Author: Art Diamond

A Forgotten Language Will Be Easier to Re-Learn

(p. 12) What makes sociolinguistics a subject worth engaging with are the surprises, and Kinzler’s book is full of them. She reveals the extent to which language imprints our brains and how we are neurologically programmed to be sensitive to it. Even if we lose a language after early childhood and no longer speak it in adulthood, learning it will be easier because of deep-seated neural settings permanently etched by that first language.

For the full review, see:

John McWhorter. “Fuggedaboutit!” The New York Times Book Review (Sunday, August 2, 2020): 12.

(Note: the online version of the review has the date July 21 [sic], 2020, and has the title “The Biases We Hold Against the Way People Speak.”)

The book under review is:

Kinzler, Katherine D. How You Say It: Why You Talk the Way You Do―and What It Says About You. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2020.

Amazon Adds 100,000 Fulltime, Nonseasonal Jobs That Include Benefits and Bonuses

(p. A1) Amazon.com Inc. plans to hire 100,000 additional employees in the U.S. and Canada, continuing a rapid expansion that began as the coronavirus pandemic forced many people to stay home and shop online for work and other necessities.

. . .

New jobs will be added at dozens of Amazon locations (p. A6) paying at least $15 an hour and including benefits and signing bonuses of as much as $1,000 in some cities. Hiring for the jobs has already begun. The positions are all nonseasonal, Amazon said.

For the full story, see:

Ben Otto, and Sebastian Herrera. “Amazon Ramps Up Hiring Plans, Adds 100,000 New Jobs.” The Wall Street Journal (Tuesday, September 15, 2020): A1 & A6.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated Sep. 14, 2020, and has the title “Amazon to Hire 100,000 in U.S. and Canada.”)

Russia Approves Covid-19 Vaccine Before Completing Phase 3 Clinical Trial

(p. A6) MOSCOW — Russia has become the first country in the world to approve a vaccine for the coronavirus, President Vladimir V. Putin announced on Tuesday, though global health authorities say the vaccine has yet to complete critical, late-stage clinical trials to determine its safety and effectiveness.

Mr. Putin, who told a cabinet meeting on Tuesday [Aug. 11, 2020] morning that the vaccine “works effectively enough,” said that his own daughter had taken it. And in a congratulatory note to the nation, he thanked the scientists who developed the vaccine for “this first, very important step for our country, and generally for the whole world.”

. . .

If Russian scientists have taken an unorthodox route to the coronavirus vaccine, it would not be the first time. Back in the 1950s, a team of researchers tested a promising, and ultimately successful, polio vaccine on their own children.

For the full story, see:

Andrew E. Kramer. “Putin Says Russia Is First to Approve Vaccine, but Skepticism Abounds.” The New York Times (Wednesday, August 12, 2020): A6.

(Note: ellipsis, and bracketed date, added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated Aug. 11, 2020, and has the title “Russia Approves Coronavirus Vaccine Before Completing Tests.”)

Chinese Communists Try to Intimidate U.S. Universities

(p. A1) The effect of the new national-security law that China imposed on Hong Kong is extending far beyond the territory to American college campuses.

Classes at some elite universities will carry a warning label this fall: This course may cover material considered politically sensitive by China. And schools are weighing measures to try to shield students and faculty from prosecution by Chinese authorities.

. . .

(p. A6) “We cannot self-censor,” said Rory Truex, an assistant professor who teaches Chinese politics at Princeton. “If we, as a Chinese teaching community, out of fear stop teaching things like Tiananmen or Xinjiang or whatever sensitive topic the Chinese government doesn’t want us talking about, if we cave, then we’ve lost.”

. . .

Concerns about China’s influence on academics around the world have grown over the past two decades, as some educational institutions set up campuses in China and many increasingly rely on fees paid by Chinese students, who account for more foreign students in the U.S. than any other country.

There are indications that Chinese students in the U.S. could fall afoul of Chinese laws. A University of Minnesota student was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment after returning home to the Chinese city of Wuhan last year. He was convicted of “provocation” for tweets he wrote while studying in the U.S. that allegedly mocked Chinese leaders.

For the full story, see:

Lucy Craymer. “Hong Kong Law Makes Top U.S. Colleges Wary.” The Wall Street Journal (Thursday, August 20, 2020): A1 & A6.

(Note: ellipses added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated Aug. 19, 2020, and has the title “China’s National-Security Law Reaches Into Harvard, Princeton Classrooms.”)

