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Chickenpox and shingles virus lying dormant in your neurons can reactivate and increase your risk of stroke Over 90% of the world population has the virus that causes chickenpox lying dormant in their nervous system. Most people contract the varicella zoster virus, or VZV, when they get chickenpox as children. For around a third of these people, this same virus will reactivate years later and cause shingles, also called herpes zoster. While most people are familiar with the painful rash that VZV causes for shingles, a wide spectrum of other complications can also occur even without visible skin symptoms. Among the most severe is stroke, in particular ischemic stroke, which occurs when the blood supply to the brain is restricted by narrowing arteries or blocked by a clot.  Continued here

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How dirty debaters win against better opponents Bo Seo, a two-time world debate champion, watched the 2016 presidential debates between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton and was disappointed by the unedifying spectacle that the debates had become. Seo saw the potential for the debate format to be exploited and degraded, and he believes that the capacity to disagree well — or poorly — is within all of us. Continued here

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The 1 Product Apple Should Introduce In 2023 That Would Change Everything. It’s Not a VR Headset It may not seem as exciting, but this is the product that would really make a difference. Continued here

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If Future Humans Terraformed a New Earth, Could They Get It Right? A novel that redefines personhood, greed and despair in biotech, arguing for a singular reality, and more books Great stories often start from a tantalizing “what if?”—the more irresistibly original the premise, the better. In The Terraformers, the new novel from i09 founder and former Gizmodo editor in chief Annalee Newitz, the central question points straight at our planet’s existential crisis: Given the painful lessons we’ve learned about how not to build a sustainable, equitable future, what if people had a chance to create a cleaner, fairer Earth 2.0? Could we succeed? Continued here

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10 Xbox Game Pass Games Worth Playing If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more. Please also consider subscribing to WIRED Xbox Game Pass is one of the few subscriptions I’ve kept around while other services got the chop. The $15 monthly fee for Xbox Game Pass Ultimate feels worth it because I get to choose from over 100 titles and regularly download new additions. In a year, the cost breaks down to about the price of three AAA games. Continued here

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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

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What are 'masking' and 'camouflaging' in the context of autism and ADHD? Many autistic people and ADHD-ers report using “masking” and “camouflaging” in their lives. This is where people conceal certain traits and replace them with neurotypical ones to avoid being recognised as neurominorities. Masking and camouflaging can cause immense stress for neurominorities. And they’re different to the adjustments neurotypical people make in response to social cues. While neurotypical people may moderate behaviour to enhance social success, masking and camouflaging differ as they are used to avoid negative consequences. Continued here

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Wellness on Wheels Is Possible Cars can be very dangerous for their occupants—over 1 million people globally die in car accidents every year. Another 20 to 50 million people report nonfatal accident-related injuries annually. These are grim statistics.  This story is from the WIRED World in 2023, our annual trends briefing. Read more stories from the series here—or download or order a copy of the magazine. Continued here

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Type 2 diabetes in young people puts their eyes at risk Professeur Titulaire. École d'optométrie. Expertise en santé oculaire et usage des lentilles cornéennes spécialisées, Université de Montréal Sixteen-year-old Karl is seen for the first time in my optometry practice. He was referred to me for a fluctuating vision problem. During his examination, I saw signs suggesting he may have diabetes, which could have explained the fluctuating vision. This suspicion became a reality when his family doctor confirmed the diagnosis. Karl’s world was turned upside down. Continued here

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Can customary harvesting of NZ's native species be sustainable? Archaeology and palaeo-ecology provide some answers Aotearoa’s wilderness areas are the jewel in our ecotourism crown. But conservation laws may soon be in for a radical shake-up. Recent proposals would, among other things, allow Māori to resume traditional harvesting practices (mahinga kai) on conservation land. Continued here

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Supporting minority languages requires more than token gestures In August 2022, Statistics Canada released the latest census data on languages in Canada. According to the data, over nine million people — or one in four Canadians — has a mother tongue other than English or French (a record high since the 1901 census). Twelve per cent of Canadians speak a language other than English or French at home. Statistics Canada observes that the country’s linguistic diversity will likely continue to grow into the future. Continued here

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What you need to know for your next hybrid or electric vehicle purchase As part of its goal to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, Canada has introduced new regulations to mandate one-fifth of all vehicles sold in Canada be electric by 2026. With the price of gasoline being projected to rise again, and consumers worrying about the legacy of fossil fuel emissions, now is the perfect time for Canadians to shift toward hybrid and battery-powered electric vehicles. Continued here

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Scientists discover a previously unknown part of the brain The human brain is an intricately-structured organ, inside and out. Decades after brain imaging entered scientists’ toolkit, we’re still learning new things about the seat of cognition and consciousness. On Thursday, researchers from the University of Rochester and the University of Copenhagen announced the discovery of a previously unknown tissue layer surrounding both mouse and human brains. The find is detailed in the journal Science. Continued here

