2007年12月28日 星期五

英國生物醫學為何能領跑歐洲

科學 | 2007.12.26

英國生物醫學為何能領跑歐洲

生物醫學被認為前途無量,人們對有朝一日能夠借助生物醫學手段治療今日的不治之症、修復或者甚至替代失去功能的器官寄予厚望。在這一領域,英國在歐洲領 先,世界上第一隻克隆哺乳動物——綿羊多莉就是在英國問世的。近1015年來,英國的生物醫學又得到了特別好的發展。原因何在?德國之聲記者從倫敦發來 以下採訪報導。

英格利希(Victoria English)是為歐洲醫療企業服務的專業雜誌MedNous的主編。在她看來,世界上除美國以外,英國的生物醫學研究條件最好,原因有二。她說:首先,英國國家衛生機構為臨床研究提供了巨大資源。其次,英國擁有極好的科研籌資機制,使得新創企業可以得到啟動資金,高校可以得到更多科研經費。

在生物醫學領域,英國的維康信託基金會 (Wellcome Trust)扮演著十分重要的角色。該基金會是私立資助機構,政治上獨立,資助範圍很廣,年經費折合7.5億歐元。該基金會分子科學和生理科學部門負責人 謝弗(Alan Schafer)就有權決定資助哪些課題,除應用科學以外,他也大力支持基礎研究。他說:英國也繼續而且還非常重視基礎研究。從事這方面研究的學者並不一定非常關心他們的結果有沒有臨床應用價值。但儘管如此,他們的工作還是具有關鍵性意義, 因為有了他們提供的一磚一瓦,人們日後才能建起高樓大廈。

謝弗強調,革新思路往往是出乎意料之作。他說英 國大學賦予科學家以很大的自由,進行試驗,冒創新的風險,最後很可能會取得全新認識。在過去10年、15年,謝弗也觀察到英國另一個有利於生物醫學研究的 發展趨勢,那就是高校和產業界的聯繫更加密切。他說: 現在,雙方的互相瞭解大為改進,通過提供啟動資金,人們現在也可以開展聯合項目,使英國開始有別於歐洲大陸其他國家的模式,更接近於美國的方式。大學畢 業生可能先到企業工作一段時間,以後再回到大學,為的是在關鍵領域,比如說在制藥方面,繼續進行科研。

恰恰在幹細胞研究領域,英國得到長足發展。謝弗認為,英國對幹細胞研究的規定不像歐洲大陸其他國家那麼嚴。他說:為了不當絆腳石,英國政府毫不遲疑地做出明確規定,允許科學家從人工培育的胚胎中攝取幹細胞,但只許用於科研,不得用於克隆人類。

維康信託基金會也資助其他生物醫學課題。還有,合成生物研究,謝弗認為也非常重要。他說:合成生物學研究的是創造特殊的微生物,比如說可以利用它們來降解毒性化學品,甚至說不定還可以利用它們對付溫室氣體呢。

德國之聲版權所有

轉載或引用請標明出處和作者

Wikipedia article "Wellcome Trust".


ype: Private - Not-for-Profit
On the web: http://www.wellcome.ac.uk

Scientists and medical researchers in need of money more than welcome a little support from the Wellcome Trust. One of the world's largest medical research charities, it funds mainly biomedical research, history of medicine research, and genome sequencing. Recipients include British universities, projects in developing countries, and the Human Genome Project. The trust uses income from investments to fund grants. The trust brought its technology transfer activities, formerly handled by subsidiary Catalyst BioMedica, in-house in 2003. In accordance with the will of Sir Henry Wellcome, the Wellcome Trust was established in 1936 from shares of The Wellcome Foundation, which eventually became GlaxoSmithKline (GSK).

Officers:
Chairman: Sir Dominic Cadbury
Director: Mark Walport
Director of Finance and Information Management: Linda Arter

Competitors:
Celera Group
Howard Hughes Medical Institute
SRI International






2007年12月23日 星期日

布萊爾皈依天主教

convert


BBC 布萊爾皈依天主教

布萊爾過去信仰新教聖公會,但是他21日受洗成為羅馬天主教徒,私人彌撒儀式由羅馬天主教樞機主教奧康納主持。

《星期日泰晤士報》報道說,天主教的教友希望布萊爾解釋在擔任首相期間對同性戀權益,墮胎和幹細胞問題所採取的"站不住腳的"的立場。

《星期日郵報》將布萊爾的天主教信仰與現任工黨內閣成員進行了一番對比。報道說,政府內閣成員中有不到一半公開承認他們信仰上帝。在22名內閣大臣中,只有8人表示他們是基督徒,2人表示他們是無神論者。

布萊爾
布萊爾過去信仰新教聖公會,現在皈依羅馬天主教

The Royal Channel

英國王室開設YouTube頻道
YouTube英國王室頻道網頁
英國王室成為首個開設YouTube網頁的王族。

英國王室在全球第一大視頻網站YouTube開設新頻道,以拉近與大眾平民間的距離。

白金漢宮發表聲明說,女王伊麗莎白二世今年的聖誕節講話也將在這一頻道上播出。

英國王室YouTube網站視頻的開通,恰逢女王1957年首次發表實況節慶講話50周年之際,也開創了世界諸國王室的此舉之先河。

此外,網站還將鏈接英國王室的歷史資料,比如1953年女王的加冕儀式,並將定期上載新的視頻內容。

白金漢宮說,此舉旨在拉近與全球各地的年輕一代人之間的距離。

英國王室的網頁標題是用紅色字體寫的“王室頻道── 英國王室的官方頻道”,並配有白金漢宮和女王衛兵的照片。

白金漢宮說:“女王一直希望與更多的人保持聯繫,並採用適當的方式。女王今年的聖誕講話會讓更多的看到聽到。”

