How Your Phone Can Help You Set Better Habits

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How Your Phone Can Help You Set Better Habits We often blame tech for our worst habits, like distraction or bad spelling. But our phones, computers and gadgets can just as easily help us build good habits — if we understand how habits work and the right technology to use. It can even help us break bad habits if we use our devices to create new ones to replace those we want to eliminate. As Charles Duhigg points out in The Power of Habit, a habit “loop” is made up of three pieces: the cue or trigger (whatever prompts you to engage in your habit), the routine (the habit itself), and the reward (the payoff that rewards and reinforces your habit.) You can use your devices — along with the apps they offer — to help you with each of these components. Continued here

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New year resolutions: why your brain isn't wired to stick to them - and what to do instead New year, new resolutions. It is that time once again. A recent survey shows that almost 58% of the UK population intended to make a new year’s resolution in 2023, which is approximately 30 million adults. More than a quarter of these resolutions will be about making more money, personal improvement and losing weight. But will we succeed? Sadly, a survey of over 800 million activities by the app Strava, which tracks people’s physical exercise, predicts most of these resolutions will be abandoned by January 19. Continued here

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How to Recover from a Toxic Job You made the brave decision to say goodbye to a toxic workplace. Now you deserve to reclaim your confidence and leave the baggage of a negative environment behind you. In this article, the author offers strategies to help you heal, forge ahead, and be successful in your new role: 1) find closure, 2) take control of what you can, 3) plan for triggers and, 4) savor the positive moments. With patience and self-compassion, you can rise above and become more resilient than ever before. Continued here

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How philosophy can help mothers avoid judgment, guilt and shame Parenting is tough: the lack of sleep, the baby that cries for hours for no reason, the toddler that has a tantrum for all too many reasons. But being a mother is often especially hard. This isn’t just because mothers often do the lion’s share of hands-on child raising. It is because motherhood can come with an additional layer of judgment, guilt and shame. Continued here

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How to Get People to Actually Participate in Virtual Meetings One of the most challenging aspects of a virtual meeting is keeping people’s attention. It’s important to be thoughtful about how you engage attendees. In the first minute of your meeting, help participants experience the problem you want them to solve by sharing statistics, anecdotes, or analogies that dramatize the issue. Then emphasize shared responsibility for solving it. Define a highly structured and brief task they can tackle in small groups of two or three people and give them a medium with which to communicate with one another (video conference, Slack channel, messaging platform, audio breakouts).  Then have the groups report out. Never go longer than 5-10 minutes without giving the group another problem to solve. The key is to sustain a continual expectation of meaningful involvement so participants don’t retreat into an observer role. When that happens, you’ll have to work hard to bring them back. Continued here

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Strategic Management for Competitive Advantage Within our increasingly complex economic system, ways must be found to retain the vigor of simple company structures in diverse, multinational organizations. These authors describe successive phases of corporate planning and conclude that the final one — strategic management — can help revitalize complex enterprises. Continued here

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How to Succeed Quickly in a New Role A role transition, whether it’s a promotion, a move to a new organization, or a fresh challenge in an existing job, can be a huge boost to one’s career. But in today’s hyper-collaborative and dynamic workplaces, successful moves aren’t as easy as they once were, even for the most qualified, hardworking people. After analyzing employee relationships and communication patterns across more than 100 diverse companies, and interviewing 160 executives in 20 of them, the authors discovered an overlooked prerequisite for transition success: the effective use of internal networks. That involves five practices: surging rapidly into a broad network by asking a lot of questions and discovering boundary-spanning, innovative people across the organization; generating pull by understanding, energizing, and adjusting to new connections; identifying how to add value, where one falls short, and which people in the broad network can help fill any gaps; creating scale by using the network to engage other key opinion leaders, expand the scope and impact of one’s projects, and more efficiently deliver outsize results; and shaping the network for maximum thriving by making connections that enhance one’s workplace experience. Continued here

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Deforestation: proposed EU import ban may fail to protect Most European consumers’ shopping baskets tend to include items linked to deforestation in tropical regions, involving agricultural commodities such as beef, soybeans, palm oil, cocoa, rubber, coffee, timber and paper. These so-called “forest-risk” commodities are used in thousands of consumer goods ranging from hamburgers to chocolate bars. Yet this may be about to change. In December, the EU provisionally agreed on a new regulation to ensure that supply chains are free from processes and products that cause deforestation. The regulation, which is expected to come into force in mid-2023, states that companies will be unable to sell products in the EU that were produced on land cleared after 2020. Companies must prove that their products are produced legally. Continued here

