From Bloodthirsty Beast To Saccharine Symbol - The History And Origins Of The Unicorn

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The unicorn is an enduring image in contemporary society: a symbol of cuteness, magic, and children’s birthday parties.

Things and events in the universe are not haphazard and chaotic: they are formed—“in-formed”—by universal attractors. The recognition that the manifest world, and thus the living organism, is “in-formed,” suggests a new definition of bodily health and disease.

“I’m bored” is a statement many parents dread hearing during the summer holidays.

Multitasking has traditionally been perceived as a woman’s domain. A woman, particularly one with children, will routinely be juggling a job and running a household

Almost every person throughout the existence of humankind has looked up at the night sky and seen more than just a random scattering of light. 

Half-price chips, “two for one” chocolates, “buy one get one free” soft drinks: Australian supermarkets make it very easy for us to fill our trolleys with junk food.

As we get older we have a greater risk of developing impairments in areas of cognitive function – such as memory, reasoning and verbal ability.

When you have begun seeing through new eyes, it might still appear to others that nothing about you has changed. However, you know inside yourself that everything has changed. A Zen proverb says: Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water; after...

At the end of the day we’re all looking for magic. This includes the ability to affect change, sometimes miraculous change, in our lives at will. Energy wants to move and flow, and once you start to listen to it and tune in, it will take you on amazing journeys.

Often the spirits only whisper and we confuse their voices with the wind, but if we do not pay attention, they may well unleash a hurricane in our lives. They certainly did with me and with many of my students because we were slow responding – but we lived to tell the tale and it was a tale of rebirth and miracles.

How do you know something exists if you never hear about it? How do you know about the truth, which is often "the other side of the coin", if it is never exposed to the light? Perhaps those two questions answer the implied question in the title: Why Marianne Williamson's Candidacy for President Is Important.

Unconditional love is loving people freely, fully and openly, with no expectations, demands or restrictions. It gives total acceptance and respect and does not criticize or judge. Unconditional love is constant and is not turned on and off as in conditional love.

In my day job, I am a scientist at the University of Aberdeen in Scotland studying things such as how agriculture contributes to climate change and what we can do about it.

In a manifesto posted online shortly before he went on to massacre 22 people at an El Paso Walmart, Patrick Crusius cited the “invasion” of Texas by Hispanics.

Most people expect hospital treatment to make them better. But for some, a stay in hospital can actually make them sicker. 

Do you struggle trying to fall asleep? Do you feel you don’t get enough sleep and you feel sleepy during the day? You are not alone.

What does it mean, exactly, to be "lost"? Perhaps this: we don't know how to get from where we are to where we want to be. I may know where I am physically but be lost because I have no idea what I want to do next in my life...

“Organic” is more than just a passing fad. Organic food sales totaled a record US$45.2 billion in 2017, making it one of the fastest-growing segments of American agriculture.

In July, the website Snopes published a piece fact-checking a story posted on The Babylon Bee, a popular satirical news site with a conservative bent.

This moon reminds us we don’t have to believe a single thought or subscribe to any belief unless we choose to. And we must choose with great care, for what occupies our mind also shapes our life. If we can simply sit in silent witness of all our mental meanderings at this moon, we can create the space around our thoughts which allows us to just be: watching them without believing them. Assessing their value before committing to them.

About a quarter of all the greenhouse gas emissions that humans generate each year come from how we feed the world.

The planet’s far North is burning. This summer, over 600 wildfires have consumed more than 2.4 million acres of forest across Alaska.

One of the most powerful, searing renditions of the national anthem ever recorded, Jimi Hendrix’s iconic Woodstock anthem, almost never happened.

Not content with monitoring almost everything you do online, Facebook now wants to read your mind as well.

Life can be stressful. It can and does present challenges. It also brings pleasures and laughter, as well as sadness and tears. Some of these experiences we accept with joy, others we want to run from and hide, others just plain aggravate us or bore us 'to death'...

There have been plenty of claims about what being left-handed means, and whether it changes the type of person someone is – but the truth is something of an enigma.

When we look in the mirror we see “me”: a particular combination of features that matches our idea of who we are.

In its latest report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change describes how agriculture, deforestation, and other human activities have altered 70% of the land on Earth’s surface.

There is ongoing debate about whether eating disorders are more common in modern society.

There’s been a rise in recent years of biomedical engineering techniques that can restore lost tissue and bone.

A sunny afternoon in Paris. An intrepid TV presenter is making his way through the streets asking passersby to smell a bottle he has in his hand.

We all start out as a closet case. We have a secret life with secret pain that we keep under wraps in this closet. We bolt the door and hide the key, keeping our dark side hidden away, and we work very hard to function over the top of that pain, fear and anguish and go on somehow with our lives, perhaps thinking we are the only ones with secret pain.

Ever relied on an online review to make a purchasing decision? How do you know it was actually genuine?