“Pessimism of the Intellect and Optimism of the Will”

(p. C4) Advertisers may have been peddling baubles or junk food, but their cash funded serious journalism — the kind that could afford to send a reporter to, say, every municipal board meeting. “People knew that,” the former editor of the once mighty Youngstown Vindicator told Sullivan, “and they behaved.” This watchdog function had tangible benefits for subscribers and nonsubscribers alike. “When local reporting waned,” Sullivan writes, “municipal borrowing costs went up.” Local news outlets provide the due diligence that bondholders often count on. Without the specter of a public shaming, corruption is freer to flourish.

. . .

“Ghosting the News” concludes with a soaring quote from the Italian theorist Antonio Gramsci about “pessimism of the intellect and optimism of the will,” but the local reporter in Sullivan follows it up with a more immediate analogy: Even if no one seems to be coming to the rescue while your house is on fire, you still have to “get out your garden hose and bucket, and keep acting as if the fire trucks are on the way.”

For the full review, see:

Jennifer Szalai. “Books of the Times; Another Endangered Species.” The New York Times (Thursday, July 30, 2020): C1 & C4.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the review has the date July 26, 2020, and has the title “Books of the Times; Yes, Fake News Is a Problem. But There’s a Real News Problem, Too.”)

The book under review is:

Sullivan, Margaret. Ghosting the News: Local Journalism and the Crisis of American Democracy. New York: Columbia Global Reports, 2020.

Shanghai Immunologist Says Phase 1 and Phase 2 Tests Show Chinese Vaccine Is Safe and “Highly Likely” to Protect Against Covid-19

(p. A8) The United Arab Emirates has become the first country outside China to approve emergency usage of a Chinese Covid-19 vaccine candidate, in a vote of confidence for a state-backed drugmaker racing global rivals to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

. . .

Tao Lina, a former immunologist with the Shanghai CDC, said in an interview that it makes sense for authorities to approve the usage of Chinese vaccines that have proved safe during the first two phases of clinical trials, given the scale of the Covid-19 crisis. Unlike medical drug treatments, vaccines work by triggering a person’s own immunity, he said. “I’m not at all worried about the safety of the vaccines,” Mr. Tao said.

While the level of efficacy of the Chinese vaccines being used including those of Sinopharm isn’t yet clear, Mr. Tao said the Chinese vaccines’ ability to induce the body to produce antibodies during previous clinical trials meant that they were highly likely to confer some degree of protection from the virus.

For the full story, see:

Chao Deng, and Rory Jones. “U.A.E. Approves Use of China-Made Covid-19 Vaccine.” The Wall Street Journal (Wednesday, September 16, 2020): A8.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated Sep. 15, 2020, and has the title “In Global Covid-19 Vaccine Race, Chinese Shot Receives First Foreign Approval.”)

600-Year-Old Ginkgo Trees Are as Vigorous as 20-Year-Old Ginkgo Trees

(p. D2) . . . a January [2020] study on ginkgo trees, which can live for over a thousand years . . . found that 600-year-old ginkgos are as reproductively and photosynthetically vigorous as their 20-year-old peers. Genetic analysis of the trees’ vascular cambium — a thin layer of cells that lies just underneath the bark, and creates new living tissue — showed “no evidence of senescence,” or cell death, the authors wrote.

For the full story, see:

Cara Giaimo. “Holding On; Can Trees Live Forever? A New Study Adds Kindling to the Debate.” The New York Times (Tuesday, August 4, 2020): D2.

(Note: ellipses, and bracketed year, added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated July 27, 2020, and has the title “Can Trees Live Forever? New Kindling for an Immortal Debate.”)

The January 2020 study mentioned above is:

Wang, Li, Jiawen Cui, Biao Jin, Jianguo Zhao, Huimin Xu, Zhaogeng Lu, Weixing Li, Xiaoxia Li, Linling Li, Eryuan Liang, Xiaolan Rao, Shufang Wang, Chunxiang Fu, Fuliang Cao, Richard A. Dixon, and Jinxing Lin. “Multifeature Analyses of Vascular Cambial Cells Reveal Longevity Mechanisms in Old Ginkgo biloba Trees.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 117, no. 4 (Jan. 28, 2020): 2201-10.

