Whether used for ceremonial, astronomical or spiritual events, Stonehenge remains a subject of intrigue. Now, using the latest scientific technologies such as radiocarbon dating and 3D laser scanning, archaeologists are understanding how this colossal stone circle was built and what its purpose was, as well as gaining new insight into how our Stone Age human ancestors lived.
New studies even suggest some of the stones could align with the moon during rare lunar events.
It is vital to climate stabilisation, remarkably challenging and systematically ignored
St Augustine’s climate policy
Carbon dioxide removals must start at scale sooner than people think
On the other hand…
Not all tonnes are created equal
Video timeline: 00:00 Lithium and the energy transition 01:13 Global lithium reserves 01:33 The process 03:03 The communities 04:05 Water reserves 05:29 The investors 07:40 Lithium supply and China 08:41 The policymakers 09:35 Cornish mining revival 12:16 The markets 15:28 Chile’s lithium policy 18:02 Direct lithium extraction 19:54 The indigenous perspective 22:58 Recycling batteries 25:30 The future
#lithium #lithiumbattery #energy #electricvehicle #zerocarbon #emission
0:15 Kiel is Germany’s first zero-waste city –Kiel has put 107 waste-reducing measures in place. They include practical changes, such as ‘pay-to-throw’, a scheme in which households pay a fee for the amount of landfill waste they generate. Other measures include recycling collection ‘islands’ around the city, discounts for shoppers who bring their own containers and banning disposable products at all city events.
1:33 Gender balanced companies outperform others – According to a BlackRock study of 1,250 of the world’s biggest companies. Over the past decade, the companies with the most equal gender balance achieved a 7.7% average annual return on assets (RoA). Those with the highest share of men delivered a 5.6% RoA, while those with the highest share of women returned a 6.1% RoA. The study concluded it was ‘diversity that counts’ rather than the dominance of a single gender.
3:08 US wants to convert empty offices into homes – The government will offer funding and technical support to help cities turn unused workspaces into affordable apartments. US office vacancy rates have hit a 30-year peak as more staff clock in to work remotely. Meanwhile, rents in the country remain at historic highs after a surge during the pandemic converting offices to apartments can be challenging.
4:48 Rwanda and Kenya open borders to other Africans – Rwanda and Kenya have made significant strides in promoting African unity by opening their borders to other Africans, enabling visa-free travel for all citizens of the continent. This move positions Rwanda as the fourth African nation to remove such restrictions, following Benin, The Gambia, and Seychelles. Kenya is set to join them on December 31, 2023.
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NEW HUMANIST MAGAZINE – WINTER 2023 ISSUE: The new issue features Pavan Amara on the new technologies revolutionising reproduction, Gabriele Di Donfrancesco on Europe’s battle over “family values” and Rachael Lennon on a decade of same-sex marriage, and a new column from Shaparak Khorsandi…
Overestimating China’s armed forces would be dangerous, argues Jeremy Page
In 1957 america was gripped by fears of a “missile gap” with the Soviet Union. The Kremlin had stunned the world with a test flight of an intercontinental ballistic missile (icbm) and the launch of Sputnik. An American intelligence report predicted that by 1962, the Soviets could have 500 icbms, outstripping America’s arsenal. When word of that leaked, a political furore erupted. Eyeing the presidency from his Senate seat, John F. Kennedy demanded action to prevent a Soviet “shortcut to world domination”.
The PLA needs them to operate all its new weapons
But China’s military tech still lags behind the West’s
Poker champion and science communicator Liv Boeree introduces us to the dark force of game theory driving many of humanity’s biggest social problems — a force that’s now threatening to derail the AI industry.
Olivia “Liv” Boeree is a British science communicator, television presenter and former professional poker player. She is a World Series of Poker and European Poker Tour champion, and is the only female player in history to win both a WSOP bracelet and an EPT event.
These systems, developed over 1,000 years ago, consist of the construction of underground channels that transport water across a large area that needs to be cooled. Vertical shafts drilled along the channel bring underground air to the surface, lowering above-ground temperatures.
In summer, people don’t leave their house until 8pm and festivals usually start at 10pm. Built on the banks of the Guadalquivir River during the Middle Ages, the Spanish city regularly records temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit) during July and August. And scientists expecting temperatures above 50°C in the near future.
BRENDAN I. KOERNER
The creator economy is fragmented and chaotic. Talent manager Ursus Magana can (almost) make sense of it, with a frenetic formula for gaming the algorithms.
Hamas posted gruesome images and videos that were designed to go viral. Sources argue that Telegram’s lax moderation ensured they were seen around the world.
At around 8 am local time the morning of October 7, Haaretz’s cyber and disinformation reporter, Omer Benjakob, was woken by his wife at their home in the historic port city of Jaffa. Something was happening in southern Israel, she said, but Benjakob shrugged it off, presuming “another round of the same shit.” Flare-ups between the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and militants in southern Israel are not uncommon. “No, no,” Benjakob’s wife insisted. “It’s more serious.”
No sunlight? No problem. This wellness lamp brings dim rooms the next best thing to natural light.
Yes, charging your phone overnight is bad for its battery. And no, you don’t need to turn off your device to give the battery a break. Here’s why.
For an object that barely ever leaves our palms, the smartphone can sometimes feel like an arcane piece of wizardry. And nowhere is this more pronounced than when it comes to the fickle battery, which will drop 20 percent charge quicker than you can toggle Bluetooth off, and give up the ghost entirely after a couple of years of charging.
Plastic is cheap to make and shockingly profitable. It’s everywhere. And we’re all paying the price.
Plastic, and the profusion of waste it creates, can hide in plain sight, a ubiquitous part of our lives we rarely question. But a closer examination of the situation can be shocking.
Indeed, the scale of the problem is hard to internalize. To date, humans have created around 11 billion metric tons of plastic. This amount surpasses the biomass of all animals, both terrestrial and marine, according to a 2020 study published in Nature.
Currently, about 430 million tons of plastic is produced yearly, according to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)—significantly more than the weight of all human beings combined. One-third of this total takes the form of single-use plastics, which humans interact with for seconds or minutes before discarding.
Philosophers, cognitive scientists, and engineers are grappling with what it would take for AI to become conscious.
David Chalmers was not expecting the invitation he received in September of last year. As a leading authority on consciousness, Chalmers regularly circles the world delivering talks at universities and academic meetings to rapt audiences of philosophers—the sort of people who might spend hours debating whether the world outside their own heads is real and then go blithely about the rest of their day. This latest request, though, came from a surprising source: the organizers of the Conference on Neural Information Processing Systems (NeurIPS), a yearly gathering of the brightest minds in artificial intelligence.
Boomers Daily 