Most Popular
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Korean labor force to shrink by 10 million by 2044: report
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[AtoZ Korean Mind] Does your job define who you are? Should it?
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Allegations surrounding BTS resurface, enraged fans demand apology
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Students with history of violence will be barred from becoming teachers
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Probe of first lady on Dior bag allegations set to begin
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'Super Rich in Korea' will leave viewers appreciating Korea more: producers
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Top prosecutor pledges 'speedy, strict' probe into first lady's luxury bag allegations
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Medical feud leaves hospitals in financial crisis
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'Queen of Tears' riding high on Netflix chart
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Chip up cycle won’t stay long: SK chief
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[Kim Seong-kon] Smart way to bridge generations
Recently, I came across an interesting article in Time magazine titled “The Me Me Me Generation.” The article points out that millennials, those born between 1980 and 2000, often have symptoms of narcissistic personality disorder. For example, young people frequently upload pictures of themselves onto social media sites for their “followers” to praise. In addition, these young people are so confident in themselves that they believe they are entitled to virtually everything. The Time article high
Aug. 27, 2013
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Abe’s nuclear imperative starts at Fukushima
Like the hundreds of tons of radioactive water now streaming daily into the Pacific Ocean off the Japanese coast, the bad news from Tokyo Electric Power Co.’s stricken Fukushima Dai-ichi plant just keeps coming. Stanching the flow and getting the Fukushima cleanup on track are critical not only to health and safety, but also to the future of nuclear energy in Japan and elsewhere, and to the credibility of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s government. The latest scare came last week, with the announcem
Aug. 26, 2013
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[Andrew Sheng] Why do nations fail or succeed?
August is the holiday month ― the time when we pause to take stock of a hectic first half year, and wonder what lies ahead. Nestled in the hills of northern Laos, the ancient city of Luang Prabang sits around a bend in the river Mekong, isolated for centuries and renowned today as a city of 15th century Buddhist temples, protected as a UNESCO Heritage site. It was a good place to catching up on one’s history to try to comprehend the uncertain future. The recent best-seller by MIT economics profe
Aug. 26, 2013
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Why science and politics do not mix
Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Harvard University and author of such popular science books as “The Blank Slate,” recently wrote an essay for the New Republic in defense of science. From left and right, he notes, from intellectuals as well as from anti-intellectuals, science is under attack for its arrogance, vulgarity and narrowness of vision. Why is this happening? Pinker asks. Because, he says, science is intruding on the humanities, disciplines lacking in vitality or any real purpo
Aug. 26, 2013
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Down with patent trolls
Patent trolls are a widely reported problem for big business and technology makers. They are companies that exist primarily to buy up patents and then collect money, in the form of licenses or lawsuit settlements, from alleged infringers of those patents. Trolls take advantage of a patent system with serious flaws, and their abuse of the system is creating, as a White House fact sheet recently put it, a “drain on the American economy.”And, as it turns out, a drain on you, the ordinary consumer.L
Aug. 26, 2013
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[Noah Feldman] A fool’s errand in China to reinvent government
Forget Client No. 9. If you want to understand the future of world politics, it’s Document No. 9 you need to know. This semisecret directive from the senior members of the Chinese Communist Party tells you how President Xi Jinping plans to manage pro-democracy voices in China: by shutting them down. The sharp repudiation of constitutional government, human rights, civic participation and free speech ― not to mention truly free markets ― guarantees that the ideological struggle between China and
Aug. 26, 2013
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Practice makes perfect, if your genes play along
Like many others who read Malcolm Gladwell’s book “Outliers” when it came out five years ago, I was impressed by the 10,000-hour rule of expertise. I wrote a column (for a different publication) espousing the rule, which holds that to become a world-class competitor at anything from chess to tennis to baseball, all that’s required is 10,000 hours of deliberate practice. David Epstein has convinced me I was wrong. His thoroughly researched new book, “The Sports Gene,” pretty much demolishes the 1
Aug. 25, 2013
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[Dominique Moisi] Arab Spring’s unlikely winner
PARIS ― The war in Iraq ― which led in 2003 to the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime ― had one clear winner: Iran. The United States-led military intervention resulted in the weakening of the Middle East’s Sunni regimes, America’s traditional allies, and the strengthening of America’s principal foe in the region, the Islamic Republic.Ten years later, we may be witnessing yet another ironic outcome in the region: At least for the time being, Israel seems to be the only clear winner of the “Arab Spr
Aug. 25, 2013
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Obama is lazy like a fox
President Obama has demonstrated leadership qualities ranging from poor to nonexistent. But is a president who lacks visible leadership qualities really such a bad thing? Or is he lazy like a fox? A lack of leadership ― whether deliberate or accidental ― can have a surprising upside, as none other than the French have historically exemplified. (And no, I’m not being facetious.)As a conservative whose heart leans firmly right, I would have thought the idea crazy until I moved to France four years
Aug. 25, 2013
