December 15, 2022 - This Startup Will Pay For Your Speeding Ticket - If It Can't Get it Dismissed. It's the Best Marketing I've Seen

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This Startup Will Pay For Your Speeding Ticket–If It Can’t Get it Dismissed. It’s the Best Marketing I’ve Seen The must-know strategy behind the clever campaign. Continued here

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Rethink Your Employee Value Proposition A lot of leaders believe that the formula for attracting and keeping talent is simple: Just ask people what they want and give it to them. The problem is, that approach tends to address only the material aspects of jobs that are top of employees’ minds at the moment, like pay or flexibility. And those offerings are easy for rivals to imitate and have the least enduring impact on retention. Companies instead should focus on what workers need to thrive over the long term, balancing material offerings with opportunities to grow, connection and community, and meaning and purpose. Continued here

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Earth’s most abundant organic material provides an ion highway Illustration of cellulose molecules (red and grey) form channels that carry water molecules (teal) and sodium ions (violet). Credit: Xin Zhang Ions can be transported at high speeds through a molecular structure derived from cellulose — the main constituent of plant cell walls, and the most abundant organic material on Earth1. Continued here

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27 Years Ago, Steve Jobs Explained How He Fired People. Here's How He Did It "My job has sometimes been exactly that: to get rid of some of the people that didn't measure up." Continued here

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The Secrets of Great Teamwork Over the years, as teams have grown more diverse, dispersed, digital, and dynamic, collaboration has become more complex. But though teams face new challenges, their success still depends on a core set of fundamentals. As J. Richard Hackman, who began researching teams in the 1970s, discovered, what matters most isn’t the personalities or behavior of the team members; it’s whether a team has a compelling direction, a strong structure, and a supportive context. In their own research, Haas and Mortensen have found that teams need those three “enabling conditions” now more than ever. But their work also revealed that today’s teams are especially prone to two corrosive problems: “us versus them” thinking and incomplete information. Overcoming those pitfalls requires a new enabling condition: a shared mindset. Continued here

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The Truth About Ozempic, the ‘Secret’ Celebrity Weight Loss Drug In the north of England, Chloe books Friday afternoon off work to drive to six different pharmacies in search of her routine prescription. For a year, she’s injected Ozempic every Monday to manage her type 2 diabetes, but it’s out of stock in her area.  She’s had no luck for the last four months. Instead, she’s had to switch to Trulicity, an alternative drug, which requires her to start again from its lowest prescription to build up the dose. Her blood sugar levels have oscillated for a couple of weeks, leading to fatigue and headaches, as well as requiring her to self-administer uncomfortable finger prick blood tests more frequently.  Continued here

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How to Survive a Recession and Thrive Afterward According to an analysis led by Ranjay Gulati, during the recessions of 1980, 1990, and 2000, 17% of the 4,700 public companies studied fared very badly: They went bankrupt, went private, or were acquired. But just as striking, 9% of the companies flourished, outperforming competitors by at least 10% in sales and profits growth. Continued here

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Ovarian cancer mutational processes drive site-specific immune evasion - Nature Nature (2022)Cite this article High-grade serous ovarian cancer (HGSOC) is an archetypal cancer of genomic instability1,2,3,4 patterned by distinct mutational processes5,6, tumour heterogeneity7,8,9 and intraperitoneal spread7,8,10. Immunotherapies have had limited efficacy in HGSOC11,12,13, highlighting an unmet need to assess how mutational processes and the anatomical sites of tumour foci determine the immunological states of the tumour microenvironment. Here we carried out an integrative analysis of whole-genome sequencing, single-cell RNA sequencing, digital histopathology and multiplexed immunofluorescence of 160 tumour sites from 42 treatment-naive patients with HGSOC. Homologous recombination-deficient HRD-Dup (BRCA1 mutant-like) and HRD-Del (BRCA2 mutant-like) tumours harboured inflammatory signalling and ongoing immunoediting, reflected in loss of HLA diversity and tumour infiltration with highly differentiated dysfunctional CD8+ T cells. By contrast, foldback-inversion-bearing tumours exhibited elevated immunosuppressive TGFβ signalling and immune exclusion, with predominantly naive/stem-like and memory T cells. Phenotypic state associations were specific to anatomical sites, highlighting compositional, topological and functional differences between adnexal tumours and distal peritoneal foci. Our findings implicate anatomical sites and mutational processes as determinants of evolutionary phenotypic divergence and immune resistance mechanisms in HGSOC. Our study provides a multi-omic cellular phenotype data substrate from which to develop and interpret future personalized immunotherapeutic approaches and early detection research. Continued here