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4 Things High Achievers Do Differently We’ve all heard the saying, “Do what you love, and you’ll never work a day in your life.” Yet a recent Gallup study shows that many people are, in fact, not loving their work and are miserable in their jobs, with only 21% of employees engaged at work and 33% thriving in their overall well-being globally. Individually and as a society, we seem to have lost our hope for the future. People want to succeed, but the path to achievement is murky. No one wakes up aiming to be average, but all the messages we receive, consciously and unconsciously, appear to push us to that undistinguishable level. Continued here

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China's COVID situation is dire - but it shouldn't pose a big risk to other countries China is currently in the midst of a severe wave of COVID infections and deaths. We don’t know exactly how bad it is because of significant gaps in official reporting, but by all indications, things are dire. News reports suggest hospitals and mortuaries are overflowing. Despite the popular perception that the current wave of infections is a direct result of the country lifting its zero COVID policy in early December, this isn’t quite true. Cases were already rising in China before restrictions were eased. Continued here

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These home products with near-perfect Amazon reviews are so genius, they should cost 5x more than they do If you’ve been needing (or just wanting) to upgrade some items around your house, now is the time to go for it. People on Amazon cannot stop raving about how much they love the items compiled on this list. In fact, these goods regularly receive such high praise that they all boast nearly perfect ratings from reviewers. That’s saying a lot when it comes to a site that gives you access to just about everything you could possibly be in the market for, all in one place. You won’t have to deal with shifting sheets while you’re sleeping thanks to these nifty bed sheet suspenders. The straps are made from a polyester blend that gives them flexibility and makes them durable. The clips on the end that attach to your sheets are nickel plated to protect the integrity of the fabric of your bedding. Continued here

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Climate change action could set off a copper mining boom: how Zambia can make the most of it Head of Tax for Growth, International Growth Centre, London School of Economics and Political Science At last year’s US Africa leaders summit in Washington the US signed an historic memorandum of understanding with Zambia and the Democratic Republic of Congo to develop an electric vehicle battery supply chain. Continued here

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Here's the Exact Moment When I Fell in Love With ChatGPT The new chatbot from OpenAI makes searching more conversational. It's surprisingly useful. Continued here

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If You Don't Know How to Say Someone's Name, Just Ask Learning to pronounce a colleague’s name correctly is not just a common courtesy but it’s an important effort in creating an inclusive workplace, one that emphasizes psychological safety and belonging. That’s why it’s important to get names right. When you’re unfamiliar with how to pronounce someone’s name, ask them to pronounce it — and actively listen. Once you’ve heard the correct pronunciation, thank the person and move on. Don’t spend a long time talking about how unfamiliar you are with their name. If you realize that you’ve been saying a colleague’s name wrong, apologize and ask for the correct pronunciation. Then move on. If you hear someone else mispronouncing a colleague’s name when they’re not around, step in and correct them gently. Continued here

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What if the January 6 insurrection at the US Capitol had succeeded? A graphic novel is uniquely placed to answer “Art is a powerful tool to confront the complex issues we face today,” says author and artist Gan Golan. An uncontroversial statement, perhaps, when discussing great portraits, harrowing films, or triple decker novels. But not one generally associated with comics. Yet Golan knows the powerful role that graphic novels can play in galvanising social movements better than most. Continued here

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Do Democracy and Capitalism Really Need Each Other? Democracy and capitalism coexist in many variations around the world, each continuously reshaped by the conditions and the people forming them. Increasingly, people have deep concerns about both. In a recent global survey, Pew found that, among respondents in 27 countries, 51% are dissatisfied with how democracy is working. Further, Millennials and Gen Zs are increasingly disinterested in capitalism, with only half of them viewing it positively in the United States. Continued here

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What We Can Learn from Japanese Management Businessmen in the United States and Europe know Japanese industry as an important supplier, customer, and competitor. But they should also know it as a teacher. Three important sets of ideas we can learn from Japan are described in this article. They could have a far-reaching impact on the quality of our executive decision making, corporate planning, worker productivity, and management training. Continued here