英女王聖誕講話成為英國聖誕節的傳統組成部分,不僅可以在英王室網站上以播客形式播出,而且今年還將首次以高清晰度電視播送。

YouTube是全球開放式的視頻內容上載和分享網站,2005年推出後迅速受到歡迎,對傳統媒體帶來巨大衝擊。

全球最大搜索引擎網站穀歌(Google)去年開出16.5億美元的高價將其收購麾下。

2007年12月19日 星期三

BBC 摘要:北岩銀行 早產嬰兒





《每日電訊報》在頭版頭條報道說,北岩銀行危機有可能使英國每位納稅人付出1800英鎊,而英國首相布朗在一年前就已得到警告,為了避免銀行業危機當局必須採取"緊急行動"。

報告說,英國政府拯救北岩銀行的注資可能上升至570億英鎊,幾乎與政府的年度教育預算相當,這使"全面國有化"的舉動看來不可避免。

北岩銀行
英國政府拯救北岩銀行的注資可能上升至570億英鎊。
《每日電訊報》表示,英格蘭銀行行長披露說,議員們曾被告知當局必須採取"緊急行動"才能避免一家商業銀行未來面臨潛在的倒閉的可能。








英格蘭專業護士缺乏

《泰晤士報》說,英國國家審計署報告稱,專業護士缺乏和特護嬰兒床位不夠用使早產嬰兒的生命處於危險之中。

早產兒
特護嬰兒床位不夠用使早產嬰兒的生命處于危險之中。
報道說,整個英格蘭"極其缺乏護士",缺幅達10%。在2006至07年度,由於缺乏護士和特護嬰兒床,國民醫療保健計劃醫院不得不回絕一些入院要求。

《每日電訊報》表示,英格蘭共有180個婦嬰產院,而其中三分之一都一直處於七成滿的狀況,這違反了英國圍產醫學會的相關安全要求。

3 million learner drivers' details lost

丟失公眾資料

英國政府對公眾資料的管理漏洞百出,不斷發生丟失事故。政府官員17日承認,由政府雇用的一家私人公司丟失了儲存英國約300萬名學車者個人信息的一塊重要硬盤。各報都對此作了報道。

《泰晤士報》在頭版刊登了大幅學車者紅色標記"L",並引述英國運輸大臣凱利向議會報告說,政府雇佣的一家私人公司5月在 美國艾奧瓦州丟失了這個硬盤驅動器,裡面存有超過300萬名需參加駕照理論考試者的姓名和住址等信息,但未包含任何銀行賬號或信用卡信息。她還證實,另外 兩個儲存有7500輛汽車信息及車主姓名和住址的硬盤驅動器也在轉移過程中丟失。

《每日快報》報道說,這些學車者的個人資料已經丟失半年多,政府只是在最近檢討海關及稅務總署保存的兩張電腦光盤遺失問題時才發現,裡面保存著大約2500萬份個人資料。




December 17, 2007

3 million learner drivers' details lost, says Ruth Kelly

The personal details of three million UK learner drivers have been lost in the American state of Iowa, the Government announced tonight.

Ruth Kelly, the Transport Secretary, told MPs this evening that the data was housed on a hard drive in the Iowa City offices of Pearson Driving Assessments Ltd, a company employed by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency.

The announcement was made minutes after Alistair Darling gave a non-committal interim report to the Commons on the loss of two computer discs earlier this year containing the Government’s entire child benefit database of around 25 million people.

The learner drivers information went missing when the hard drive was lost in May, Ms Kelly said. The records contained the name of the test applicant, their postal address and telephone number but no details of any individual’s bank account or credit card.

Ms Kelly apologised for “any uncertainty or concern” caused to those affected and announced she was tightening security procedures by a series of measures including a new link to provide information to police by electronic transmission from the DVLA rather than transferring tapes by courier.

She said that Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, had said the case did not appear to present “a substantial risk” to individuals.

Ms Kelly confirmed that her department had also lost details on 7,500 vehicles - including the names and addresses of their owners - which went missing in the mail as they were transferred from Northern Ireland to Wales.

The DVLA’s breach of data security followed the unprecedented autumn fiasco in which a junior HM Revenue and Customs official placed two unencrypted CDs containing highly secure information into the regular postal system.

The two Child Benefit discs that went missing in October contained names, dates of birth, bank and address details.

The Chancellor said there was still no evidence that identity fraudsters had got hold of the personal details. He told the Commons there was no increase in fraud attempts following the loss of the child benefit records, adding that police have no information that the data has fallen into wrong hands

Mr Darling refused to detail how the Government would prevent future breaches of security or examine the errors that allowed these blunders to occur until a full review of the incident was completed by Kieran Poynter.

Philip Hammond, Shadow Treasury minister, said that was “a wholly inadequate reponse from a wholly inadequate Chancellor”.

Mr Poynter, UK chairman at PriceWaterhouseCoopers, has recommended in an interim report that HMRC computers be restricted so that private details could not be downloaded without the proper clearance. The report is due to be published in full in the first half of next year.

The HMRC has already banned transfer of bulk data without adequate security protection and disabled all its computers to prevent data downloading onto removable discs. They will only be reactivated by a senior manager for a “business critical purpose”.

A interim report by Cabinet Secretary Gus O’Donnell on improving data handling across government was also being published today.

Police have searched rubbish tips around London as well as scouring government offices in a massive hunt for the missing discs. Mr Darling asked millions of families to be alert and vigilant to ensure that no improper activity was affecting their bank accounts while the discs remain at large.




