Ke Jie, a Chinese Go chess prodigy and the world’s No.1 Go player, lost to Google’s AlphaGo AI mid-game during their second match on Thursday.

The 19-year-old master began a best-of-three series against Google’s artificial-intelligence-based Go system on Tuesday morning, during a week-long competition in the historic town of Wuzhen, east China’s Zhejiang Province.

The dual was the latest contest between elite human Go players and AlphaGo, which has been developed by Google’s DeepMind. The program defeated South Korean Go master Lee Se-dol 4-1 in March 2016.

Ke Jie dropped the first round of the best-of-three match on May 23, 2017.

The final game will take place on May 27.

Chinese and foreign top scholars and experts pose for group photo during the 3rd Dialogue of Civilizations – Chang’an Forum held in Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, May 21-22, 2017. [Photo/ China.org.cn]

Chinese and foreign scholars and experts gathered in Xi’an, Shaanxi Province, this week for a dialogue of civilizations, and discussed how to build a community of a shared future for all humankind.

The 3rd Dialogue of Civilizations – Chang’an Forum was held May 21-22 at Northwest University in Xi’an, known Chang’an in Tang Dynasty when it was the capital. More than 30 representatives from academia, science institutes, think tanks, civil societies, diplomacy, business, translation and literature circles from eight countries discussed how to promote Chinese culture abroad, as well as dialogues among cultures and peoples from the countries along the route of the Belt and Road Initiative.

In a congratulatory message read out at the forum, Professor Yue Daiyun, chairman of Chinese Comparative Literature Academy and former head of Peking University Comparative Literature and Culture Institution, stated: “It seems we have entered a time of uncertainty when development and retrogression co-exist… We ought to stand firm and look further ahead, thinking how we can renew our actions and ideology within a much more complex context,”

Ambassador Mussie Hailu, regional director of the United Religions Initiative (URI) for Africa and Representative of URI to the African Union and United Nations, said there was “a strong need in our world more than ever to promote inter-religious and inter-cultural constructive dialogue to build understanding, trust and avoid holding a wrong image of others and overcome the fear of the unknown.

“We are constantly hearing of the challenges our world is facing. We must not wait for fundamental change to come from somewhere; meaningful change must come from within. If everyone does his or her bit, together we can accomplish what is necessary. This forum will help to create such awareness in people’s minds.”

Gong Jianzhong, former ambassador of China to Ghana and the executive vice president of the China Public Diplomacy Association, also pointed out that resolution of complicated global problems should adopt the wisdom of different cultures, and that China always wants to achieve harmony when engaged in diplomatic relationships and exchanges with other countries. He hoped China could learn from other cultures while maintaining the cultural confidence of its own development, build a diversified cultural environment and promote progress and development of all humankind.

Professor Zhang Xiping of Beijing Foreign Studies University, Professor Zhou Hong from Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Xi’an’s Vice Mayor Professor Fang Guanghua, German sinologist Wolfgang Kubin, Professor Russell Duncan from the University of Copenhagen, CERN physicist and researcher Ren Zhongliang, French Taoist Thomas Morillon, President of Northwest University Guo Lihong, Professor Hu Zongfeng, president of the School of Foreign Languages at Northwest University also attended and addressed the forum.

Gao Ping, president of the China’s Qiaology Institute on Dialogue of Civilizations, told China.org.cn that dialogue at the spiritual and thinking level could guide human society, and dialogue in culture and belief areas bring about new ways of thinking, as well as understanding and reflecting the world and its meaning.

He pointed out that the renowned 20th Century British historian Arnold Joseph Toynbee (1889-1975) predicted, in his later years, that Western civilization had started to decline and Chinese civilization would take over and lead the world. “If Chinese people didn’t realize their mission or they try hard but fail, the prospect of humankind indeed will be gloomy. “

His institute initiated the forum and has been promoting it for three years, “The dialogue of civilizations will be like the multifunctional and delicate Swiss Army knife to resolve human problems,” he said, citing President Xi Jinping’s speech at the Boao Forum for Asia in 2015 as his inspiration, in which President Xi proposed a conference of dialogue among Asian civilizations to be held with an aim to boost regional cooperation and development.

