Remember the climate map from your school atlas? Here's what climate change is doing to it

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Remember the climate map from your school atlas? Here's what climate change is doing to it     You probably saw a multi-coloured climate map at least once in school. You might have pored over it, fascinated. Was Antarctica really a cold desert? And why was so much of Russia listed as tundra?Almost always, those maps were based on the climate classification system proposed by Wladimir Köppen. The colours are chosen to suit our imagination: Australia with its red desert centre, surrounded by a yellow or orange semi-arid fringe and more lush green climates along many coastlines and hinterland. Continued here

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Leadership in a crisis: how President Ramaphosa's COVID speeches drew on Mandela's ideas of South African unity     In times of crisis, leaders wield more than just political power. They harness the art of rhetoric in a bid to unite their nations towards a common goal. South Africa, with a tumultuous history marked by apartheid, has seen leaders employ persuasive communication to navigate challenges. For instance, in the 1990s then-president Nelson Mandela appealed to patriotic sentiments. He often used reconciliatory rhetoric to help smooth the transition from centuries of colonial and apartheid oppression to democracy for South Africans. Continued here

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2 biggest threats to wombats revealed in new data gathered by citizen scientists     Launched in 2015, WomSAT (Wombat Survey and Analysis Tool) is a citizen science project and website that allows “wombat warriors” to report sightings of wombats, their burrows, and even their cube-shaped poops.The project initially aimed to uncover information on all things wombat from across Australia, particularly threats. Its ultimate aim is to support conservation, informed by an enhanced understanding of wombat biology. Continued here

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Increasing melting of West Antarctic ice shelves may be unavoidable - new research     The Antarctic ice sheet, the world’s largest volume of land-based ice, is a system of interconnected glaciers comprised of snowfall that remains year-round. Coastal ice shelves are the floating edges of this ice sheet which stabilise the glaciers behind them. The ocean melts these ice shelves from below, and if melting increases and an ice shelf thins, the speed at which these glaciers discharge fresh water into the ocean increases too and sea levels rise. In West Antarctica, particularly the Amundsen Sea, this process has been underway for decades. Ice shelves are thinning, glaciers are flowing faster towards the ocean and the ice sheet is shrinking. While ocean temperature measurements in this region are limited, modelling suggests it may have warmed as a result of climate change. Continued here

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Decontaminating Fukushima: have the billions spent been worth it?     The Chernobyl and (to a lesser extent) Fukushima nuclear accidents contaminated large areas of land with low-level radioactivity. After both accidents, huge efforts were taken to decontaminate the affected areas. But a recent study at Fukushima raises doubts about whether these decontamination efforts were worthwhile. Less than one-third of the population has returned to the evacuated zones and extensive areas of forest in the region remain contaminated. Continued here

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Where the ICC stands if war crimes are committed on either side of the Israel-Hamas war     Since Hamas launched its offensive in Israel on October 7 2023, drawing a swift and emphatic response from the Netanyahu government, at least 1,400 people in Israel and 5,000 people in Palestine have been killed. Many of these have been civilians – hundreds of Israelis at a music festival near the Re'im kibbutz, close to the border of Gaza. Hundreds of Palestinians were killed by an explosion at the Al-Ahli Baptist Hospital in Gaza. While the first atrocity was committed by Hamas fighters, responsibility for the hospital blast has yet to be determined. Investigators will eventually attempt to piece together the truth about both atrocities. But will anyone stand trial for war crimes? Continued here

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'Bone smashing': broken bones, tooth loss and blood vessel damage are just a few of the harms of this bizarre TikTok trend     The internet never ceases to amaze when it comes to the bizarre health crazes people are willing to try. One of the latest social media trends is “bone smashing” – and it’s every bit as insane as it sounds.This involves subjecting your face to blunt force trauma in the hopes of permanently improving the way you look. The suggestion is that by using a hammer, rolling pin, bottle – basically whatever hard object you can find – and repeatedly driving it into the bony architecture of your face, you’ll alter your appearance. Continued here

