"I like pigs," Winston Churchill supposedly once said. "Dogs look up at us, cats look down on us, but pigs treat us as equals. "Whether Churchill's contemporary George Orwell also liked pigs is less clear. But he, too, surely saw something in them that was lacking in other domestic beasts, for it was they who ended up running the show in novel Animal Farm. Pigs, then, are intelligent social creatures.

And, like all animals, they sometimes fight. A study just published in Animal Cognition by Ivan Norscia, a biological anthropologist at the University of Turin, in Italy, and his colleagues, looked at how a group of 104 domestic pigs went about resolving such incidents. In total, Dr. Norscia and his team studied the details of 216 pig conflicts over the course of six months.

Some pigs tend to be attackers; others tend to be victims. Who is what depends largely on weight, for, among pigs pounds mean power. The attacker might bite, kick, bump or lift the victim (or string together a sequence of those actions). Most conflicts ended in seconds, but some lasted a minute or two.

In most animal species that would be that. However, many of the pig conflicts Dr. Norscia observed had interested parties beyond the protagonists (主角). He therefore wanted to understand the role of these bystanders in resolving fights-and what this says about pigs' cognitive (认知) abilities.

Since there was usually not enough time for a bystander pig to intervene during the heat of a conflict (though this did occur), he and his colleagues looked at what happened in the three minutes directly following an aggressive interaction. Sometimes, they found, the protagonists made up on their own—for instance, by touching noses.

On other occasions, though, a third pig stepped in. Sometimes this bystander acted as a peacemaker, engaging with the attacker and reducing the number of subsequent attacks compared with what might otherwise have been expected. Sometimes, by contrast, the bystander engaged with the victim. This appeared to calm the victim down, for it reduced anxiety-related behavior such as shaking and scratching.

The idea of low material desire, low consumption and refusing to work, marry and have children, concluded as a "lying down" lifestyle, recently struck a chord with many young Chinese who are eager to take pause to breathe in this fast-paced and highly-competitive society.

Many millennials (千禧一代) and generation Zs complained to the Global Times that burdens, including work stress, family disputes (纷争) and financial strains, have pushed them "against the wall". They said they hate the "involution (内卷)," joking that they would rather give up some of what they have than get trapped in an endless competition against peers.

"Instead of always following the 'virtues' of struggle, endure and sacrifice to bear the stresses, they prefer a temporary lying down as catharsis (宣泄) and adjustment," said a scholar. "It is no wonder that some young people, under the growing pressures from child-raising to paying the mortgage (按揭) today, would try to live in a simple way and leave the worries behind."

Interestingly, the majority of millennials and Gen Zs reached by the Global Times, who claim to be big fans of the lying down philosophy, acknowledged that they only accept a temporary lying down as a short rest. It is true that with the great improvement of living conditions, some Chinese youth have partially lost the spirit of hardship and are not willing to bear too much hard work. But in fact, lying down is not entirely comfortable. Young people who lie down always feel guilty about their constant loss of morale (士气) far beyond their reach.

"Young people on campus have both aspirations and confusion about their future, but most of us have rejected setting ourselves up in chains to waste opportunities and challenges," a postgraduate student told the Global Times. "It's no use running away. I have to 'stand up' and face the reality sooner or later."

In 2009 in a small town, Todd Bol came up with an idea to share his mother's love of reading with others. Bol's mother had been a teacher who had loved reading. He decided to build a wooden box and fill it with books. Bol placed the box of books on a post in his front yard with a sign that read "Free Books". Soon his neighbours noticed this tiny model of a "schoolhouse". They began taking the books and replacing them with books of their own. The tiny library allowed people the opportunity to "check out" books day or night.

Bol's friends and neighbours wanted little libraries of their own. Bol built several and gave them away. One of his friends, Rick, believed that Bol's little libraries could benefit more than just local friends and neighbours. With these ideas in mind, Bol and Rick came up with a plan to build over 2,500 Little Free Libraries around the world. They believed that books should be available to all people, no matter where they live or what their background is. To help achieve their goal, Bol and Rick created a website that provides information about the Little Free Libraries and how people can establish little libraries of their own. 

Thanks to Bol and Rick, the Little Free Libraries are encouraging people to read more. They didn't just provide books. They also helped build friendships and a sense of belonging among community members. As more and more people visited Bol's little library, they began talking with one another. They shared thoughts, ideas, and stories. They got to know one another. Everyone loved the little library. After all, as Bol says, "It's a magic box with books. People tell us all the time that they've met more people in a week than they have in a lifetime. "

Today there are more than 25,000 Little Free Libraries around the world, and they can be found on almost every continent.