User:The Transhumanist
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Introduction
Hi. My name is The Transhumanist.
- As a transhumanist...
I love emerging and evolving technologies, and so...
I'm currently immersed in studying AI (particularly generative AI and reasoning engines), and big data.
I dabble in JavaScript, including writing user scripts from time to time.
My best user script so far, is SearchSuite...
SearchSuite provides further control over Wikipedia search results, such as on/off features to sort them, to present results one-per-line, and more. While it seems to work fairly well, there is definitely room for improvement. Comments and suggestions are welcome.
By the way, most of the scripts I've been working on are for building and augmenting outlines...
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- As an encyclopedist...
I'm interested in all knowledge, especially how to organize it so you can find whatever is most relevant at any given moment.
I've been around Wikipedia since the Fall of 2005, and have been working mostly on Wikipedia's structure, and its knowledge navigation systems, throughout that time.
Selected articles that I've worked on
Prehistoric technology is technology that predates recorded history. History is the study of the past using written records. Anything prior to the first written accounts of history is prehistoric, including earlier technologies. About 2.5 million years before writing was developed, technology began with the earliest hominids who used stone tools, which they first used to hunt food, and later to cook.
There are several factors that made the evolution of prehistoric technology possible or necessary. One of the key factors is behavioral modernity of the highly developed brain of Homo sapiens capable of abstract reasoning, language, introspection, and problem-solving. The advent of agriculture resulted in lifestyle changes from nomadic lifestyles to ones lived in homes, with domesticated animals, and land farmed using more varied and sophisticated tools. Art, architecture, music and religion evolved over the course of the prehistoric periods. (Full article...)
James Burke (born 22 December 1936) is a broadcaster, science historian, author, and television producer. He was one of the main presenters of the BBC1 science series Tomorrow's World from 1965 to 1971 and created and presented the television series Connections (1978), and its more philosophical sequel The Day the Universe Changed (1985), about the history of science and technology. The Washington Post has called him "one of the most intriguing minds in the Western world". (Full article...)- The Library of Congress Classification (LCC) is a system of library classification developed by the Library of Congress in the United States, which can be used for shelving books in a library. LCC is used by many large research and academic libraries. LCC was developed in 1897 by James Hanson (chief of the Catalog Department), with assistance from Charles Martel while they were working at the Library of Congress. It was designed specifically for the purposes and collection of the Library of Congress, to replace the fixed location system developed by Thomas Jefferson.
LCC has been criticized for lacking a sound theoretical basis; many of the classification decisions were driven by the practical needs of that library rather than epistemological considerations. Although it divides subjects into broad categories, it is essentially enumerative in nature. That is, it provides a guide to the books actually in one library's collections, not a classification of the world. (Full article...) 
Natural science or empirical science is a branch of science concerned with the description, understanding, and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and reproducibility of findings are used to try to ensure the validity of scientific advances.
Natural science can be divided into two main branches: life science and physical science. Life science is alternatively known as biology. Physical science is subdivided into physics, astronomy, Earth science, and chemistry. These branches of natural science may be further divided into more specialized branches, also known as fields. As empirical sciences, natural sciences use tools from the formal sciences, such as mathematics and logic, converting information about nature into measurements that can be explained as clear statements of the "laws of nature".
Modern natural science succeeded more classical approaches to natural philosophy. Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, René Descartes, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton debated the benefits of a more mathematical as against a more experimental method in investigating nature. Still, philosophical perspectives, conjectures, and presuppositions, often overlooked, remain necessary in natural science. Systematic data collection, including discovery science, succeeded natural history, which emerged in the 16th century by describing and classifying plants, animals, minerals, and so on. Today, "natural history" suggests observational descriptions aimed at popular audiences. (Full article...)- A userscript (or user script) is a program, usually written in JavaScript, for modifying web pages to augment browsing. Uses include adding shortcut buttons and keyboard shortcuts, controlling playback speeds, adding features to sites, and enhancing the browsing history.
On desktop browsers such as Firefox, userscripts are enabled by use of a userscript manager browser extension such as Tampermonkey or Greasemonkey. The Presto-based Opera-supported userscripts (referred to as User JavaScript) are placed in a designated directory. Userscripts are often referred to as Greasemonkey scripts, named after the original userscript manager for Firefox.
On Wikipedia, a user scripts feature is enabled for registered users that allows them to install userscripts to augment editing and viewing of the encyclopedia's pages. (Full article...) - Types of democracy refers to the various governance structures that embody the principles of democracy ("rule by the people") in some way. Democracy is frequently applied to governments (ranging from local to global), but may also be applied to other constructs like workplaces, families, community associations, and so forth.
Types of democracy can cluster around values. Some such types, defined as direct democracy (or participatory democracy, or deliberative democracy), promote equal and direct participation in political decisions by all members of the public. Others, including the many variants of representative democracy (i.e., constitutional), favor more indirect or procedural approaches to collective self-governance, wherein decisions are made by elected representatives rather than by the people directly.
Types of democracy can be found across time, space, and language. The foregoing examples are just a few of the thousands of refinements of, and variations on, the central notion of "democracy." (Full article...) - This article explains terms used for the British Armed Forces' ordnance (weapons) and ammunition. The terms may have different meanings depending on their usage in another country's military. (Full article...)
- Life extension is the concept of extending the human lifespan, either through incremental improvements in medicine or through radical increases in maximum lifespan beyond its generally-settled biological limit of around 125 years. This field of study has been explored by numerous researchers and advocates, including "life extensionists", "immortalists", and "longevists" (those who aspire to achieve prolonged lifespans themselves). These researchers and advocates hypothesize that future advancements in tissue rejuvenation, stem cells, regenerative medicine, molecular repair, gene therapy, pharmaceuticals, and organ replacement (such as through artificial organs or xenotransplantations) will eventually enable humans to have indefinite lifespans through complete rejuvenation to a state of optimal health and youth (agerasia). The ethical implications of life extension are a subject of discourse among bioethicists.
The sale of purported anti-aging products, such as supplements and hormone replacement therapy, is a lucrative global industry. For example, the industry that promotes the use of hormones as a treatment for consumers to slow or reverse the aging process in the US market generated about $50 billion of revenue a year in 2009. The use of such hormone products has not been proven to be effective or safe. Similarly, a variety of apps make claims to assist in extending the life of their users, or predicting their lifespans. (Full article...) 
Traditionally, meals have been prepared by women in a home kitchen (painting from the circle of Jean-Baptiste de Saive, 1563).
A meal is an occasion that occurs at a specific time and involves the consumption of food. The English names used for specific meals vary, depending on the speaker's culture, the time of day, or the size of the meal. A meal is different from a snack in that meals are generally larger, more varied, and more filling.
Though they can be eaten anywhere, meals usually take place in homes, restaurants, and cafeterias. Regular meals occur on a daily basis, typically several times a day. Special meals are normally held in conjunction with celebratory or momentous occasions such as birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, funerals, and holidays.
The type of food that is served or consumed at any given time depends on regional customs. Three main meals are typically eaten in the morning, early afternoon, and evening in most civilizations. Furthermore, the names of meals are often interchangeable by custom as well. Some serve dinner as the main meal at midday, with supper as the late afternoon/early evening meal, while others may call their midday meal lunch and their early evening meal supper or dinner. Except for breakfast, these names can vary from region to region or even from family to family. (Full article...)- Friendly artificial intelligence (friendly AI or FAI) is hypothetical artificial general intelligence (AGI) that would have a positive (benign) effect on humanity or at least align with human interests such as fostering the improvement of the human species. It is a part of the ethics of artificial intelligence and is closely related to machine ethics. While machine ethics is concerned with how an artificially intelligent agent should behave, friendly artificial intelligence research is focused on how to practically bring about this behavior and ensuring it is adequately constrained. (Full article...)
Abdominal obesity, also known as central obesity and truncal obesity, is the human condition of an excessive concentration of visceral fat around the stomach and abdomen to such an extent that it is likely to harm its bearer's health. Abdominal obesity has been strongly linked to cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer's disease, and other metabolic and vascular diseases.
Visceral fat, central abdominal fat, and waist circumference show a strong association with type 2 diabetes.
Visceral fat, also known as organ fat or intra-abdominal fat, is located inside the peritoneal cavity, packed in between internal organs and torso, as opposed to subcutaneous fat, which is found underneath the skin, and intramuscular fat, which is found interspersed in skeletal muscle. Visceral fat is composed of several adipose depots including mesenteric, epididymal white adipose tissue (EWAT), and perirenal fat. An excess of adipose visceral fat is known as central obesity, the "pot belly" or "beer belly" effect, in which the abdomen protrudes excessively. This body type is also known as "apple shaped", as opposed to "pear shaped" in which fat is deposited on the hips and buttocks.
Researchers first started to focus on abdominal obesity in the 1980s when they realized it had an important connection to cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and dyslipidemia. Abdominal obesity was more closely related to metabolic dysfunctions connected with cardiovascular disease than was general obesity. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, insightful and powerful imaging techniques were developed that would further help advance the understanding of the health risks associated with body fat accumulation. Techniques such as computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging made it possible to categorize mass of adipose tissue located at the abdominal level into intra-abdominal fat and subcutaneous fat. (Full article...)
Athlete's foot, known medically as tinea pedis, is a common skin infection of the feet caused by a fungus. Signs and symptoms often include itching, scaling, cracking and redness. In rare cases the skin may blister. Athlete's foot fungus may infect any part of the foot, but most often grows between the toes. The next most common area is the bottom of the foot. The same fungus may also affect the nails or the hands. It is a member of the group of diseases known as tinea.
Athlete's foot is caused by a number of different funguses, including species of Trichophyton, Epidermophyton, and Microsporum. The condition is typically acquired by coming into contact with infected skin, or fungus in the environment. Common places where the fungi can survive are around swimming pools and in locker rooms. They may also be spread from other animals. Usually diagnosis is made based on signs and symptoms; however, it can be confirmed either by culture or seeing hyphae using a microscope.
Athlete's foot is not limited to just athletes: it can be caused by going barefoot in public showers, letting toenails grow too long, wearing shoes that are too tight, or not changing socks daily. It can be treated with topical antifungal medications such as clotrimazole or, for persistent infections, using oral antifungal medications such as terbinafine. Topical creams are typically recommended to be used for four weeks. Keeping infected feet dry and wearing sandals also assists with treatment.
Athlete's foot was first medically described in 1908. Globally, athlete's foot affects about 15% of the population. Males are more often affected than females. It occurs most frequently in older children or younger adults. Historically it is believed to have been a rare condition that became more frequent in the 20th century due to the greater use of shoes, health clubs, war, and travel. (Full article...)- The meaning of life is the concept of an individual's life, human life, or existence in general having an inherent significance or a philosophical point. There is no consensus on the specifics of such a concept, or whether the concept itself even exists in any objective sense. Thinking and discourse on the topic is sought in the English language through questions such as—but not limited to—"What is the meaning of life?", "What is the purpose of existence?", and "Why are we here?". There have been many proposed answers to these questions from many different cultural and ideological backgrounds. The search for life's meaning has produced much philosophical, scientific, theological, and metaphysical speculation throughout history. Different people and cultures believe in different answers to this question. Opinions vary on the usefulness of using time and resources in the pursuit of an answer. Excessive pondering can be indicative of, or lead to, an existential crisis.
The meaning of life can be derived from philosophical and religious contemplation of, and scientific inquiries about, existence, social ties, consciousness, and happiness. Many other issues are also involved, such as symbolic meaning, ontology, value, purpose, ethics, good and evil, free will, the existence of one or multiple gods, conceptions of God, the soul, and the afterlife. Scientific contributions focus primarily on describing related empirical facts about the universe, exploring the context and parameters concerning the "how" of life. Science also studies and can provide recommendations for the pursuit of well-being and a related conception of morality. An alternative, humanistic approach poses the question, "What is the meaning of my life?" (Full article...) - The technological singularity, often simply called the singularity, is a hypothetical event in which technological growth accelerates beyond human control, producing unpredictable changes in human civilization. According to the most popular version of the singularity hypothesis, I. J. Good's intelligence explosion model of 1965, an upgradable intelligent agent could eventually enter a positive feedback loop of successive self-improvement cycles; more intelligent generations would appear more and more rapidly, causing an explosive increase in intelligence that culminates in a powerful superintelligence, far surpassing human intelligence.
Prominent technologists and academics dispute the plausibility of a technological singularity and associated artificial intelligence "explosion", including Paul Allen, Jeff Hawkins, John Holland, Jaron Lanier, Steven Pinker, Theodore Modis, Gordon Moore, and Roger Penrose. One claim is that artificial intelligence growth is likely to run into decreasing returns instead of accelerating ones. Stuart J. Russell and Peter Norvig observe that in the history of technology, improvement in a particular area tends to follow an S curve: it begins with accelerating improvement, then levels off without continuing upward into a hyperbolic singularity. (Full article...) 
A length of string
String is a long flexible tool made from fibers twisted together into a single strand, or from multiple such strands which are in turn twisted together. String is used to tie, bind, or hang other objects. It is also used as a material to make things, such as textiles, and in arts and crafts. String is a simple tool, and its use by humans is known to have been developed tens of thousands of years ago. String may also be a component in other tools, and in devices as diverse as weapons, musical instruments, and toys. The ubiquity of string as a tool has led to conceptual and scientific uses of the term, including strings in computer science, cosmic strings, and string theory. (Full article...)- A revenue model is a framework for generating financial income. There can be a variety of ways for revenue generation such as the production model, manufacturing model, as well as the construction model. A revenue model identifies which revenue source to pursue, what value to offer, how to price the value, and who pays for the value. It is a key component of a company's business model. A revenue model primarily identifies what product or service will be created and sold in order to generate revenues.