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Why science and politics don’t mix
Steven Pinker, professor of psychology at Harvard University and author of such popular science books as “The Blank Slate,” recently wrote an essay for the New Republic in defense of science. From left and right, he notes, from intellectuals as well as from anti-intellectuals, science is under attack for its arrogance, vulgarity and narrowness of vision. Why is this happening? Pinker asks. Because, he says, science is intruding on the humanities, disciplines lacking in vitality or any real purpo
Aug. 25, 2013
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[Eli Park Sorensen] Alienation and emancipation of the self
In the “Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts of 1844,” Karl Marx outlines a theory of the bleak consequences of modern industrialization ― the experience of being alienated from one’s work, one’s relations, and ultimately oneself. No longer in control of their work or products, Marx argues, the workers are reduced to replaceable components in a colossal social machine. Building on this analysis, the Hungarian philosopher Georg Lukacs viewed the spread of alienation in the beginning of the 20th
Aug. 25, 2013
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Responding to the massacre in Syria
It may take awhile to determine whether, as the opposition claims, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons to slaughter more than 1,000 of his citizens. If he has, this brazen atrocity not only changes the U.S. calculus in the region but also requires a clear response from the civilized world. Words and resolutions would not do for a massacre of this scale. Ideally the United Nations Security Council would sanction limited international military action to punish and deter Assad. I
Aug. 23, 2013
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[Robert Reich] The loss of the public good
Congress is in recess, but you’d hardly know it. This has been the most do-nothing, gridlocked Congress in decades. But the recess at least offers a pause in the ongoing partisan fighting that’s sure to resume in a few weeks.It also offers an opportunity to step back and ask ourselves what’s really at stake.A society ― any society ― is defined as a set of mutual benefits and duties embodied most visibly in public institutions: public schools, public libraries, public transportation, public hospi
Aug. 23, 2013
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U.S. choices on Egypt run from bad to worse
The bloody images coming out of Egypt invite Americans to pick white hats and black hats: to punish the generals who staged a coup and, rather than listen to American pleas for restraint, killed many demonstrators. Or to hold our noses and work to restore a democratically elected President Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, no matter how much we disagree with his Islamist agenda.In determining what America should do, there’s no satisfying answer. But there is an obvious one: The U.S. shou
Aug. 22, 2013
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[Joel Brinkley] Bitter disputes over sea rights
TAIPEI ― The South China Sea controversy continues to roil the waters. China claims to own almost every square inch, including every island and natural feature in this vast sea ― despite angry protestations from its neighbors.Well, a similar debate simmers just north, in the East China Sea, which borders Taiwan, China and Japan. There, a group of small islands known as the Diaoyu if you’re Chinese, or Senkakus if you’re Japanese, are also objects of covetous contestation.Various passive explorat
Aug. 22, 2013
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Ending scourge of discrepant governance
The pork barrel scam ― whose intricate web of ghost projects, fictitious beneficiaries, and fake nongovernment organizations is unraveling before the nation’s eyes ― is a good example of a “discrepant event.”This is a term used in science education to refer to something that happens contrary to expectation, a phenomenon without a visible cause, begging for explanation. I think we may use the concept to describe the kind of governance we have ― a way of doing things for which no one takes respons
Aug. 22, 2013
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China’s granary embezzlers
It is beyond imagination more than 100 officials and staff are under investigation for allegedly embezzling public money after a probe into the Henan branch of the China Grain Reserve Corporation.The probe was launched after the branch’s head fled to the United States last year with money he had embezzled.The Henan branch of the grain reserve reported to the higher authorities that they had bought a certain amount of fresh grain to keep in reserve and sold the grain they had in storage. They the
Aug. 22, 2013
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Warn youths about dangers of Internet addiction
An increasing number of young people are so obsessed with using smartphones and computers that their health and schoolwork are being undermined. Prompt measures should be taken at school and home to deal with this problem.According to a recent survey by a Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry research team, about 520,000 middle and high school students are addicted to the Internet, particularly for online gaming and e-mailing.The survey shows that 9 percent of middle school students and 14 percent
Aug. 22, 2013
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[Kavi Chongkittavorn] Sino-Japan feud grips ASEAN
The intensifying hostility between China and Japan and the increasing mutual distrust between their peoples will have serious ramifications for ASEAN.For the past three decades, the two Asian giants’ stable relations have helped generate huge volumes of trade and investment and propelled the region’s economic progress. So if the current trend in East Asia continues, ASEAN’s ambitious plan to build a community of 630 million people with a single production base will suffer.A recent survey conduct
Aug. 22, 2013
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Can Xi’s crackdown clean up corruption?
The new regime of Chinese President Xi Jinping is turning up the heat on corruption there, and is making sure you can read all about it. Stories of graft, official excess and corporate malfeasance abound, not only in foreign news outlets but also in China’s emboldened domestic publications and social media.Xi, who took office in March, has responded aggressively to public complaints about official misconduct. He has denounced corruption as a threat to the existence of his ruling Communist Party.
Aug. 21, 2013