Eco-anxiety: climate change affects our mental health - here's how to cope

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Eco-anxiety: climate change affects our mental health - here's how to cope The University of Bath recently published the results of its 2023 Climate Action Survey. Out of almost 5,000 respondents, 19% of students and 25% of staff said they were “extremely worried” about climate change, while 36% and 33% stated they were “very worried”. Climate worry was higher compared with results from the previous year’s survey. In 2021, a global survey of how children and young people felt about climate change found similarly high levels of worry. Most of the 10,000 participants reported feelings of sadness, anxiety, anger, powerlessness, helplessness and guilt. Continued here

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The Stunning Mystical Paintings of the 16th-Century Portuguese Artist Francisco de Holanda In 1543 — the year Copernicus published his revolutionary treatise on the heliocentric universe and promptly died — the Portuguese artist Francisco de Holanda (c. 1517–June 19, 1585) began working on a series of mystical paintings, which would consume the next three decades of his life, eventually culminating in his book De Aetatibus Mundi Imagines: Images of the Ages of the World.Francisco was only twenty when he became a professional illuminator of religious manuscripts, following in his father’s footsteps. By thirty, he had studied with Michelangelo in Italy. It was during that period, as he was finding his artistic voice and spiritual footing, that he began working on his paintings exploring the relationship between the human and the divine. Continued here

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Is China Emerging as the Global Leader in AI? China is quickly closing the once formidable lead the U.S. maintained on AI research. Chinese researchers now publish more papers on AI and secure more patents than U.S. researchers do. The country seems poised to become a leader in AI-empowered businesses, such as speech and image recognition applications. But while China has caught up with impressive speed, the conditions that have allowed it to do so — the open science nature of AI and the nature of the Chinese market, for instance — will likely also prevent it from taking a meaningful lead and leaving the U.S. in the dust. Continued here

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Is China Emerging as the Global Leader in AI? China is quickly closing the once formidable lead the U.S. maintained on AI research. Chinese researchers now publish more papers on AI and secure more patents than U.S. researchers do. The country seems poised to become a leader in AI-empowered businesses, such as speech and image recognition applications. But while China has caught up with impressive speed, the conditions that have allowed it to do so — the open science nature of AI and the nature of the Chinese market, for instance — will likely also prevent it from taking a meaningful lead and leaving the U.S. in the dust. Continued here

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The Power of Leaders Who Focus on Solving Problems There’s a new kind of leadership taking hold in organizations. Strikingly, these new leaders don’t like to be called leaders, and none has any expectation that they will attract “followers” personally — by dint of their charisma, status in a hierarchy, or access to resources. Instead, their method is to get others excited about whatever problem they have identified as ripe for a novel solution. Having fallen in love with a problem, they step up to leadership — but only reluctantly and only as necessary to get it solved. Leadership becomes an intermittent activity as people with enthusiasm and expertise step up as needed, and readily step aside when, based on the needs of the project, another team member’s strengths are more central. Rather than being pure generalists, leaders pursue their own deep expertise, while gaining enough familiarity with other knowledge realms to make the necessary connections. They expect to be involved in a series of initiatives with contributors fluidly assembling and disassembling. Continued here

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The Power of Leaders Who Focus on Solving Problems There’s a new kind of leadership taking hold in organizations. Strikingly, these new leaders don’t like to be called leaders, and none has any expectation that they will attract “followers” personally — by dint of their charisma, status in a hierarchy, or access to resources. Instead, their method is to get others excited about whatever problem they have identified as ripe for a novel solution. Having fallen in love with a problem, they step up to leadership — but only reluctantly and only as necessary to get it solved. Leadership becomes an intermittent activity as people with enthusiasm and expertise step up as needed, and readily step aside when, based on the needs of the project, another team member’s strengths are more central. Rather than being pure generalists, leaders pursue their own deep expertise, while gaining enough familiarity with other knowledge realms to make the necessary connections. They expect to be involved in a series of initiatives with contributors fluidly assembling and disassembling. Continued here

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How Diversity Can Boost Board Effectiveness Over the past two decades, U.S. corporate boards have become increasingly more diverse as company shareholders and stakeholders have made it clear that they expect diversity in boardrooms. In addition to expertise, experiences, and other factors, that diversity also includes gender, racial, and ethnic diversity. Many companies are making tremendous progress, and a 2020 analysis identified 200 companies with greater than 40% diversity — nearly four times the number of companies a decade ago. However, a new report shows that new appointments of first-time directors, women, and underrepresented racial minorities slowed in 2022, perhaps influenced by economic and political uncertainty.Now more than ever, there’s work to be done when it comes to demonstrating the effectiveness of diverse boards. While some studies reflect a positive relationship between board diversity and financial performance, others have found limited or no relationship. What’s behind these mixed findings? While board diversity is increasing, less conclusive is whether and how more diverse boards have become more effective over time. By effective, we mean that boards not only engage in good governance practices but also focus on inclusion practices, such as encouraging open, honest discussions in the boardroom to help drive robust conversations around oversight. They may walk the walk in appointing members who bring different insights, skills, and backgrounds to the board, but are they really listening to and acting upon what these new board members contribute? Continued here

