Music is something that every person has his or her own opinion about. Different people have different tastes, and various types of music have many ways of leaving an effect on someone. It can be relaxing, angering, soothing (抚慰的), energizing, and many more.

There are so many types of music out there today. Rap, pop, rock, country, indie, alternative, hardcore are some of the abundant (丰富的) types in the world. Music sends out either good or bad messages that have big impacts on how people act. People usually become friends with others who have the same taste in music as the rest of the people they hang out with. People may not want to associate with people who have different tastes in music because they’ll argue about what they think is better, but they are just their own opinions.

Rap and Rock music are two very important types of music in the world. They both send out different messages and help kids. The lyrics sung or rapped by the artists can be things going on in their own personal lives, and people with the same types of problems can listen to them so they know their hopes and people like this out there in the world. Music can also serve as a catalyst (催化剂) for new ideas. When people listen to the new things out there, they learn different things going on in the world and they become more open-minded.

People can use music to express themselves, in ways it can’t be expressed through behavior, or art. You can usually tell how someone’s feeling by the type of music he or she is listening to at the time. It’s a tool used by many. Groups of people around the world can come together and gather at concerts, shows, and venues to show what their interests and likings are and you see how many people have similar likings as you.

It is often said that dogs are “man’s best friends”. 【小题1】

Wu Qi, a dog trainer in Shanghai, started the Paw for Heal (PFH) program in China about eight years ago. The program trains dogs for animal-assisted therapy (动物辅助治疗). These animals help old people feel quiet and less stressed. 【小题2】

In Shanghai, the dogs have been trained to help kids with autism (自闭症) who are easily scared by their environments. When the PFH dogs are around, they feel much better.

【小题3】 Although this training is difficult (only 20 percent of dogs can pass the program), it also helps a lot of people.

“She (my dog) makes me happy every day, and I think she can bring happiness to other people in need as well,” one of the pet owners Wang Lei said in a report by Sixth Tone.

【小题4】 But Wu has high hopes for the future, as he is now working together with a British university to improve his program.

“Through learning from the European team, 【小题5】” Wu said in the Sixth Tone report.

Genetic engineering (基因工程), in its broadest definition, means to control a species (种类) so that a particular trait (特征) is increased in the population. A trait is how an organism (生物) looks or acts or what it does. Having brown eyes is a trait. Flying in circles is a trait. Climbing trees is a trait.

The earliest forms of genetic engineering happened on farms. People chose seeds from plants that had more fruit production or tastier leaves than other plants of their types. Then they chose to save the seeds from the best of that group to plant the next year. So, year by year, the farmers produced better and better crops. This type of activity probably has been going on since mankind first settled in villages and began making a life for themselves in one place, about 12,000 years ago!

The same sort of thing would have also happened with animals. For example, people chose to eat the animals that didn’t have favorable traits and let the animals with the favorable traits reproduce. It was thousands of years before mankind figured out how plants and animals reproduce themselves. With this knowledge, people could pollinate (授粉) plants by hand or keep a pair of animals together in order to cause an increase in a favorable trait.

It was only in the last 250 years that scientists began figuring out chromosomes (染色体) and genes and the role they play in the way one generation passes its traits on to the next. And it’s only been in the last 30 years that scientists have been able to cut out specific genes from one organism and put them in another. It is this 30-year-old technology that is described by the narrow definition of genetic engineering. Mankind has long been able to have a great effect on the world around him. He now possesses the tools to change himself. Some people are afraid of what might be done with that power.