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Where is the next COVID variant, pi? A virologist explains why omicron is continuing to dominate The omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, has now been around for more than a year. Before omicron became dominant, there had been a quick succession of named variants of concern – from alpha, to beta, to gamma, to delta. But now it seems as though we’re facing a never-ending string of letter and number combinations denoting the children and grandchildren of omicron: BA.2, BA.2.75, BA.5, BQ.1, BF.7, XBB – the list goes on. So what does it take for a new variant to earn a Greek letter for a name, and are we ever going to see omicron replaced? Continued here

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If Mars had life, it may not have needed oxygen to survive — study Earth’s oxygen-rich atmosphere does more than provide the foundation for complex life. The oxygen in the atmosphere is so reactive that it readily combines with other chemical elements. Together, they form important ores like iron oxides and manganese oxides found in the Earth’s crust. So, when rovers spotted manganese oxides on Mars, scientists interpreted them as clues to Mars’ earlier atmosphere: it must have contained oxygen. Both Gale Crater and Endeavour Crater contain manganese oxides. We know this thanks to MSL Curiosity (Gale Crater) and the Opportunity Rover (Endeavour Crater.) The discovery suggested that Mars at one time had not only oxygen in its atmosphere but also surface water. Continued here

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Steve Jobs, Tim Cook, Jeff Bezos, and Warren Buffett Confronted This Brutal Truth. How About Elon Musk? "No one gets out of here alive." Continued here

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Delta’s Partnership With Starbucks Is Such a Hit It Generated 1 Million New SkyMiles Members in 16 Days The airline's membership program is about more than earning miles. Continued here

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You need to watch the most surreal sci-fi apocalypse on Netflix ASAP Ever since movies became a popular form of entertainment, certain beloved books have been considered “unadaptable” by fans and critics. Hollywood has nonetheless tried its hand at bringing some of those books to life, and while many attempts failed miserably, others — like Denis Villeneuve's awe-inspiring 2021 Dune — managed to pull off the seemingly impossible. In 2022, writer-director Noah Baumbach attempted a similar feat with White Noise, a Netflix original that couldn’t be any more different from his previous film, 2019’s Marriage Story. Based on the 1985 National Book Award-winning novel by Don DeLillo, White Noise is not only a surrealist sci-fi flick but also the biggest, weirdest movie Baumbach has made. Continued here

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Viking DNA study finds they were more genetically diverse than modern Scandinavians The Viking Age brought surprising genetic diversity to northern Europe, but it didn’t last. Modern humans like to think a lot of themselves — take globalization, for example. Modern folks would be forgiven for believing that with the ease of travel and the historical migration of peoples across the world, most populations have a more diverse genetic record than they did in their supposedly more isolated past. But a new study that traces Viking DNA through to modern Scandinavia suggests otherwise. Continued here

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Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time As the demands of the workplace keep rising, many people respond by putting in ever longer hours, which inevitably leads to burnout that costs both the organization and the employee. Meanwhile, people take for granted what fuels their capacity to work—their energy. Increasing that capacity is the best way to get more done faster and better. Continued here

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Look: Incredible images reveal winter on Mars as seen from space While Mars does not experience snowfall the same way Earth does, seasonal change results in some very interesting phenomena. It’s winter here on Earth for those living in the Northern Hemisphere. This means snow, rain, colder temperatures, and all the other things we associate with “the festive season.” Much the same is true for Mars (aka “Earth’s Twin”), which is also experiencing winter in its Northern Hemisphere right now. This means colder temperatures, especially around the polar regions where it can get as low as -123 °C (-190 °F), as well as ice, snow, frost, and the expansion of the polar ice caps — which are composed of both water ice and frozen carbon dioxide (“dry ice”). Continued here

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Nuclear energy could help astronauts survive 336-hour-long lunar nights With the help of international and commercial partners, NASA is sending astronauts back to the Moon for the first time in over 50 years. In addition to sending crewed missions to the lunar surface, the long-term objective of the Artemis Program is to create the necessary infrastructure for a program of “sustained lunar exploration and development.” But unlike the Apollo missions that sent astronauts to the equatorial region of the Moon, the Artemis Program will send astronauts to the Moon’s South Pole-Aitken Basin, culminating in the creation of a habitat (the Artemis Basecamp). Continued here

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Extremely clever things on Amazon reviewers use multiple times a day — & you'll wish you knew about sooner When it comes to daily routines, most of us don’t spend tons of time thinking about changing them. As we go through the day, we touch the same items and use the same bathroom fixtures, kitchen cabinets, and underwear drawers we used yesterday and the day before. So when something radically improves one of those high-touch areas of life, it can have an outsized effect on time management, frustration level, and mood. That’s the idea behind these extremely clever things on Amazon that reviewers use multiple times a day. You'll wish you knew about them sooner. Whatever your particular system is, chances are there’s a clever thing here that will make it better. Continued here