2007年12月15日 星期六

Designer baby

胚胎干細胞
胚胎干細胞研究還未能在治療疾病上取得突破

bbc新聞兩則

設計嬰兒

《泰晤士報》報道,一對英國夫婦獲准對胎兒進行基因檢測,以診治能導致高膽固醇和心臟病風險的基因。

文章說,這一決定將引發新的倫理爭議。儘管這一技術是被用來診斷罕見的重症,但也可以用來判斷一些可以藥物治療的疾病,這樣可能會導致一些夫婦將那些具有一般病症基因的嬰兒墮胎。

批評者說,檢測會帶來史無前例的道德困境,因為很難產生毫無疾病基因的胚胎。


From
December 15, 2007

Designer baby fear over heart gene test

A British couple have won the right to test embryos for a gene that leads to high cholesterol levels and an increased risk of heart attacks, The Times has learnt.

The decision by the fertility watchdog will reopen controversy over the ethics of designer babies, as it allows doctors to screen embryos for a condition that is treatable with drugs and can be influenced by lifestyle as well as genes.

While the procedure is designed to detect a rare version of a disease called familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH), which often kills children before puberty, it will also identify a milder form that can be controlled by drugs and diet.

Critics argue that the test will allow couples to destroy embryos that would have had a good chance of becoming children with fulfilling and reasonably healthy lives.

The test will also create an unprecedented moral dilemma for some couples, as it could show that they have produced no embryos completely unaffected by the disease. This would force them to decide whether to implant embryos that they know have a genetic risk of premature heart disease and death, or to throw them away and deny them a chance of life.

Britain’s first licence to test embryos for FH will be awarded next week to Paul Serhal, of University College Hospital in London, by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA).

Its decision breaks new ground because it permits Mr Serhal to screen out not only the severe form of the condition but also the milder type, which is usually treatable.

Embryo screening has previously been approved only for disorders in which a gene invariably causes a serious disease, or for conditions such as breast cancer in which mutations carry an 80 per cent lifetime risk.

FH occurs in two forms. The more common version, heterozygous FH, affects 1 in 500 people. It is caused by a single mutated gene, which raises cholesterol and thus the risk of hardened arteries, heart disease and stroke. It can usually be managed with statin drugs and diet.

One in 250,000 people inherits two defective copies of the gene and develops homozygous FH, which is much more serious. Sufferers show severely elevated cholesterol from the age of 5, and can suffer angina by 6 or 7. Many die in childhood, and most have suffered at least one heart attack by the end of their twenties.

Mr Serhal’s patients, who are in their thirties, both have the milder heterozygous FH. They discovered their status only when they had a daughter, now 5, with the homozygous form, and they also have an unaffected son.

They said yesterday that they were delighted. “We had no idea that we both carried a gene for high cholesterol until the double gene was expressed in our first child. We are very lucky that our child has responded so well to the very high-dose drug regime. We have been led to understand that other children with the same double gene may not be so lucky.”

The couple, who approached Mr Serhal after learning that he was offering the pre-implantation genetic diagnosis test for a breast cancer gene, will have IVF next month, even though they are naturally fertile.

A single cell will be removed from each embryo at the eight-cell stage, and be tested for defective FH genes. Any that have homozygous FH will be discarded. The test will also determine whether the remaining embryos are completely clear of FH, or whether they have the heterozygous form. There may be none that are unaffected, leaving the couple with a difficult ethical decision.

Mr Serhal said: “This obnoxious disease can cause cardiovascular accidents at a very young age. Ideally, we will find embryos with no FH genes, but it is possible we will not and it will be up to the patients to choose. Some people would think twice about using embryos that they know have a risky gene, and others would say you shouldn’t screen out a condition that can be managed so people can live with it. It will be an awkward choice.”

Mr Serhal said that the HFEA had also indicated that it would be prepared to sanction screening for the milder form of FH alone for couples in which one partner was a carrier and the other was not, though he was not yet proposing to do such screening.


From
December 15, 2007

Testing Issue

Genetic screening is permissible but only under strict regulation

Inevitably, whenever the words “lifestyle” and “designer babies” are used in a report on genetic screening or embryo testing, free rein is given to speculation on the more repulsive fantasies of Aldous Huxley's hatcheries and Nazi eugenics. The ethics of human reproduction and scientific intervention in this delicate area are a moral minefield, provoking strong emotions and a cacophony of opinions. It is not surprising, therefore, that the decision by the Government's fertility watchdog to allow a couple to test their embryos for a gene that causes high cholesterol levels is as controversial as it is misunderstood. It appears, at first glance, to open the way to designing children who will never grow fat or to speeding the acceptance of bioengineering to produce superbabies. It is no such thing.

The procedure that has been allowed by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority is designed to detect a rare version of a disease called familial hypercholesterolaemia (FH), which often kills children before puberty. The condition occurs in two forms — a relatively mild one, caused by a single mutated copy of a gene, that nevertheless raises cholesterol levels to dangerous levels, causing heart disease, hardened arteries and strokes; and a far more deadly version, when the sufferer inherits two defective copies that cause high levels of cholesterol from the age of 5, angina and likely early death.

The principle of screening embryos to avoid such suffering has already been accepted for such conditions as Huntington's disease and cystic fibrosis. Other diseases, caused by genetic defects, have recently been added to the list. This pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, using embryos obtained by IVF, screened and then re-introduced to the womb, is costly, invasive and must be regulated by clear guidelines. But there is no reason why FH should be excluded. It does, however, raise a moral dilemma: while embryos with double mutations should not be implanted, what should be done with those affected by only the milder condition? Should parents — and the State — be obliged to support the birth of a child who will, inevitably, face a life of some suffering and much expense? Or should even partially affected embryos be discarded and the mother obliged to undergo again the full IVF procedure?

