Features

LOS ANGELES — Rapper Kendrick Lamar dominated the MTV Video Music Awards on Sunday as the glitzy gala took a political turn with impassioned denunciations of white supremacists in America. 

Lamar won the most prestigious award of Video of the Year for “HUMBLE”., his ironic look at his growing fame in which he dresses up as everything from the Pope to Jesus in “The Last Supper”.

Lamar opened the show in Los Angeles with a martial arts-themed performance with ninja dancers, one of whom eerily appeared to set himself ablaze.

One of the most acclaimed rappers of recent times, Lamar took home six statuettes — rechristened the “Moon Person” from “Moonman” to be gender-neutral. 

English songwriter Ed Sheeran won Artist of the Year, a new prize after the separate male and female categories were merged, while rapper Khalid won for new artist.

While Lamar’s latest album “DAMN”. toned down his earlier political bent, the globally televised awards gala itself did anything but. 

The mother of Heather Heyer, the 32-year-old anti-racism protester killed when an avowed white supremacist drove into a crowd during the August 12 unrest in Charlottesville, Virginia, took the stage and vowed to “make Heather’s death count”.

Controlling her emotions as the crowd applauded, Susan Bro announced a foundation in her daughter’s name to offer scholarships to pursue careers in social justice.

Bro presented “Best Fight Against the System”, a new award that recognises activism in a music video. In the spirit of equality, Bro said all six contenders would share the prize.

The songs ranged from attacks on racism to “Scars to Your Beautiful” by rising star Alessia Cara, an ode to healthy body image which she performed at the awards, dancers around her rustling her hair and removing her oversized dress.

The singer PINK also took up body perceptions as she accepted an award for lifetime achievement, saying she gave a PowerPoint demonstration to her daughter about successful androgynous musicians after the six-year-old voiced doubt about her femininity.

Sharp words for Trump

Paris Jackson, a model and the daughter of the late “King of Pop” Michael Jackson, also lashed the white supremacists who marched in Charlottesville. 

“We must show these Nazis,” she said to cheers, “that we have zero tolerance for their violence and hatred.”

With Texas being whipped by massive storm Harvey, the gala sent best wishes to residents in harm’s way. Host Katy Perry asked viewers to consider donations to the American Red Cross.

Perry used wires to float onto the stage in an MTV-style moonsuit before an evening of shifting attire, ending with the singer back in the air to slam-dunk basketballs during her song “Swish Swish”.

Perry took aim at President Donald Trump as she urged fans to choose a winner in a category still open to online voting.

“This is one election where the popular vote actually matters,” quipped Perry, one of the most vocal celebrity campaigners for defeated candidate Hillary Clinton. “But hurry up before some random Russian pop star wins.”

MTV invited transgender US servicepeople to attend the show — two days after Trump ordered a ban on new transgender recruits in the military.

Taylor goes gothic

Pop A-lister Taylor Swift used the awards to unveil the video for her latest song, “Look What You Made Me Do”, in which she showed a new dark, bad-girl image.

The camera opens with imagery of a cemetery and a grave that says “Here Lies Taylor Swift’s Reputation” — a theme that will apparently weigh heavily on Swift’s newly announced album, which is entitled “Reputation” and comes out on November 10.

The 27-year-old singer, usually known for her squeaky-clean image, appears in the video in a crashed car, smashing up a store with a baseball bat and sitting atop a motorcycle in a spiked leather jacket.

Jared Leto of Thirty Seconds to Mars paid tribute to two rock singers who committed suicide this year — Chester Bennington of Linkin Park and Chris Cornell of Soundgarden — before putting on a trippy performance with thermal cameras.

The rapper Logic, joined by Cara and Khalid, reinforced the anti-suicide message singing “1-800-273-8255” — the title a reference to a help line, with the number emblazoned on the T-shirts of dozens of people who had attempted suicide and joined them on stage.

On a lighter theme, pop great Rod Stewart sang a new take on his 1978 hit “Da Ya Think I’m Sexy?” — this time with much younger dance group DNCE.

A visually arresting sports crossover SUV with authentic sporting credentials but when first launched as the FX back in 2003, Infiniti’s enduring signature model was extensively evolved for a second generation circa 2009.

Renamed the QX70 as of 2013, its influence on the now burgeoning sports SUV segment has been significant if somewhat unrecognised by rivals. And even now, on the eve of its retirement, the QX70 remains a truly unique vehicle, with inspired and viscerally-charged design, dynamics and drive-train that is engaging and rewarding like scant few others.

Dramatic and charismatic

Stylish and evocative, QX70 could have been mistaken for a European exotic when it first arrived, and remains as sexy as ever today, with its long bonnet, side vents, short overhangs, rakish roofline and rearwards cabin design all alluding to its sports car intentions, underpinnings and layout.