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Here are 3 Ways Your Business Should be Using AI for Content Creation Can't keep up with the demand for content? Here are 3 ways to leverage AI to create content for your business. Continued here

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Damar Hamlin's cardiac arrest shows need for CPR training and emergency defibrillators in public spaces Adam Pyle currently does education work with the Heart and Stroke Foundation on CPR and AED use. Football — a sport that involves violent collisions — came under shocking scrutiny on Jan. 2 when Buffalo Bills player Damar Hamlin collapsed from a cardiac event immediately following an on-field collision. Continued here

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Long before Silicon Valley, scholars in ancient Iraq created an intellectual hub that revolutionised science Time and again, collaboration has proven to be a key driver of scientific and technological innovation. So it follows that some of the greatest advances have come from intellectual hubs set up for this very purpose. Today Silicon Valley is synonymous with this idea – but it’s just one in a long line of institutions that paved the way before it. One such example came from Baghdad, Iraq, during the Islamic Golden Age in the fourth Islamic century (tenth century AD). Continued here

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HIV remains a leading killer in Africa despite medical breakthroughs - how to eliminate it It’s not like we’re doing something wrong, but you can always do better than what we do now. Most new infections are coming from two different groups.The first is key populations. The largest number of new infections is occurring in men who have sex with men. Especially young men – often young black men. These infections occur largely in Eastern Europe and in Russia. The second high priority is the large numbers of new infections in young women in Africa. If we don’t address those two groups, we won’t solve the problem.But to address those two groups is not easy. The challenges in much of Eastern Europe and Russia relate to their marginalisation and discrimination as much as they are about services for key populations. Continued here

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10 Browser Add-Ons to Make Downloading Videos Easy Maybe you want to save an image or a video clip from the web through your browser because it’ll make a great wallpaper or you want to include it in a video you’re making. In most cases (especially when it comes to pictures) you can simply right-click on the file and choose “save image as,” or something similar. But sometimes that doesn’t work, or not well enough. What if there’s no save option on the right-click menu? What if you want to quickly save dozens of images from a single website? What if you’re trying to save an animated video as a GIF, or you keep downloading one of those .webp files no one wants? Continued here

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Let’s Call Quiet Quitting What It Often Is: Calibrated Contributing Janet is a pharmacist who worked in person throughout the pandemic, enduring daily risk to her own health and a stream of abuse from scared, frustrated customers. For this commitment, she made less than 1% of the salary of her company's CEO in each of the past three years. Alex works in IT support. For several years, he actively tried to help improve his group's efficiency and culture but found his ideas repeatedly ignored. When the pandemic hit, he figured management would finally listen to and act on his insights about how to keep virtual workers positive and productive. He was wrong. Like millions of other Americans, Janet and Alex eventually concluded that what they were getting out of work — be it their financial compensation or a sense of control or respect — didn't match what they were putting in. They were, in short, giving more than they were getting, so they decided to scale back their efforts. Janet still does her job well, but she won't stay late or take extra shifts. Alex still handles the same volume of support calls, but he has stopped speaking up or investing effort in coming up with potential improvements. Continued here

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The epic farewell posts of laid-off employees “I hated how my employer handled it,” says the New York-based software developer. “They received praise for large severance packages, but the process on who was let go was very unfair. And the messaging was terrible: the layoffs were leaked beforehand, yet they didn’t make it public that high performers also lost their jobs.” Singh’s frustrations were compounded by the fact that he believed his job was relatively safe, especially since he’d never been informed of any performance problem. Plus, as an Indian expatriate on a US work visa, he had just 60 days to find a new role. Continued here

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20 of the best films to watch in 2023 With a title so short and to the point that it makes Snakes on a Plane seem convoluted, Cocaine Bear is "inspired by" the true story of a black bear that swallowed a drug dealer's stash of cocaine. The sad reality is that the bear died almost immediately afterwards. It was then stuffed and displayed in the Kentucky Fun Mall, and labelled "Pablo Escobear". But in this raucous horror comedy, directed by Elizabeth Banks (Pitch Perfect 2, Charlie's Angels), our ursine hero rampages through a forest, attacking campers and criminals played by Keri Russell, O'Shea Jackson Jr, Alden Ehrenreich and the late Ray Liotta. If the viral trailer is anything to go by, Cocaine Bear should be a blast, although it probably won't win many Oscars. (Nicholas Barber) The Jurassic Park / World franchise might have gone extinct with Jurassic World Dominion, but there are plenty more dinosaurs on the big screen in 65. Adam Driver stars as Commander Mills, a spaceship pilot "on a long-range exploratory mission" who crash-lands on a wilderness planet. It looks as if only one of his passengers has survived, a girl played by Ariana Greenblatt. But they aren't alone. The twist is that they're actually on Earth, 65 million years ago (hence the title). Does that mean Mills has travelled back in time? Or is he an alien who happens to look human? The film's writer-directors, Scott Beck and Bryan Woods, are the co-writers of A Quiet Place, so they know a thing or two about lean, mean, survival thrillers involving showdowns between humans and hungry monsters. (NB) Continued here

