The psychology of overconfidence: why excessive self-belief is often a successful strategy in life
Nicoleta Ionescu/Shutterstock People are overconfident, on the whole. Most of us believe we are more intelligent, more skilful or better drivers than the average person. But we can’t all be right. Such beliefs are not harmless. Overconfidence – and the self-deception that drives this excessive self-belief – can contribute to extreme risk-taking, failed businesses, disastrous […]
Museums face growing cyber threats but security remains an afterthought
Up to 1,500 items were identified as missing or stolen from the British Museum following a review of its collection in 2023. Flik47/Shutterstock In the last few years, some of the UK’s biggest cultural institutions have experienced major threats to their security. A report by the public accounts committee (PAC) has warned that such incidents […]
Dash for Ceuta adds heat to Europe’s migration debate
At a time when the debate over migration is drawing a great deal of heat, Spain has stood out in Europe for its liberal stance. Six months ago, the government of Pedro Sánchez opened up a pathway to legal residency for hundreds of thousands of undocumented migrants. So, when tens of thousands of migrants crossed […]
Online shadow libraries – and why they’re being implicated in AI copyright lawsuits
won gou choi/Shutterstock A few days before Christmas 2025, a secretive online activist group called Anna’s Archive said it had downloaded roughly 86 million audio files and 256 million rows of track metadata from Spotify’s catalogue. Anna’s Archive is a shadow library. It holds one of the world’s largest online collection of pirated books, academic […]
Catherine Opie: To Be Seen – who gets to be visible, belong and be remembered?
This summer, as Edinburgh comes alive with the Festival, one of the most significant figures in contemporary photography comes to Scotland for the first time. Curated in collaboration with the artist, Catherine Opie: To Be Seen at the Royal Scottish Academy features nearly 80 works spanning more than three decades of her pioneering photography. Across […]
What Spider-Man: Brand New Day can teach us about loss and grief
This article contains spoilers for Spider-man: Brand New Day Spider-Man’s origin story in the comics is rooted in the death of his Uncle Ben. He is a hero driven by grief – on a mission, to begin with, to avenge his uncle’s death. In the latest iteration of Spider-Man, however, his grief is different. In […]
We might soon have the technology to reach other star systems
The recent confirmation of an atmosphere around a rocky exoplanet called LHS 1140b has created a wave of interest within the astronomy community. The planet orbits within the habitable zone around its parent star – a red dwarf located some 48 light years from Earth. The habitable zone is the region around the star where […]
Prisoner release: Andy Burnham’s difficult choices
SeventyFour/Shutterstock The UK may have a new prime minister, but the problem of prison overcrowding in England and Wales remains. Andy Burnham recently clarified the details of the Sentencing Act 2026, which aims to release prisoners earlier than usual. Like other PMs before him, Burnham faces a difficult choice between addressing the overcrowded and chaotic […]
Firefighting aircraft aren’t enough – Britain needs to build a wildfire-resilient society that involves everyone
Calls for a dedicated UK national wildfire service are growing louder. Given the huge recent fires across the country, this is an understandable reaction – people see specialist aircraft used in Spain, Portugal and Greece and want the UK to have something similar. Sudden climatic stresses are increasing periods of prolonged heat, drought and dry […]
The Ceuta border incident shows how EU migration can be ‘weaponised’ – but overall levels are declining
It took one night in Ceuta to end a relatively quiet summer on Europe’s southern border. Over 70,000 people entered the Spanish enclave from Morocco between July 30 and 31, most of them swimming around the heavily guarded border fences. For comparison, at the peak of the 2015-16 migration crisis, Italy received over 180,000 irregular […]