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4 Tests That Your CFO Is a Great Business Partner Your CFO should support the CEO's vision, manage costs and profitability, invest in growth, set goals and hold people accountable. Continued here

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China’s Protests Spill Into the US. FBI Arrests a Chinese Student For Stalking. A 25-year-old Chinese student was arrested and charged in U.S. federal court in Boston on Wednesday accused of harassing a Chinese pro-democracy activist.  Xiaolei Wu, a student at the Berklee College of Music, was charged with one count of stalking. He was accused of sending threats to the victim through Instagram, email and Chinese social media platform WeChat, after learning through Instagram that the victim had put up a pro-democracy flier near campus in October. The flier said, “We Want Freedom”, “We Want Democracy”, and “Stand With Chinese People.”  Continued here

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Have You Been ‘Therapy-Baited’ While Dating? Here’s How to Tell Emily Wester was impressed when the guy she was on a date with opened up about having a lot of experience in therapy. They got on well, went out on more dates and the 32-year-old project manager caught feelings. Eventually they became boyfriend and girlfriend. Years into the relationship, she discovered he had a “huge coke addiction” and it became clear that he’d vastly exaggerated his experience with therapy. “He’d been referred to the NHS for six sessions and only went to about two,” she says.  They carried on with their relationship, but when things became strained during lockdown, Wester - who was actually in therapy - convinced him to see a professional. “Clearly, he didn’t tell them anything, because he came back and told me, ‘Oh, they said I didn’t need therapy.’” she says. “This is a man still addicted to cocaine, who’s had a lot of childhood trauma. Nobody would have said he didn’t need therapy if he’d actually told them what was going on.”  Continued here

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How the EU could force Apple to open up iMessage and end an App Store monopoly The European Union's new law could be the beginning of the end for Apple’s iMessage and App Store. Apple and other tech giants are facing even more pressure from the European Union to change their ways. According to a Bloomberg report, Apple is gearing up to allow third-party app stores onto its devices due to an upcoming law from the EU. Continued here

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Global estimates of excess deaths from COVID-19 Enrique Acosta is at the Centre for Demographic Studies, 08193 Barcelona, Spain, and at the Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany. Knowing how COVID-19 affects global mortality rates is crucial if we are to understand the factors that govern its spread and severity, and to be able to evaluate the effectiveness of government responses to the pandemic. In May, a team of researchers led by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs published the first results from their attempt to estimate global, COVID-19-related death rates. Writing in Nature, Msemburi et al.1 present these estimates in more detail. Continued here

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Barbara Corcoran's 7 Top Tips for Succeeding Against All Odds She's been an icon of entrepreneurship for decades--first as a New York City real estate maven and then as a Shark. But even at 73, she still leans on some early lessons learned. Continued here

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Are prices real? How ghosts of calculus and physics influenced what we pay for things today With inflation in the UK and around the world threatening to spiral out of control, prices of everything from milk to oil, energy and Christmas presents are a concern for most of us. Most people understand prices as simply the result of supply and demand – an agreement between sellers and buyers about how much something should cost. But there’s more to these numbers, starting with the mathematically philosophical question: do prices even exist? Continued here

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The Founder of CitiStorage's Next Billion-Dollar Idea: Disrupting College The storage company founder Norm Brodsky recently embarked on a new enterprise: teaching entrepreneurs how to scale up. Here's what you can learn from the octogenarian. Continued here

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Buying gifts? Why ‘buy now, pay later’ could be a dangerous option for many holiday shoppers Gift-givers hoping to splurge this holiday season despite the pinch of high inflation have an easy option: buy now, pay later. An ever-growing number of financial companies and apps are offering consumers what are essentially small, short-term loans that combine instant gratification with interest- and fee-free payments spread out in the new year. Continued here

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The Perfect Paradox of Star Brands: An Interview with Bernard Arnault of LVMH Who would want to run a company that makes and sells products no one needs? Only a fool, right? Unless, of course, the company is LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest and by far most successful purveyor of luxury goods. Each year, LVMH sells billions of dollars—$10 billion in 2000 to be exact—of items that serve little purpose in the lives of consumers except to fulfill dreams. And those dreams don’t come cheap—a magnum of 1985 Dom Pérignon Rosé champagne costs about $925; a Givenchy gown $15,000; and the finest TAG Heuer watch upwards of $58,000. No one needs these items, of course, yet millions desire them. Continued here