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First grader who shot teacher in Virginia is among the youngest school shooters in nation's history Ph.D. student in Criminal Justice and Creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database, University of Central Florida Barely a week into the new year, a 6-year-old boy shot his teacher at Richneck Elementary School in Newport News, Virginia, becoming one of the youngest school shooters in the nation’s history. While details of the case are still emerging, his teacher remains hospitalized with serious injuries. David Riedman, creator of the K-12 School Shooting Database, discusses the relative rarity of school shooters under age 10 and the likely aftermath of the event. Continued here

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Hilaree Nelson Was One of the Greatest Adventurers Ever A very sad piece of news in 2022 was the death of Hilaree Nelson at age 49. A premier ski mountaineer, Hilaree held numerous firsts, including the first ski descent from the summit of Lhotse (next door to Mount Everest), the first ski descent of Papsura in India (and known as the “peak of evil” because of its exceptional danger), and the first person to ski the Five Holy Peaks of Mongolia. Hilaree helped to break the barrier of “women’s firsts.” When people spoke of her, they didn’t say she was one of the world’s great female mountaineers. They said she was one of the world’s great mountaineers. In 2018 she succeeded Conrad Anker—who had climbed Everest three times, twice without oxygen—as captain of the North Face Global Athlete Team, cementing her position as one of the greatest adventurers ever. Continued here

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Guide to the classics: Elizabeth Gaskell's North and South - class warfare, 'shoppy people' and radical love The industrial revolution was one of the biggest cataclysms in European history. Between 1790 and 1850, the countryside rapidly depopulated. Huge masses of people flooded into cities for factory work, living cheek-by-jowl in unhygienic slums. In Britain, the government could barely keep up with the spirit of laissez-faire capitalism. There were almost no restrictions on child labour, working hours, or safety in the workplace. And, if progressive legislation was proposed, newly emboldened capitalists often resisted it as an imposition on their freedom – and their profits. Continued here

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How housing made rich Australians 50% richer, leaving renters and the young behind - and how to fix it Compared to the rest of the world, income inequality is not particularly high in Australia, nor is it getting much worse – until you include housing. Rising housing costs have dramatically widened the gap between what Australians on high and low incomes can afford. Rising home prices paired with plummeting rates of homeownership are driving up wealth inequalities. Continued here

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Meet the eastern bristlebird: tragically under-appreciated, and one fire away from local extinction Am I not pretty enough? This article is part of The Conversation’s series introducing you to unloved Australian animals that need our help. In 1962, renowned American conservationist Rachel Carson wrote a book entitled “Silent Spring” after she noticed the birdsong she used to wake up to as a child had been thinning. Its eventual absence had become almost deafening. Continued here

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Too many smelly candles? Here's how scents impact the air quality in your home There’s nothing wrong with wanting your home to smell nice and fresh – and from candles to diffusers, there’s no shortage of home scent products to help you achieve that. But having rampant fragrances in our indoor air can dramatically impact air quality, coming with a host of potential problems. Continued here

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One creature’s live fast, live long lifestyle may reveal how to slow aging Let me describe a mystery bird that vividly illustrates some of the biological challenges birds have had to conquer in order to live as long as they do. My mystery bird is tiny, weighing about the same as a U.S. penny. When active, it requires so much energy that it must eat up to several times its own body weight in food per day to avoid starving. During the flight, its wings beat 80 times per second, and each gram of its flight muscles produces up to 10 times the energy of the muscles of an elite human athlete when both are working at maximum capacity. In fact, it has the highest metabolic rate of any endothermic animal — and it is very endothermic. Its typical body temperature of 40°C (104°F) would be a dangerously high human fever. It requires so much fuel to maintain this level of energy expenditure that, when inactive, it drops its body temperature to that of the surrounding environment in order to not starve to death while sleeping. Its heart pounds away at machinegun-like 20-something beats per second. Even at rest, it breathes 250 times per minute, about the same rate as a panting dog, to get enough oxygen. Finally, its normal blood sugar concentration would make it dangerously diabetic if it were human. Continued here

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Which Connections Really Help You Find a Job? Experiments involving 20 million people generated a surprising finding: moderately weak connects — and not strong connections — are the most useful in finding a new job. To be more specific, the ties that are most helpful for finding new jobs tend to be moderately weak: They strike a balance between exposing you to new social circles and information and having enough familiarity and overlapping interests so that the information is useful. The findings are important not just for job seekers; they also have implications for managers seeking to hire new people. Continued here

