Why do our hands wander toward our faces: stroking chins, scratching eyebrows, rubbing noses? German researchers have discovered the neurology and psychology at play.
Source: DIE WELT
Die Welt (“The World”) is a German daily founded in Hamburg in 1946, and currently owned by the Axel Springer AG company, Europe’s largest publishing house. Now based in Berlin, Die Welt is sold in more than 130 countries. A Sunday edition called Welt am Sonntag has been published since 1948.
JERUSALEM — I was walking down Via Dolorosa — the Way of the Cross in Jerusalem. In front of me were three young Germans. They found the whole thing laughable, and kept confirming this to each other by pointing out all the stupid details. “Here, look, we’re at the next station. What does it say […]
Categories
Yes, Mermaiding Is A Thing
Splashed ever more across popular culture, mermaids are now something very real for enchanted girls and women who can don tails and dive in. Some are better at it than others.
Aware of the profound effect Christmas has on people, researchers have studied our reactions to everything from supermarket music to gender-specific gifts and delayed gratification.
BERLIN — As the price of oil continues to fall, share prices on the Gulf region’s stock markets have plummeted in parallel. The price of oil reached a yearly low of $60 a barrel on Friday, and we’re now looking at a possible $50, which would create a truly bleak outlook for economic prospects in […]
After World War II, it was SS prisoners in Germany’s Landsberg prison. After 9-11, it was Guantanamo. The U.S. repeats its sins, but also repeats its repentance.
The U.S. currency is stronger on world markets than it’s been in years, which could fundamentally undermine emerging economies that have borrowed trillions in dollars.
Use of this incredibly addictive drug is growing in Germany, especially among Millennials who say it makes them feel invincible.
LONDON — In London’s posh Mayfair district on Grafton Street, just around the corner from where international art dealers and high-end jewelry brands are clustered, the adage about not being fooled by appearances rings truer than ever. Here there is a branch store of the contemporary jewelry brand launched by the mining consortium Gemfields. The […]
The young Turkish-German woman was killed after defending others, and in death has become a symbol of how immigration is central to Germany’s modern history.
A new study from Shell shows that changing behavior among younger generations of Germans will eventually lead to fewer cars on the road – and more women behind the wheel.
The ISIS terror group believes that if it is Allah’s will, the organization will take over much of the world. But at the moment, Allah doesn’t seem to be on their side.
MILAN — The International Highrise Award enjoys great prestige because, unlike other similar competitions, it is granted neither for a building’s height nor form. Instead, the prize — bestowed by the German Architecture Museum, the city of Frankfurt and Deka Bank — honors criteria such as sustainability and innovation. And this year’s winner, Milan’s Bosco […]
HAMBURG — When Kathrin Fiesel talks about lunch breaks at her company, people can’t believe it: “You do what? You go dancing!?” Her employer, the e-commerce giant Otto, in Hamburg’s Bramfeld district, has for several months now been trying out alternatives to the classic visit to the canteen. One of the things they’ve come up […]
-OpEd- BERLIN — As German military theorist Carl von Clausewitz once wrote, the aggressor is always peace-loving. He wants to take over our land, our people, our resources without firing a single shot. By this same logic, the defender is always the aggressor. This truth has seldom been better illustrated than by events in eastern […]
Categories
Love Accessibly
A look at the German dating service created exclusively for people with disabilities.
MUNICH — It began nearly a year ago, on the weekend after Christmas. On Saturday night, unidentified individuals broke into a church in the Cologne district of Porz-Urbach. They broke open the safe in the sacristy and got hold of the key to the church. They ended up stealing money from the collection boxes, liturgical […]
RADOLFZELL — Biologist Martin Wikelski put sensors on goats living on Italy’s Mount Etna and watched what happened. He found that if you watched their movements, you could predict when there would be volcanic eruptions. So now he wants to do satellite research on how animals roam and escape on a world scale. What happened […]
It’s a rare but hardly new question: what should airline staff do when a passenger dies mid-flight? Legend has it that British Airways used to use the ‘vodka tonic’ approach.
