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Scientists Extracted DNA From Medieval Parchment—and Found a Hidden Disease
The 3,500-year history of sheeppox was written into the books—quite literally.
Sponsor spotlight: Make banks compete for your business
Banks regularly compete for new customers by offering cash bonuses, higher interest rates and other perks. By periodically reviewing your options, you may be able to earn extra money while […]
Shell Falls as Europe Revives Windfall-Tax Politics
Oil above $100 strengthens cash generation and the political case for taxing extraordinary profits.
Democrats differ over campaign funding flap - Illinois Times, the capital city's source of news, politics, arts, entertainment, culture
My associate Isabel Miller and I told subscribers earlier this month that Democrats for the Illinois House had been suddenly cut off from the Democratic Party of Illinois’ lucrative postage discount program, which can save as much as a third to a half of campaign postage costs. Afterward, an extraordinary interaction occurred between the executive […]
Apple Mac Studio (M5 Ultra) review: Huge AI and graphics power at a huge premium
At $11,299, the M5 Ultra's extra performance over the M5 Max model is only worth it for select buyers.
Roma Taking an Extended Look at Free Agent Defender
Roma could take advantage of the extra-long break to bring in a free agent and have had some contacts with Matteo Darmian as of late. He has been approached by a few smaller sides during the summer, b...
Culturally Relevant Cardiovascular Disease Prevention and Care Strategies
(Feature Impact) Driven by rising rates of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and other risk factors, cardiovascular disease has surpassed cancer as the leading cause of death among Hispanic adults in the United States. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('fixed-big-ad-top-asset'); }); Hispanic people represent nearly 1 in 5 of the U.S. population and are the nation’s largest ethnic minority group, yet many continue to face barriers to achieving heart health and accessing high-quality healthcare. A new scientific statement published in the American Heart Association’s flagship journal, “Circulation,” revealed how social, economic, cultural and environmental factors contribute to persistent disparities in cardiovascular health, calling for culturally tailored prevention strategies, equitable access to care and greater representation of Hispanic populations in cardiovascular research.“Hispanic populations in the U.S. are incredibly diverse even within their own communities with differences in genetic ancestry, language, cultural traditions and social experiences that can significantly influence cardiovascular health,” said Johanna Contreras, M.D., M.Sc., FAHA, director of the Division of Heart Failure and medical director of the Hispanic Heart Center within the Mount Sinai Health System. “Yet Hispanic people remain underrepresented overall in the research that guides prevention and treatment strategies… Without better representation and more detailed data, we risk overlooking important differences that can help us improve care and save lives.”Hispanic Cardiovascular Health by the NumbersCardiovascular risk factors – obesity (nearly 46%), type 2 diabetes (15.5%) and high blood pressure (approximately 44%) – are prevalent among Hispanic adults and often emerge at younger ages and occur more frequently among Hispanic adults compared with white adults.According to the report, only about 1 in 5 Hispanic adults achieves ideal cardiovascular health as defined by the American Heart Association’s original Life’s Simple 7 metrics. Updated analyses using the Life’s Essential 8 framework demonstrated persistent disparities for heart and brain health, as well as suboptimal dietary quality, sleep patterns and levels of physical activity.Social and Economic Barriers MatterBiology alone does not explain cardiovascular health disparities. The environments where people live, work and age, along with social and economic challenges, impact heart health. In fact, approximately 17% of Hispanics live below the federal poverty threshold, compared with 8.2% of white adults. googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('fixed-big-ad-middle-asset'); }); “Many Hispanic adults face obstacles that extend far beyond the doctor’s office,” Contreras said. “Limited health insurance coverage, language differences, food insecurity, environmental exposures and concerns related to immigration status can make it more difficult to prevent disease, manage chronic conditions and receive timely treatment.”Contreras emphasized the cultural values and practices of Hispanic people also influence how they perceive their health and healthcare options.“Family plays a central role in many Hispanic communities and can be an extraordinary source of strength, support and resilience,” Contreras said. “At the same time, family members are often called upon to translate medical information, navigate health systems and help make healthcare decisions for loved ones. Those responsibilities can shape how health information is understood and acted upon.”An Action Plan for Improving Hispanic HealthThere are practical opportunities to achieve equitable cardiovascular health and reduce disparities through community engagement, culturally responsive care, inclusive research and policies that address the underlying drivers of health.“Reducing cardiovascular disease among Hispanic populations demands action at every level,” Contreras said, “from improving access to culturally responsive care and expanding research participation to addressing the social and environmental conditions that shape health.”By addressing both medical risk factors and the social conditions that shape health, experts believe there is an important opportunity to reduce disparities and help more people live longer, healthier lives. Learn more at Heart.org.Photo courtesy of Shutterstock googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('fixed-big-ad-bottom-asset'); });
Culturally Relevant Cardiovascular Disease Prevention and Care Strategies
(Feature Impact) Driven by rising rates of obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and other risk factors, cardiovascular disease has surpassed cancer as the leading cause of death among Hispanic adults in the United States.Hispanic people represent nearly 1 in 5 of the U.S. population and are the nation’s largest ethnic minority group, yet many continue to face barriers to achieving heart health and accessing high-quality healthcare. A new scientific statement published in the American Heart Association’s flagship journal, “Circulation,” revealed how social, economic, cultural and environmental factors contribute to persistent disparities in cardiovascular health, calling for culturally tailored prevention strategies, equitable access to care and greater representation of Hispanic populations in cardiovascular research.“Hispanic populations in the U.S. are incredibly diverse even within their own communities with differences in genetic ancestry, language, cultural traditions and social experiences that can significantly influence cardiovascular health,” said Johanna Contreras, M.D., M.Sc., FAHA, director of the Division of Heart Failure and medical director of the Hispanic Heart Center within the Mount Sinai Health System. “Yet Hispanic people remain underrepresented overall in the research that guides prevention and treatment strategies… Without better representation and more detailed data, we risk overlooking important differences that can help us improve care and save lives.”Hispanic Cardiovascular Health by the NumbersCardiovascular risk factors – obesity (nearly 46%), type 2 diabetes (15.5%) and high blood pressure (approximately 44%) – are prevalent among Hispanic adults and often emerge at younger ages and occur more frequently among Hispanic adults compared with white adults.According to the report, only about 1 in 5 Hispanic adults achieves ideal cardiovascular health as defined by the American Heart Association’s original Life’s Simple 7 metrics. Updated analyses using the Life’s Essential 8 framework demonstrated persistent disparities for heart and brain health, as well as suboptimal dietary quality, sleep patterns and levels of physical activity.Social and Economic Barriers MatterBiology alone does not explain cardiovascular health disparities. The environments where people live, work and age, along with social and economic challenges, impact heart health. In fact, approximately 17% of Hispanics live below the federal poverty threshold, compared with 8.2% of white adults.#placement_976606_0_i{width:100%;max-width:550px;margin:0 auto;}var rnd = window.rnd || Math.floor(Math.random()*10e6);var pid976606 = window.pid976606 || rnd;var plc976606 = window.plc976606 || 0;var abkw = window.abkw || '';var absrc = 'https://ads.empowerlocal.co/adserve/;ID=181918;size=0x0;setID=976606;type=js;sw='+screen.width+';sh='+screen.height+';spr='+window.devicePixelRatio+';kw='+abkw+';pid='+pid976606+';place='+(plc976606++)+';rnd='+rnd+';click=CLICK_MACRO_PLACEHOLDER';var _absrc = absrc.split("type=js"); absrc = _absrc[0] + 'type=js;referrer=' + encodeURIComponent(document.location.href) + _absrc[1];document.write('');“Many Hispanic adults face obstacles that extend far beyond the doctor’s office,” Contreras said. “Limited health insurance coverage, language differences, food insecurity, environmental exposures and concerns related to immigration status can make it more difficult to prevent disease, manage chronic conditions and receive timely treatment.”Contreras emphasized the cultural values and practices of Hispanic people also influence how they perceive their health and healthcare options.“Family plays a central role in many Hispanic communities and can be an extraordinary source of strength, support and resilience,” Contreras said. “At the same time, family members are often called upon to translate medical information, navigate health systems and help make healthcare decisions for loved ones. Those responsibilities can shape how health information is understood and acted upon.”An Action Plan for Improving Hispanic HealthThere are practical opportunities to achieve equitable cardiovascular health and reduce disparities through community engagement, culturally responsive care, inclusive research and policies that address the underlying drivers of health.“Reducing cardiovascular disease among Hispanic populations demands action at every level,” Contreras said, “from improving access to culturally responsive care and expanding research participation to addressing the social and environmental conditions that shape health.”By addressing both medical risk factors and the social conditions that shape health, experts believe there is an important opportunity to reduce disparities and help more people live longer, healthier lives. Learn more at Heart.org.Photo courtesy of Shutterstock
What to stream: 'A Different World,' 'Toy Story 5' and Kenny Chesney
Disney+ is adding “Toy Story 5" to its lineup this week. The film about toys battling tech for Bonnie's attention arrives on the service on Wednesday. HBO Max is offering
Lesley-Anne Down says Burt Reynolds was obsessed with 3 things: ‘He wanted that extra… four inches or so’
The pair starred together in the 1980 heist movie “Rough Cut.”
Cap Times Idea Fest: Two stories of a seafaring heroine
Forward Theater’s Jennifer Uphoff Gray moderated a “love fest” between Tilar J. Mazzeo and Erica Berman, who both wrote about an extraordinary journey.
Why politicians should pay more attention to the polls (reprise)
Welcome to the 231st edition of The Week in Polls (TWIP), a polling newsletter that always welcomes new readers. So please don’t keep TWIP a secret; share it with your friends and colleagues: Share The Week in Polls With all the stories swirling around Reform, JL Partners and political polling, I am finally tearing myself away from talking about the regulation of polling this week - and instead re-running a previous piece reminding us why the solution to problems with polls isn’t simply to ban or ignore them. Rather, we need them to play a vital role in making our politics - and politicians - better. This is followed by summaries of the latest national voting intention polls, seat projections from MRPs and the most recent party leader ratings. Subscribers who pay for the full edition can also read ten insights from the latest polls and analyses, including: A trio of organisations and a pair of professors have been casting their eyes over the Liberal Democrats ahead of the party’s autumn conference; What impact did the summer heatwave have on views on climate change? and Which wins out between chocolate and cheese? If you are not yet a paid subscriber, you can read all ten by starting a free trial now: Get FREE 7-day trial For more polling news as it comes in ahead of next week’s edition, you can also follow The Week in Polls on Bluesky. Picking up on my doubt last week about whether or not 35% of British train travellers have tried to order a takeaway for delivery to a railway station or carriage, thank you to reader Iain, who has been in touch to say he has done just that… in India. Another quick pair of updates, this time on the controversies around Reform and polling. Politico has a further scoop - “Farage aide caught in donor sting attended Egypt retreat with JL Partners” - and Ian Dunt has written about the problems with polling too: “Seeing the response of many polling experts in the last few weeks suggests that they are nervous about what is happening and keen to mitigate against it. Seeing the response of journalists, which has been basically non-existent, suggests the precise opposite.” My usual reminder as well: please do hit reply if you’ve spotted a poll, focus group or new piece of poll-based research that you think should be in contention for coverage in a future edition. Thank you! And with that, on with the show. How politicians get public opinion wrong I have written before about the benefits that come from widespread availability of high-quality political polling. We need more polls and more good coverage of polls. However, what I’ve not dug into before is the research into how accurately politicians estimate public opinion on issues. Thankfully we have academic research to tell us. First, the bad news: We present results from a study of 866 politicians in four countries.1 Politicians were asked to estimate the percentage of public support for various policy proposals. Comparing more than 10,000 estimations with actual levels of public support, we conclude that politicians are quite inaccurate estimators of people’s preferences. They make large errors and even regularly misperceive what a majority of the voters wants. Politicians are hardly better at estimating public preferences than ordinary citizens. Walgrave, S., Jansen, A., Sevenans, J., Soontjens, K., Pilet, J.B., Brack, N., Varone, F., Helfer, L., Vliegenthart, R., van der Meer, T., Breunig, C., Bailer, S., Sheffer, L. & Loewen, P.J. (2023a), “Inaccurate Politicians: Elected Representatives’ Estimations of Public Opinion in Four Countries”, The Journal of Politics, 85(1): 209-222. The bad news is not quite as bad as that makes it sound because, when asked whether the majority of public opinion was for or against various policies, politicians picked the wrong option ‘only’ 29% of the time. However, this included getting it wrong even when public opinion is far from evenly split on an issue: They do not only get it wrong when the public is divided and hard to read (e.g., when there is a 51%:49% distribution). Seventy percent of the misplacements occur for policies with a relatively clear distribution of at least 60% (dis)agreeing citizens. Moreover, the public scored only slightly worse than politicians, picking the wrong option 2.7 out of 8 times on average, compared with 2.3 times for politicians. Turning to the other measure of accuracy (not which side is in the lead but what the percentage support is for each side), politicians on average were 18 percentage points out in their guesses. Again, this was only slightly better than the public, whose error came in at 21 percentage points.2 Further research, using the same mix of countries, gives a little more comfort about how (in)accurate perceptions are: We show that politicians have a better understanding of public opinion when they think the issue matters to voters. Further, when an issue is personally important to politicians they more accurately estimate their party supporters’ opinions. The results confirm that politicians hold more accurate perceptions of voters’ preferences when they think it is important to do so but not necessarily when the issues actually are important to voters. Butler, C., Walgrave, S., Soontjens, K. & Loewen, P.J. (2024), “Politicians are better at estimating public opinion when they think it is more salient”, Party Politics: 1–13. Even so, it’s not a good picture. The remedy for this? Politicians should spend more time reading the polls. So forward this newsletter to someone you know… Share For a more general argument against banning polls, see my 2024 piece. Is “Let Bartlet Be Bartlet” good advice or not? The latest episode of my Political Fictions podcast heads across the Atlantic for a dip into one of the political TV classics: Mark and Cory talk about a giant of American political drama for the first time this week, as they tackle The West Wing. They talk about Let Bartlet Be Bartlet, the nineteenth episode of series one. In it, Mark wonders if The West Wing is actually the epitome of the “Boris Johnson school of politics”, Cory outmanoeuvres Mark into confirming we will record a Christmas Special about Love, Actually and they debate whether the central message of this episode has been misunderstood. Cory’s email newsletter is Paperback Rioter and Mark has a family of email newsletters. Subscribe to our newsletter for some additional bonus content and to get alerted whenever a new episode comes out. Our theme tune is “Monkeys Spinning Monkeys” by Kevin MacLeod/incompetech.com and licensed under the Creative Commons: By Attribution 4.0 License. You can also listen to our episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, the web or YouTube. Elsewhere from me… [ A Lord's Eye View How to fix the problem of money in our politics Welcome to my latest update on work in the House of Lords. This time I am taking a look at how our political system is regulated, and the protections we need to keep democracy safe from becoming simply a contest to see who has the biggest bank account… Read more 5 days ago · 3 likes · 2 comments · Mark Pack ](https://lordseyeview.substack.com/p/how-to-fix-the-problem-of-money-in?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=1269283) If you spot a factual error… Borrowing an idea from Stuart Ritchie and others, if you spot a factual error in an edition of this newsletter, I will give you a free 12-month subscription to the paid-for version (or an extra 12 months on your existing one). Factual errors qualify, but grammatical errors or disagreements over interpretation do not, and my decision is final. Messages about both of those are always welcome, though. Voting intention and leadership ratings Here are the latest voting intention polls from different pollsters. It is all pretty static at the moment, with a small and consistent Labour lead in nearly all the polls. The table is also online here, along with explanations about what is included. It is updated regularly throughout the week as new polls are released. Next are the seat projections from MRPs, also sorted by fieldwork dates, listing those which are based on dedicated fieldwork (rather than models based on averages of other polls). Because such MRPs are published infrequently, some of the entries below are quite old. Finally, here is a summary of leadership ratings, with a graph from PollCheck: Detailed numbers from the latest polls are online here, and both that and the graph are updated regularly throughout the week as new data comes out. For historical figures on both voting intention and leader approval stretching back to the 1930s, including Parliamentary by-election polls, see PollBase. Catch up on the previous two editions [ ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/a-crisis-point-for-political-polling) [ A crisis point for political polling Sep 13 ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/a-crisis-point-for-political-polling) [ Read full story ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/a-crisis-point-for-political-polling) [ ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/extra-questions-about-the-polls-in) [ Extra questions about the polls in Reform’s funding scandal Sep 6 ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/extra-questions-about-the-polls-in) [ Read full story ](https://theweekinpolls.substack.com/p/extra-questions-about-the-polls-in) My privacy policy and other legal information are available here. Links to purchase books or other items are usually affiliate links which pay a commission for each sale. Quotes from social media messages are occasionally lightly edited for punctuation and clarity. If you are subscribed to other email lists of mine, please note that unsubscribing from this one will not automatically remove you from the others. If you wish to be removed from all my lists, simply reply to this email to let me know. A quintet of Lib Dem polling analyses, and 9 other polling insights you shouldn’t miss The following ten findings from the most recent polls and analyses are only for subscribers who pay for the full edition, but you can sign up for a free trial to read them straight away. Ahead of the start of Liberal Democrat conference, we have a trio of organisations and a pair of professors with pieces out about Ed Davey’s party:
As tailors disappear, this Upper Bucks shop looks to a fifth generation
With tailors disappearing, an Upper Bucks shop is set to pass to a fifth generation. That's "extraordinarily uncommon," the head of a trade association said.