Without a clear and well-defined revenue model new businesses will be more likely to struggle. By having a clear revenue model, a business can focus on a target audience, fund development plans for a product or service, establish marketing plans, open a line of credit and raise capital. (Full article...) - The history of California has been divided into:
Other related articles include:- Alta California § History* Baja California § History* Bibliography of California history
- Outline of California history
- Territorial evolution of California
- List of historical societies in California
- History of education in California
- Hispanics and Latinos in California
- Women's suffrage in California
- More specific place histories
- History of Chico, California
- History of Los Angeles
- History of Piedmont, California
- History of Riverside, California
- History of Sacramento, California
- History of San Bernardino, California
- History of San Diego
- History of San Francisco
- History of San Jose, California
- History of Santa Ana, California
- History of Santa Barbara, California
- History of Santa Monica, California
- Genius is a characteristic of original and exceptional insight in the performance of some art or endeavor that surpasses expectations, sets new standards for the future, establishes better methods of operation, or remains outside the capabilities of competitors. Genius is associated with intellectual ability and creative productivity. The term genius can also be used to refer to people characterised by genius, and/or to polymaths who excel across many subjects.
There is no scientifically precise definition of genius. Howard Gardener identified at least eight distinct categories of intelligences, that are publicly generalized within the one noun 'Genius'. Those categories include linguistic, logical-mathematical, spatial, musical, bodily-kinesthetic, interpersonal, intrapersonal, and naturalistic intelligence. Though many researchers have seen no evidence supporting his proposal for independent brain-based intelligences for different types of cognitive abilities. Experts like Visser argue that the multiple intelligences (MI) hypothesis is wrong and that the general intelligence factor (g) is observable in non-verbal, non-quantitative, and non-paper-and-pencil tasks regardless of whether tasks are timed or untimed. When used to refer to the characteristic, genius is associated with talent, but several authors such as Cesare Lombroso and Arthur Schopenhauer systematically distinguish these terms. Walter Isaacson, biographer of many well-known geniuses, explains that although high intelligence may be a prerequisite, the most common trait that actually defines a genius may be the extraordinary ability to apply creativity and imaginative thinking to almost any situation.
In the early-19th century Carl von Clausewitz, who had a particular interest in what he called "military genius", defined "the essence of Genius" (German: der Genius) in terms of "a very high mental capacity for certain employments". (Full article...) 
Etruscan: Diomedes and Polyxena, from the Etruscan amphora of the Pontic group, c. 540–530 BCE – From Vulci
Ceramic art, one of the plastic arts, is art made from ceramic materials, including clay. Ceramic art may take forms such as pottery, tiles, figurines, sculptures, and tableware. While some ceramic products are considered fine art, others are considered decorative, industrial, or applied art objects. Ceramics may also be considered artefacts in archaeology. People design, manufacture, and decorate pottery in pottery or ceramic factories. Some pottery is regarded as art pottery. In one-person pottery studios, ceramists or potters produce studio pottery. Ceramics exclude glass and mosaics made from glass tesserae.
In Britain and the United States, modern ceramics as an art took its inspiration in the early twentieth century from the Arts and Crafts movement, leading to the revival of pottery considered as a specifically modern craft. Such crafts emphasized traditional non-industrial production techniques, faithfulness to the material, the skills of the individual maker, attention to utility, and an absence of excessive decoration that was typical to the Victorian era.
The word "ceramics" comes from the Greek keramikos (κεραμεικός), meaning "pottery", which in turn comes from keramos (κέραμος) meaning "potter's clay". Most traditional ceramic products were made from clay (or clay mixed with other materials), shaped and subjected to heat, and tableware and decorative ceramics are generally still made this way. In modern ceramic engineering usage, ceramics is the art and science of making objects from inorganic, non-metallic materials by the action of heat. It excludes glass and mosaic made from glass tesserae.
There is a long history of ceramic art in almost all developed cultures, and often ceramic objects are all the artistic evidence left from vanished cultures, like that of the Nok in Africa over 2,000 years ago. Cultures especially noted for ceramics include the Chinese, Cretan, Greek, Persian, Mayan, Japanese, and Korean cultures, as well as the modern Western cultures. (Full article...)- Health has a variety of definitions which have been used for different purposes over time and is a multidimensional concept. It commonly refers to physical and emotional well-being. Good health is associated with normal functioning of the human body in day to day life, absent of disease, pain (including mental pain), or injury.
Health can be promoted by encouraging healthful activities, such as regular physical exercise and adequate sleep, and by reducing or avoiding unhealthful activities or situations, such as smoking or excessive stress. Health be argued to be affected by individual choices, like high risk behaviors, as well as structural determinants, such as racism in healthcare. The latter is to say that society is arranged in a way that makes it easier for some, and harder for others, to receive healthcare or engage in health-promoting behavior. Health can also be affected by biological factors like genetic disorders. (Full article...) - Artificial consciousness, also known as machine consciousness, synthetic consciousness, or digital consciousness, is consciousness hypothesized to be possible for artificial intelligence. It is also the corresponding field of study, which draws insights from philosophy of mind, philosophy of artificial intelligence, cognitive science and neuroscience.
The term "sentience" can be used when specifically designating ethical considerations stemming from a form of phenomenal consciousness (P-consciousness, or the ability to feel qualia). Since sentience involves the ability to experience ethically positive or negative (i.e., valenced) mental states, it may justify welfare concerns and legal protection, as with non-human animals.
Some scholars believe that consciousness is generated by the interoperation of various parts of the brain; these mechanisms are labeled the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). Some further believe that constructing a system (e.g., a computer system) that can emulate this NCC interoperation would result in a system that is conscious. Some scholars reject the possibility of non-biological conscious beings. (Full article...) - In futures studies and the history of technology, accelerating change is the observed exponential nature of the rate of technological change in recent history, which may suggest faster and more profound change in the future and may or may not be accompanied by equally profound social and cultural change. (Full article...)
- This glossary of philosophy is a list of definitions of terms and concepts relevant to philosophy and related disciplines, including logic, ethics, and theology. (Full article...)
An EXCOMM meeting during the Cuban Missile Crisis, a crisis between the United States and Soviet Union over ballistic missiles in Cuba
A crisis (: crises; adj: critical) is any event or period that will lead to an unstable and dangerous situation affecting an individual, group, or all of society. Crises are negative changes in the human or environmental affairs, especially when they occur abruptly, with little or no warning. More loosely, a crisis is a testing time for an emergency. (Full article...)- Knowledge extraction is the creation of knowledge from structured (relational databases, XML) and unstructured (text, documents, images) sources. The resulting knowledge needs to be in a machine-readable and machine-interpretable format and must represent knowledge in a manner that facilitates inferencing. Although it is methodically similar to information extraction (IE) in natural language processing (NLP) and extract, transform, load (ETL), the main criterion is that the extraction result goes beyond the creation of structured information or the transformation into a relational schema. It requires either the reuse of existing formal knowledge (reusing identifiers or ontologies) or the generation of a schema based on the source data.
The RDB2RDF W3C group was standardizing a language for extraction of resource description frameworks (RDF) from relational databases. Another popular example for knowledge extraction is the transformation of Wikipedia into structured data and also the mapping to existing knowledge (see DBpedia and Freebase). (Full article...)
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Selected emerging technologies and related articles
Diversity of neuronal morphologies in the auditory cortex
A wetware computer is an organic computer (which can also be known as an artificial organic brain or a neurocomputer) composed of organic material "wetware" such as "living" neurons. Wetware computers composed of neurons are different than conventional computers because they use biological materials, and offer the possibility of substantially more energy-efficient computing. While a wetware computer is still largely conceptual, there has been limited success with construction and prototyping, which has acted as a proof of the concept's realistic application to computing in the future. The most notable prototypes have stemmed from the research completed by biological engineer William Ditto during his time at the Georgia Institute of Technology. His work constructing a simple neurocomputer capable of basic addition from leech neurons in 1999 was a significant discovery for the concept. This research was a primary example driving interest in creating these artificially constructed, but still organic brains. (Full article...)
GeForce Now (stylized as GeForce NOW) is the brand used by Nvidia for its cloud gaming service. Nvidia Grid, Nvidia's cloud gaming service for Nvidia Shield devices, launched in 2013. On September 30, 2015, Nvidia rebranded the service as GeForce Now and introduced a $7.99/month subscription model. The subscription service provided users with unlimited access to a library of games hosted on Nvidia servers for the life of the subscription, being delivered to subscribers through streaming video. Certain titles were also available via a "Buy & Play" model. This version was discontinued in 2019, and transitioned to a new version of the service that enabled Shield users to play their own games.
In January 2017, Nvidia unveiled GeForce Now clients for Windows and Mac computers, available in North America and Europe as a free beta. GeForce NOW lets users access a virtual computer, where they can install their existing games from existing digital distribution platforms, and play them remotely. As with the original Shield version, the virtual desktop is also streamed from Nvidia servers. (Full article...)
Helium II will "creep" along surfaces in order to find its own level—after a short while, the levels in the two containers will equalize. The Rollin film also covers the interior of the larger container; if it were not sealed, the helium II would creep out and escape.
Superfluidity is the characteristic property of a fluid with zero viscosity which therefore flows without any loss of kinetic energy. When stirred, a superfluid forms vortices that continue to rotate indefinitely. Superfluidity occurs in two isotopes of helium (helium-3 and helium-4) when they are liquefied by cooling to cryogenic temperatures. It is also a property of various other exotic states of matter theorized to exist in astrophysics, high-energy physics, and theories of quantum gravity. The semi-phenomenological theory of superfluidity was developed by Soviet theoretical physicists Lev Landau and Isaak Khalatnikov.
Superfluidity often co-occurs with Bose–Einstein condensation (BEC), but neither phenomenon is directly related to the other; not all Bose–Einstein condensates can be regarded as superfluids, and not all superfluids are Bose–Einstein condensates. Even when superfluidity and condensation co-occur, their magnitudes are not linked: at low temperature, liquid helium has a large superfluid fraction but a low condensate fraction; while a weakly interacting BEC, with almost unity condensate fraction, can display a vanishing superfluid fraction. (Full article...)- Pattern recognition is the task of assigning a class to an observation based on patterns extracted from data. While similar, pattern recognition (PR) is not to be confused with pattern machines (PM) which may possess PR capabilities but their primary function is to distinguish and create emergent patterns. PR has applications in statistical data analysis, signal processing, image analysis, information retrieval, bioinformatics, data compression, computer graphics and machine learning. Pattern recognition has its origins in statistics and engineering; some modern approaches to pattern recognition include the use of machine learning, due to the increased availability of big data and a new abundance of processing power.
Pattern recognition systems are commonly trained from labeled "training" data. When no labeled data are available, other algorithms can be used to discover previously unknown patterns. KDD and data mining have a larger focus on unsupervised methods and stronger connection to business use. Pattern recognition focuses more on the signal and also takes acquisition and signal processing into consideration. It originated in engineering, and the term is popular in the context of computer vision: a leading computer vision conference is named Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition. (Full article...) 
Early embodiment of contact lens display, Canadian patent application 2280022, 1999 July 28th
A bionic contact lens is a proposed device that could provide a virtual display that could have a variety of uses from assisting the visually impaired to video gaming, as claimed by the manufacturers and developers. The device will have the form of a conventional contact lens with added bionics technology in the form of a head-up display, with functional electronic circuits and infrared lights to create a virtual display allowing the viewer to see a computer-generated display superimposed on the world outside. (Full article...)
The Llyn Stwlan dam of the Ffestiniog Pumped-Storage Scheme in Wales. The lower power station has four water turbines which can generate a total of 360 MW of electricity for several hours, an example of artificial energy storage and conversion.
Energy storage is the capture of energy produced at one time for use at a later time to reduce imbalances between energy demand and energy production. A device that stores energy is generally called an accumulator or battery. Energy comes in multiple forms including radiation, chemical, gravitational potential, electrical potential, electricity, elevated temperature, latent heat, potential and kinetic. Energy storage involves converting energy from forms that are difficult to store to more conveniently or economically storable forms.
Some technologies provide short-term energy storage, while others can endure for much longer. Bulk energy storage is currently dominated by hydroelectric dams, both conventional as well as pumped. Grid energy storage is a collection of methods used for energy storage on a large scale within an electrical power grid. (Full article...)
Northern bat hibernating in Norway
Hibernation is a state of minimal activity and metabolic reduction entered by some animal species. Hibernation is a seasonal heterothermy characterized by low body-temperature, slow breathing and heart-rate, and low metabolic rate. It is most commonly used to pass through winter months – called overwintering.
Although traditionally reserved for "deep" hibernators such as rodents, the term has been redefined to include animals such as bears and is now applied based on active metabolic suppression rather than any absolute decline in body temperature. Many experts believe that the processes of daily torpor and hibernation form a continuum and use similar mechanisms. The equivalent during the summer months is aestivation. (Full article...)- Finance refers to monetary resources as well as the discipline that studies such resources, with related concepts such as money, currency, assets and liabilities. As a subject of study, it is related to the fields of economics (the study of the production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services) and business administration (the management of an organization's resources to achieve its goals). Based on the scope of financial activities in financial systems, the discipline can be divided into personal, corporate, and public finance.