In a secret location in the Lebanese capital, a 60-bed hospital treats ISIS and other Islamic extremists whose backers must pay cash in advance. Enemies share doctors where medicine is a blind business, and cash is king.
Moscow is clearly testing the limits of the West, which must now put a stop to Putin’s muscle-flexing with some muscle of its own. How about a German-Polish army brigade?
But just try brushing your teeth with bamboo.
Yes, it’s a minority, but too many Muslims offer religious justification for violence and subjugation – and we must be free to criticize Islam’s dark side without being branded Islamophobes.
BERLIN — Worldwide researchers are experimenting increasingly with moss, algae and potted plants as a way to turn houses into multifunctional buildings. The question is “how a facade in a city neighborhood can generate additional value,” says Steffen Braun of the Stuttgart Fraunhofer Institute’s Urban System Engineering. Behind that lies “a whole new approach to […]
Meet the Burial Boys of Monrovia, whose role is no less important than medical staff in trying to stop the disease from spreading further.
MUNICH — Tobias Fröhlich no longer wears a suit and tie to work. The former BMW salesman dons a white polo shirt and blue trousers for his job at a new branch of the Munich firm where he greets customers with a smile, iPad in hand. Fröhlich is a “product genius” and as such is […]
A Turkish immigrant playwright in Germany explores the meaning and theater of a religious rite that divides modern society.
It gets harder to feel the weight of history’s most brutal hours when you’re surrounded by tourists soaking in the sun and thinking about lunch plans.
The only way to eradicate the destructive lionfish, non-native to the Atlantic Ocean and now endangering prey species along the U.S. coast, may be to eat it. But mind the venom.
MAROSTICA — An hour southwest of Venice, behind an inconspicuous gate at the end of a long conifer-lined path, stands a rustic hut. It’s fashion entrepreneur Renzo Rosso“s weekend house, which he calls “Diesel Farm.” Rosso sits making a call at a large table in the main room, which is decorated with hunting trophies. On […]
In the end, it has nothing to do with God. From biblical times to crusades and jihad, self-proclaimed “holy wars” are actually driven by power, territory and economic interests.
New research in Germany shows that something triggers after decades of adulthood controls. And no, it’s not retirement or grandparenthood that explains the changes.
On the Turkish border, at a refugee camp where Kurds from the Syrian town of Kobani are taking refuge, the displaced wonder why Turkey and the West aren’t arming them against ISIS.
Categories
The Ebola Risk In Europe Is Very Real
BERLIN – Ebola has reached Europe. No, it is not just here via patients brought to isolation wards under strict security conditions to be saved from an otherwise relatively certain death by high-tech Western medicine. Now the virus has arrived in a Spanish hospital, having managed to pass from a priest infected in West Africa […]
They want to expel “non-European” immigrants and expound ugly racial theories. A reporter sits in at the controversial international gathering even the Hungarian government tried to ban.
Categories
The Global Village Has Become A Nightmare
Coined a half-century ago by Marshall McLuhan, the ‘global village’ had come to express hope in a connected world. Now, such plagues as ISIS and Ebola, show how that can turn against us.
At 1,000 rooms and a $350 million pricetag, the vast new palace the Turkish president has had built for himself is both illegal and a bold expression of his own power and that of the “new Turkey.”
It is nearly too little, nearly too late, but there is still a way for the U.S. President to be the leader the world needs in the face of ISIS extremism.
Categories
Mini Architecture, A Gigantic Challenge
Making the most of the conditions and restrictions of size, shape and place is the essence of the architectural pursuit.
DUSSELDORF — Something happened on a Friday night in the atrium of Düsseldorf’s most beautiful hotel that caused DJ Antoine“s normally enviably good mood to sour. He was talking about a few of the items he’d bought now that he earned the kind of money to buy beautiful things. Then, somewhere between the very expensive […]