Angels 6, Twins 5: Mostly Dead
The Twins made their remaining loyal contingent suffer through a blown lead and another loss in extra frames, as the Angels took the third game of the series. Walker Jenkins continued his tear, leading off the third inning with a single. This would enable Luke Keaschall to bring him home on a one-out double; Keaschall […]
Biljon has ambitions to coach at top level
ROTHERHAM director of rugby Harvey Biljon believes he’s shown he has what it takes to coach at the very top level after an extraordinary last four years has seen him win three different leagues. ■By LUKE JARMYN The former Wasps and Barbarians scrum-half has overcome both professional and personal adversity to win the Championship title […] The post Biljon has ambitions to coach at top level appeared first on The Rugby Paper .
DPAA: WORLD CLASS ENTERTAINMENT AT OUR DOORSTEP
The Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra, The Dayton Opera and The Dayton Ballet. will come together this coming weekend (Sept. 26-27) to perform West Side Story.
The Tax Rich Business Owners Skip That W-2 Workers Can’t: How S Corp Profits Escape the Medicare Surtax
A salaried nurse looks at her pay stub and sees Medicare tax coming out of every dollar she earns. It does not stop at a cap. Once her wages plus her spouse’s cross an income line, an extra ACA Medicare surcharge kicks in on top, and it also has no ceiling. There is no form […]
Sean Mannion spent extra time perfecting a minor offensive detail
Eagles OC Sean Mannion is emphasizing one of the smallest details in football, and Nick Sirianni says the work is paying off.
DNA Has a Four-Letter Alphabet. Scientists Just Expanded It to Eight
Researchers showed how a natural bacterial enzyme can accurately transcribe DNA containing four extra genetic letters. Life uses a four-letter DNA alphabet, but could its genetic machinery read a larger one? Researchers at the University of California San Diego have shown that RNA polymerase, the enzyme that copies DNA instructions into RNA, can accurately transcribe
Derek Hough Details Daughter's 1st Visit to 'DWTS' Ballroom: 'Extraordinary'
Derek Hough may have won six Dancing With the Stars trophies, but the experience pales in comparison to becoming a dad.
Three Heroes from Brewers' 6-5 Win vs. Orioles
Jackson Chourio’s home run, clutch hitting in the 10th, and a resilient bullpen fueled a gritty extra-innings victory for the Milwaukee Brewers.
Science Vs on the 49ers Substation: Anatomy of a Hatchet Job
In August, Pablo Torre Finds Out and Science Vs released an episode about my theory that electromagnetic fields from the electrical substation beside the 49ers facility may be contributing to the team’s run of soft-tissue injuries. As the originator of the theory, I was also a subject of the episode. I sat was interviewed by Wendy Zukerman and Rose Rimler of Sciene Vs. I sent them research, connected them with scientists, and spent hours digging through the City of Santa Clara’s and Silicon Valley Power’s records to help clarify critical details. Both Wendy and Rose came off as affable and professional, showing curiosity during the interviews, with Wendy going out of her way to question the “conspiracy theory” framing itself. Then they titled the episode We Solve the 49ers Viral Conspiracy Theory. I was familiar enough with their catalog that I never expected them to agree with my theory, but I did expect them to give it a fair hearing and to deliver their findings honestly. On both counts they came up short. They were not directly dishonest in anything they said, but rather in what they left out, in how what remained was cut, and in the picture painted by those two things in combination. They asked me to recorded the interview on my phone for better audio quality, and I held on to my copy for reference later. That turned out to be a fortuitous decision. Here is the raw audio of my first interview, unedited*. Only my side was recorded, so their questions aren’t on it, but you can generally infer them from the answers, and every claim I make below about what I said can be checked against my statements in this clip. (Note: Wendy had connection trouble at the beginning of the interview and was cutting in and out, which accounts for the false starts.) 0:00 -1:19:13 Audio playback is not supported on your browser. Please upgrade. Science Vs is a fun show. It is pitched at roughly a high-school understanding of science, for an audience that is skeptical, Snopes-oriented, and worried about misinformation. Take a claim circulating online, interview a supporter of the claim, interview consensus scientists, and then tell people which side of the line it lands on. I have listened to their episodes on raw milk, seed oils, 5G and other contested issues in the wellness space. I have problems with all of them, but each at least made an honest attempt to represent the actual range of scientific opinion by talking to credentialed scientists with differing perspectives. Dissenting researchers were heard from, answered, and often given a chance to respond. This episode did not do that. This article is not a relitigation of the science. I have written extensively about that already. This post is for the record. It is simply an accounting of what was wrong with their episode. Contents Is there a power plant next to the 49ers practice facility? — the clearest single example of getting something objectively wrong For the record — a high-level overview of all of the problems with their investigation Draw your own conclusions — why they had to make this episode at all What they left out about childhood leukemia — the exposure threshold, and playing games with statistics to minimize sick children What they left out about the mechanism — the body of literature they refused to cover, and evidence for the mechanism used against it The scientists Science Vs interviewed and did not air — four credential scientists who support myhe theory, recorded and cut, or not even called How they misrepresented me and my case — an answer severed from its question, and three telling edits How you would actually study the injuries — it doesn’t actually matter which team is the most injured, overall The theory: magnetic fields, oxidative stress, and collagen Since the episode never states my theory, here it is below. Those who are familiar with my work can skip this section. Electrical equipment produces magnetic fields, and those fields induce faint electrical currents in anything that passes through them, including people. My argument goes further than induced current. Mitochondria — the structures that generate a cell’s energy — run on continuous flows of electrons and protons, and those flows carry faint electromagnetic fields of their own. Maxwell’s principle of superposition shows that when two fields share the same space, they add together. An external field does not need to be strong to alter an internal field, it only needs to be present. The electron transport chain inside the mitochondria leaks a small fraction of its electrons by design, and those become reactive oxygen species — free radicals, which healthy cells use as signals. External magnetic fields cause the rate of leakage to change, increasing free radicals. When free radicals accumulate faster than the cell’s antioxidant systems can clear them, the result is oxidative stress. Oxidative stress is a recognized driver of chronic illness, including cardiovascular disease, neurodegeneration, diabetes and cancer, and it is in every medical school curriculum. One of its ordinary effects in connective tissue is that it switches on matrix metalloproteinases — MMPs, the enzymes that break collagen apart — while suppressing new collagen synthesis. Tendons are made of collagen. An athlete loading his soft tissue heavily six days a week is already creating oxidative stress in the tendons, so the addition of magnetic field exposure compounds the damage and inhibits repair, making him more susceptible to injury when enormous force lands on a tendon in a fraction of a second. That is the theory. We know that EMF causes oxidative stress, and we know that oxidative stress degrades collagen. The only thing missing is a study showing that direct connection. I have never claimed certainty that the substation is contributing to the elevated injury rate. I do believe it is likely, and I believe it warrants caution, and that a revenue machine like a major NFL team can easily afford to remove the exposure out of precaution. Is there a power plant next to the 49ers practice facility? Here is the clearest single instance of the problem with this episode. It requires no knowledge of electromagnetic fields at all. This story first came to me through Jon Feliciano, a former 49er, in an interview on Willard & Dibs on 95.7 The Game. Asked about why the 49ers are always injured, he said players used to joke that it was the power plant behind the practice fields. Wendy Zukerman corrects him on air. “It’s important to say that it’s not a power plant near the 49ers site.” Torre then asks her to explain the difference between a substation and a power plant. Her answer: a power plant generates electricity and transmits it to a substation, which converts the voltage into something your house can use and sends it on to your home or your business. There are two problems with that. The first is that there is a power plant on that site. The Gianera Generating Station is a natural-gas-fired peaker plant owned by Silicon Valley Power, and it has been there since 1986. I have published aerial photographs of the location from 1987 in which the gas plant is the only thing standing, before the practice facility was even there. I even mentioned the gas plant in my first interview. (Feliciano has since gone on record about this issue, and it is clear he had the substation in mind rather than the gas plant.) The second is that her definition describes a distribution substation, and the facility beside the 49ers is not that. It is the Northern Receiving Station, which takes in bulk power from outside the city’s grid and delivers it to distribution substations. Silicon Valley Power’s own map distinguishes receiving stations from substations, and Rose Rimler even reads the label out loud in the episode when she walks through that map on air. A few minutes before the map segment, Zukerman tells Torre: “like I said, we fact check everything.” Well, maybe not everything. I made a mistake On the morning of July 6th, at 10:20, I sent Rose and Wendy two studies. During the interview I had been asked which human studies show oxidative stress from electromagnetic fields, and I had not been able to name one on the spot. Rose emailed asking for the studies, I quickly searched for a couple, and I wrote that I thought these were the most relevant from that search. Unfortunately, I was busy and did not read either one closely at first. I picked them because they were topically relevant — one on substation workers, one on power plant workers. Neither were great studies, and their problems go past the ones raised in the episode. That was careless on my part. There is context that did not make the episode, though. Before that email I had been on a Zoom call with Rose talking about EMF and oxidative stress, and I pointed her to Dr. Henry Lai at the University of Washington, who has spent years aggregating the literature on this question. His tallies show that roughly 90% of studies since the late 1990s find oxidative effects from electromagnetic field exposure — hundreds of studies, systematically counted. Rose told me she was already aware of his work. So when she asked for studies, I understood her to have the aggregate view already and that she would report anything within that context. Not reading those two carefully was still a mistake, but the larger mistake was assuming the episode would be based on a thorough review of the actual body of literature, rather than on whatever I happened to send that morning. The second email At 1:49 that same afternoon — three hours and twenty-nine minutes after the first — I sent them a second email that I had been preparing for a while. It was a structured document in six numbered sections, written in response to a request they had made two weeks earlier, laying out my entire argument with citations attached to every link in the chain. The episode aired on August 13th, five weeks later, and not a single item from the second email is in it. Here is how it opens: The full email is included at the bottom of this post in Appendix B. Nearly 1,500 words in total. It contains two named mechanisms with the physics behind them. Occupational studies in humans. The literature on oxidative stress and collagen. A section addressing the strongest counter-evidence against my own theory, which I raised myself. And a closing section stating plainly what the theory cannot yet show. My entire argument, in writing, with detailed citations for every claim, provided to them five weeks before broadcast, and none of it made it into the episode. That is the single largest omission, but it is not an isolated one. The whole episode is riddled with similar problems, and the conclusion they came to is not merely a difference of opinion about the scientific evidence. Through omission and through strategic editing, Science Vs misinformed its audience — about what the evidence shows, about what I argued, and about who they spoke to. That is a notable outcome for a show whose stated purpose is correcting misinformation. For the record I am not going to tell you that Science Vs set out to discredit me, or that they had come to their conclusion before they reported the story, or that they used misleading editing to make me look like a man retreating from his own theory. I cannot know what was in anyone’s head, and I am not going to pretend otherwise, either. What I can tell you is what is on the record. They asked me for evidence and aired the weakest thing I sent. They interviewed three scientists who supported my theory and aired none of them. They discussed childhood leukemia without ever saying the exposure level at which it appears. And they took an answer I gave weeks before Ken Karipidis, the one EMF scientist who was put on air, was interviewed, and placed it directly after his critique, where it comes off as a major concession. A friend of mine who has worked as a journalist for thirty years read that last one and called it sleazy. I agree with her. Those are just the four issues that are impossible to defend as pure editorial decision, but they are not the only issues. The most glaring issues stem from what they left out: The exposure level at which the childhood leukemia association actually appears — three to four milligauss, a number the episode never states despite it being much lower than what I measured. The mechanism itself: The episode gets as far as “oxidative stress could weaken collagen,” which leaves it sounding like speculation, rather than a known pathway. The second email, and all the studies in it. Dr. Paul Héroux at McGill, whose work my proposed mechanism rests on, whose contact details I supplied, and who was never called. Dr. Beatrice Golomb at UC San Diego, who runs a research group on oxidative stress and mitochondrial function and has specific expdertice in collagen, interviewed and not aired. Dr. David Carpenter at Albany, the most prominent academic voice on the harm from magnetic field exposure, interviewed and not aired. Dr. Joel Moskowitz at Berkeley, interviewed and not even credited. The specific, testable condition I put in writing that would make me abandon the theory. My own unprompted statement of the theory’s evidentiary gap. My caveats about my own measurements. My ranking of EMF as one factor among several rather than the only one. The new equipment installed at those facilities between 2010 and 2014, and the sharp rise in system load from 2013 onward. But that is not all. What they kept, they selectively edited to serve a narrative that was not served by the raw transcripts of the interviews. A description of thousands of commercial routers in a workplace, reduced to the Wi-Fi in your house. My own acknowledgment, multiple times, that "I'm not a scientist" clipped in an episode that spends considerable energy pointing out that I am not a scientist. And a qualification I volunteered about my own measurements, cut from my answer and delivered later by their EMF expert as a correction. Together their edit produce a portrait of a wellness guy with Wi-Fi phobia and two bad studies, backing away from his theory the moment a “real” scientist looked at it. A practice facility where nothing changed because no new substation was built. Injuries written off as random because the 49ers were not quite the single most injured team in the league over the period in question. That portrait is false even though almost no individual statement made in the episode is. Draw your own conclusions At the top of the episode, Pablo Torre says his show had been flooded with requests to investigate the substation — that it was the thing they were asked to look into over and over again. Neither show went hunting for this story. It arrived from their own audience, in volume, and it could not be waved off. A thread I posted on X reached twenty-two million people. A guy with a gaussmeter and a brand-new Substack obligated a Pultizer prize winning program to spend an hour on a question about player health, that is considered fringe enough that most media operations won’t touch it. Pablo Torre Finds Out could not ignore it. So Science Vs came in and ran a “debunking” operation instead of an investigation. Everything below is what had to be left on the cutting room floor to deliver the “debunking”. They could not ignore it. So they tried debunked it instead. The demand was strong enough to force an episode, and since the episodes release the 49ers have sustained more injuries, including season ending ones, and interest has only grown. Demand from fans and playets is strong enough to force a better investigation from someone else. An omission is not a lie until you find out what was omitted. What follows is the detailed record so you can see the full picture. Draw your own conclusions. I have drawn mine. I am going to keep publishing. A note about Pablo Torre Finds Out After the episode aired I posted publicly, calling out Pablo Torre Finds Out for concerns I had about the integrity of their investigation, and about an interview directly with Pablo Torre which had been offered but never happened. I have since spoken with a producer at PTFO. The offer had rested on a misunderstanding about where things stood between us, and it fell away as the Science Vs part of the production widened past the science. He apologized for the miscommunication and I accepted. The producer also confirmed to me that they did essentially hand off the entire investigation to Science Vs for narrative purposes — so Pablo would be genuinely curious or potentially surprised by their findings — while still taking responsibility for what went out under their name. I appreciated the candor and the accountability, and I am comfortable with where we left things. So this post is not about PTFO. My disagreement is with Science Vs. What they left out about childhood leukemia Childhood leukemia appears at three milligauss. They gave no number at all. 1. They built an EMF ruler, then discussed childhood cancer without it. The sequence on air went like this: First I measured almost 9 mG, then I measured up to 50 milligauss. Torre reacts with concern — “that sounds high.” Cut to Karipidis: the public limit is 2,000 milligauss. Torre reacts again — “What happens at 2,000?” Karipidis explains that nothing happens at 2,000, that safety factors are built in. Then: at more than 50,000 milligauss you get flickers of light in the retina, and higher still, nerve stimulation. The listener now has a ruler (their ruler) to measure these numbers with. Fifty is nothing by their ruler. Then the episode turns to childhood leukemia and states, accurately, that there is a real association — but tellingly, they never give the exposure level at which that association appears. Childhood leukemia appears at three milligauss. They conveniently left that out. The pooled analyses that produced the World Health Organization’s carcinogen classification found roughly a doubling of childhood leukemia risk above three to four milligauss. That is the number that belongs in that segment, and it is more than ten times below the reading that had just been dismissed as trivial. I gave them that number myself, on tape, in the interview. Describing my own threshold, I said my comfort level for long-term chronic exposure is three to four milligauss, but preferably one. 2. Six children in thirteen million. The episode reports that these fields might explain one to four percent of childhood leukemias, then reframes it as a German estimate of perhaps six cases among thirteen million children. Torre, to his credit, is uncomfortable. What never gets explained is why that number is small. Almost no children lives above three milligauss in Europe. Fewer than two children in a hundred, in the Italian data. So even if the risk to those children doubles, the number of additional cases across an entire country stays small — not because the hazard is small, but because hardly anyone is exposed to it. Count the whole population and the few who are exposed disappear. And the reason hardly anyone is exposed is that siting rules keep housing away from transmission lines. In Europe, at least. The Dutch government has a standing precautionary policy against building new homes in any zone where the annual average magnetic field exceeds 4 milligauss — the same number the episode never mentioned. Denmark and Norway treat 4 milligauss as the level that triggers a look at mitigation. That is five hundred times below the ICNIRP figure quoted on air. The United States has no federal equivalent. That is evidence of infrastructure siting policy working. It is not evidence that there is no hazard. It is evidence that we already act as though there is one. If you listen to the raw audio you will hear that my proposed solution is EMF exposure is to build better infrastructure. What they left out about the mechanism 3. They accused me of cherry-picking, and then cherry-picked themselves. On air, Zukerman tells Torre that people who worry about electromagnetic fields dismiss the studies showing null results and collect the ones showing harm, and that this is why you have to be careful not to cherry-pick. They had two papers I had rattled off in a hurry, and a second email containing a carefully chosen set. They ran the two weakest, graded them on air, and presented the result as the state of the evidence for not only my theory, but the whole question of oxidative stress from magnetic fields. That is cherry-picking from my emails. The bigger picture is what they did with the literature as a whole. Zukerman acknowledges it exists, dismisses it, and disposes of it in a single stroke. You can go online right now, she tells Torre, and find scores of studies showing these fields increase oxidative stress. The issue, she says, is that they are not studies in people. Many of them are in people. The occupational studies in my second email are in people. That email had been in her inbox for five weeks. She waved off the literature on a factual claim that the documents in her possession contradict. (I have written separately about the evidentiary standard at work here). The effect was that they essentially baited me: ask the subject to supply the evidence, take the weakest thing he sends, and let that stand as a proxy for the whole argument. Wendy has been doing this show for ten years and clearly knows how to extract what she needs for her desired narrative. 