With its swooping lines, scalloped wings and pert rear, the shark-like QX70 seems to be sitting on its rear, with an athletic stance, distinct sense of urgency, and the long distance between its wheel-arches and A-pillar lending it and indulgent, luxurious and sporty profile.

Underneath, the QX70 is built on a front-mid engine platform with the engine positioned just behind the front axle for balanced within wheelbase 53:47 front-to-rear weighting. It also features sophisticated front double wishbone, rear multi-link suspension and rear-drive derived and biased four-wheel-drive system for sports car-like driving dynamics.

A baroque design with a palpable sense of motion and the dramatic, it features slim, browed headlights and broad, deep-set and hungry honeycomb grille and dual big bore tailpipes at the rear, while in the sportier QX70S trim, as driven on Jordanian roads, it fitted vast 21-inch wheels to better fill in its discretely bulging wheel-arches.

Urgent and exacting

Likely to be replaced by a smaller displacement turbocharged engine in the QX70’s eventual replacement, the current VQ-series naturally-aspirated 3.7-litre V6 with variable valve timing and lift, is, however, a true gem. 

Developing 329BHP at a haughty 7000rpm, it is a velvety smooth, urgently progressive, engaging and exacting engine with superbly precise throttle control to allow one to dial in perfectly measured increments of power and grip versus slip through a corner. Long-legged and high-revving to 7500rpm rev limit, the QX70’s engine allows one to maintain a consistent yet, uninterrupted power build-up through fast sweeping corners.

Pulling hard and responsive from tick-over to redline, the QX70’s charismatic V6 is gutsy, punchy and incremental with toque peaking at 267lb/ft at 5200rpm, if at 13l/100km combined, is slightly thirstier than more modern yet, less rewarding engines. Acceleration through the 0-100km/h benchmark takes just 6.8-seconds or less, and top speed is 233km/h or more.

Refined and quiet at low rev, the QX70S’ acoustics rise from discreet thrusting, whirring and whining to a more intense and urgent, yet, subdued wail as revs reach towards the redline. Given the QX70S’ visceral character, an optionally more vocal and evocative exhaust note would not have been amiss.

Fluency and feel

Peaky, precise and with pin-point throttle control, the QX70S is still a benchmark in its segment after all these year. Driving all-four-wheels through a smooth and swift shifting 7-speed automatic gearbox, with responsive manual mode shifts actuated through fixed column-mounted magnesium paddle shifters, the QX70S also features downshift rev matching that automatically blips the throttle on downshift, for more fluent driving. 

Rear-biased up to 100 per cent and able to send 50 per cent to the front wheels when necessary on low traction surfaces and for road-holding, the QX70S handles with rear-drive balance and sporting panache, but can claw back grip when necessary.

Benefiting from rear-drive instincts yet four-wheel-drive road-holding at the limit, the QX70S is about as close as a 1995kg SUV gets to being a sports car. Playful at the rear if provoked while stability controls are in low intervention mode, the QX70S’ chassis is balanced, nuanced and adjustable with a pivot of it weight, while some understeer is evident if pushed too hard into a corner without some finesse.

Firm and meaty when cruising, the QX70S’ hydraulic-assisted comes alive through corners, becoming lighter, more natural and intuitive with better road feel, feedback, resistance and nuance than expected for an SUV riding on huge low profile 265/45R21 tyres.

Classy, comfortable and committed

Stable, committed, refined and reassuring on motorway duties, the QX70S is, however, also, intuitive, eager and agile through winding switchbacks and country lanes. Well-controlling its weight through corners, the QX70S feels tidy in lateral weight shift, while rebound control is settled and buttoned down. 

Last driven as the FX37 on smooth Dubai roads, the QX70S thoroughly impressed one more demanding, textured and winding Jordanian back roads, where it well-processed road imperfections despite its somewhat firm setup and tyres. One, however, felt that perhaps slightly tauter dampers and taller tyre sidewalls would retain fluency while improving suppleness, vertical control on crests and help keep wheels even more firmly dug into the road.

Classy and comfortable with supportive seats and alert driving position, the QX70S’ cabin feels well constructed with quality materials like purple thread stitched leather upholstery and steering, and a sporty dual pod-like design and intuitive layouts. Well-kitted, it features a reversing and bird’s eye view camera to help negotiate tight parking spots and compensate for its low roofline, high waistline and long bonnet.

Evocative when peering over its long scalloped bonnet, the QX70S’ curvaceous wings somewhat limit front visibility in tight spaces, but help one position it through corners. Despite a rakishly sloped roofline, it is well packaged with good rear headroom even for tall passengers and wide door swing angles.

TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS

Engine: 3.7-litre, in-line V6-cylinders

Bore x stroke: 95.5 x 86mm

Compression ratio: 11:1

Valve-train: 24-valve, DOHC, variable timing

Gearbox: 7-speed automatic, four-wheel-drive

Ratios: 1st 4.923 2nd 3.193 3rd 2.042 4th 1.411 5th 1.0 6th 0.862 7th 0.771

Reverse/final drive ratio: 3.972/3.692

0-100km/h: 6.8-seconds

Maximum speed: 233km/h

Rev limit: 7500rpm

Power, BHP (PS) [kW]: 329 (333) [245] @7000rpm

Specific power: 89BHP/litre

Power-to-weight: 164.9BHP/tonne

Torque, lb/ft (Nm): 267 (363) @5200rpm

Specific torque: 97.9Nm/litre

Torque-to-weight: 181.4Nm/tonne

Fuel consumption, combined: 13-litres/100km*

Fuel tank: 90-litres

Length: 4865mm

Width: 1925mm

Height: 1680mm

Wheelbase: 2885mm

Track, F/R: 1635/1640mm

Ground clearance: 187mm

Approach/break-over/departure angles: 28.8°/18.7°/20.9°

Aerodynamic drag co-efficiency: 0.35

Headroom, F/R: 998/978mm

Shoulder room, F/R: 1455/1458mm

Legroom, F/R: 1135/879mm

Loading height: 790mm

Kerb weight: 1995kg

Weight distribution, F/R: 53/47 per cent

Steering: Variable-assisted, rack and pinion

Lock-to-lock: 2.96-turns

Turning circle: 11.2-metres

Suspension: Double wishbone/multi-link, anti-roll bars

Brakes, F/R: Ventilated discs, 320mm/308mm

Tyres: 265/45R21

*US EPA

Euphoria

Lily King

New York, Grove Press, 2014

Pp. 261

Lily King’s fictionalised account of a pivotal interval in the life and work of the influential American anthropologist, Margaret Mead, is set in the Territory of New Guinea. Now an independent state in the eastern half of the second largest island in the world, the western section being part of Indonesia, it remains one of the most diverse and least explored areas of the globe.

Think what it was like in the early 20th century, when the first Western anthropologists began to arrive. King’s vibrant, but not overly profuse descriptions of the tropical jungle and its exotic inhabitants are certainly part of the novel’s charm, but not the main one.

“Euphoria” is overwhelmingly fascinating, but more because of the author’s nuanced depiction of the three main characters, their love triangle, and the ideas and emotions which motivate their research and romance. The novel was inspired by Mead’s life, but not in terms of events, for many of these are changed. 

Rather, the story is true to Mead’s spirit and ideas, especially her conviction in the intertwining of the personal and the professional that inspires the very structure of the novel, driving the plot and filling it with romantic and moral tension. For the three anthropologists in the novel, scholarly theories, and their ideas about love and life are so tightly bound together as to defy separation, and it is King’s skilful rendering of this tightness which is her greatest achievement.

In 1933, anthropologists Margaret Mead, Reo Fortune and Gregory Bateson spent some months together on the Sepik River in New Guinea, studying what were considered primitive tribes — the primary subject matter of the profession at that time. While retaining much of the real backgrounds of the three, King assigns them different names and fates. [Mead was actually married to both men, but the novel occurs at the time of her marriage to Fortune.]

Mead’s stand-in, Nell, feels stifled by her husband Fen’s possessiveness. While his priority is gathering relics [ownership], hers is participating in the indigenous people’s social life in hopes of discovering alternative patterns of child-rearing, sexuality and mourning that would make humans more free, compassionate and peaceful than in Western societies. “Always in her mind there had been the belief that somewhere on earth there was a better way to live, and that she would find it.” [p. 107]

In Andrew [modelled on Bateson], Nell finds a kindred spirit with whom she can discuss her theories and discoveries about the tribes they are studying in the expansive, open-ended way she considers productive. This leads her to share with him the euphoria she experiences when she feels she has begun to understand a new society. “It’s a delusion… and it’s followed by the complete despair of ever understanding anything. But at that moment the place feels entirely yours. It’s the briefest, purest euphoria.” [p. 50]

Andrew is lonely, having worked in an isolated area for two years. Encountering Nell is exhilarating. “For so long I’d felt that what I’d been trained to do in academic writing was to press my nose to the ground, and here was Nell Stone with her head raised and swiveling in all directions.” [p. 84] Their falling in love makes the professional team a love triangle. Romantic considerations underlie their mutual discussions, as well as their interactions with the indigenous people. Being the only foreigners in a remote environment furthers compresses their interaction. One does not know in which direction the triangle will explode.

Since that time, anthropology has gone way beyond only studying primitive societies. Yet, many issues raised by the novel, and the ideas debated by Nell, Fen and Andrew, are still relevant. Some of these issues are ethical, such as whether it is admissible to take away valuable relics, or to share detailed knowledge of a locality gained in field research, with armies or intelligence services, and if anthropologists can avoid being identified with colonial enterprises.