Gao later also proposed a Conference for Dialogue of Asian Civilizations to be inaugurated in Xi’an in 2018 for the sake of its rich culture and history that was for long a capital of dialogue for civilizations from around the world.

Shared bikes will be banned from military areas in Beijing starting Thursday, a military officer said Wednesday.

The off-limits zones include restricted military areas and hospitals, residential areas, and sanitariums administrated by the military in Beijing.

“Bike sharing has brought new problems to the management of military areas, such as illegal parking and entering and exiting without approval,” said the officer with the training management department of the Central Military Commission.

“The army’s image would be tainted once misuse like bike refitting or damage is found in military areas,” the officer said.

Shared bikes are being moved away from military zones, and inspections will be carried out by the department.

The Ministry of Transport on Monday released draft rules requiring local governments to strengthen oversight of the sector.

Bike-sharing services took off in Chinese cities in the past two years. They allows riders to hire bikes for about one yuan (about 15 U.S. cents) per hour via a mobile app, and drop them off for the next user.

The service has reduced traffic congestion and cut auto emissions, but haphazardly parked bikes often block sidewalks, causing complaints.

There were 18.9 million users of shared bicycles nationwide at the end of 2016. The number is expected to hit 50 million by the end of this year, according to the China E-Commerce Research Center.

Shanghai’s first unisex public restroom, designed to help reduce waiting times for women, is failing to woo users, especially females.

The restroom’s automatic tally device showed that only about 100 people a day have used it since it opened in November, a rate far lower than other public restrooms in the city.

That could partly be a result of its secluded location – a green space in the city’s Pudong New Area that is far from bustling streets or residential areas. Most users are migrant laborers working nearby, with only about 10 percent of its users female.

There have also been complaints that some male users smoke in the restroom, which is forbidden.

“Most of the users are male workers at nearby construction sites, and I have totally different hygienic habits from them,” said Zhang Xia, a female who regularly uses the toilet. “Sometimes it’s really uncomfortable to use the toilet.”

Another user, who only agreed to disclose her surname Jiang, said, “It’s really embarrassing and I would like to use other washrooms, even though it’s a 5 to 10 minute walk from work.”

She added that people smoking in the facility or failing to flush it sometimes made her feel sick.

With 10 unisex cubicles, the public restroom has a separate men-only area featuring four urinals, and another space allocated for people with disabilities and users with children.

“I think it’s fine,” said Wang Lian, who used the restroom for the first time on Friday. “It can reduce waiting times for females who often take longer to use the toilets, and the LED screen at the top of each cubicle clearly shows whether it is vacant or occupied.”

Zhang Hui, a male working at a nearby construction site, said that the higher and stronger partitions between cubicles ensure a more private space.

“However, there is no clear sign indicating the restroom is a unisex one. I felt really confused when I used it for the first time,” he added.

Gu Chunming, who cleans the restroom, said the environment and facility of the unisex restroom is much better than most of the other public restrooms in Shanghai, despite her annoyance about some users’ bad habits.

“Smoking is the biggest problem,” she said. “Warnings are posted at the entrance, but it still can’t be stopped.”

Authorities have said that they will evaluate the response to the restroom before deciding whether to build more in the city.

A top Taiwan court ruled in favor of same-sex marriage on Wednesday, a landmark ruling that paves the way for Taiwan to become the first place in Asia to legalize same-sex unions.

The court said Taiwan’s current Civil Code provision, which does not allow two persons of the same sex to marry, is in violation of both the people’s freedom of marriage and the people’s right to equality as guaranteed by its Constitution.

The court rules that the authorities concerned shall complete the amendment of relevant laws in accordance with the ruling within two years. If the amendment of relevant laws is not completed within the two-year time frame, then two persons of the same sex may apply for marriage registration.

The case was brought by gay rights activist Chi Chia-wei after the Taipei city government rejected his and his long-time partner’s application to marry in 2013.