Several clear principles must be paramount when framing a moral and legal response. The first is that the parents should decide. The circumstances of each case may differ. Only parents can judge what they and their offspring are prepared to undergo. Secondly, medical regulation remains essential. Sanction for pre-implantation diagnosis does not apply to other situations: abortion of a foetus in the womb is a very different issue that raises other ethical questions. Thirdly, the scientific possibilities of screening must not be abused. Parents who choose this rigorous and sometimes distressing procedure over natural conception do so out of determination not to pass on genetic defects. They are not trying to manipulate their genes to raise IQ, breed a top athlete or “design” a baby — nor could they, when limited by their own gene pool. But a technique to prevent suffering must never be used for eugenics, with a promiscuous shopping list of genes to be screened out. That way not only moral madness lies, but present fears of Frankenstein science could prove all too true.

英國寬帶

電纜電線
BBC敦促加快修建新一代寬帶網絡。

《金融時報》報道,英國廣播公司(BBC)推動英國電信監管機構Ofcom在英國全境構建更快速的寬帶網。

BBC未來媒體和技術總監阿什利﹒海菲爾德說,如果英國不建造新一代的通信網絡將面臨"數字鴻溝"。

今年年初,Ofcom呼籲電訊行業投資興建新的互聯網網絡,替代舊的銅線電纜,但響應者並不積極,因為這需要投資150多億英鎊。

BBC在此時呼籲政府加快修建新網絡是因為準備推出新的網站,新網站將包括更多的聲音和圖像內容,如果沒有更快速的寬帶,BBC將難以推出更豐富的內容。


2007年12月9日 星期日

Wife Recounts Hidden Life

Police Charge 'Dead' Briton With Fraud

Wife Recounts Hidden Life

Washington Post Foreign Service
Sunday, December 9, 2007; Page A25

LONDON, Dec. 8 -- British police filed fraud charges Saturday against a man who was declared dead after he disappeared on a canoeing trip in 2002 but last week walked into a police station claiming amnesia.

Police in Cleveland, in northern England, charged John Darwin, 57, with making false statements to obtain a passport and using deception to make money transfers. Police said that Darwin would be held until a court appearance Monday and that they wanted to interview his wife, Anne, 55, who recently moved to Panama.


Police provided no other details of Darwin's five-year odyssey, but his wife laid out an extraordinary tale in a lengthy interview published Saturday in two British newspapers, the Mirror and the Daily Mail. The newspapers said Anne Darwin spoke to a reporter in Miami during a stopover on her return trip to Britain.

According to her account, Darwin began planning to fake his death in early 2002 because he believed it was the only way the couple could escape growing debts related to their apartment rental business.

She said she doubted he would go through with the plan and initially believed he had died when he disappeared in March 2002. But she said he returned to their family home in northern England in February 2003, looking dirty, thin and "disheveled."

For the next three years, she told the newspapers, Darwin lived with her in their family home, spending most of his time in a small room in an apartment building they owned next door. She said his secret room was connected to their bedroom by a passageway that was knocked into the wall and hidden behind a large wardrobe.

"I was always on eggshells when friends and family came to stay in case someone wandered into John's room and saw him," she said, adding that he would often take walks disguised in a woolly hat and faking a limp.


超大型监狱

英国的监狱面临“人满之患”,如何解决确实让当局大伤脑筋。

曾经有官员建议提早释放罪名较轻的囚犯,也有法官呼吁轻判犯人,以缩短罪犯的囚禁期,从而减轻监狱所承受的压力。也有人建议当局购置囚船,在船上囚禁犯人。

现在,为了解决监狱拥挤的问题,英国政府计划建造3座超大型监狱,每座监狱可容纳2,500名受刑人。

新建3座超大型监狱是英国政府解决监狱拥挤问题的计划之一部分,在未来7年内,政府计划要扩大监狱容量,增加10,500名受刑人的设施。

大型设施

其中一座超大型监狱将在2012年完工,其规模比英国现有的所有监狱都要大,另外两座超大型监狱将在2014年完工。

英国司法大臣斯特劳(Jack Straw)宣布,在现有的15亿英镑经费之外,又增加了12亿英镑的额外经费来进行扩大监狱容量的计划。

英国监狱拥挤问题由来已久,因为受刑人太多,有些受刑人不能参加矫正课程,因此没有资格减刑,这使得问题恶性循环。

此前由卡特勋爵(Lord Carter)的检讨报告提议,英国设立一个类似美国的永久判决委员会(sentencing commission),将受刑人与监狱资源配对。