Another issue is how anthropology, like some other social sciences, constantly has to prove itself alongside the “hard” sciences. Other questions are philosophical, like the dangers of preconceived ideas about what is “natural” or “normal”, or whether the researcher should go beyond observation to share findings with the subjects and elicit their views.

Most interesting is the question of whether one can truly understand another culture. Andrew despairs of the researcher’s ability to be objective, finding that analyses of other cultures say more about the researcher than about the people under study, whereas Nell is at home with the limits of subjectivity, knowing that it cannot be otherwise and that a person can have only one perspective. “But our perspective can have an enormous wingspan, if we give it freedom to unfurl”. [p. 50]

To enrich the plot and increase its wingspan, King writes from two perspectives, letting Andrew narrate most chapters but interspersing chapters composed of Nell’s diary-like notes. With imagination, insight and authenticity, King has crafted an unforgettable tale of adventure, romance and socially relevant ideas which is hard to put down.

Energy drinks could be a gateway to cocaine use, according to a new study.

Researchers at the University of Maryland School of Public Health found that young adults who said they had consumed energy drinks yearly between ages 21 and 24 were at greater risk for subsequently doing cocaine, using prescription stimulants for non-medical uses and problem drinking.

The 1,099 study participants were recruited as 18-year-old college students.

Those who did not consume energy drinks as they got older were less likely to develop substance-abuse problems.

Amelia Arria, director of the university’s Centre on Young Adult Health and Development, explained that factors contributing to a propensity for risk taking, susceptibility to peer pressure and changes in energy-drink users’ brain that make them like stimulants more.

“Energy drinks are not as regulated as some other beverages. One policy implication is to consider options for regulating the maximum amount of caffeine that can be put in an energy drink.” she said. “Parents need to be aware of those risks when their child or adolescent or young adult wants to make a decision about what sort of beverage to consume. They need to be aware of the potential risk.”

Energy drinks are a booming segment of the beverage market. Last year, North American retail sales were close to $11 billion, up from less than $5 billion in 2007, according to the market research company Euromonitor.

Big names among energy drinks include Red Bull, Monster, Amp and Rockstar.

Anheuser-Busch announced last month that it was acquiring the organic energy drink maker Hiball Energy.

Arria and her co-authors cited existing data that an estimated one in every three American teens and young adults consume energy drinks or energy shots with 50 per cent of college students reporting they have taken them in the past month.

William Dermody, vice president of policy for the American Beverage Association, questioned the methodology and comprehensiveness of the University of Maryland study and said it did not prove causation.

“Mainstream energy drinks have been extensively studied and confirmed safe for consumption by government safety authorities worldwide, including a recent review by the European Food Safety Authority. Nothing in this study counters this well-established fact,” he explained, adding that the US Food and Drug Administration regulates the drinks’ ingredients and labelling.

Dermody said that mainstream energy drinks contain about half the caffeine of a similarly-sized cup of coffee and that they account for about 2 per cent of Americans’ caffeine intake from all sources.

SINGAPORE — Passengers’ baggage is collected by robots, they relax in a luxurious waiting area complete with an indoor garden before getting a face scan and swiftly passing through security and immigration — this could be the airport of the future. 

It is a vision that planners hope will become reality as new technology is rolled out, transforming the exhausting experience of getting stuck in lengthy queues in ageing, overcrowded terminals into something far more pleasant.

The Asia-Pacific has been leading the way but faces fierce competition from the Middle East as major hubs compete to attract the growing number of long-haul travellers who can choose how to route their journey.

The regions “are the two leading pockets of technology growth because they are really competing to be the global hubs for air transportation”, Seth Young, director of the Centre for Aviation Studies at Ohio State University, told AFP.

“If I’m going to fly from New York to Bangalore, do I transfer through Abu Dhabi or Dubai or do I transfer through Hong Kong? That’s a huge, huge market.”

But the changes also represent major challenges that could upend decades-old business models at major airports, with analysts warning operators may face a hit to their revenues to the tune of billions of dollars.

Facial scanning in particular is generating a lot of buzz. Changi in the affluent city-state of Singapore, regarded as among the world’s best airports, is set to roll out this biometric technology at a new terminal to open later this year.

Passengers will have their faces scanned when they first check in and at subsequent stages, theoretically allowing them to go through the whole boarding process quickly without encountering another human. 

Australia announced in July an investment of Aus$22.5 million ($17.5 million) to introduce face recognition technology at all the country’s international airports, while Dubai airport is also trialling it.

Robot baggage handlers

Robots are appearing at some major hubs, including at Seoul’s Incheon airport, where they carry out tasks including cleaning and carrying luggage, while Changi’s new terminal will have robotic cleaners complete with butlers’ uniforms.

Self-service check-in and printing of boarding passes is already common, with many people printing their passes at home or at airport kiosks, and some hubs are now introducing self-service baggage drop points.