The vicious ideology that allegedly drove a gunman to kill 22 people in El Paso, Texas could be traced back to a tiny island on the eastern fringe of the Caribbean Sea.

Most people want to be sustainable, but have a hard time taking the necessary actions.

Rarely has our environment changed so quickly. On top of climate change, we’re exposing ourselves to air pollutants, microplastics and unprecedented levels of fat, salt and sugar in our food.

From young adults to people in their 60s, everyday functioning in today’s world can place high demands on our attention and memory skills.

Contrary to opinion polls predicting a groundswell of support for Labor’s relatively progressive agenda on climate and economics, the election results revealed that Australians are more divided on climate change than we thought.

Buddhists believe that all our actions are dependent on our state of mind. A mind that is not well controlled is liable to cause a great deal of harm to itself and others, while a peaceful mind creates a comfortable atmosphere for itself and everyone around.

Human breast milk is more than a meal – it’s also a clock, providing time-of-day information to infants.

The IPCC special report, Climate Change and Land, released last night, has found a third of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions come from the “land”: largely farming, food production, land clearing and deforestation.

Sepsis, colloquially known as blood poisoning, occurs as a result of an infection, usually from bacteria.

I study emerging technologies and digital culture. In our field it’s well-established: major studies show no link between violent criminal action and violent video games.

While “freedom songs” were key in giving motivation and comfort to those fighting for equal rights in the Civil Rights Movement, music may have also helped empower black women to lead

What do you do if you have a question? You probably Google it.

In mountains of Bosnia, a community of mystics who call themselves the Emissaries of Light, said to me: "Our role is not to bring peace to where it is not, but to reveal peace where it is hidden." Peace, the Emissaries said, is not something that can be understood with the mind, but must be experienced with the heart.

Forgetting to do or to say things happens to all of us sometimes.

A new study links stressful life experiences among middle-aged women—but not men—to greater memory decline in later life.

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Is any item more symbolic of our modern, disposable culture than the single-use coffee cup?

For many of us, eating a meal containing meat is a normal part of daily life. But if we dig deeper, some sobering issues emerge.

The Lion King is a movie about a young lion cub named Simba, who idolizes his father, King Mufasa, and is eager for his own royal destiny.

This week we bring you articles that help shed light on "you" and your affect on life, and the people whose lives you touch...

This weekly astrological journal is based on planetary influences, and offers perspectives and insights to assist you in making the best use of current energies. This column is not intended as prediction. Your own experience will be more specifically defined by transits to your personal chart.

When many people think about making a social impact, they do not think that this change can extend to themselves and their life’s work. On the one hand, it feels exciting and worthwhile to take on a worthy cause, and on the other, it can feel too time consuming and overwhelming.

As a composer, John Cage sought to get the weight of Beethoven and the other past masters off his shoulders. He felt it was essential to be freed from the repetitive patterns of personality and style (“memory, tastes, likes, and dislikes”) and to free audiences from their expectations of what art should look and sound like.

One of the most fascinating aspects of the human body is the fact that there are so many reflexology maps found on different parts of the body. By reading the zones that are located on the surface of the skin on different parts of the body we can discover incipient health disturbances, which may otherwise remain hidden, before they become chronic problems.

Taking nonprescribed psychostimulants may slightly improve a person’s short-term focus but impede sleep and mental functions that rely on it—such as working memory.

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Challenge prizes – which offer a cash incentive to those working to solve a particular problem – are becoming a force for change by allowing entrepreneurs and innovators, often overlooked by existing grant and procurement systems, to develop solutions to the world’s greatest problems.

Imagine “carbon emissions”, and what springs to mind? Most people tend to think of power stations belching out clouds of carbon dioxide or queues of vehicles burning up fossil fuels as they crawl, bumper-to-bumper, along congested urban roads.

Viruses are mostly known for their aggressive and infectious nature. It’s true, most viruses have a pathogenic relationship with their hosts – meaning they cause diseases ranging from a mild cold to serious conditions.

When love, lust and all things in between come calling, dating apps appear to be the only way to meet new people and experience romance in 2019.

The upcoming Canadian federal election once again raises the spectre of interference and disruption through the misuse and abuse of personal data.

A commitment to an anger-free life involves signing up for a new journey. Deciding to actually enjoy this journey will make it much more pleasant. Learn to think of life as a process. If you focus only on goals, you are not going to be happy until you have achieved them.

The concept of soul loss may seem foreign and perhaps impossible for people who see the soul as an immutable essence that reflects the divine presence within us. While this is an ideal, it is likely that this ideal has not been a constant throughout a person’s life. The soul is sacred essence energy that originates from divine source, but this energy can be depleted if we allow it to be.

Politicians and pundits from all quarters often lament democracy’s polarized condition.