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As viral infections skyrocket, masks are still a tried-and-true way to help keep yourself and others safe The cold and flu season of 2022 has begun with a vengeance. Viruses that have been unusually scarce over the past three years are reappearing at remarkably high levels, sparking a “tripledemic” of COVID-19, the flu and respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV. This November’s national hospitalization levels for influenza were the highest in 10 years. To respond to the COVID-19 pandemic, we and our public health colleagues have had to quickly revive and apply decades of evidence on respiratory virus transmission to chart a path forward. Over the course of the pandemic, epidemiologists have established with new certainty the fact that one of our oldest methods for controlling respiratory viruses, the face mask, remains one of the most effective tools in a pandemic. Continued here

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The Inside Story of Europe’s Weirdest Crypto Mining Boom MITROVICA, Kosovo – There are divided cities all over the world. Some are separated by walls, some by armed checkpoints but a lot are just separated by fear and mistrust. In Mitrovica in the north of Kosovo, Europe’s newest country, the symbol and literal representation of division is a bridge. The optimistically named New Bridge that crosses the River Ibar separates less than 40,000 Serbs from the rest of Albanian Kosovo, and its government, law enforcement, courts, energy bills, and, most recently, licence plate requirements. Continued here

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1.5°C: where the target came from – and why we're losing sight of its importance The US economist William Nordhaus claimed as early as the 1970s, when scientific understanding of climate change was still taking shape, that warming of more than 2°C would “push global conditions past any point that any human civilisation had experienced”. By 1990, scientists had also weighed in: 2°C above the pre-industrial average was the point at which the risk of unpredictable and extensive damage would rapidly increase. Two years later, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) was established to stabilise the amount of greenhouse gas in the atmosphere at a level that would “prevent dangerous interference with the climate system”. At the first summit in Berlin in 1995, countries began negotiations for the global response to climate change which continue to this day. Continued here

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Emotionally Intelligent People Don’t Do Small Talk. Here’s What They Do Instead Want to be more emotionally intelligent? Learn how to engage in smart conversation--the type that helps you stronger relationships. Continued here

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ANC in crisis: South Africa's governing party is fighting to stay relevant - 5 essential reads Director, African Centre for the Study of the United States, University of Pretoria South Africa’s governing party, the African National Congress (ANC), is in a crisis. Having dominated the country’s politics since democracy in 1994, it has been losing voter support in the last three national elections. Since the 2016 local elections2016 local elections, the party has also been losing some of its strongholds. Continued here

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Air purifiers: indoor pollution kills but many devices are ineffective and some may even cause harm Air pollution kills around 7 million people each year. Most of these deaths occur in developing countries, where solid fuel is often burned in poorly ventilated spaces. However, between 26,000 and 38,000 of those deaths occur in the UK. People in the UK spend over 80% of their time indoors, whether at home, at work, at school or commuting. So making sure the air inside those enclosed spaces is safe to breathe is crucial. Continued here

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Advent Calendars: How Small Businesses Are Reinvigorating the Christmas Tradition Advent calendars have increased in popularity over recent years; here's how businesses say they've helped to bolster their holiday sales. Continued here

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Best space images of 2022: 10 stellar views of the universe In 2022, we saw some of the most striking photos from deep space alongside brand-new views of our Solar System. Historically important, scientifically informative, or just plain beautiful, the year was full of remarkable space images. Continued here

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Google’s CEO Faced Intense Criticism at an All-Hands Meeting. His Response Was a Lesson for Every Leader No one can predict the future, but that doesn't mean you can't provide your employees with certainty. Continued here

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Why This Investor Put Her Money on ClassPass's Payal Kada­kia Anjula Achariahas invested in several successful startups. Here's how you can get her attention. Continued here

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Teen Survivor of South Korea Crowd Crush Found Dead in Suspected Suicide A teenager who survived a deadly crowd crush in Seoul over Halloween weekend was found dead on Tuesday night, local news reported. A police official said he is suspected to have died by suicide, though this remains unconfirmed.  According to the South Korean police, the unnamed high schooler was found in a motel located in western Seoul, following a missing person’s report by his mother. No suicide note was found.  Continued here

