Issue41 第13篇 写得满眼冒白光，没想到字数却还行！

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作者：寄托家园作文版普通用户     共用时间：40分2秒     527 words
从2005年7月4日0时1分到2005年7月4日0时40分

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Such nonmainstream areas of inquiry as astrology, fortune-telling, and psychic and paranormal pursuits play a vital role in society by satisfying human needs that are not addressed by mainstream science.

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Nowadays, many people including some famous sports athletes, pop stars, even the political leaders make their schedules based on the fortune-telling or astrology. Do such nonmainstream areas of inquiry play a vital role in society? Do they satisfy human needs that are not addressed by mainstream science? In my point of view, I have to concede that to some extent they do so.

In the first place, most of people would fear the uncertainty or be curious about the unknown things. A number of magazines and newspapers now open such columns that forecast the fortune of people in a week or in a month. Do you want to know whether your enterprise goes well or not? Do you need some advices that could change your bad luck? Having a glance of those astrology or fortune-telling information would give you some kind of certainty or satisfy your curiosity of the future. Furthermore, when people come to some dilemmas which could not be solved by the scientific methods, they would need a way to help them make a decision. For example, in ancient East, the military leaders would often use shells or stones to see the possible results of their actions. If they were told that they would fail in the war, they preferred to hold on the battle as they were willing to believe that they could avoid the unnecessary loss by doing so.

Secondly, another important merit that nonmainstream areas could bring to is to comfort us.  When people need some help or have some psychological problems which could not be addressed by mainstream science, they would appeal to the nonmainstream areas of inquiry. For example, in my country, some people believe that there are some ones owning psychic super ability existing in the world. And they could help us to talk to our nearest and dearest people who had passed away. It is a specific way that solves our sick for those dead people. Admittedly, in this sense, the mainstream science seems to be cool and rigid that could not build up a bridge for us to communicate with the people we think of.

Thirdly, some pursuit of paranormal could help us to explore the essence of the nature. Their explanation of some usnidentified flying objects, no matter whether it is true or false would give us some evidences about the possible existing spacemen outside earth.

However, undue belief in the nonmainstream areas or ignore the mainstream science would do harm to our society. Some people would be depressed by the unfortunate forecast by the astrology and lose confidence in themselves. In that case, they often make no effort to earn their living because they think the fate of them has been decided and could not be changed at all. As a result, they would miss some good chance and go down to a bad life. It is some kind of negative effect caused by the nonmainstream areas.

In sum, although the nonmainstream areas of inquiry would sometimes cause misconception in the future, it does play an important role in our society for it satisfies our curiosity, move away our uncertainty and give some comfort to us.