What the World Cup hydration breaks reveal about who governs men’s football
Twenty-two minutes into Canada’s group match against Qatar on June 18, the home crowd began to boo. They weren’t questioning a referee decision, nor a move by the opposition, but the mandatory three-minute player break for water. Canada was already cruising to a 6-0 win; the irritation was aimed squarely at the interruption. Fifa introduced […]
Venezuela earthquakes highlight the limits of early warning systems
Earthquakes still arrive without warning. That is the hard truth scientists have been forced to accept, despite a decade of advances in artificial intelligence, satellite monitoring and dense seismic networks. We are getting better at detecting earthquakes once they start. We are now better at estimating the damage they may cause. But we still can’t […]
Why turning off screens is so hard for children – and four tips to make it easier
NadyaEugene/Shutterstock The challenges and consequences surrounding children’s screen use are a leading concern for UK families. One especially difficult challenge is the resistance, arguments and emotional battles – “techno-tantrums” – that can follow when parents ask children to end a screen-based activity or refuse children’s requests to start one. Most families with young children experience […]
NHS patients are being socially prescribed yoga. But is yoga ready to help them?
Rawpixel.com/Shutterstock Yoga can be seen as an accessible way to exercise and improve wellbeing. You don’t always need a gym membership, specialist machinery or other people to do it. But in practice, yoga in the UK is easier for some people to access than others. It is increasingly being linked to NHS social prescribing, where […]
Replacing warships with drones is not an upgrade in capability
Britain’s Defence Investment Plan (DIP) marks a significant shift in military priorities. Over four years, an additional £15 billion will take spending up to £298 billion overall. This includes £63 billion to fund nuclear deterrence and £8 billion for future combat aircraft. But its most attention-grabbing headline concerns the maritime domain. Plans for the Type […]
The strange history of Czech cactus hunters – and why some see themselves as Robin Hood figures
Four Czech men were arrested at Guarulhos International Airport in São Paolo, Brazil in February this year on charges of smuggling native species. Brazil is a well-known centre of the illegal bird and pet trade, but allegations of an attempted theft of more than 100 cactus plants and some 2,000 seeds were perhaps more surprising. […]
What Netflix’s Little House On The Prairie remake says about today’s culture wars
Time to dust off the gingham: Netflix is about to release a new adaptation of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s beloved frontier stories. The series will revisit Little House on the Prairie (1935), the best-known of her books. For nearly a century, Wilder’s fictionalised accounts of her experiences on the American frontier in the 1870s and 1880s […]
Five ways to make your clothes last longer
Kmpzzz/Shutterstock Care labels on clothes are no longer enough for supporting consumers to enjoy their clothes for longer. Clothing retailers will face growing pressure to think about the whole lifecycle of their products with the forthcoming European introduction of a policy called extended producer responsibility – this holds fashion brands and manufacturers responsible for managing […]
Why unelected power brings us a strange comfort
1000 Words/Shutterstock The UK is not usually thought of as the kind of country that’s prone to a coup d’état. Yet in the UK too, power can change hands without a general election. Boris Johnson, Rishi Sunak, Theresa May, Liz Truss – in each case, internal party dynamics determined who occupied 10 Downing Street. In […]
Consciousness: how ‘working memory’ may mysteriously give rise to it
You know that feeling when you walk into a room and immediately forget why you came in? Maybe you were there to fetch your keys. On your way to the room, you were thinking about grabbing your keys. But once you arrive, your keys have completely disappeared from your mind. This is sometimes known as […]