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How Leaders Can Open Up to Their Teams Without Oversharing In the age of social sharing, people who work together know more and more about each other. In general, this is a good thing. Research shows our brains respond positively to people when we feel a personal connection with them. Command and control management is on its way out, and bosses who practice empathy and make an effort to connect are in. But, when leaders open up too much to their teams, they can also completely undermine themselves. So, when does sharing become oversharing? This issue often presents itself when there are new initiatives or changes in an organization, and leaders aren’t sure how much of their worries they should reveal. The best leaders are honest about how they feel while simultaneously presenting a clear path forward. This is called being selectively vulnerable — or opening up while still prioritizing everyone’s boundaries. A good rule of thumb for figuring out if you’re about to overshare is to ask yourself: “How would I feel if my manager said this to me?” If it’s something that you’d be thankful to hear, chances are, your reports will feel similarly. On the other hand, if you think members of your team might be feeling anxious about the project, it’s okay to surface those feelings to help them feel less isolated. Always try to pair realism with optimism, and share when you sense it will be helpful to others. Continued here S48 Unregistered NDIS providers are in the firing line – but lots of participants have good reasons for using them There has been a lot of debate recently about the quality, safety and cost of National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) services. Some of it relates to the types of providers people purchase services from. Some NDIS service providers are registered with the NDIS Quality and Safeguards Commission. To be registered, service providers must undertake compliance and auditing processes, which can be time-consuming and expensive. Some providers choose not to do this. Continued here S47 A brief history of Yorkshire puddings – and why they technically shouldn't feature in a traditional Christmas dinner Christmas dinner is considered by many to be the best meal of the year and yet when it comes to deciding what this meal should consist of people’s opinions often differ. For some there will never be a centre piece that can replace the turkey, although often there are additional meats included such as roast ham, beef or pork, alongside roast potatoes, Brussels sprouts, pigs in blankets, bread sauce and stuffing. And of course, there are those who are vegetarian or vegan and prefer a nut roast. Continued here S12 4 Innovative Solutions to Keep Your Business Productive and Flexible  How leaders can strike the right balance between flexibility and productivity in 2023, according to a new study. Continued here S49 Many Kenyans have embraced vigilante cops – an ineffective police force is to blame This study was supported by St. Antony’s College and the African Studies Centre at the University of Oxford and IFRA-Nairobi. In March 2017, Ahmed Rashid, a Kenyan police officer, shot and killed two unarmed teenagers accused of theft. They had surrendered and were lying on the ground in a Nairobi neighbourhood. Rashid executed them in full view of the public. This was caught on camera. Continued here S59 China’s War Against Taiwan Has Already Started In 2018, a typhoon stranded thousands of people at Kansai International Airport, near Osaka, Japan. Among them were some tourists from Taiwan. Normally, this story might not have had much political meaning. But a few hours into the incident, an obscure Taiwanese news website began reporting on what it said was the failure of Taiwanese diplomats to rescue their citizens. A handful of bloggers began posting on social media, too, excitedly praising Chinese officials who had sent buses to help their citizens escape quickly. Some of the Taiwanese tourists supposedly had pretended to be Chinese in order to get on board. Chatter about the incident spread. Photographs and videos, allegedly from the airport, began to circulate. The story rapidly migrated into the mainstream Taiwanese media. Journalists attacked the government: Why had Chinese diplomats moved so quickly and effectively? Why were the Taiwanese so incompetent? News organizations in Taiwan described the incident as a national embarrassment, especially for a country whose leaders proclaim they have no need for support from China. Headlines declared, “To Get on the Bus, One Has to Pretend to Be Chinese,” and “Taiwanese Follow China Bus.” At its peak, the angry coverage and social-media attacks became so overwhelming that a Taiwanese diplomat, apparently unable to bear the deluge of commentary and the shame of failure, died by suicide. Continued here S28 COVID spurs boom in genome sequencing for infectious diseases Many labs are using genome-sequencing equipment acquired during the pandemic to track other diseases.Credit: T. Narayan/Bloomberg via Getty When a three-year old boy in Cambodia came down with avian influenza last year, researchers at the Pasteur Institute of Cambodia in Phnom Penh, used genome-sequencing technology bought during the COVID-19 pandemic to sequence samples from the boy in a single day. They confirmed that he had H9N2, a common virus found in birds. Later, they sequenced samples of the virus from a chicken living in the boy’s house, suggesting that was how he was infected and that the virus was unlikely to spread to other people. Before