The Express Tribune hi five - November 9

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Your Proofness: Sarah Munir Master Storyteller: Nudrat Kamal Creativity Analysts: Jamal Khurshid, Essa Malik, Talha Ahmed Khan, Munira Abbas, Omer Asim and Umar Waqas

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Hi light

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Some of the best games are the ones that allow us to unleash our imaginations and create whole new worlds.

Whether it is building mansions from Lego bricks or making up elaborate stories for our dolls, the most exciting thing about these games is that while you’re playing them, anything is possible. You can be a pirate fighting off villains, or a sailor lost at sea. Just as this principle of building worlds is the basis for real life games, modern technology has made it possible for virtual games to be created based on the same idea. Among the countless video games that exist today, the one game that is totally and completely about creating new worlds is Minecraft — an open-ended video game in which you create and play in elaborate worlds.

Created in 2009, Minecraft is one of the top-selling games in the world and is available in nearly every device in which games can be played — PCs, smart phones, iPhones, iPads and Xboxes.

Minecraft is what is known as a ‘sandbox’ game, which means that it has no end and has no overall goal (like beating other players or completing one level to get to the next).

Playing the game is simple: when you start the game, you find yourself in a large open space, with mountains, deserts and even lakes. You are provided with only a few tools and no instructions to work with. Instead, you have to gather raw materials by exploring this open space, and you use these raw materials to build anything you want — buildings, more elaborate tools and anything else that you need to survive. These raw materials include iron ore, stone, wood and even diamonds and gold which you can mine from the ground.

You have to hunt for food and protect yourself from creatures that appear at night — zombies, giant spiders and many others.

The lack of instructions or an outright goal can be confusing at first, but that’s part of that fun — you figure the game out as you go along. Minecraft can be played by yourself, with a handful of friends or with total strangers.

Markus Persson, the video game programmer who created Minecraft ( he is known in video game circles by the alias Notch), said

that when he was young, he used to play endlessly with Lego, using the blocks to make complicated structures. He also says that this fascination with Lego certainly inspired him to create the game. In fact, Minecraft shares many similarities to Lego.

The objective of both is to construct, not to tear down.

Both are basically building toys. And just as Lego comprises of square blocks, Minecraft’s graphics are such that everything is made of 3D cubes. In fact, compared to other, fancier video games which have sleek graphics, Minecraft has an old-fashioned look, with boxy and even blurry graphics. But players can take these simplistic graphics and build really sophisticated things with them.

For instance, players make exact replicas of famous structures such as the Taj Mahal, the Empire State Building and the famous ship Titanic. You can build replicas of board games, fictional characters, mythological lands. That’s the best part about Minecraft — there are no restrictions or rules. It allows imagination and creativity to reign free. This is why boys and girls of all ages all around the world are deeply passionate about Minecraft.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Hi light

3 Most grownups automatically become suspicious of any video games, dismissing them as a mindless waste of time — time that could be spent actually learning something. And a lot of games really are just mindless entertainment. But the thing about Minecraft is that not only is it a lot of fun, it actually makes you smarter in a lot of different ways and teaches you lots of things: It forces you to come up with creative solutions to problems — In the game, you need to figure out ways to build things from scratch, to protect yourself from monsters and to procure food and shelter in order to survive. All these tasks require creative, out-of-the-box thinking. It also teaches you about architecture, engineering and geology.

It encourages teamwork and collaboration — Players team up to build worlds, and as anyone who has worked in school group projects knows, it’s not easy working with other people. But Minecraft shows that creative minds working together is far more exciting than working alone.

It teaches you computer programming — To keep things interesting, the game offers different ‘mods’, which are different versions of the Minecraft world. And the best part is that you can even make your own mods, by learning basic rules of computer programming and applying them. Children can write their own computer code and create a whole new mod for the game.

It’s something you can do with your parents and siblings — The biggest complaint about video games is that it keeps you from spending time with your family, but Minecraft is at its best when family members play together. You can create a separate server just for the family, and all the siblings and parents can create and explore this world, making for some quality family time.

What would you like to see in Hi Five? Send an email to hifive@tribune.com.pk and let us know!

