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Why did Ron DeSantis take over Disney World’s special district?
Florida’s Governor Ron DeSantis signed a bill on the doorstep of Disney World that will give him new power over the entertainment giant and will punish them for speaking out against Republican Party. It allows the governor to replace the Reedy Creek Improvement District’s existing board, mostly people with ties to Disney with a five-member…
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A mother and daughter are working to find new worlds
Natasha Batalha, who collaborated with her daughter Natalie Batalha on the observations of WASP-39a, a hot exoplanet with aSaturn-like mass, said she wanted to work for an organisation that made space programs. But she got an internship studying the atmosphere of Gliese 1214b, an exoplanet orbiting a star 48 light years (14.7 parsecs) from Earth.
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The win by ‘everything Everywhere All at Once’ was a first for the awards
Yeoh won an award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, becoming the first Asian woman to win in that category. This was her second Golden Globe award for her role in ‘Everything Everywhere All At Once’. Jamie Lee Curtis and Ke Huy Quan also…
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Scott Adams, creator of the comic strip “Dilbert”, lashed out at minorities in the strip
Comedian-actor Adam Adams, known for his comic strip “Dilbert”, was criticised for his remarks on Black Americans and said that he’d be backing off from being a helpful Black person. In a YouTube clip, Adams said, “White people should get the hell away from them. It makes no sense to help Black Americans if you’re…
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Publishers of sci-fi are bracing for an artificial intelligence battle
Clarkesworld Editor-in-Chief, James Yeatts, has said the magazine received over 700 submissions written by humans and 500 machine-generated stories. “In February alone, we received 700 submissions written by humans…and 500 machine-generated stories,” he added. Clarkesworld is working with the FFO team to train staff readers to look for certain story elements as they’re taking a…
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It is possible to turn yourbackyard into a biodiversity hot spot
A study of bee diversity in US’ Saint Louis has found that the city has the most bee-diverse city anywhere in the world. Ed Spevak, director of the Saint Louis Zoo’s WildCare Institute Center for Native Pollinator Conservation, said, “We are the most bee-diverse city of any city anywhere in the world so far that’s…
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The second phase of the COVID origin’s investigation has been abandoned by WHO
US House foreign affairs committee Chairman Mike McCaul said he was “pleased” that the Department of Energy “has finally reached the same conclusion” that he had earlier come to. McCaul had released a report in 2016 that found evidence that COVID-19 was caused by a leak from a laboratory in China’s Wuhan. “A lot of…
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There’s a cautionary sign after inflation eases in January
The US Federal Reserve has raised interest rates for the sixth straight time this year after it increased them by one-quarter of a percentage point to a range of 2.75%-3.0%. The latest increase brings the Fed’s three-hike cycle to four, which is the longest since the 1990s. The US central bank also said it expects…
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The documents raise questions about the suspension of the ecologist
University of California, Los Angeles professor Priyanga Amarasekare, who was removed from her position last year, has said she’s “devastated” to be dropped. Amarasekare said, “This has been a deeply personal and painful experience for me…I don’t have the answer.” Amarasekare was accused of breaching the faculty code of conduct after she criticised her colleagues…
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Elizabeth Banks directed ‘Cocaine Bear’
Actor Ray Liotta, who played the role of a drug dealer in ‘Cocaine Bear’, will be next seen in ‘M3GAN’, a computer-animated film based on a story by author Kristen Roupenian. The movie is based on the real-life incident of a drug dealer who lost a shipment of cocaine in Georgia, US. ‘M3GAN’ is scheduled…
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A treasury official stated that US monitoring and countervailingRussian intelligence services as part of the sanctions cracking
The US on Friday imposed sanctions on Russian and third-country actors that are “supporting Russia’s war effort” in Ukraine. It targeted over 200 individuals and entities, including both Russian and third- country actors across Europe, Asia, and the Middle East. It also imposed sanctions on companies tied to Russia’s aerospace, technology and electronics sectors.
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China’s chief diplomat calls conflict a “warfare” and says it will propose a peace plan
US State Department Deputy Secretary Anthony Blinken has said the US has “seen Chinese companies providing non-lethal support to…Russia for use in the Ukraine”, adding that the US would put some restrictions on Chinese companies involved in evading sanctions related to the conflict. The US has recently seen disturbing trends in China’s support for Russia’s…
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The deaths of 4 University of Idaho students are being investigated by police
Four college students were shot dead in the US state of Idaho last month. The victims were found inside a house in Moscow, a city near the University of Idaho. The police have said they believe the man who committed all four murders is Timothy Kohberger, a student at the university.