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Kevin McCarthy’s Hollow Victory Will Have Economic and Political Consequences Early Saturday morning, amid scenes redolent of the nineteenth century, when brawls occasionally broke out on the floor of the House of Representatives, Kevin McCarthy was elected Speaker of the 118th Congress. After it was all over—after McCarthy had angrily confronted the holdout Matt Gaetz in full view of the C-SPAN cameras; after a fellow-congressman had to grab the McCarthy ally Mike Rogers, of Alabama, around the throat to keep him from lunging at Gaetz; after enough of the holdouts had finally agreed to end this four-day political debacle in a fifteenth ballot—after all that, the best the fifty-seven-year-old Californian could manage, when his Democratic opponent Hakeem Jeffries finally handed him the wooden gavel, was a lame wisecrack, followed by a telling admission. "That was easy, huh?" McCarthy said. "I never thought we'd get up here." Be careful what you wish for. Perhaps the most revealing image of the ugly night came shortly after the final ballot had been completed. As McCarthy sat waiting for the official tally, Marjorie Taylor Greene, the far-right election denier and conspiracy theorist who represents Georgia's Fourteenth District, crouched down beside him to take a cheek-to-cheek picture with the soon-to-be Speaker. In February, 2021, eleven House Republicans voted with the Democrats to strip Greene of her committee assignments. McCarthy wasn't among them, but he did issue a statement "unequivocally" condemning some of her incendiary statements, which included endorsing political violence against Democrats and suggesting that some school shootings had been staged. After McCarthy's tortuous elevation, things are very different. In return for backing McCarthy, Greene will likely receive new committee assignments and be treated, by Party leaders, as an important ally, despite the fact that just last month she said the January 6th insurrection would have succeeded if she and Steve Bannon had been in charge of it. Based on his own self-serving modus operandi, McCarthy doesn't have much choice but to comply; if he is to get anything done over the next two years, he will need to retain the support of Greene and many other far-right extremists. Continued here

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The 14 Best Gadgets From CES 2023 You Can Buy Right Now a new year means new gadgets. And thanks to CES 2023, we've seen a ton of innovative tech this past week. While many products announced at CES won't be available till later this year, a fair number are already for sale—which could help tide you over until then. If your wallet has recovered from the holidays, check out these CES devices available for purchase or preorder. Special offer for Gear readers: Get a 1-year subscription to WIRED for $5 ($25 off). This includes unlimited access to WIRED.com and our print magazine (if you'd like). Subscriptions help fund the work we do every day. Continued here

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Science News Briefs from around the World: January 2023 Synchronizing chimpanzees in Zambia, a plankton-trapping ecosystem in the Maldives, Neandertal teeth from Spain, and much more in this month’s Quick Hits Narwhals seem to be migrating later every year as ice-coverage patterns change in Arctic waters. The unicornlike whales were thought to be particularly vulnerable to climate change because of their 100-year life spans and slow evolution, so this behavioral shift bodes well for their adaptability. Continued here

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Stop Protecting "Good Guys" Rates of sexual harassment in medicine outpace all other science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and medicine (STEMM) fields. When women speak up about sexism or sexual harassment in these workplaces, they’re often met with the “good guy” defense: “He didn’t mean anything by it. He’s a good guy.” This response minimizes, excuses, or deflects the sexist or harassing behavior of a man by appealing to the utility of this commonly used phrase. In calling someone a “good guy” as an explain-away defense, men and medical institutions are offering an endorsement of the offender’s moral character, suggesting his innocence, and signaling an allegiance to him. But the “good guy” defense serves two salient functions: to gaslight women and to enable the offender. Continued here

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Present Your Data Like a Pro While a good presentation has data, data alone doesn’t guarantee a good presentation. It’s all about how that data is presented. The quickest way to confuse your audience is by sharing too many details at once. The only data points you should share are those that significantly support your point — and ideally, one point per chart. To avoid the debacle of sheepishly translating hard-to-see numbers and labels, rehearse your presentation with colleagues sitting as far away as the actual audience would. While you’ve been working with the same chart for weeks or months, your audience will be exposed to it for mere seconds. Give them the best chance of comprehending your data by using simple, clear, and complete language to identify X and Y axes, pie pieces, bars, and other diagrammatic elements. Try to avoid abbreviations that aren’t obvious, and don’t assume labeled components on one slide will be remembered on subsequent slides. Every valuable chart or pie graph has an “Aha!” zone — a number or range of data that reveals something crucial to your point. Make sure you visually highlight the “Aha!” zone, reinforcing the moment by explaining it to your audience. Continued here