The service, which allows passengers to print and tag their baggage, and then send it off on the conveyor belt, is available at airports including Australian hubs, Hong Kong, London Heathrow and Amsterdam’s Schiphol.

Airports are also trying to overhaul their image as dreary places that must be endured in order to get from A to B, to somewhere travellers can enjoy spending time.

Changi is building a new terminal complex called Jewel, a 10-storey development filled with shops and restaurants, whose centrepiece will be a 40-metre indoor waterfall surrounded by an indoor garden.

The complex will make the airport look more like a shopping mall than a traditional hub, and is aimed at cashing in on transiting passengers.

“They are looking at retail, non-aeronautical profits,” said Shukor Yusof, an aviation analyst from Endau Analytics.

But while hubs in Asia-Pacific and the Middle East surge ahead, airports in the United States and Europe are being left behind. 

“Europe and the US were the leading aviation markets for the last 75 to 100 years, and it’s very difficult to revolutionise your infrastructure when you are on a foundation that is 75 years old,” said Young of the Centre for Aviation Studies.

He added it was also a matter of “political will”, as emerging economies see building cutting-edge airports as a way of raising their status globally.

Ageing hubs 

Some US and European airports are nevertheless trying to up their game.

New York’s ageing airports have long been criticised as old-fashioned, cramped and dirty but JFK, the main international hub serving the city, hopes to shed its dire reputation with a proposed $10 billion redevelopment.

Amsterdam’s Schiphol is aiming to become the world’s leading digital airport by 2019, and has been testing hand luggage scanners that allow passengers to keep liquids and laptops in their bags. It is also looking at biometric technology.

Despite the buzz surrounding new technology, there are concerns that rapid innovation could threaten long-held ways of doing business.

A report from consultancy Roland Berger warned that airport revenues from retail and parking could fall by between 2 and 4 billion dollars due to the new innovations.

Automated, more predictable check-in procedures threaten retail outlets as passengers are likely to reduce the “buffer” they build in to trips to the airport, meaning less shopping time, while developments such as ride-hailing apps could undercut parking revenues, it said.

Still, the landscape may not transform so quickly as many airports face difficulties in introducing new technology, from resistance to change to availability of financing, said Xavier Aymonod, a transport expert at Roland Berger and lead author of the report.

“It’s really challenging for airports to launch this digital transformation,” he told AFP.

Older adults who smoke are more likely to become physically frail than their counterparts who are former smokers or never used tobacco products, a recent study suggests.

Researchers studied people age 60 or older in the UK who had not yet developed so-called frailty, a term that describes a lack of robustness and physical reserves that leaves a person more vulnerable to disability when they become ill or experience an injury like a fall.

After four years of follow-up, smokers were 60 per cent more likely to become frail than participants who didn’t smoke.

“Those who quit smoking in the past did not have the same increased risk of frailty, which suggests that stopping smoking is likely to have benefits even if late in life,” said study leader Dr Gotaro Kojima of University College London.

“It could potentially decrease the risk of becoming frail,” Kojima said by e-mail.

While frailty is associated with aging, it’s not inevitable. Symptoms can include weight loss, fatigue, slow walking speed, low levels of physical activity, and reduced muscle mass. Frail elders are at higher risk for falls, fractures, hospitalisations and cognitive decline.

To see if smoking might influence the risk of frailty, researchers analysed data from a nationally representative UK survey of 2,542 older adults.

At the start of the study, 56 per cent of participants were considered “robust” because they reported no signs of frailty. The rest had one or two symptoms of frailty but not enough to be classified as frail.

Overall, 1,113 participants were former smokers and another 261 people currently smoked.

Current smokers had an increased risk of frailty even after researchers accounted for other factors that can play a role such as age, gender, alcohol use, education, income and cognitive function.

Past smokers, however, didn’t appear to have an increased risk of frailty. There also wasn’t a difference in frailty risk based on whether ex-smokers had quit at least a decade earlier or more recently, researchers report in Age and Ageing.

The picture looked different, however, when researchers examined chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), a common complication of smoking that makes it difficult to breathe. COPD is linked with an increased risk of balance difficulties, muscle weakness, thinning bones, blackouts and falls.

When researchers accounted for COPD, current smoking no longer appeared to influence the risk of frailty. This suggests that smokers are more apt to become frail because of COPD rather than from smoking itself, the authors conclude.

The study wasn’t a controlled experiment designed to prove whether or how smoking causes frailty.

Another limitation is that researchers lacked data on how much people smoked. In addition, participants who dropped out of the study over time tended to be frailer and sicker than those who remained and were included in the final analysis.

Even so, the findings should offer smokers yet another reason to quit, said Dr Teemu Niiranen, a researcher with Boston University’s Framingham Heart Study.

