical, hand-written thank you note. Tony Robbins said, "Gratitude is the antidote to the two things that stop us: fear and anger."

4) Perform a random act of kindness.

The ironic and amazing thing about acts of kindness is that they end up being kind-of selfish, because you feel SO great after doing them. Open a door for people leaving it for awhile. Help an elderly lady cross the street. Buy a homeless man lunch. Retweet a bunch of people. Whatever you do, take your mind off of yourself and your problems and focus on helping another person. You'll come back feeling rejuvenated.

5) Read inspiring quotes.

Reading a book or even an article can take more time than you have to spare sometimes. So it's worth looking at inspiring quotes from great leaders, writers and thinkers of the past.

6) Listen to music.

Plato said, "Music is the movement of sound to reach the soul for the education of its virtue." Looking to educate your soul? Or perhaps just to let off some steam and feel better about the work before you?

7) Watch an inspiring video.

As inspiring and uplifting as music can be, video can be even more inspiring. Whether it's your favorite movie, or, if you don't have time, a short video you find through a quick search on YouTube, you can get in a good mood in just a few minutes.

Questions:

1. Ways to inspire yourself at work?

2. What are the advantages of reading books?

3. What are your ways to improve your mood when you're feeling down?

How to motivate yourself and improve your life?

4. What are the advantages and disadvantages of music?

5. What are the advantages of doing exercise regularly?

6. Why helping others is good for your health?

What are the benefits of gratitude?

7. What are the advantages of watching inspirational films?

8. Your new year resolution?

 

天才的條件 

How To Be A Genius (Forbes Scott Berkun)

Have a great, or horrible, family

Picasso, Mozart, Beethoven, Einstein and Goethe are popular geniuses whose parents were interested in their creative lives. Mozart and Beethoven both had fathers who were professional musicians and they were taught by them during childhood to play instruments. Can you guess what Picasso’s dad did? Yes, he was a painter, and he spent many hours with young Pablo.

But lousy families can make geniuses, too.

Beethoven’s dad was cruel, torturing him during practice sessions. Unlike many child prodigies who burn out at adolescence, Beethoven kept his passion for music. Leonardo da Vinci barely knew his father.

Isaac Newton was also born to a single-parent home and hated his stepfather. From that broken relationship may have come the seed of unrest that fueled his independent life and ideas.

Be obsessed with work

Show me a genius and I’ll show you a workaholic. Van Gogh produced 2,000 works of art between 1880 and 1890 (or 1,100 paintings and 900 sketches). That’s four works of art a week for a decade. He didn’t even get started until age 25. Da Vinci’s journals represent one clear fact: Work was the center of his life. He had neither a spouse nor children. Picasso was a machine, churning out 12,000 works of art. He said, “Give me a museum and I’ll fill it” and made good on that boast. Shakespeare wrote more than 40 plays, plus dozens of sonnets, poems and, of course, grocery lists. These are people who sacrificed many ordinary pleasures for their work.

The debate over talent vs. effort is moot: History makes it clear you always need extraordinary effort.

Have emotional or other serious problems

For all their brilliance, most geniuses did not live well-adjusted lives. Picasso, Van Gogh, Edison, Einstein and Nietzsche (and most major modern philosophers) were often miserable. Many never married or married often, abandoned children and fought depression.

Newton and Tesla spent years in isolation by choice and had enough personality disorders to warrant cabinets full of pharmaceuticals today. Michelangelo and da Vinci quit jobs and fled cities to escape debts.

Kafka and Proust were both hypochondriacs, spending years in bed or in hospitals for medical conditions, some of which were psychological. Voltaire, Thoreau and Socrates all lived in exile or poverty, and these conditions contributed to the works they’re famous for.

Happily positive emotions can work as fuel, too. John Coltrane, C.S. Lewis and Einstein had deeply held, and mostly positive, spiritual beliefs that fueled their work.

Questions:

1. How to be a genius? Ways to be a genius?

What we can learn from geniuses?

2. Can lousy families make geniuses? Does family background affect achievement of a person?

3. Want to be smart and successful? And how to make yourself smarter?

4. Do you want to make friends with smart people?

5. Why so many guys like pretty but stupid girls?

Do girls prefer dumb good-looking guys or smart less-attractive guys?