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'A love letter to the world of curries' Since reporting this story, Raghavan Iyer had sadly passed away. This was one of the last interviews he did, and we publish this story and his recipe for Sri Lankan prawn curry as a celebration of his life and legacy as the iconic Indian-born American chef and author who taught us to cook Indian food and curries from around the world. Raghavan Iyer, chef, cookbook author, culinary teacher and curry expert passed away on Friday after a prolonged battle with cancer. According to a recent New York Times article, he taught Americans to cook Indian food. He is the author of seven cookbooks, including the now iconic 660 Curries. Continued here

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The man behind a covert WW2 operation At the outbreak of World War Two, a US journalist named Varian Fry volunteered to travel to the French port city of Marseilles and help repatriate members of the continent's cultural elite, many of whom were being hounded by the Nazis as anti-authoritarian dissidents, or because they were Jewish. Marseilles was the last free port in Europe and the final destination for refugees desperate to find a new place to live in freedom.When he arrived in the city on 15 August, 1940, Fry had $3,000 in banknotes taped to his leg, and a list of 200 artists, writers, and intellectuals who were blacklisted by the Gestapo and the Vichy police. Just over a year later, when he was forced to leave the city, he had orchestrated a remarkable exodus which had saved approximately 2,000 individuals. This included some of Europe's most influential artistic figures: Marc Chagall, Marcel Duchamp, Remedios Varo, Max Ernst, Hannah Arendt, Jacques Lipchitz, Wilfredo Lam and many more. Continued here

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Companies that frack for oil and gas can keep a lot of information secret - but what they disclose shows widespread use of hazardous chemicals Lourdes Vera serves on the coordinating committee of the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative, which develops practices and tools to generate, analyze, steward, and improve environmental data and information. From rural Pennsylvania to Los Angeles, more than 17 million Americans live within a mile of at least one oil or gas well. Since 2014, most new oil and gas wells have been fracked. Continued here

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Sex, love and companionship ... with AI? Why human-machine relationships could go mainstream There was once a stigma attached to online dating: Less than a decade ago, many couples who had met online would make up stories for how they met rather than admit that they had done so via an app. Not so anymore. Online dating is so mainstream that you’re an outlier if you haven’t met your partner on Tinder, Grindr or Hinge. Continued here

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Why are snails and slugs so slow? Curious Kids is a series for children of all ages. If you have a question you’d like an expert to answer, send it to curiouskidsus@theconversation.com.Wander through your backyard or walk along a stream and it’s likely you’ll see a snail – small, squishy animals with shells on their backs. Continued here

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Sabertooth cat skull newly discovered in Iowa reveals details about this Ice Age predator The sabertooth cat is an Ice Age icon and emblem of strength, tenacity and intelligence. These animals shared the North American landscape with other large carnivores, including short-faced bears, dire wolves and the American lion, as well as megaherbivores including mammoths, mastodons, muskoxen and long-horned bison. Then at the end of the Pleistocene, between 50,000 and 10,000 years ago, they all vanished. The only place to see them now is in the fossil record.Carnivore fossils are extremely rare, though, in comparison to those of their prey. Prey are always more abundant than predators in a healthy ecosystem. So the probability of burial, storage and discovery of carnivore bones and teeth is therefore slim compared to those belonging to herbivores. Continued here

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Regulating AI: 3 experts explain why it's difficult to do and important to get right John Villasenor is a nonresident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford, and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations.These technologies – image generators like DALL-E, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion, and text generators like Bard, ChatGPT, Chinchilla and LLaMA – are now available to millions of people and don’t require technical knowledge to use. Continued here

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Tackling online misogyny: what needs to be done in schools - and our communities Senior lecturer, College of Business Law and Social Sciences, Nottingham Law School, Nottingham Trent University Research from the Children’s Commissioner for England has found that 79% of children have encountered violent pornography before they are 18. One-third of young people have reported receiving nude videos or photographs, with more than half sent from strangers. Continued here

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Mass protests in Kenya have a long and rich history - but have been hijacked by the elites University of Johannesburg provides support as an endorsing partner of The Conversation AFRICA.The right to protest is enshrined in the constitution of Kenya under Article 37. It states that: Continued here

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Tanzania-South Africa: deep ties evoke Africa's sacrifices for freedom University of the Witwatersrand provides support as a hosting partner of The Conversation AFRICA.Tanzania’s President Samia Suluhu Hassan recently paid a state visit to South Africa aimed at strengthening bilateral political and trade relations. As the South African presidency noted, ties between the two nations date back to Tanzania’s solidarity with the anti-apartheid struggle. Continued here

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Archaeology shows how hunter-gatherers fitted into southern Africa's first city, 800 years ago Where the Limpopo and Shashe Rivers meet, forming the modern border between Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe, lies a hill that hardly stands out from the rest. One could easily pass it without realising its historical significance. It was on and around this hill that what appears to be southern Africa’s earliest state-level society and urban city, Mapungubwe, appeared around 800 years ago.My team and I have been working in northern South Africa at sites that we believe will help us recognise the roles played by hunter-gatherers during the development of the Mapungubwe state in a bid to generate a more inclusive representation of the region’s past. Continued here