斯特劳说,司法部将设立工作小组来研究判决委员会的可行性。

BBC 新聞

pay blunder

《星期日泰晤士報》報道,由於新的計算機系統出錯,成千上萬的英國官兵過去幾個月來軍餉未能足額發放,有的被迫申領困難補助。

文章說,在伊拉克和阿富汗前線作戰的士兵的軍餉也受到影響,有些官兵每月少領580英鎊。

隨著聖誕節的臨近,受影響的官兵的手頭吃緊。

報道還說,已從桑赫斯特皇家軍事學院畢業三年的軍官至今拿的薪金與新兵一樣,沒有得到相應的增長。

此外,有些官兵的軍餉則過多發放,很多人都沒意識到是系統出錯,而將錢花掉。


前線作戰的英軍士兵軍餉受到電腦系統的影響

文章說,這一發放軍餉的電腦系統去年三月首次在皇家海軍中應有(sic),不久就有人反映欠發工資,但該系統還是逐步在空軍和陸軍部隊中推廣應用。

該系統最大的問題是,軍餉的發放必須經過上級軍官的授權批准,一旦授權人有任務外出,整個系統就陷入停頓。

From
December 9, 2007

Soldiers are cheated in pay blunder


《星期日電訊報》報道,接近70%的英格蘭選民希望能維持與蘇格蘭聯合,只有24%的人表示二者應分而治之。

該報委托進行的調查還顯示,很多人對英格蘭和蘇格蘭聯合的前景表示擔憂,多達48%的人認為,這一聯合最多能再持續25年。

出人意料的是,57%的選民贊同組建一支統一的英國足球隊,只有34%的人表示反對。

文章緊接著說,這一調查是在英格蘭隊入圍2008歐洲足球錦標賽失利後進行的,言下之意是:英格蘭球迷對本國隊伍倍感失望後做出的選擇。

《觀察家報》報道,英國準備進行一項福利制度改革,將錢發放給老人,使他們有權選擇看護服務。

這將改變看護人員進入老人家庭、由他們決定提供何種服務的現行做法。

這一新政策將於明年四月推出,老人或他們制定的親屬將設立帳戶,每月可收到一定數額的補貼,然後由他們自己根據需要,選擇看護服務。

目前有大約90萬65歲以上的老人無法獨立生活,到2025年,這一數字將超過130萬,給養老服務帶來巨大壓力。

埃文斯
埃文斯反對延長扣押恐怖嫌疑人期限

文章說,政府將把資金從地方當局轉發給個人,這筆錢每年多達80億英鎊,各家公司會加劇競爭,提供更好的服務方案。

拘留法案

《星期日電訊報》報道,英國軍情五局掌門人埃文斯說,他不會贊同拘押恐怖嫌疑人超過28天的提議。

英國政府計劃將不提出起訴拘押恐怖嫌疑人的期限延長至42天,文章說,埃文斯的表態給首相布朗的反恐計劃新的打擊。

一些工黨部長說,考慮到恐怖陰謀的複雜性和全球性,延長拘留期限是必要的,但保守黨和自民黨則堅決反對,一些工黨資深成員現在也傾向反對這一提議。

戰機
BAE最近與沙特達成武器交易合同

腐敗調查

《星期日泰晤士報》報道,英國嚴重欺詐辦公室將對英國最大防務公司BAE涉嫌腐敗重新展開調查。

英國白廳官員說,十多名公司高級主管未來兩個月將就是否收受8000萬英鎊的佣金接受訊問。

據悉,在與南非、坦桑尼亞、羅馬尼亞等國政府簽訂的豐厚利潤的武器交易中,這筆錢被支付給了中間人。

英國政府此前曾就此展開調查,但在沙特政府威脅停止在反恐方面與英國展開合作後,英國暫停了對此案的調查。

2007年12月7日 星期五

Britannia Bites

紐約時報的書評 不過我們可以從末段的"體驗"中了解社會與階層生活如 lunch和dinner的"演變" 此說法可參考





篇名每字都可以進一步了解 Britannia Bites


Britannia Bites


Published: December 9, 2007

In an effort to clarify and define the rights and obligations of British citizenship, Prime Minister Gordon Brown recently invited the British public to help its government develop “a statement of British values”: as a Scot at a time when Scots in England are not as popular as they used to be, reviving the waning idea of an inclusive British identity is useful to him. Many people misread his words and imagined Brown wanted to find values unique to Britain — “British values.” More careful readers noted that what he was looking for was a particularly British expression of the Enlightenment beliefs common to, say, France or the United States, whose catchy slogans (“liberty, equality, fraternity” and “land of the free”) he seemed to envy.

Skip to next paragraph
From “Taste”

TASTE

The Story of Britain Through Its Cooking.

By Kate Colquhoun.

Illustrated. 460 pp. Bloomsbury. $34.95.

In a country without a written constitution, national values can be slippery. What are they — characteristics, aspirations, exemplary models of behavior, laws, traditions? Can food express a national value? In the 18th century, Britain (or at least the English part of it) saw roast beef — “the roast beef of old England” — as more than a piece of meat with some gravy slopped over the top. It came plain and hot from the oven and the spit, its freshness needing no fancy foreign trickery with spices and casseroles to disguise its age or toughness. Roast beef symbolized honest yeoman strength. As a patriotic symbol, it appeared in cartoons and said boo to the French. Today its equivalent as the national dish is said to be chicken tikka masala, a popular, yellow-sauced invention of Britain’s Indian restaurants. Perhaps this is a consoling myth of multiculturalism that would be contested by McDonald’s, but again it shows how a nation can use food to boast of its qualities and strengths.

In the two centuries between the roast beef and the chicken masala, Britain did very little culinary boasting. The cliché was that it had woeful cooking, the worst in Europe. Foreigners wrote home with details of floury brown soups, overboiled vegetables, watery stews and coffee that, in the words of Kingsley Amis, “tasted of old coffee pots.” Why was it, people asked from 1800 until about 1980, that a country so rich in promising raw materials (beef, fish, lamb, game, cream) had the habit of murdering their flavors on the way to the table? The question was aggravated by the divisions created by social class and by the shortages of war. As a child of the 1940s and ’50s, this reviewer grew up in Britain when food was still rationed — butter and cheese until 1954 — and recalls puzzling over the highly-colored pictures of roast hams studded with pineapple chunks that appeared on the back covers of National Geographic magazine, advertisements that were just as exotic to him as the editorial content about, say, Samoa, that lay inside. By the 1960s, the exotic had become ordinary. Prosperity provided European holidays and different ideas of cooking, and waves of immigration had begun to establish Indian and Chinese restaurants, peppered with a scattering of Italian and Greek, in every British high street. The story is well known, and Kate Colquhoun tells it well in “Taste.” But because Colquhoun is a writer of lively detail rather than argument — you might say her book is too busy stuffing its face, one course after another, to pause for conversation — the question of why Britain developed such a poor cuisine is never fully addressed.