The people who play Minecraft are really part of a big community. Everyone exchanges tips and shares their own creation on the internet. There are famous Minecraft players with their own YouTube channels in which you can see them build worlds and play the game. Millions of players follow these YouTubers, learning from their work to improve their own — just like you would watch sports matches on TV to improve your own game. There is a Minecraft Wiki, countless Minecraft forums and there’s even an annual convention called MineCon in which players from all over the world meet up in real life and share their love for the game. The players range anywhere from four-year-olds to 80-year-olds, and include both boys and girls.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Reading corner

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Why do seagulls live near the sea?

Because if they lived near the bay, they’d be bagels.

How do astronauts serve dinner?

On flying saucers.

Where do fish put their money?

In riverbanks.

Why are frogs so happy?

Because they can eat whatever bugs them.

Why are chemists perfect for solving problems?

Because they have all the solutions.

What do you call two dinosaurs that have been in an accident?

Tyrannosaurus wrecks.

Adventures in Space What lies beyond our planet? This is a question that has intrigued us for centuries, and scientists and astronauts have made great progress towards unraveling the mysteries of the universe. But there is still a lot that we don’t know about outer space, and this is where our collective imagination comes in. We try to imagine what it would be like if we were to go have adventures in outer space and lots of books have been written and movies made about this exciting prospect. Here are some great books and films that explore outer space: George’s Secret Key to the Universe George’s parents, who have always been wary of technology, warn him about their new neighbours: Eric is a scientist and his daughter, Annie, seems to be following in his footsteps. But when George befriends them and Cosmos, their super-computer, he finds himself on a wildly fun adventure, while learning about physics, time, and the universe.

With Cosmos’s help, he can travel to other planets and a black hole. Read George’s Secret Key to the Universe, written by the famous scientist Stephen Hawking and his daughter Lucy, and find out all about the marvels of the universe.

The Way Back Home When a boy finds an airplane in his closet, he does what every adventurer would do — he flies it into outer space. Millions of miles from Earth, the plane’s fuel runs out and he has to land on the moon. But the moon is a lonely, scary place and the boy is happy to find that engine trouble has stranded a young Martian on the other side of the moon, and he’s just as frightened and alone. Martian, Earthling—it’s all the same when you’re in need of a friend. Read The Way Back Home by Oliver Jeffers and join the unlikely duo on their moon exploration.

Sofia’s Dream In this magically illustrated book, Sofia is a little girl who one night befriends the Man on the Moon and sets out on a wonderful adventure to meet him. Once she reaches the moon, she gets a chance to view our planet from its point of view.

Together with some help from the Man on the Moon, Sophia decides to do whatever she can to protect the Earth and to encourage others to do the same. Read Sofia’s Dream by Land Wilson and join Sofia on her magical space adventure.

Wall-E In a distant, but not so unrealistic, future where mankind has abandoned earth because it has become covered with trash, WALL-E, a garbage collecting robot has been left to clean up the mess. One day, EVE, a sleek (and dangerous) robot, is sent to Earth to find proof that life is once again sustainable.

WALL-E falls in love with EVE and follows her into outer space to win her over. Watch the animated film Wall-E and join the adorable robotic lovebirds on their journey through space.

Zathura: A Space Adventure Danny and Walter may be brothers but they don’t get along at all. But one day, when they are at home with their older sister looking after them, they find an old board game called Zathura, and decide to play it together. However, after their first move, they find that the game has apparently flung them, their sister and their entire house into outer space. They realize that the only way to return home is to finish the game. However with almost every move, new dangers arise as the siblings find themselves learning to cooperate in ways they never expected. Watch Zathura: A Space Adventure to find out how they will win this game.

Do you have a favourite book or movie you would like us to review? Write to us at hifive@tribune.com.pk and tell us all about it.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

Get your weekly dose of the unusual and funny news from across the globe!