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Is democracy on the ballot in west Africa? What the latest data tells us Democracy indices compiled by respected organisations have suggested that around the world, there’s an increase in authoritarianism or democratic backsliding. These indices typically draw from expert evaluations. They seldom consider the opinions of citizens in the countries concerned. So they may miss important parts of the democratic story. Continued here

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How food shortages affect shopping habits and why people keep switching stores Three-quarters of British shoppers are loyal to their usual supermarket, but the UK retail sector is no stranger to the complex and fluctuating needs of its customers. In the last three years alone, shops have had to deal with Brexit, a pandemic and a cost of living crisis – all of which have influenced their customers’ behaviour. More recently, large UK supermarket retailers have struggled to meet customer demand for fresh fruit and vegetables, causing shortages, which has led to the need to impose buying restrictions. Continued here

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The UK spent a third of its international aid budget on refugees in the UK - what it's paying for, and why it's a problem A third of the UK’s international aid budget was spent supporting refugees in the UK in 2022. A new report by the Independent Commission for Aid Impact (ICAI) details the £3.5 billion expense, a threefold increase on 2021, and about 12 times the amount spent in 2015.An enquiry by a parliamentary committee published in February expressed concerns about the government’s increased spending on refugees in the UK. The committee called it a “political choice” that comes “at the expense ofvulnerable and marginalised people living in the world’s poorest countries”. But the ICAI report is the first to provide a detailed analysis of how much is being spent. Continued here

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Easter eggs: their evolution from chicken to chocolate A lot of Easter traditions – including hot cross buns and lamb on Sunday – stem from medieval Christian or even earlier pagan beliefs. The chocolate Easter egg, however, is a more modern twist on tradition.Chicken eggs have been eaten at Easter for centuries. Eggs have long symbolised rebirth and renewal, making them perfect to commemorate the story of Jesus’ resurrection as well as the arrival of spring. Continued here

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First Peoples' knowledge of 'mysterious fairy circles' in Australian deserts has upended a long-standing science debate Warnman - Manjilyjarra man from Karlamilyi National Park, interpreter and artist, Indigenous Knowledge What are “fairy circles”? They are polka dots of bare earth, regularly scattered across arid grasslands. Scientists first described fairy circles in Namibia in the 1970s and sparked a global debate in the scientific community about the causes of the phenomenon. Continued here

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Countries agreed to ban ozone-depleting chemicals in the 1980s - but we found five CFCs increasing to record levels in the atmosphere Despite a global ban in place since 2010, atmospheric concentrations of five ozone-depleting chemicals have reached a record high.Chlorofluorocarbons, or CFCs, are entirely man-made gases used in a variety of applications, including refrigeration, air conditioning or as chemical solvents. They have been increasingly regulated by a series of international treaties since the 1980s. The 1987 Montreal protocol, which has been unanimously ratified, restricted the release of CFCs to the atmosphere where they contribute to the destruction of the ozone layer: a region high up in the stratosphere which absorbs harmful ultraviolet (UV) radiation and protects life below. Continued here

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Canadian astronaut Jeremy Hansen will be among the next humans to fly to the moon On April 3, NASA announced the crew for Artemis II, which will see astronauts spending up to three weeks on a flyby trip to the moon in 2024. This mission will be the first time in more than 50 years that humans will visit the moon — or leave low Earth orbit — since Apollo 17 in 1972. And a Canadian will be onboard this milestone mission: astronaut Jeremy Hansen.I am a professor, an explorer and a planetary geologist. For the past decade, I have been helping to train astronauts from Canada and the United States in geology, including Hansen. I am also the principal investigator for the Canadian Lunar Rover Mission. Continued here

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Mongolia: squeezed between China and Russia fears 'new cold war' Mongolia’s prime minister, Luvsannamsrain Oyun-Erdene, recently expressed his country’s fear that the world is heading towards a new cold war as the relations between Russia and China and the west – particularly Nato – have taken a turn for the worse. “It’s like a divorce,” he said. “When the parents divorce, the children are the ones who get hurt the most.”The country sits landlocked between Russia and China and is fearful of antagonising either. It gets much of its power from Russia, and China buys much of its exports – mainly agricultural goods and minerals such as copper. By pursuing a nimble foreign and trade policy since it transitioned to a multiparty democracy in the early 1990s, Mongolia has established a stable economy, receiving a thumbs up from the World Bank in its latest country report: Continued here

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A professor is going to live in an underwater hotel for 100 days - here's what it might do to his body As nightmares go, being trapped in a small box deep underwater is probably high on many peoples’ lists. But one US professor is doing this on purpose. Joe Dituri, a former US navy diver and expert in biomedical engineering has been living in a 55 square meter space 30 feet below the surface of the Florida Keys since March 1, and plans to stay for 100 days. If he manages this, he will break a record for most time spent in a habitat beneath the surface of the ocean. Interestingly, Dituri’s endeavour will be very different from living on a submarine. Submarines are sealed when submerged and maintained at sea level pressure. This means there’s no significant difference in pressure, even when a submarine is at depths of hundreds of meters. Continued here