“In addition to causing cancer, smoking can damage the heart, lungs, blood vessels, mouth, reproductive organs, bones, skin and eyes,” Niiranen, who wasn’t involved in the study, said by e-mail. “Dysfunction in all of these organ systems predisposes to frailty at old age.”

Quitting can’t reverse or prevent all of the health problems associated with a lifetime of smoking, noted Dr Christian Delles of the Institute of Cardiovascular and Medical Sciences at the University of Glasgow in the UK. 

But the study does suggest smoking cessation may make a difference when it comes to frailty, Delles, who wasn’t involved in the study, said by e-mail. 

“[Ex-smokers’] risk of frailty was as low as that of people who had never smoked,” Delles said. “It is never too late to quit.” 

OSLO — Scientists are sucking carbon dioxide from the air with giant fans and preparing to release chemicals from a balloon to dim the sun’s rays as part of a climate engineering push to cool the planet. 

Backers say the risky, often expensive projects are urgently needed to find ways of meeting the goals of the Paris climate deal to curb global warming that researchers blame for causing more heatwaves, downpours and rising sea levels. 

The United Nations says the targets are way off track and will not be met simply by reducing emissions for example from factories or cars — particularly after US President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the 2015 pact.

They are pushing for other ways to keep temperatures down. 

In the countryside near Zurich, Swiss company Climeworks began to suck greenhouse gases from thin air in May with giant fans and filters in a $23 million project that it calls the world’s first “commercial carbon dioxide capture plant”.

Worldwide, “direct air capture” research by a handful of companies such as Climeworks has gained tens of millions of dollars in recent years from sources including governments, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and the European Space Agency.

If buried underground, vast amounts of greenhouse gases extracted from the air would help reduce global temperatures, a radical step beyond cuts in emissions that are the main focus of the Paris Agreement.

Climeworks reckons it now costs about $600 to extract a tonne of carbon dioxide from the air and the plant’s full capacity due by the end of 2017 is only 900 tonnes a year. That’s equivalent to the annual emissions of only 45 Americans. 

And Climeworks sells the gas, at a loss, to nearby greenhouses as a fertiliser to grow tomatoes and cucumbers and has a partnership with carmaker Audi, which hopes to use carbon in greener fuels.

Jan Wurzbacher, director and founder of Climeworks, says the company has planet-altering ambitions by cutting costs to about $100 a tonne and capturing one per cent of global man-made carbon emissions a year by 2025.

“Since the Paris Agreement, the business substantially changed,” he said, with a shift in investor and shareholder interest away from industrial uses of carbon to curbing climate change.

But penalties for factories, power plants and cars to emit carbon dioxide into the atmosphere are low or non-existent. It costs 5 euros ($5.82) a tonne in the European Union.

And isolating carbon dioxide is complex because the gas makes up just 0.04 per cent of the air. Pure carbon dioxide delivered by trucks, for use in greenhouses or to make drinks fizzy, costs up to about $300 a tonne in Switzerland.

Other companies involved in direct air capture include Carbon Engineering in Canada, Global Thermostat in the United States and Skytree in the Netherlands, a spinoff of the European Space Agency originally set up to find ways to filter out carbon dioxide breathed out by astronauts in spacecrafts.

Not science fiction

The Paris Agreement seeks to limit a rise in world temperatures this century to less than 2Co, ideally 1.5oC above pre-industrial times.

But UN data show that current plans for cuts in emissions will be insufficient, especially without the United States, and that the world will have to switch to net “negative emissions” this century by extracting carbon from nature.

Riskier “geo-engineering” solutions could be a backstop, such as dimming the world’s sunshine, dumping iron into the oceans to soak up carbon, or trying to create clouds.

Among new university research, a Harvard geo-engineering project into dimming sunlight to cool the planet set up in 2016 has raised $7.5 million from private donors. It plans a first outdoor experiment in 2018 above Arizona.

“If you want to be confident to get to 1.5oC you need to have solar geo-engineering,” said David Keith, of Harvard. 

Keith’s team aims to release about 1 kilo of sun dimming material, perhaps calcium carbonate, from a high-altitude balloon above Arizona next year in a tiny experiment to see how it affects the microphysics of the stratosphere.

“I don’t think it’s science fiction ... to me it’s normal atmospheric science,” he said.

Some research has suggested that geo-engineering with sun-dimming chemicals, for instance, could affect global weather patterns and disrupt vital Monsoons. 

And many experts fear that pinning hopes on any technology to fix climate change is a distraction from cuts in emissions blamed for heating the planet.

“Relying on big future deployments of carbon removal technologies is like eating lots of dessert today, with great hopes for liposuction tomorrow,” Christopher Field, a Stanford University professor of climate change, wrote in May.

Jim Thomas of ETC Group in Canada, which opposes climate engineering, said direct air capture could create “the illusion of a fix that can be used cynically or naively to entertain policy ideas such as ‘overshoot’” of the Paris goals.

