Word: rain
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Whatever city this is, it sure is dark. And here, too, the film-makers show us something new. They don't film the movie at night to make it dark. Instead they film it mostly during the day, allowing window-shades, buildings and profuse amounts of rain to block most of the light. It is easy to make a movie dark which takes place in the absence of light, but when the days appear drab and lifeless (when the light casts no light), that is true darkness...
...security agents, in plainclothes or uniform, acted with all too much efficiency. They tailed visitors, photographed gatherings, searched rooms and bags, confiscated documents and videotapes, stopped peaceful protests, detained some journalists and on the whole created an intimidating atmosphere. To top things off, even the heavens glowered, sending forth rain that churned up mud, mud everywhere...
...just really distressed that the media are sending back trivial information about the rain and the buses," said Rosalie Bertell, a Canadian epidemiologist. "There is other, substantive stuff going on here." Observed Janice Engberg, an American who teaches at China's Xiamen University: "Some people have had incredibly horrible experiences, while some people are absolutely elated to be here. This is the most exciting 10 days in their lives." A reminder of the old, often misquoted Chinese curse: May you live in exciting times...
...Siberian eruptions could have killed off plant and animal life in half a dozen different ways. An atmospheric mist of sulfur dioxide, for example, could have stoked lethal storms of acid rain. Carbon dioxide, injected into the atmosphere by erupting volcanoes, could have trapped solar heat, disrupting climate through global warming. Even the physical force exerted by the rising plume of molten magma could have contributed to the extinction by uplifting a substantial section of the earth's crust. Since temperatures fall with elevation, says Renne, snow and ice would have quickly accumulated, wrecking ecosystems at higher elevations and contributing...
...shows that a staggering drop in sea level-perhaps as much as 300 ft.--did in fact occur during the Permian. But there is no evidence that global cooling triggered by volcanism was the cause. Similarly, new analyses of late Permian soils suggest that a substantial surge of acid rain accompanied the extinction. Acid rain, however, does not require a volcanic source. It could also have been caused by changes in atmospheric chemistry after the impact of a big comet or meteorite...