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4 ways Netanyahu's new far-right government threatens Israeli democracy Democracy is not just about holding elections. It is a set of institutions, ideas and practices that allow citizens a continuous, decisive voice in shaping their government and its policies. The new Israeli government, headed by Benjamin Netanyahu and sworn in on Dec. 29, 2022, is a coalition of the most extreme right-wing and religious parties in the history of the state. This government presents a major threat to Israeli democracy, and it does so on multiple fronts. Continued here

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Janelle Monáe Peels the Onion One evening in December, Janelle Monáe materialized at the Grand Salon of the Baccarat Hotel, in midtown, looking like a creature from another dimension. Enveloped in a faux-coyote-fur armchair, she wore a houndstooth top hat over her dyed-blond hair, a tweed black-and-white skirt with a matching tie, and platform saddle shoes—Catholic schoolgirl meets "A Clockwork Orange." The outfit, she told me in a soft, Kansas-accented voice, was by Thom Browne, one of her favorite designers, and it captured both "the structure of a uniform" and the "whimsy of who I am." So who is Janelle Monáe? Since she emerged on the music scene, she's been less a pop star than a world-builder, refracting herself through sci-fi and Afrofuturist imagery. Her first EP, "Metropolis: The Chase Suite," from 2007, drew on Fritz Lang's German Expressionist classic and cast Monáe as her android alter ego, Cindi Mayweather. With her tuxedos and protruding pompadours, she was a glam retro-futurist androgyne, and her three studio albums—"The ArchAndroid" (2010), "The Electric Lady" (2013), and "Dirty Computer" (2018)—leaned into her funk-robot persona. "I'm a cyber-girl without a face, a heart, or a mind," she sang on one track. Monáe used Mayweather and other spinoff characters as metaphors for her sense of otherness, as a queer Black woman from Kansas City, Kansas. (In 2018, she came out as pansexual, and last April revealed herself to be nonbinary; she uses she/her or they/them pronouns but says that her preferred pronoun is "freeassmuthafucka.") Monaé's forty-eight-minute visual album—or "emotion picture"—for "Dirty Computer" featured her as Jane 57821, a Sapphic android in a "Blade Runner"-esque dystopia, and in 2022 she expanded the "Dirty Computer" universe into a sci-fi story collection, "The Memory Librarian." Continued here

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Here’s How Far You Need to Walk to Improve Your Health This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies for distribution to your colleagues, clients or customers visit http://www.djreprints.com. Walking 10,000 steps a day is one of those mysteriously decided good things we should all do, much like drinking eight glasses of water a day. I read it comes from a Japanese marketing campaign in the 1960s. Continued here

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Food scientist debunks a bizarre health myth about eating bananas When hungover, some people might fall back on the classic carb sandwich — a bacon-egg-n-cheese perhaps, maybe with some hot sauce and home fries on the side. Others might choose a sweeter dish to soothe the soul, like pancakes. And then some may simply try a little hair of the dog and order a bloody mary. While none or all of these breakfast options might make you feel less sorry for yourself, you may be tempted to make your parents proud and add another morning staple: Fruit. And when you need carbs and comfort in equal measure, what fruit is better than a banana? Continued here

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You need to play Nintendo’s most influential game of the decade ASAP Freedom sounds good on paper. We want to be able to do whatever we want, whether it's eating cheese or surfing the darknet. But there’s a fine line between freedom and anarchy. Especially in video games. Too little freedom can make games feel linear and constrained, but too much freedom lets players break everything. Who gets it right? Nintendo does. In 2017, Nintendo launched its latest, long-awaited installment in the Zelda franchise The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. And six years later, BotW still holds up as one of the greatest (if not THE greatest) open-world RPG ever devised. With a sequel due out in a few months, there’s never been a better time to revisit this masterpiece. Continued here

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Slow cognitive decline with flavonols, study says | CNN Eating more flavonols, antioxidants found in many vegetables, fruits, tea and wine, may slow your rate of memory loss, a new study finds. The cognitive score of people in the study who ate the most flavonols declined 0.4 units per decade more slowly than those who ate the fewest flavonols. The results held even after adjusting for other factors that can affect memory, such as age, sex and smoking, according to the study recently published in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology. Continued here