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Here's how the Rogers-Shaw merger could benefit Canadian customers The Canadian government has finally approved the $26 billion takeover of Shaw by Rogers after nearly two years of delays. When the merger was first announced by Rogers in 2021, it stirred up a significant amount of competition concern. The Canadian Competition Bureau was worried the merger would soften competition in the telecom industry, resulting in higher prices and lower service quality for customers. Continued here

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Cultural heritage and historic preservation: creating a digital twin of Shahjahanabad PhD dandidate, faculty of geo-information science and earth observation, University of Twente PhD Student in Architectural and Landscape Heritage, Department of Architecture and Design, Politecnico di Torino Continued here

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How Russian and Iranian drone strikes further dehumanize warfare Along with the recent reciprocal drone strikes by Iran and the United States in Syria, Russia continues to unleash its arsenal on Ukrainian civilian and military targets alike. While the Russian armies have started using outdated weapons, novel technologies remain the objects of fascination on the battlefield.Hypersonic missiles and nuclear weapons have understandably grabbed media attention. However, drone warfare continues to occupy a central role in the conflict. Continued here

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'Drinking isn't an option, it's more of a requirement': the reasons for high alcohol consumption among some student athletes I attended matches, away games and social gatherings, and carried out interviews with players, coaching staff, committee members, supporters and senior student union staff. I gained a detailed understanding of the pressures sportspeople faced to drink alcohol. You always feel under pressure to go out for a drink. After rugby or after you’ve played a game. It’s more intimidating drinking with the rugby team than with anybody else and that’s just a fact. I have never been as scared as I was at the first rugby social here. Continued here

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The theatre we want in 2040? We used 'strategic foresight' to plan on the Prairies Does it seem far-fetched to imagine a future where the government subsidizes theatres and theatre artists at a living wage, and land-based art hubs rely heavily on new technologies while nurturing partnerships to grow and tend gardens?Theatre as an art form asks audiences to “suspend their disbelief” and activate their imaginations. But challenge a number of theatre practitioners to imagine what the future of theatre might look like in 2040, and this is quite a different prospect. Continued here

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A public perp walk into a Manhattan courtroom could energize - not humiliate - Donald Trump Manhattan may be the scene of the perp walk of the century on April 4, 2023, when former President Donald Trump answers to his recent indictment and turns himself in to authorities in court.Trump has reportedly told his aides that he has no desire to hide from the cameras and is ready for a perp walk through a crowd of photographers, police and other onlookers to create a “spectacle.” Continued here

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The UN is asking the International Court of Justice for its opinion on states' climate obligations. What does this mean? Last week, the UN General Assembly supported a Pacific-led resolution asking the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to provide an advisory opinion on a country’s climate obligations. This has been hailed as a “turning point in climate justice” and a victory for the Pacific youth who spearheaded the campaign. Continued here

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Australia's main iron ore exports may not work with green steelmaking. Here's what we must do to prepare Making steel was responsible for about 7% of global greenhouse gas emissions in 2020. That’s because steelmakers in countries like China, Japan and South Korea have long relied on fossil fuels like coal to make steel in blast furnaces. If the move to green steel gathers speed, Australia could be left behind. That’s because even though we’re the world’s largest exporter of iron ore, some of the new techniques rely on ore with a higher purity than we currently export. Coal exporters could also lose income, as we’re the largest exporter of the coking coal burnt in furnaces using current technology. Continued here

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Family support protects trans young people - but their families need support too In her address to the National Press Club of Australia today, actress, writer and advocate Georgie Stone OAM is sharing her experience as a young trans person growing up in Australia. Georgie’s story highlights her courage and determination to overcome barriers that prevent young trans people from accessing gender affirming health care and support. At just 22, Georgie has been recognised for her tireless work to reduce discrimination and remove systemic barriers for young trans people, who were subjected to attacks at recent protests in Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra. Continued here

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Enraged, tragic and hopeful: Alexis Wright's new novel Praiseworthy explores Aboriginal sovereignty in the shadow of the anthropocene Praiseworthy is Alexis Wright’s most formidable act of imaginative synthesis yet. It is simultaneously a hero’s journey for an age of global warming, a devastating story of young love caught between two laws, and an extended elegy and ode to Aboriginal law and sovereignty. It is Wright’s most enraged, tragic and hopeful novel to date, with a magnificently upbeat denouement. Continued here

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Supernatural beliefs have featured in every society throughout history. New research helps explain why Postdoctoral fellow, Kellogg School of Management, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Religion is a human universal. For thousands of years, humans have held religious beliefs and participated in religious rituals. Throughout history, every human society has featured some kind of supernatural or religious belief. Continued here

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How digital marketing of legal but harmful products escalates health threats to the most vulnerable The marketing of legal but harmful products – like alcohol and tobacco – has always targeted our emotional desires. But it has now moved to digital and social media, and this creates a heightened threat to public health because both the products and the platform target our neurological response. Promoting psychoactive products for profit by stimulating the neurotransmitters in the brain’s reward centres, or its limbic structures, is called “limbic capitalism”. Continued here