In these financial systems, assets are bought, sold, or traded as financial instruments, such as currencies, loans, bonds, shares, stocks, options, futures, swaps, etc. Assets can also be banked, invested, and insured to maximize value and minimize loss. In practice, risks are always present in any financial action and entities. (Full article...) 
The HAV 304 dynastat, seen bow-on
A hybrid airship is a powered aircraft that obtains some of its lift as a lighter-than-air (LTA) airship and some from aerodynamic lift as a heavier-than-air aerodyne.
A dynastat is a hybrid airship with fixed wings and/or a lifting body and is typically intended for long-endurance flights. It requires forward flight to create the aerodynamic lift component. (Full article...)- The plasma window (not to be confused with a plasma shield) is a technology that fills a volume of space with plasma confined by a magnetic field. With current technology, this volume is quite small and the plasma is generated as a flat plane inside a cylindrical space.
Plasma is any gas whose atoms or molecules have been ionized, and is a separate phase of matter. This is most commonly achieved by heating the gas to extremely high temperatures, although other methods exist. Plasma becomes increasingly viscous at higher temperatures, to the point where other matter has trouble passing through. (Full article...) - Synthetic genomics is a nascent field of synthetic biology that uses aspects of genetic modification on pre-existing life forms, or artificial gene synthesis to create new DNA or entire lifeforms. (Full article...)
A laboratory rat with a brain implant
Brain implants, often referred to as neural implants, are technological devices that connect directly to a biological subject's brain – usually placed on the surface of the brain, or attached to the brain's cortex. A common purpose of modern brain implants and the focus of much current research is establishing a biomedical prosthesis circumventing areas in the brain that have become dysfunctional after a stroke or other head injuries. This includes sensory substitution, e.g., in vision. Other brain implants are used in animal experiments simply to record brain activity for scientific reasons. Some brain implants involve creating interfaces between neural systems and computer chips. This work is part of a wider research field called brain–computer interfaces. (Brain–computer interface research also includes technology such as EEG arrays that allow interface between mind and machine but do not require direct implantation of a device.)
Neural implants such as deep brain stimulation and vagus nerve stimulation are increasingly becoming routine for patients with Parkinson's disease and clinical depression, respectively. (Full article...)
Bitcoin (abbreviation: BTC; sign: ₿) is the first decentralized cryptocurrency. Based on a free-market ideology, bitcoin was invented in 2008 when an unknown person published a white paper under the pseudonym of Satoshi Nakamoto. Use of bitcoin as a currency began in 2009, with the release of its open-source implementation. From 2021 to 2025, El Salvador adopted it as legal tender currency before revoking it. As bitcoin is pseudonymous, its use by criminals has attracted the attention of regulators, leading to its ban by several countries.
Bitcoin works through the collaboration of computers, each of which acts as a node in the peer-to-peer bitcoin network. Each node maintains an independent copy of a public distributed ledger of transactions, called a blockchain, without central oversight. Transactions are validated through the use of cryptography, preventing one person from spending another person's bitcoin, as long as the owner of the bitcoin keeps certain sensitive data secret. (Full article...)
Nintendo DS Lite (2006), the best-selling handheld console and the third best-selling console overall
A handheld game console, or simply handheld console, is a small, portable self-contained video game console with a built-in screen, game controls and speakers. Handheld game consoles are smaller than home video game consoles and contain the console, screen, speakers, and controls in one unit, allowing players to carry them and play them at any time or place.
In 1976, Mattel introduced the first handheld electronic game with the release of Auto Race. Later, several companies—including Coleco and Milton Bradley—made their own single-game, lightweight table-top or handheld electronic game devices. The first commercially successful handheld console was Merlin from 1978, which sold more than 5 million units. The first handheld game console with interchangeable cartridges is the Milton Bradley Microvision in 1979. (Full article...)- A vactrain (short for vacuum tube train) is a proposed type of high-speed transport system where vehicles travel through partially evacuated tubes or tunnels. By operating in a partial vacuum, air resistance is drastically reduced, allowing for higher speeds than conventional ground transportation, theoretically up to 4,000 km/h (2,500 mph).
Vactrains have been proposed from 1906, and developed as scale models since 1917. (Full article...) - Electrohydrodynamics (EHD), also known as electro-fluid-dynamics (EFD) or electrokinetics, is the study of the dynamics of electrically charged fluids. Electrohydrodynamics (EHD) is a joint domain of electrodynamics and fluid dynamics mainly focused on the fluid motion induced by electric fields. EHD, in its simplest form, involves the application of an electric field to a fluid medium, resulting in fluid flow, form, or properties manipulation. These mechanisms arise from the interaction between the electric fields and charged particles or polarization effects within the fluid. The generation and movement of charge carriers (ions) in a fluid subjected to an electric field are the underlying physics of all EHD-based technologies.
The electric forces acting on particles consist of electrostatic (Coulomb) and electrophoresis force (first term in the following equation)., dielectrophoretic force (second term in the following equation), and electrostrictive force (third term in the following equation): (Full article...) 
A General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper, an unmanned combat aerial vehicle used for both intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance (ISTAR) and drone strike missions.
An unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), or unmanned aircraft system (UAS), commonly known as an aerial drone or simply drone, is an aircraft with no human pilot, crew, or passengers on board, which instead is either autonomous or controlled remotely. UAVs were originally developed through the twentieth century for military missions too "dull, dirty or dangerous" for humans, and by the twenty-first had become essential assets to most militaries. As control technologies improved and costs fell, their use expanded to many non-military applications. These include aerial photography, area coverage, precision agriculture, forest fire monitoring, river monitoring, environmental monitoring, weather observation, policing and surveillance, infrastructure inspections, smuggling, product deliveries, entertainment, and drone racing. (Full article...)
LightSail-2 with deployed solar sail in July 2019.
Propellantless spacecraft propulsion is any spacecraft propulsion system that accelerates the craft by interacting with the environment rather than expelling on-board propellant, which is the more traditional approach used by chemical and electric propulsion systems. Various physical phenomena can be exploited to achieve propulsion without propellant, most notably gravity, radiation pressure, solar wind, planetary magnetic fields or aerodynamic drag in the upper atmosphere.
Several propellantless technologies have been demonstrated in flight, while others are at varying stages of development. Aerobraking was first demonstrated around Earth by Hiten (1991), and has since been used by several interplanetary spacecraft. Solar sailing, while not widely used, has been demonstrated in flight by several spacecraft, including interplanetary ones. Space tethers of various types have also been flown on several occasions as far back as Gemini 11 (1966). (Full article...)
Taxonomy of money, based on "Central bank cryptocurrencies" by Morten Linnemann Bech and Rodney Garratt
Digital currency (digital money, electronic money or electronic currency) is any currency, money, or money-like asset that is primarily managed, stored or exchanged on digital computer systems, especially over the internet. Types of digital currencies include cryptocurrency, virtual currency and central bank digital currency. Digital currency may be recorded on a distributed database on the internet, a centralized electronic computer database owned by a company or bank, within digital files or even on a stored-value card.
Digital currencies exhibit properties similar to traditional currencies, but generally do not have a classical physical form of fiat currency historically that can be held in the hand, like currencies with printed banknotes or minted coins. However, they do have a physical form in an unclassical sense coming from the computer to computer and computer to human interactions and the information and processing power of the servers that store and keep track of money. This unclassical physical form allows nearly instantaneous transactions over the internet and vastly lowers the cost associated with distributing notes and coins: for example, of the types of money in the UK economy, 3% are notes and coins, and 79% as electronic money (in the form of bank deposits). Usually not issued by a governmental body, virtual currencies are not considered a legal tender and they enable ownership transfer across governmental borders. (Full article...)- An ion-propelled aircraft or ionocraft is an aircraft that uses electrohydrodynamics (EHD) to provide lift or thrust in the air without requiring combustion or moving parts. Current designs do not produce sufficient thrust for crewed flight or useful loads. (Full article...)
3D carbon nanotube scaffolds
Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) are cylinders of one or more layers of graphene (lattice). Diameters of single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWNTs) and multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWNTs) are typically 0.8 to 2 nm and 5 to 20 nm, respectively, although MWNT diameters can exceed 100 nm. CNT lengths range from less than 100 nm to 0.5 m.
Individual CNT walls can be metallic or semiconducting depending on the orientation of the lattice with respect to the tube axis, which is called chirality. MWNT's cross-sectional area offers an elastic modulus approaching 1 TPa and a tensile strength of 100 GPa, over 10-fold higher than any industrial fiber. MWNTs are typically metallic and can carry currents of up to 109 A cm−2. SWNTs can display thermal conductivity of 3500 W m−1 K−1, exceeding that of diamond. (Full article...)
Early Automatix (now part of Omron) machine vision system Autovision II from 1983 being demonstrated at a trade show. Camera on tripod is pointing down at a light table to produce backlit image shown on screen, which is then subjected to blob extraction.
Machine vision is the technology and methods used to provide imaging-based automatic inspection and analysis for such applications as automatic inspection, process control, and robot guidance, usually in industry. Machine vision refers to many technologies, software and hardware products, integrated systems, actions, methods and expertise. Machine vision as a systems engineering discipline can be considered distinct from computer vision, a form of computer science. It attempts to integrate existing technologies in new ways and apply them to solve real world problems. The term is the prevalent one for these functions in industrial automation environments but is also used for these functions in other environment vehicle guidance.
The overall machine vision process includes planning the details of the requirements and project, and then creating a solution. During run-time, the process starts with imaging, followed by automated analysis of the image and extraction of the required information. (Full article...)
The Pentecost HX-1 Hoppi-Copter, a functional backpack helicopter
A backpack helicopter / helipack is a helicopter motor and rotor and controls assembly that can be strapped to a person's back, so they can walk about on the ground wearing it, and can use it to fly. It uses a harness like a parachute harness and should have a strap between the legs (so the pilot does not fall out of the harness during flight). Some designs may use a ducted fan design to increase upward thrust. Several inventors have tried to make backpack helicopters, with mixed results.
Typically, a backpack helicopter differs from a conventional helicopter in two main ways: (Full article...)
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Selected global issues and related topics
- Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause harm. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the components of pollution, can be either foreign substances/energies or naturally occurring contaminants.
Although environmental pollution can be caused by natural events, the word pollution generally implies that the contaminants have a human source, such as manufacturing, extractive industries, poor waste management, transportation or agriculture. Pollution is often classed as point source (coming from a highly concentrated specific site, such as a factory, mine, construction site), or nonpoint source pollution (coming from widespread distributed sources, such as microplastics or agricultural runoff).
Many sources of pollution were unregulated parts of industrialization during the 19th and 20th centuries until the emergence of environmental regulation and pollution policy in the later half of the 20th century. Sites where historically polluting industries released persistent pollutants may have legacy pollution long after the source of the pollution is stopped. Major forms of pollution include air pollution, water pollution, litter, noise pollution, plastic pollution, soil contamination, radioactive contamination, thermal pollution, light pollution, and visual pollution. (Full article...) - Unemployment is the state of not being in paid employment or self-employment but rather currently available for work. Unemployment is measured by the unemployment rate, which is the number of people who are unemployed as a percentage of the labour force (the total number of people employed above a specified age added to those unemployed) during the reference period. (Full article...)
Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. In a broader sense, climate change also includes previous long-term changes to Earth's climate. The modern-day rise in global temperatures is driven by human activities, especially fossil fuel (coal, oil and natural gas) burning since the Industrial Revolution. Fossil fuel use, deforestation, and some agricultural and industrial practices release greenhouse gases. These gases absorb some of the heat that the Earth radiates after it warms from sunlight, warming the lower atmosphere. Earth's atmosphere now has roughly 50% more carbon dioxide, the main gas driving global warming, than it did at the end of the pre-industrial era, reaching levels not seen for millions of years.
Climate change has an increasingly large impact on the environment. Heat waves and wildfires are becoming more common. Amplified warming in the Arctic has contributed to thawing permafrost, retreat of glaciers and sea ice decline. Higher temperatures are also causing more intense storms, droughts, and other weather extremes. Rapid environmental change in mountains, coral reefs, and the Arctic is forcing many species to relocate or become extinct. Even if efforts to minimize future warming are successful, some effects will continue for centuries. These include ocean heating, ocean acidification and sea level rise.
Climate change threatens people with increased flooding, extreme heat, increased food and water scarcity, more disease, and economic loss. Human migration and conflict can also be a result. The World Health Organization calls climate change one of the biggest threats to global health in the 21st century. Societies and ecosystems will experience more severe risks without action to limit warming. Adapting to climate change through efforts like flood control measures or drought-resistant crops partially reduces climate change risks, although some limits to adaptation have already been reached. Poorer communities are responsible for a small share of global emissions, yet have the least ability to adapt and are most vulnerable to climate change. (Full article...)
Anti-Shein protest, Grenoble, France.
Overconsumption describes a situation where consumers overuse their available goods and services to where they cannot, or do not want to, replenish or reuse them. In microeconomics, this is the point where the marginal cost of a consumer is greater than their marginal utility. The term overconsumption is quite controversial and does not necessarily have a single unifying definition. When used to refer to natural resources to the point where the environment is negatively affected, it is synonymous with the term overexploitation. However, when used in the broader economic sense, overconsumption can refer to all types of goods and services, including artificial ones, e.g., "the overconsumption of alcohol can lead to alcohol poisoning." Overconsumption is driven by several factors of the current global economy, including forces like consumerism, planned obsolescence, economic materialism, and other unsustainable business models, and can be contrasted with sustainable consumption.
