Weird World News

July 19, 2024

Top Headlines

Want to Spot a Deepfake? Look for the Stars in Their Eyes

July 17, 2024 — In an era when the creation of artificial intelligence (AI) images is at the fingertips of the masses, the ability to detect fake pictures -- particularly deepfakes of people -- is becoming increasingly important. So what if you could tell just by ...

Ritual Sacrifice at Chichén Itzá

June 12, 2024 — Rising to power in the wake of the Classic Maya collapse, Chichen Itz was among the largest and most influential cities of the ancient Maya, but much about its political connections and ritual life remain poorly understood. Close kin relationships, ...

Some Countries Could Meet Their Total Electricity Needs from Floating Solar Panels

June 4, 2024 — Floating solar photovoltaic panels could supply all the electricity needs of some countries, new research has shown. The researchers calculated the daily electrical output for floating photovoltaics ...

Close to 1 in 2 Surveyed Say They Would Use Air Taxis in the Future

May 28, 2024 — Through a study of 1,002 participants, scientists have found that almost half (45.7 per cent) say they intend to use air taxis when they become available, with over one-third (36.2 per cent) planning to do so regularly. According to the findings, ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:19pm EDT

Small, Adsorbent 'Fins' Collect Humidity Rather Than Swim Through Water

June 26, 2024 — Clean, safe water is a limited resource and access to it depends on local bodies of water. But even dry regions have some water vapor in the air. To harvest small amounts of humidity, researchers ...

Parliamentary Members Use Simpler Language on Hot Days

June 13, 2024 — Climate change has many widespread and complicated effects on the well-being of people and the planet, and a new study has now added a surprising one to the list. After analyzing the language used in ...

Slugs and Snails Love the City, Unlike Other Animals

May 29, 2024 — Most native species avoid more urbanized areas of Los Angeles, but slugs and snails may actually prefer these environments, according to a new ...

Brain Waves Shape the Words We Hear

June 3, 2024 — The timing of our brain waves shapes which words we hear. Researchers used psychophysics, neuroimaging, and computational modeling to test whether neural timing influences perception of more or less ...

Australian Study Proves 'Humans Are Planet's Most Frightening Predator'

May 22, 2024 — A new study demonstrates that kangaroos, wallabies and other Australian marsupials fear humans far more than any other ...

Coming out to a Chatbot?

May 13, 2024 — Today, there are dozens of large language model (LLM) chatbots aimed at mental health care -- addressing everything from loneliness among seniors to anxiety and depression in teens. But the efficacy ...

AI Systems Are Already Skilled at Deceiving and Manipulating Humans

May 10, 2024 — Many artificial intelligence (AI) systems have already learned how to deceive humans, even systems that have been trained to be helpful and honest. Researchers describe the risks of deception by AI ...

'Digital Afterlife': Call for Safeguards to Prevent Unwanted 'Hauntings' by AI Chatbots of Dead Loved Ones

May 8, 2024 — Researchers lay out the need for design safety protocols that prevent the emerging 'digital afterlife industry' causing social and psychological ...

Hey Dave, I've Got an Idea for You: What's the Potential of AI-Led Workshopping?

Apr. 23, 2024 — Sure, ChatGPT can write a poem about your pet in the style of T.S Eliot, but generative artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots have a potentially more ...

Data-Driven Music: Converting Climate Measurements Into Music

Apr. 18, 2024 — A geo-environmental scientist from Japan has composed a string quartet using sonified climate data. The 6-minute-long composition -- entitled 'String Quartet No. 1 'Polar Energy Budget'-- is based on ...

Earlier Headlines

Can Consciousness Exist in a Computer Simulation?

July 19, 2024 — A new essay explores which conditions must be met for consciousness to exist. At least one of them can't be found in a ...

When There's Money to Lose, Phone Usage While Driving Drops

July 10, 2024 — Researchers discovered that feedback plus cash incentives designed with insights from behavioral science reduces phone use while ...

Time Zones and Tiredness Strongly Influence NBA Results, Study of 25,000 Matches Shows

May 1, 2024 — The body clock has a significant impact on the performance of NBA players. Data shows vastly better win ratio for home teams from the Western Time Zone Area (PDT) when playing an EDT team, compared ...