4. They presented the collagen-improvement research as a gotcha, but I had already addressed it. The episode treats the existence of studies showing that EMF can improve collagen as a surprise that undercuts me, but I had pre-emptively addressed that five weeks earlier in the email they ignored. Those studies use measured, high-intensity pulsed dosing. The mechanism by which they work is oxidative signalling. The cell reads a controlled rise in reactive oxygen species as a warning, upregulates its antioxidant defenses, mounts a repair response, and the therapy stops before the system is overwhelmed. The key point is that it induces an oxidative response, which means those studies are actually evidence for my proposed mechanism, not against it. A field that produces a therapeutic effect cannot be biologically inert (which is the implication when they say “Nothing happens at 2,000 milligauss). Chronic ambient exposure is the same pathway with no off switch, and it is most consequential during the evening and while sleeping, when the body is in repair mode and the exposure does not stop. Section 5 of my email is titled What about the study showing improved collagen synthesis. I raised the counter-evidence myself, explained why I did not think it refuted the theory, and wrote that I was disappointed the question had not come up in the interview. That is worth holding against the cherry-picking charge in the item above: the studies they presented as inconvenient for me were studies I had gone out of my way to put in front of them. 5. Section 1 of my email stated a critical argument that was never put to the expert directly responsible for it. My email says the exposure limits exist to prevent acute effects and do not address chronic exposure at all, and that my dispute is with the entire framework. Zukerman gestures at this once. After Karipidis gives the 2,000 milligauss figure, she tells Torre that I would object because those levels do not capture “more subtle effects.” That is not my argument, and “subtle” is doing a lot of work here. My argument is that the limits are built to prevent acute effects — nerves firing, muscles twitching, etc — and were not designed to address chronic exposure at all. In fact, ICNIRP’s own documents state as much themselves. Mine is a structural objection to what the standard measures, reduced as a concern about subtlety, it becomes a matter of degree, rather than a categorical difference. They interviewed Ken Karipidis, vice chair of ICNIRP — the body that writes those limits. He was asked what the limit is, but he was never asked how it applies to chronic exposure. The scientists Science Vs interviewed and did not air 6. They interviewed four officials of the standards body. The episode credits roughly a dozen researchers. Four of them are associated with ICNIRP. Ken Karipidis is the vice chair. Rodney Croft chaired ICNIRP from 2020 to 2024 and led the development of its current guidelines. Dan Baaken is ICNIRP’s scientific secretary. Frank de Vocht sits on the Main Commission. One of them speaks in the episode. Their institution’s position is more than adequately represented — the 2,000 milligauss figure, the safety factors, the assurance that nothing happens below the line. 7. The four who were left out. Dr. Beatrice Golomb is Professor of Medicine at UC San Diego — a physics undergraduate degree, a PhD in biology, an MD. She directs a research group whose stated focus is the relationship between oxidative stress, mitochondrial function and health. That is the mechanism the episode spent its first half dismissing. Her published work includes the fluoroquinolone case series behind the FDA’s black box warning on an antibiotic class that ruptures tendons, where the accepted mechanism is oxidative stress and mitochondrial toxicity — the back half of my chain, already on a drug label. She is in the credits. She is not in the episode. She has told me she finds my theory biologically plausible, and that she has a recording of her interview. Dr. David Carpenter directed the Institute for Health and the Environment at the University at Albany for decades and is the most prominent academic voice arguing these fields cause harm. Childhood leukemia is the reason these fields carry a WHO classification at all, and Carpenter is the person you call if you want that case made by someone who has spent a career on it. He is in the credits. He is not in the episode. He has told me that when he was interviewed they could not have been less interested in what he had to say. Dr. Joel Moskowitz directs the Center for Family and Community Health at UC Berkeley’s School of Public Health. He told me directly that they interviewed him and that he thought it went well. He does not appear in the episode, and unlike Golomb and Carpenter, he does not even appear in the credits. Dr. Paul Héroux at McGill is the researcher whose work provides the foundation for the oxidative stress mechanism my theory rests on. I gave Rose his email address and phone number. He was never interviewed. They never even called him. 8. “He’s not a scientist.” The episode leans hard on the fact that I am not a credentialed scientist. Zukerman says it. Torre repeats it. “At all.” Having built a segment on that, they then left out the physicist-biologist-physician, the professor of public health, the director of a university environmental health institute, and the McGill researcher whose work the primary mechanism comes from. They spent the episode telling their audience I am not a scientist, and then kept four actual scientists who support the theory off because their argument does not survive otherwise. How they misrepresented me and my case 9. They played my words as a response to an interview I had never heard. Near the end of the hour, Zukerman says she went to me and told me the evidence was lacking. Then she plays me saying I am not wedded to it being an EMF, that I have staked my reputation on it needing more study, and that I am not certain of anything. That segment was placed immediately after Karipidis had finished taking the cherry-picked papers apart. It plays as a man folding under expert scrutiny. Commenters have used it against me since, but it is incorrect. Here is the sequence as it happened. I was interviewed. Karipidis was interviewed weeks later. I was never told what he said, or even who he was. I was never asked to respond to it. I did not know his name until the episode aired. That is not a simple editing decision. That is a quote from one interview, moved to follow a critique from a different interview it was not a response to, so that it would land as a concession. A friend of mine who has spent thirty years as a journalist read that sequence and called it sleazy. She is right. The full passage is reproduced in Appendix A, and it is worth reading. What airs is the preamble. Four paragraphs later I say “to directly answer your question” — and that answer, about what would change my mind if the team relocated, is not in the episode. Neither is the sentence two paragraphs on, where I say the EMF might turn out to be ten percent of the problem. I will say the underlying point again, though, because I meant it and I still do. I am not wedded to my theory that magnetic fields from the substation are contributing to the 49ers injuries. I could be wrong. What I am wedded to is the process of scientific inquiry, and the fact that we should be cautious around these exposures and we need more independently funded studies. 10. Three telling edits. They cut “I’m not a scientist” mid-sentence. What I said: “...and I am not certain of anything. I’m not a scientist. To me, I find the mechanisms compelling. I will go back to the fact that I got into this not because of the 49ers, but because of clients I was working with who suffer from EDS...” What aired: “...and that I am not certain of anything. I’m not.” The clip ends on the first two words of the sentence in which I say I am not a scientist, in an episode that spends considerable energy establishing that I am not a scientist. The full sequence is in Appendix A. They cut my own description of my work. Asked what I do, I said I run a wellness business, that I am focused on writing software to help people navigate environmental stressors, that environmental health is my focus, and that I also do independent journalism and research. What aired is the wellness business and the environmental health, with the software and the journalism removed from my own answer. The software engineering does come up later — narrated by them, as a hacker who grew up to write firmware — but my current work, in my own words, arrives as “wellness guy.” Thousands of commercial routers became home Wi-Fi. What I described: working at a wireless networking company surrounded by thousands of Wi-Fi routers, and a stress-induced health collapse afterward that working in that environment contributed to. What aired: Wi-Fi, the kind you have at home — reinforced by a clip of Christian McCaffrey talking about turning his router off at night. Three cuts, and every one of them makes me seem less credible. That is not a coincidence. 11. I gave them my own caveats and the test that would disprove me. In the first email I wrote that a well-designed chronic, ambient-level exposure study in tendon showing no collagen degradation, run over many months, would undercut my confidence in the theory. That is a specific, testable condition, stated in advance and in writing. There was a second interview, weeks later, which was not used in the episode, but in that I asked again for the falsification criterion to be included. What the episode presents instead is a man saying “we need more study,” which reads as a hedge, an open-ended request for the benefit of the doubt. It is the opposite of a hedge. Section 6 of my second email says, unprompted, that as far as I am aware there is not a single study showing EMF-driven oxidative stress degrading collagen in a human in vivo or in human tendon in a lab. I wrote that because it is true and because it is the first thing anyone should check. Under their standard it becomes the hinge of the entire first half, framed as something they had to surface without my cooperation. I had handed it to them five weeks earlier. And in the interview I said that my 25 to 50 milligauss readings were taken at knee level, and that these fields attenuate quickly, so by the time it reaches your head it is not that high anymore. That did not air either. The qualification arrives later, from Karipidis, as a correction. How you would actually study the injuries 12. They measured the wrong thing. The episode spends its final act on whether the 49ers are the most injured team in the NFL, finds no clean ranking, and lands on “injuries are random”. That is the wrong test. You would define the exposure — measured field levels at the facility — and the outcome narrowly: soft-tissue injuries, not a single MSK injury count that a broken finger and a ruptured Achilles both land in. Then you would compare the 49ers to themselves before and after the exposure changed, and compare that change against every other team over the same window. That controls for league-wide shifts in rules, turf and training load. It is a difference-in-differences design, and it is standard. I sent them that argument on July 28th, in writing, along with the fact that in eleven of the past twelve seasons the 49ers had finished top ten in Adjusted Games Lost. And by the episode’s own reporting, the 49ers are second in games lost to injury over the past decade, with FTN’s Aaron Schatz confirming that once you adjust for starters they come out second worst in the league — after having been one of the healthiest teams for years before that. A finding like that is where an investigation starts, not where it stops. 13. I did a lot of substation research for the episode that was never aired. I had reported that the substation next to the facility was expanded in 2014. That was wrong, and Rose Rimler and I sorted it out together. They gave me credit on air, which I appreciated, but framed it as a concession on my part to something they had found. In fact I had been investigating it myself, was uncertain before they asked, but was waiting for clarification from Silicon Valley Power. The uncertainty centered around a substation named “Esparanca” that was proposed right behind the facilities as part of the stadium construction, but now appears to never have been built. I spent days in Silicon Valley Power’s records, and did eventually reach Silicon Valley Power for confirmation and indentified the mistake myself. I also gave them highly detailed documents on what we do know about those facilities: new equipment installed between 2010 and 2014, and load growth across the system with an inflection around 2013–2014, with the Northern Receiving Station carrying the highest capacity in the system and sitting closest to the data center corridor. None of that is in the episode. I have a separate piece about it coming out soon. *I cut 2 seconds from the raw audio to remove personal information that had no connection to anything in the episode. Appendix A: the passage the clip was taken from This is the sequence from my first interview, in full. The episode uses one fragment of it. It’s tricky because my understanding is that there’s something like a 15-year half-life on collagen remodeling issues. They’re going to get a new crop of players. What I really need, though, is for the injuries to be broken down so we can see the soft tissue injuries. Right now, they’re categorized as MSK injuries, but let’s say we can actually identify them more specifically. Is that right? He was able to do that? Oh, cool. I wasn’t able to find that information. Interesting — I didn’t know that data existed. I tried so hard to get it, and I didn’t know it was available. Maybe you could connect me with that person. That would be amazing. I’m not wedded to it being an EMF, honestly. I’m not. I would say that, to a certain extent, I’ve staked my reputation on the fact that it needs more study. It’s important to look into it, and I am not certain of anything. I’m not a scientist. To me, I find the mechanisms compelling. I will go back to the fact that I got into this not because of the 49ers, but because of clients I was working with who suffer from EDS, Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome, a tendon hypermobility issue. This condition is documented to be partially caused by oxidative stress. I’ve worked with them to mitigate their EMF exposure and have seen people improve. I think it’s a bigger story. In a way, the 49ers represent an occupational cluster with specific exposure risks. If someone would conduct a study on this, I believe we could learn a lot. Perhaps we would discover that it’s like, okay, maybe it’s 10% of the problem. I don’t know the exact number, but I think either way, conducting the study would provide valuable insights. To directly answer your question, it’s challenging for me because it’s part of a bigger story. If the 49ers move and stop having injuries, I might conclude that it was related to the substation. However, if they move and still experience injuries, I would want to analyze the nature of those injuries. Are they primarily soft tissue injuries? I don’t think it’s necessarily a case closed, but the story might lose traction at that point regardless. Three things are worth noting. The aired fragment stops immediately before the sentence in which I say I am not a scientist — the cut described in item 10. It also stops four paragraphs before the words “to directly answer your question.” What the episode plays is the throat-clearing. The actual answer, about what would change my mind, never airs. And two paragraphs in, I say the EMF might turn out to be ten percent of the problem. That is the ranking the episode says I never gave. Appendix B: the full email, July 6th, 1:39 PM Hi Rose, You asked me to send you some studies a couple of weeks ago. I apologize for the delay. I have been incredibly busy. I also wanted to give you a chance to dig in yourself, and get your own perspective before I influenced you too much with mine. That said, I do want to make sure that the actual argument is abundantly clear, so here it is! One note before I begin, there are really two separate questions here: Does the substation cause the soft-tissue injuries? That was my specific claim, and what the podcast is about. Is the theory biologically sound? Can 50/60 Hz fields at these levels do anything biological below the safety limits? Question two is why people have been calling me a conspiracy theorist. The regulatory and advisory bodies (ICNIRP, etc) maintain that anything below their exposure limits is biologically inert, and that position is broadly accepted within the mainstream, but the actual science paints a different picture. To defend my theory I’ve had to defend a much larger claim: that the advisory bodies have the biology wrong. I can’t honestly answer question 1 without first addressing that. Here’s is a simplified outline of my theory, with links to studies: 1. Advisory body thresholds for biological effects The ELF magnetic-field limits (ICNIRP’s ~2,000 mG public / 10,000 mG occupational) exist to prevent acute effects from exposure. If a magnetic field is strong enough, it makes nerves fire and muscles contract. Muscles twitch. You can see faint flashes of light in your vision. People can even feel tingling or even a shock. That happens due to Faraday’s law, which states that a time-varying magnetic field induces an electric field inside the body via the creation of Eddy currents.The standards assume that those currents do nothing below the twitch threshold. They do not consider chronic effects at all. My argument is that they are biologically active and do have chronic effects. 2. There are multipe ELF-EMF mechanisms for inducing oxidative stress. This is basic biophysics. Below are the two primary mechanisms. Simplest first. Dr. Paul Héroux of McGill has the most intuitive explanation, which rests on Maxwell’s principle of superposition: because Maxwell’s equations are linear, two sets of electromagnetic waves sharing the same space simply add together. In the interview I pictured a pebble dropped into a pond, sending out clean ripples. Then a boat motors past at distance, sending larger waves, and where they meet the ripples, the two add together and the original pattern gets distorted. In our cells, the mitochondria run on continuous currents of electrons and protons that carry their own faint electromagnetic fields. An external field from a substation, by the principle of superposition, adds to those internal currents and shifts the pattern. The electron transport chain in the mitochondria leaks a fraction of its electrons by design as reactive oxygen species (ROS), which act as signalling molecules in a healthy cell. Distorting that field increases that electron leakage, creating oxidative stress. A tiny electromagnetic interference results in a large downstream effect. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2405844025006474 The more complex pathway is Dimitris Panagopoulos’s Ion Forced-Oscillation / Voltage-Gated Ion Channel (IFO-VGIC) mechanism. Weak, polarized, low-frequency fields force the ions (calcium, potassium, sodium) next to an ion channel’s voltage sensor to oscillate; because that force scales with the inverse cube of the distance involved, fields far below the stimulation threshold can still force the channel open, disrupting the cell’s ion balance and driving ROS overproduction (Nitric oxide and superoxide interact and produce peroxynitrite, a highly unstable cytotoxin that breaks down into free radicals). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/366088934 https://www.spandidos-publications.com/ijo/59/5/92 https://www.mdpi.com/1422-0067/22/18/10041 https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/public-health/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2025.1585441/full https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3772193/ 3. Evidence of oxidative stress, in vivo, in humans from ELF-EMF There are many studies, and the strongest are occupational, which applies to the 49ers situation. 115 power-plant workers vs. 145 office controls. Serum malondialdehyde (MDA, the standard lipid-peroxidation marker), superoxide dismutase, and catalase were all significantly higher in the exposed group, and the markers rose with increasing field exposure. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.3233/WOR-203244 A follow-up where they reversed the oxidative stress in power plant workers. A double-blind randomized controlled trial: 91 power-plant workers given vitamin E, vitamin C, both, or placebo for 90 days. The antioxidant groups showed reduced lipid peroxidation and raised antioxidant capacity versus controls. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32191586/ A spot-welder study: 46 welders occupationally exposed at 50 Hz, showed significantly altered red-blood-cell antioxidant enzyme activity and concluded ELF-MF “might act as an oxidative stressor… even at the recommended levels of exposure.” https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18504600/ A substation-specific study found oxidative stress and DNA damage https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/24460415/ 4. Oxidative stress degrades collagen This half isn’t controversial at all. Oxidative stress activates the matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs) that break collagen down and suppresses its synthesis. Here are three example studies: Siwik et al. 2001: Oxidative stress raises MMPs and lowers collagen synthesis in cardiac fibroblasts. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11121376/ Fisher et al. 2009: Collagen fragmentation drives oxidative stress and elevates MMP-1 in aged human skin. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC2631323/ Varani et al. 2006: Decreased collagen production in oxidatively aged skin. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/16723701/ 5. What about the study showing improved collagen synthesis I’m glad you asked this question, and I’m bummed we didn’t get to it in the interview because it is a great question, and very important to understand. Superficially it may appear to be a refutation of my theory, but I would argue that it actually supports the underlying argument. That study used a short, high-intensity pulsed dose: therapeutic-PEMF, the same type of field used clinically to stimulate bone and tissue healing. The reason this works is because it triggers the very same biological pathways that can lead to oxidative stress. The exposure still stimulates ROS production, but done at a controlled dosage, for a limited duration it has a different effect. The cell reads the ROS as a warning signal and it upregulates its antioxidant defenses, and mounts a repair/proliferation response. The therapy is then stopped before the cell gets overwhelmed. That is essentially a hormetic response: a small dose of a stressor producing a beneficial adaptation. Two things follow: At the very least, this means the field is biologically active, which by itself undercuts the regulatory claim that these fields are inert below their thresholds. There is a wealth of literature on PEMF (pulsed EMF) bone regeneration and calcium channel signalling (which is the second mechanims in section one). Here is one. https://www.nature.com/articles/srep13856 At best, it leads us straight to my actual concern, which is that under chronic, chaotic and unregulated exposure, the cell’s antioxidant capacity gets overwhelmed, resulting in oxidative stress. There are plentiful examples of things that are beneficial at controlled doses, but harmful at uncontrolled doses. Excecise is one obvious, uncontroversial example. Botox is perhaps a more interesting example. 6. What about a study that shows EMF causing collagen degradation in humans? As far as I am aware there is not a single study showing EMF-driven oxidative stress degrading collagen in a human, in vivo, or in human tendon in a lab. There are studies involving isolated fibroblasts though, which secrete collagen. The most relevant one showed that human fetal scleral fibroblasts exposed to 50 Hz ELF-EMF showed a significant decrease in collagen synthesis and that MMP-2 expression was upregulated, which is the exact mechanism I described in section 2. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3626379/ That’s it! Thanks again for the interview. Best, Peter Anthony Cowan Environmental Health · Wellness Tech · Researcher & Journalist Publisher & Editor, Living Energy Bio: petercowan.comSocial: X · Instagram · TikTokApp: sunlightis.lifePhone: [redacted]
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BAR HARBOR—MDI Health celebrated the people and partnerships strengthening local healthcare during its 2026 Annual Meeting and Community Celebration, held September 15 at the Bar Harbor Club. The gathering brought together patients, medical staff, employees, trustees, volunteers, supporters, and community partners to recognize the year’s accomplishments and honor those whose contributions make a meaningful difference across the organization and the communities it serves. “This celebration is an opportunity to recognize the extraordinary people who make our work possible,” said Chrissi Maguire, president and CEO of MDI Health. “Their compassion, dedication, and belief in strong local healthcare can be felt throughout our hospital, health centers, Birch Bay Village, and the communities we serve.” During the celebration, MDI Health presented its 2026 Impact Award to Mount Desert Nursing Association (MDNA), recognizing the organization as Community Partner of the Year for providing compassionate, skilled in-home nursing care across Mount Desert Island, Trenton, and Lamoine. “MDNA extends care beyond our walls, helping people remain safely at home, surrounded by the people and places they know and love,” Maguire said. “Its work lies at the intersection of healthcare and community and strengthens our entire healthcare system.” “For 77 years, MDNA has helped our neighbors recover and remain safely at home,” said Amy McVety, MDNA Executive Director. “Our longstanding partnership with MDI Health helps ensure a seamless transition from hospital to home and the continued care patients need. We are grateful for this recognition and especially proud of our talented, hardworking team.” The evening marked a transition in Board leadership. Martha Wagner, PhD, was recognized as she concluded her term as chair of the MDI Health Board of Trustees. Madeleine Braun, PhD, MBA, was introduced as incoming chair. “It is an honor to build on Martha’s leadership and serve an organization so deeply connected to this community,” Braun said. Individual honorees recognized during the evening’s program included Nancy D’Agostino, MDI Health Volunteer of the Year; George Rossi, Birch Bay Village Volunteer of the Year; Marc Woolfolk, Birch Bay Village Employee of the Year; and Beth Applebee, MDI Hospital Employee of the Year. “These honorees represent the very best of who we are,” Maguire said. The program also highlighted new initiatives and honors from the past year. MDI Health launched a free Screening Mammogram Scholarship Program to remove financial barriers to early detection, supported by a generous grant from the Maine Cancer Foundation. An in-hospital food pantry has been opened to meet rising community need and address the link between nutrition and health. MDI Health earned CMS five-star ratings for Patient Experience and Nurse Communication, top marks in the 2026–2027 Lown Institute Hospitals Index, recognition from the American Hospital Association and American Heart Association, and a third consecutive Best Places to Work in Maine designation. The hospital will open its new Main Entrance this fall, as work advances on the expanded Emergency Department and other patient-care spaces. The Building Our Future Campaign has raised more than $56 million in capital and programmatic support to date. “Everything we have accomplished reflects the strength of this community,” Maguire said. “We are grateful to everyone who has contributed their time, talent, leadership, and support to help MDI Health continue meeting the evolving needs of the region.” Subscribe Share Leave a comment
Giants Outlast Cardinals in Extras to Take Series
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Free Play Days features two free Xbox games this weekend
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Whales Have Rebounded in the Southern Ocean. Scientists Worry Commercial Fishing Could Threaten Their Comeback.
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What Does the Science of Climate Change Really Look Like?
Editor’s Note: This is the second in a three-part series on how the Right should think about environmental and climate policy. Read Chris Barnard on Reclaiming Environmental Policy from the Left. More than a decade ago, the world’s governments negotiated and signed the Paris Climate Agreement, committing to hold global warming well below 2 degrees Celsius. In the following years, climate had immense cultural power. Greta Thunberg emerged. Fortune 500 companies established net-zero plans. The U.S. got the Inflation Reduction Act. Then the pendulum swung back. President Donald Trump returned to the Oval Office, speaking of green energy as a “scam” and carbon footprints as a “hoax” and on all matters of international policy emphasizing bilateral engagement and power over globalism and cooperation. The technology companies that had been at the forefront of net-zero pledges and green leadership discovered the importance of all-of-the-above power to their visions for artificial intelligence and began quietly postponing or removing their targets. On the left side of the political spectrum, rising concerns about inflation and cost pushed climate lower down in the stated priorities of voters and stump speeches of politicians. The moment is ripe for a reset on the politics of climate change and for conservatives especially to chart a course that acknowledges and addresses the real challenges in plausible ways. So what should we think about climate change as we enter a post-peak climate era? If it is neither an apocalypse nor a hoax, what will hold up as a durable view of climate change? And how does it project onto the concerns and priorities of the right-of-center’s emerging coalition? New to Commonplace_? Subscribe below to get the magazine in your inbox._ Subscribe A Solid Foundation As the politics and economics of climate careened over the past ten years, the physics carried on regardless. In 2015, the year the Paris Climate Agreement was adopted, the world emitted 41.2 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide. By 2025, emissions had risen only 2.4%, to 42.2 gigatonnes, because falling emissions from land use offset increasing emissions from fossil fuels. But slow growth in annual emissions is not rapid decline, let alone net-zero, so carbon dioxide kept accumulating in the atmosphere, going from 399 to 426 parts per million. Global temperature kept rising too, from about 1.1 degrees Celsius above the 1850–1900 average in 2015, to 1.4 degrees above it in 2025. None of this should surprise anyone. Even most prominent skeptics, like the authors of the 2025 report commissioned by the Trump administration’s Department of Energy, accept the basic physics. Carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere at industrial volumes accumulates and traps heat that would otherwise escape to space. That heat warms the upper ocean and increases temperatures at the surface. Increased ocean heat and melting of land ice cause sea levels to rise. Changes in the climate become noticeable to us as subtle shifts in temperature and precipitation, seasons arriving early or late, changes in the surrounding ecosystem, and weather extremes. The much more meaningful debate is not about whether these things are happening, but about what it all means for human societies. (While it is a proxy measure of overall risk, no one experiences global surface temperature.) This debate invokes at least three interesting questions: how much today’s warming is showing up in regional climate trends, how much more warming we should anticipate, and how extreme weather events can be understood in the context of climate change. Recent scientific advances give us new insights into each of these, but there is still much to learn. This is the context in which the next generation of conservative leaders will be the first to deal with significant climate change as a fact, not a forecast. It will be with them for their entire careers. Our evolving scientific picture of climate change will come from weather and climate records stretching further into the past, new kinds of observations in the present, better modeling tools for the future, and simply more time to observe the emergence of climate signals and their tangible effects on ecosystems and communities in the United States and around the world. The policy landscape will be shaped by not only the impacts of changes in the climate, but also by the ways in which societies respond and by the emergence of new technologies for both altering the trajectory of emissions and adapting to new climate realities. Global climate records now show the fingerprints of warming in different phenomena around much of the world. The IPCC, in its most recent assessment report, documents warming trends over all land regions, even as natural variability adds substantial variance to local trends. And the highest temperature extremes have become more intense and frequent, almost everywhere, since the 1950s. Scientists are highly confident that these changes are attributable to human influence. But confidence in detecting trends and attributing them to human influence degrades across heavy precipitation events; drought trends are heterogeneous and not attributable to human activity with great confidence. For hurricanes, tornadoes, and other severe storms there is even less confidence in trends or their relationship to climate change. In general, a fair summary of the evidence is that for well-observed phenomena, like surface temperature or heavy rainfall, with a clear relationship to warming, our multidecadal observations are consistent with human influence overcoming natural variability over long time periods and extremes increasing. For regions that are sampled more sparsely, or phenomena with a higher noise-to-signal ratio, we will need to observe them longer to understand the magnitude of the climate signal or improve dynamical understanding using models and observations together. But for Climate For those who can’t wait, we also have new techniques that attempt to understand the role climate change has in influencing particular extreme events. When the climate is changing and disaster strikes, it is natural to ask whether that disaster was somehow “caused” by climate change. For scientists and policymakers acting in good faith, answering that question helps develop a more accurate picture of the problem, how it may be getting worse, and what preparations we should be making to respond to it. It may, at some point, give some weight to how liability is assigned by courts or adaptation funding is distributed by society. But how we ask this question is extremely important. It is easy to get the analysis wrong by discounting the role that meteorology plays. As meteorologist Theodore Shepherd explained in a clear 2016 review of climate attribution methods, “if a weather or climate event is truly extreme in the present climate, then perforce it requires unusual meteorological conditions, which means that climate change is at most a contributing factor.” Share Scientists have two ways to probe climate as a contributing factor, both of which have entered media coverage of extreme weather events. One asks a probabilistic question: How much more likely is a particular event (e.g., a temperature record over a particular area) amid global warming? The answer involves using historical records and computer simulations to estimate the likelihood of such an event in both a changed and a preindustrial climate. The findings are less about the specific event, and more about events of that nature. The other question is: How has the changed climate affected the specific event in question? Here, scientists try to understand what a similar event would have looked like in the preindustrial climate. This is sometimes called the storyline approach, where the story is the specific meteorological details of the event. These methods offer ways to test the intuition of scientists about real weather extremes. In late June and early July of 2021, a persistent high-pressure ridge, or heat dome, set up over the Pacific Northwest and an extraordinary heat wave affected the area from Oregon to British Columbia. For six days, it shattered temperature records across the region and hundreds died from heat-related causes, in an area where such high, and persistently high, temperatures were well outside of experience and many live without air conditioning. Scientists have studied its connection to climate change using multiple approaches. This specific event was created by a rare combination of meteorological factors, a strong high-pressure ridge created the conditions for extreme heat, which occurred on top of higher average temperatures in the region from global warming. Probabilistic analyses showed that climate change increased the likelihood of such an event by at least 8-fold to more than 100-fold. One standout example found that such an event had effectively zero probability of occurring in the preindustrial climate. The enormous range in these assessments reflects how hard it is to estimate probabilities of events at the tail of the historical record. Estimates of the effect on the temperature of the event are more clustered. A recent review paper documents how multiple methodologies have found a positive influence, roughly 1-2 degrees Celsius of an anomaly that exceeded 15 degrees, of climate change on the temperature magnitude of the event. Multiple studies have investigated and found some positive influence of climate change in other extreme events. Attribution studies found climate likely increased the heavy rainfall that accompanied Hurricane Helene in North Carolina and surrounding regions in 2024. The extensive fires that struck Los Angeles in 2025 illustrate how the causal chain can become messy, though. Studies do detect a positive influence of climate on the event’s likelihood, but while climate change likely contributed to underlying aridity, it would not have played a role in the heavy winds or land practices that preceded disaster. These event attribution studies will become more common for extreme, or damaging, weather events. They can be produced quickly, and often are reported before peer review. As the Pacific Northwest heatwave example shows, when multiple methods converge on a positive attribution, the finding should probably carry some weight even if you have to be careful about accepting the results from a single study. I expect that as climate change proceeds and the climate thus departs further from a preindustrial counterfactual, the influence will become more detectable across a variety of extreme events and more easily identified. This will be used to cast blame, but can also be used to inform how communities and society adapt to ongoing change. We May Still Be Surprised One positive development, insofar as less climate change is better, has been that our central estimates for future climate change should probably be revised downward. Mostly, that is because the high-end warmings that scientists regularly analyzed about ten to 20 years ago, driven by high emissions throughout the twenty-first century, now appear to be somewhere between unlikely and impossible. At one time, the upper end of mainstream climate projections extended well into 4 to 6 degrees Celsius of warming by the end of this century, which, models suggest, would have wrought enormous real-world damage. Current energy and policy trends now point toward 2.5 or 3 degrees. Damages and risks are commonly modeled as increasing steeply with more warming, so this is already a better-than-previously-expected outcome for the climate (which is independent of the physical response to emissions). But we should maintain a wide range for plausible outcomes and prepare for the possibility of being surprised. Emissions trajectories are subject to deep uncertainty, the physical climate response is still developing, and whatever change occurs in the climate will then be mediated through unpredictable economic, social, and political institutions. Over the past decade, the pace of warming surprised some keen observers and appeared to accelerate, though not yet outside the range of expectation provided by climate models. The reasons for that apparent acceleration are being actively studied (as was the apparent pause in warming from 1998 to 2012), but no single driver has emerged. Some blame it on the El Niño, variability which would have no bearing on climate. Some think it is a result of factories in East Asia and global shipping fleets cutting aerosol emissions, which in the strongest version of the argument would indicate higher climate sensitivity to carbon-dioxide emissions. Others are more measured, not yet ready to draw solid conclusions as to whether climate projections require revision. We will have to see. Long-Term Thinking Climate change asks us to think over long time scales. But the pace of human-driven warming is compressing a large global change into a century. Changing weather patterns and extreme events are already causing adjustment costs and damages and will do more. Adaptation will help, but it is not free. For some communities, these costs will erode livelihoods and well-being, and may force migration. Are we prepared for large-scale managed retreats in the United States? Thankfully, American wealth, geographical diversity, and moderate climates may leave us better prepared than many around the world. But wealthy countries can still suffer serious disruption from narrowly concentrated costs, even if they appear entirely manageable in aggregate. Readers of Commonplace are familiar with the challenges of rapidly adapting to economic forces. The displacement that came from the China Shock is barely perceptible in aggregate GDP and employment data, but it affected millions of people and those people were far less mobile than economic models tended to assume. Deindustrialization rippled through the nation with enormous effects for not only our economic vitality, but also our national security. The forces surrounding climate change may not be so different; the world gets richer and must accept some diffuse costs. Those may be modest overall, but cause all manner of unpredictable effects with which policymakers must cope. In the case of the China Shock, our faith in a growing pie served us poorly. We’ll need to do better on climate. Leave a comment
Here's Why a New Apple Watch Charging Puck Was Just Released
The new Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4 have hardware changes that allow for faster charging, but you will need to use the new version of the Apple Watch Magnetic Fast Charger included in the box in order to achieve this boost. If you need extra ones for your own charging stands or travel or so forth, Apple released the new version of the charger on its online store last week, with U.S. pricing set at $29.