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To Retain Your Best Employees, Invest in Your Best Managers Managers are really having a moment. Between the Great Resignation, a lingering pandemic, employees demanding flexibility, skyrocketing mental health challenges, a looming recession, and general uncertainty, more and more employees are turning to their direct supervisors for direction and support. Unfortunately, managers aren’t always prepared to meet their moment because they’re woefully under-trained and overworked while tasked with leading their teams during heightened turbulence. To retain your managers — and the employees who report to them — you need to invest in their development. The author presents three ways to do it. Continued here

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Road to nowhere: why the suburban cul-de-sac is an urban planning dead end The cul-de-sac is a suburban trap. It’s virtually useless as a road, doesn’t support public transport, cycling or walking, and doesn’t work well as a play or gathering place. Its literal translation from the French is “bottom of a sack” – which sounds a lot less glamorous, you’ll agree. And yet we persist with them. The calls for more housing that resonate across many urban societies almost always include plans to repurpose broad swathes of agricultural land into single-family housing serviced by twisting strands of cul-de-sac-capped roads. Continued here

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Life in Fukushima is a glimpse into our contaminated future | Aeon Essays A rice field in Iitate, Fukushima prefecture, Japan, 2016. Photo by Eric Lafforgue/Corbis/Getty A rice field in Iitate, Fukushima prefecture, Japan, 2016. Photo by Eric Lafforgue/Corbis/Getty Continued here

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AI might be seemingly everywhere, but there are still plenty of things it can't do - for now These days, we don’t have to wait long until the next breakthrough in artificial intelligence (AI) impresses everyone with capabilities that previously belonged only in science fiction. In 2022, AI art generation tools such as Open AI’s DALL-E 2, Google’s Imagen, and Stable Diffusion took the internet by storm, with users generating high-quality images from text descriptions. Continued here

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Democracy under attack in Brazil: 5 questions about the storming of Congress and the role of the military Thousands of far-right supporters of former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro stormed the country’s Congress, Supreme Court and presidential palace on Jan. 8, 2023. In images similar to those from the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol, demonstrators were seen overwhelming and beating police while breaching the security perimeter of the buildings. Continued here

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Of all the cheap things for your home on Amazon, these look the most expensive Having a home that looks like it could hold its own in a magazine photo shoot may be a lofty ambition — especially if you’re not willing to drop a lot of money on the effort. When it comes to making a living space shine for less cash, it pays to focus on the small upgrades and tools. The goal is to find items that reflect your style and of course, work well. It’s icing on the cake if they look luxe while having bargain prices. A whole collection of such items can be found right here. Because there is all that travel, fine bourbon, and new tech to pay for still, right? To save your wallet, I did the hunting and comparing. And, of all the cheap things for your home on Amazon, these look the most expensive. Continued here

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New measurements support the idea that dark matter doesn’t exist Although dark matter is a central part of the standard cosmological model, it’s not without its issues. There continue to be nagging mysteries about the stuff, not the least of which is the fact that scientists have found no direct particle evidence of it. Despite numerous searches, we have yet to detect dark matter particles. So some astronomers favor an alternative, such as Modified Newtonian Dynamics (MoND) or the modified gravity model. And a new study of galactic rotation seems to support them. The idea of MoND was inspired by galactic rotation. Most of the visible matter in a galaxy is clustered in the middle, so you’d expect that stars closer to the center would have faster orbital speeds than stars farther away, similar to the planets of our solar system. What we observe is that stars in a galaxy all rotate at about the same speed. The rotation curve is essentially flat rather than dropping off. The dark matter solution is that galaxies are surrounded by a halo of invisible matter, but in 1983 Mordehai Milgrom argued that our gravitational model must be wrong. Continued here

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Help! My kid won't read chapter books. What do I do? Many children start school excited about learning to read. And parents too! After many years of reading and re-reading (seemingly ad nauseam) favourite picture books aloud, it’s thrilling to see your child develop their own reading skills. But what if they seem to be “stuck” on books that still use lots of illustrations, such as graphic novels, comics or picture books? Continued here

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The Failure of the DEI-Industrial Complex Despite the increase in organizations adopting DEI initiatives and the proliferation of DEI firms and practitioners, the big, poorly kept secret is that the majority of these initiatives are less effective than many make them out to be. On the one hand, there is a lack of standards, consistency, and accountability among DEI practitioners. And on the other, organizations keep asking for, and funding, interventions that don’t work. This phenomenon that purports to end inequity but instead sustains it at great cost to marginalized populations is called the DEI-Industrial Complex. To end it, the author, a DEI practitioner, provides four actions for organizations and DEI practitioners to take: 1) Identify DEI challenges before prescribing DEI solutions, 2) find the right specialist(s), 3) measure not only inputs, but outcomes, and 4) have those doing the work inform the budget for it. Continued here