Defining the amount of a natural resource required to be consumed for it to count as "overconsumption" is challenging because defining a sustainable capacity of the system requires accounting for many variables. A system's total capacity occurs at regional and worldwide levels, which means that specific regions may have higher consumption levels of certain resources than others due to greater resources without overconsuming a resource. A long-term pattern of overconsumption in any region or ecological system can cause a reduction in natural resources, often resulting in environmental degradation. However, this is only when applying the word to environmental impacts. When used in an economic sense, this point is defined as when the marginal cost of a consumer is equal to their marginal utility. Gossen's law of diminishing utility states that at this point, the consumer realizes the cost of consuming/purchasing another item/good is not worth the amount of utility (also known as happiness or satisfaction from the good) they had received, and therefore is not conducive to the consumer's wellbeing.
When used in the environmental sense, the discussion of overconsumption often parallels population size, growth, and human development: more people demanding a higher quality of living requires greater extraction of resources, which causes subsequent environmental degradation, such as climate change and biodiversity loss. Currently, the inhabitants of high-wealth, "developed" nations consume resources at a rate almost 32 times greater than those of the developing world, making up most of the human population (7.9 billion people). However, the developing world is a growing consumer market. These nations are quickly gaining more purchasing power. The Global South, which includes cities in Asia, America, and Africa, is expected to account for 56% of consumption growth by 2030, meaning that if current trends continue, relative consumption rates will shift more into these developing countries, whereas developed countries would start to plateau. Sustainable Development Goal 12, "responsible consumption and production", is the main international policy tool with goals to abate the impact of overconsumption. (Full article...)
Summary of major environmental-change categories that cause biodiversity loss. The data is expressed as a percentage of human-driven change (in red) relative to baseline (blue), as of 2021. Red indicates the percentage of the category that is damaged, lost, or otherwise affected, whereas blue indicates the percentage that is intact, remaining, or otherwise unaffected.
Biodiversity loss happens when species disappear completely from Earth (extinction) or when there is a decrease or disappearance of species in a specific area. Biodiversity loss means that there is a reduction in biological diversity in a given area. The decrease can be temporary or permanent. It is temporary if the damage that led to the loss is reversible in time, for example through ecological restoration.If this is not possible, then the decrease is permanent. The cause of most of the biodiversity loss is, generally speaking, human activities that push the planetary boundaries too far. These activities include habitat destruction (for example deforestation) and land use intensification (for example monoculture farming). Further problem areas are air and water pollution (including nutrient pollution), over-exploitation, invasive species and climate change.
Many scientists, along with the Global Assessment Report on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, say that the main reason for biodiversity loss is a growing human population because this leads to human overpopulation and excessive consumption. Others disagree, saying that loss of habitat is caused mainly by "the growth of commodities for export" and that population has very little to do with overall consumption. More important are wealth disparities between and within countries. In any case, all contemporary biodiversity loss has been attributed to human activities.
Climate change is another threat to global biodiversity. For example, coral reefs—which are biodiversity hotspots—will be lost by the year 2100 if global warming continues at the current rate. Additionally, the change of temperatures are likely to increase fire activity driving events such as forest fires. Still, it is the general habitat destruction (often for expansion of agriculture), not climate change, that is currently the bigger driver of biodiversity loss. Invasive species and other disturbances have become more common in forests in the last several decades. These tend to be directly or indirectly connected to climate change and can cause a deterioration of forest ecosystems. (Full article...)
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, convention centers (pictured here) were deemed to be ideal sites for temporary hospitals, due to their existing infrastructure (electrical, water, sewage). Hotels and dormitories were also considered appropriate because they can use negative pressure technology.
A pandemic (/pænˈdɛmɪk/ pan-DEM-ik) is an epidemic of an infectious disease that has a sudden increase in cases and spreads across a large region, for instance multiple continents or worldwide, affecting a substantial portion of the human population. Widespread endemic diseases with a stable number of infected individuals such as recurrences of seasonal influenza are generally excluded as they occur simultaneously in large regions of the globe rather than being spread worldwide.
Throughout human history, there have been a number of pandemics of diseases such as smallpox. The Black Death, caused by the Plague, caused the deaths of up to half of the population of Europe in the 14th century. The term pandemic had not been used then, but was used for later epidemics, including the 1918 H1N1 influenza A pandemic—more commonly known as the Spanish flu—which is the deadliest pandemic in history. The most recent pandemics include the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the 2009 swine flu pandemic and the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost all these diseases still circulate among humans though their impact now is often far less.
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, 194 member states of the World Health Organization began negotiations on an International Treaty on Pandemic Prevention, Preparedness and Response, with a requirement to submit a draft of this treaty to the 77th World Health Assembly during its 2024 convention. The WHO Pandemic Agreement was adopted at the World Health Assembly in May 2025, establishing rules on how countries should act and collaborate to prevent, prepare for and respond to pandemic emergencies and public health emergencies of international concern. It was approved with 120 votes in favour, 70 abstentions and the absence of the United States, which had already withdrawn from the WHO. (Full article...)- Soil retrogression and degradation are two regressive evolution processes associated with the loss of equilibrium of a stable soil. Retrogression is primarily due to soil erosion and corresponds to a phenomenon where succession reverts the land to its natural physical state. Degradation or pedolysis is an evolution, different from natural evolution, related to the local climate and vegetation. It is due to the replacement of primary plant communities (known as climax vegetation) by the secondary communities. This replacement modifies the humus composition and amount, and affects the formation of the soil. It is directly related to human activity. Soil degradation may also be viewed as any change or ecological disturbance to the soil perceived to be deleterious or undesirable.
According to the Center for Development Research at the University of Bonn and the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington, the quality of 33% of pastureland, 25% of arable land and 23% of forests has deteriorated globally over the last 30 years. 3.2 billion people are dependent on this land. (Full article...) 
Map of the world's biodiversity hot spots, all of which are heavily threatened by habitat loss and degradation
Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss) occurs when a natural habitat is no longer able to support its native species. The organisms once living there have either moved elsewhere, or are dead, leading to a decrease in biodiversity and species numbers. Habitat destruction is in fact the leading cause of biodiversity loss and species extinction worldwide.
Humans contribute to habitat destruction through the use of natural resources, agriculture, industrial production and urbanization (urban sprawl). Other activities include mining, logging, and trawling. Environmental factors can contribute to habitat destruction more indirectly. Geological processes, climate change, introduction of invasive species, ecosystem nutrient depletion, water and noise pollution are some of the examples. Loss of habitat can be preceded by an initial habitat fragmentation. Fragmentation and loss of habitat have become one of the most important topics of research in ecology as they are major threats to the survival of endangered species. (Full article...)
Global distribution of dryland areas based on the aridity index computed over a 30-year average during 1981 to 2010. Typical deserts are indicated by the hyper-arid category (light yellow).
Desertification is a type of gradual land degradation of fertile land into arid desert due to a combination of natural processes and human activities.
The immediate cause of desertification is the loss of most vegetation. This is driven by a number of factors, alone or in combination, such as drought, climatic shifts, tillage for agriculture, overgrazing and deforestation for fuel or construction materials. Though vegetation plays a major role in determining the biological composition of the soil, studies have shown that, in many environments, the rate of erosion and runoff decreases exponentially with increased vegetation cover. Unprotected, dry soil surfaces blow away with the wind or are washed away by flash floods, leaving infertile lower soil layers that bake in the sun and become an unproductive hardpan.
At least 90% of the inhabitants of drylands live in developing countries, where they also suffer from poor economic and social conditions. This situation is exacerbated by land degradation because of the reduction in productivity, the precariousness of living conditions and the difficulty of access to resources and opportunities. (Full article...)
Two Indian stamps which combine to symbolize gender equality
Gender equality, also known as sexual equality, gender egalitarianism, or equality of the sexes, is the state of equal ease of access to resources and opportunities regardless of gender, including economic participation and decision-making, and the state of valuing different behaviors, aspirations, and needs equally, also regardless of gender.
UNICEF (an agency of the United Nations) defines gender equality as "women and men, and girls and boys, enjoy the same rights, resources, opportunities and protections. It does not require that girls and boys, or women and men, be the same, or that they be treated exactly alike."
As of 2017,[update] gender equality is the fifth of seventeen sustainable development goals (SDG 5) of the United Nations; gender equality has not incorporated the proposition of genders besides women and men, or gender identities outside of the gender binary. Gender inequality is measured annually by the United Nations Development Programme's Human Development Reports. (Full article...)
Ocean acidification means that the average seawater pH value is dropping over time.
Ocean acidification is the ongoing decrease in the pH of the Earth's ocean. Between 1950 and 2020, the average pH of the ocean surface fell from approximately 8.15 to 8.05. Carbon dioxide emissions from human activities are the primary cause of ocean acidification, with atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) levels exceeding 422 ppm (as of 2024[update]). CO2 from the atmosphere is absorbed by the oceans. This chemical reaction produces carbonic acid (H2CO3) which dissociates into a bicarbonate ion (HCO−3) and a hydrogen ion (H+). The presence of free hydrogen ions (H+) lowers the pH of the ocean, increasing acidity (this does not mean that seawater is acidic yet; It is still alkaline, with a pH higher than 8). Marine calcifying organisms, such as mollusks and corals, are especially vulnerable because they rely on calcium carbonate to build shells and skeletons.
A change in pH by 0.1 represents a 26% increase in hydrogen ion concentration in the world's oceans (the pH scale is logarithmic, so a change of one in pH units is equivalent to a tenfold change in hydrogen ion concentration). Sea-surface pH and carbonate saturation states vary depending on ocean depth and location. Colder and higher latitude waters are capable of absorbing more CO2. This can cause acidity to rise, lowering the pH and carbonate saturation levels in these areas. Several other factors influence the atmosphere-ocean CO2 exchange, and thus local ocean acidification. These include ocean currents and upwelling zones, proximity to large continental rivers, sea ice coverage, and atmospheric exchange with nitrogen and sulfur from fossil fuel burning and agriculture.
A lower ocean pH has a range of potentially harmful effects for marine organisms. Scientists have observed for example reduced calcification, lowered immune responses, and reduced energy for basic functions such as reproduction. Ocean acidification can impact marine ecosystems that provide food and livelihoods for many people. About one billion people are wholly or partially dependent on the fishing, tourism, and coastal management services provided by coral reefs. Ongoing acidification of the oceans may therefore threaten food chains linked with the oceans. (Full article...)- Biotechnology risk is a form of existential risk from biological sources, such as genetically engineered biological agents. The release of such high-consequence pathogens could be
- deliberate (in the form of bioterrorism or biological weapons)
- accidental, or
- a naturally occurring event.
A chapter on biotechnology and biosecurity was included in Nick Bostrom's 2008 anthology Global Catastrophic Risks, which covered risks including viral agents. Since then, new technologies like CRISPR and gene drives have been introduced.
While the ability to deliberately engineer pathogens has been constrained to high-end labs run by top researchers, the technology to achieve this is rapidly becoming cheaper and more widespread. For example, the diminishing cost of sequencing the human genome (from $10 million to $1,000), the accumulation of large datasets of genetic information, the discovery of gene drives, and the discovery of CRISPR. Biotechnology risk is therefore a credible explanation for the Fermi paradox. (Full article...) 
Garbage floating in water, Circular Quay, Sydney, Australia
Water pollution (or aquatic pollution) is the contamination of water bodies, which has a negative impact on how they can be used. It is usually caused by human activities. Water bodies include lakes, rivers, oceans, aquifers, reservoirs and groundwater. Water pollution results when contaminants mix with these water bodies. Contaminants can come from one of four main sources. These are sewage discharges, industrial activities, agricultural activities, and urban runoff including stormwater. Water pollution may affect either surface water or groundwater. This form of pollution can lead to many problems. One is the degradation of aquatic ecosystems. Another is spreading water-borne diseases when people use polluted water for drinking or irrigation. Water pollution also reduces the ecosystem services such as drinking water provided by the water resource.
Sources of water pollution are either point sources or non-point sources. Point sources have one identifiable cause, such as a storm drain, a wastewater treatment plant, or an oil spill. Non-point sources are more diffuse. An example is agricultural runoff. Pollution is the result of the cumulative effect over time. Pollution may take many forms. One would be toxic substances such as oil, metals, plastics, pesticides, persistent organic pollutants, and industrial waste products. Another is stressful conditions such as changes of pH, hypoxia or anoxia, increased temperatures, excessive turbidity, or changes of salinity). The introduction of pathogenic organisms is another. Contaminants may include organic and inorganic substances. A common cause of thermal pollution is the use of water as a coolant by power plants and industrial manufacturers.
The control of water pollution requires appropriate infrastructure and management plans, as well as legislation. Technology solutions can include improving sanitation, sewage treatment, industrial wastewater treatment, agricultural wastewater treatment, erosion control, sediment control and control of urban runoff (including stormwater management). (Full article...)
Present-day climate change includes both global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its wider effects on Earth's climate system. In a broader sense, climate change also includes previous long-term changes to Earth's climate. The modern-day rise in global temperatures is driven by human activities, especially fossil fuel (coal, oil and natural gas) burning since the Industrial Revolution. Fossil fuel use, deforestation, and some agricultural and industrial practices release greenhouse gases. These gases absorb some of the heat that the Earth radiates after it warms from sunlight, warming the lower atmosphere. Earth's atmosphere now has roughly 50% more carbon dioxide, the main gas driving global warming, than it did at the end of the pre-industrial era, reaching levels not seen for millions of years.