6. How to maintain your passion for success?

7. Can live poverty helped lead to success? How poverty affects career performance?

天才的條件  【《科學人》第138期】

【撰文／賽門頓（Dean Keith Simonton）；翻譯／謝伯讓】

要認定誰是天才是一種冒險的賭注。比如說，最近無意間在Listerverse網站看到的「十大天才」排行榜。從第一名到第十名的上榜者有：歌德、達文西、斯維登堡、萊布尼茲、彌爾、帕斯卡、維根斯坦、費雪、伽利略以及斯塔爾夫人。

 

如果把斯維登堡換成愛因斯坦呢？有些在世的名人或許也值得冠上這項殊榮，例如霍金。有幾位女性或許也能登上天才排行榜，例如居禮夫人或是莫里森。如果棋王費雪能冠上天才的稱號，那麼在藝術與科學領域之外的其他天才應該也要列入考量，例如拿破崙是軍事天才、曼德拉是政治天才、蓋茲是創業天才等。

 

這些問題與可能的答案都是茶餘飯後的熱門閒聊話題，正好顯示出我們對於智慧的起源和卓越的創造力所知甚少。人們在探討這項存在已久的議題時，總是想要釐清各領域的天才具備哪些共同點。我們對於天才的某些共同印象，包括遺傳因素、特別廣泛的興趣和有點心理變態等，都顯示出天才的頭腦有明顯的模式與傾向。

我們的最終目標，是想解釋一個卓越的思想家如何擁有他們改變世界所具備的洞察力。儘管這樣的突破性想法通常都是瞬間即逝，但是潛藏其下的機制似乎有條理。根據我協助發展出來的一項理論：天才會近乎盲目地廣泛搜尋問題的解答，會追根究底柢、並且在找到最佳答案之前反覆回溯思量。如果這個理論的結果確立，我們就能開始探究天才是否能夠經由後天培育，讓嶄新構想能夠不斷出現以造福世人。

何謂天才？

研究天才的第一道障礙，就是如何為天才下一個具有說服力的定義。「天才」（genius）這個辭彙本身可追溯到古羅馬神話：古羅馬神話裡的每位男性都有某一種守護天使，代表與生俱來的某項獨特才能，而每位女性則是受到婚姻女神的眷顧。直到文藝復興之後，天才一詞在應用上變得較為嚴謹，只有少數展現出天賦的人才能擁有這項稱號。例如哲學家康德就認為，天才是指能夠發展出原創成果且能成為典範的人。天才一詞原本並不具備科學意涵，直到19世紀末葉之後，心理學家才藉由兩種明確的方式來定義天才。

傑出的作品是確認天才的第一種方式，如同康德的做法。總體來說，這些成就通常能引發該領域其他專家以及世人的讚揚並競相仿效。毫無疑問，牛頓的《原理》、莎士比亞的《哈姆雷特》、托爾斯泰的《戰爭與和平》、米開朗基羅的西斯廷小堂壁畫以及貝多芬的第五號交響曲都屬於這一類的優秀作品。雖然這個定義能夠延伸到卓越的領導能力，例如軍事才能以及驚人的表現，包括一些國際西洋棋大師等，但大多數關於天才的科學研究仍著眼在科學或藝術方面的傑出創意，這篇文章也聚焦於此。

天才的第二種定義和20世紀前半葉出現的智力測驗相符。如果標準智力測驗的分數夠高，也就是在心理學家特曼（Lewis Terman）所提出的原始智力測驗中獲得140分以上、通常落在前1%者，就是所謂的天才。這兩種定義沒有什麼共同點，許多擁有超高智商的人並沒有創造出原創且能成為典範的作品。莎凡特（Marylyn vos Savant）就是其中一例，她曾是《金氏世界紀錄》認證現今仍存活之智商最高的人。她在週日報紙副刊中的專欄「向瑪麗蓮求教」並沒有在科學、藝術或是新聞工作上引發任何新風潮。許多傑出人士也沒有天才等級的智商。例如，榮獲諾貝爾物理學獎的電晶體共同發明者蕭克利（William Shockley），其智商就遠低於140。因此，卓越的成就似乎是較為有用的認定方式。

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周五(12/27)1.博士浪費時間?2.美麗的錯誤

 周五聚會地點: 快提café  7:00PM-- 9:30PM

新北市板橋區文化路一段387巷10號
(沿著新埔捷運站1號出口左方向前走約100公尺 經過新埔郵局看到康是美
從信義房屋旁的巷子進入) 連絡電話: 0976217450   Billy
說吧!英文讀書會  完全免費  練習英文  交流知識  交友談心的平台  我們歡迎  老朋友
新朋友 不設限  只要您想學英文   100%歡迎您  直接到聚會地點參加   地址在本會網頁上
只要您有熱誠  說一口流利英文不是問題  新朋友們 如感閱讀文章較深澀  建議到周六班
有英文口語訓練
©  All copy rights reserved. Neither this material nor its presentation may be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

    
博士浪費時間?