A University Lecture, With a Dash of Jumping Jacks

Apr. 24, 2024 — A university professor has found a way to help students -- and himself -- power through long lecture classes: exercise breaks. A new study showed that five-minute exercise sessions during lectures ...

Researchers Envision Sci-Fi Worlds Involving Changes to Atmospheric Water Cycle

Apr. 4, 2024 — Human activity is changing the way water flows between the Earth and atmosphere in complex ways and with likely long-lasting consequences that are hard to picture. Researchers enlisted water ...

Last Chance to Record Archaic Greek Language 'Heading for Extinction'

Apr. 2, 2024 — A new data crowdsourcing platform aims to preserve the sound of Romeyka, an endangered millennia-old variety of Greek. Experts consider the language to be a linguistic goldmine and a living bridge to ...

AI Writing, Illustration Emits Hundreds of Times Less Carbon Than Humans, Study Finds

Apr. 2, 2024 — A group of scholars calculated the amount of energy used by AI tools for the tasks of writing and illustrating and compared it to the average amount of energy humans use for the same processes. Their ...

New Technique Helps AI Tell When Humans Are Lying

Mar. 18, 2024 — Researchers have developed a new training tool to help artificial intelligence (AI) programs better account for the fact that humans don't always tell the truth when providing personal ...

Advanced Army Robots More Likely to Be Blamed for Deaths

Mar. 14, 2024 — Advanced killer robots are more likely to blamed for civilian deaths than military machines, new research has revealed. The study shows that high-tech bots will be held more responsible for ...

Sprinting 'Like a Jet' Will Produce Premier League Strikers of Tomorrow, Study Shows

Mar. 5, 2024 — Sprinting 'like a jet plane taking off' will help produce Premier League star strikers of tomorrow, new research has revealed. A new study of Tottenham Hotspur's academy has shown that ...

The West Is Best to Spot UFOs

Feb. 28, 2024 — Researchers identified environmental factors that explain why reports of Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) are more common in certain regions of the country. Most sightings occur in the American ...

Researchers Overestimate Their Own Honesty

Feb. 26, 2024 — The average researcher thinks they are better than their colleagues at following good research practice. They also think that their own research field is better than other research fields at ...

Mystery Solved: The Oldest Fossil Reptile from the Alps Is an Historical Forgery

Feb. 16, 2024 — Palaeontological analysis shows that a renowned fossil thought to show soft tissue preservation is in fact just paint. The fossil discovered in 1931 was thought to be an important specimen for ...

How Teachers Make Ethical Judgments When Using AI in the Classroom

Feb. 7, 2024 — A teacher's gender and comfort with technology factor into whether artificial intelligence is adopted in the classroom, as shown in a new ...

Research Team Breaks Down Musical Instincts With AI

Jan. 23, 2024 — A research team announced they have identified the principle by which musical instincts emerge from the human brain without special learning using an artificial neural network ...

Are Bugs Bugging Humans or the Other Way Around? Study Reveals a Few Surprises

Jan. 16, 2024 — Research has determined key factors that impact biodiversity among spiders and insects in urban areas. The response of specific groups varied significantly, surprising the researchers. The study ...

Is There a Common Link Between the Physical and Social Worlds? Two Brothers Think So

Jan. 11, 2024 — A Rutgers biophysical chemist and his brother, a political scientist on the West Coast, have joined intellectual forces, realizing a long-standing dream of co-authoring an article that bridges their ...

Artificial Intelligence Can Predict Events in People's Lives

Dec. 18, 2023 — Artificial intelligence can analyze registry data on people's residence, education, income, health and working conditions and, with high accuracy, predict life ...

Thinking About God Inspires Risk-Taking for Believers, Study Finds

Dec. 14, 2023 — Does thinking about faith make religious people more likely to take leaps? A new study says yes, finding that participants were more likely to take risks when thinking about God as a benevolent ...

Can AI Be Too Good to Use?

Dec. 12, 2023 — Much of the discussion around implementing artificial intelligence systems focuses on whether an AI application is 'trustworthy': Does it produce useful, reliable results, free of bias, ...