Climate change has an increasingly large impact on the environment. Heat waves and wildfires are becoming more common. Amplified warming in the Arctic has contributed to thawing permafrost, retreat of glaciers and sea ice decline. Higher temperatures are also causing more intense storms, droughts, and other weather extremes. Rapid environmental change in mountains, coral reefs, and the Arctic is forcing many species to relocate or become extinct. Even if efforts to minimize future warming are successful, some effects will continue for centuries. These include ocean heating, ocean acidification and sea level rise.
Climate change threatens people with increased flooding, extreme heat, increased food and water scarcity, more disease, and economic loss. Human migration and conflict can also be a result. The World Health Organization calls climate change one of the biggest threats to global health in the 21st century. Societies and ecosystems will experience more severe risks without action to limit warming. Adapting to climate change through efforts like flood control measures or drought-resistant crops partially reduces climate change risks, although some limits to adaptation have already been reached. Poorer communities are responsible for a small share of global emissions, yet have the least ability to adapt and are most vulnerable to climate change. (Full article...)- Inclusive growth is economic growth that raises standards of living for broad swaths of a population. It is widely accepted that inclusive growth is challenging to be achieved in the real world. Both the intangibility and long-term perspective make it less desirable than other more conspicuous economic targets for policymakers.
There is a lack of a comprehensive and worldly recognised set of standards to systematically measure the inclusiveness of growth, which makes data collection and policy evaluation difficult. Proponents for inclusive growth warn that inequitable growth may have adverse political outcomes.
The definition of inclusive growth implies direct links between the macroeconomic and microeconomic determinants of the economy and economic growth. The microeconomic dimension captures the importance of structural transformation for economic diversification and competition, while the macro dimension refers to changes in economic aggregates such as the country's gross national product (GNP) or gross domestic product (GDP), total factor productivity, and aggregate factor inputs. (Full article...)
Societal collapse (also known as civilizational collapse or systems collapse) is the fall of a complex human society characterized by the loss of cultural identity and of social complexity as an adaptive system, the downfall of government, and the rise of violence. Possible causes of a societal collapse include natural catastrophe, war, pestilence, famine, economic collapse, population decline or overshoot, mass migration, incompetent leaders, and sabotage by rival civilizations. A collapsed society may revert to a more primitive state, be absorbed into a stronger society, or completely disappear.
Virtually all civilizations have suffered such a fate, regardless of their size or complexity. Most never recovered, such as the Western and Eastern Roman Empires, the Maya civilization, and the Easter Island civilization. Some civilizations like ancient Greece have survived indirectly through other civilizations such as the West, while other ancient civilizations like Chinese civilization and Indian civilization have survived continuously to the present day.
Anthropologists, historians, and sociologists have proposed a variety of explanations for the collapse of civilizations involving causative factors such as environmental degradation, depletion of resources, costs of rising complexity, invasion, disease, decay of social cohesion, growing inequality, extractive institutions, long-term decline of cognitive abilities, loss of creativity, and misfortune. Complete extinction of a culture is not inevitable, and in some cases, the new societies that arise from the ashes of the old one are evidently its offspring, despite a dramatic reduction in sophistication. The influence of a collapsed society, such as the Western Roman Empire, may linger on long after its death. (Full article...)
Solid waste after being shredded to a uniform size
Waste are unwanted or unusable materials. Waste is any substance discarded after primary use, or is worthless, defective and of no use. A by-product, by contrast is a joint product of relatively minor economic value. A waste product may become a by-product, joint product or resource through an invention that raises a waste product's value above zero.
Examples include municipal solid waste (household garbage), hazardous waste, wastewater (such as sewage, which contains bodily wastes (feces and urine) and surface runoff), radioactive waste, and others. (Full article...)
Food recovered by food waste critic Robin Greenfield in Madison, Wisconsin, from two days of recovery from dumpsters
Food loss and waste is food that is discarded or otherwise lost uneaten. This occurs throughout the food system, during production, processing, distribution, retail and food service sales, and consumption. Overall, about one-third of the world's food is thrown away, and a huge amount of resources used in food production are wasted. A 2021 meta-analysis by the United Nations Environment Programme estimated that global food waste amounted to 931 million tonnes annually (about 121 kg per person) across three sectors: 61 percent from households, 26 percent from food service and 13 percent from retail.
Food waste is addressed through prevention (e.g. by food preservation), reuse (e.g. food donation), animal feed, or recycling. Discarding food in landfills is to be avoided because it is a major source of the greenhouse gas methane. Reducing food waste in all parts of the food system is an important part of reducing the environmental impact of agriculture, by reducing the total amount of water, land, and other resources used.
Wasted food is a major part of the impact of agriculture on climate change (it amounts to 3.3 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent emissions annually) and other environmental issues, such as land use, water use and loss of biodiversity. It also conflicts with food insecurity in parts of the world. The UN's Sustainable Development Goals seek to "halve global per capita food waste at the retail and consumer levels and reduce food losses along production and supply chains, including post-harvest losses" by 2030. In the 2022 United Nations Biodiversity Conference nations agreed to reduce food waste by 50% by the year 2030. (Full article...)- International trade is the exchange of capital, goods, and services across international borders or territories because there is a need or demand for goods or services.
In most countries, such trade represents a significant share of gross domestic product (GDP). While international trade has existed throughout history (for example Uttarapatha, Silk Road, Amber Road, salt roads), its economic, social, and political importance has been on the rise in recent centuries.
Carrying out trade at an international level is a complex process when compared to domestic trade. When trade takes place between two or more states, factors like currency, government policies, economy, judicial system, laws, and markets influence trade. (Full article...) - Gray goo (also spelled as grey goo) is a hypothetical global catastrophic scenario involving molecular nanotechnology in which out-of-control self-replicating machines consume all biomass (and perhaps also everything else) on Earth while building many more of themselves, a scenario that has been called ecophagy (literally: "consumption of the environment"). The original idea assumed machines were designed to have this capability, while popularizations have assumed that machines might somehow gain this capability by accident.
Self-replicating machines of the macroscopic variety were originally described by mathematician John von Neumann, and are sometimes referred to as von Neumann machines or clanking replicators.
The term gray goo was coined by nanotechnology pioneer K. Eric Drexler in his 1986 book Engines of Creation. In 2004, he stated "I wish I had never used the term 'gray goo'," arguing that it had inspired public fears that interfered with research on more conventional, non-self replicating nanotechnology. Engines of Creation mentions "gray goo" as a thought experiment in two paragraphs and a note, while the popularized idea of gray goo was first publicized in a mass-circulation magazine, Omni, in November 1986. (Full article...) - The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a network of networks that comprises private, public, academic, business, and government networks of local to global scope, linked by electronic, wireless, and optical networking technologies. The Internet carries a vast range of information services and resources, such as the interlinked hypertext documents and applications of the World Wide Web (WWW), electronic mail, discussion groups, internet telephony, streaming media and file sharing.
Most traditional communication media, including telephone, radio, television, paper mail, newspapers, and print publishing, have been transformed by the Internet, giving rise to new media such as email, online music, digital newspapers, news aggregators, and audio and video streaming websites. The Internet has enabled and accelerated new forms of personal interaction through instant messaging, Internet forums, and social networking services. Online shopping has also grown to occupy a significant market across industries, enabling firms to extend brick and mortar presences to serve larger markets. Business-to-business and financial services on the Internet affect supply chains across entire industries.
The origins of the Internet date back to research that enabled the time-sharing of computer resources, the development of packet switching, and the design of computer networks for data communication. The set of communication protocols to enable internetworking on the Internet arose from research and development commissioned in the 1970s by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) of the United States Department of Defense in collaboration with universities and researchers across the United States, the United Kingdom and France. (Full article...) 
Two men next to a pile of American bison skulls awaiting industrial processing and conversion into fertilizer in the United States, in 1892.
The Holocene or Anthropocene extinction is an ongoing extinction event caused by human activity during the current geological epoch, impacting diverse families of plants and animals, including mammals, birds, reptiles, amphibians, fish, and invertebrates, as well as both terrestrial and marine species. It is sometimes also called the sixth extinction (though this can also describe the Capitanian).
Current extinction rates are estimated at 100 to 1,000 times higher than natural background extinction rates. The Holocene extinction was preceded by the Late Pleistocene extinctions at the end of the last ice age (to which human activity also likely contributed) and the extinctions caused by Polynesian expansion.
The Holocene extinction continues into the 21st century, driven by anthropogenic climate change, destruction of wetlands, deforestation, overfishing, ocean acidification, human population growth, economic growth, and increasing consumption, particularly among affluent societies. Factors such as rising meat production and the destruction of critical habitats compound these issues. Other drivers include overexploitation of natural resources, pollution, and climate change-induced shifts in ecosystems. (Full article...)- It has been hypothesized that substantial progress in artificial general intelligence (AGI) and artificial superintelligence (ASI) will lead to human extinction or an irreversible global catastrophe.
One argument for the validity of this concern and the importance of this risk references how human beings dominate other species because the human brain possesses distinctive capabilities other animals lack. If AI were to surpass human intelligence and become superintelligent, it might become uncontrollable. Just as the fate of the mountain gorilla depends on human goodwill, the fate of humanity could depend on the actions of a future machine superintelligence.
Experts disagree on whether artificial general intelligence (AGI) can achieve the capabilities needed for human extinction. Debates center on AGI's technical feasibility, the speed of self-improvement, and the effectiveness of alignment strategies. Concerns about superintelligence have been voiced by researchers including Geoffrey Hinton, Yoshua Bengio, Demis Hassabis, and Alan Turing, and AI company CEOs such as Dario Amodei (Anthropic), Sam Altman (OpenAI), and Elon Musk (xAI). In 2022, a survey of AI researchers with a 17% response rate found that the majority believed there is a 10 percent or greater chance that human inability to control AI will cause an existential catastrophe. In 2023, hundreds of AI experts and other notable figures signed a statement declaring, "Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war". Following increased concern over AI risks, government leaders such as United Kingdom prime minister Rishi Sunak and United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres called for an increased focus on global AI regulation. In 2025, hundreds of public figures including AI experts, five Nobel Prize laureates, and former senior US national security officials such as Michael Mullen and Susan Rice signed a statement calling for a ban on the development of superintelligence. (Full article...) 
Global monthly average total ozone amount
Ozone depletion consists of two related events observed since the late 1970s: a lowered total amount of ozone in Earth's upper atmosphere, and a much larger springtime decrease in stratospheric ozone (the ozone layer) around Earth's polar regions. The latter phenomenon is referred to as the ozone hole. There are also springtime polar tropospheric ozone depletion events in addition to these stratospheric events.
The main causes of ozone depletion and the ozone hole are manufactured chemicals, especially manufactured halocarbon refrigerants, solvents, propellants, and foam-blowing agents (chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), HCFCs, halons), referred to as ozone-depleting substances (ODS). These compounds are transported into the stratosphere by turbulent mixing after being emitted from the surface, mixing much faster than the molecules can settle. Once in the stratosphere, they release atoms from the halogen group through photodissociation, which catalyze the breakdown of ozone (O3) into oxygen (O2). Both types of ozone depletion were observed to increase as emissions of halocarbons increased.
Ozone depletion and the ozone hole have generated worldwide concern over increased cancer risks and other negative effects. The ozone layer prevents harmful wavelengths of ultraviolet (UVB) light from passing through the Earth's atmosphere. These wavelengths cause skin cancer, sunburn, permanent blindness, and cataracts, which were projected to increase dramatically as a result of thinning ozone, as well as harming plants and animals. These concerns led to the adoption of the Montreal Protocol in 1987, which bans the production of CFCs, halons, and other ozone-depleting chemicals. Over time, scientists have developed new refrigerants with lower global warming potential (GWP) to replace older ones. For example, in new automobiles, R-1234yf systems are now common, being chosen over refrigerants with much higher GWP such as R-134a and R-12. (Full article...)
A typical suburban development in the United States, located in Chandler, Arizona
Urban sprawl (also known as suburban sprawl or urban encroachment) is defined as "the rapid expansion of the geographic extent of cities and towns, often characterized by low-density residential housing, single-use zoning, and increased reliance on the private automobile for transportation". Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growth in many urban areas of housing, commercial development, and roads over large expanses of land, with little concern for very dense urban planning.
Urban sprawl refers to a special form of urbanization, and it relates to the social and environmental consequences associated with such development. In modern times some suburban areas described as "sprawl" have less detached housing and higher density than the nearby core city. Medieval suburbs suffered from the loss of protection of city walls, before the advent of industrial warfare. Sometimes the urban areas described as the most "sprawling" are the most densely populated.
The modern disadvantages and costs of urban sprawl include increased travel time, transport costs, pollution, and destruction of the countryside. The revenue for building and maintaining urban infrastructure in these areas are gained mostly through property and sales taxes. Most jobs in the US are now located in suburbs generating much of the revenue. (Full article...)
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Did you know...
- ... that because the capital of The Gambia is on a small island, its population has overflowed into Serekunda in the nearby municipality of Kanifing?
- ... that the Tāhuna Glenorchy Dark Sky Sanctuary is in an astronomical "sweet spot" where the aurora australis and the core of the Milky Way can both be seen?
- ... that Ray Allensworth was featured on the Time 100 Next list in 2025 for her work as program director of the first private spacecraft to land successfully on the Moon?
