America Has a Police Shortage
Many Americans have decided that their country’s problem is that it has too many police officers. In fact, it has too few.
Smiling pope returns to Vatican after cancer surgery
Pope Leo XIV's discharge on Saturday, four days after undergoing lung cancer surgery, ended a stretch of uncertainty that shook the Vatican and the world's 1.4 billion Catholics, less than two years into the Chicago-born pope's papacy.
Australia’s Boland damages South Africa in brief respite from rain
* Just 12.2 overs possible on first day of second Test * Bowler seizes his opportunity with two wickets If there is a theme to Scott Boland’s Test career, it’s making the most of limited opportunity. Finding a way into the team in 2021 when it seemed that chance had passed him by, remaining fourth in line for three spots, playing at the whim of absence, yet in those moments becoming a wrecking force, causing rashes of wickets, taking first-over strikes, threatening hat-tricks and once making good. So began the second Test in Gqeberha, another match he wasn’t supposed to play, on a day that didn’t get 13 overs bowled, yet there he was. Making the score 20 for two. Squeezing into the game through the tiniest gap, like Eugene Tooms escaping from a cell. Continue reading...
How Do Fungi Keep the Planet Healthy?
People may think of soil as just dirt, but it is anything but inert. Beneath your feet, a vast network of mycorrhizal fungi is hard at work, trading minerals with plant roots. This trading system helps enrich the soil, and it sequesters 13 billion tons of atmospheric carbon dioxide each year roughly equivalent to one-third of the world’s fossil-fuel emissions. Scientists know that these fungi… Source ]]>
He Wants AI Benchmarking To Be a Science, Not a Dark Art
Benchmarks are the rulers of AI, in both senses of the word. As measuring sticks, they work according to an extremely simple logic: If you want to know what an AI model can do, devise a standardized test to gauge it. But AI benchmarks can also dominate the behavior of the entire field. In 1987, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s first benchmark on automatic speech-to-text… Source ]]>
Man United show fight but familiar flaws remain in Leeds draw
Manchester United manager Michael Carrick took heart from his team's resilience in Sunday's 1-1 Premier League draw at Leeds United, but his description of the result as a "step forward" underlined how far expectations have fallen during a difficult spell for the club.
Eagles lose edge Nolan Smith to concussion
Philadelphia Eagles edge rusher Nolan Smith exited the team's home game against the Carolina Panthers with a concussion and will not return, the team announced Sunday.
Zimbabwean author Simbarashe Kundizeza denies using AI to write prize-winning story
Article in Atlantic claims The Blue Fighter was artificially generated, days after it won Caine prize for African writers The Zimbabwean writer Simbarashe Kundizeza has denied using AI to write a prize-winning short story after an article in the Atlantic said software had flagged it as almost completely AI-generated. Kundizeza’s story The Blue Fighter was announced as the winner of the prestigious Caine prize for African writers on 6 October. Five days later, The Atlantic published an article by the author and journalist Vauhini Vara titled: “Yet Another Literary prize winner Seems to Be AI.” Continue reading...
LGBTQ+ people go into hiding in Senegal as hundreds are arrested
At least 320 people detained for ‘acts against nature’ after law criminalising homosexuality toughened, HRW reports Mass arrests, forced HIV testing and barriers to legal representation are part of an escalating crackdown against LGBTQ+ people in Senegal, according to a new report. More than 320 individuals have been arrested and detained on allegations of “acts against nature” since February, according to HIV Justice Network, an organisation quoted in the Human Rights Watch (HRW) report. Among these, at least 84 were charged with “voluntary HIV transmission”, solely on the basis of their HIV status. Continue reading...
Hilarious quips and ‘100,000-volt’ energy: the hypemen (and women) redefining Afrobeats music
Style of emceeing based on high-octane, ad-libbed vocals has flourished thanks to its unique way of captivating crowds For the 2015 freshmen cohort of the history degree programme at the University of Lagos, their classmate’s first-semester presentation was so captivating that they began calling him Toby Shang, after the 16th-century Chinese dynasty he had focused on. His crowd engagement that day had been harnessed from his high school days as a ginger-man (energiser) in a three-man band and as a private tutor. By his final year at university, his viral catchphrases and infectious energy had resulted in a hit song, Shedibalabala. Today, he is one of the self-acclaimed “evangelists and pioneers” in the Afrobeats sub-genre some are now calling Afrohype or lamba. Continue reading...
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