All the evidence points to the triad of the Industrial Revolution, empire and free trade. The first drove people from the fields to the factories; the colonies of the second grew what Sidney Mintz has called the tropical “drug foods” (including sugar and tea); the cheap imports encouraged by the third drove out the homegrown. None of these phenomena were peculiar to Britain, but no other European country had them in combination so early or to the same extent. Britain’s industrial working classes, unmoored from the domestic habits of their rural ancestors and crazed by their factory hours, simply forgot how to cook. As early as 1800, according to Colquhoun, “the poor in Britain were now subsisting not on the diet that had remained broadly unchanged for centuries, of ale, grain, vegetables and a modicum of fatty meat, but on a vastly less nutritious mix of often adulterated white bread, cheese, tea and sugar.”

In the course of the next century, the British population grew fourfold. Canning factories were part of the solution to feeding it. “Tinned meat was generally foul,” Colquhoun writes, “but it was cheap and it came in handy for unexpected guests, titivated into soups, stews and rissoles.” It cost less than half the price of fresh meat and arrived from everywhere. First from Australia as “coarse-grained, overdone lumps with a wad of fat,” then from the United States, whose tinned exports to Britain multiplied nearly 1,500 times between 1866 and 1871, and finally from Uruguay and Argentina, whose modern economies were founded largely on shipping tinned and refrigerated beef to London and Liverpool. By 1914, Britain was the world’s largest consumer of tinned goods — a fact that echoes today in the figures for its consumption of “ready meals,” which are three times more than the European average. In 1937 George Orwell wrote: “We may find in the long run that tinned food is a deadlier weapon than the machine gun.”

Orwell wasn’t the first (and certainly not the last) anxious inquirer into the British diet. Food scares erupted throughout the 19th century, caused mainly by adulteration, and the physique of the poor spoke eloquently of their undernourishment on jam and margarine. The crisis was reached in the Boer War, when 38 percent of eligible army recruits were found unfit to fight and a government study showed that working-class boys aged 12 were on average five inches shorter than boys of the same age who attended private schools. The parents of these richer boys would have been sitting down to meals at the apex of late Victorian and Edwardian luxury — meals that stretched far into the night, ice-cold caviar followed by velvety soups, followed by sole and duckling breasts and Chateaubriand steaks and meringues, the courses interspersed with sorbets and finished off with a savory, oysters wrapped in bacon or eggs en cocotte.

Colquhoun is mindful of these extremities of privilege, though the real delight of her book lies in the abundance of illuminating and curious facts. Alexis Soyer, chef at the Reform Club, designed one of the earliest gas cookers and called it, catchily if you were very well educated, the Phidomageireion, which means “thrifty kitchen” in classical Greek. Meanwhile the English passion for gravy led to the belief in an illusory substance called ozmazome, a kind of El Dorado of juicy nourishment thought to lie at the heart of the meat — a “befuddled concept” from which the German chemist Justus von Leibig nevertheless made a great deal of money when he invented beef extract.

Social class is never far away in this story. Just before Gordon Brown became prime minister, I had a meal with him in his Scottish home. Homemade lamb stew was followed by shop-bought rhubarb tart, with a glass of supermarket white available, if anyone wanted one, from an already-opened bottle. As befits a politician keen to stress his plain values, the meal was perfectly good and superbly ordinary, the kind of food we had both grown up with (though 40 or 50 years ago, wine would have been unusual). The interesting thing is that we called it “lunch.” In my youth, the working-class appellation for the midday meal was dinner. Tea was the evening meal. Lunch (luncheon! How fancy!) existed only in the stories of children’s books like “Wind in the Willows.” Just as much as the television popularity of the sacred Nigella Lawson or the profane Gordon Ramsay, this change in terminology suggests that in much of Britain middle-class eating habits have triumphed, not a moment too soon.

Ian Jack, until recently editor of Granta, writes for The Guardian.

Wandsworth 監獄

Wandsworth - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia



另類監獄體恤受刑人 親子會面同作功課
法國哲學家傅柯在其名著《規訓與懲罰》裡,討論到監獄的誕生及其目的,傅柯表示,監獄產生的目的主要是為了改造個人,透過一系列特定技術,對個人行為儀態進行監視、控制、規範及規訓,鑄造出所謂有利社會整體利益的個體。
【文/潘彥君】

法國哲學家傅柯在其名著《規訓與懲罰》裡,討論到監獄的誕生及其目的,傅柯表示,監獄產生的目的主要是為了改造個人,透過一系列特定技術,對個人行為儀態 進行監視、控制、規範及規訓,鑄造出所謂有利社會整體利益的個體。然而,傅柯精闢的見解在於他強調,與其達到這些預設的目標,監獄所真正帶來的影響是隔離 甚至斷絕人與社會的關係,這解釋了許多服完刑的人面對社會適應不良的困境,以及污名化的社會現實。

為了「補救」監獄體制所產生的負面效果,一些社會學研究特別發現家庭關係與出獄犯人再犯機率之間有決定性的相互關係。不少犯人在入獄前有家庭、小孩,夫妻及親子關係,經常因為有限的互動而生疏冷淡,這對許多犯人出獄後的社會生活適應產生很大的障礙,也很可能導致再度犯罪。

對此,位於泰晤士河南岸的Wandsworth監獄(大倫敦地區最大的監獄,目前共看守一千四百多名犯人),最近實施一項HomeworkClub(中文 暫譯:家庭作業集會)的新計畫,讓所有為人父的犯人,每個禮拜可以與自己的小孩會面一小時,一起做功課和玩遊戲。因此,在Wandsworth監獄,親友 會面的畫面很不同於英國其他地方的監獄,在這裡可以看到七歲大孩童,與父親一起寫家庭作業,打鬧嬉戲。當然,這些小孩都得經過嚴密的安檢過程,獄方仍然得 嚴加防範,不希望這理應是溫馨的親子交流時間,不會淪於走私毒品的管道。