People with type 2 diabetes are at a higher risk of getting cardiovascular diseases, including heart attack and stroke

Food additives do a lot of good: they prolong shelf life, improve taste and texture, and add colour to otherwise unappealing products.

Melanoma is a potentially deadly form of skin cancer linked to overexposure to ultraviolet (UV) rays from the sun.

If any nationality is followed to its roots, there will be an Earth-based society with its own form of shamanic healing. Shamanism is a spiritual-healing practice (not to be confused with religion) at the foundation of all indigenous, Earth-based, societies. In short, shamanism mends where the laws of nature have been broken. The spiritual illness of “soul loss” is a universal shamanic concept.

Injury is the leading cause of death for U.S. children and adolescents, accounting for over 60% of all deaths in this group. Firearms are the second leading cause of death among U.S. children and adolescents, after car crashes. Firearm deaths occur at a rate over three times higher than drownings.

The aloe plant’s ability to survive extended periods of drought could contribute to more resilient crops.

In a world where negativity seeps into every corner of our lives and whatever is gross, weird, or shocking is considered hip and appropriate for children, we must find ways to create a home environment that promotes positive thinking and joyful attitudes. Create a fortress of beauty, hope, and peace where we can...

Many pregnant women find themselves waking up in the middle of night to go the bathroom (for the third time) or struggling to find a comfortable sleep position.

Personalised nutrition, where your DNA tells you what to eat and what not to eat, is gaining momentum.

Toni Morrison, who has died aged 88, was the most influential and studied American author of her generation.

Sweat comes from special parts in our skin called glands. You might be able to see them if you have a very strong magnifying glass.

In their second round of debates, Democratic presidential candidates called for aggressive measures to slow climate change.

Conspiracy theories are popular and there is no doubt that the internet has fuelled them on.

In an actual war, to be attacked means to have our survival threatened. Thus, we might chose between surrender, withdrawal, or counterattack. When we feel attacked (criticized or judged) by others in conversation, we often move into that same...

Some might balk at the idea that plants made of roots, stems and leaves could have intelligence or consciousness. 

Last summer the World Economic Forum (WEF) invited its 1,500 council members to identify top trends facing the world, including what should be done about them.

Wicked problems are issues so complex and dependent on so many factors that it is hard to grasp what exactly the problem is, or how to tackle it.

For all of human history, babies have been born where their mothers lived – whether in a house, hut or cave.

A new technique grows live bone to repair craniofacial injuries by attaching a 3D-printed bioreactor—basically, a mold—to a rib.

The deaths of twins in the backseat of their father’s car is yet another reminder of how tragedies can occur when the brain goes into an autopilot mode and loses awareness of crucial events.

There comes a point when you must decide if you want a life that is fear-driven or one founded on love and hope. Establishing this premise is tantamount to bringing your healing to the next level. Remember, each gain will be incremental. You'll catch the negative voices faster; you'll dismiss them more quickly...

Despite a cumulative increase of nearly 10 per cent in voter turnout in Canadian federal elections between 2008 and 2015, the country’s voter turnout rates remain moderate.

Fainting, also known as syncope, is the sudden loss of consciousness. In most cases, fainting is not dangerous — unless it is complicated by a fall or other injury — and the person recovers quickly.

In 1970, only three countries – Italy, Japan and Mauritius – banned corporal punishment in schools. By 2016, more than 100 countries banned the practice, which allows teachers to legally hit, paddle or spank students for misbehavior.

When animal welfare campaigner Ruth Harrison published a book in 1964 called Animal Machines, there was a public outcry.

Coral reefs are critically important to the world but despite the ongoing efforts of scientists and campaigners, these stunningly beautiful ecosystems still face a variety of threats.

The abuse inflicted on child detainees at the Don Dale facility in the Northern Territory in Australia has shone a much-needed light on youth justice.

In one way or another we're all seeking ways to find happiness and fulfillment. And we all know that success alone doesn't bring happiness. Mother Teresa said that the greatest poverty was spiritual, not physical.

Is home somewhere that you feel comfortable? Is it filled with memories of beloved friends and family — some of whom may be furry animals?

Having a cough can be distressing. It can disrupt sleep or even worsen urinary incontinence. So it’s not surprising 7% of Australians have reached for a cough or cold medicine in the last two weeks.

People often say that babies are like little sponges — with their ability to soak up language quickly and easily.

Search for “climate change” on YouTube and before long you’ll likely find a video that denies it exists.

Restoring the world’s forests on an unprecedented scale is “the best climate change solution available”, according to a new study.

Imagine that your son Tommy is about to turn two. He is a shy and sweet little boy, but his behaviours can be unpredictable.

Emotional suppression sometimes serves a useful, even essential purpose. When suffering a severe traumatic injury, for example. Yet while emotional suppression may sometimes serve a useful purpose, inhibiting the free flow of emotional energies over the course of a lifetime causes serious...