Watching the World
Population Dilemma
According to population experts, Europe now has a dozen nations that are getting close to a demographic growth rate of zero (the point where births are equal to the level of deaths), notes El Universal, Mexico City’s daily newspaper. The average world growth is said to have declined to about 1.6 percent and seems to be decreasing slowly each year. “That is not enough,” claims Werner Fornos, president of the Population Institute in Washington, D.C. Why? Lester Brown of the Worldwatch Institute explains that despite the fact that the percentage of population growth is decreasing on a world level, the total number of persons on the globe keeps growing. The year 1950 saw a net increase (births minus deaths) of 35 million in world population. In 1970 it grew by 70 million. In 1986 it is expected to grow by 82 million. This means that the world population is increasing by 2.6 persons each second, 9,360 each hour, and 224,640 each day! At this rate, it is predicted that there will be six billion persons on earth by the end of this century.
Crime Increasing
A recent FBI report revealed that serious crime in the United States increased by 8 percent during the first half of 1986, compared to a 5-percent jump during the previous year. Some major cities have experienced over a 15-percent increase. Crime in Dallas, Texas, however, skyrocketed 19.5 percent! Cited as potential links to crime’s increase are drug use, financial problems, and America’s appetite for violence. Commenting on the latter, Jerald Vaughn of the International Association of Chiefs of Police explained: “Violence has become an accepted way of life in America—we seem to thrive on it.”
Reindeer Killing
At least 38,000 reindeer in Norway and Sweden have been scheduled to be killed as a result of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. The animals, worth $225 to $300 each, are unsuitable for eating because of their high levels of radiation after grazing on contaminated lichen. “This will be a blow to the Lapp people who herd more than 600,000 reindeer in the Arctic wasteland,” reports The Sunday Times of London. The strongly flavored meat is popular in Scandinavia and is exported to countries such as the Federal Republic of Germany and Japan. “This is a threat to our entire livelihood,” a reindeer herder commented.
Immorality by Computer
When “minitels,” small computer terminals linked up with the telephone system for consulting data banks, were instituted in France, they gave access to a host of useful information. Railway timetables, bank information, and games were among the many features accessible to users. However, the minitel has also opened up new commercial horizons in the field of pornography. The French daily Le Monde reported that among nine hundred services offered to minitel customers, “three hundred . . . are opening the door to convivial message systems,” an expression that more often than not means conversations of a pornographic nature. The article added that these “‘convivial’ conversations can end up soliciting minors, inciting to immoral behavior, or even opening the way to the prostitution network.”
Kidney-Stone Breakthrough!
A new technique for destroying kidney stones by laser has just been tried by two British scientists. According to the French weekly magazine L’Express, a laser beam can break up stones already in the ureter, a duct leading from the kidney to the bladder. Stones cannot be crushed at this stage by the use of ultrasonic waves. However, by means of an endoscope “the laser device—a long flexible tube with a quartz fiber head of a quarter of a millimeter [0.01 in.] in diameter—is introduced into the ureter. At the rate of five shots a second, it takes 2,000 pulses to destroy an average sized stone. The stones are progressively broken up as if by a pneumatic drill. Reduced to tiny particles like tiny grains of sand, they are . . . eliminated simply and painlessly when urine is passed.”
Baby’s Best Friend
A newborn infant abandoned in a “weed-choked, bottle-strewn alley in 60-degree weather” was kept alive by a stray German shepherd, reports the Detroit Free Press. According to one of the police officers who discovered the infant, the animal had “curled [itself] around a baby that was holding onto a little twig. And the baby was being licked by the dog.” This bizarre discovery came about three hours after the officers had learned that a woman suffering from severe bleeding due to childbirth was admitted to a hospital. When no baby was found and the woman claimed she had never been pregnant, the police went to her apartment and followed a trail of blood to the alley where the child had been abandoned. The six-pound, four-ounce baby boy is listed in stable condition after suffering from hypothermia.
Record Distribution
Information supplied by the United Bible Societies reveals that by May of last year the Bible had been translated into 1,829 languages or dialects. This represents an increase of 21 languages within a year! Only a few Bible books, however, are actually translated into that number of languages. The whole Bible is currently translated into only 293 languages, some of which are no longer spoken.
New Panda Cub
“The birth of a giant panda Aug. 10 at a center run by China and the World Wildlife Fund is a major step in efforts to save the species from extinction,” reports The New York Times. The panda cub, weighing only three and a half ounces (99 g), was born to Li Li, a 15- to 18-year-old female weighing 237 pounds (108 kg). The father, Quan Quan, is a male 6 1/2 to 7 years old who weighs 198 pounds (90 kg). Because the center tries to create conditions similar to the pandas’ natural habitat, it is said that pandas being cared for there can be returned to the wild more easily than those born in zoos.
Dissension Growing
The Vatican’s recent penalizing of two Catholic prelates in the United States because of their liberal views on birth control and other sexual issues has increased the discord among American Catholics, says Archbishop Rembert G. Weakland of Milwaukee. According to Weakland, continued disciplinary action taken against Roman Catholic leaders in the United States may cause many ordinary Catholics to drift away from the church and “begin pursuing their faith privately in their own fashion,” notes The New York Times. Comparing present church conditions in the United States to the church in the Netherlands, Weakland pointed out that it was possible that the American church would follow the path of the Dutch church. In what way? “Dutch Catholics are among the most liberal in the world, and many in the church there have distanced themselves from Rome and its teachings,” reports the Times. It should be noted, however, that “liberal” teachings often go contrary to Bible teachings.
Memory Metal
A unique metal alloy that was developed by the U.S. military nearly 25 years ago is now available to consumers. What makes the alloy unique? Its ability to “remember” its original shape when heated. For example, Time magazine notes that the Beta Phase company of California has produced a pair of frames for eyeglasses that can be restored to their original shape when exposed to a temperature of 130 degrees Fahrenheit (54° C.). The Memory Wire bra, made by Japan’s Wacoal Corporation, that is currently sold in the United States was also cited as a product containing the unique metal.