- ... that 72,000 forms for the 2017 Chilean census from the Atacama Region, enough for 60% of its population, were damaged by heavy rains?
- ... that the basement of the Old Town Hall in Gdańsk was rented by a famous astronomer to store his beers?
- ... that the 1962 space-age pop album Latin-esque was recorded with halves of the orchestra separated by almost a city block to heighten its stereo effects?
- ... that an estimated three-quarters of New Zealand's population saw Elizabeth II during her 1953–1954 tour of the country?
- ... that a 1965 proposal for South Station included a bus terminal, 5,000 parking spaces, and a heliport?
- ... that Priamurye Governorate-General, a Russian colony in East Asia, issued passports in order to segregate East Asian migrants from the general population?
- ... that Bienor is a very long space centaur?
- ... that Uranus's moon Margaret is named after a Shakespearean character, an astronomer's daughter, and its discoverer's mother?
- ... that a photograph of Lesotho sprinter Motsapi Moorosi was sent into space on the Voyager Golden Records?
- ... that the co-creator of Tickle Me Elmo charged for rides on a toy rocket ship that he constructed from an old washing machine?
- ... that Carl Grillmair, a Canadian astrophysicist at Caltech, discovered water on multiple exoplanets?
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Selected images that captured my attention
The 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake was a magnitude 9.15, undersea earthquake that occurred at 00:58:53 UTC on December 26 2004. The earthquake generated a tsunami that killed more than 150,000 people around the Indian Ocean, making it one of the deadliest disasters in modern history. This photograph shows the tsunami as it reached Ao Nang, Thailand.
The I-35W Mississippi River bridge was an eight-lane, steel truss arch bridge that carried Interstate 35W across the Saint Anthony Falls of the Mississippi River in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Once the third-busiest bridge in the state, it suddenly collapsed on August 1, 2007, killing 13 and injuring 145. Rescue of people stranded on the bridge was complete in three hours, while recovery of bodies—involving 75 local, state and federal agencies—took three weeks. An NTSB investigation cited a design flaw as the likely cause of the collapse, noting that a too-thin gusset plate ripped along a line of rivets.
A Marginated Tortoise hatchling.
Sandboarding is a boardsport similar to snowboarding, but competitions take place on sand dunes rather than snow-covered mountains. Here, a member of the US Navy sandboards down a dune in Jebel Ali, Dubai.
American astronaut Eugene Cernan (born March 14, 1934), shown here on the surface of the Moon during the Apollo 17 mission, the last time any human has set foot on it. In that final lunar landing mission, launched December 7, 1972, Cernan became "the last man on the moon" since he was the last to re-enter the Apollo Lunar Module during its third and final extra-vehicular activity. Prior to this, Cernan had also gone into space twice on the Gemini 9A and Apollo 10 missions.
The International Space Station (ISS) as seen from the Space Shuttle Endeavour. Zarya, the first module of the ISS launched in 1998, is seen in the foreground. Since then, twenty-six Space Shuttle flights have docked with the ISS to assemble various other modules and components, which include four pairs of solar arrays seen on each side.
United States Navy personnel engage in Special Patrol Insertion/Extraction (SPIE) training between a Sikorsky SH-60 Seahawk helicopter and the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN-69). SPIE involves either a person or goods being lowered from or raised to a helicopter via a cable above terrain on which landing would be difficult.
The sperm whale is the largest toothed animal on Earth. The species was hunted extensively by humans throughout history, until protected by a worldwide moratorium on whaling starting in 1985–86.
San Francisco Bay shrouded in fog, as seen from the Marin Headlands looking east. The fog of San Francisco is a kind of sea fog, created when warm, moist air blows from the central Pacific Ocean across the cold water of the California Current, which flows just off the coast. The water is cold enough to lower the temperature of the air to the dew point, causing fog generation. In this photo, the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge can be seen poking through the fog, and the Bay Bridge is visible in the distance.
A lava lake at Mount Nyiragongo, a volcano found in Virunga National Park in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Lava lakes, which can form in three different ways, are large volumes of molten lava, usually basaltic, contained in a volcanic vent, crater, or broad depression. Persistent lava lakes such as the one at Nyiragongo, which is the largest to appear in recent times, are rare.
Lucky Diamond Rich (b. 1971) is a New Zealand-born performance artist and street performer who holds the Guinness World Record for most tattooed man, taking the title from Tom Leppard in 2006. He is recognized by Guinness as being covered in tattoos over 100% of his body, including the inside of his eyelids, ears, and mouth.
NGC 1300 is a barred spiral galaxy located roughly 69 million light-years away in the direction of the constellation Eridanus. In its core, the nucleus shows its own extraordinary and distinct "grand-design" spiral structure that is about 3,300 light-years long.
A man engaging in big wave surfing at Mavericks, located just north of Half Moon Bay, California. Big wave surfing is a discipline within surfing in which experienced surfers paddle into or are towed onto waves which are at least 20 ft (6.1 m) high, and is a hazardous activity, as surfers can be pushed far beneath the surface of the water after a wipeout.
View from Notre-Dame de Paris.
Atlantic White-sided Dolphins, on a concrete-floored dock at the port of Hvalba, which is in the Faroe Islands, north of the United Kingdom. Whaling in the Faroe Islands has been practised since at least the 10th century. It is strongly regulated by Faroese authorities and is approved by the International Whaling Commission.
The American Bison, or Buffalo, is the largest terrestrial mammal in North America, and once inhabited the Great Plains in massive herds. They were central to the lives of Native American tribes. This pile of bison skulls from the 1870s illustrates the extent of their slaughter in the 19th century by settlers: from a population of about 60 million in 1800 to as few as 750 in 1890. They have since been reintroduced into the wild and are no longer considered a high risk endangered species.
aurora australis, as seen from the International Space Station. Aurorae are natural light displays in the sky caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude thermosphere. The particles originate in the magnetosphere and solar wind and, on Earth, are directed by Earth's magnetic field into the atmosphere.
Imagine waking up to this. Which makes me wonder whatever happened to the guy who took this photo.
The Hubble Extreme Deep Field is an image of a small area of space in the constellation Fornax released by NASA on September 25, 2012. The successor to the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field, this image was compiled from 10 years of previous images with a total exposure time of two million seconds, or approximately 23 days.
One of two monkey selfies taken by Celebes crested macaques using equipment belonging to the British nature photographer David Slater. In mid-2014, the images' hosting on Wikimedia Commons was at the centre of a dispute over whether copyright could be held on artworks made by non-human animals. Slater argued that, as he had "engineered" the shot, he held copyright, while Wikimedia considered the photographs public domain on the grounds that they were made by an animal rather than a person. In December 2014, the United States Copyright Office stated that works by a non-human are not subject to US copyright, a view reaffirmed by a US federal judge in 2016.
The mushroom cloud caused by the detonation of the "Fat Man" bomb during the atomic bombing of Nagasaki, Japan in 1945, rising approximately 18 kilometres (11 mi) above the hypocenter.
A neutral density filter is a filter that reduces or modifies the intensity of all wavelengths or colors of light equally, giving no changes in hue of color rendition. The filter reduces the amount of light entering the lens, allowing the photographer to select combinations of aperture, exposure time and sensor sensitivity to avoid overexposed pictures. It would normally be attached to the lens, but is hand-held here to illustrate the effect.
Crash landing of an F6F Hellcat into the port side 20mm gun gallery of the USS Enterprise, November 10, 1943. Lieutenant Walter L. Chewning, Jr., USNR, the Catapult Officer, is climbing up the plane's side to assist the pilot from the burning aircraft. The pilot, Ensign Byron M. Johnson, escaped without significant injury. Note the plane's ruptured belly fuel tank.
A swan created using modular origami, a paperfolding technique which uses two or more sheets of paper to create a larger and more complex structure than possible with single-piece origami techniques. Each individual sheet of paper is folded into a module, or unit, and then modules are assembled into an integrated flat shape or three-dimensional structure by inserting flaps into pockets created by the folding process. These insertions create tension or friction that holds the model together.
A dust storm rushes towards a military camp as it rolls over Al Asad Airbase, Iraq, just before nightfall on April 27, 2005. A dust storm (or sandstorm) is a meteorological phenomenon common in dry, arid and semi-arid regions, usually the result of convection currents created by intense heating of the ground. These currents then carry clouds of sand over large distances.
Astronaut Buzz Aldrin saluting the flag of the United States, part of the Lunar Flag Assembly, during Apollo 11. The Lunar Flag Assembly was designed to survive a Moon landing and to appear to "wave" as it would in a breeze on Earth. This flag fell over when the Lunar Module Eagle took off.
Devastation caused by Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, Louisiana during 2005, shown here looking down on Interstate 10 at West End Boulevard towards Lake Pontchartrain. Over 1,800 people were confirmed dead with 705 still missing. It was the costliest Atlantic hurricane in history causing around $86 billion in damage. This photo shows flooded roadways as the United States Coast Guard conducted initial damage assessment overflights of New Orleans on Monday, August 29, 2005. The city flooded due primarily to the failure of the levee system. Many who remained in their homes had to swim for their lives, wade through deep water, or remain trapped in their attics or on their rooftops.
You are feeling very sleepy...
The "Baker" explosion, part of Operation Crossroads, a nuclear weapon test by the United States military at Bikini Atoll, Micronesia, on July 25, 1946. Its purpose was to test the effect of nuclear weapons on naval ships. It was the second US nuclear bomb set off since the bombing of Nagasaki.
The Pinwheel Galaxy is a face-on spiral galaxy located 21 million light-years away in the constellation Ursa Major. It was first discovered by Pierre Méchain on March 27, 1781, and communicated to Charles Messier, who verified its position for inclusion in the Messier Catalogue as one of its final entries. This image, released on February 28, 2006, is composed of 51 individual exposures, as well as some extra ground-based photos. At the time of its release, it was the largest and most detailed image of a galaxy by the Hubble Space Telescope.
Tracy Caldwell Dyson in the Cupola module of the International Space Station, observing the Earth below during Expedition 24. Caldwell Dyson is an American chemist and astronaut. She was selected by NASA in 1998 and made her first spaceflight in August 2007 on the STS-118 mission aboard Space Shuttle Endeavour.
An overhead view of Skylab, the United States' first space station, in Earth orbit as photographed from the Skylab 4 Command and Service Modules. Skylab 4 was the last mission to Skylab and brought back its final crew; this photograph was the last one taken of the station before the mission re-entered Earth's atmosphere and disintegrated in 1979.
Burj Khalifa is a skyscraper in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and currently the tallest man-made structure in the world, at 829.8 m (2,722 ft). It was designed to be the centerpiece of a large-scale, mixed-use development known as Downtown Dubai. Construction took over five years, and the skyscraper was officially opened in January 2010.
Glaucus atlanticus is a species of small, blue sea slug. This pelagic aeolid nudibranch floats upside down, using the surface tension of the water to stay up, and is carried along by the winds and ocean currents. The blue side of their body faces upwards, blending in with the blue of the water, while the grey side faces downwards, blending in with the silvery surface of the sea. G. atlanticus feeds on other pelagic creatures, including the Portuguese man o' war.
An animation of a cicada undergoing ecdysis, the molting of the exoskeleton in arthropods and related groups. Since the cuticula of these animals is inelastic, it is shed during growth and a new, larger covering is formed. The old, empty exoskeleton is called an exuvia. Within one or two hours, the cuticle hardens and darkens, during which time the animal grows, since growth is otherwise constrained by the rigidity of the exoskeleton. Each frame of this image was taken at one-minute intervals, with a 30-minute gap in middle while the cicada rested. The entire process took about 2 hours to complete.
Height comparison of notable statues: 1) Statue of Unity 240 m. 2) Spring Temple Buddha 153 m. 3) Statue of Liberty 93 m. 4) The Motherland Calls 91 m. 5) Christ the Redeemer 39.6 m. 6) Statue of David 5.17 m.
The Aqueduct of Segovia is a Roman aqueduct located in Segovia, Spain that transports water from the Rio Frio. It is thought to have been constructed during the 1st century CE. One of the most significant and best-preserved ancient monuments left on the Iberian Peninsula, the aqueduct is considered a symbol of Segovia and is present on the city's coat of arms.
Crowds surrounding the Reflecting Pool, during the August 28 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom. An estimated 200,000 to 500,000 people participated in the march, which featured Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech. It was a major factor leading to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the 1965 Voting Rights Act. The march was also condemned by the Nation of Islam and Malcolm X, who termed it the "farce on Washington".
The Door to Hell is a natural gas field in Derweze, Turkmenistan, which has been burning since 1971 when it was ignited by Soviet scientists who expected it to burn out within days. They were trying to prevent the release of poisonous gases. The name "Door to Hell" was given to the field by locals. The hot spots range over an area with a width of 60 metres (200 ft) and to a depth of about 20 metres (66 ft).
The Leaning Tower of Pisa is the freestanding bell tower of the Cathedral of Pisa, Italy. The third oldest structure in the city's Square of Miracles, it is known worldwide for its unintended tilt. The tower's tilt began during construction in the 12th century, caused by an inadequate foundation on ground too soft on one side to properly support the structure's weight. The tilt gradually increased until the tower was stabilized (and the tilt partially corrected) by efforts in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The tower, which measures 55.86 metres (183.27 feet) from the ground on the low side and 56.67 metres (185.93 feet) on the high side, has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1987.