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Discussions about antisemitism need to include gender and sexuality The last few years have been a time of increased antisemitism in Europe. In a 2018 study of 16,395 people, the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) found that 85% of participants considered antisemitism to be a “very big” or “fairly big” problem in their country. The Community Security Trust, a charity that protects UK Jews from antisemitism, logged 2,255 reported incidents of antisemitism in 2021. This was a record high for a single year, and up from 1,684 in 2020. These high numbers are notable given that Jews make up just 0.5% of the English and Welsh population, and that many incidents are not reported. Continued here

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Archaic technology could one day help astronauts navigate the Moon Alvin Yew created an AI-driven local map service that uses local landmarks for navigation. When humans start living and working on the Moon in the Artemis missions, they’re going to need good navigational aids. Sure, they’ll have a GPS equivalent to help them find their way around. And, there’ll be LunaNet, the Moon’s equivalent to the internet. But, there are places on the lunar that are pretty remote. In those cases, explorers could require more than one method for communication and navigation. That prompted NASA Goddard research engineer Alvin Yew to create an AI-driven local map service. It uses local landmarks for navigation. Continued here

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Mad world: global flashpoints to watch in 2023 in the era of 'polycrisis' When 2022 began, there was trepidation about what might happen in at least ten regions. Topping most lists were concerns about tensions in Ukraine, Afghanistan and Ethiopia. What actually transpired in 2022 were some of the most shocking humanitarian scenes in modern history – with a backdrop of the continuing pandemic and extreme weather events exacerbated by climate change. Continued here

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Use these 3 expert-backed tips to combat the remote-work blues Gig work comes with some upsides, like being one’s own boss or setting one’s own schedule. In the wake of the pandemic, it is clear that remote work is here to stay. It seems every week, there are more news stories about workers preferring to work remotely or companies closing physical office spaces. Continued here

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Teaching an AI to beat video games still takes human imagination | Aeon Videos In 2013, researchers at the artificial intelligence research company DeepMind in London set out to create a system of AI networks that could master any Atari game. And they had excellent results, with their system outperforming skilled humans at exponential rates. However, one game with some novel gameplay characteristics, Montezuma’s Revenge (1984), left the system totally stumped, unable to score a single point. This delightfully retro animation explores how the DeepMind team was finally able to conquer the game by borrowing concepts from human psychology. Further, the video explores the ways in which AI development remains a deeply human enterprise that demands our creative guidance, even as AIs increasingly outperform us at certain tasks. Fifty years ago, a train collided with Jack and Betty’s car. Here’s how they remember it Continued here

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Why we should all learn to love stinging nettles Thinking of stinging nettles (Urtica dioica) may bring to mind childhood memories of legs burning as you whizzed down country lanes on your bike. Or itchy white bumps blooming on your hands and even face as you foraged blackberries from the hedgerow. As an adult, you may have fresher memories of the pain from trying to weed persistent nettles from your garden. As soon as you think you’ve got them all, they spring up again like difficult relatives at Christmas. Continued here

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Pandemic stress caused some young people’s brains to age too fast — study At this point, it’s obvious that the stress of life with Covid-19 has caused a decline in our collective mental health. Now new research suggests pandemic-induced stress has fundamentally altered some people’s brains. The discovery adds to a body of research on what causes accelerated brain aging, which we know is influenced by both biological and environmental factors. The brain’s appearance changes as people age, but the evidence suggests not all people experience brain aging at the same rate. Stressful events can cause a mismatch between a person’s brain age and their chronological age — how many years they’ve been alive. Continued here

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Stop Doing Low-Value Work In the past, time management experts would recommend that you divide up your work into A tasks, B tasks, and C tasks. The concept was to do the A tasks first, then the B tasks, then the C tasks, when you can get to them. If priorities changed, you just changed the order of your As, Bs, and Cs. Doing all aspects of a job seemed possible then, if you just followed some basic time management rules. Continued here

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Colds, flu and COVID: how diet and lifestyle can boost your immune system Every day we are exposed to a wide array of potentially harmful microorganisms – such as colds, the flu and even COVID. But our immune system – a network of intricate pathways within our body – helps protect us against these microorganisms and other potential diseases. Essentially, it recognises foreign invaders, such as viruses and bacteria, and takes immediate action to defend us. Humans have two types of immunity: innate and adaptive. Innate immunity is the body’s first-line of defence, primarily consisting of physical barriers (such as skin), and secretions – including mucus, stomach acid and enzymes in saliva and sweat which prevent microorganisms getting inside the body. It also consists of cells that attack all foreign invaders entering the body. Continued here