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Is a Coincidental Similarity Enough for Real Intimacy?     In 2019, the astrologer Jess Campbell, who runs the popular Spicy Gemini Memes account on Instagram, posted about the experience of “sharing a soul connection” with your so-called astrological twin, someone with the same zodiac profile. She encouraged her followers to respond with their own sun, moon, and rising signs—the “Big Three” of the astrological chart, which are determined based on the time, date, and location of one’s birth—to find their twins. Campbell told me that she’d merely intended to create some lighthearted online conversation, but soon, tens of thousands of people were commenting—enough of a response that Campbell decided to start the website Zodiac Twin to facilitate these matches. (She has since archived the original post.) Others have been searching for their twins on Facebook groups.The appeal of finding one’s zodiac doppelgänger seems to be the promise, however unsubstantiated, of looking into a cosmic mirror. People might hope to find someone who understands them profoundly. In some ways, this sort of pursuit isn’t unusual—we all want to meet people we relate to. And the more similar people already are, the stronger a connection they can feel: Finding out you went to the same college as someone else is going to be more potent than simply having the same educational level, just as discovering that you have the same birth chart is probably more intoxicating than a looser shared interest in astrology. These revelations might just be coincidences, but to our pattern-loving brains, they can seem like destiny. Can that feeling be enough to power real intimacy? Continued here

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Greta Thunberg is far from the only neurodivergent climate activist - many who see the world differently also want to change it     Amid her calls for governments to act on climate change, Swedish activist Greta Thunberg has spoken openly about her Asperger’s syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder. She is not the only environmental campaigner to speak about being neurodivergent (having a neurological condition or disability) – something Thunberg describes as her “superpower”.In the UK, naturalists Chris Packham and Dara McAnulty have both discussed their autism. Packham has said that it has been “enormously beneficial” to his career. Continued here

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A brief history of goth fashion - from all-black to pastels     Goth is the subculture that never died – or more precisely, perhaps, remains undead. The persistence of the subculture’s style is due to the remarkable richness of the cultural tradition on which it draws, and its malleability – its striking ability to absorb new influences into a recognisably coherent aesthetic. Goth’s visual style has left as vivid a legacy as its music, one that continues to inspire designers, creatives and today’s teenagers far beyond its initial invention. Continued here

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Israel-Palestine conflict: How sharing the waters of the Jordan River could be a pathway to peace     When the Israeli government cut off supplies of water to the Gaza Strip following Hamas’s brutal attack, it put the role of water within human conflict into particularly sharp relief.Debate on the notion of “water wars” has raged among water experts for nearly four decades. In 1988, Boutros Boutros-Ghali (who later became secretary general of the United Nations) said that the next set of wars will be over water. However, the years since have seen no clear instances of wars fought over water, making such a bold statement seem somewhat misguided in hindsight. Continued here

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Climate change: Kenya's power sector is a shining example, the big hurdles are household and transport emissions     Kenya’s ambition is to reduce carbon emissions by one-third by 2030, relative to the business-as-usual scenario of 143 metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. It also seeks to reduce carbon emissions to as close to zero as possible by 2050. How and whether these goals are achieved will have huge implications for the country’s economic development.Over the past decade, Kenya has taken unprecedented measures to move towards low-carbon energy sources. Despite increasing electricity demand over the past decade, carbon emissions in the power sector have been on a decline. This is because renewable energy sources such as hydropower, geothermal, wind and solar have continued to slowly replace power plants that run on fossil fuels, such as diesel. These clean sources made up 90% of Kenya’s total energy source in 2022. Their share is likely to increase following the country’s plan to promote private sector deployment of renewable electricity at competitive bidding prices in the near future. Continued here

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Accidental managers: why people who are great at their job can fail when they get promoted     There’s a saying that people don’t quit their job, they quit their boss. And poor management certainly has a lot to answer for in the UK workplace. A staggering 82% of new managers in the UK are what the Chartered Management Institute (CMI) calls “accidental managers”, according to a YouGov survey commissioned among 4,500 workers and managers in June, which has recently been published.As a first and obvious step to combat the curse of the accidental manager, companies shouldn’t appoint people to managerial roles unless they’ve had the appropriate training. Alongside this, they need a clear development plan before they start their new management role. Continued here

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How antidepressants, ketamine and psychedelic drugs may make brains more flexible - new research     The first-line pharmacological treatment for major depressive disorder (MDD) are antidepressant drugs known as selective serotonin re-uptake inhibitors (SSRIs). But a significant proportion of people don’t respond to these drugs. Given that major depression is a global mental health problem that is on the increase, it is important to find novel pharmacological treatments for those who do not respond to the current ones. But to do that, we need to understand exactly how the drugs work – which we currently don’t. Continued here