Why awarding Monaco a sprint race completely detracts from exciting 2027 F1 calendar
Comment: Two popular venues returning and more sprint races in the schedule should be the main headline; instead, Formula 1 has bafflingly put an extra race at a circuit you can’t overtake at
Truth and Politics in the Age of Post-Truth
Get E-International Relations delivered to your inbox, free of charge. As you sign up, consider becoming a paid subscriber, or make a donation, to support our work. Subscribe This is an excerpt from Global Politics in a Post-Truth Era. You can download the book free of charge from E-International Relations. The term post-truth is by now so ubiquitous in describing the state of politics in the Western world and even beyond that the most pressing issue of the day appears to be about making democracy work in the era of post-truth rather than questioning the normalisation of the term itself in the first place. The critical turning point appeared to have occurred in 2016 when the term was chosen by the Oxford English Dictionary as ‘The Word of the Year.’ On its website, the Dictionary notes the transformation of post-truth from ‘being a peripheral term to being a mainstay in political commentary and connects ‘the spike in frequency’ directly with the Brexit referendum in the United Kingdom and the election of Donald J. Trump in the United States – both occurring in 2016. Paired with the noun ‘politics,’ post-truth is defined as an adjective ‘relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.’ The Oxford English Dictionary traces the first use of the term to a 1992 essay in The Nation by the playwright Steve Tesich as he reflected on the 1980s Iran-Contra scandal and the 1990–91 Gulf War: We are rapidly becoming prototypes of a people that totalitarian monsters could only drool about in their dreams. All the dictators up to now have had to work hard at suppressing the truth. We, by our actions, are saying that this is no longer necessary, that we have acquired a spiritual mechanism that can denude truth of any significance. In a very fundamental way we, as a free people, have freely decided that we want to live in some post-truth world (Tesich 1992, 13; emphasis added). He then continued, The Gulf War is over but the war at home goes on. The gulf between rich and destitute widens – between those of us who live in a modern post-industrial nation and those of us who live in the Third World countries of our inner cities. The present administration’s response to this internal crisis has shifted from benign to malignant neglect. The current levels of misery and decomposition of our cities and the economic gulags of our ghettos are acceptable. Since there is only so much hope to go around, there is a freeze on hope. The have-nots have now been reclassified as never-will-haves (Tesich 1992, 13). In the context of Tesich’s essay, truth includes both facts, as in what happens, and ‘moral absolutes,’ as in the ‘self-evident truths mentioned in our Constitution’ (Tesich 1992, 14). Together, these two notions of truth entail the obligation to both act and react. The two passages cited above show that even in the early post-Cold War years, Tesich was already deeply concerned that the American people are neither prepared to act on truth nor react to truth that is disconcerting, or what he calls ‘bad news’ (Tesich 1992, 12). Accordingly, Tesich’s insight as captured by the term post-truth is not that truth is irrelevant to what we know, but rather it is irrelevant to how we act. In contrast, ‘post-truth politics,’ as defined by Oxford as a term that pitches ‘objective facts’ against ‘emotion and personal belief’ such that the latter appears to have overtaken the former in shaping ‘public opinion’ and thereby, democratic politics. When Tesich’s post-truth politics and its current usage are juxtaposed, the two are in fact not identical in terms of what truth is and how it relates to politics. Against such consideration, this chapter provides a critical survey of selected historical events and theoretical considerations for the purpose of gaining a more nuanced understanding of the relation between truth and politics. Truth and Language One notable impact of post-truth politics is that language is being overtly deployed as a political weapon not only by politicians and those in power, but among the general population. It seems that once facts are irrelevant to the validity of what is being said, language becomes the platform for an all-out political contest in which what is said is no more than an act of will expressed as an assertion of power and/or an exercise in defiance. As early as in the writings of Thucydides (460–400 BCE), the vulnerability of logos – which is the human capacity for rational discourse in tumultuous times – was already noted. Thucydides belonged to a school of Greek thought which maintained that language is conventional and that the association between name and things is a result of ‘human use and habit’ rather than ‘nature or divine dispensation’ (Connor 1984, 99). The conventional nature of language means that it is incapable of providing its users with any independent criteria for judgement. In Thucydides’ study of the Peloponnesian War (431–405 BCE), the subversion of logos as seen in the manipulation of language was introduced through his account of the civil war in Corcyra (Thucydides 1972, 236-245). The war first broke out in 427 BCE between the pro-Athenian democratic faction and the pro-Spartan oligarchic faction before it spread to the rest of the Greek world. There was a general breakdown of law and order, resulting in extreme violence and death. Language underwent changes that were reflective of the events of the time. The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes (1588–1679) translated Thucydides’ description of the situation as follows: The received value of names imposed for signification of things, was changed into arbitrary. For inconsiderate boldness, was counted true-hearted manliness: provident deliberation, a handsome fear: modesty, the cloak of cowardice: to be wise in everything, to be lazy in everything... he that had been so provident as not to need to do the one or the other, was said to be a dissolver of society, and one that stood in fear of his adversary. In brief, he that could outstrip another in the doing of an evil act, or that could persuade another thereto that never meant it, was commended (Hobbes 1839–1845, 8: 348; Thucydides 1972, 242-243). What concerned Thucydides most was that the meanings of words are no more than linguistic conventions that require logos to support them. The Corcyrean civil war was a reminder that such capacity cannot be assumed. This is why history understood as an authentic account of what happens matters. Guided by logos, the historian’s task is ‘the search after truth’, which is established through ‘the absence of the fabulous,’ including ‘the rejection of myth and unverifiable stories’ (de Jonge 2017, 2). Thus, history plays an important role in facilitating the stability of language – without which distinctions and judgements cannot be rendered communicable. Just like Thucydides, Hobbes was a nominalist who subscribed to the view that there is no inherent meaning to words. Hobbes’ state of nature, where there is no common authority, is precisely one in which distinctions cannot be made. As Hobbes put it, there is ‘no Mine and Thine distinct’ nor is there distinction between ‘the notions of Right and Wrong, Justice and Injustice’ (1968, 188; emphasis in original). This is clearly an unsustainable condition for everyone. Behind Hobbes’ famous words that life in the state of nature is ‘solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short’ is his uncompromising argument for the ‘Leviathan’, which is described by the late American political theorist, Sheldon Wolin (1922–2015), as the ‘sovereign definer’ (Hobbes 1968, 186; Wolin 2004, 238–243). Accordingly, the social contract is importantly a ‘linguistic contract’ that binds all parties to ‘general names agreed upon’ (Peters 1979, 125; Hobbes 1968, 111). Through Thucydides and Hobbes, we can identify a line of thinking that sees politics as a contestation over the use of language, which is based on shared conventions and norms. Thus understood, politics is not a collective quest for the true nature of our being or an epistemological exercise in pursuit of true knowledge. Rather, politics is about humans living with one another by finding a shared language to communicate with one another on matters that affect them all. Truth is in that sense contingent on what is being said as opposed to setting the standard for it. In other words, truth is the embodiment of shareability among us. While truth as such ensures the viability of a political entity, truth by no means represents a normative standard to adjudicate among contesting actors in what they say, let alone in what they do. During Thucydides’ times, ancient China was also experiencing a tumultuous time as the ruling Zhou dynasty deteriorated into the period of the Warring States (481–221 BCE). This was when the rulers of Zhou no longer presided over the territories brought under its control through conquest. Instead of professing allegiance to the Zhou royalty, the lords of these territories became kings themselves to rule over their own land. The period was one marked by endless military campaigns as each of the seven major states aimed to conquer the rest (Lewis 1999). Yet, the period was also known for its intellectual vibrancy as different thinkers challenged the restoring of order among these warring states – including offering ideas and advice to rulers on good governance. Among these thinkers was Confucius (551–479 BCE). His thought, which came to be known as Confucianism, went on to become the state ideology of China from the Han dynasty (206 BCE–222 CE) until the end of the Qing dynasty in 1911 when China became a republic. The founding text of Confucianism was the Analects, which is a collection of dialogues between Confucius and his students as recorded by them. One key concept Confucius advanced is the ‘rectification of names’. Though the term only appears in one exchange in the Analects, it is considered a major aspect of Confucius’ thought. Generations of Confucian scholars from past and present, including Western academics, have debated over its interpretation (Makeham 2003). The passage in question reads as follows: Zi Lu said: ‘The monarch of the state of Wei wants you to govern the country, what is the first thing you plan on doing?’ Confucius said: ‘First it is necessary to rectify the names.’Zi Lu said: ‘Is that really what has to be done? You are being too pedantic, aren’t you now? How will you rectify these names?’Confucius said: ‘Zhong You, you are too unrefined. A gentleman, faced with a matter that he does not understand, takes a skeptical attitude. If names are not correct, one cannot speak smoothly and reasonably, and if one cannot speak smoothly and reasonably, affairs cannot be managed successfully. If affairs cannot be managed successfully, rites and music will not be conducted. If rites and music are not conducted, punishments will not be suitable. And if punishments are not suitable, the common people will not know what to do. So, when the gentleman uses names, it is necessary to be able to speak so that people understand. If one can say it, one can definitely do it. A gentleman should not be careless with words’ (Analects 13:3 in Cao 2016, 148). This translation is offered by the contemporary philosopher Cao Feng. As Cao notes, the passage is what started the whole debate over ‘exactly what kind of names did Confucius... wish to rectify’ (Cao 2016, 148). Of the three major groups of interpretation examined by Cao, beginning with classical Confucian scholarship, one is arguably the most influential and certainly most pertinent to the issue of language and politics. This is the interpretation that was first associated with the Neo-Confucian master, Zhu Xi (1130–1200), who argued that the ‘rectification of names is simply the rectification of politics’ (Cao 2016, 149). Within this interpretive framework, rectification has the dual functions of correction and prescription by ensuring that predetermined hierarchical roles are strictly adhered to through following ‘the system of rites and propriety’ (Cao 2016, 151). In addition, the rectification of names entails ‘using names to rectify actuality’ (Cao 2016, 151). Yet Cao rejects this whole body of interpretive works by arguing that these were ideas developed later. Instead, Cao suggests the following: The original meaning of Confucius’ rectification of names may, then, be quite simple. Confucius did not mean to establish a concrete, normative system of “names”; rather, Confucius was simply the first person in history to realize or remark upon the importance of language in politics. As a politician, he noticed and foresaw the impact that the indeterminacy, ambiguity, and arbitrariness of names would have on politics. Confucius recognized the political consequences of language’s not accurately expressing meaning or not being accurately received by people. He realized the great role that names, as a means of distinguishing right and wrong and establishing norms, could play in society and politics (Cao 2016, 168). Scholarly debates aside, Cao’s view has the advantage of identifying an interpretation of this controversial exchange in the Analects that enables its readers to extrapolate from it the observation that the meaning of words depends as much on their users as on their interpreters; neither of which can be predetermined. Accordingly, a good ruler is someone who can speak without ambiguity to his subjects and make good his words through actions. Stated differently, Cao’s view on what concerned Confucius then, who was living through times of protracted political upheaval, is that language is an indispensable political tool for those in power and can be deployed by both good and bad rulers alike. To sum up, this historical survey shows that politics as a war of words is by no means a distinctive marker of contemporary politics nor the Western world. Be it ancient or current, east or west, language is subject to manipulation to serve political purposes and when there is an outright war of words that defies existing norms, it is indicative of a political situation in which people no longer share a language and truth becomes irrelevant. Accordingly, political order entails stability in language use. Truth and Politics As previously noted, current use of the term post-truth as an adjective to the term ‘politics’ suggests that once there was a time when politics aligned with truth. Indeed, if we start with Plato’s Republic as the key founding text of Western political thought, we see that the ideal polis (city-state of ancient Greece) is where truth and politics converge, and justice is achieved. Written around 380 BCE when Athens was still coping with its defeat by the Spartans in the Peloponnesian War, the Republic is a defence of the rule of the ‘philosopher king’, defined as someone who is ‘guided by the truth’ and is ‘always and in every way’ in pursuit of the truth (Plato 1974, 490a). For Plato, truth converges with virtues and hence, letting the philosopher take charge of politics is to let the wisest and the most virtuous lead the less wise and the less virtuous even if it requires compulsion (Plato 1974, 499b). In Plato’s words, ‘…until the philosophers attain power in a city there will be no respite from evil for either city or citizens…’ (Plato 1974, 501e). The uncompromising rule of philosopher-kings is made palatable by the claim that we are all ‘earth- born brothers’ with random mixtures of gold, silver, bronze and iron, but only the gold can rule (Plato 1974, 414–415). Understandably, academic debates over the interpretation of Plato’s Republic revolve around the question of whether truth as attained in philosophy can be realised in politics as action and whether such a connection is even desirable. Without getting into the details of these scholarly exchanges, I suggest that they all share the concern that truth acquired through the rigorous process of philosophical reasoning is not without problem when applied to the real world of living humans. This is because not all humans are philosophers – and indeed, in Plato’s view, not everyone is capable of becoming a philosopher given the protracted and arduous training that one needs to endure to become one. Hannah Arendt (1906–1975), a highly influential political philosopher of the twentieth century, notes that ‘Plato was the first to introduce the division between those who know and do not act and those who act and do not know’ and that such a separation has remained ‘at the root of all theories of domination’ (Arendt 1958, 223, 225). What Arendt points out in this remark is not the gap between theory and practice, but rather that Plato provides the normative ground for those who know the truth to tell those who do not know what to do. Arendt herself took on the challenge of understanding the relationship between truth and politics through her analysis of Nazism and Stalinism. Arendt’s insight, which was controversial when The Origins of Totalitarianism was published in 1951, was to identify Nazism and Stalinism as representative of a new form of political rule – totalitarianism – making it distinct from ‘other forms of political oppression... such as despotism, tyranny and dictatorship’ (Arendt 1973, 460). Arendt defines totalitarianism as a self- contained system of ideas driven by their ‘logic’ and marked by a mode of reasoning called ‘ideological thinking.’ Ideological thinking as such is a distinctive form of political reasoning defined by three characteristics. First, ideological thinking claims to provide a ‘total explanation’ of all historical happenings, encompassing the past, the present, and the future. Second, while ideological thinking is an attempt to account for ‘factual reality’ in its totality, this mode of thinking is paradoxically divorced from reality and experience. This is because experience, being rooted in specificity, is clearly limited in its claim to totality. It follows that as its third characteristic, ideological thinking aims to emancipate thought from the limitation imposed by experience through a ‘specific method of demonstration.’ The method involves arranging facts into an ‘absolutely logical procedure’ that starts from an ‘axiomatically accepted premise’. It is, in short, a ‘process of deduction from a premise’ – which is the only possible movement in the realm of logic that leads to one definitive conclusion. This is how the ‘logicality of ideological thinking’ provides the basis for total explanation and the ‘principle of action’ for totalitarian movement (Arendt 1973, 468–474). Stated differently, totalitarianism is a form of uncompromising idealism that exists in one’s head irrespective of shared reality as experienced. It is the perverse form of what Arendt later refers to as ‘rational truth’, which is the product of the ‘speculative mind’ that belongs to philosophy, mathematics and the sciences. The ‘speculative mind’ is the mind working on its way to generate axioms and theories by relying on the cognitive capacity of the human brain (Arendt 1977, 231). The presence of others has no bearing whatsoever on rational truth. In contrast, ‘factual truth’ is what happens when humans are ‘living and acting together’ (Arendt 1977, 231). Factual truth is therefore particular and temporal by definition. But more importantly, factual truth is ‘political by nature’ because it can only be validated in the context of the human community (Arendt 1977, 238). In other words, factual truth is about humans in their plurality rather than in their singularity. For factual truth to be sustainable, we need what Arendt calls ‘common sense’ – understood as ‘community sense’ (Arendt 1982, 72). There is also another distinction about truth that Arendt makes which is pertinent to understanding how totalitarianism works. The issue is whether the so-called totalitarian ideology is simply an unnecessarily cumbersome way of saying that it is an all-round and polished lie. Here, Arendt calls totalitarian ideology the ‘modern lie’ – in contrast to the ‘traditional lie’. The latter is restricted by two conditions: that it is a lie about the ‘particulars’ and that it deceives only the ‘enemy’ – which means that the liar is not engaged in self- deception. The modern lie, however, involves a ‘complete rearrangement of the whole factual texture’. It also intends to deceive everyone alike, to the extent that those who initiate the lie eventually ‘fall victims to their own falsehood’ (Arendt 1977, 249–254). This distinction between the traditional and modern lie is important. It indicates that not only is totalitarianism a lie, but the lie is in fact too big to fit into the standard meaning of the word. To tell a lie from truth, we need a common standard. In the case of a traditional lie, the common standard is precisely ‘the fabric of factuality’. As such, a lie always appears as a ‘tear’ to that fabric. Yet, modern lies require making a surrogate reality with a completely different context for facts to fit ‘without seam, crack, or fissure, exactly as the facts fitted into their original context’. Arendt notes that as long as those who concoct the surrogate reality are prepared to engage in self- deception to ‘create a semblance of truthfulness’, there is nothing to prevent ‘these new stories, images, and non-facts from becoming an adequate substitute for reality and factuality’ (Arendt 1977, 253–254). Totalitarianism therefore requires a person to stand outside of the system itself in order to make sense of it. Arendt points out that it is futile for us to argue with (for example) a Nazi or a Stalinist on race or class. To confront totalitarianism requires more than just a confrontation with specific facts. It is a more fundamental confrontation between reality as experienced and its total rejection. This means that Nazism and Stalinism are more than radical ways of conducting racial conflict or class struggle. Rather: Totalitarian politics – far from being simply antisemitic or racist or imperialist or communist – use and abuse their own ideological and political elements until the basis of factual reality, from which the ideologies originally derived their propaganda value– the value of struggle, for instance, or the interest conflicts between Jews and their neighbours – have all but disappeared (Arendt 1973, xv). Accordingly: The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (that is, the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (that is, the standards of thought) no longer exist (Arendt 1973, 474). Who then is the ‘ideal subject’ of totalitarianism? Although there is a revival of interest in Arendt’s observation on truth and politics since the onset of post- truth politics, not enough has been said about her reply to the question (Hyvönen 2018; Klinkler 2018; Lee 2019; Zerilli 2020). Yet if we take a look at Arendt’s portrait of this ideal subject, her view is even more pertinent to our current challenge. As a self-contained system of ideas that is detached from experience, totalitarian thinking offers consistency in ways that reality cannot. Arendt notes that this kind of consistency is especially appealing to those who have lost a sense of bearing in the world (Arendt 1973, 353). They constitute what she calls the ‘masses’. The ‘mass man’ is thus a highly isolated and atomised individual, who is ‘obsessed by a desire to escape from reality’ (Arendt 1973, 318, 352). In his ‘essential homelessness’ the mass man can ‘no longer bear its accidental, incomprehensible aspects’ (Arendt 1973, 352). This longing for escape from reality is a ‘verdict against the world’ in which one is ‘forced to live’ but ‘cannot exist’ (Arendt 1973, 352). Such a situation is ripe for the ‘revolt of the masses’ against ‘common sense,’ which is ‘the result of their atomisation, of their loss of social status’ and with it, the ‘whole sector of communal relationships in whose framework common sense makes sense’ (Arendt 1973, 352). In short, the masses are people who are considered to be ‘superfluous or can be spared … [who] cannot be integrated into any organisation based on common interest’ (Arendt 1973, 311). Whether one agrees with Arendt’s analysis of the social conditions in the interwar years that led to the formation of the ‘masses’, her portrait of the ‘mass man’ is a powerful account of what can happen to an individual who has become disposable to the society that they used to belong to. Hand in hand with this phenomenon is indeed the collapse of ‘common sense’ that leaves the dislodged individual scrambling for reconnection. By offering the masses a substitute reality validated by the ‘logic of an idea’ rather than by experience, totalitarianism makes it possible for them to live in a world where there is no condition of plurality. Between ‘facing the anarchic growth and total arbitrariness of decay’ and ‘bowing down before the most rigid, fantastically fictitious consistency of an ideology’, the masses will likely ‘choose the latter’ (Arendt 1973, 352). A world created by ideology, then, is more attractive to the masses not because ‘they are stupid and wicked, but because in the general disaster this escape grants them a minimum of self- respect’ by conjuring up ‘a lying world of consistency which is more adequate to the needs of the human mind than reality itself’ (Arendt 1973, 353). Moreover, it is precisely this ability to guarantee consistency that makes it possible for the leaders of totalitarian movements to demand ‘total, unrestricted, unconditional and unalterable loyalty of the individual member’ (Arendt 1973, 323). While this chapter is not a study of the social factors that led to specific contemporary developments such as the result of the Brexit referendum or the election of Donald Trump in 2016, Arendt’s ‘mass man’ seem to have found their counterparts among the supporters of Brexit and Trumpism. Studies of voters’ profiles in both events point to a disproportionate share of supporters from white male lower income backgrounds without university educations. These are individuals who have either already lost their jobs to globalisation or who are at high risk of losing their job with very little capacity to be retrained for the twenty-first century market economy of advanced industrialised states (BBC 2016; Pew Research Center 2018). In short, these displaced workers are part of the tapestry forming the modern equivalent of Arendt’s ‘mass man’ – ready to be the recruits of totalitarianism. Conclusion If we step back to take a more comprehensive approach to the relationship between truth and politics, both historically and theoretically, it is not so obvious that 2016 is a defining moment. From ancient China and ancient Greece to our so-called post-truth age, the indeterminacy of language appears to be a persistent political challenge. Language is always open to manipulation by its users to serve power. Nonetheless, the tendency these days is to single out the ubiquity of social media and the proliferation of Internet platforms as the incubator for the countless cyberwars of words that in turn fuel the real world of politics. In this context, language is no longer the conveyor of objective facts and accurate information, but rather the medium for expressing subjective opinions and feelings, as captured by the Oxford Dictionary’s definition of the term ‘post-truth politics’. In contrast, the historical approach used in this chapter shows that it is in fact too easy to point the figure at the Internet and digital communication for the political challenge that we face today. What is being suggested here is that with or without the Internet, language, be it used to convey facts or emotions, is simply a tool for communication that humans have invented. While language per se cannot adjudicate what is true or not true, what is right or wrong, it embodies such capacity when language is a shared norm. That shared norm cannot be sustained without some semblance of cohesion in any given community. Any war of words, irrespective of its platform, is indicative of the breakdown of such cohesiveness. Returning to the original context in which the term post-truth politics was first used by Steve Tesich helps to identify the important distinction between truth as the standard for knowledge and truth as the standard for action. The two do not necessarily coincide. Placed in the context of the history of political thought, this distinction is in fact at the heart of Plato’s Republic. Yet when the philosopher as the quintessential bearer of truth becomes king, the polis that he rules over is far from the ideal of a just state that it purports to be. Instead, it is one that is held together by lies and coercion. What Arendt reveals through her study of Nazism and Stalinism is that it is dangerous for the kind of truth that philosophy generates – ‘rational truth’ – to become the guide to politics. Politics guided by rational truth can only be uncompromising and follows a logic of its own that cannot afford the ambiguity and indeterminacy of reality as lived experiences of humans. A world of post-truth politics can be an opportunity for a new kind of politics if it is indeed about dismantling the idea that truth is the ideal that politics should strive for. But as it stands, the post-truth politics of today is more about invoking a past that never exists to judge the presence as a crisis in naming when the real crisis is about rebuilding a shared space that has room for all – be they of the left, right or centre; cosmopolitan or parochial; civic-minded or self-centred; liberal-minded or bigoted. Politics is and always will be about striving for that space, without which no human can thrive. References Arendt, Hannah. 1958. The Human Condition. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Arendt, Hannah. 1973. The Origins of Totalitarianism. Rev. ed. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich. Arendt, Hannah. 1977. “Truth and Politics.” In Between Past and Future, 227–264. New York: Penguin Books. Arendt, Hannah. 1982. Lectures on Kant’s Political Philosophy, edited by Ronald Beiner. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. British Broadcasting Corporation. 2016. “Brexit vote: The breakdown.” BBC News, December 7, 2016. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-38227674 Cao, Feng. 2016. “A New Examination of Confucius’ Rectification of Names.” Journal of Chinese Humanities 2: 147–171. https://doi-org.subzero.lib. uoguelph.ca/ doi/ 10.1163/23521341-12340032. Connor, W. Robert. 1984. Thucydides. Princeton: Princeton University Press. de Jonge, Casper C. 2017. “Dionysius of Halicarnassus on Thucydides.” in The Oxford Handbook of Thucydides, edited by Sara Forsdyke, Edith Foster, and Ryan Balot. Oxford University Press. DOI: 10.1093/ oxfordhb/9780199340385.013.17 https://www-oxfordhandbooks-com.subzero. lib.uoguelph.ca/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199340385.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780199340385 Hyvönen, Ari-Elmeri. 2018. “Careless Speech: Conceptualizing Post-Truth Politics.” New Perspectives 26 (3): 31–55. https://www.proquest.com/ scholarly-journals/careless-speech-conceptualizing-post-truth/ docview/2204515132/se-2?accountid=11233. Hobbes, Thomas. 1839–1845. The English Works of Thomas Hobbes, edited by Sir William Molesworth. London: John Bohn. Vol. 8. Klinkner, Melanie. 2018. “Reasonable Truth.” International Journal of Media & Cultural Politics 14 (3): 393–99. doi:10.1386/macp.14.3.393_7. Lee, Haiyan. 2019. “When Nothing Is True, Everything Is Possible: On Truth and Power by Way of Socialist Realism.” PMLA/Publications of the Modern Language Association of America 134 (5). Cambridge University Press: 1157–64. https://doi.org/10.1632/pmla.2019.134.5.1157 Lewis, Mark E. 1999. “Warring States Political History.” In The Cambridge History of Ancient China: From the Origins of Civilization to 221 BC, edited by Michael Loewe and Edward Shaughnessy, 587–650. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Makeham, John. 2003. “Zheng ming (Rectification of names).” In RoutledgeCurzon Encyclopedia of Confucianism, edited by Xinzhong Yao. Vol. 2: 813-814. New York: Routledge. Oxford Languages, n. d. “Word of the Year 2016.” Accessed 19 August 2017. https://languages.oup.com/word-of-the-year/2016/ Peters, Richard. 1979. Hobbes. Westport: Greenwood Press. Pew Research Center. 2018. “An examination of the 2016 electorate, based on validated voters.” Report, August 9, 2018. https://www.pewresearch.org/ politics/2018/08/09/an-examination-of-the-2016-electorate-based-on- validated-voters/ Plato. 1974. Republic. Translated by G. M. A. Grube. Indianapolis: Hackett. Tesich, Steve. 1992. “Watergate Syndrome: A Government of Lies.” The Nation: 12-14. January 6/13, 1992. Thucydides. 1972. The Peloponnesian War. Translated by Rex Warner. Harmondsworth, England: Penguin Books. Wolin, Sheldon. 2004. Politics and Vision: Continuity and Innovation in Westen Political Thought. Expanded Edition. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Zerilli, Linda M. G. 2020. ‘Fact-Checking and Truth-Telling in an Age of Alternative Facts.’ Le foucaldien 6, no. 1: 2, 1–22. Theresa Man Ling Lee is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Guelph (Canada). Lee is a political theorist who specializes in contemporary political thought. Her research and teaching areas include continental philosophy, Marxism and critical theory, feminism, postmodernism, philosophy of social science, psychoanalysis, multiculturalism, human rights, disability studies, modern Chinese political thought and comparative political theory. Lee has published on a wide range of subjects in these areas, including intercultural pedagogy and the challenges of teaching as a person with multiple minority designations in a Canadian university classroom.
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Please Stop Conflating Sports Betting Handle With Spending On Entertainment
Editor’s note: The Cashout for paid subscribers will publish on Tuesday. Every September there’s a huge uptick in how much people bet on sports with the start of football season. Which means it’s time to get ahead of a ridiculous narrative before it picks up steam on social media or in mainstream media. Subscribe Every few months I see some version of this: [ Charlie Bilello@charliebilello Americans bet over $165 billion on sports last year, which is more than they spent on movies, books, concerts and sports tickets - combined. 1:00 PM · Jun 28, 2026 · 4.1M Views 258 Replies · 674 Reposts · 4.23K Likes ](https://x.com/charliebilello/status/2071217050328895935?s=20) Fortune published this in July. The headline and start of the story tell the same narrative (emphasis added): Gambling becomes America’s favorite pastime as Americans spend more on sports bets than movies, arts, museums, and music combined: The North American box office totaled $8.87 billion in 2025, which is still 22% below pre-pandemic levels. Recorded music revenue hit a record $11.5 billion. Live music like concerts and festivals brought in $18.51 billion. Meanwhile, book publishers tracked by the Association of American Publishers reported $14.6 billion for the year. And the U.S. museum industry generated an estimated $16.4 billion. Add it up and the total comes to roughly $70 billion, which is less than half what Americans wagered on sports. The story, to its credit, goes on to tell us why sports betting is entirely different, although people who only read headlines will miss that nuance. (The tweet above definitely skips over the nuance.) I will mostly be preaching to the choir here, but it’s worth saying out loud: Wagering money on sports is not the same thing as spending on entertainment from a financial perspective. When you spend money on a movie or concert ticket, that money is gone. You exchanged money for an experience. It’s a good trade! I get to have fun for “x” dollars. (Unless the movie sucks, I guess.) When you bet money on sports, the money is not necessarily gone every time you wager it. It could be gone, but sometimes it’s not and you actually get more money back! That’s not “spending” money or something you should try to compare directly to entertainment spend. A far better comp would be how much people lose at sports betting. That number was more like $17 billion in the US last year, at least for state-regulated sportsbooks. Why are we trying to equate handle and entertainment spending? I dunno. It makes for splashy headlines, I guess. Now, people should be betting for entertainment, and not because they expect to win in the long term; no doubt about it. Anyway, here’s hoping I don’t see people saying Americans “spent” hundreds of millions of dollars on sports betting this fall. Mindway AI and DraftKings Expand Responsible Gaming Drive with Launch of Gamalyze American Football In time for the NFL kickoff, Mindway AI has expanded its partnership with DraftKings to launch Gamalyze American Football the second title in the neuroscience-based Gamalyze Sports collection. Following the success of Gamalyze Football (soccer) during the FIFA World Cup, this gridiron-themed update replaces static questionnaires with immersive, stadium-inspired gameplay. Backed by 10+ years of Aarhus University research, Gamalyze evaluates real-time decision-making to deliver instant, unbiased player risk assessments. Integrated into DraftKings’ platform and nationwide activations, it engages fans when excitement peaks. Ready to upgrade your player protection? Contact Mindway AI to try Gamalyze Sports today. Gambling news roundup 🚨The important stuff 1st NFL Sunday of Season ‘Champagne-Popping Day for Bettors’ (Covers): “The first NFL Sunday of the season was a champagne-popping day for bettors, while the book was left cleaning up the corks,” Caesars’ head of football Joey Feazel said prior to the Sunday night game. “Caesars Sportsbook reported that Detroit’s Jahmyr Gibbs, Baltimore’s Derrick Henry, Indianapolis’ Jonathan Taylor, and Atlanta’s Bijan Robinson were among the top five most-bet players to reach the end zone, and all of them cashed tickets.” [ Ben Fawkes@BFawkes22 A @CaesarsSports oddsmaker on how Week 1 has gone so far: “The first NFL Sunday of the season was a champagne-popping day for bettors, while the book was left cleaning up the corks.” ➡️8 of 10 most popular anytime TD scorers cashed 1:31 AM · Sep 14, 2026 · 276K Views 16 Replies · 16 Reposts · 615 Likes ](https://x.com/BFawkes22/status/2099310001927995849?s=20) 🔍 Are we already getting a “customer-friendly results” narrative in Week 1? NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell spoke with CNBC about the prediction markets industry: “We think that there needs to be stronger regulations into the predictive markets,” Goodell said. “We want to see that to protect the integrity of our game. We want to make sure we’re protecting the consumers that are on those platforms for the NFL. So, we’re continuing to have conversations with them and talk to them about the things that we think they need to do to strengthen that so that they could be potential partners at some point in the future.” More on the NFL + PMs: [ Straight to the Point Quid Pro Quo The NFL has asked Kalshi and other prediction markets to remove certain easy to manipulate markets. Does a potential partnership hang in the balance… Read more 6 hours ago · 19 likes · Steve Ruddock ](https://straighttothepoint.substack.com/p/quid-pro-quo?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=1472492) Kalshi was on my podcast?: Kalshi was on my podcast [ The Event Horizon Episode 32: Talking Prediction Market Enforcement With Kalshi’s Robert DeNault Kalshi? On my podcast? Yep… Listen now 5 hours ago · 6 likes · 1 comment · Dustin Gouker ](https://nexteventhorizon.substack.com/p/episode-32-talking-prediction-market-enforcement-kalshi?utm_source=substack&utm_campaign=post_embed&utm_medium=web&embedding_publication_id=1472492) DraftKings Enhances Responsible Engagement Efforts With New Customer Initiatives, Tools and Education (press release): DraftKings Inc. today announced a series of new initiatives designed to promote responsible engagement and increase awareness and use of the tools and resources to help customers make informed decisions and engage responsibly. The efforts include a new digital advertising campaign featuring Kevin Hart and Nick Jonas that promotes responsible engagement, a PGA TOUR sweepstakes that promotes customer engagement with responsible engagement features, the launch of Gamalyze American Football in collaboration with Mindway AI, and new custom cool-off options that give customers enhanced flexibility when choosing a cool-off period. The initiatives build on DraftKings’ commitment to making responsible engagement an integral part of the customer experience and providing players with accessible tools and resources that help them make informed choices about their gaming experience. “At DraftKings, responsible engagement is embedded in how we operate and is essential to building trust with our customers and our long-term sustainability,” said Lori Kalani, Chief Responsible Gaming Officer at DraftKings. “We’ve continued to invest in tools and resources that give customers enhanced access to information about their play and more choices for managing how they engage. From My Budget Builder and My Stat Sheet to player-set limits and new custom cool-offs, we’re continuing to evolve our approach while promoting awareness and use of the tools and resources available to help customers play responsibly.” … DraftKings is launching a new digital advertising campaign featuring Kevin Hart and Nick Jonas that continues the pair’s road trip and promotes responsible engagement and awareness of the tools and resources available to help customers make informed choices about their gaming experience and engage responsibly. The campaign was initially launched on Sep. 10th and will reach customers through digital channels, bringing responsible engagement messaging to fans in an engaging way. bet365 Launches “The Matchup,” a New Weekly Video Podcast Hosted by Super Bowl Champions Chris Harris Jr. and Emmanuel Sanders (press release): "bet365, a global leader in online sports betting and gaming, today announced the launch of “The Matchup,” a new weekly video podcast hosted by former Super Bowl Champions Chris Harris Jr. and Emmanuel Sanders. Featuring current and former NFL players, the original series marks a significant, intentional investment in football as bet365 works to become a go-to destination for U.S. bettors throughout the season. “The Matchup” premieres September 10, with new episodes released weekly in both video and audio formats. Full episodes will be available on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever podcasts are available, with clips and additional content rolling out across YouTube, X, Instagram, Facebook, Threads, and TikTok. The show is being produced by Last Row Digital Media. Each week, Harris and Sanders will be joined by guests from across the game to break down the biggest NFL matchups, unpack the latest league news and share perspectives that go beyond the box score. By bringing together two former players with distinct perspectives and firsthand experience, “The Matchup” will give audiences timely context and a deeper understanding of the teams, players and storylines shaping the week ahead. “Every great football conversation starts with a matchup—who has the edge, what everyone is overlooking and what could change the game,” said Chris Harris Jr. “Emmanuel and I have experienced the game from different perspectives, and we want the audience to feel like they are part of the conversation and leave every episode knowing more about the week ahead.” Today’s iGaming companies face new litigation threats as expansive consumer protection statutes spark lawsuits with sky’s-the-limit aspirations, sometimes backed by private funders. Clients of Ifrah Law have a staunch defender in Robert Ward – an agile litigator and case tactician who responds to the changing state of play with creative legal defenses and efficient case-closing strategies. Robert draws on federal clerkship experience and appellate defense work to advise iGaming clients on litigation exposure, white-collar risk, and regulatory defense across multiple jurisdictions. Read More: Robert Ward on Helping iGaming Clients Outmaneuver Lawsuit-Obsessed Adversaries 🔮 Prediction markets Update on legal action in Connecticut: [ Daniel Wallach@WALLACHLEGAL Connecticut says gaming service license holders which received subpoenas over sports prediction markets “are not under investigation” by the @CTDCP but may possess information that could assist the state “in evaluating the conduct of prediction market platforms.” 