The mushroom cloud from the Ivy Mike nuclear test, one of two tests conducted as part of Operation Ivy at the Pacific Proving Grounds on Elugelab in the Marshall Islands. Mike was the first successful full-scale test of a multi-megaton thermonuclear weapon, and it left an underwater crater 6,240 ft (1,900 m) wide and 164 ft (50 m) deep where the island had been.
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Trump news tracker
- 17 August 2026 – South Korea–United States relations
- United States president Donald Trump orders the Department of Defense to substantially reduce the Ulchi-Freedom Guardian military exercises with South Korea, citing their cost and his relationship with North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un. The drills begin as scheduled. (AFP via The Straits Times)
- 1 August 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- U.S. president Donald Trump cancels a planned attack against Iran, citing progress in ceasefire negotiations. (Axios) (The Japan Times)
- 30 July 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- U.S. president Donald Trump announces that the Board of Peace has reached a deal for a complete disarmament of Hamas. (BBC News) (Jewish Insider)
- 25 July 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- The United States halts strikes against Iran after government officials reportedly saw a potential opening to resume diplomatic efforts and talks. (Al-Monitor) (AP)
- 21 July 2026 – Tariffs in the second Trump administration
- A spokesperson for Canadian infrastructure minister Gregor Robertson announces that Canada has cancelled a joint opening ceremony for the Gordie Howe International Bridge that will connect Detroit, Michigan, and Windsor, Ontario, after U.S. president Donald Trump announced 50% tariffs on Canadian goods. (AP) (CBC)
- 21 July 2026 – Lebanon–United States relations
- U.S. president Donald Trump authorizes U.S. airlines to resume direct flights to Lebanon, ending a suspension imposed after the 1985 hijacking of TWA Flight 847. (The Independent)
- 20 July 2026 – Canada–United States relations
- U.S. president Donald Trump signs another executive order imposing 50% tariffs on many Canadian goods, including USMCA-covered products, citing alleged discriminatory trade practices. The duties take effect in 30 days, with exemptions for energy, potash, and products under sector-specific tariffs. (AFP via Vanguard) (CBC News)
- 15 July 2026 –
- U.S. president Donald Trump announces that American citizen Dena Karari has been released from Iran after being detained on espionage charges since 2024. Her lawyer, Jared Genser, also confirmed her release. (The Guardian) (NBC News)
- 14 July 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- U.S. president Donald Trump cancels a proposal to implement a 20% fee on cargo ships transiting through the strait. (AP) (BBC News)
- 13 July 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- U.S. president Donald Trump announces that the naval blockade will resume beginning tomorrow and announces a 20% fee on ships transiting the Strait of Hormuz. (Khaleej Times) (CNN)
- Trump reportedly notifies U.S. Congress that the war has resumed, giving his administration another 60-day clock without congressional approval. (Politico) (The Hill)
- 11 July 2026 – Housing in the United States
- The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act becomes law after U.S. president Donald Trump allows the bill to take effect without his signature. It was passed by the U.S. Congress to expand affordable housing and reduce housing costs. (CBS News)
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Wikipedia newsfeed
- 18 August 2026 – 2026 Iran war
- 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis
- The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations reports that a cargo vessel has come under attack in the Strait of Hormuz, leaving one dead. (Al Jazeera)
- United Arab Emirates in the 2026 Iran war
- The United Arab Emirates's defence ministry detects two missiles fired from Iran towards the country, including one that fell outside territorial waters and another that fell within it. (Gulf News) (Khaleej Times) (Emirates 24/7)
- 18 August 2026 – Russo-Ukrainian war
- Attacks in Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian war, Russia–United Kingdom relations
- British prime minister Andy Burnham confirms that the United Kingdom will continue to militarily support Ukraine after Russia warned the UK will face "consequences" for allowing Ukraine to use British-made drones to strike targets deep inside Russian territory. (BBC News)
- Russian attacks on civilians in the Russo-Ukrainian war
- A Russian ballistic missile strike kills ten civilians and injures eight others in Pechenihy, Kharkiv Oblast. Several homes are completely destroyed. (AP)
- Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant crisis
- A drone strike hits a bus stop near the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant in Enerhodar, killing one plant worker and injuring several others. (Reuters)
- 18 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- Blue Nile campaign
- The Sudanese Doctors Network reports that recent attacks in Geissan of Sudan's Blue Nile region has displaced over 5,000 people to Damazin. (Sudan Horizon)
- Darfur campaign
- The Rapid Support Forces launches a major crackdown in Nyala, South Darfur, its largest security and military mobilization since seizing the city in 2023. (Sudan Tribune)
- 18 August 2026 –
- A bus head-on collision in Parana, Brazil kills at least 21 people and injures four others. (Reuters)
- At least eight people are killed and more than 20 others are injured after a vehicle rams into a truck in Madhya Pradesh, India. (Xinhua)
- Three people are killed after an explosion at a thermal power plant in Baniyas, Syria. (Xinhua)
- A second Mw 4.7 earthquake strikes the province of Granada, in Spain. Damage and injures are reported in Granada and the surrounding area, while the Alhambra is evacuated. (Expansión in Spanish)
- The UK Health Security Agency confirms that an outbreak of salmonella in the UK has left one person dead and hundreds more ill. The outbreak is believed to be linked to imported eggs. (BBC News)
- 18 August 2026 – 2026 Zamboanga City school shooting
- A student is killed while nine other people are injured in a mass shooting at a junior secondary school building of the Ateneo de Zamboanga University in Zamboanga City, Philippines. The perpetrator, also a student, later kills himself. (Reuters) (The Philippine Star)
- 18 August 2026 – Imprisonment of Imran Khan
- Pakistan's Supreme Court orders imprisoned former prime minister Imran Khan transferred from the central jail in Rawalpindi, Punjab, to Shifa International Hospital in Islamabad for medical examinations following a petition by his lawyers concerning his health. (AFP via RFI)
- 18 August 2026 –
- Singapore begins requiring major Internet messaging platforms to restrict unsolicited contacts and social media services to verify advertisers and block suspected scam advertisements under new anti-scam rules, with penalties of up to S$1 million (US$780,000) for non-compliance. (AFP via The Manila Times)
- 18 August 2026 – 2026 Zambian general election
- Zambian president Hakainde Hichilema is declared the winner by the electoral commission, re-electing him to a second term. (AP)
- 17 August 2026 – Russo-Ukrainian war
- Violations of non-combatant airspace during the Russo-Ukrainian war
- A Russian Banderol cruise missile explodes in Ștefan Vodă District, Moldova, after entering from Ukrainian airspace, triggering a wildfire in a corn field. Moldovan authorities condemn the strike as "a serious violation of Moldova’s sovereignty". (The New Voice of Ukraine)
- 17 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- Kordofan campaign
- The Sudanese Armed Forces says that it has shot down a long-range drone used by the Rapid Support Forces in Sudan's North Kordofan state, the second drone shot down this month in the region. (Sudan Tribune)
- South Sudanese president Salva Kiir meets with Darfur governor Minni Minnawi in Juba, South Sudan, to discuss efforts to end the conflict in Sudan. (Eye Radio)
- 17 August 2026 – Somali Civil War
- Constitutional crisis in Somalia, Controversies of Hassan Sheikh Mohamud
- Several fighters from both sides are killed after Somali federal forces and opposition groups clash in the South West State. Two civilians are also killed. Militias loyal to former state president Abdiaziz Laftagareen enter the regional capital Baidoa, challenging two battalions of the Somali National Army loyal to Somali president Hassan Sheikh Mohamud. (Reuters) (Garowe Online) (i24 news)
- 17 August 2026 – Nigerian bandit conflict
- At least 22 people are killed in a mass shooting in Kebbe, Sokoto State, Nigeria. (Tribune)
- 17 August 2026 – Terrorism in Afghanistan
- A explosion is reported at a school in the Dashte Barchi neighborhood of Kabul, Afghanistan, injuring several people. The perpetrator is unknown. (Al Jazeera)
- 17 August 2026 – 2026 Pacific hurricane season
- A 90-year-old woman is confirmed dead in Nāʻālehu, Hawaii, United States, and over 100,000 people remain without power after Hurricane Lala struck the state. (AP) (The Guardian)
- 17 August 2026 – 2026 Pacific typhoon season
- Floods and landslides caused by the southwest monsoon and Tropical Storm Kujira kill at least 23 people and displace thousands across the Philippines. (AA)
- 17 August 2026 –
- A crowd crush at the Ashokdham Temple in Bihar, India, kills at least seven people and injures 19 others. (AFP via ABS-CBN News)
- Seven people are killed and several others are injured after a fire breaks out in a hotel in Birbhum District, West Bengal, India. (Xinhua)
- Humanitarian NGO Emergency rescues 50 migrants from a wooden boat in international waters off Libya and recovers seven bodies. Two survivors require urgent medical evacuation, and 29 of those rescued are unaccompanied minors. (Reuters)
- Three people are killed when a private helicopter crashes on Sifnos, South Aegean, Greece. (AP)
- Torrential rainfall causes widespread flooding in Geoje-si, South Gyeongsang, South Korea, killing at least one. (BBC News) (The Guardian)
- 17 August 2026 – 2026 Ebola epidemic
- The United Nations reports that at least 2,325 people have died from the current Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of Congo, making it the deadliest in the country's history. (DW)
- 17 August 2026 – Seventh cholera pandemic
- A city official reports that at least 500 people have been hospitalized for severe diarrhea, with nearly 150 testing positive for cholera, in Yangon, Myanmar. (AFP via CNA)
- 17 August 2026 –
- California's energy commission approves the United States's first energy-efficiency standards for replacement tires, aiming to reduce rolling resistance and lower driver fuel costs by 2029. However, manufacturers warn the strict limits could eliminate up to 70% of current replacement tire options by 2033. (The New York Times) (Fox Businesss)
- 17 August 2026 – France–Iran relations
- Iran says it barred two French embassy employees from returning for allegedly violating the Vienna Convention through activities supporting Iranian civil society. France says their work involved programs for civil society, students, and artists. (Reuters)
- 17 August 2026 – South Korea–United States relations
- United States president Donald Trump orders the Department of Defense to substantially reduce the Ulchi-Freedom Guardian military exercises with South Korea, citing their cost and his relationship with North Korean supreme leader Kim Jong Un. The drills begin as scheduled. (AFP via The Straits Times)
- 17 August 2026 – Opposition to Vladimir Putin in Russia, Protests against the Russo-Ukrainian war
- A Russian court sentences Yabloko deputy chairperson Lev Shlosberg to 11 years and one month in prison for discrediting the armed forces and spreading disinformation after he publicly condemned the Russo-Ukrainian war. (Reuters)
- 17 August 2026 –
- Discord suspends live streaming, screen sharing, and video calls in Brazil to comply with an order from the national data protection authority following the death of a 13-year-old girl allegedly encouraged to kill herself during an online broadcast. (AFP via RFI)
- The trial of Duane "Keffe D" Davis for his alleged role in the murder of Tupac Shakur begins in Las Vegas, Nevada, United States. (BBC News) (CNN)
- 17 August 2026 – Mexican drug war
- Elements of the Mexican Navy seized 3.2 million doses of cocaine floating off the coasts of the state of Michoacán. This action represent a financial blow of 340.2 million pesos to organized crime.(López Doriga)
- 17 August 2026 – Immigration policy of the second Trump administration
- United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) commissioner Rodney S. Scott pauses construction of a $1.7 billion border-security project in Big Bend National Park, Texas, while the CBP reviews the plan amid bipartisan local opposition and environmental concerns. (AFP via RFI)
- 17 August 2026 –
- Former South Korean prime minister Kim Min-seok is elected as the new leader of the Democratic Party with 54.08% of the vote against its former leader Jung Chung-rae. (The Diplomat) (The Korea Herald)
- 16 August 2026 – Russo-Ukrainian war
- Violations of non-combatant airspace during the Russo-Ukrainian war, Russia–NATO relations
- 2026 drone incidents in Romania
- A Spanish F/A-18 Hornet jet shoots down a Russian drone in Romanian airspace. The drone was downed near Galați after entering from Moldova. (Politico)
- Attacks in Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian war
- Ukrainian forces launch 822 drones at Russia, including over 600 towards Moscow, killing at least seven people and injuring 39 others. A Wildberries warehouse is also destroyed. Russian officials say it is the largest Ukrainian drone attack launched this year. (BBC News)
- 16 August 2026 – Insurgency in Balochistan
- Seven suspected members of the Pakistani Taliban are killed in a intelligence-based joint operation in Kharan District, Balochistan, Pakistan. (The Express Tribune)
- 16 August 2026 – Mali War
- 2026 Mali offensives
- Tuareg separatist Azawad Liberation Front releases six wounded Malian troops. (AFP via Arab News)
- 16 August 2026 – Myanmar civil war
- Rakhine offensive
- Two civilians are killed and several homes are damaged by a government airstrike in Thandwe, Rakhine State, Myanmar. (Narinjara News)
- 16 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- The African Union (AU) holds a meeting with Sudanese officials in an effort to end the war, marking the first talks by the AU in the country since the military led by Abdel Fattah al-Burhan seized power in the October 2021 coup. (Sudan Tribune)
- 16 August 2026 –