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International Criminal Court has cited Russia's deportation of Ukrainian children a war crime: on Russia's long history of weaponising deportation On March 17, the International Criminal Court cited Russia’s deportation of Ukrainian children as a war crime for which President Vladimir Putin is being held responsible. By some reports, since the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, more than 6,000 children have been removed from Ukraine into Russia. The UN Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine published evidence of the “illegal transfer of hundreds of Ukrainian children to Russia”. Continued here

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Russia's shadow war: Vulkan files leak show how Putin's regime weaponises cyberspace Recent revelations about the close partnership between the Kremlin and NTC Vulkan, a Russian cybersecurity consultancy with links to the military, provide some rare insights into how the Putin regime weaponises cyberspace. More than 5,000 documents have been leaked by an anonymous whistleblower, angry at Russia’s conduct in the war in Ukraine. They purport to reveal details about hacking tools to seize control of vulnerable servers; domestic and international disinformation campaigns; and ways to digitally monitor potential threats to the regime. Continued here

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How Clive Palmer is suing Australia for $300 billion with the help of an obscure legal clause (and Christian Porter) Australian business figure Clive Palmer is suing the Australian government for almost A$300 billion in an international tribunal, having lost a case against the Western Australian government he took all the way to the High Court.The High Court is meant to be the ultimate arbiter of Australian legal disputes. But in 2019 while in conflict with the WA government Palmer moved ownership of his two main Australian firms offshore, ultimately to a company he set up in Singapore, Zeph Investments Pte Ltd. Continued here

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Australian parents want schools to teach more sex education topics and teach them from an earlier age So it is important schools know what Australian parents actually think and want when it comes to relationships and sexuality education. Our recent study surveyed Australian parents about what schools should teach and when they should teach it. Continued here

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Let's base AI debates on reality, not extreme fears about the future A recent open letter by computer scientists and tech industry leaders calling for a six-month ban on artificial intelligence development has received widespread attention online. Even Canada’s Innovation Minister François-Philippe Champagne has responded to the letter on Twitter.The letter, published by the non-profit Future of Life Institute, has asked for all AI labs to stop training AI systems more powerful than GPT-4, the model behind ChatGPT. The letter argues that AI has been “locked in an out-of-control race to develop and deploy ever more powerful digital minds that no one — not even their creators — can understand, predict, or reliably control.” Continued here

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Meet the next four people headed to the Moon - how the diverse crew of Artemis II shows NASA's plan for the future of space exploration Wendy Whitman Cobb is affiliated with the US Air Force School of Advanced Air and Space Studies. Her views are her own and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Department of Defense or any of its components.On April 3, 2023, NASA announced the four astronauts who will make up the crew of Artemis II, which is scheduled to launch in late 2024. The Artemis II mission will send these four astronauts on a 10-day mission that culminates in a flyby of the Moon. While they won’t head to the surface, they will be the first people to leave Earth’s immediate vicinity and be the first near the Moon in more than 50 years. Continued here

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Why was TikTok banned on government devices? An expert on why the security concerns make sense Australia has joined a raft of other countries in banning the popular video sharing app TikTok from government devices, as several outlets have today reported. The move comes after a seven month-long review instigated by Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil into security risks posed by social media platforms. Continued here

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Children have a basic understanding of poverty - a more equal society means talking to them about it Rates of child poverty in Aotearoa New Zealand remain stubbornly high, despite the issue being the focus of considerable political attention while Jacinda Ardern was prime minister. In 2022, 120,000 children in New Zealand were being raised in households experiencing material hardship. This means their family is unable to afford essential items such as food, clothing, accommodation, heating and transport. Continued here

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Labor and Albanese gain in Newspoll after Aston byelection triumph Election Analyst (Psephologist) at The Conversation; and Honorary Associate, School of Mathematics and Statistics, The University of Melbourne A federal Newspoll, conducted March 29 to April 2 from a sample of 1,500, gave Labor a 55-45 lead, a one-point gain for Labor since the early March Newspoll. Primary votes were 38% Labor (up one), 33% Coalition (down two), 10% Greens (steady), 8% One Nation (up one) and 11% for all Others (steady). Continued here

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Famous double-slit experiment recreated in fourth dimension by physicists More than 200 years ago, the English scientist Thomas Young carried out a famous test known as the “double-slit experiment”. He shone a beam of light at a screen with two slits in it, and observed the light that passed through the apertures formed a pattern of dark and bright bands.At the time, the experiment was understood to demonstrate that light was a wave. The “interference pattern” is caused by light waves passing through both slits and interfering with each other on the other side, producing bright bands where the peaks of the two waves line up and dark bands where a peak meets a trough and the two cancel out. Continued here

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What are microaggressions? And how can they affect our health? Microaggressions are seemingly innocuous verbal, behavioural or environmental slights against members of minority communities. The term microaggressions was coined by American psychiatrist Chester Pierce in his 1970 essay Offensive Mechanisms. He explained: Continued here

