It is jarring how differently Taiwan’s politics is portrayed in the international press compared to the local Chinese-language press. Viewed from abroad, Taiwan is seen as a geopolitical hotspot, or “The Most Dangerous Place on Earth,” as the Economist once blazoned across their cover. Meanwhile, ta
Taiwan is one of the world’s greatest per-capita consumers of seafood. Whereas the average human is thought to eat around 20kg of seafood per year, each Taiwanese gets through 27kg to 35kg of ocean delicacies annually, depending on which source you find most credible. Given the ubiquity of dishes li
The captain of the giant Royal Navy battleship called his officers together to give them a first morsel of one of World War II’s most closely guarded secrets: Prepare yourselves, he said, for “an extremely important task.”“Speculations abound,” one of the officers wrote in his diary that day — June
Guillermo del Toro has been telling monster stories for as long as he’s been making films. A romantic with keen appreciation for the macabre, his creations are things of strange beauty, haunting, poetic and unforgettable. It’s no wonder his earliest love was Frankenstein, first the Boris Karloff fil
Artificial intelligence is a matter of design — not destiny.That’s the message from 10 philanthropic foundations aiming to loosen the grip that the technology’s moneyed developers, fueled by an investing frenzy, hold over its evolution. Launched Tuesday under the name Humanity AI, the coalition is c
After the release of the Deepseek AI from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) it soon became obvious that it would shy away from topics the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) did not want discussed. In January of this year the Guardian observed in an article on Deepseek that, while it would not talk dir
The elite Central Committee of China’s ruling Communist Party will hold a closed-door meeting from Monday to Thursday to discuss, among other things, the country’s 15th five-year development plan.The meeting, known as a plenum, is the fourth since the 2022 Party Congress. Here is what it all means:W
There were many excellent presentations at the 5th World Congress of Taiwan Studies at Academia Sinica in May, with a session on Cold War and Mobility standing out. Three papers were presented, each by the author of a landmark book on displacement, migration and refugeeism.First was Dominic Meng-Hsu
China’s sweeping new restrictions on rare earth exports jolted governments and set off a race to secure alternative supplies, in a stark demonstration of Beijing’s global clout and growing risks for companies.The rules announced last week require overseas firms to obtain Chinese government approval
Jaw Shaw-kong (趙少康), media mogul, television personality and former vice presidential candidate, on Saturday rode to the rescue of his long-time comrade, former Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) in his lackluster bid to win the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) party chair election. In a post on Faceboo
This is a bit of a gray area, says Bethan Crouse, a performance nutritionist at Loughborough University. She wouldn’t advise the athletes she works with to completely cut out carbohydrates — foods such as bread, grains, potatoes and sweets. “However,” she says, “reducing carbohydrate intake can be b
The first Monopoly set I ever owned was the one everyone had — the classic edition with Mr Monopoly on the box. I bought it as a souvenir on holiday in my 30s. Twenty-five years later, I’ve got thousands of boxes stacked away in a warehouse, four Guinness World Records and have made several TV appea
The very best journeys involve traveling not only through space but also through time. You encounter places and objects that are hundreds or even thousands of years old and find yourself imagining what kind of society would have made them. And yet, to be alive in 2025 is to be overwhelmed by the pre
“How China Threatens to Force Taiwan Into a Total Blackout” screamed a Wall Street Journal (WSJ) headline last week, yet another of the endless clickbait examples of the energy threat via blockade that doesn’t exist. Since the headline is recycled, I will recycle the rebuttal: once industrial power
Oct. 13 to Oct. 19 When ordered to resign from her teaching position in June 1928 due to her husband’s anti-colonial activities, Lin Shih-hao (林氏好) refused to back down. The next day, she still showed up at Tainan Second Preschool, where she was warned that she would be fired if she didn’t comply. L
With one week left until election day, the drama is high in the race for the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) chair. The race is still potentially wide open between the three frontrunners. The most accurate poll is done by Apollo Survey & Research Co (艾普羅民調公司), which was conducted a week and a half a
Every now and then, it’s nice to just point somewhere on a map and head out with no plan. In Taiwan, where convenience reigns, food options are plentiful and people are generally friendly and helpful, this type of trip is that much easier to pull off. One day last November, a spur-of-the-moment day
Century-old wreaths made from human hair fill the walls of Leila’s Hair Museum, and glass cases overflow with necklaces and watch bands woven from the locks of the dead. There also are tresses purported to come from past presidents, Hollywood legend Marilyn Monroe and even Jesus.For about 30 years,
In Kathryn Bigelow’s A House of Dynamite, when a mysterious missile launches from the Pacific and begins bearing down on the Midwest, the biggest threat initially at the White House is a pile of paper work.The ho-hum response that kicks off Bigelow’s firecracker of a film is quickly shattered. But t