But governments face a dilemma. Average surface temperatures are already about 1oC above pre-industrial levels and hit record highs last year.

“We’re in trouble,” said Janos Pasztor, head of the new Carnegie Climate Geoengineering Governance Project. “The question is not whether or not there will be an overshoot but by how many degrees and for how many decades.”

Faced with hard choices, many experts say that extracting carbon from the atmosphere is among the less risky options. Leaders of major economies, except Trump, said at a summit in Germany this month that the Paris accord was “irreversible”.

‘Barking mad’

Raymond Pierrehumbert, a professor of physics at Oxford University, said solar geo-engineering projects seemed “barking mad”. 

By contrast, he said “carbon dioxide removal is challenging technologically, but deserves investment and trial”.

The most natural way to extract carbon from the air is to plant forests that absorb the gas as they grow, but that would divert vast tracts of land from farming. Another option is to build power plants that burn wood and bury the carbon dioxide released.

Carbon Engineering, set up in 2009 with support from Gates and Murray Edwards, chairman of oil and gas group Canadian Natural Resources Ltd. has raised about $40 million and extracts about a tonne of carbon dioxide a day with turbines and filters.

“We’re mainly looking to synthesise fuels” for markets such as California with high carbon prices, said Geoffrey Holmes, business development manager at Carbon Engineering. 

But he added that “the Paris Agreement helps” with longer-term options of sucking large amounts from the air.

Among other possible geo-engineering techniques are to create clouds that reflect sunlight back into space, perhaps by using a mist of sea spray.

That might be used locally, for instance, to protect the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, said Kelly Wanser, principal director of the US-based Marine Cloud Brightening Project.

Among new ideas, Wurzbacher at Climeworks is sounding out investors on what he says is the first offer to capture and bury 50 tonnes of carbon dioxide from the air, for $500 a tonne. 

That might appeal to a company wanting to be on forefront of a new green technology, he said, even though it makes no apparent economic sense. 

LOS ANGELES — Mark Wahlberg soared to the top of the world’s highest paid actors on an annual Forbes magazine list that highlighted a huge disparity between male and female Hollywood stars.

Wahlberg, 46, earned an estimated $68 million in 2017 thanks to his pay days for movies “Daddy’s Home 2” and “Transformers: The Last Knight”, according to the Forbes ranking released on Tuesday.

The rapper-turned-actor knocked 2016 leader Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson into second place, with estimated 2017 earnings of $65 million.

Forbes estimates earnings, before taxes and management fees, from movies, TV and commercial endorsements.

The Forbes list again highlighted Hollywood’s gender pay gap. Last week, the magazine named “La La Land” Oscar winner Emma Stone as the world’s highest paid actress with an estimated 2017 take of $26 million.

Forbes said the 10 highest-paid leading men earned a combined $488.5 million before tax in its June 2016-June 2017 scoring period, nearly three times more than the $172.5 million earned by the top 10 scoring women.

Forbes attributed the disparity to the prevalence of superhero and action blockbusters that earn big at the box office for Hollywood studios, but tend to have fewer leading roles for women.

“Pirates of the Caribbean” star Johnny Depp, who for years has been among the top five paid actors, did not make the top 20 this year, Forbes said. Depp is currently embroiled in a bitter lawsuit with his former business managers who have detailed what they describe as his lavish spending habits.

Last December, before the May 2017 release of “Pirates of the Caribbean; Dead Men Tell No Tales”, Forbes named Depp the most overpaid actor for a second straight year as films such as “Alice Through the Looking Glass” and “Mortdecai” did not fare well. 

Three of Bollywood’s biggest stars — Shah Rukh Khan ($38 million), Salman Khan ($37 million) and Akshay Kumar ($35.5 million) — took the 8th, 9th and 10th places on the Forbes list, respectively.

The fast pace of technological changes and innovation continues unabated. Minor ones aside, perhaps the most obvious, the biggest two trends are electric cars and then our increasing dependency on the digital cloud for most everything.

The first is the impressive, strong push by the industry and governments to discontinue gasoline cars and move either to hybrid or to fully electric vehicles. The second is making us not just to keep data there but also, and more importantly, to do all our computer work, transactions, purchases and business directly on the net, without installing software on our computers, except for Internet access. The combined social impacts of these two changes cannot be underestimated. Moreover, merely following is not enough, one has to make the best of it all.

Make the best of the innovations requires adaptation. So, how do you adapt?

The speed of change is nothing new. For the last 25 years or so, we have kept on saying “technological changes are taking place faster than we can adapt to them” – it’s understood. Even those working in the technology field are now finding it hard to follow. It is therefore easy to imagine how the consumer, the layman feels about it!