NSC predicts shortage of doctorate holders within 10 years (2013/11/28)

 Reports of doctorate holders having trouble finding suitable jobs have led some prospective students to shy away from pursuing advanced degrees. The National Science Council warns that this will lead to a shortage of doctorate holders, especially in high-demand fields such as IT and telecommunications.

 When a doctorate student at National Chengchi University chose to sell fried chicken instead of taking a teaching assistant job that paid NT$50,000 a month, it took many by surprise. Now Sung Keng-lang’s business is so good that he plans to open a second branch. One thing that didn’t surprise Sung was to hear that fewer students are pursuing PhDs.

Is doing a PhD a waste of time?

 In most countries a PhD is a basic requirement for a career in academia. It is an introduction to the world of independent research—a kind of intellectual masterpiece, created by an apprentice in close collaboration with a supervisor. And yet, one thing many PhD students have in common is dissatisfaction. Some describe their work as “slave labour”. Seven-day weeks, ten-hour days, low pay and uncertain prospects are widespread. What many find dispiriting is the fact that, due to an oversupply of PhDs, the promise of an academic job has been yanked out of reach. The number of PhD positions is unrelated to the number of relevant job openings. Meanwhile, business leaders complain about shortages of high-level skills, suggesting PhDs are not teaching the right things. The fiercest critics compare research doctorates to Ponzi or pyramid schemes. So, is doing a PhD a waste of time? 

Questions:

1. What do you think about the doctorate holders having trouble finding suitable jobs?

2. Is doing a PhD a waste of time? The benefits of having a PhD degree?

3. Does higher education really lead to higher job opportunities?

4. Does a degree guarantee you a good job? What are the pros and cons of higher education?

5. What are your ideal jobs?

6. What do you think of unemployment rate in Taiwan?

What are the causes of unemployment?

7. How to reduce unemployment? Ways to improve unemployment rate?

 

美麗的錯誤

Man sues ex-wife over ugly children and wins: Daughter's looks 'horrified' him (examiner.com)

Man sues ex-wife over ugly kids and wins! This sad and bizarre story will leave its mark.

A man sued his ex-wife over having ugly kids and he won. His ex-wife was ordered by court to pay him $120,000 in this bizarre case. This story started out with the man suing his wife because she gave birth to an ugly baby girl, but once DNA tests proved that the child was his, he sued her for having ugly children. He did this on the grounds of 'false pretenses' after finding out his ex-wife's beauty was due to plastic surgery before they met, according to “Fox and Friends First” on Friday, Nov. 8.

The Chicago Now radio station reports that Jian Feng, a Chinese man, sued his wife when she gave birth to an ugly daughter. He accused her of having an affair because the child did not look like him or his wife. When the DNA tests came back naming Feng the father of the girl, the wife came clean.

Apparently the kids look like his wife, but before she had $100,000 worth of plastic surgery in South Korea before the couple ever met. It is obvious that looks are important to the couple, who look like the Chinese version of a Barbie and Ken doll. The wife spent a small fortune to look like she does today.

The husband took his now ex-wife back to court to sue her for giving him three ugly kids. He sued her on the grounds of false-pretenses and won. The judge ruled that the wife never told Feng about the procedures “duping him into thinking she was beautiful.” The judge order the ex-wife to pay Feng $120,000.

No matter how you try, there’s no way to sugar coat this horrible thing this man said about his kids. He explained in his own words how his superficial lawsuit came to be:

Questions:

1. What do you think about the case of Man sues ex-wife over ugly kids?

2. Should you tell your spouse about your cosmetic surgery? If you underwent a cosmetic surgery?

3. What Are The Pros & Cons Of Cosmetic Surgery?

4. is Cosmetic Surgery the Right Choice to boost people’s confidence?