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Algorithms Need Management Training, Too The European Union is expected to finalize the Platform Work Directive, its new legislation to regulate digital labor platforms, this month. This is the first law proposed at the European Union level to explicitly regulate “algorithmic management”: the use of automated monitoring, evaluation, and decision-making systems to make or inform decisions including recruitment, hiring, assigning tasks, and termination. Aislinn Kelly-Lyth, formerly a researcher at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, University of Oxford, works at Blackstone Chambers in London.M. Six Silberman and Halefom Abraha are postdoctoral researchers at the Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, University of Oxford.Jeremias Adams-Prassl is Professor of Law at Magdalen College, University of Oxford, and the Principal Investigator of the ‘iManage’ Project on regulating algorithmic management, funded by the European Research Council (ERC). Continued here

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What Data Scientists Really Do, According to 35 Data Scientists What do data scientists do? According to interviews with more than 30 data scientists, data science is about infrastructure, testing, using machine learning for decision making, and data products. Data science is being used in numerous fields, but it’s not all about deep learning or the search for artificial general intelligence. In fact, the skills needed include communication and storytelling. But data science is becoming more specialized, and with that the skills data scientists need are evolving. In addition, ethics is becoming a bigger and bigger challenge. Continued here

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What Snow Days Mean to Adults This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning. Shortly after our writer Katherine J. Wu, “a born-and-bred Californian,” moved to Boston, she was met with an epic snowstorm—one so bad that the city ran out of places to dump the snow piles. As you can imagine, she wasn’t thrilled. But now, more than eight years later, climate change is threatening winter snow in Boston and the rest of New England, she writes: “Snow may someday cover New England’s landscape for only about six weeks a year, about half the norm of recent decades.” Continued here

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13 years ago, one steamy action game made everyone a simp I’ll say it, video games should be hornier — especially cookie-cutter AAA action games. There are only so many gruff white male protagonists I can take. Thankfully in 2010, action game experts Platinum Games thought precisely that, releasing a new title that blended campy and lusty appeal and satisfying combat to make one of the best action games of all time, Bayonetta, and spawning a now beloved franchise. It also introduced the world to everybody’s favorite dominatrix witch. And we are all better for it. Love at first sight — From its first moments, Bayonetta is a striking game. It throws players into the middle of a battle atop a falling clock tower against angels. You take control of a mysterious woman clothed in black, wearing a masquerade mask and a large hooded cloak. Continued here

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Kevin McCarthy voted Speaker of the House on 15th vote -- we had some questions about the chaotic week in Congress and got a few answers Editor’s note: This article was published prior to a 15th vote in the House of Representatives that saw Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California elected as House Speaker in the early hours of Jan. 7, 2023. It still has lots of super interesting information and analysis in it though, so please do read on. It is fair to say that the beginning of the 118th U.S. Congress has not gone entirely to plan. Continued here

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New Details Emerge About Apple's Mixed-Reality Headset If you're into virtual reality, you were probably focused on the news coming out of CES this week. There was no shortage of new augmented reality glasses and virtual reality headsets. But the biggest AR-VR news came from a company that very deliberately did not announce it at CES. More leaks emerged this week about Apple's upcoming mixed-reality headset. A report by The Information outlined a bunch of new details about the most eagerly anticipated wearable in years. According to unnamed Apple insiders working on the project, there's a bevy of features coming to the ski-goggle-shaped device. Some of them, like foveated rendering and pass-through views, are also found in competing headsets like the Meta Quest Pro and Sony's imminent PS VR2. But Apple's headset is aiming to be lighter than the Quest Pro and more maneuverable than either competitor. Continued here

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Have You Set Your New Year's Resolution Yet? Science Says To Follow These 3 Rules For a Better You in 2023 Make it actually stick this time. Continued here

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Is Dry January effective? An expert explains the problem with trendy sobriety As a substance use researcher and therapist, I’m troubled by some of the trends around Dry January. Campaigns that challenge people to abstain from alcohol for one month — often in support of a good cause — have emerged across the globe over the past decade. Dry January officially launched in 2013 with a public health campaign by British charity Alcohol Change. Continued here