For a quarter of a century we have just been observing the situation and admitting how hard it was to adapt, without anyone coming up with a solution, not to the change per se of course, but to learning how to adapt quickly, smoothly.

This is a big question, and asking for a formal, structured methodology to address it is easier said than done, I admit.

Countless subjects have become crucial to living well in this modern age. Adapting to technological changes is one of them. This is one of the topics that they don’t teach you at school, for there has simply never been any curriculum set for that. Maybe academics and education authorities should start thinking about it; it is never too late.

There would be no need to establish a full college degree in what I would call “Adapting to Technological Changes”; that would be going overboard. However, setting up an elective course would do nicely. Essentially it all consists of being mentally ready to keep learning new ways, not to be “locked” in what you already know, have learned or are using at some point in time.

One should be constantly prepared to accept the fact that, for example, whatever software application you have learned and are using, you should never take it for granted or think you will be using it as it is for as long as you live, but should be willing to start all over again and again, and learn a new one several times in a lifetime, repeatedly, relentlessly.

I have spoken to computer programmers who have graduated in the 1980s. Most of them are already in their fourth or fifth programming language. College days seem so distant…

Many are the drivers who are over sixty, and who still do not make the best use of the (already old) technology built in their cars such as ABS or automatic gear shifting. How are they going to handle fully-electric cars? Swedish carmaker Volvo has just announced that starting 2019 it will completely stop building gasoline-only cars and France has serious plans to see only electric cars on its roads by 2040.

So next time you see a screen notification on your computer inviting you to upgrade Windows 10 to its new Creators version (expected before the end of this year), or if your Internet provider is after you, nagging to make you change from copper ADSL to fibre optic, just welcome the change and go for it gladly. It is easy and painless once you accept the idea that nothing stays the same for too long in the field of technology. It’s just a state of mind one has to get into.

HONG KONG — It is 2050 and the world revolves around you. From the contents of your fridge to room temperature — digital assistants ensure your home runs smoothly. Your screens know your taste and show channels you want to see as you enter the room. Your car is driverless and your favourite barman may just be an android.

Predictions for an artificial intelligence (AI)-dominated future are increasingly common, but Antoine Blondeau has experience in reading, and arguably manipulating, the runes — he helped develop technology that evolved into predictive texting and Apple’s Siri.

“In 30 years the world will be very different,” he says, adding: “Things will be designed to meet your individual needs.”

Work, as we know it, will be redundant, he says — visual and sensory advances in robotics will see smart factories make real-time decisions requiring only human oversight rather than workers, while professions such as law, journalism, accounting and retail will be streamlined with AI doing the grunt work. 

Healthcare is set for a revolution, with individuals holding the data about their health and AI able to diagnose ailments, he explains. Blondeau says: “If you have a doctor’s appointment, it will be perhaps for the comfort of talking things through with a human, or perhaps because regulation will dictate a human needs to dispense medicine. But you won’t necessarily need the doctor to tell you what’s wrong.”

The groundwork has been done: Amazon’s Alexa and Google Home are essentially digital butlers that can respond to commands as varied as ordering pizza to managing appliances, while Samsung is working on a range of “smart” fridges, capable of giving daily news briefings, ordering groceries, or messaging your family at your request.

Leading media companies are already using “AI journalists” to produce economics and sports stories from data and templates created by their human counterparts.

Blondeau’s firm Sentient Technologies has already successfully used AI traders in the financial markets. In partnership with US retailer Shoes.com, it created an interactive ‘smart shopper’, which uses an algorithm that picks up information from gauging what you like and what you do not, offering suggestions.

In healthcare, the firm worked with America’s MIT to invent an AI nurse able to assess patterns in blood pressure data from thousands of patients to correctly identify those developing sepsis 30 minutes before the outward onset of the condition more than 90 per cent of the time in trials.

“It’s a critical window that doctors say gives them the extra time to save lives,” Blondeau says, but concedes bringing such concepts to the masses is difficult.

“The challenge is to pass to market because of regulations, but also because people have an intrinsic belief you can trust a doctor, but will they trust a machine?”

For many the idea of mass AI-caused redundancy is terrifying, but Blondeau is pragmatic: humans need to rethink careers and education.

“The era where you exit the education system at 16, 21, or 24 and that is it, is broadly gone,” he explains.

“People will have to retrain and change skillsets as the technology evolves.”

Blondeau disagrees that having a world so catered to your whims and wants might lead to a myopic life, a magnified version of the current social media echo chamber, arguing it is possible to inject “serendipity” into the technology, to throw up surprises.

While computers have surpassed humans at specific tasks and games, predictions of a time when they develop artificial general intelligence enabling them to perform any intellectual task an adult can range from as early as 2030 to the end of the century.

But Blondeau, says, “Like any invention it can be used for good and bad. There will be checks along the way, we are not going to wake up one day and suddenly realise the machines are aware.”