Celebrating 100 A ‘miracle’ set of giant panda triplets born at the Chimelong Safari Park in Guangzhou, China celebrated their 100th day on Wednesday, November 5. The panda cubs, born on July 29, are the only known set of surviving giant panda triplets in the world. Each panda cubs weighs more than five kilogrammes now — they weighed only 100 grammes at birth. They started teething at around 80 days and have two small teeth each. The cubs were born on July 29 within four hours, the female cub being a little ahead of her brothers. The 100 day milestone is significant for vulnerable panda cubs, as pandas are known to have difficulty surviving in the wild and in zoos. It is tradition to wait until baby pandas are 100 days old before naming them. The Chimelong Safari Park is asking the public for name suggestions and will name each of the triplets soon. HUFFINGTONPOST.COM

Massive dinosaur discovery What’s 30 feet tall, 85 feet long, and heavier than seven elephants? The answer is a massive dinosaur more than 75 million years old. Called Dreadnoughtus, meaning ‘fearing nothing’, this newly discovered creature is believed to be one of the largest land animals that ever lived. Dreadnoughtus was a leading beast in the titanosaur family, a group of dinosaurs with long necks, small heads, and tall, thick legs. Dr. Kenneth Lacovara, a palaeontologist, found the specimen in Argentina in 2005. Though Dreadnoughtus was discovered in small pieces, Lacovara and his team put the puzzle together to find some big answers. From more than 200 uncovered bones, this fearless dinosaur was revealed to have had a long neck and a powerful 29-foot tail. The team determined Dreadnoughtus to have weighed about 130,000 pounds. Recently, Lacovara and his team used their collections to create a computerised reconstruction to determine how Dreadnoughtus looked and moved. TIMEFORKIDS.COM

World wide weird

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Cloud of glitter

A bizarre, glittering cloud with a strip of rainbow across it appeared in the skies over Australia, mystifying everyone. Residents of the Gippsland area in the east of Victoria state were baffled and blown away in equal measure to see the unusual cloud formation, which appeared at around 1pm local time on Monday. The circular band in the cloud with the rainbow belt was revealed to be a Fallstreak Hole, also known as a hole-punch cloud or a skypunch.

According to the Cloud Appreciation Society, the holes are formed when water droplets in the cloud freeze into ice crystals, becoming slightly heavier than the surrounding droplets and pulling a portion of the cloud downward.

The rainbow effect is the result of those frozen crystals refracting light. METRO.CO.UK

Saturn’s Titan moon US space agency NASA has released a stunning image revealing the polar seas on one of Saturn’s moons, Titan. Shot by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft in late August, the image shows sun light reflecting off of Titan’s swirling surface. Titan is the largest of Saturn’s 53 official moons, and is the second largest moon in the solar system, after Jupiter’s Ganymede.

With a diameter 50% larger than Earth’s moon, Titan is mainly composed of water, ice and rocky material while its atmosphere is largely nitrogen.

The sun’s glint, also called a specular reflection, appears in the image as the bright area near the 11 o’clock position on the upper left. This mirror-like reflection is in the south of Titan’s largest sea, Kraken Mare, just north of an island archipelago separating two different parts of the sea. From the image, scientists understand that the Kraken Mare sea was larger at some point in the past, but has since evaporated. INDEPENDENT.CO.UK

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

6 Did you know?

How does memory work?

Memory refers to the process by which we remember things. The things we experience and then remember make up who we are. In the past, scientists used to describe memory as a sort of tiny filing cabinet full of individual memory folders in our brains, in which information is stored away. But today science tells us that human memory is much more complex. The storing and remembering of memories is a process that uses many different parts of our brains. What seems to be a single memory is actually a complex construction. For example, if you think of a pen, your brain retrieves the pen’s name, its shape, its function, the sound when it scratches across a page. Each part of the memory of what a ‘pen’ is comes from a different part of the brain. The entire image of the ‘pen’ is actively reconstructed by the brain from many different areas. Memories can be of three different types — sensory, short-term and long-term. Sensory memory is when our brains takes in information using our senses without us being aware of it. For example, if we glance across a room, the brain will take in all the furniture, the people, and even the snippets of conversation we hear. All this will occur without us paying attention. Sensory memory lasts only a few seconds. The next type of memory is the short-term memory, which is also called the ‘brain’s Post-it Note’. This type of memory lasts for around 30 seconds, and can contain only seven items of information (to test this, briefly look at, and then recall, a random series of 10 numbers or words). The third type of memory is the long-term memory, which actually starts out as a short-term memory, but because it is important information, our brains stores it so that we can remember it later. Unlike sensory and short-term memory, which are limited and decay rapidly, long-term memory can store unlimited amounts of information indefinitely.

