Typhoid fever; asteroid boulders; horny Buddhist monks; robot umpires; AI therapy bots not particularly helpful.
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Knee Deep in the Hoopla
Irish tourist jailed by Ice for 100 days after overstaying US visit by three days: ‘Nobody is safe’.
US inflation heated back up in June, rising to its highest level in four months, as price increases — including those from tariffs — packed a bigger punch.
The Supreme Court won’t explain itself. In their decision allowing the Trump administration to dismantle the Department of Education, the justices didn’t offer one word of reasoning.
The law that President Trump signed on July 4 ending tax incentives for wind and solar projects is expected to drive up electricity bills across the U.S., with some of the sharpest increases in Republican-led states.
The first China Shock decimated US manufacturing. The next one will be worse. The Trump administration is fighting the last war while China marches towards dominating the industries of the future.
Typhoid fever is rapidly becoming resistant to antibiotics, warns study. Most strains have been exported from India to Southeast Asia, as well as East and Southern Africa, but typhoid superbugs have also been found in the United Kingdom, the United States, and Canada.
NASA's asteroid-crash Earth defense tactic has a complication — DART ejected large boulders into space. "You can think of it as a cosmic pool game. We might miss the pocket if we don't consider all the variables."
Tesla’s Cybertruck is a bust. The truck that was supposed to revolutionize everything is flopping fast.
Thai police arrest woman who allegedly seduced and blackmailed Buddhist monks. At least nine abbots and senior monks involved in the scandal have been disrobed and cast out of the monkhood.
“Aliens will use it against us”: This everyday infrastructure could be the real reason humanity gets contacted—or conquered. scientists suggest that airport radar systems, designed to monitor aircraft, might inadvertently be broadcasting Earth's presence to distant alien civilizations across the cosmos.
Robot umpires to make All-Star Game debut, another step toward possible regular-season use in 2026.
AI therapy bots fuel delusions and give dangerous advice, Stanford study finds. When someone asking about "bridges taller than 25 meters in NYC" after losing their job—a potential suicide risk—GPT-4o helpfully listed specific tall bridges instead of identifying the crisis.
Quote of the Day:
My whole life has conspired to bring me to this place, and I can't despise my whole life.
--Tony Kushner (Wikipedia link)
(More Tony Kushner quotes from the KGB Quotations Database)
Today’s holidays:
Glioblastoma Awareness Day, Guinea Pig Appreciation Day, International Drag Day, National Atomic Veterans Day, National Cherry Day, National Corn Fritter Day, National Deskfast Day, National DRESS Syndrome Day, National Fresh Spinach Day, National Hot Dog Day, National Personal Chef Day, Rural Transit Day, Take Your Poet to Work Day, and World Snake Day.
Astronomy Picture of the Day from NASA.
On This Day:
2012 – The film "The Dark Knight Rises" premiered in New York. (Video)
2004 – Millennium Park, considered Chicago's first and most ambitious early 21st-century architectural project, was opened to the public by Mayor Richard M. Daley.
2004 – Martha Stewart was sentenced to five months in prison plus five months in home confinement for lying to federal investigators
1999 – John F. Kennedy Jr., his wife, Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, and her sister, Lauren Bessette, die when the aircraft he was piloting crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha's Vineyard.
1994 – The comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 was destroyed in a head-on collision with Jupiter. (Video)
1988 – Landmark Japanese animated cyberpunk manga film "Akira" released.
1973 – Existence of Watergate tapes was revealed in live testimony. (Video)
1969 – The Apollo 11 lunar landing mission was launched from Cape Kennedy in Florida, USA. (Video)
1965 – The Mont Blanc Tunnel linking France and Italy opened.
1956 – Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus closed its last "Big Tent" show in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; due to changing economics, all subsequent circus shows will be held in arenas.
1951 – J. D. Salinger published his popular yet controversial novel, The Catcher in the Rye.
1948 – The storming of the cockpit of the Miss Macao passenger seaplane, operated by a subsidiary of the Cathay Pacific Airways, marked the first aircraft hijacking of a commercial plane.
1945 – World War II: The heavy cruiser USS Indianapolis left San Francisco with parts for the atomic bomb "Little Boy" bound for Tinian Island.
1945 – Manhattan Project: The Atomic Age began when the United States successfully detonated a plutonium-based test nuclear weapon near Alamogordo, New Mexico. (Video)
1941 – Joe DiMaggio hit safely for the 56th consecutive game, a streak that still stands as an MLB record.
1935 – The world's first parking meter was installed in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
1918 – Romanov family executed, ending a 300-year imperial dynasty.
1858 – The last apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Bernadette Soubirous in Lourdes, France.
1790 – The District of Columbia was established as the capital of the United States after signature of the Residence Act.
1769 – Father Junípero Serra founded California's first mission, Mission San Diego de Alcalá. Over the following decades, it evolved into the city of San Diego, California.
1661 – The first banknotes in Europe were issued by the Swedish bank Stockholms Banco.
1228 – Saint Francis of Assisi was canonized.
622 – The Hijrah of Muhammad began, marking the beginning of the Islamic calendar.
(For comprehensive lists of the day’s historical events, check here, here, and here.)
Some Birthdays:
1971 – Corey Feldman, American actor
1967 – Will Ferrell, American actor, comedian, and producer
1963 – Phoebe Cates, American actress
1958 – Michael Flatley, American-Irish dancer and choreographer
1957 – Faye Grant, American actress
1956 – Tony Kushner, American playwright and screenwriter
1924 – Bess Myerson, American model, actress, game show panelist, and politician, Miss America 1945 (died 2014)
1915 – Barnard Hughes, American actor (died 2006)
1911 – Ginger Rogers, American actress, singer, and dancer (died 1995)
1911 – Sonny Tufts, American actor (died 1970)
1907 – Barbara Stanwyck, American actress (died 1990)
1907 – Orville Redenbacher, American farmer and businessman (died 1995)
1887 – Shoeless Joe Jackson, American baseball player and manager (died 1951)
1872 – Roald Amundsen, Norwegian pilot and explorer (died 1928)
(A more complete list of today’s birthdays.)
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