Can Cosmetic Surgery help Transforming One’s Live?

5. Is It Okay To Ask My Girlfriend To Get Plastic Surgery?

6. Is cosmetic surgery good or bad?

Reasons why People Give for Having Plastic Surgery?

7. Will plastic surgery save one’s marriage?

Are plastic surgery girls easily to marry rich men?

 流浪博士多，博士生甚至還賣起雞排，不過，國科會發出警訊，國內博士供過於求，只是短期現象，每年人才流失1到2萬人，加上博士班報考人數越來越低，未來10年將逐漸出現缺口，預估2016年就會缺才，2020年企業恐怕面臨，找不到高階人才的危機。

頂著「政治大學博士生」的宋耿郎，放棄當初月薪五萬多的助教，改行賣雞排，生意好到要開第二家分店，聽到國立大學的博士班報，報考人數越來越低，宋耿郎說，這是趨勢。

 [[博士雞排店長 宋耿郎]]

目前不需要這麼多高等教育人才，那我們因應這個趨勢，持續做一個未來方向的規劃，我想對國家教育政策是有利的。

 根據國科會統計，今年台大清大交大成大，博士班報名人數總共2千6百多人，不到98學年度一半，休學比率也明顯增加，雞排博士很有感觸。

 選擇讀博士的人減少，但反觀企業徵才，博士需求的比率卻增加，一消一長下，國科會發出警訊，10年後就會出現博士荒

老婆太醜：生女醜的不可思議婚前整容被丈夫狀告索賠75萬  和訊網

一名馮先生在女兒出生後發現她長得很醜，完全不像她媽，便對妻子的長相產生了質疑。 丈夫懷疑妻子對自己不忠，面對丈夫的指責，妻子只得承認自己曾花約60多萬整容。 該男子認為妻子是詐騙手段騙自己與其結婚，將妻子告上法庭，要求離婚並賠償其精神損失費。 不可思議的是，他居然得到了75萬賠償。

 

 

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周二(12/24)1.新聞有毒 2. 不相信婚姻

  感謝各位好友熱情 參加聖誕聚會 新的來年 祝大家順心平安

聽聽看 台語聖誕歌

周二聚會點  丹提咖啡 寶慶店  晚上7:00~9:30
台北市延平南路107號
(西門捷運站3號出口 往前走30公尺 向左看到全家便利商店巷進入 / 在中山堂對面)
連絡電話: 0976217450   Billy
說吧!英文讀書會  完全免費  練習英文  交流知識  交友談心的平台  我們歡迎  老朋友
新朋友 不設限  只要您想學英文   100%歡迎您  直接到聚會地點參加   地址在本會網頁上
只要您有熱誠  說一口流利英文不是問題

**(他會朋友們 感謝您欣賞 本會文章 all copy rights reserved by writers 請您有自己idea

勿搶先發表 造成本會困擾 謝謝合作) 
 

©  All copy rights reserved. Neither this material nor its presentation may be published, broadcast,
rewritten or redistributed.
 

 新聞有毒

      

News is toxic to your body    

 – and giving up reading it will make you happier (theguardian.com)

 News is bad for your health. It leads to fear and aggression, and hinders your creativity and ability to think deeply.
News is easy to digest. The media feeds us small bites of trivial matter, tidbits that don't really concern our lives and don't require thinking. That's why we experience almost no saturation. Unlike reading books and long magazine articles (which require thinking), we can swallow limitless quantities of news flashes, which are bright-coloured candies for the mind.

News is toxic to your body. It constantly triggers the limbic system. Panicky stories spur the release of cascades of glucocorticoid (cortisol). This deregulates your immune system and inhibits the release of growth hormones. In other words, your body finds itself in a state of chronic stress. High glucocorticoid levels cause impaired digestion, lack of growth (cell, hair, bone), nervousness and susceptibility to infections. The other potential side-effects include fear, aggression, tunnel-vision and desensitisation.
News increases cognitive errors. News feeds the mother of all cognitive errors: confirmation bias. In the words of Warren Buffett: "What the human being is best at doing is interpreting all new information so that their prior conclusions remain intact." News exacerbates this flaw. We become prone to overconfidence, take stupid risks and misjudge opportunities. It also exacerbates another cognitive error: the story bias. Our brains crave stories that "make sense" – even if they don't correspond to reality.