英國媒體BBC特地走訪了這座監獄,訪談了幾位受刑人父親,每個人都對這項計畫表示肯定與感謝,有一位父親表示自己是第一次服刑,更是第一次離開自己的妻 兒,透過「家庭作業集會」可以與兒子相處,儘管時間短暫,對他和兒子而言,卻是很寶貴的一小時。一位接受訪問的小男孩,表示非常期待每個禮拜的「家庭作業 集會」,因為他非常喜歡與父親做功課,當記者詢問原因為何,他則笑著表示,因為父親不比母親嚴格,話一說完,引起父親及旁人大笑。當然,並不是所有父親都 可以參與這個計畫,先決條件必須是獄中行為良好者,同時也必須經過獄方完整的風險評估,也因此,有人形容,這是一個贏來的特權。

Wandsworth的典獄長對BBC強調,家庭關係的和諧與否,對正在服刑或已出獄的犯人有很重要的影響,健全的家庭關係往往扮演了受刑人重返社會的基 石,協助其社會適應,也因此降低他們再犯的機率。他表示,為了顧及整個監獄的安全,這個每周一次的「家庭作業集會」,獄方派有專人監控,同時也請來受過訓 練會帶活動的社福人員,協助親子的互動。

令人好奇的是,為何沒有為女性受刑人量身訂做類似的計畫?

2007年12月5日 星期三

Great Smog of 1952

1952年倫敦煙霧事件

[編輯首段]維基百科,自由的百科全書

跳转到: 导航, 搜尋

1952年倫敦煙霧事件1952年12月5日9日發生在倫敦的一次嚴重大氣污染事件。這次事件造成多達12000人因為空氣污染而喪生,並推動了英國環境保護立法的進程。

目錄

[隱藏]

[編輯] 事件經過

1952年12月5日開始,逆溫層籠罩倫敦,城市處於高氣壓中心位置,垂直和水準的空氣流動均停止,連續數日空氣寂靜無風。當時倫敦冬季多使用燃煤採暖,市區內還分佈有許多以為主要能源的的火力發電站。由於逆溫層的作用,煤炭燃燒產生的二氧化碳一氧化碳二氧化硫、粉塵等污染物在城市上空蓄積,引發了連續數日的大霧天氣。期間由於毒霧的影響,不僅大批航班取消,甚至白天汽車在公路上行駛都必須打開大燈。

當時在正在倫敦舉辦一場展覽會,參展的牛隻首先對煙霧產生了反應,350頭牛有52頭嚴重中毒,14頭奄奄一息,1頭當場死亡。不久倫敦市民也對毒霧產生了反應,許多人感到呼吸困難、眼睛刺痛,發生哮喘咳嗽等呼吸道癥狀的病人明顯增多,進而死亡率陡增,據史料記載從12月5日到12月8日的4天里,倫敦市死亡人數達4000人。根據事後統計,在發生煙霧事件的一周中,48歲以上人群死亡率為平時的3倍;1歲以下人群的死亡率為平時的2倍,在這一周內,倫敦市因支氣管炎死亡704人,冠心病死亡281人,心臟衰竭死亡244人,結核病死亡77人,分別為前一周的9.5、2.4、2.8和5.5倍,此外肺炎、肺癌、流行性感冒等呼吸系統疾病的發病率也有顯著性增加。

12月9日之後,由於天氣變化,毒霧逐漸消散,但在此之後兩個月內,由於又有近8000人因為煙霧事件而死於呼吸系統疾病

事件之後倫敦市政當局開始著手調查事件原因,但未果。此後的1956年1957年1962年又連續發生了多達十二次嚴重的煙霧事件。直到1965年後,有毒煙霧才從倫敦消聲匿跡。

[編輯] 原因

發生1952年倫敦煙霧事件的直接原因是燃煤產生的二氧化硫粉塵污染,間接原因是開始於12月4日的逆溫層所造成的大氣污染物蓄積。燃煤產生的粉塵表面會大量吸附水,成為形成煙霧的凝聚核,這樣便形成了濃霧。另外燃煤粉塵中含有三氧化二鐵成分,可以催化另一種來自燃煤的污染物二氧化硫氧化生成三氧化硫,進而與吸附在粉塵表面的化合生成硫酸霧滴。這些硫酸霧滴吸入呼吸系統後會產生強烈的刺激作用,使體弱者發病甚至死亡。

[編輯] 影響

1952年的煙霧事件並非倫敦歷史上第一次嚴重的煙霧事件,據史料記載倫敦最早的有毒煙霧事件可以追溯到1837年2月,那次事件造成至少200名倫敦市民死亡。而在1952年之後,倫敦也多次發生煙霧事件。

1952年的事件引起了民眾和政府當局的注意,使人們意識到控制大氣污染的重要意義,並且直接推動了1956年英國潔淨空氣法案的通過。

1952年倫敦煙霧事件被環保主義者看做20世紀重大環境災害事件之一,並且作為煤煙型空氣污染的典型案例出現在多部環境科學教科書中。

[編輯] 類似事件

1952年倫敦煙霧是比較典型的由於燃煤廢氣和天氣因素共同造成的環境災害,在人類歷史上曾經多次出現類似事件:發生在美國1948年多諾拉煙霧事件1930年比利時馬斯河谷煙霧事件1959年墨西哥波薩里卡事件都是此類環境災害的典型案例。