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The environmental cost of data centres is substantial, and making them energy-efficient will only solve half the problem In 2022, Indonesia hosted around 215 million internet users, who spent an average of more than eight hours on the internet every day. This includes activities with lower data traffic such as using ride-hailing apps and sending emails, to heavier ones like video streaming and big data processing. Continued here

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Should I put more money into my super? What are the benefits and can I take it out before retirement if I need it? Superannuation is never far from the headlines lately, with the government recently calling for views from the public on what the objective of super should be. The basic idea behind super is you set aside a portion of your pay over your working life, so you can build up a nest egg to see you through your retirement years. Continued here

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I used to work at Google and now I'm an AI researcher. Here's why slowing down AI development is wise Is it time to put the brakes on the development of artificial intelligence (AI)? If you’ve quietly asked yourself that question, you’re not alone.Meanwhile, the industry shows no sign of slowing down. In March, a senior AI executive at Microsoft reportedly spoke of “very, very high” pressure from chief executive Satya Nadella to get GPT-4 and other new models to the public “at a very high speed”. Continued here

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Choreographic legacies, human connectivity, and a psychedelic rainbow celebration: FRAME is a joyous festival of dance Staying true to its objectives of representing dance artists from across practices and lineages, the inaugural FRAME Dance Festival offered a diversity of performance styles and forms in locations around Melbourne and beyond. The program included shows, films and workshops in venues ranging from courtyards to galleries to dance studios. Continued here

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Sure, the RBA froze interest rates this time, but there's plenty of pain to come Visiting Fellow, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University Australia’s Reserve Bank has hit pause on interest rates after ten successive hikes, but for many Australians, the pain it has inflicted is about to begin. Continued here

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More than 650 refugees arrived in this regional town. Locals' welcoming attitudes flipped the stereotype When we think of regional towns in Australia, some of us might think “close-knit”, “conservative”, or “resistant to change”.Over four years, we examined a regional town’s attitudes before and after hundreds of refugees settled in the area. Our surveys found residents of Armidale, in northeastern New South Wales, started out reasonably positive about the settlement program, and became even more so. Continued here

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Word from The Hill: Interest rate pause, Aston, Liberals looking for their voice on the Voice, Yunupingu, TikTok As well as her interviews with politicians and experts, Politics with Michelle Grattan includes “Word from The Hill”, where she discusses the news with members of The Conversation’s politics team.In this podcast Michelle and Amanda Dunn, politics + society editor, discuss the Reserve Bank’s pause (but for how long?) on interest rate hikes, the Aston byelection, the Liberals grappling with the Voice, the loss of a great Indigenous leader in Yunupingu, and the ban on TikTok on government devices. Continued here

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My Upstate Fantasy Life Scrolling through Hudson Valley Craigslist one night, I come across a sprawling—but cozy—oak-floored Victorian house that’s perfectly insulated despite being two hundred years old. I buy it for a hundred and fifty thousand dollars, without having to borrow any money from my parents.Moving is a breeze. Even at the end of the brisk drive upstate, I’m in a sea of B.L.M. signs and rainbow flags, and nobody wants to shoot me for my political beliefs. In fact, I receive several compliments on my electric pickup truck, and everyone calls me Chief. Continued here

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Nursery Themes That Reflect the Reality of New Parenthood Cultivate cosmic calm in your baby with planet decals, constellation-printed bedding, and a wall hanging of an astronaut floating alone in the void that is space. You might find yourself envying the astronaut, as all opportunities for solitude have been swallowed up by your precious little infant-shaped black hole. Put on the decorative space helmet, close your eyes, and pretend that this nursery is still your office. The universe is rapidly expanding—if only the same were true of your two-bedroom apartment.Turquoise walls are patterned with smiling jellyfish, dolphins, and turtles, so you’ll be the only one in this nursery who’s concerned about drowning. There is a life buoy to reassure you, but unfortunately it’s mounted on the ceiling, forever out of reach. Like the ocean, parenthood is beautiful but inhospitable to human life—specifically yours. If this environment causes you to hyperventilate, supplemental oxygen is conveniently located in a scuba tank under the crib. Continued here

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Marjorie Taylor Greene Caught in N.Y.C. Eating Soros-Backed Hebrew National Hot Dog NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene’s political future was in peril after she was caught on camera in New York City eating what her supporters alleged was a George Soros-backed Hebrew National hot dog.Greene, in Manhattan to protest Donald J. Trump’s arraignment, was photographed eating the Judaic sausage in Times Square while en route to having her picture taken with Elmo. Continued here

