The United States and China stepped away from the brink of a near embargo of bilateral trade on May 12. The countries had entered an escalatory spiral after the Trump administration announced new tariffs in April. By April 11, tariffs on both sides had reached prohibitive levels. The Geneva negotiations allowed both sides to unwind… Continue reading What the Trade War Reveals About China’s Vulnerabilities and Power
Heat Is Killing Oil Workers. The Industry Is Trying to Kill a Rule That Would Protect Them
CLIMATEWIRE | The oil and gas industry is pushing the Trump administration to kill a proposed rule that would protect workers from extreme heat, arguing that it jeopardizes the president’s vision of achieving “energy dominance.” The opposition comes as people who work in U.S. oil and gas fields face increasingly dangerous conditions as global temperatures… Continue reading Heat Is Killing Oil Workers. The Industry Is Trying to Kill a Rule That Would Protect Them
Disbanding the PKK: Political Engagement as the Key to Ending Insurgencies
The recent decision by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to disarm and disband has important lessons for any country facing a seemingly intractable insurgency. On May 12, the group stated that following its 12th Congress it will “dissolve the PKK’s organizational structure and end the armed struggle method.” The organisation has said that it will… Continue reading Disbanding the PKK: Political Engagement as the Key to Ending Insurgencies
A New Pyramid-Like Shape Always Lands the Same Side Up
Achieving the right balance between the weight of the loading zone and the weight of the rest of the tetrahedron is easy in the abstract realm of mathematics — you can define the weight distribution without a care for whether it’s physically possible. You might, for instance, let parts of the shape weigh nothing at all,… Continue reading A New Pyramid-Like Shape Always Lands the Same Side Up
We’ll Be Arguing for Years Whether Large Language Models Can Make New Scientific Discoveries
When OpenAI released its newest AI models o3 and o4-mini in April, its president Greg Brockman made an intriguing claim: “These are the first models where top scientists tell us they produce legitimately good and useful novel ideas.” If AI can indeed make scientific discoveries, that would not only have practical impacts for society but… Continue reading We’ll Be Arguing for Years Whether Large Language Models Can Make New Scientific Discoveries
Are You Flourishing? This Global Study Has Surprising Takeaways
Rachel Feltman: For Scientific American’s Science Quickly, I’m Rachel Feltman. How are you doing today, listeners? Would you say you’re flourishing? I’m guessing you probably wouldn’t—unless you have a particularly florid vocabulary. But researchers are increasingly focused on the idea of “human flourishing,” a multifaceted measurement that aims to take a holistic look at our… Continue reading Are You Flourishing? This Global Study Has Surprising Takeaways
John F. Kennedy Assassination Hearings (Lee Harvey Oswald? Conspiracy? CIA? Coverup?)
John F. Kennedy Assassination Hearings (Lee Harvey Oswald? Conspiracy? CIA? Coverup?) < !- end of Google Analytics Code Snippet by GA4WP–> // tabnab protection window.addEventListener(‘load’, function () { // make all links have rel=”noopener noreferrer” document.querySelectorAll(‘a[target=”_blank”]’).forEach(link => { link.setAttribute(‘rel’, ‘noopener noreferrer’); }); }); ]]> Podcast: Download MYS373: The 1963 assassination of President John F. Kennedy… Continue reading John F. Kennedy Assassination Hearings (Lee Harvey Oswald? Conspiracy? CIA? Coverup?)
Reimagining School Meals to Improve Health for All Children
Some may think free school meals are a welfare issue, but they are so much more. Free school meals are a major investment in our country’s future. Nutrition and healthy diets are important parts of children’s health. Obesity is one preventable diet-related disease that continues to affect too many children in the United States. The… Continue reading Reimagining School Meals to Improve Health for All Children
Why Do We Launch Space Telescopes?
Why Do We Launch Space Telescopes? Telescopes in space give us a view we literally cannot get from the ground By Phil Plait edited by Lee Billings Astronauts Steven Smith and John Grunsfeld, appear as small figures in this wide-angle photograph from December 1999, taken during a spacewalk to service the Hubble Space Telescope. On… Continue reading Why Do We Launch Space Telescopes?
The Wagner Group Is Leaving Mali. But Russian Mercenaries Aren’t Going Anywhere
The June 6 announcement by the infamous Wagner Group private military company that it will end its three-and-a-half-year-long deployment in Mali is an important development in Russia’s evolving mercenary landscape. Even as one Russian mercenary group is leaving, the country’s presence in Africa is not going anywhere. The Kremlin seized control of Wagner’s operations, most… Continue reading The Wagner Group Is Leaving Mali. But Russian Mercenaries Aren’t Going Anywhere