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Accelerated Learning: Learn Faster and Remember More - Farnam Street You can train your brain to retain knowledge and insight better by understanding how you learn. Once you understand the keys to learning, everything changes—from the way you ask questions to the way you consume information. People will think you have a superpower. Learning is the act of incorporating new facts, concepts, and abilities into our brains. We start learning in the womb and we never stop; we are always developing new competencies. Every new bit of knowledge we acquire builds on what we already know and gives us a fuller, richer picture of the world. And the more developed our understanding of the world is, the easier it is for us to adapt and pivot when our circumstances change. Continued here

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What it’s like to wear a prosthetic that ‘feels’ | Aeon Videos As a biomedical engineer and a practitioner of the Indian classical dance form bharatanatyam, Shriya Srinivasan understands the value of being able to sense the world around you with your entire body. Working at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Srinivasan has been part of a team dedicated to creating the next generation of prosthetics limbs, which owners use not only to move, but also to receive sensory feedback. With these emerging surgically attached robotic protheses and exoskeletons, which integrate the signals of muscle tissues and electrodes, Srinivasan and her fellow researchers aim to help those with amputations or paralysis to feel more fully. Fifty years ago, a train collided with Jack and Betty’s car. Here’s how they remember it Continued here

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How faith can inspire environmental action It has become clear that meaningful progress on climate change is not going to be achieved by one person or indeed, one government. Coordinated action between governments, industry, local leaders and society is needed urgently. The recent COP27 decision itself mentions the importance of local communities, cities, indigenous peoples and children. But strikingly absent is the role of faith or religion. Religion can have a significant and positive influence on people’s behaviour when it comes to the environment. Spiritual practices and liturgies are being developed to help believers integrate environmental concerns with their spirituality. Continued here

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What passes from one generation to the next is not only genetic | Aeon Essays Each new generation learns from its elders. But familial voices now compete for influence with a chorus of urgent others writes on topics from creationist biology classes in Galápagos schools to the connections between suffering and selflessness. She is the author of What Makes a Hero? (2013) and, for children, The Life Heroic: How to Unleash Your Most Amazing Self (2019). She lives in San Jose, California. Continued here

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Can 10 Minutes of Meditation Make You More Creative? Whether you are trying to reconcile conflicting stakeholder priorities, finding a solution to a customer’s issue, or launching a new product line, your solution probably won’t come out of a textbook. But it’s hard to keep having great ideas day after day. What do you do when you run out of good ideas? How do you “get your mojo back”? One increasingly popular solution is mindfulness meditation. Google, Goldman Sachs, and Medtronic are among the many leading firms that have introduced meditation and other mindfulness practices to their employees. Executives at these and other companies say meditation is not only useful as a stress-reduction tool but can also enhance creativity, opening doors where once there seemed to be only a wall. To gain a deeper understanding of the effectiveness of short meditation sessions in boosting creativity, the authors looked first at the literature and then conducted their own experiments. They found that mindfulness mediation works to enhance creativity and innovation, and 10 to 12 minutes of it are enough to boost creativity. Continued here

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Chubb review of Australia's carbon credit scheme falls short - and problems will continue to fester Andrew Macintosh consults to various organisations about the carbon market and other environmental markets. He is also a Director of Paraway Pastoral Co., which has ERF projects. An independent review of Australia’s controversial carbon credit system released today concluded the scheme is essentially sound. But key questions remain unaddressed – a fact that will continue to undermine confidence in Australia’s central climate policy. Continued here

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Plant-based plastics may not be as eco-friendly as they seem Growing crops to make plastic may theoretically reduce reliance on fossil fuels, but at an enormous environmental cost. It’s the year 2050, and humanity has made massive progress in decarbonizing. That’s thanks in large part to the negligible price of solar and wind power, which was cratering even back in 2022. Yet the fossil fuel industry hasn’t just doubled down on making plastics from oil and gas — instead, as the World Economic Forum warned it would happen, it has tripled production from 2016 levels. Continued here

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Antipsychotic withdrawal - an unrecognised and misdiagnosed problem It’s not withdrawal, it’s a relapse of your illness. This is what many people trying to stop their antipsychotic drugs are told when seeking support to get off the medication. Antipsychotics are a group of drugs used to treat psychosis (when people lose some contact with reality). It is thought that high levels of a brain chemical called dopamine may cause the symptoms of psychosis, such as hearing voices or feeling paranoid. Antipsychotics help to reduce the intensity of these symptoms by blocking the effect of dopamine. Continued here