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“Showing Up,” Reviewed: A Masterwork About an Artist's Life Until now, I haven't been very enthusiastic about Kelly Reichardt's films. While admiring her craft and determination, I've long felt that her movies mostly efface her characters' inner lives in order to line up their events and emotions, like magnets, to form a simplified message. Her latest film, "Showing Up," which opens Friday (it premièred at the Cannes Film Festival last May and had its U.S. début in October, at the New York Film Festival), is significantly different from her other films in its substance, mood, import, and approach. It's a quiet, candid, sharply conceived and imaginatively realized masterwork, her first film of such bold and decisive originality; it's Reichardt's first great movie."Showing Up" is also the first of her films that includes a character whose persona is so closely related to Reichardt's own position as a filmmaker. There's no artistic mandate or necessity for filmmakers to mirror themselves or their experiences in their work, and doing so is no formula for making a good movie. What all great filmmakers have in common is a certain contact with the film, as with a sparkplug—it can be an idea, a style, or a method that yields the energizing spark. "Showing Up" depicts an experienced female artist at work, one who's struggling to make and sustain a place in the professional realm of her art, and, here, Reichardt makes the ethical and economic concerns of her earlier work catch aesthetic fire. Continued here

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The Return of the Non-stop Trump News Cycle Over the past two weeks, since Donald Trump said on Truth Social that his indictment in Manhattan was imminent, the country has been in thrall to a familiar phenomenon: the frantic Trump news cycle. Once upon a time, it was all too common. An Axios graphic from September, 2017—“The insane news cycle of Trump’s presidency in 1 chart”—is a helpful reminder of that era. The chart showed search trends around major events during Trump’s first eight months in office. There was the Women’s March, the travel ban, “Covfefe,” and the firing of Sally Yates and of James Comey. There were also items I had no memory of: “Don Jr tweets his email”; “Beautiful chocolate cake” (Trump had the dessert right before a missile strike on Syria); “MOAB dropped” (the U.S. used its most powerful non-nuclear bomb on ISIS targets). I was struck by the mixture of ultimately inconsequential stuff (cake, tweets) with moments of life and death. How could I have forgotten those?Trump’s arraignment and pending court case, his 2024 campaign, and other potential indictments mean the country is about to be deluged with Trump news: a jarring prospect, given that the past two years provided a relative reprieve from the former President’s antics. His ban from some social media, including Twitter and Facebook, meant he filtered into our feeds—and brains—less. (Those bans have since been reversed.) Perhaps because the mainstream television networks felt some remorse for having given Trump so much free airtime during the 2016 election and beyond, his campaign rallies, which re-started a couple of months ago, have so far received much less attention. Even Fox News has cooled on the former President a bit; he only recently returned to the network after months away, and prominent hosts have struck a more Trump-skeptical tone. Most of the country was just plain burned out on news following the Trump Presidency. A 2022 study from the Reuters Institute found that forty-two per cent of Americans now actively avoid the news. Continued here

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Requiem for a Great Cat The citizens of Los Angeles have not forgotten about P-22, the furtively majestic mountain lion of Griffith Park, who died a week before Christmas, at the age of about twelve. A handsome beast with amber eyes and a white muzzle, P-22 was probably born in the Santa Monica Mountains, the coastal range west of L.A. His father was P-1, the first animal to have been tagged in a National Park Service mountain-lion study that began in 2002. (“P” stands for puma; the cats are known variously as pumas, mountain lions, panthers, catamounts, and cougars.) At the age of around one and a half, P-22 made a perilous twenty-mile journey eastward, presumably in search of uncontested territory. He crossed Interstate 405; loped through the hills above Westside L.A.; traversed the 101; and reached a reasonably safe haven in Griffith Park, a forty-two-hundred-acre expanse of urban wilderness northeast of Hollywood. In 2012, the biologist Miguel Ordeñana was reviewing images from a remote camera in the park when he saw, to his amazement, the sturdy hindquarters of a massive feline. There had been occasional puma sightings in the park, but no one had conceived of a big cat residing there full time.The L.A. Times reported P-22’s existence in 2013, and his rise to fame began. A photographer from National Geographic caught an image of him prowling at night, with the Hollywood sign aglow on the hill above. Two homeowners in Los Feliz, a neighborhood south of Griffith Park, discovered him resting placidly in a crawl space. Dozens of other residents recorded glimpses of P-22 on doorbell cameras. When, in 2016, he became the lead suspect in the death of a koala at the Los Angeles Zoo, a local politician argued that he should be removed, but no action was taken. Instead, the L.A. City Council instituted P-22 Day, which became a yearly celebration in Griffith Park. Songs were written, documentaries filmed, school curricula devised. P-22’s renown crossed the ocean; the Guardian dubbed him the “Brad Pitt of mountain lions,” in reference both to his fetching looks and to his inability to find a mate. Continued here