the pandemic, samples would have been sent abroad for sequencing and such information would typically have taken weeks or months to arrive. Continued here S15 What Can World Cup Penalty Shootouts Teach You About Performing Under Extreme Pressure? A Lot, Considerable Science Says Performing at your best when the stakes are high can be extremely challenging. But not if you embrace the pressure, and take a few steps to put it in its proper place. Continued here S38 A tortured and deadly legacy: Kissinger and realpolitik in US foreign policy In 2023, Henry Kissinger will mark a century since his birth and more than 50 years of influence on American foreign policy. Kissinger’s centennial represents an important opportunity to reflect on not only his influence, but also the effects of the vision of foreign policy he has espoused. I am a scholar of American foreign policy who has written on Kissinger’s service from 1969 to 1977 as national security advisor and secretary of state under the Nixon and Ford administrations. I have seen how his foreign policy views and actions played out for good and, mostly, for ill. Continued here S54 Grattan on Friday: Morrison endures the witness box, while Albanese enjoys being in the box seat with the Senate Scott Morrison will forever be known as “the bulldozer”, and he lived up to his self-description at the Robodebt royal commission this week. It was vintage Morrison, verbally lumbering about, up and down side streets of varying relevance, as he gave evidence on a scandal that involved appalling treatment of people wrongfully pursued in the name of the “integrity” of the welfare system. Continued here S8 7 Ways to Make Your Company More Resilient Before a Recession Hits, According to MIT Research Armed with MIT research and 'Game of Thrones' quotes, a pair of experts explain how businesses can prepare to survive (or even thrive) in a recession. Continued here S42 Kenya in 2022: 4 essential reads on a year of political drama and economic hardships The year 2022 was always going to be an eventful one. After nearly 10 years in power, President Uhuru Kenyatta was destined to leave office to make way for the winner of the August 2022 presidential vote. Would it be his former bitter rival turned political ally Raila Odinga? Or would it be close ally turned bitter rival William Ruto? It mattered to millions of Kenyan voters, too, who would lead the country out of a particularly difficult year. High food prices, record fuel prices and the worst drought in 40 years made for a depressing run-up to the election. Continued here S25 Biomedical breakthroughs come of age Gene therapy — which aims to treat genetic conditions by altering the genes that underlie the problem — has had something of a turbulent history. When it was first mooted half a century ago, researchers were enthusiastic about the prospect of treating the underlying causes, rather than just the symptoms, of persistent and complex genetic disorders. Then came the recognition that changing the DNA of a sufficient number of cells in an organ to create meaningful results was an uphill struggle. Now, however, scientists are finally making headway and bringing gene therapy out of its ‘dark age’. This renewed progress is representative of where the biomedical sciences now finds itself more generally. Long-pursued innovations are finally maturing to become game-changers. Organoids, complex 3D multi-cell tissues, are changing how in vitro experiments are performed, for example, giving scientists a more accurate picture of how biological processes might play out in real organs. Organoid research is also helping to plug the gaps in the study of diseases for which suitable animal models are lacking. Continued here S17 5 Things the Best Bosses Always Do During Layoffs, According to a Yale Management Expert This is your time to show empathy and integrity. People are watching. Continued here S39 Nasal vaccines promise to stop the COVID-19 virus before it gets to the lungs – an immunologist explains how they work The mucosal immune system provides protection at the mucosal surfaces of the body. These include the mouth, eyes, middle ear, the mammary and other glands, and the gastrointestinal, respiratory and urogenital tracts. Antibodies and a variety of other anti-microbial proteins in the sticky secretions that cover these surfaces, as well as immune cells located in the lining of these surfaces, directly attack invading pathogens. The circulatory part of the immune system generates antibodies and immune cells that are delivered through the bloodstream to the internal tissues and organs. These circulating antibodies do not usually reach the mucosal surfaces in large enough amounts to be effective. Thus mucosal and circulatory compartments of the immune system are largely separate and independent. Continued here S21 Three ways to combat antimicrobial resistance Staphylococcus aureus on the microscopic fibres of a wound dressing.Credit: Science Photo Library The need to find new antibiotics is pressing, but many scientists and policy makers are tackling antimicrobial resistance from other angles. Nature Index takes a look at three methods in more detail. Continued here S24 Gigantic telescope and AI supremacy After 30 years of planning and negotiations, construction began last week on the Square Kilometre Array (SKA), the world’s largest radio-astronomy observatory. The giant instrument — to be built as two telescopes across sprawling sites in Australia and Africa — will collect radio signals emitted by celestial objects and will hopefully shed light on