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A layered lake is a little like Earth's early oceans - and lets researchers explore how oxygen built up in our atmosphere billions of years ago     Little Deming Lake doesn’t get much notice from visitors to Itasca State Park in Minnesota. There’s better boating on nearby Lake Itasca, the headwaters of the Mississippi River. My colleagues and I need to maneuver hundreds of pounds of equipment down a hidden path made narrow by late-summer poison ivy to launch our rowboats.But modest Deming Lake offers more than meets the eye for me, a geochemist interested in how oxygen built up in the atmosphere 2.4 billion years ago. The absence of oxygen in the deep layers of Deming Lake is something this small body of water has in common with early Earth’s oceans. Continued here

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15 Years Ago, a Chilling Thriller Made Vampires Scary Again -- And Jumpstarted a Phenomenon     In 2008, vampires were facing an existential crisis. More than 100 years after Dracula first emerged from the pages of Bram Stoker’s 1897 classic, the once-intimidating monsters had long lost their fangs thanks to swooning YA books and their glossy big-screen adaptations that romanticized the once-fearsome creatures. Now, vampires were brooding bad boys, not sinister creatures of the night. However, a month before Catherine Hardwicke’s Twilight hit theaters, a nondescript Swedish horror movie introduced one of the most terrifyingly eerie cinematic takes on the vampire.Based on the 2004 novel of the same title by John Ajvide Lindqvist, Let the Right One In is a chilly, brutal coming-of-age story that happens to feature a vampire. But one of the ingenious decisions by director Tomas Alfredson and Lindqvist, who wrote the screenplay, was to withhold the fact that this was a vampire movie until about two-thirds of the way in. Up until that point, Let the Right One In is a story of Oskar (Kåre Hedebrant), a meek 12-year-old boy who lives with his mother in the western Stockholm suburb of Blackeberg in 1982. Continued here

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How much time do kids spend on devices - playing games, watching videos, texting and using the phone?     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.How many hours does the average American spend on devices each year? – Maxwell P., age 10 Continued here

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Breakthroughs in medicine: top virologist on the two most important developments for Africa     Nigerian Academy of Science provides support as a hosting partner of The Conversation AFRICA.There have been several important breakthroughs in medical science recently. Crispr, mRNA, next-generation cancer treatments and game-changing vaccines are some of them. Oyewale Tomori, a virologist with decades-long involvement in managing diseases in Nigeria, gives his verdict on the most significant discoveries and what they mean for Africa. Continued here

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The Israel-Hamas war deepens the struggle between US and Iran for influence in the Middle East     As Israel readies for a ground invasion of Gaza, and Palestinian and Israeli civilian deaths continue to mount, a broader struggle for influence continues in the Middle East between the United States and Iran. The U.S. has long played an important leadership role in the Middle East. American influence has hinged on maintaining close ties to diverse allies, including Israel, Egypt, Jordan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Continued here

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X/Twitter: imposing a US$1 bot tax on new customers will only make the platform's problems worse     X, formerly known as Twitter, is testing a subscription plan called “Not a Bot” of US$1 equivalent per annum in New Zealand and the Philippines. Those who don’t subscribe will still be able to log in to view content and follow other accounts, but won’t be able to interact through tweeting, liking, sharing or bookmarking content. The plan is limited to new accounts and only the browser version of the platform, as opposed to the mobile app. As the name of the plan suggests, X has positioned Not a Bot as a means to deter bots. Bots are fake accounts running on automated scripts, usually created by malicious actors to spread fake news and drive advertising traffic. They are present in large numbers not just on X but also other platforms such as Facebook. Continued here

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From messages on bombs to keychains made from downed Russian jets: Crowdfunding the war in Ukraine     When Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, its expectations of a quick and decisive victory evaporated quickly as Ukrainian Territorial Defence Forces proved more capable and resilient than anticipated. Within the first few weeks following the invasion, weapons, humanitarian assistance and even volunteer fighters from around the world began pouring into Ukraine to stave off the Russian advance. Continued here

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Could gut fungi be linked to severe COVID? What to make of new research findings     Many tiny organisms including bacteria, fungi and viruses normally live on our bodies, and even inside us. These are called the microbiome. The large number of these organisms living in the gastrointestinal tract are collectively known as the gut microbiome.Increasingly the gut microbiome is recognised as playing a large part in health and disease, particularly relating to human physiology, metabolism and immune function. Continued here