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Raving, Co-opted and Reimagined Techno was invented by a group of Black artists from Detroit in the early nineteen-eighties. The scene and the sound globalized rapidly, but as an American subculture early electronic dance music was characterized by a science-fictional Futurism pursued through experimental sound, social mixing, free-form radio, pride in Blackness and queerness, altered states of consciousness, style, discernment, and technological innovation. The word “rave” to describe a certain style of partying associated with electronic music came into general use in England in the late eighties, after Detroit techno and Chicago house d.j.s began crossing the Atlantic to perform and inspired their British and Continental imitators. There’s no strict definition for what constitutes a rave, but in the past the word connoted an underground gathering, usually at some kind of repurposed space, such as a warehouse, a skate park, or a farmyard. Raves were often illegal in the sense that they violated licensing rules, and because people often used banned substances. Renegade in spirit, they were conceived of in part to engineer an alternative reality for a few hours, a place where ordinary rules of consciousness and comportment would not apply. There was also an expectation of endurance, of a collective experience that would continue through the night and into the morning.Like many other subcultures, the rave was quickly co-opted. The profits of a denatured, commercially engineered version of the sound enriched a coterie of mostly white male artists who remixed pop hits and played festivals sponsored by corporations. The word “rave” lost meaning, and came to refer to any kind of happening involving a d.j. and a sound system that its organizers wanted to give a frisson of hedonism. Elon Musk threw a nine-thousand-person promotional “rave” at the Tesla factory outside Berlin in 2021. This February, the electronic-pop music producers Fred again.., Skrillex, and Four Tet billed a sold-out concert at Madison Square Garden that ended at midnight as a “pop-up rave.” Continued here

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'Yellowjackets' Episode 2 Reveals a Chilling Real-Life Cult Connection Yellowjackets has always had cult vibes. From the first glimpse of the Antler Queen, it’s very obvious that the power of belief would have a huge role in the lives of the survivors, and Season 2 has doubled down on that with the introduction of Simone Kessell as Adult Lottie. Lottie has channeled her traumatic experience in the woods (and the inpatient treatment she received after rescue) into a cult — or rather, an “intentional community.” But immediately, it’s clear this cult isn’t a purely fictional entity — it owes inspiration to one of the most insidious American cults. Continued here

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This Dental Device Was Sold to Patients To Fix Their Jaws -- Boja Kragulj, an accomplished clarinetist who once performed with orchestras in New York, Philadelphia, and Jacksonville, Florida, has already lost four teeth.Boja Kragulj, an accomplished clarinetist who once performed with orchestras in New York, Philadelphia, and Jacksonville, Florida, has already lost four teeth. And she expects to lose at least a dozen more. Continued here

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How to Get Into Dungeons & Dragons If You Loved 'Honor Among Thieves' We begin with a newcomer sitting next to you at the living room table. The scent of fresh pencil markings waft from their printed character sheet as you scoop for them a spare set of dice from your collection. As they listen to Cody the Dungeon Master, you see them struggle to make sense of five-dollar phrases like “constitution check” and “saving throw.” What do you do? Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves is a big, splashy movie wholly designed to welcome all audiences — and it may be the windfall players need to bring more friends into the fold. Over 20 years after a disastrous first attempt, D&D is back in theaters with a fresh reboot from Game Night’s Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley, the latter a huge D&D fan themselves after their time on the teen comedy Freaks and Geeks. Continued here

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25 Years Ago, a Terrible Sci-Fi Movie Did One Thing Better Than Star Trek The year is 1998. The category is sci-fi family film. The entrants are Lost in Space, a feature remake of the popular 1960s TV series, and Star Trek: Insurrection, basically a feature-length episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation. Insurrection, which sees the crew of the Enterprise helping the people of Ba’ku after uncovering a Federation conspiracy on the planet, is by far the better story, but Lost in Space had Star Trek beat in one way.For the most part, Star Trek is a workplace drama. Even if I couldn’t articulate that aspect of its narrative formula as a kid, the utopian workplaces of The Original Series and The Next Generation had me dreaming about what my future work families would look like. But while I didn’t have a job as an 11-year-old, I did have a family. This gave Lost in Space an edge, because it was all about a family, and it actually gave its kid characters stuff to do. Continued here

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Inside the Wild, True, Hot Mess That Was 1993's 'Super Mario Bros.' In 1993, no one had ever made a live-action movie based on a video game. In the spring of that year, Super Mario Bros. demonstrated why.Stories about the film are the stuff of Hollywood legend. Though Super Mario Bros. had the blessing of Nintendo, which had created the world of Mario and his brother Luigi in 1985, things went from bad to worse on a production that seemed cursed the moment the first word of the first draft was written. By the time the film was released, there was no hope. “We lost the actors,” says co-director Rocky Morton, who calls the experience “humiliating” and “deeply hurtful.” Continued here

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'Beef' Review: Netflix's Revenge Thriller Is a Career High For Steven Yeun and Ali Wong What is Beef even about? The new Netflix series starring Steven Yeun and Ali Wong has one of those infuriatingly opaque titles — one that makes one’s mind immediately jump to a docuseries on the meat industry, or maybe a cooking show about mouthwatering cuts of steak. But Beef refers to the colloquial term for “feud,” the kind that arises from a particularly aggressive case of road rage between Yeun’s Danny Cho and Wong’s Amy Lau, and which spirals out of control until it starts to violently destroy the lives of everyone around them.The thing about Beef is that neither its title nor its premise does justice to just how smart and darkly funny this dramedy series is. Created by Lee Sung Jin as an A24 and Netflix co-production, Beef has all the teeth of today’s most withering social satires, and more perspective and wit than most “eat the rich” thrillers. Despite the spectacular heights Danny and Amy’s feud takes the 10-episode series to, Beef remains a singularly grounded (and might I say, raw) depiction of the fractured state of the Asian-American experience. Continued here