The blistering pace of development in China ensures there are no shortages of dazzling statistics and facts about the middle kingdom. The latest to attract my attention was a report in today’s Financial Times that announced that China’s urban dwellers now outnumbered the rural population. At the end of 2010 49.95% of its population lived in cities. By the end of 2011 this had risen to […]
Society
If you need a less frantic pastime than watching paint dry or grass grow you should head to the St. Lucia campus of the University of Queensland in Brisbane, Australia. Make your way to the second floor of the Parnell Building and behold the world’s longest continuously running laboratory experiment – the pitch drop experiment. In 1927, Professor Thomas Parnell, the university’s first professor of physics, […]
Pitching for the long term
What species has the greatest combined mass? All the world’s African elephants, or the oceans’ stock of blue whales (respectively the largest land and sea mammals)? Neither. It is the Antartic krill, weighing in at just two grams and growing to six centimetres long. What the Antartic krill lacks in individual size it more than makes up in collective heft. It has a combined biomass of […]
Krillion
The MTV Europe Music Awards started in 1994 with a spectacular concert next to Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate. Since then the annual popfest has been held in a host of cities across Europe, only returning to the same city once (with Berlin’s 2010 event). It has been held 18 times, in ten countries. Two countries have hosted the event four times (the UK and Germany) and two have held […]
EMAzing
In 1968 John Brunner, a British novelist, worked out that the entire world’s population of 3.5 billion could stand shoulder to should on an island the size of the Isle of Man (572 km²). In 1950 the earth’s 2.5 billion people could have squeezed on to the Isle of Wight (381 km²). He prophesised that by 2010 there would be 7 billion people, and they would fit on […]
All stand, please!
The American-Canadian border is often referred to as the 49th parallel as it runs for much of its length along the 49th parallel north. It is the longest border between two countries in the world, stretching 8,891 kilometers (5,525 miles) (including the Alaska-Yukon/British Columbia frontier). The continuous border stretches 6,416 kilometres (3987 miles) between Douglas (British Columbia) and Blaine (Washington) on the Pacific coast to Lubeck (Maine) […]
Magic line
> The ravages of HIV / AIDS have had a catastrophiceffect on life expectancy in sub-Saharan Africa. Swaziland has the world’slowest life expectancy at 39.6 years according to the UN’sworld population report and is joined at the lower reaches of the table byMozambique, Zambia and Sierra Leone. But even Swaziland’s tragic figures aresignificantly higher than Manchester, Lancashire in the first half of the 19thcentury. Szreter and […]
>It really was tough up north
After the flame is extinguished, the flags lowered and the last medals awarded the Olympic roadshow will move on from London to focus on Rio de Janeiro. But the organisers of London 2012 are hoping that the games will leave more than memories – the legacy of the spectacle has been at the heart of the project since the bid’s inception. From 2013 the Olympic Park […]
Olympic makeover
Hendiadys (pronounced /hɛnˈdaɪ.ədɨs/, a Latinized form of the Greek phrase ἓν διὰ δυοῖν, hèn dià duoîn, “one through two”) is a figure of speech used for emphasis, and is defined as the substitution of a conjunction for a subordination. The basic idea is to use two words linked by a conjunction (e.g. and) to express a single, complex idea. Examples of this include sound and fury (from Macbeth) versus […]
Sound and fury
The Weather Girls, best known for all time gay anthem “It’s Raining Men”, were previously known as the Two Tons, and then later Two Tons O’ Fun.
Two Tons O’ Fun
By 2012 London’s skyline will have been transformed. Since the Second World War a city of church spires dominated by the dome of St. Pauls has slowly given way to taller buildings. By 2012 both the Gherkin and Tower 42 will be topped by the Heron Tower (or the Walkie Talkie) at 202 metres tall, the Bishopsgate Tower (or the Cheese Grater) at 235m and the Pinnacle (or […]
From spires to shards – London’s 2012 skyline
Qatar is ranked 164th in area and 148th in population amongst the world’s sovereign states. This makes the gulf state about the same size as Yorkshire (11,437 km² to 11,897 km²) and has a population a little bit bigger than Merseyside (1.69 million to 1.35 million). It is a little bit smaller than Connecticut (14,357 km²) or Puerto Rico (13,792 km²), but is nearly three times […]