[編輯] 外部連接


Great Smog of 1952

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Jump to: navigation, search

The Great Smog also referred to as the Big Smoke, befell London starting on 5 December 1952, and lasted until 9 December 1952. This catastrophe caused or advanced the death of thousands and formed an important impetus to the modern environmental movement. Deaths in most cases during the Great Smog were due to respiratory tract infections from hypoxia (low level of oxygenation of blood) due to mechanical obstruction of the air passages by pus arising from lung infections due to smog. The lung infections were mainly bronchopneumonia or acute purulent bronchitis superimposed upon chronic bronchitis. [1]

Early in December 1952, a cold fog descended upon London. Because of the cold, Londoners began to burn more coal than usual. The resulting air pollution was trapped by the inversion layer formed by the dense mass of cold air. Concentrations of pollutants, coal smoke in particular, built up dramatically. The problem was made worse by use of low-quality high-sulphur coal for home heating in London in order to permit export of higher-quality coal, because of the country's tenuous economic situation [1]. The "fog," or smog, was so thick that driving became difficult or impossible. It entered indoors easily, and concerts and screenings of films were cancelled as the audience could not see the stage or screen.

Since London was known for its fog, there was no great panic at the time. In the weeks that followed, the medical services compiled statistics and found that the fog had killed 4,000 people—most of whom were very young or elderly, or had pre-existing respiratory problems. There was relief that Queen Mary The Queen Dowager, then aged 85 and suffering with respiratory problems, was not at Buckingham Palace at the time of the incident. Another 8,000 died in the weeks and months that followed.

These shocking revelations led to a rethinking of air pollution; the disaster had demonstrated its lethal potential to people around the world. New regulations were put in place restricting the use of dirty fuels in industry and banning black smoke. These included the Clean Air Acts of 1956 and of 1968, and the City of London (Various Powers) Act of 1954.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Camps, Francis E (Ed.) (1976). "Gradwohl's Legal Medicine, 3rd edition" Bristol: John Wright & Sons Ltd, ISBN 0 7236 0310 3. page 236

[edit] External links

2007年12月1日 星期六

Twentieth-Century Britain : An Encyclopedia

Twentieth-Century Britain : An Encyclopedia

這本 因為有內容標題 所以值得"臥遊"

Eric Gill 愛立克 蓋爾

*Eric Gill

Eric Gill 愛立克 蓋爾


Arthur Eric Rowton Gill (February 22, 1882November 17, 1940) was a British sculptor, ty發佈文章peface designer, stonecutter and printmaker, who was associated with the Arts and Crafts movement. Today he is a controversial figure, with his well known religious views and subject matter being seen at odds with his paraphiliaic behaviour and erotic art.


Wikipedia article "Eric Gill". 相當有參考 價值

THE GOLDEN COCKERELS.


Prospero and Ariel (BBC)


spray (Venus)


Prospero and Ariel (BBC)

Eric Gill

"In 1932 Gill produced a group of sculptures, Prospero and Ariel, for the BBC's Broadcasting House in London."



Sculptures in Portland Stone at first floor level by Eric Gill.

中國的網際網絡間諜威脅

espionage (China)

es·pi·o·nage (ĕs'pē-ə-näzh', -nĭj) pronunciation
[n. 探索, スパイ行為[活動]; スパイを使うこと.

The act or practice of spying or of using spies to obtain secret information, as about another government or a business competitor.

[French espionnage, from espionner, to spy, from Old French espion, spy, from Old Italian spione, of Germanic origin.]

bbc《泰晤士報》說,英國的軍情五處就中國的網際網絡間諜威脅發出警告。

報道指出,300名商業領袖遭到"電子攻擊"和中國軍方針對英國的商業部門。

英國政府公開指責中國對英國的主要經濟部門,包括銀行和金融機構的電腦系統,進行國家支助的間諜行為。

在一次前無先例的行動中,軍情無處的首長向銀行、會計師行和律師事務所的300名業務和保安主管發出機密信件,警告他們小心"中國國家組織的攻擊"。

相信這是英國政府首次直接指稱中國涉及網絡間諜活動,這一笨拙和明顯的指控可能引起嚴重的外交後果,甚至使布朗作為首相身份在明年首次訪華的計劃蒙上陰影。

軍情五處的機密信件承認,與中國做生意有強大的經濟和商業理由,但有需要確保所涉及的風險管理。

英國政府公開指責中共,說中共國家機構對英國經濟的重要環節進行網路間諜活動,對象包括大型銀行與金融服務業的電腦系統;英國軍情局第五處(MI5)已提醒相關機構加強防範。

倫敦泰晤士報一日報導,這可能是英國政府首次直接指責中共涉及網路間諜活動,可能產生嚴重的外交後果,並影響英國首相布朗明年初的中國大陸訪問行程。

MI5在一項秘密通報中指出,MI5處長伊文斯親自通知英國企業領袖,表示他們可能面臨中共國家機構支持的網路攻擊。通報指出:「我們必須與中國保持密切 的經貿關係,但也必須做好風險控管。」除銀行與金融服務業外,獲得這項通報的重要產業還包括電信、水電機構,以及國防承包商。

報告表示,中共軍方已經鎖定在中國大陸經商的英國企業,透過網路竊取重要商業資訊。報告又說,英國面臨一場「電腦冷戰」,駭客已嚴重威脅英國國家安全。




From The Times
December 1, 2007
MI5 alert on China’s cyberspace spy threat
Exclusive: director-general of MI5 sends letter to British companies warning systems are under attack from China

Rhys Blakely, Jonathan Richards, James Rossiter and Richard Beeston

The Government has openly accused China of carrying out state-sponsored espionage against vital parts of Britain’s economy, including the computer systems of big banks and financial services firms.