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COMMENTARY / World
Oct 6, 2013

Separating Jesus from the legends

There's enough biblical scholarship about the historical Jesus to raise questions about some of the myths that have formed around Him over the past 2,000 years.
Reader Mail
Oct 5, 2013

The kanji cultures pack a punch

Economics must truly be the dismal science based on what professor Dipak Basu wrote in his Sept. 26 letter, "Questionable link to innovation." Did this economist really suggest that Japan's education system would be greatly improved if Japan abolished the Chinese kanji character system — which he says...
BUSINESS / Companies
Oct 5, 2013

Mizuho admits four execs knew of yakuza loans

Mizuho Bank has admitted that at least four of its executives, including two former deputy presidents, knew that it was lending money to underworld and other "antisocial" groups and that it neither stopped nor sought to hold management responsible.
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 1, 2013

Business partnerships in the fight against poverty

The private sector must be a critical partner if we are to sustainably lift people out of poverty. It is small- and medium-size enterprises that consistently drive job creation and economic growth.
Japan Times
LIFE / Lifestyle / CHILD'S PLAY
Oct 1, 2013

A welcome sign: Tantrums may be on the way out

Every parent is all too familiar with The Tantrum. The screaming, the flailing arms, the angry head butting — and the timing (normally in the most inconvenient public place possible).
EDITORIALS
Sep 26, 2013

Ms. Merkel triumphant

The victory of Germany's conservative coalition in Sunday's elections was a rousing affirmation of the popularity of a wily chancellor whom Germans have come to call 'mummy.
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / WORDS TO LIVE BY
Sep 24, 2013

Producer gets deep inside the otaku heart

Masaaki Katabami is a content producer working in Tokyo. Besides producing manga and mascot design for clients, Katabami publishes Burgeon, a biannual free manga magazine aimed at a female otaku (geek) readership. Available at Tokyo's Comiket (Comic Market fair), the magazine is in its sixth year. In...
Japan Times
COMMUNITY / Voices / VIEWS FROM THE STREET
Sep 23, 2013

Tokyo: What would you like to be reincarnated as?

Is it a bird? Is it a Pacific islander? Tokyoites tackle the big existential question: What do you want to be in your next life
Japan Times
WORLD
Sep 22, 2013

Vetting firms 'rush' through security clearances

When Ileana Privetera started working for the contractor USIS, the firm that vetted National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden and Washington Navy Yard shooter Aaron Alexis, it sounded like the perfect job. A mother, she would have flexible hours for her family, and she would be helping the country...
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Sep 21, 2013

Presenting the up, down and dark sides of 'Gorinnomics'

The weekly magazines' and tabloids' reaction to the selection of Tokyo to host the 2020 Olympics reminds one of an oft-quoted remark by Oscar Wilde that goes, "In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it."
Japan Times
CULTURE / Film
Sep 19, 2013

'Elysium'

On the one hand "Elysium" is the last of this year's summer blockbusters, the new Matt Damon star vehicle and the Hollywood debut by South African director Neill Blomkamp, acclaimed for his debut aliens-among-us feature "District 9." On the other, this is a political propaganda film so stark and simplistic...
Japan Times
BUSINESS
Sep 17, 2013

How Wal-Mart's Waltons maintain their billionaire fortune

Visitors to the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art in Bentonville, Arkansas, leave appreciative notes on a glass wall near the entrance.
BUSINESS / Companies
Sep 17, 2013

Eiji Toyoda was instrumental in turning Toyota into export giant

Eiji Toyoda, who died Tuesday in Aichi Prefecture, spearheaded Toyota Motor Corp.'s expansion in the U.S. as the automaker's longest-serving president.
EDITORIALS
Sep 15, 2013

Keep tuition exemption

The government should increase taxes on wealthy families rather than exclude their children from the high school tuition exemption and support system.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 15, 2013

Shooting down five myths about cruise missiles

U.S. cruise missiles are no magical solution to the horror taking place in Syria.
JAPAN / Media / BIG IN JAPAN
Sep 14, 2013