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“Hammer Attack” Three Virgin Marys kept their baleful eyes on the back of Allen's head. But more powers were needed—of clemency, of healing—so, to accompany the dolorous mothers, somebody had also taped to the wall behind Allen's hospital bed half a dozen Jesuses (a few were laminated), the famous "Last Supper" painting, and a grave-looking figure who, Alice, one of Allen's sisters, told Gina, was St. Jude, the patron saint of lost causes, of last hope. I said to Gina, The school I went to in Manila was called St. Jude. It was next to the church, also called St. Jude, where hundreds of people went for Mass. St. Jude is a very popular saint with the Filipinos, I added. Although, if Gina hadn't asked and Alice hadn't told her, I would not have been hip to this figure's identity. It had been a long time since I'd given any thought to my boyhood, devoutness, obedience, my family. Allen was, in some ways, a kindred spirit. His one-word self-description, at our first book-group gathering, was "lapsed." What did he mean? You name it, I've lapsed. To much laughter, he enumerated: lapsed Christian, lapsed Korean, lapsed middle-class person, lapsed heterosexual. He was an unusual gay man, but maybe I was relying on stereotypes: he was young but chubby, unstylish, unprepossessing in appearance and manner. He wasn't the most talkative of the bunch of us, and he had a fondness for upspeak, like a teen-ager. Continued here

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You need to play the best post-apocalypse game ever ASAP Post-apocalyptic video games are a dime a dozen these days, but even if the mere mention makes you roll your eyes, there’s one you absolutely cannot skip. Arguably the best PlayStation game ever, The Last of Us, is easily one of the all-time greats — with a rich narrative, wonderfully-written characters, satisfying gameplay, and stunning visuals. Ahead of the game’s upcoming HBO TV adaptation, and with the recently released PS5 remake (which Inverse awarded a 10/10), there’s never been a better time to experience the best post-apocalyptic game of all time. Whether you play the original PS3 game, the PS4 remaster, or the PS5 remake, The Last of Us is a treat from start to finish. The PS5 remake offers 60+ new accessibility features and massive quality-of-life improvements. But you’d be surprised just how well the 2013 original holds up, too. Continued here

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Why is January so depressing? Blame the Earth’s tilt Above the equator, winter officially begins in December. But in many areas, January is when it takes hold. Atmospheric scientist Deanna Hence explains the weather and climate factors that combine to produce wintry conditions at the turn of the year. As the Earth orbits the Sun, it spins around an axis — picture a stick going through the Earth, from the North Pole to the South Pole. During the 24 hours that it takes for the Earth to rotate once around its axis, every point on its surface faces toward the Sun for part of the time and away from it for part of the time. This is what causes daily changes in sunlight and temperature. Continued here

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You need to watch Steven Spielberg's most underrated sci-fi thriller on Netflix ASAP Steven Spielberg has, of course, directed more than his fair share of iconic movies. However, most of his well-known films were made in the 1970s, ‘80s, and ‘90s. Fairly or not, it’s become common to argue that Spielberg’s 21st-century efforts are inferior to his earlier work. While some of the director’s worst movies have been released over the past 23 years, that hardly means all of his more recent films have been disappointing. That’s especially true for Minority Report. The 2002 sci-fi blockbuster, based on a short story by Philip K. Dick and co-adapted by The Queen’s Gambit creator Scott Frank, is a thrilling, thought-provoking, and well-realized genre film. Featuring two pitch-perfect performances from Tom Cruise and Colin Farrell, it easily ranks among Spielberg’s most underrated. Continued here

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Use these science-backed hacks to cook the perfect pasta — and save money while doing it Italians are notoriously — and understandably — protective of their cuisine, as frequent arguments about the correct toppings for pizza or the appropriate pasta to use with a Bolognese ragu will attest. So it was hardly surprising that when a Nobel Prize-winning Italian physicist weighed in with advice about how to cook pasta perfectly, which seemed to upend everything the countries’ cooks had been doing in the kitchen for centuries, it caused an almighty row. Continued here

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You need to play the most groundbreaking fighting game ever on Switch ASAP As video games swept into mainstream culture in the 1990s, they began attracting political attention. The growing industry ran directly into an American battle over morality, led by Senators Joe Lieberman and Herb Kohl, Democrats from Connecticut and Wisconsin. In 1993, A member of Lieberman’s staff had bought Mortal Kombat for his son and had been horrified by the brutality. Blood everywhere, spines being pulled out, and demands to “Finish him?” Mortal Kombat was ghastly! Lieberman and Kohl held hearings on the game, bringing it into the halls of Congress so elected officials could see it for themselves. The hearings shook the video game industry, which banded together in their aftermath to create the Entertainment Software Ratings Board (ESRB). Continued here

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One style of social media use makes you feel better than any other — it’s not what you think Are you a doom scroller or a frequent Tweeter? Do you pass the time by flicking endlessly through others’ posts on social networking sites, or perhaps you use these platforms to share your content? Psychologists believe our style of social media usage has important effects on our psychological well-being, but we’ve struggled to measure people’s online behavior accurately — until now. It’s estimated that more than 4 billion people use social media worldwide, which is expected to rise to a staggering 6 billion by 2027. Although many people consider social media to be a good thing, helping us to connect with vast social networks, others argue that replacing meaningful, real-world interactions with virtual ones is having negative effects on our mental health. Continued here