China’s “Emergency-Use” Rule Allows Vaccinating Hundreds of Thousands Against Covid-19

(p. A1) A Chinese pharmaceutical company has injected hundreds of thousands of people with experimental Covid-19 vaccines, as its Western counterparts warn against administering mass vaccinations before rigorous scientific studies are complete.

China National Biotec Group Co., a subsidiary of state-owned Sinopharm, has given two experimental vaccine candidates to hundreds of thousands of people under an emergency-use condition approved by Beijing in July [2020], the company said this week.

For the full story, see:

Chao Deng. “China Tests Vaccines on Hundreds of Thousands.” The Wall Street Journal (Saturday, September 12, 2020): A1 & A8.

(Note: bracketed year added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated September 12, 2020, and has the title “China Injects Hundreds of Thousands With Experimental Covid-19 Vaccines.”)

”There Was a Great Marxist Called Lenin”

(p. C11) Robert Conquest (1917-2015) was what used to be called a Renaissance man. He was so good at everything he did—soldier, diplomat, historian and poet—that I wouldn’t be surprised to learn he also left behind a few sonatas and paintings in oil. His histories of the Soviet Union’s failures and atrocities include “The Great Terror” (1968) and “The Harvest of Sorrow” (1986), meticulously researched and humane investigations of a criminal state, surely among the major historical achievements of the 20th century. His television documentary series, “Red Empire” (1990), distills this work and makes grimly compelling viewing.

But Conquest first came to readers’ attention as a poet of sophistication and grace, . . .

. . .

”There was a great Marxist called Lenin,
Who did two or three million men in;
That’s a lot to have done in
But where he did one in
That grand Marxist Stalin did ten in.”

For the full review, see:

David Mason. “The Impervious Dream.” The Wall Street Journal (Saturday, Aug. 22, 2020): C11.

(Note: ellipses added; the limerick in quotation marks is by Robert Conquest.)

(Note: the online version of the review has the date Aug. 21, 2020, and has the title “‘Robert Conquest: Collected Poems’ Review: The Impervious Dream.”)

The book under review is:

Conquest, Robert. Collected Poems. New York: The Waywiser Press, 2020.

Before Covid-19, Poverty and Unemployment Were Lowest in 50 Years

(p. B8) WASHINGTON — A record-low share of Americans were living in poverty, incomes were climbing, and health insurance coverage was little changed in 2019, a government report released on Tuesday showed — though the circumstances of many have deteriorated as pandemic lockdowns and industry disruptions have thrown millions out of work.

The share of Americans living in poverty fell to 10.5 percent in 2019, the Census Bureau reported, down 1.3 percentage points from 2018. That rate is the lowest since estimates were first published in 1959.

Household incomes increased to their highest level on record dating to 1967, at $68,700 in inflation-adjusted terms. That change came as individual workers saw their earnings climb and as the total number of people working increased.

. . .

Unemployment was hovering at around 3.5 percent before the crisis took hold, the lowest in 50 years, and wages were steadily rising.

For the full story, see:

Jeanna Smialek, Sarah Kliff and Alan Rappeport. “Census Shows Record-Low Poverty in U.S. Before Virus Struck.” The New York Times (Wednesday, September 16, 2020): B8.

(Note: ellipsis added.)

(Note: the online version of the story has the date Sept. 15, 2020, and has the title “U.S. Poverty Hit a Record Low Before the Pandemic Recession.”)

Chinese Communist Authoritarian System Inhibited Local Officials From Sharing Covid-19 Information

(p. A5) Communist Party leaders oversee an authoritarian system that inhibits local officials from freely sharing information with national-level officials, they said, and this has had deadly consequences for the world. It is a version of the so-called Chernobyl effect, where local officials avoid telling central authorities about a catastrophic event until it is far too late, American officials said.

Moreover, officials in Beijing have tried to spread disinformation about the origins of the virus. The C.I.A. has said since at least February [2020] that Chinese central officials were not sharing everything they knew about the virus — including a more accurate case count — or doing all they could to help the world prepare for the pandemic.

For the full story, see:

Edward Wong, Julian E. Barnes and Zolan Kanno-Youngs. “Local Officials Hid Dangers From Beijing, Says U.S. Report.” The New York Times (Thursday, August 20, 2020): A5.

(Note: bracketed year added.)

(Note: the online version of the story was updated Sept. [sic] 17, 2020, and has the title “Local Officials in China Hid Coronavirus Dangers From Beijing, U.S. Agencies Find.”)