2:31 PM · Sep 13, 2026 · 844 Views 5 Likes ](https://x.com/WALLACHLEGAL/status/2099143914271670576?s=20) American Gaming Association Opposes CFTC Bid to Block New York Prediction-Market Enforcement (DeFi Rate): “The brief points to the Ninth Circuit’s Aug. 28 decision in KalshiEX LLC v. Assad, which the AGA says supports New York’s authority to regulate sports contracts as gambling. It also cites Kalshi advertising, product comparisons and reporting on Kalshi’s sports volume to argue that the economic product resembles a sportsbook wager more than a conventional financial hedge.” [ Daniel Wallach@WALLACHLEGAL AGA intervenes in CFTC v. NY case to oppose CFTC request for preliminary injunction, says the CFTC’s arguments “obfuscate a simple truth: prediction markets offer sports betting.” Highlights CA9 decision, @DustinGouker (6x), and $1.32 billion in OSB taxes for NY (0 from PMs). Daniel Wallach @WALLACHLEGAL High stakes hearing on Monday in CFTC v. New York State. If SDNY judge Lorna Schofield denies the CFTC’s motion for preliminary injunction, the New York AG would have a clearer path for securing a state court geofencing order against Kalshi, Coinbase, and Gemini Titan. 2:08 AM · Sep 13, 2026 · 4.78K Views 1 Reply · 2 Reposts · 8 Likes ](https://x.com/WALLACHLEGAL/status/2098957043474280584?s=20) Gaming Commission remains member of gambling council after questions raised over ties to Kalshi (Mass Live): “The Massachusetts Gaming Commission will not follow the leads of gaming regulators in Ohio and Michigan and drop ties with the National Council on Problem Gambling over its new association with Kalshi.” Sponsor’s messageTrusted Voices: Conversations About Betting is designed to equip adults, including parents and coaches, with tools and resources to talk to young people about gambling, including information on warning signs, risks and proxy betting. The program is led by retired professional basketball player Randy Livingston and his wife, basketball agent Anita Smith, who share their personal stories related to problem gambling, with the hope of preventing others from experiencing similar harms. Learn more and join the conversation here. 📣 Industry news Gaming M&A: Latest Mergers, Acquisitions and Deals (SBC Americas): “But what else is happening in the world of gaming mergers, acquisitions, investments, and partnerships? Here, we round up some of the news you might have missed.” BetMGM Named Official Sports Betting and Online Casino Partner of the Minnesota Vikings in Canada (press release): BetMGM, a leading iGaming and sports betting operator, announced a multi-year partnership with the Minnesota Vikings, naming it the Official Sports Betting Partner and Online Casino Partner of the team in Canada. The agreement gives BetMGM rights to use Vikings marks across approved sports betting, online casino and marketing activities in Canada. In addition, Vikings Big Kick LuckyTap™, a casino game by Design Works Gaming, is available now exclusively at BetMGM Casino in Alberta and Ontario. “Vikings fans bring a level of passion and loyalty that extends well beyond game day,” said Matt Prevost, Chief Revenue Officer at BetMGM. “As the home of one of the largest collections of sports-themed casino content in North America, BetMGM is uniquely positioned to combine sports fandom with iGaming. We are eager to start football season off strong with another fantastic partnership especially as we expand our reach in Canada to Alberta.” Martin Nance, Minnesota Vikings Chief Marketing Officer, said, “As we continue to deepen our connection with Vikings fans across Canada, we’re proud to welcome BetMGM as the team’s official sports betting and online casino partner in Canada. Their commitment to innovation and fan engagement aligns well with our organization, and we’re excited to create memorable experiences that celebrate Vikings football and connect with Canadian fans in new and meaningful ways.” Caesars Entertainment Launches Ball Rush Jackpots™ in New Jersey,the Latest Proprietary Online Title from Empire Creative™ (press release): Caesars Entertainment, Inc. (NASDAQ: CZR) (“Caesars”) today announced the launch of Ball Rush Jackpots™, a new ball-and-peg style online casino game developed by Empire Creative™, the Company’s in-house game development studio. Now live in New Jersey across Caesars Palace Online Casino, Caesars Sportsbook & Casino and Horseshoe Online Casino, Ball Rush Jackpots is expected to become available in additional jurisdictions where Caesars offers online casino gaming following regulatory approval. The title expands Caesars’ growing portfolio of proprietary online casino titles, following the successful launch of Ca$hline™ earlier this year and further diversifying the Company’s lineup beyond traditional slots and table games. Ball Rush Jackpots follows the traditional ball-drop gameplay experience where players drop a ball down a board filled with pegs to land in a prize slot. As balls navigate independently through a field of pegs, every drop creates new opportunities to collect feature symbols, unlock bonuses and pursue jackpots, delivering a different experience with every round. “Ball Rush Jackpots delivers a different kind of casino experience for our players, combining easy-to-understand gameplay with meaningful customization, exciting bonus opportunities and jackpot potential,” said Matthew Sunderland, Senior Vice President and Chief iGaming Officer at Caesars Digital. “As we continue expanding our proprietary content portfolio, we’re focused on creating games that are simple to pick up, rewarding to revisit and designed around the features players enjoy most.” Bally’s Corporation Secures New Financing to Support the Development of the Bally’s Bronx Project (press release): Bally’s Corporation (NYSE: BALY) (“Bally’s” or the “Company”) announced today that it secured new financing led by WhiteHawk Capital Partners, LP to fund further development of the Bally’s Bronx project and general corporate purposes. The new financing comprises closing date term loan commitments in an aggregate principal amount of $400 million and delayed draw term loan commitments in an aggregate principal amount of $160 million (together, the “Facilities”). … Bally’s Chairman of the Board, Soo Kim, commented, “This important financing allows us to progress the pre-construction planning process so that we are ready to complete the remainder of the capital raise and remain on schedule. Furthermore, the additional liquidity provides us greater flexibility for other capital opportunities.” WORLD JAI ALAI LEAGUE LAUNCHES CENTENNIAL SEASON AND ENTERS NEXT CHAPTER IN MIAMI (press release): The World Jai Alai League will open its 2026 fall season on Tuesday, September 15 at Miami’s JAM Arena, beginning a milestone season that marks 100 years since professional Jai Alai first arrived in Miami. Season X, the tenth season of the Battle Court team-based competition launched in 2022, will also be the first since entrepreneur and sports asset investor Rob Gough acquired the World Jai Alai League in August 2026. The acquisition marks the beginning of a new chapter for the league. World Jai Alai League will maintain the existing Battle Court competition and operating format, with Chief Operating Officer Scott Savin overseeing Season X. Gough and his team will use the coming months to listen to players and fans, evaluate opportunities across the league, and execute plans for a broader evolution of Jai Alai’s presentation, live experience, media, marketing and commercial strategy beginning in 2027. “This is a really unique moment for Jai Alai,” said Rob Gough, Owner of the World Jai Alai League. “We have a sport with more than 100 years of history in Miami, extraordinary athletes and incredible speed, but I also believe there is enormous untapped potential.” bet365 reveals most popular online slots in 3 US states in August (SBC Americas): “In its monthly Gaming Insights and Performance report, growing online casino operator bet365 tracks player trends and game performance in online slots across its North American online casino markets.” The Closing Line is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber. Subscribe
Marathon Delays New Content And Ditches Seasons As Bungie's Extraction Shooter Fights For Its Life
Things are looking bad
When extra work goes unpaid: Protecting payment rights on Idaho construction projects
This article explains how contractors in Idaho can protect payment rights for extra work on construction projects through documentation and lien laws.
Raiders Week 1 performance 'extra special' for Maxx Crosby
Sunday's win was 'extra special' for Raiders DE Maxx Crosby after an emotional rollercoaster offseason.
China’s FAST telescope maps neutral hydrogen, the cosmic gas for making stars
Survey identifies more than 156,000 extragalactic sources, offering an unprecedented pool for studying the universe’s biggest questions.
Harrisburg beats O’Gorman by one in 48th Dakota Bowl
SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO) — A missed extra point was the difference between #3 O’Gorman and #5 Harrisburg in the 48th annual Bob Burns Dakota Bowl, and this year the visiting Tigers will head back home with the win, 21-20. O’Gorman scored on their first drive of the ballgame, a long sustained push capped off […]
Falcons Have Extra Reason for Cooper Rush Worry
The Atlanta Falcons are already in a less-than-ideal spot for Week 1. They’ll be starting Cooper Rush at quarterback on Sunday against the Pittsburgh Steelers, on the road, because Tua Tagovailoa and Michael Penix will both miss the season opener due to injury. Rush has been mostly a backup in his career, with fill-in stints […] The post Falcons Have Extra Reason for Cooper Rush Worry appeared first on HEAVY.
The politics and possibilities of ‘AI could kill us all’
I found myself fielding a lot of questions from folks who don’t usually talk much about AI this week. They were mostly along the lines of “do you think AI is going to kill us all?” or “how worried should I be about this human extinction stuff?” Motivating this wave of existential anxiety was the highly dramatic resignation of now-former Anthropic employee Jacob Coxon, who quit his job while publicly sharing his concerns about safety practices at the leading AI companies. More specifically, he declared that almost everyone at OpenAI and Anthropic, the leading AI labs, believes that there’s a decent chance the AI systems they’re producing could “kill us all” by the end of the decade, and the companies aren’t “acting responsibly.” Other AI safety researchers, including those still employed at Anthropic and OpenAI, all confirmed that yes, Coxon is correct, they’re all worried that their company’s products might prove fatal for the entire human race as well. Two more AI employees quit and joined the chorus. Now, the warning shot has been covered everywhere from the Wall Street Journal to Fox News to WIRED to the Guardian. I understand why all this sounds scary, but my response to those who have asked, has generally been: No, you don’t need to worry that AI will kill go rogue and kill us all. But that does not mean we shouldn’t worry, period. Far from it. The companies building AI products are now among the wealthiest and most powerful entities in the world. And they very much are building enormous engines of mass surveillance, extraction, and automation. They can and have allowed their AI systems to carry out felony hacks of other companies, provided the government with autonomously generated kill lists, and sold enterprise technology to firms around the world that is explicitly intended to replace jobs. But “AI” has done these things not because they have all-powerful minds of their own but, ultimately, because people have programmed, calibrated, and directed them to. In other words, it’s not AI we need to worry the most about. It’s the people and corporations working to profit from and gain power by deploying it. The technology is sophisticated, sure, and, especially in cybersecurity contexts, potentially disruptive to plenty of existing systems. But if we want to stop this predatory, profiteering, and extractive form of AI—and it’s worth noting that at this point, most people do—we absolutely can. A quick note/plea: I can only do all of this with the support of readers like you, so if you find value in independent, critical tech journalism and analysis, please consider becoming a paid subscriber. I want to keep as much of this un-paywalled as absolutely possible, and I need your support to do so. Many thanks to all who continue to chip in, it’s very much appreciated. Onward. Subscribe First, some context: AI industry folks like Coxon have been discussing the prospect that AI will destroy humanity for years. Even before the beginning of the AI boom, many working in the industry, from the executive staff to the rank and file researchers, have obsessed over ‘x-risk’, or the possibility that AI will become sentient or semi-sentient and move one way or another to exterminate humanity. This is ostensibly why Elon Musk bankrolled OpenAI in the first place, and is the grounds for his lawsuit alleging OpenAI betrayed its charter by abandoning its nonprofit status to become a commercial enterprise. Many AI engineers and startup founders have calculated their own personal p(doom), or the probability that the tech product they are working on will initiate an actual humanity-extinguishing apocalypse. 10-25% p(doom)s are pretty common. (I wrote about a long weekend I spent among these folks at one of their top conferences here, to give you an idea of their ideas and belief systems.) Sam Altman himself drove the narrative of the imminent rise of a super-powerful AI, or artificial general intelligence, to prominence by declaring that the technology he was building posed an existential risk to humanity. This idea is in other words baked into the DNA of modern AI companies and into the products they engineer. It’s also why the industry is routinely accused, by myself and others, of “doom marketing,” ie, using such proclamations and framings to impart the sheer power of the technology behind your product onto investors, partners, consumers, and the state. Some ambient understanding of this tendency may have helped prevent the press from repeating the claim every time one of the x-risk folks made it over the years, including when they quit their jobs at AI companies while doing so. Yet Coxon’s AI x-risk alarm has broken containment, as they say, and has exposed the idea to the mainstream media once again. This has happened, I think, for a number of reasons. First, when AI CEOs were going around saying AI might kill everyone in 2023, their companies were well-capitalized, but not nearly to the extent they are today. They were more easily dismissed as eccentric geeks of the sort that Silicon Valley is supposed to produce. Now, not only do their products have much greater market saturation, but people are more aware of a) the often unethical ways the executives and companies comport themselves b) the other adverse impacts of AI that have already arrived, and c) the physical cost of building these systems, particularly when it comes to data centers. Finally, toss in the constant stream of headlines in 2026 about AI models going rogue or potentially upending the world’s infrastructure. [ ](https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/with-the-backlash-to-data-centers) [ With the backlash to data centers, Flock and AI glasses, a mass opposition to big tech is underway. Silicon Valley is in denial. ](https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/with-the-backlash-to-data-centers) Brian Merchant · Aug 27 [ Read full story ](https://www.bloodinthemachine.com/p/with-the-backlash-to-data-centers) As a result, general sentiment was already overwhelmingly skeptical of AI and its overlords, so the table was pretty well set for someone to come along and say ‘just a reminder, the companies that are building the product that promises to take your job and leave a data center in your neighborhood also think that it might exterminate the human race’ and get a strong reaction from the media and the public. The question is: Should we understand this stuff as hype, strategically fanned to feed already swelling valuations? Is it doom marketing? Genuine cause for alarm that the infrastructure that undergirds modern life is facing a novel threat vector? Or reason to be sincerely worried that AI companies are amassing too much power, and that their products are genuinely dangerous? The answer, I’m afraid, is “yes.” Let me try to untangle all of this a bit, because arguments over how to navigate this moment are extremely heated right now, as they are essentially arguments over how to approach the politics of AI at a moment where there may be a unique opening for action. Those sympathetic to AI alignment concerns and x risk arguments—which increasingly includes a faction on the left who want to shut down AI over safety concerns—argue that people who dismiss AI as all hype have their heads in the sand. Meanwhile, critics of the x-risk narrative—which I might note includes a cadre of investors and tech folks on the right, too—argue that it is hype and can be used to further inflate valuations or for pursuing regulatory capture. The challenge is that many feel that dismissing AI as just hype or purely marketing also diminishes the urgency of taking on the AI industry as the novel and threat to labor, civil society, and the public sphere it is; others that by accepting the industry’s own terms, we imbue it with undue power and enable it. But let’s be clear: Declarations that AI is so powerful it might end the world are a kind of marketing, and anyone who says otherwise is just as off base as those who say that’s all that it is. If you don’t think that these sub-trillion dollar companies have higher-ups who noticed that when their founders talked about super-powerful dangerous AI they got spikes in media interest and phone calls from investors, or that those founders didn’t notice that themselves, and lean into certain narratives to advantage their products, then I don’t know what to tell you. Not all marketing is a Pepsi ad campaign with a celebrity spokesperson. Yet confronting the AI industry should certainly be considered an urgent project. Do I share the x-riskers’ fear that out-of-control, super-intelligent AI agents might end the world? I do not. I’ve read a good deal of AI extinction literature over the last couple of years and I have not come across a credible, step-by-step documentation of how exactly AI might move from self-recursively improving AI to killing every single human on the planet. Most of what I’ve read seems predicated on a sort of reverse Ian Malcolmian logic: Eventually, it becomes smart enough and AI, uh, finds a way (to exterminate humanity). Are the AI companies also overstating and dramatizing what their products can do? Yes, pretty much all the time. They’re in a knife fight for market share and are trying to win customers and government contracts before their investors come knocking. And yet. They have concentrated enormous amounts of compute, have extensive data collection and surveillance capacities, have inserted themselves into the state in numerous capacities, including military kill chains, and they are being run by egomaniacal billionaires who are rushing to monopolize an entire new market. The way I think about their most recent frightening-seeming exploits is not as a “swarm of rogue AI agents building a new civilization” or whatever, but as corporations with a hitherto-unimaginable amount of compute at their disposal recklessly experimenting with automation programs, completely unafraid of any repercussions because we have been unwilling or unable to impose any on them. So I think we should welcome any newfound imperative to hold them accountable. I also think that ultimately, the AI critics, Pause AI folks, leftists, doomers, effective altruists, and, honestly, most of the public, want a lot of the same things: legitimate checks and limits on AI companies’ power, actual transparency into what the companies are doing, and for more of AI to be under public control. (Ultimately, a lot of what animates the x-risk fears are rooted in just that: a fear of losing control.) How we move towards all this, exactly, is the question of the day, and while there’s much to be argued over in terms of building a viable political platform to challenge the AI industry’s power, I do want to cast a vote against one particular approach. Not to pick on Chris here, as there are a lot of folks out there proposing stuff like this, and the policy ideas actually stem from AI safety groups. But not only would this be challenging to land politically (I can already hear the ‘China will beat us to AGI’ calls) and all but unworkable in practice, this approach is a) far too limiting, b) fails to address the current harms caused by AI and c) would likely only wind up serving Anthropic and OpenAI; it’s what regulatory capture looks like in action. Full model transparency is the floor for what should be on offer here. If these companies believe their products will kill us, the very least we deserve is to know how. It’s in the public interest. I would also argue we might get a lot of the way to stopping any currently envisioned robot apocalypse simply by forcing AI companies to assume liability, and to submit to the full brunt of the law. If Sam Altman were liable to be charged with a felony for approving the hack on Hugging Face1, if Google was forced to pay defamation fines each time it published a false and injurious AI Overviews, these companies might suddenly find cause to restrain their models’ output, and we might hear less about rogue AI. We would need to introduce new frameworks and available tools for tracking automated lawbreaking, to be sure, but I’d wager that little would frighten the AI companies more than actually being held accountable for what their products enable. To that end, Illinois has passed an AI liability law, which the industry fought tooth and nail, and Florida is considering one. The next steps would be towards moving AI under public control; again, it’s only reasonable, since everyone, not just AI insiders, should get a say over how a technology whose developers say might kill us is developed and deployed. Dismantling the whole industrial project as currently structured should be on the table, too, pending democratic input. But that’s for another post. For now, suffice to say that while I won’t be losing any sleep about an AI-enabled extinction event, Mr. Coxon and co. have given us an opportunity to underscore the urgency of the clear and present damage AI companies are doing, the extreme power they wield and the extent to which they hold themselves unaccountable, and the abundance of political capital there is out there for taking them on. Subscribe 1 Purely speculative! I do not know if he did or not.