Japanese media declare 'dark times' are on us

Being good has never been easy. And it's not getting easier — unlike many things in this age of mass technological empowerment. If it were, presumably, there would be more good and less evil — unless evil is more attractive?
Reader Mail
Sep 14, 2013

Make use of chemical conventions

Regarding the Sept. 12 article "Obama gives Syria diplomatic option to avoid U.S. strike": In a plan jointly developed just over a week ago with Dr. Gordon Thompson, who directs the Institute for Resource and Security Studies in Cambridge, Massachusetts (before U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry's door-opening...
COMMUNITY / Our Lives / JAPAN LITE
Sep 13, 2013

The dysfunctional family of Mother Nature

"From now on, I will carry my own water bottle," I promised Mother Nature. She had just scolded me as I came around the corner by presenting me with an angry beach covered with garbage. And this was not the first time she has told me off. Hundreds of beaches in the Seto Inland Sea are inundated with...
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 12, 2013

Chemical arms: fact and fiction

Technological advances have made conventional weapons capable of leaving a greater trail of death and destruction than any poison gas.
BUSINESS / Economy / 'SUMMER DAVOS' SPECIAL 2013
Sep 10, 2013

Advising visitors to truly see Japan with their own eyes

Last summer at age 66, Seiichi Kondo climbed Mount Fuji for the first time in his life. Friends warned it wouldn't be an easy expedition, and it wasn't. But conquering Japan's highest mountain was essential for what he was about to do next.
ENVIRONMENT
Sep 9, 2013

Could man-made clouds help lower the planet's temperature?

With the planet warming inexorably, some experts are wondering whether the time may have come to deliberately attempt 'solar radiation management.
SOCCER / J. League / J. LEAGUE NOTEBOOK
Sep 4, 2013

Life goes on for Reysol after Nelsinho's shock resignation

Kashiwa Reysol are still reeling from the shock resignation of manager Nelsinho last weekend, but with the club competing on four fronts heading into September, there is no time for an extended grieving period.
COMMENTARY / World
Sep 4, 2013

Tragedy of America's 'good and virtuous wars'

Americans still believe in the idea of the good and virtuous war. What a dangerous idea it is.
JAPAN / Media / DARK SIDE OF THE RISING SUN
Aug 31, 2013

Japan's nuclear comedy just goes on and on

What has been will be again,
Reader Mail
Aug 31, 2013

Enough unsolicited information

The more I hear in the news about civil rights for sexual minorities, the more confused I become. Maybe I am intimidated by rapid change in society. Or maybe I'm homophobic.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 29, 2013

Once again, U.S. rushing to attack without facts

Assertions that Syrian President Bashar Assad is guilty of chemical weapons use without hard evidence presented to the international community will not do, not after the dodgy dossiers fiasco on Iraq in 2003.
CULTURE / Music / STRANGE BOUTIQUE
Aug 28, 2013

Twenty years ago, Cornelius releases the track that defined Shibuya-kei

The song "The Sun is My Enemy," released 20 years ago on Sept. 1, 1993, may have only reached No. 15 on the Japanese singles charts, but its importance lingers.
EDITORIALS
Aug 28, 2013

A crime against humanity in Syria

The Syrian government should allow U.N. inspectors full access to the battlefield where last week's chemical-weapons attacks to place, and ensure that all their questions are answered.
COMMENTARY / World
Aug 28, 2013

Syria will require more than missiles

The question before U.S. President Barack Obama is whether he will make matters worse by convincing himself that he has found a minimal solution to the Syrian problem. He will convince no one else.

Longform

A small shrine perched atop rocks braves the waves hitting the shoreline during a storm in Shimoda, Shizuoka Prefecture. The area is under threat of a possible 31-meter-high tsunami if an earthquake strikes the nearby Nankai Trough.
If the 'Big One' hits, this city could face a 31-meter-high tsunami