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The S23 Ultra has a camera that is worth its high price
The Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra is the world’s first smartphone to feature an “ultra-wide” camera, with the ability to take pictures up to 10 times faster than a ‘normal’ camera, The Verge wrote. It features a 13MP camera with a wider field of view, along with Optical image stabilisation and an SD card slot for…
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Biden administration was divided over the path for Ukraine as Milley advocated diplomacy
China said that it’s “firmly opposed” to US President Joe Biden’s meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Bali. The Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said, “We believe that the US’ policy on Taiwan and its ‘One China’ policy has not changed despite the meeting between Biden and China’s…
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7 voices reflect on one year of Putin’s war
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s energy war “is a signal to Russia, not Ukraine, but to the world and to Russia”, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said. “The things we held dear, like…memory of the Second World War, for instance, became completely compromised,” Clinton added. “I think around now, what Putin is considering is how…
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Discrimination and racism were not uncommon for black Americans in WWII
During World War II, Black Americans were treated differently in the US military than they were at home, and they experienced “intense racism” in both the military and at home, a woman who served during the first Black American war has said. “They (black Americans) organised the fight for civil rights,” Ella Baker said. The…
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After Biden offered more support for Zelensky, the Kremlin warned of a long war
Ukrainian forces on Sunday hunted Russian stragglers in the key city of Lyman, which was taken back from Russia after its demoralised troops fled with “empty eyes”, Russian newspaper Komsomolskaya Gazeta reported. Despite Russia’s baseless claim it had annexed the region surrounding the city, Ukrainian forces fled with “empty eyes”, the report added.
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Alex Murdaugh’s wife was worried about his finances and truthfulness before she was murdered
Alex Murdaugh, the millionaire accused of killing his wife and son in a boating accident, told his son that he wanted to settle the case with his law firm by end of 2021, a lawyer said. Murdaugh also asked his son to rewrite the check and make it out to the law firm, the lawyer…
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Daily briefing about how artificial intelligence might change mathematics
Nearly 60,000 Ukrainian researchers fled Ukraine during the first half of World War II, according to an estimate by the National Scientific Academy of Ukraine. The academy has been supporting scientists who have left the country, it added. Some scientists said that they did not want to continue working at the Large Hadron Collider (LHR)…
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Is it possible that Russian assets can be used to rebuild Ukraine?
Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu has said that the reasons for the ongoing war in Ukraine are because the country has historically been part of Russia, even though it had gained independence from the Soviet Union more than 30 years ago. He added that Russia was defending itself against “neo-Nazi” government in Ukraine just as…
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Biden learns from the Cuban Missile Crisis in dealing with Putin
Russia has carried out a test of an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) that appears to have failed around the time US President Joe Biden was in Ukraine on Monday, media reports said. The test of the Satan II missile, which could deliver multiple nuclear warheads, seems to have failed, officials said. Biden was in the…
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The final sample of Mars dirt was dropped by NASA’s Perseverance rover
NASA’s Perseverance Rover has dropped the last of 10 sample tubes on the surface of Mars, thereby completing humankind’s “first sample depot on another world”. Six weeks ago, Perseverance deposited titanium tubes filled with samples of rock and dust on Mars, to be sent to Earth for further study. The depot will include crater floor…
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A skinny robot is documenting the rapid erosion of anAntarctic glacier
Researchers said it’s hard to tell if the West Antarctic Glacier is falling. The grounding-line retreat is driven by warm ocean water melting the underside of the ice. “Thwaites is a…changing system, much more rapidly changing than when we started this work five years ago and even since we were in the field three years…
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A video that could undermine Alex Murdaugh’s claim of not being at the scene of the killings is about to be played in court, a source says
Alex Murdaugh, the former US lawyer who is accused of killing his wife and son in 2021, confronted his former law firm CEO about missing funds the morning of the killings, Jeanne Seckinger, the firm’s CFO, testified at Murdaugh’s double murder trial on Thursday. Seckinger added that legal fees shouldn’t have been made payable to…