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Here's Exactly When You Can Start Playing 'Alan Wake 2'     After 13 years of waiting, the sequel to the cult classic horror game Alan Wake is just around the corner. It’s clear Remedy Entertainment put everything it has into Alan Wake 2, making it the studio’s most ambitious game to date. Of course, it’s also Remedy’s first true take on survival horror, a genre that’s seen a massive resurgence in recent years. With all that in mind, here’s everything you need to know about Alan Wake 2, including exactly when you can dive back into the eerie town of Bright Falls. Continued here

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Kevin Feige Just Shattered MCU TV Canon     The Marvel universe is as complex as the comics it was birthed from. Now, in Phase Five, we’ve reached a new level in the multiverse. While the action is still playing out in the blockbuster movies, there’s now an entirely different medium at play: Disney+ streaming originals like WandaVision and Loki, which exist totally separately from the other television series like the Defenders group of Netflix originals and the ABC series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.Now, finally, we have an answer to one of the biggest question in all of the MCU — how do these other series fit into the greater scheme? Continued here

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Fallen crypto king Sam Bankman-Fried was 'perfectly positioned to make a religion of himself'     A year ago, Sam Bankman-Fried (often called “SBF”) was on top of the world. He had been on the covers of Forbes, which dubbed him “the richest twentysomething in the world”, and Fortune – the equivalent, for a business leader, of a rock star on Rolling Stone, or an athlete on Sports Illustrated. He was featured in the prestigious “lunch with the FT” in the Financial Times. He was seen as the responsible face of cryptocurrency. There was even speculation he could become the first trillionaire. Continued here

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Listening to youth voices was missing in the COVID-19 pandemic response     Health Promotion Specialist - Knowledge Translation and Exchange, University of British Columbia As we face the future, it’s important to reflect on the past. Learning from how we weathered the pandemic can help improve our response to the ongoing presence of COVID-19 and the potential emergence of other diseases. Continued here

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GOP's House paralysis is a crisis in a time of crises     House Republicans fired one leader, Kevin McCarthy, and have spent almost three weeks trying unsuccessfully to choose another to succeed him as speaker of the House. That’s left the U.S. House of Representatives unable to do its work, paralyzing the entire legislative branch of government, because the Senate can’t pass legislation without a functioning House. The speaker of the House of Representatives is a powerful position with an outsized role in lawmaking. According to the rules of the House, the speaker is “the presiding officer of the House and is charged with numerous duties and responsibilities by law and by the House rules.” Continued here

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"My Name Is Barbra," Excerpted     With her long-awaited memoir, Barbra Streisand offers a funny and frank look at her career, six decades in. At a whopping 992 pages, it appears that the Hollywood and Broadway legend . . . isn't skimping on the details of her rarefied life.PAGE 5 — Barbra recounts girls' weekend with Donna Karan full of laughter, nail care. Continued here

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'Spider-Man 2' Reveals the Limits of a Popular Video Game Trend     Marvel’s Spider-Man 2 may just be the best-looking game on PlayStation 5. But swinging around the game’s rendition of New York City and watching cutscenes of Peter and Miles, I can’t help but wonder what “best-looking” means. Realistic? Spider-Man 2 certainly tries to get closer to reaching the other side of the uncanny valley, but at a time when the race toward better graphics has diminishing returns, the industry should prioritize unique art direction over graphical fidelity.On an otherwise uneventful afternoon in 2011, my mother walked into the living room where I was playing the recently released Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception on the television. Whatever set-piece was currently on-screen made an impression on my mother, who commented that she thought I was watching a movie. Continued here

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For the Osage Nation, the betrayal of the murders depicted in 'Killers of the Flower Moon' still lingers     The excerpt is from the poem “Wi’-gi-e,” or “Prayer,” which Osage author Elise Paschen wrote in 2009 to honor Anna Kyle Brown, who was thought to be the first victim of the Osage Reign of Terror.Brown’s body was found at the bottom of a ravine near Fairfax, Oklahoma, in 1921, with the cause of death ruled as “whiskey poisoning.” In truth she’d been murdered for her share of the hereditary mineral rights that had made her wealthy. Years later, a widespread investigation would reveal that Brown clearly died by gun violence and her cause of death was a cover-up. Continued here