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30 years ago, Jennifer Aniston made a horrible thriller — and launched an unkillable franchise “There’s loads of movies where you’re thinking: ‘Oh god, this is just… how am I going to survive this in my future?” Jennifer Aniston remarked to InStyle in 2019. “And then it’s a cult [classic] because it’s so embarrassing.” The Friends alum could have been talking about the terrible Gerard Butler rom-com The Bounty Hunter, her schmaltzfest Mother’s Day, or even Mac and Me (the McDonalds commercial masquerading as an E.T. knock-off she had an uncredited role in). She was, however, referring to the schlocky horror that has somehow spawned a further six films’ worth of shoe-shining, Irish-stereotyping madness. We’re talking, of course, about Leprechaun. Continued here

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People With High Emotional Intellgence Ask 3 Key Questions Before Apologizing to Anyone Right words + right message = righted relationships. Continued here

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A Massive New Study of 500,000 People Says This Is How Much to Sleep, According to Neuroscience What if the rule of "eight hours a day" turns out to be incorrect? Continued here

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Microsoft Is Said to Be Making a Very Bold Move. It's Google's Worst Nightmare There may finally be a compelling reason to switch to Bing. Continued here

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US Cities Are Falling Out of Love With the Parking Lot This story originally appeared in The Guardian and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration. They are gray and rectangular, and if you laid all 2 billion of them together they would cover an area roughly the size Connecticut, about 5,500 square miles. Parking lots have a monotonous ubiquity in US life, but a growing band of cities and states are now refusing to force more on people, arguing that they harm communities and inflame the climate crisis. Continued here

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Managing the New Tensions of Hybrid Work Developing corporate culture and inspiring innovation were tough three years ago, when everyone sat in adjoining cubicles all week, drinking coffee from the same pot. Now that hybrid work appears to be here to stay, with many employees dividing their working hours between home and a company location, these challenges are magnified. New research shows that managers are deeply concerned about the downsides of hybrid arrangements for two domains that are, beyond most others, inherently social: Although evidence of damage to innovation and culture remains largely anecdotal, the potential threat is real. We define hybrid work as a flexible balance, with working hours divided between a company location and elsewhere, typically a home office. Its endurance became manifest during the two years we studied market-leading global corporations that had adopted the model during the COVID-19 pandemic. All of the managers in our sample said that their companies intended to create long-term hybrid strategies or had already done so. The imperative to support hybrid working is largely workforce demand. Employees — pointing to their strong performance when they worked from home during the worst of the pandemic — are reasonably demanding greater flexibility to work where and when they want. Leaders know they have to offer flexible working arrangements to attract, retain, and motivate top talent. Continued here

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Salesforce’s CEO Faced Intense Pushback at an All-Hands Meeting. His Response Was the 1 Thing a Leader Should Never Do If you're going to get your team together, at least give them the respect of answering questions. Continued here

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4 Body Language 'Facts' Most People Believe That Are All Wrong, According to a Former FBI Agent Here's what crossed arms, mirroring, and smirking actually mean. Continued here

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How biologist and artist Ernst Haeckel defrauded and hijacked science Haeckel’s illustration (left) and a more accurate illustration from the period (right). (Credit: Internet Archive / Public domain) You’ve probably seen Ernst Haeckel’s work, without realizing it. His illustrations of radiolarians, bat faces, mosses, crustaceans, mushrooms, hummingbirds, and other specimens are breathtaking — iconic to this day. He found extraordinary success in harnessing visual media to convey and embellish his ideas to scientists and laymen alike. Continued here

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Practicing one whimsical activity may stave off brain aging — study Opinion: Interventions like social ballroom dancing are a promising, noninvasive, and cost-effective path toward staving off dementia. Social ballroom dancing can improve cognitive functions and reduce brain atrophy in older adults who are at increased risk for Alzheimer’s disease and other forms of dementia. That’s the key finding of my team’s recently published study in the Journal of Aging and Physical Activity. Continued here

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The Secret to Getting Everything Done: Don't Rush! How slowing down can improve productivity and help you grow your business faster. Continued here

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Speaker in Name Only Having at long last put down a rebellion from within his party, Kevin McCarthy is now House speaker. He finally has the gavel he’s long coveted, but the job he secured after 14 consecutive drubbings is not the one he envisioned. Last night, he suffered one more indignity to get it, perhaps the most stunning in a week’s worth of humiliations. McCarthy had to literally beg his most hated Republican foe, Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida, for the deciding vote, and a fight nearly broke out on the House floor. But after 14 failed votes, it was finally over. Continued here