 News works like a drug. As stories develop, we want to know how they continue. With hundreds of arbitrary storylines in our heads, this craving is increasingly compelling and hard to ignore. Scientists used to think that the dense connections formed among the 100 billion neurons inside our skulls were largely fixed by the time we reached adulthood. Today we know that this is not the case. Nerve cells routinely break old connections and form new ones. The more news we consume, the more we exercise the neural circuits devoted to skimming and multitasking while ignoring

 News wastes time. If you read the newspaper for 15 minutes each morning, then check the news for 15 minutes during lunch and 15 minutes before you go to bed, then add five minutes here and there when you're at work, then count distraction and refocusing time, you will lose at least half a day every week. Information is no longer a scarce commodity. But attention is. You are not that irresponsible with your money, reputation or health. Why give away your mind?

News makes us passive. News stories are overwhelmingly about things you cannot influence. The daily repetition of news about things we can't act upon makes us passive. It grinds us down until we adopt a worldview that is pessimistic, desensitised, sarcastic and fatalistic. The scientific term is "learned helplessness". It's a bit of a stretch, but I would not be surprised if news consumption, at least partially contributes to the widespread disease of depression.
 

Questions:

 

1. Is news bad for our health? Discussing pros and cons of news media?
 

2. How to recognize bias in a newspaper article? How to detect bias in news media?
 

3. Do you think that reading the news wasting your life? Is news toxic to our mind?
 

4. What do you feel about news gossip? Do you enjoy reading tabloid gossip?
 

Why do people love celebrity tabloid gossip?
 

5. Is the news making us dumb? Why the news makes us dumb?
 

6. Are we being brainwashed by news?
 

What has an influence on the news we read and/or see?

 

         
不相信婚姻

The Taiwanese pop star will not be getting married anytime soon (xln.msn.com)

Taiwanese singer, Jolin Tsai, recently revealed that she has no plans to marry 27-year-old model boyfriend, Vivian Dawson, at a promotional event yesterday, reported Taiwanese media.

Despite the recent hype of flash marriages in showbiz (think: Lee Hom), the 32-year-old songstress, dressed in a punkish outfit, told reporters candidly that marriage does not guarantee happiness and she is happy with her current relationship status.

“I have absolutely no plans for marriage. I think it’s more important to feel happy with your other half than thinking about getting married. If you’re happy, the rest are just secondary. If there’s a choice to make, I may not get married at all,” she professed.

Darryl Guo and wife finalise their divorce

The Taiwanese artiste, who was recently rumoured to have contracted a STD, has officially parted ways with his wife

Following his police arrest for smoking and being in possession of Marijuana in September, former Comic Boyz member Darryl Guo, 35, made headlines again, after officially divorcing with his wife, Nina, yesterday.

According to Taiwanese media reports, the two decided to end their two-year marriage despite going through mediation, as Darryl was said to have deliberately hid the news of contracting a sexually transmitted disease (STD) in April last year.

Other reasons behind their split include the latter taking drugs, displaying violent tendencies at home as well as excessive gambling.

The court awarded Nina the full custody of their only son, Xiao Mai and Darryl is allowed to visit him twice a month. The singer-actor will pay his ex-wife a monthly alimony of NT$15,000 (approximately S$635) till Xiao Mai turns 20; Darryl was also said to have agreed to sell their NT$36 million (approximately S$1.52 million) apartment and return balance from the profits made to Xiao Mai. 

Questions:

1. Does marriage guarantee happiness?

2. Why some women don't trust marriage? Reasons women don't want to get married?

3. Will Marriage Make people Happier? The Pros and Cons of Marriage?

4. What do you think about divorce and divorced people?

What do you think about celebrities divorce?

5. According news reported that “One couple divorces every 10 minutes in Taiwan”

What do you think about divorce rate in Taiwan?

6. Why Is The Divorce Rate So High?

 說吧! 英文讀書會 每周一句 2013/12/23

 

set the world on fire極為成功並引起轟動 

---Fig. to do exciting things that bring fame and glory. (Frequently with the negative.)

 例句:

1.      Billy once set the world on fire with his singing.

比利一度以唱歌聞名於世。

2.      Her first performance has set the world on fire.

 她的首次表演已震撼了全世界。

 ３　I'm not very ambitious. I don't want to set the world on fire.

４　You don't have to set the world on fire. Just do a good job.

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