The stars aren’t fixed and unchanging, unlike what many ancient people thought. Once in a while, a star appears where there wasn’t one before, and then it fades away in a matter of days or weeks. The earliest record of such a “guest star,” named so by ancient Chinese astronomers, is a star that suddenly appeared in skies around the world on July 4, 1054. It quickly brightened, becoming visible even during the day for the next 23 days. Astronomers in Japan, China and the Middle East observed this event, as did the Anasazi in what is now New Mexico.…
Author: admin
Read More
The £2.1 million Weardale Natural Flood Management project has seen 25 features constructed in the stunning Upper Weardale landscape to reduce flood risk for communities. The series of nature-based flood risk solutions includes storage basins, wooden leaky barriers and timber fences, all of which hold water back on the land during times of heavy rainfall. They reduce flood risk across 41 square kilometres (16 square miles) to communities including Lanehead, Wearhead, Westgate and Stanhope. The work explores reducing flood risk using natural flood management techniques to communities which have historically flooded due to water running from the surrounding hills. The…
A $2.7 billion plan to support nearly 15 million people this year is less than a third funded, resulting in huge shortfalls, which also impact local organizations at the forefront of the response. “To stop a large-scale famine from taking hold, donors must urgently scale up their financial support while using diplomatic means to push for opening up of humanitarian access,” said Clementine Nkweta-Salami, the UN Humanitarian Coordinator for Sudan. “If not, we will see an even more catastrophic situation unfold,” she warned. ‘Man-made crisis’ The appeal came a day after global food security experts declared that after 15 months…
On behalf of the United States of America, I extend heartfelt congratulations to the people of Switzerland as you celebrate your National Day today. The United States and Switzerland share a profound commitment to advancing human rights, promoting democratic values, achieving global health goals, and ensuring peace and security worldwide. Our robust partnership is built on a foundation of mutual respect and cooperation in various domains, including trade and economic growth, technological and scientific innovation, cyber defense, and climate action. We commend Switzerland’s role in international diplomacy, including your support for the people of Ukraine in the face of Russian…
CAPTCHAs are those now ubiquitous challenges you encounter to prove that you’re a human and not a bot when you go to log in to many websites. Websites and mobile apps have long been attacked by bots on a massive scale. Those malicious bots are programmed to automatically consume a large amount of computing resources, post spam messages, collect data from websites and even register and perform user authentication. This state of affairs led to the introduction of CAPTCHA, which stands for Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart. As a computer scientist, I see CAPTCHAs…
Language enables people to transmit thoughts to each other because each person’s brain responds similarly to the meaning of words. In our newly published research, my colleagues and I developed a framework to model the brain activity of speakers as they engaged in face-to-face conversations. We recorded the electrical activity of two people’s brains as they engaged in unscripted conversations. Previous research has shown that when two people converse, their brain activity becomes coupled, or aligned, and that the degree of neural coupling is associated with better understanding of the speaker’s message. A neural code refers to particular patterns of…
Dublin-based bank Allied Irish Banks (AIB) has announced a significant 31% rise in its pre-tax profit, reaching almost €1.3 billion (£1.1 billion) for the first half of 2024. According to BBC News, this notable increase comes amid the robust performance of the Irish economy and solid domestic growth in the previous year. Despite the overall positive financial results, AIB’s UK operations saw a decline in profit by 17%, dropping from £107 million to £89 million. The reduction was attributed to increased costs associated with bad loans. Colin Hunt, AIB’s chief executive, emphasised the bank’s strong performance and future prospects, noting…
As part of the exchange, Poland did release Pavel Rubtsov — also known as Pablo Gonzales, a Spanish-Russian journalist. He had been arrested in February 2022 near the border with Ukraine and was accused of being a Russian intelligence agent. Mariusz Kamiński, the former coordinator of special services under the past PiS administration, wrote on X that Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government “gave away their most valuable agent to the Russians without getting anything in return.” Whether Poland received any direct quid pro quo is unclear; however, the U.S. is one of Poland’s closest political and military allies. In Germany, human rights…
In the world of artificial intelligence (AI), a battle is underway. On one side are companies that believe in keeping the datasets and algorithms behind their advanced software private and confidential. On the other are companies that believe in allowing the public to see what’s under the hood of their sophisticated AI models. Think of this as the battle between open- and closed-source AI. In recent weeks, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, took up the fight for open-source AI in a big way by releasing a new collection of large AI models. These include a model named Llama 3.1…
Prime Minister Keir Starmer met with local leaders in Southport today to confirm a package of support for the local community, following the appalling killings and violent disorder that rocked the area earlier this week. The package will equip local leaders and agencies so that the right support is in place for victims, ensure the needs of bereaved families are at the heart of the response, and drive longer term efforts to bring the community together. During his visit to Southport the prime minister took part in a meeting with Metro Mayor Steve Rotheram, Chief Constable Serena Kennedy and other…