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A far-out plan to build an asteroid city But what are a bunch of physicists to do when a pandemic grinds the world to a halt if not work on something “wildly theoretical,” as they put it? And there’s few things more aptly described as such than an asteroid city.  Even more wild: they’ve got an idea they think — and the math says — could work (if we are ever in a position to do it). Continued here

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M3GAN, the Killer-Robot Doll, Is Just What 2023 Needs Come January, Hollywood always undergoes a strange shift in its major releases, from awards-centric fare and festive hits to the doldrums of the post-holiday season. Studios usually regard this period as a dumping ground for low-quality genre films that seem designed to be quickly forgotten. But 2023 is different, because this year, viewers have a special new friend to help them acclimatize: a pint-size robot girl named M3GAN. She’s full of fun facts, exceptionally strong, and surprisingly fond of belting out modern pop songs at random moments, even though she’s dressed like a preppy coed. Oh, and one other thing: M3GAN, the “Model 3 Generative Android” created by the brilliant but awkward roboticist Gemma (played by Allison Williams), is a touch homicidal. That’s a problem for Gemma and her recently orphaned niece, Cady (Violet McGraw), for whom M3GAN is meant as a therapeutic gift. The violent tendencies only mean more amusement for audiences, who can kick off the year with 102 minutes of zany, self-aware horror. Yes, Gerard Johnstone’s M3GAN is pulled from January’s bucket of mostly low-budget pablum, but it’s cheeky and knowing enough to stand out from the slop. Continued here

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A new look at the strange case of the first gene-edited babies In the four years since an experiment by disgraced scientist He Jiankui resulted in the birth of the first babies with edited genes, numerous articles, books and international commissions have reflected on whether and how heritable genome editing – that is, modifying genes that will be passed on to the next generation – should proceed. They’ve reinforced an international consensus that it’s premature to proceed with heritable genome editing. Yet, concern remains that some individuals might buck that consensus and recklessly forge ahead – just as He Jiankui did. Some observers – myself included – have characterized He as a rogue. However, the new documentary “Make People Better,” directed by filmmaker Cody Sheehy, leans toward a different narrative. In its telling, He was a misguided centerpiece of a broader ecosystem that subtly and implicitly supported rapid advancement in gene editing and reproductive technologies. That same system threw He under the bus – and into prison – when it became evident that the global community strongly rejected his experiments. Continued here

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Follow the 3-second PowerPoint rule to simplify slides and create persuasive presentations. Use the billboard test to simplify presentation slides. Continued here

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What Twitter's 200 million email leak really means After reports at the end of 2022 that hackers were selling data stolen from 400 million Twitter users, researchers now say that a widely circulated trove of email addresses linked to about 200 million users is likely a refined version of the larger trove with duplicate entries removed. The social network has not yet commented on the massive exposure, but the cache of data clarifies the severity of the leak and who may be most at risk as a result of it. Continued here

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I Saw Horrific Things When I Played in the NFL When the Buffalo Bills safety Damar Hamlin collapsed on the field on Monday night, I was watching a cartoon with my 3-year-old son. When that ended, my son began playing with magnets on the floor, and I switched over to the game. Instead of football, I witnessed a frantic scene. A “routine football hit”—just like the thousands I had been involved in as a professional player—had left a 24-year-old man lying motionless on the grass, an EMT’s hands clasped above his sternum, trying to save his life. Nearly nine minutes of CPR happened on that field as Hamlin’s teammates circled him and watched. The look on their faces told the real story: They believed they were watching their brother die—something most football players never consider as a possibility. An injury? Sure, we’ve all seen plenty of them. But not a fatality. It was shocking. So, frankly, was the fact that the NFL adjourned the game. The game always goes on. Continued here

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"Jumping genes": A new model of Alzheimer's The causes of Alzheimer’s Disease are complex and mysterious. Alzheimer’s is characterized by the build-up of plaques and tangles, consisting of insoluble amyloid and tau proteins, respectively, in the brain tissue, and for decades it was widely believed that plaques are the culprit. Pharmaceutical companies have developed hundreds of drugs that remove plaques or prevent their build-up, but although many of these alleviate Alzheimer’s-like symptoms in mice, they invariably fail in human clinical trials or have only modest effects. These failures have led researchers to investigate other possible causes, including inflammation, immune system dysfunction, and metabolic dysfunction. More recently, evidence that “jumping genes” may play a role has emerged. Continued here