the nature of dark matter and how galaxies form. The SKA will be built in stages, and the €1.3-billion (US$1.4-billion) first phase is expected to be completed in 2028. The SKA-Low telescope, in Australia, will comprise about 131,000 antennas, each resembling a 2-metre-tall wire Christmas tree. More than 500 arrays of 256 antennas will dot the red sands of the site (artist’s impression pictured). The large distances between antennas and their sheer number mean that the telescopes will pick up radio signals with unprecedented sensitivity. Continued here S34 Social media always remembers – which makes moving on from a breakup that much harder Before the internet, people commonly burned Polaroids and love letters in a fire as an act of closure following a breakup. Nowadays, it isn’t so simple. People produce and consume massive amounts of digital stuff – 33 trillion gigabytes of online data in 2018 alone, a number that has surely grown. Continued here S60 World Shocked That Man Running Business Based On Imaginary Money Might Be Fraud THE BAHAMAS (The Borowitz Report)—People around the world have been flabbergasted to learn that a man who created a business based on imaginary money might be a fraud. In interviews spanning the globe, respondents expressed shock and disbelief that a firm offering customers wealth by turning their actual money into pretend money could be anything but legitimate. Continued here S26 COVID deaths: three times the official toll This week, a team of researchers working with the World Health Organization have used statistical modelling to estimate the number of excess deaths associated with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021. The work estimates that there were almost 15 million deaths either directly or indirectly attributed to the pandemic, almost three times higher than the official toll. Why dinosaurs' tail clubs may actually have been used to battle rivals, and the ancient images that make up the earliest known narrative scene. Continued here S31 Understanding dishonesty in children – when, how and why do kids lie? When asked if they peeked at a toy, 40% of children falsely confessed to peeking, even though they did not do so, in a recent study of lying in toddlers. When so many children made up falsehoods with no benefit, there is more to it than cheeky fibs. From an early age, children are taught lying is a moral failing. Yet, in some social contexts, children might also be encouraged to lie. Many parents explicitly tell their children not to distort the truth, emphasising the importance of being honest. However, they also give nuanced messages about honesty. For example, they might claim it is sometimes acceptable to tell white lies to protect other people’s feelings. Continued here S52 Why do we like what we like? The neuroscience behind the objects that please us We humans, like other cognitive systems, are sensitive to our environment. We use sensory information to guide our behaviour. To be in the world. We decide how to act based on the hedonic value we assign to objects, people, situations or events. We seek out and engage in behaviours that lead to positive or rewarding outcomes and avoid those that lead to negative or punitive consequences. We construct our knowledge of the world according to how much we like elements of the environment, and we do so by learning and generating expectations about them. Continued here S30 Albanian migration has spurred a generation of artists to reflect on issues of identity and belonging There’s been a great deal of xenophobia directed at Albanian immigrants to the UK recently. It’s easy to argue that Albanians are being scapegoated for the current crisis in Britain’s migration system. But prejudice against Albanians across Europe is not new. After the collapse of communism in 1990, poverty, financial instability and unemployment forced Albanians to emigrate, many to Greece and Italy. In these two countries, Albanians have been constant victims of discrimination, often facing racist violence. Continued here S53 Get well or get back to work? Why some European countries want sick staff to return while others leave them to recover When an employee is off work sick in Italy, they are paid a benefit that could be translated literally into English as “compensation for illness”. Similarly, if that person was working in Spain, their situation would be described as “temporary incapacity”. However, if they were working in Sweden, they would be “an insured person who has reduced work capacity”. And in the United Kingdom, this worker might be assessed as “not fit for work” or “may be fit for work”. Continued here S58 Cumbrian coal: the 18th-century poem that perfectly encapsulated Whitehaven’s mining culture The debates waged over the opening of the Woodhouse Colliery in Whitehaven, Cumbria, have laid bare starkly different views about the steps the UK should take to honour its net zero commitments. On December 7, Communities Secretary Michael Gove issued a letter approving the colliery’s creation, but his statement might not be the last word on the matter. The colliery’s opponents seem poised to launch a legal challenge. Continued here S66 The Special Counsel Investigation Into Trump Is Moving Fast The prosecutor tasked with investigating former president Donald Trump is showing so much hustle, he’s prompted former prosecutors to say Smith may be gearing up to indict Trump within the first few months of 2023.  