Light Pollution Light pollution, also known as luminous pollution, refers to a phenomena that excessive and obtrusive optical radiation seriously affects human activities of living and production. Actually, it is a byproduct of industrial civilization and its sources include building exterior and interior lighting, commercial properties, offices, factories, streetlights, electronic products and even papers. How is light pollution produced and how does it do harm to us? First, colorful neon signs, lighting of architectures and streetlights(some sources of light pollution) light up cities over night. They competes with starlight in the night sky for urban residents and interferes with astronomical observatories. Second, all kinds of lighting fixtures, glass buildings, electronic products and polished papers involve people in a world full of intense lights and harmful radiation. As a result, more and more people are suffering from myopia, night blindness, insomnia, neurasthenia, and even cancer. Thirdly, artificial daytime has broken the laws of nature and has hurt many creatures. It disrupts the growth mechanism of plants and makes nocturnal animals lose their facilities of distinguishing the orientation, then directly or indirectly causes their death or extinction. To prevent and control light pollution, we have to take some effective measures. For one thing, we can make full use of technology to improve our lighting fixtures to make them environmental friendly; for another, we should adjust our lifestyles of using lights and electronic products.

Modesty and Honesty Is the answer of that American hostess, as some Chinese people thought, “want of modesty”? Is the answer of that young interpretress, as the hostess felt, “want of honesty”? In fact, the hostess’ answer is not immodest and the interpretress’ answer is not dishonest too. English speakers usually use “Thank you” to respond to the praise from others and receive it. “Thank you” shows that the speakers believe such praise was given in good faith and the things being praised are laudable, so they think people should not “pretend inferiority” or “ be affectedly modest”. However, the Chinese think that when people are complimented, they normally need to demonstrate their unworthiness and inadequateness, or attribute their success to luck or other objective conditions, etc.. On the contrary, accepting praise is a sign of complacency or poor upbringing. Therefore, the above mentioned different reactions to the two answers are due to the difference of language habits between English and Chinese. People from the two language environments both construe others’ words in accordance with their respective customs.

Should Adopted Children Know Their Birth Parents? Li Mei is twenty, a university student. When she was eighteen, at her birthday party she was shocked to learn that she was actually adopted by her present parents. However, she gradually accepted the fact and understood her parents. The case about Li Mei proves that adopted children should have free access to information about their birth parents when they turn eighteen. The apparent reason is that after fully grow up children would be able to accept the truth that they were abandoned by their birth parents. It’s absolutely true that almost everyone would be more mature and reasonable when they turn eighteen, an age of transition from child to adult. They would also understand and tolerate others, so foster parents should seize the chance to tell the truth instead of keeping it in mind. In addition to the mental aspect, the rights of adopted children should be considered. As we know, everyone has a strong desire to know where he was from and why he came to the world. If he cannot find the answers, he will feel pain and grow up with it. So foster parents tell their adopted children the truth for not only avoiding the risk of revealing it accidently someday but also respecting children’s rights. Finally, the most important reason adopted children should be informed of the truth is that foster parents and birth parents are both important to them. Birth parents brought them to the world while foster parents brought them up, so adopted children can never give up either of them. Meanwhile, if foster parents insist on keeping the truth, children will not be thankful but angry with the lie when they know the truth. Therefore, what a stable family relationship need is love from parents and thankfulness from children and even kinship cannot break the relationship. Then what can stop adopted children having free access to information about their birth parents?