Extra Point, Week Three: Providence Christian hosts Bayshore Christian
The dirtiest places on an airplane; testing for a breast cancer gene mutation; the evolution of esophageal cancer; plus other stories with Vanderbilt Health sources
William Schaffner, MD, Professor of Preventive Medicine, was quoted by several news outlets about public health issues, including: WKRN News 2 (heat-related illness); NBC News (how bad will flu and COVID be this winter?); AAA’s The Extra Mile (the dirtiest places on an airplane); WKRN News 2 (again) (measles in Tennessee); and The Tennessean and Healthline (new COVID vaccines). Schaffner also spoke to the EMJ European Medical Journal for a Q&A interview. Tuya Pal, MD, Professor of Medicine, was quoted in a New York Times story about testing for a breast cancer gene mutation. Michael Gibson, MD, PhD, Professor of Medicine, was quoted in a MedPage Today story about the epidemiologic evolution of esophageal cancer. Medpage Today writer Shannon Fritz quoted Shravani Durbhakula, MD, Associate Professor of Pain Medicine, who answered questions about a street drug called cychlorphine. Becker’s Behavioral Health picked up the story. WSMV Channel 4 News reporter Diana Rocco interviewed Michael Caucci, MD, Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Obstetrics and Gynecology, for a story about postpartum psychosis and the trial of Lindsay Clancy.
Collins calls Trump’s $5K checks ‘extraordinarily expensive’
A spokeswoman for Collins’ opponent, Democrat Troy Jackson, said Trump doesn’t live up to his promises.
Pete Davidson says the 25th anniversary of dad’s death on 9/11 is ‘extra tough’ and ‘extra beautiful’
The comedian also revealed how he and his daughter Scottie feel his late dad’s presence.
Life Science Core Day to connect Cornell’s facility resources with researchers
Life Science Core Day, taking place Sept. 22, offers Cornell researchers a chance to explore an extraordinary range of specialized life science core facilities, technologies, and expertise available to them from across campus in one place.
“Harry Potter” star reveals ‘most extraordinary’ act of kindness Alan Rickman did on set before his death
“He was such a darling like that,” said Sirius Black actor Gary Oldman at the Toronto International Film Festival.
Doing business in Canada: Business organization and corporate governance
Businesses establishing a presence in Canada typically choose among incorporation (federally under the Canada Business Corporations Act (CBCA) or under an equivalent provincial statute), partnership (general, limited or limited liability, depending on the province), joint venture, sole proprietorship, or extra-provincial registration of an existing foreign entity as a branch.
Teams need to adapt to fixture scheduling
Manchester City manager Enzo Maresca says teams "need to adapt" to the fixture scheduling as his side head into Sunday's derby with two days extra rest over rivals Manchester United.
'We were wearing masks on the bus'
Swimmer Keanna MacInnes believes the extra measures the Scottish and British teams have taken to ensure their competitors stay healthy has been a big factor behind her own breakthrough summer.
Don't buy the 'regular' AirPods 5
The first time you need to adjust volume, you’ll wish you’d spent that extra $20.
Extradition is becoming a political football — here’s how the states can stop it
A governor who wants to shield someone from a prosecution he objects to, or from a sister state whose politics he finds distasteful, may simply keep an extradition demand “under investigation” inde…
Supreme Court again rejects GOP-friendly congressional map in Missouri for midterms
The Supreme Court sided with opponents of a Republican-friendly congressional map in Missouri on Thursday, handing down a quick decision rejecting a plan that could have given the GOP an extra seat in the House of Representatives.
Do black holes have hidden hair? Scientists are searching
If black holes have extra matter around them – aka hidden hair – astronomers could find it by measuring the different characteristics of these ripples.
Out & About: A weekly guide to live and local entertainment
Thursday, Sept. 10 Music
Trump’s Convention Offers an Unusual Fund-Raising Opportunity for Republicans
Republicans are hoping to use the Dallas extravaganza as a fund-raising opportunity, with some local parties charging as much as $20,000 to be an “honorary delegate.”
Héctor Socas, astrophysicist: ‘If a more advanced civilization contacted us, they should be more afraid of us than we are of them’
Artificial intelligence, extraterrestrial life, the climate crisis, the future of work and global governance. This science communicator uses the lens of science to tackle a much broader question: what kind of civilization do we want to be?
iPhone Duo's Interface Is iPad-Like, With Some Extra Tricks
Using multiple apps at once? You bet.
The Tate brothers must stay locked up during their UK extradition fight, US judge says
A federal judge in Miami has ruled that social media influencers Andrew and Tristan Tate must remain in custody as they fight extradition to the United Kingdom.
Carrick on Shaw, 'magical' Champions League and Sabah
Manchester United boss Michael Carrick has been speaking to the media before Thursday's Champions League fixture against Sabah at Old Trafford (kick-off 20:00 BST). Defender Luke Shaw has been given an extra recovery day and they will know by Thursday whether he will be in the squad. Dutch defender Matthijs de Ligt has trained well and is "on good track" to make a return soon but United have to "get the balance right" for the next steps.
Luma locks down 15-year, $410M fund for life science investments
Luma Group today announced the final close of its inaugural life sciences venture capital fund, totaling $410 million. The New York-based investment firm has had a grip on life sciences since its founding in 2023. The funds unveiled today, dubbed LumaBio Fund I, include investments that have already been made into more than 10 biotechs. They include the likes of eye disease-focused Character Biosciences, rebranded Belgian biotech Coultreon Biopharma and cellular rejuvenation company Altos Labs. The fund saw early success when one of the companies it co-founded, called Vaccine Company, was picked up by Eli Lilly earlier this year for up to $1.55 billion. The acquisition of the in vivo nanoparticle technology-focused biotech formed part of a trio of vaccine buys for the Big Pharma, which has itself been on a prolonged spending spree in 2026. Luma's fund is structured as a 15-year investment with plans to support groundbreaking science and support companies through key milestones from discovery to commercialization, Luma explained in the release. "We founded Luma Group on the belief that extraordinary science, supported by patient, long-term capital, has the power to improve millions of lives," Joshua Fink, founder and managing member of Luma Group, said in the release. "This fund represents more than capital—it is a commitment to partnering with extraordinary innovators as they translate visionary science into life-changing medicines."
Scientists in Switzerland made a sponge from cheesemaking waste that captures gold from discarded electronics — after dissolving metal parts from 20 old computer motherboards, they recovered enough to melt into a 22-carat gold nugget
A Swiss lab transformed dairy waste into a gold-recovery tool, extracting precious metal from e-waste that most recyclers leave behind.
Have we found alien life? Hundreds of scientists weigh in
Two major alien-life announcements in 2025 generated enormous excitement, but most astrobiologists remained unconvinced. Only 6.6% of surveyed experts thought possible biological molecules on K2-18b probably represented extraterrestrial life, while 15.1% said the same about intriguing mineral patterns in a Martian rock.
Supreme Court rejects Missouri’s request to use congressional map with extra GOP seat
The Supreme Court on Tuesday denied Missouri’s request to use a congressional map for the November midterm election that would have given Republicans a chance to flip a seat, a rare setback for the GOP’s effort to keep control of the House next year by eking out an advantage from its political boundaries.
Kansas State Adds Former Temple CB Ben Osueke
Temple Owls cornerback Ben Osueke was granted an extra year of eligibility and has decided to play for the Kansas State Wildcats
Behind the scenes of Hard Rock Casino Tejon’s Third Eye Blind private concert
METTLER, Calif. (KGET) — An extra special concert took place Monday night at Hard Rock Casino Tejon. 17 News got an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to prepare for the Third …
AZ's R&D chief Barr touts internal 'science success story' after IL-33 antibody's stellar showing in COPD
With a detailed data drop that AstraZeneca’s R&D chief described as an internal “science success story,” the British Big Pharma has secured an FDA priority review for what it believes could become a flagship biologic in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). In detailed results from the late-stage Oberon and Titania trials—first teased in March and detailed in full at the European Respiratory Society Congress in Barcelona this week—the drugmaker laid out the extent of its IL-33 inhibitor’s potential to reduce moderate and severe exacerbations in a wide range of COPD patients still struggling with those “lung attacks,” as AstraZeneca’s Sharon Barr, Ph.D., called them, despite using standard-care inhaled therapy. In the headline results, a 300 mg dose of tozorakimab given once every four weeks curbed those moderate and severe exacerbations in the studies’ primary population of former smokers by 29% in the Oberon study and 34% in Titania. In the overall population of both current and former smokers, these reductions were 30% and 29%, respectively, versus placebo and inhaled standard of care. The benefits also extended to clinically meaningful exacerbation reductions in all prespecified patient subgroups and specifically turned up promising signals in patients across a range of blood eosinophil counts, with Barr telling Fierce that “it’s the details that make this even more exciting than the high-level results that we’ve already shared.” In fact, during AZ’s tozorakimab poster presentation at the ERS 2026 Congress this past weekend, attendees were so enamored by the data that event organizers had to encourage people to clear the room and look at the other presentations on offer, Barr said in an interview. “I think it really speaks to the fact that there is a lot of buzz around these data because the entire respiratory community has been so desperate for new therapies for these patients,” she explained. The respiratory disease continues to represent a “staggering unmet medical need,” Barr said, highlighting the COPD exacerbations that the Oberon and Titania studies homed in on, which she added carry a greater mortality risk than a heart attack. “When a patient has a severe exacerbation, only about half of them are still alive within three and a half years,” she pointed out. As for tozorakimab specifically, Barr christened the molecule “an AstraZeneca science success story,” harkening several years back to the point at which researchers began to explore IL-33 as a driver of respiratory disease, and COPD in particular. At the same time, “there was still so much that wasn’t understood,” she admitted, highlighting the insight that IL-33 signals through both ST2 and EGFR through the RAGE pathway, a discovery Barr attributed to AstraZeneca's own scientists. Understanding the need to tackle both pathways in COPD—and aware of competitor candidates in the hopper, including one that bound ST2—the company ultimately had to make some “courageous decisions,” Barr said. These included taking a prior COPD molecule offline and going back to the drawing board to reinvent its potential IL-33 label “to make sure that we had a molecule that could block signaling through both arms of the pathway, through both the reduced form and the oxidized form, knowing that we wouldn’t be first, but striving to be best.” “When we put [tozorakimab] into the clinic, we firmly believed that we had a differentiated molecule, and we saw the other molecules blocking just ST2 or partially blocking IL-33, unable to deliver two positive pivotal studies in COPD,” Barr explained. “We kept marching forward because we believed our molecule was differentiated, and now I think we have the clinical validation that supports that.” Ultimately, AstraZeneca finds itself on much better footing these days when it comes to potential biologic rivals to tozorakimab in COPD. Sanofi and Regeneron’s Dupixent, for instance, is approved to treat COPD exacerbations in patients with high eosinophil counts, but not low ones. Meanwhile, the future has become cloudier for other next-gen IL-33 candidates from Sanofi and Regeneron, as well as Roche, which have suffered trial flops in recent years. One other potential ingredient for AstraZeneca’s success in its duo of studies was that the company was “ambitious in the trial design, willing to look at an all-comers population,” Barr said, “and willing to enroll the most severe patients.” Prior studies for would-be biologics rivals in COPD “avoided enrolling” those patients, she pointed out. She also highlighted the Big Pharma’s painstaking design of exacerbations in its trial, which “gave us a very rigorous readout,” and pointed to “the extra effort and investment” the company put in to understand the effect of mucus plugs in patients. Barr described mucus production as a “key feature in disease diversity,” noting that mucus plugs—obstructing clumps of mucus that block patients’ airways—are associated with worse outcomes in COPD. In its data announcement, AstraZeneca noted that an integrated analysis of Oberon and Titania found tozorakimab “demonstrated a reduction in patients’ mucus plug score,” with the pharma claiming its biologic is the first to deliver such results in a broad COPD population. “So being able to reduce those mucus plugs, we expect, is an important part of driving benefit for patients who are living with COPD,” Barr said. Again touching on the breadth of the study populations, Barr added that tozorakimab “worked across all eosinophil levels in both current and former smokers across all levels of lung function,” which she suggested “really simplifies decision-making for clinicians, and it allows them to offer therapy to the broadest possible patient population.” In the highest patient eosinophil count group, tozorakimab helped chart a 43% reduction in exacerbation risk, which Barr stressed were “unprecedented data.” In the mid-level group, AZ’s drug delivered a 23% reduction and, in the lowest group, a 34% reduction in eosinophils, which Barr said suggests efficacy “in all patient subgroups.” As for AZ’s recent guidance upgrade on the medicine’s sales opportunity, the lift from a $3 billion to $5 billion range to $5 billion plus was informed by multiple factors, Barr said, including the fact that “in 2024, there were multiple competitors, and there aren’t anymore.” Additionally, “we know that this is a massive unmet medical need, and this is a really incredible set of data that we think will be very convincing to the clinical community,” Barr said. Looking ahead to a potential evolution of the COPD treatment landscape, Barr noted that most patients start treatment in the community with an option like a triple therapy, and for them, having an option like AstraZeneca’s inhaler Breztri will remain a “really important part” of that journey. But of the patients uncontrolled on triple therapy, which Barr described as “about half of them today,” just a “small fraction” are currently eligible for biologic therapy, which she emphasized AstraZeneca is working to change. Understanding that COPD is not a “one-size-fits-all” disease, AstraZeneca is also looking at its antibody drug Tezspire for patients with T2-driven disease, and the company continues to think about new mechanisms for tackling COPD through both systemic and inhaled drugs, Barr said.
Texas says 5th year OL Cole Hutson currently ineligible
Hutson sued the NCAA in Texas state court in July for an extra year of college eligibility after the NCAA announced a new plan for athletes to have five years once they enter college.
Walking an extra 1,000 steps a day may help your heart, study finds
Here’s the latest science on how many steps you actually need every day.
Walking an extra 1,000 steps a day may help your heart, study finds
Here’s the latest science on how many steps you actually need every day.
Giants Survive Cardinals Rally in 11 Innings
Shay Whitcomb’s walk-off heroics secured a gritty San Francisco Giants victory after a late bullpen collapse forced an extra-inning battle against the St. Louis Cardinals.
Headline Booking Celebrates 15 Years of Creating Extraordinary Live Entertainment Experiences
Entertainment company marks 15 years of connecting private clients, corporations and charitable organizations with world-class headline talent.
NFL QB Legend Kurt Warner Has Blunt Message to Sports Critics
Kurt Warner has seen the pressure that comes with professional football from nearly every possible angle, and the NFL legend recently delivered a blunt message to sports critics. The Hall of Fame quarterback expressed frustration with the growing tendency to attack athletes online as though performing under extraordinary pressure should be effortless. Warner acknowledged that […] The post NFL QB Legend Kurt Warner Has Blunt Message to Sports Critics appeared first on Gridiron Heroics.