Links
How the fake Beatles conned South America - BBC Culture
link
Is this the most powerful word in the English language?
‘The’. It’s omnipresent; we can’t imagine English without it. But it’s not much to look at. It isn’t descriptive, evocative or inspiring. Technically, it’s meaningless. And yet this bland and innocuous-seeming word could be one of the most potent in the English language.
link
How gaming became a form of meditation
Outside my window the streets are quiet, the world is weird, the future uncertain. Conspiracy theorists are bombarding my social media feed, and everyone is an armchair expert on the pandemic. But for now I am okay, because I am a moose. The game called Everything has been out for a while now.
link
The ingredients for a longer life
One is a town surrounded by tropical forest and beaches popular with surfers, two are craggy islands in the turquoise waters of the Mediterranean, the fourth is at the tail of the Japanese archipelago, while the last is a small city in California whose name means “beautiful hill”.
link
Why we've been saying 'sorry' all wrong
Academics are sorry that apology research is floundering. New discoveries on apologies rarely appear because the studies are challenging to design, not unlike determining whether woodpeckers get headaches, or boiling the ocean.
link
Coronavirus: 'I run lockdown marathons in the dead of night'
Lockdown guidance on exercising for people in England will loosen on Wednesday. But Colin Johnstone is among those runners who have not allowed their strict exercise regimes to slip, even if it means going out in the middle of the night.
link
How your smart home devices can be turned against you
For billions of people around the world, life at home has taken on a new significance this year. Flats and houses have become workplaces, gyms, schools and living spaces all rolled into one by national lockdowns.
link
The myth of being 'bad' at maths
Are you a parent who dreads having to help with maths homework? In a restaurant, do you hate having to calculate the tip on a bill? Does understanding your mortgage interest payments seem like an unsurmountable task? If so, you’re definitely not alone.
link
Longer overlap for modern humans and Neanderthals
Modern humans began to edge out the Neanderthals in Europe earlier than previously thought, a new study shows. Tests on remains from a cave in northern Bulgaria suggest Homo sapiens was there as early as 46,000 years ago.
link
Why Are You Alive – Life, Energy & ATP
Get Merch designed with ❤ from https://kgs.link/shop-121 Join the Patreon Bird Army 🐧 https://kgs.link/patreon ▼▼ More infos and links are just a click away ▼▼ Sources & further reading: https://sites.google.com/view/sourceswhyareyoualive At this very second, you are on a narrow
link
Anna Jarvis: The woman who regretted creating Mother's Day
The woman responsible for the creation of Mother's Day, marked in many countries on the second Sunday in May, would have approved of the modest celebrations likely to take place this year. The commercialisation of the day horrified her - to the extent that she even campaigned to have it rescinded.
link
The day the pirates came
For Sudeep Choudhury, work on merchant ships promised adventure and a better life. But a voyage on an oil tanker in West Africa, in dangerous seas far from home, would turn the young graduate's life upside down.
link
Scientists obtain 'lucky' image of Jupiter
Astronomers have produced a remarkable new image of Jupiter, tracing the glowing regions of warmth that lurk beneath the gas giant's cloud tops.
link
VE Day: The fall of Nazi Berlin in pictures
After nearly four years of intense fighting, Soviet forces finally launched their assault on Berlin on 16 April 1945. Nazi Germany had invaded the Soviet Union in June 1941 and killed an estimated 25 million of the country's civilians and military.
link
Coronavirus: How they tried to curb Spanish flu pandemic in 1918
It is dangerous to draw too many parallels between coronavirus and the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic, that killed at least 50 million people around the world. Covid-19 is an entirely new disease, which disproportionately affects older people.
link
Virginia 'sorry' for slavery role
Virginia's General Assembly has adopted a resolution, expressing "profound regret" for the role the US state played in slavery. The resolution was passed by a 96-0 vote in the House and also unanimously backed in the 40-member Senate.
link
UN opens slavery remembrance year
The United Nations has launched its International Year to Commemorate the Struggle against Slavery. A ceremony was held in the Ghanaian port of Cape Coast, once one of the most active slave trading centres.
link
Millions 'live in modern slavery'
Some 12.3 million people are enslaved worldwide, according to a major report. The International Labour Organization says 2.4 million of them are victims of trafficking, and their labour generates profits of over $30bn.
link
Lincoln letter sets record price
A letter written by former US President Abraham Lincoln has sold for $3.4m (£1.7m) at auction in New York, setting a record for any American manuscript.
link
German boy, 11, calls police over housework
A boy of 11 called a German police emergency line to complain of "forced labour" after his mother told him to help clean the home.Police say the boy from Aachen, who has not been identified, spoke to an officer via the 110 number.They say he complained: "I have to work all day long.
link
Five arrests in 'slavery' raid at Green Acres travellers' site
Twenty-four men suspected of being held against their will have been found during a raid at a travellers' site. Four men and a woman were arrested on suspicion of committing slavery offences in the raid at Green Acres travellers' site, Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, on Sunday.
link
Cherokees eject slave descendants
Members of the Cherokee Nation of native Americans have voted to revoke tribal citizenship for descendants of black slaves the Cherokees once owned. A total of 76.6% voted to amend the tribal constitution to limit citizenship to "blood" tribe members.
link
Brazil rescues farm workers from slave-like conditions
The Brazilian authorities say they have rescued 95 farm workers who were being kept in slave-like conditions in two south-eastern states, the official Agencia Brasil reports.
link
Experts shed light on David Livingstone massacre diary
A diary written 140 years ago by Scots explorer David Livingstone can now be read for the first time after experts shed new light on the badly-faded text.Scientists used spectral imaging to recover the account of the massacre of 400 slaves, which had been written on old newspaper with makeshift ink.
link
From Knowable Magazine
As Covid-19 cases fill the world’s hospitals, among the sickest and most likely to die are those whose bodies react in a signature, catastrophic way. Immune cells flood into the lungs and attack them, when they should be protecting them. Blood vessels leak, and the blood itself clots.
link