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Vietnam war: how US involvement has influenced foreign policy decisions over 50 years 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the US withdrawal from Vietnam and the war still casts long shadows over American life. The cost in lives was enormous. Over almost 20 years, more than 2.7 million Americans served in uniform in the conflict, and around 58,318 lost their lives. Estimates of Vietnamese deaths are more than 3 million civilians and soldiers from both sides. Thousands of US veterans suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder and tried to readjust on their return home. Continued here

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These cheap, clever products are amazing because they save you from having to buy expensive stuff I would love to be able to run out and buy a new car, remodel my kitchen, and pick up a delicious cold brew coffee whenever the mood strikes. I’m on a budget, though — and honestly, even if I could do those things, I think I’m too much of a penny pincher to spend with reckless abandon. I enjoy finding a better, cheaper, or smarter way of getting the yummy coffee or gorgeous counters I crave almost as much as having those things. I know I’m not the only one playing this game because some of my best sources — when I’m researching a new life hack — dwell in the reviews on Amazon. That is a crowd that loves cheap products that save you from buying expensive stuff. Because you know what? There’s always a product that was created by people who spend more on thinking up clever solutions and engineering them than they do on marketing. And those are the things I’m talking about. They’re smart and cheap. For example, I have been looking for a lighted mirror that isn’t extremely expensive, but I discovered it’s much easier and cheaper to light the mirror I already have. I was also considering hiring a plumber to fix the drain that’s always clogging — but then, I found discovered a super cheap hack that’ll prevent this. But the hack that’s likely to save the most money is the one that turns stopping for coffee into something I can do from my own fridge. Continued here

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'Last of Us' showrunners explain their biggest canon change: "This is happening right now" The Last of Us video game is deeply steeped in the year of its release. From the moment the player hits start, they become Sarah, a young girl in 2013, as she looks for her dad Joel and uncle Tommy while the zombie apocalypse starts with a bang (quite literally) outside. After the game’s prologue comes to its heart-wrenching finale, the action jumps two decades into the future with the story of Joel and wisecracking teen Ellie’s trek across a post-apocalypse America in the 2030s. So when HBO set out to adapt The Last of Us into a live-action series 10 years later, the studio faced a dilemma. Keep the original timeline? Or more the entire plot forward by a decade? Instead, co-creators Craig Mazin (Chernobyl) and Neil Druckmann (the original game’s director) chose a third option: push that prologue into the past. Continued here

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Inverse's 23 most anticipated movies of 2023 What a time it is to be a movie fan. Whether you are excited for the next superhero sequels or the weirdest sci-fi indie, 2023 looks to offer everything a growing cinephile could need. From neon-drenched hitman fourquels, to sandy sci-fi odysseys, to the last hurrah for our favorite galaxy-protecting idiots, 2023 is shaping up to be a pretty good year for franchises. And outside of the sequel mania, we have a swan song for the greatest anime auteur, a surreal drama featuring too many Joaquin Phoenixes, and a bear that ingested too much cocaine. Continued here

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The Failure of the DEI-Industrial Complex Despite the increase in organizations adopting DEI initiatives and the proliferation of DEI firms and practitioners, the big, poorly kept secret is that the majority of these initiatives are less effective than many make them out to be. On the one hand, there is a lack of standards, consistency, and accountability among DEI practitioners. And on the other, organizations keep asking for, and funding, interventions that don’t work. This phenomenon that purports to end inequity but instead sustains it at great cost to marginalized populations is called the DEI-Industrial Complex. To end it, the author, a DEI practitioner, provides four actions for organizations and DEI practitioners to take: 1) Identify DEI challenges before prescribing DEI solutions, 2) find the right specialist(s), 3) measure not only inputs, but outcomes, and 4) have those doing the work inform the budget for it. Continued here

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To Retain Your Best Employees, Invest in Your Best Managers Managers are really having a moment. Between the Great Resignation, a lingering pandemic, employees demanding flexibility, skyrocketing mental health challenges, a looming recession, and general uncertainty, more and more employees are turning to their direct supervisors for direction and support. Unfortunately, managers aren’t always prepared to meet their moment because they’re woefully under-trained and overworked while tasked with leading their teams during heightened turbulence. To retain your managers — and the employees who report to them — you need to invest in their development. The author presents three ways to do it. Continued here

S58

To Retain Your Best Employees, Invest in Your Best Managers Managers are really having a moment. Between the Great Resignation, a lingering pandemic, employees demanding flexibility, skyrocketing mental health challenges, a looming recession, and general uncertainty, more and more employees are turning to their direct supervisors for direction and support. Unfortunately, managers aren’t always prepared to meet their moment because they’re woefully under-trained and overworked while tasked with leading their teams during heightened turbulence. To retain your managers — and the employees who report to them — you need to invest in their development. The author presents three ways to do it. Continued here