Words in Different Languages that Don’t Exist in English There are so many ideas, emotions and views in the world that only one language cannot possibly encapsulate them all. Here are some words in different languages that describe certain things that the English language has no specific word for.

Tartle (Scottish): The act of hesitating while introducing someone because you’ve forgotten their name.

Cafuné (Brazilian Portuguese): The act of tenderly running one’s fingers through someone’s hair.

L’appel du vide (French): Literal translation is ‘The call of the void’ but it is used to describe the instinctive urge to jump from high places.

Waldeinsamkeit (German): The feeling of being lost in the woods and having a connectedness to nature.

Luftmensch (Yiddish): One who lives on air.

Culaccino (Italian): The mark left on a table by a cold glass.

Fun facts about dogs You can lower your blood pressure just by petting your dog.

The reason dogs curl up is because of an age-old instinct to keep themselves warm and to protect vital organs while they sleep.

Dogs have wet noses because it helps to absorb scent chemicals.

If you leave your dog a piece of clothing that smells like you, the scent will comfort them and it can help curb their separation anxiety.

The basenji is the only breed of dog that can’t bark, but they can yodel.

Dogs’ sense of smell is 10,000 times stronger than humans’.

The Norwegian Lundehund is the only dog that has six toes on each foot.

Dogs can be trained to detect changes in the human body — there are even seizure alert dogs that assist patients during the onset of a seizure.

When your dog spins in a circle before settling down to snuggle, it’s because he’s making himself at home! This is a nesting trait carried down from the dog’s wilder ancestors.

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

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Artwork

Notable Entries for the Liberty Books Cards Competition Ayesha Fawad Winner

Mariyam Majeed

Mumtaz Mir

Aleeza, Aliya and Zoya

Mahnaz Mir

Hadia Imtiaz Winner

THE EXPRESS TRIBUNE, NOVEMBER 9, 2014

You will need: • 2-litre clear plastic bottles • Water • Food colouring • 1 teaspoon of glitter (optional) • Water • Duct tape

What to do: 1. Fill one of the plastic bottles about ¾ full of water.

2. Add a couple of drops of food colouring. Then add about a teaspoon of glitter to the coloured water (The glitter represents the dust in the tornado).

You will need: * Plain digestive biscuits * Unsalted butter, melted * Sugar * Cream cheese * condensed milk * Fresh lemon juice * Vanilla extract

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2 packets 11 tablespoons 2 tablespoons 2 8-ounce packets 1 & 1/4 cups 1/4 cup 1 teaspoon

• Put the biscuits in a large plastic bag, and crush them with a rolling pin until it turns into very fine crumbs.

• Pour crumbs into a medium bowl and stir in sugar. Add butter, and stir until well combined.

• Press the crumb mixture into a 9-inch shallow dish, spreading it 1 & 1/2 to 2 inches up the side and press flat. Chill crust in the freezer for at least 10 minutes.

• Meanwhile, make the filling: Using an electric mixer set at medium-high speed, beat the cream cheese in a large bowl until smooth. Beat in the condensed milk a little at a time, scraping the sides of the bowl as necessary. Beat in the lemon juice and vanilla.

3. Use the duct tape to tape the top of the empty bottle to the top of the bottle with the water. Make sure the tape is secure around the bottle tops, as we don’t want any water leaking out. Then turn the bottles around, with the water-filled bottle on top.

4. Watch as the water flows from the top bottle into the bottom bottle. The water flows slowly from the top bottle into the bottom bottle. The air bubbles travel up through the water in the top bottle, making a noise. Hold the bottles where they are connected and quickly swirl them in a circular motion for a few seconds. There’s a mini tornado in the top bottle as the water flows quickly and quietly into the bottom bottle.

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• Pour the filling into the crust and smooth the top with a rubber spatula. Cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for 2 & 1/2 to 3 hours, until it is firm.

What is happening:

• Served chilled.

MARTHASTEWART.COM

Remember kids, always get permission from your parents before you start.

It’s always a good idea to have a helper nearby.

Spinning the bottle in a circular motion creates a water vortex that looks like a mini tornado. The water is rapidly spinning around the center of the vortex due to centripetal force (an inward force directing an object or fluid such as water towards the center of its circular path). Vortexes found in nature include tornadoes, hurricanes and waterspouts (a tornado that forms over water).

SCIENCEBOB.COM