That’s partly due to the flurry of investigative activity following Smith’s appointment in mid-November, a time when many observers worried openly that naming a special counsel would dramatically slow the Trump investigations. Smith quickly proved those doubters wrong, filing a legal brief on Thanksgiving Day and a raft of new subpoenas for testimony from top Trump associates, including former White House lawyers and former Trump speechwriter Stephen Miller.  Continued here S61 Notable Performances and Recordings of 2022 The Russian question dominated the year in classical music. In the wake of the invasion of Ukraine, major institutions finally began to extricate themselves from the sticky cultural tentacles of Vladimir Putin’s regime. Prior invasions, assassinations, and acts of repression had failed to impede the career of Valery Gergiev, Putin’s court conductor, who has amassed enormous wealth and is essentially a member of the oligarchy. Anna Netrebko’s admiration for Putin’s “strong, male energy,” not to mention her disdain for COVID protocols and her defense of blackface, had done little damage to her stardom. The Greek-Russian conductor Teodor Currentzis, whose bombastic revisionist projects receive funding from a Putin-aligned bank, had found a cult following and critical adoration. All that changed on February 24th, or soon thereafter. Gergiev’s career in the West is over; Netrebko is persona non grata at the Met; Currentzis is facing criticism, especially in Germany. The jettisoning of a few problematic Russians allowed musical organizations to assume a mantle of virtue, although many of them had recalibrated their positions at a conspicuously late hour. (Just before the invasion began, Peter Gelb, the Met’s general manager, was in Moscow, monitoring a production of “Lohengrin” that the Met was to have co-produced with the Bolshoi.) In truth, no one is in a position to claim moral purity. Leading American opera houses and orchestras take funding from individual and corporate sources that are implicated in inequality, exploitation, and environmental destruction. American artists have no great record of standing up to this country’s imperialist foreign policy. The challenge, in this and in other spheres, is to support ethical practices without cloaking oneself in self-righteousness. Continued here S41 Sacred rivers: Christianity in southern Africa has a deep history of water and ritual Water is a scarce commodity in much of Africa, particularly in southern Africa. This is well symbolised in the name of the Botswana national currency, pula (rain). When tragedies like flooding and drowning take place, it may seem inappropriate to speak of the scarcity and commodity of water. For example, members of the Johane Masowe church drowned in a flash flood during a baptismal ceremony at a river in South Africa recently. But part of the attraction of moving bodies of water to religious groups may be rooted in this very scarcity. Whatever is scarce is also precious and whatever is precious might be termed sacred. Religions by whatever name venerate the sacred. Think, for example, of places like the city of Jerusalem, which has sacred status in Judaism, Islam and Christianity. Or think of Mecca for Islam, or the River Ganges in Hinduism. Continued here S27 How sports science is neglecting female athletes Just 5% of the studies on baseball and softball in the analysis focused on female athletes.Credit: C. Morgan Engel/NCAA Photos via Getty Research on the science of sport is heavily skewed towards male athletes, finds a review of hundreds of sports-medicine studies1. The imbalance leaves large gaps in knowledge about female sports and sport-related injuries. Continued here S20 An arms race between a plant and a virus This is a summary of: Chen, J. et al. NLR surveillance of pathogen interference with hormone receptors induces immunity. Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-022-05529-9 (2022). All prices are NET prices. VAT will be added later in the checkout.Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout. Continued here S51 Looking to work in a bank? Better hide those tattoos and piercings Through interviews with 32 recruiters (28 men and 4 women between the ages of 28 and 57), we were able to pinpoint the items best not to don if one wants to work as a bank advisor, including visible tattoos, piercings, miniskirts, scruffy clothes or combining jeans with sneakers. Any of these is likely to inspire comments that could torpedo an application (“No such thing here” or “That’s a deal-breaker”). Continued here S62 An Introvert’s Guide to Surviving the Holidays The holidays are a polarizing season. On one hand, they’re intended to spread cheer. On the other, they’re a roller coaster of events, gatherings, and social responsibilities that can be particularly overwhelming to a certain group of people—introverts.  While introversion is a spectrum, and not all introverts necessarily want to spend Christmas and the holidays alone, there are a few things that tie them together: a limited social battery, a low tolerance for external stimulation, and a preference for smaller groups.  Continued here S29 The women ham carvers of Spain Jamon iberico – expertly cured ham from the Iberian pig – has been part of Spain's culinary history since Roman times and is arguably the country's most iconic food product. No Spanish event is complete without a carver, a leg of pork and plates of burgundy-red ham laced with creamy, nutty-tasting fat.  Carvers are respected and celebrated for their skill. It is no mean feat to slice a huge bone-in leg in a way that does justice to the quality of an acorn-fed pig that has been cured for up to three years, by delivering a balance of flavour in every umami-packed mouthful. The huge number of carving competitions in Spain attest to how seriously this job is taken.  