Snip!t channels - Alan Dix

Reading frequency is also at a historic low, with 20.5% of eight- to 18-year-olds reporting reading daily in their free time, compared with 28% last year.
The gender gap in reading enjoyment has widened, with 28.2% of boys aged eight to 18 ...

Air fryers that gather your personal data and audio speakers “stuffed with trackers” are among examples of smart devices engaged in “excessive” surveillance, according to the consumer group Which?

When Google announced it was integrating AI-generated summaries into its search engine earlier this year, it brandished a bold slogan: “Let Google do the searching for you.” It’s an appealing idea that plays on our fondness for conven...

It is a distinct language that has survived against the odds for centuries in a tiny pocket of central Sweden, where just 2,500 people speak it today. And yet, despite bearing little resemblance to Swedish, Elfdalian is considered to be onl...

A “standard-free” definition for the meter was actually proposed back in the 17th century. The Dutch mechanic, physicist, mathematician, astronomer, and inventor Christiaan Huygens suggested using a simple pendulum for this purpose. You...

UPDATE: Musk said at his rally that one had to be a petition signer to be eligible for the $1 million prize. (“So– we really want to try to get as many people as possible to sign this petition. So. I have a surprise for you [crowd chee...

Each participant was presented with a three-word starting sentence that flashed up for 300ms, followed by a second sentence that was either identical or differed by one word. Participants were asked to indicate whether the sentences matched...

The UK is being urged by Europe’s leading human rights organisation to push ahead with strategies to promote the use of Irish and Ulster Scots languages in Northern Ireland despite continued tensions over the issue.
The Council of Europe ...

Governments and private companies should contribute to a global artificial intelligence fund that will allow developing nations to benefit from advances in the technology, according to a UN report.
The fund would help provide models, comput...

Empathy is the feeling relationship in which the physician understands the patient’s plight as if the physician were the patient. The physician identifies with the patient and at the same time maintains a distance. Empathetic communicatio...

Nuclear is costly, risky and slow, Ramana says. Why then, he asks in his new book, do governments still champion it?

AI's solution to the 'cocktail party problem' used in court

Inspired by Ed Hawkins’ climate stripes, the new air quality stripes show air pollution from 1850 to today. Each year is a separate vertical bar that is coloured according to the amount of particle pollution. Air that meets World Health O...

Google's dominance in search, which a federal court recently ruled as an illegal monopoly, has positioned the company as a powerful player in the emerging AI industry.
This has led to accusations of unfair competition, especially as the AI ...

Scientists show it is possible to control a virtual car and switch on real-world kettle from inside a lucid dream

The other striking story from this year’s results is the huge and growing popularity of maths, which becomes the first A-level to exceed 100,000 entries, while 17,000 pupils took further maths, making it the subject with the biggest year-...

However, this new technology has not yet fully delivered on this productivity promise: Nearly half (47%) of employees using AI say they have no idea how to achieve the productivity gains their employers expect, and 77% say these tools have ...

A recent survey of people using GenAI tools at work found that 77% said that AI had added to their workload rather than increased their productivity in the way envisioned by their bosses.  

BBC: Pepper X: Eating world's hottest pepper was euphoric, says creator

At one point during the interview with the BBC, a PuckerButt Pepper Company employee, Tom, chimes in on the phone to talk about what it is like to work with his boss.
...

Howard's school attendance had dropped below 50% after he started intensive weekly chemotherapy in January, following his diagnosis of a rare kind of arm cancer in December.
But since then, the 12-year-old, who attends a school in Twickenha...

The Ifaluk of Micronesia consider emotions transactions between people. To them, anger is not a feeling of rage, a scowl, a pounding fist, or a loud yelling voice, all within the skin of one person, but a situation in which two people are e...

Owen Sayers, who made the FoI request, said, "the statements from Microsoft make clear that they 100% cannot comply with UK data protection law...
"They've confirmed for the first time that a guarantee of sovereignty for data at rest (which...

Young people from the wealthiest families across England are 11 times more likely to enter a university requiring high entry grades, the most academically selective, than those from the most disadvantaged.

So when anyone says too many youn...

Hancock said people who walked three to five times a week, for an average of 130 minutes a week, remained pain-free for nearly twice as long compared with those who did not receive any treatment.
Taking regular steps also improved their qua...

In 2018, a study analysed 14 million tweets over a ten-month period in 2016 and 2017. It found bots on social media were significantly involved in disseminating articles from unreliable sources. Accounts with high numbers of followers were ...

And while 23% of the UK workforce is from a working-class background, working-class people are underrepresented in every area of arts and culture. They make up 8.4% of those working in film, TV, radio and photography, while in museums, arch...

Lord Blunkett, education secretary from 1997 to 2001, added: “Sure Start was always one of those programmes that the public yearned for, but politicians rarely deliver. Namely, a long-term policy without short-term electoral gain, but tra...

So Gagne studied for a PhD, and became a therapist. She thinks her detachment was helpful. “If you are constantly projecting your own emotions into the session, they’re not going to be able to process what they’re feeling.”

“So you’re willing to take the margin of error of using artificial intelligence, risking collateral damage and civilians dying, and risking attacking by mistake, and to live with it,” they added.

Between 1840 and 1872, more than 25,000 enslaved Africans were brought on to St Helena from slaving voyages intercepted by the British Navy. About one-third died shortly after and were buried on the island in unmarked graves.