Continued here S37 Special counsels, like the one leading the Department of Justice's investigation of Trump, are intended to be independent – but they aren't entirely When Attorney General Merrick Garland appointed veteran prosecutor Jack Smith as special counsel to oversee two criminal investigations into former President Donald Trump on Nov. 18, 2022, Garland’s goal was to shield the probes from the appearance of partisanship. But in immediate and repeated attacks, Trump, and some of his allies, alleged political bias anyway. For instance, in one highly charged social media post, the former president argued that he won’t “get a fair shake from” Smith. Continued here S32 How Ireland's 'great reshuffle' could benefit women and older workers Assistant professor of Decent Work & Human Resource Management, University of Galway Recent global tech sector layoffs have hit Ireland’s workforce hard. Prior to these job cuts, the Irish digital sector directly employed more than 270,000 people, as well as creating many more ancillary jobs. Continued here S35 Mpox, AIDS and COVID-19 show the challenges of targeting public health messaging to specific groups without causing stigma During infectious disease outbreaks, clinicians and public health officials are tasked with providing accurate guidance for the public on how to stay safe and protect themselves and their loved ones. However, sensationalized media coverage can distort how the public perceives new emerging infections, including where they come from and how they spread. This can foster fear and stigma, especially toward communities that are already mistrustful of the health care system. The racial and sexual stigma surrounding monkeypox is what spurred the World Health Organization to rename the disease to mpox in November 2022. While this is a step in the right direction, I believe more work needs to be done to reduce the stigma surrounding infectious diseases like mpox. Continued here S33 The Catholic view on indulgences and how they work today Affiliated Faculty of Bioethics, Religion, and Society, Department of Religious Studies, DePaul University In 1517, the German theologian Martin Luther nailed 95 theses to Wittenberg’s Castle Church door, attacking indulgences, a Catholic practice that, according to church teachings, can reduce or eliminate punishment for sin. Starting in the 11th century, the church offered indulgences to those who joined the Crusades and later sold certificates of indulgences to raise funds, giving rise to the abusive marketing tactics criticized by Luther. Continued here S40 Record low water levels on the Mississippi River in 2022 show how climate change is altering large rivers Rivers are critical corridors that connect cities and ecosystems alike. When drought develops, water levels fall, making river navigation harder and more expensive. In 2022, water levels in some of the world’s largest rivers, including the Rhine in Europe and the Yangtze in China, fell to historically low levels. The Mississippi River fell so low in Memphis, Tennessee, in mid-October that barges were unable to float, requiring dredging and special water releases from upstream reservoirs to keep channels navigable. Continued here S45 Insects may feel pain, says growing evidence – here’s what this means for animal welfare laws At least a trillion insects are killed annually for food and animal feed. Routine slaughter methods include extreme heat and cold, often precededby starvation. By comparison, “only” around 79 billion mammals and bird livestock are slaughtered every year. Scholars have long recognised that the survival value of pain means manyanimals experience it, supposedly with the exception of insects. But we surveyed more than 300 scientific studies and found evidence that at least some insects feel pain. Other insects, meanwhile, haven’t been studied in enough detail yet. Continued here S55 Cameroon's Anglophone crisis: how the common law court offers a ray of hope Six years on, the crisis in the Anglophone (English-speaking) regions of Cameroon continues. Recent reports indicate that over 6,000 people have been killed. A further 600,000 have been internally displaced, while over 7,700 people have become refugees in neighbouring Nigeria. Continued here S56 2022 was a rough year for people everywhere – South Africa was no exception Tough economic conditions meant that 2022 was a rough year for people everywhere in the world. South Africa was no exception. But this year’s crop of problems came on top of a legacy of poor economic performance. The country’s economic growth averaged 1% over the nine years to 2021, leaving the population poorer on average. The poverty rate has increased, reaching 63% in 2021, according to the latest World Bank estimates, back to where it was a decade earlier. Failure to improve living standards, the bank has warned, threatens social stability and will add pressure to public finances, which are already overstretched. Continued here Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom) Followers Blog Archive ►  2025 (7) ►  March (5) ►  January (2) ►  2024 (4) ►  December (4) ►  2023 (542) ►  December (2) ►  November (33) ►  October (27) ►  September (37) ►  August (45) ►  July (30) ►  June (73) ►  May (3) ►  April (33) ►  March (17) ►  February (84) ►  January (158) ▼  2022 (387) ▼  December (84) January 1, 2023 - This Scientist Fled a Deadly Wil... 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