- The death toll of the Lake Kariba vessel capsizing in Zimbabwe from last week rises to 72 after twelve more bodies are recovered. (AP)
- A passenger bus carrying tourists from Poland crashes in to a ditch in Mezőkeresztes, Hungary, killing 12 people and injuring ten more. (AP)
- Ten people are killed after a tourist bus overturns near Petrópolis, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Xinhua) (O Globo in Portuguese)
- Five teenagers are killed and four others, including a child, are injured in a head-on collision caused by a wrong-way driving vehicle on the M9 motorway in County Kildare, Ireland. (BBC News)
- St. Nicolas' Church is completely destroyed by a fire at the Museum of Folk Architecture in Sanok, Podkarpackie Voivodeship, Poland. (TVP World)
- Three people, including a teenager, are killed and two others are injured in a shooting in Isla Cristina, Andalusia, Spain. Police investigate the attack as a possible dispute between rival drug-trafficking groups and search for the gunman. (Reuters)
- 16 August 2026 – 2026 IFAF Women's Flag Football World Championship, Canada at the 2028 Summer Olympics
- In flag football, Canada's women's team defeats the defending champion United States to win its third IFAF Flag Football World Championship title. Additionally, the men's football team qualifies for the upcoming Summer Olympics. (Global News)
- 15 August 2026 – 2026 Iran war
- 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis
- 2026 Iran–Oman negotiations
- Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei says that Iran and Oman have reached an agreement on a safe route for vessels transiting through the Strait of Hormuz. (Iran International) (Saudi Gazette)
- The Emirates News Agency reports that a third Abu Dhabi National Oil Company vessel was attacked by Iran while transiting through the Strait of Hormuz a day earlier. No injuries were reported. (Reuters) (Al-Monitor)
- 15 August 2026 – Hezbollah–Israel conflict
- 2026 Lebanon war
- Israeli airstrikes in southern Lebanon kill eleven people, including three children. (Sky News)
- The Israel Defense Forces says that they have killed Ali Samir Al-Haj Hassan, a Hezbollah commander in the Radwan Force, during a airstrike in Ansar. (The Times of Israel)
- 15 August 2026 –
- A 180-foot (55 m) the Our Lady of Mercy monument dedicated to the Virgin Mary and the tallest of its kind in Europe, is inaugurated in Konotopie, Poland. (NBC News) (Vatican News)
- 15 August 2026 – 2026 Indiana floods
- Authorities in Indiana, United States, report that six people have died in recent floods from storms. (Reuters)
- 15 August 2026 –
- The death toll of the Lake Kariba vessel capsizing in Zimbabwe from last week rises to 72 after 26 more bodies are recovered. (AP via CNN)
- Six people are killed and several others wounded after a container truck crashes into an auto rickshaw in Latehar district, Jharkhand, India. (ETV Bharat)
- A minibus carrying a wedding party overturns in Diyarbakir Province, Türkiye, killing five and injuring eleven others. (Asharq al-Awsat)
- 15 August 2026 – 2026 Ceuta migrant crisis
- Police in Morocco arrest 111 migrants who attempted to enter Spain's autonomous community Ceuta, amidst tightened security on both sides of the border with Spain. (CBC)
- 15 August 2026 –
- Four artwork by Renaissance artist Antonello da Messina are reportedly stolen from the Regional Museum of Messina in Messina, Sicily, Italy. (The Guardian) (Reuters)
- Three people are shot dead and two others are wounded in a mass shooting in a flat in Newclare, Johannesburg, South Africa. (EWN)
- 15 August 2026 – Succession to the Liechtensteiner throne
- Hereditary Prince Alois announces that Liechtenstein will gradually transition its line of succession to absolute primogeniture, stating that any future descendant of him and Hereditary Princess Sophie, regardless of sex, will inherit the throne, allowing future women to inherit the throne. (AP)
- 15 August 2026 – 2026 European Aquatics Championships
- In swimming, Johannes Liebmann sets a men's 1,500-metre freestyle world record of 14:26.79 at the European Championships, improving Bobby Finke's 2024 Olympic record by nearly four seconds. (AFP via RFI)
- 15 August 2026 – 2026 Pan Pacific Swimming Championships
- In swimming, Kate Douglass sets a women's 50-metre freestyle world record of 23.49 seconds in the Pan Pacific Championships heats, surpassing Gretchen Walsh's 23.55-second mark set in June. (AFP via RFI)
- 14 August 2026 – Gaza war
- Gaza war hostage crisis
- The Israel Defense Forces announce that Al-Qassam Brigades commander Muhammad Bassam Mushtaha, who was accused of taking hostages during and after the Hamas–led attacks against Israel on October 7, was killed in a recent airstrike last month in northern Gaza. (The Times of Israel)
- 14 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- Kordofan campaign
- Heavy fighting erupts in El Obeid, North Kordofan, Sudan, between the Sudanese Armed Forces and Rapid Support Forces (RSF). Clashes also break out in Umm Arda. (Sudan Tribune)
- Around 14 people are reported to be killed following an attack by RSF militants on the North Kordofan town of Umm Arda. (AFP via Arab News) (Xinhua)
- 14 August 2026 – Colombian conflict
- A Colombian soldier is killed and four more wounded following a drone strike in the rural area of El Carmen, Norte de Santander. (El Colombiano in Spanish)
- 14 August 2026 – Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
- A constable policeman is killed and another is injured after a group of suspected insurgents attacked a police post in Bajaur district, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. (Dawn)
- 14 August 2026 – Mexican drug war
- Three gunmen are killed and a child is wounded in an attempted ambush on a highway in La Piedad, Michoacán, Mexico. Authorities seize four long guns, magazines, ammunition, and improvised explosives. (El Heraldo de México in Spanish)
- 14 August 2026 – War in the Sahel
- American missionary Kevin Rideout is released from captivity after being kidnapped by an unidentified organisation front in Niger nine months prior. (The New York Times)
- 14 August 2026 – 2026 Croatia wildfires
- One person dies and at least 40 others are injured after a severe wildfire breaks out on Croatia's coastline. (BBC News)
- 14 August 2026 – 2026 Flores earthquake
- At least 47 people are killed and several more are injured when a Mw 7.7 earthquake strikes the coast of the island of Flores in East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia. (AP)
- 14 August 2026 –
- A Mw 4.8 earthquake strikes the province of Granada in Spain, with damage reported in Granada and the surrounding area, and being felt in Madrid. (The News International)
- Sixteen people are killed and 40 others injured on the Yaounde-Bafoussam highway after a passenger bus crashed into a parked truck carrying planks in Mbam-et-Inoubou, Cameroon. (Xinhua)
- Thai rescuers find a French tourist and his two sons alive after they spend more than 16 hours at sea when their rented jet ski capsizes off Ko Samui. The family receives medical checks and is discharged. (CBS News)
- Heavy rainfall persists in Eastern China due to the remnants of Typhoon Dolphin, resulting in flooding in Zhejiang province, China, killing atleast one. (Reuters)
- 14 August 2026 – Internet censorship in France
- The Constitutional Council of France blocks a bill proposing a ban social media access for minors under the age of 15. President Emmanuel Macron orders prime minister Sebastien Lecornu to re-work the draft legislation and resubmit it to the Council. (RFI) (Business of Fashion)
- 14 August 2026 – 2026 political prisoner release in Venezuela
- Venezuela releases 131 detainees under alternative custody measures as part of a national reconciliation program following former president Nicolás Maduro's removal. Human rights group Foro Penal confirms that at least 45 of those freed are political prisoners. (AFP via RFI)
- 14 August 2026 – 2026 NFL season
- In American football, the National Football League suspends Atlanta Falcons linebacker James Pearce Jr. for eight games for violating the league's personal conduct policy after his arrest in February on domestic violence charges. (AP) (WAGA-TV)
- 14 August 2026 – 2026 Volta a Portugal
- In road bicycle racing, the eighth stage at the Volta a Portugal race is neutralised after British cyclist Finlay Tarling is killed in an accident during the race. (The Athletic via The New York Times)
- 13 August 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- 2026 Iran war
- 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis
- The United Arab Emirates says that two vessels linked to the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company were attacked in the Strait of Hormuz, accusing Iran of being behind the attacks. (Al Jazeera) (The New Region)
- 2026 United States military buildup in the Middle East
- The Wall Street Journal reports that the Nimitz-class USS George Washington will deploy to the Middle East to replace the USS Abraham Lincoln following a nine-month deployment and amidst reports of conditions on the aircraft carrier. (CBS News) (The Hill) (The Wall Street Journal)
- Gaza war
- The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and Shin Bet says that they have killed Hamas commander and Gaza District Police chief Jamal Mahmoud Abu Kamil in a airstrike in Gaza City. Additionally, the IDF also kills a Hamas company commander in a separate strike in Khan Yunis. (The Jerusalem Post) (Israel National News)
- 13 August 2026 – Russo-Ukrainian war
- Crimea attacks
- Russian military officer Robert Shagaev, who commanded the submarine Zaporizhzhia before defecting to Russia after its annexation of Crimea, is reported to have been killed by an explosive planted in a trash can in Sevastopol. (CNN) (Ynet)
- 13 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- Blue Nile campaign
- The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) says that they have retaken control of the Blue Nile town of Kurmuk, a month after being recaptured by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF). (Sudans Post)
- Kordofan campaign
- The SAF and Joint Forces repels a major assault by RSF on the Jebrat al Sheikh district in North Kordofan, Sudan. (Sudan Tribune) (AA)
- Renewed drone attacks by the RSF are reported in Khartoum, Sudan, for a second consecutive day, with the SAF intercepting several drones targeting the area. (La Presse) (Sudan Tribune)
- 13 August 2026 – 2026 Pacific hurricane season
- In the United States, Hawaii governor Josh Green declares a state of emergency ahead of Tropical Storm Lala's expected landfall on the state over the weekend. (AFP via CNA)
- 13 August 2026 – 2026 United Kingdom wildfires
- Multiple wildfires break out across England on the hottest day of the year in the United Kingdom so far, with widespread damage in Stourbridge, West Midlands. (BBC News)
- 13 August 2026 – Lewes derailment
- At least 20 people are injured when a GTR Southern commuter train derails near Lewes, East Sussex, United Kingdom. (BBC News) (CNN)
- 13 August 2026 –
- At least eleven people are killed and 13 others are injured after two trucks, two minibuses, two cars and a tricycle collided on the Accra–Kumasi Expressway, Ghana. (Xinhua)
- Seven people are killed after an under-construction tunnel collapsed in Chamoli District, India. (Xinhua)
- Unprecedented torrential rainfall due to severe thunderstorms causes widespread flooding in Chiba Prefecture, Japan, leaving at least eight people dead. (BBC News) (Reuters)
- 13 August 2026 – 2026 European heatwaves
- Romania begins shutting down the second reactor at the Cernavodă Nuclear Power Plant, the country's only nuclear power plant, after a drought lowered the Danube river below the level required for cooling, leaving both reactors offline. The government says alternative sources and imports will cover electricity demand. (AP)
- 13 August 2026 –
- Greece's public health agency reports 110 West Nile virus infections and nine deaths in 2026, including 45 new cases in one week, as authorities increase mosquito control measures in the Athens metropolitan area. (AFP via Daily Sabah)
- 13 August 2026 – Russian spies in the Russo-Ukrainian war
- Polish prime minister Donald Tusk says authorities, working with U.S. services, foiled an alleged Russian plot to kill a Ukrainian-American citizen in Warsaw and arrest a suspect accused of acting for Russian intelligence. Tusk says it is the first such Russian-directed plot in another NATO country. (CBS News)
- 13 August 2026 – 2027 Kyrgyz presidential election
- Kyrgyz president Sadyr Japarov announces that he will run for a second term in the upcoming presidential election in January 2027. (Reuters)
- 13 August 2026 – 2026 Zambian general election
- Zambians vote to elect a president and 280 seats of the National Assembly. Incumbent president Hakainde Hichilema is running for re-election to a second term in office. (AP)
- Zambian police arrest several senior opposition figures during the elections, accusing them of possessing military weapons and planning armed insurrection. Opposition leader Brian Mundubile says security forces raided his residence after voting ended. (Reuters)
- 12 August 2026 – Sudanese civil war
- Kordofan campaign, Siege of El Obeid
- The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) launch eight drone and land attacks across El Obeid, North Kordofan. Two people are reported to be killed during the attacks. (Reuters)
- The RSF launch drone strikes across multiple cities in Sudan, including its capital Khartoum, Bahri, and Omdurman in Khartoum State, and the River Nile cites of Ad-Damir and Atbara. (AFP via Arab News) (The National News)
- 12 August 2026 – Colombian conflict
- Two Colombian soldiers are killed and 17 more are wounded in an ambush by FARC dissidents in Algeciras, Huila. (El Colombiano in Spanish) (Sociedad Media)
- 12 August 2026 – Libyan crisis
- A drone strike is reported on a electrical substation in Zawiya, western Libya, causing a fire and power outages. (The Hill)
- 12 August 2026 – Mexican drug war
- A failed attack against the Tayoltita Airfield, in San Dimas Municipality, Durango, Mexico, leaves one gunman killed and two soldiers wounded. Authorities deploy an operation in the zone to secure the area and search for the remaining attackers. (La Jornada in Spanish)
- 12 August 2026 – Red Sea crisis
- Pakistani foreign minister Ishaq Dar reports that three Pakistanis were killed in a attack on a commercial vessel in the Red Sea. (DW)
- 12 August 2026 –
- A woman is killed and 172 other people are rescued after a ferry catches fire off the coast of Bali, Indonesia. (AFP via RFI)
- Four people are killed, including the perpetrator, in shooting and stabbing attacks at a daycare and a house in Hopkins, Minnesota, United States. (CBS News)
- 12 August 2026 – 2026 Cook Islands general election
- Cook Islanders vote to elect all 24 seats of Parliament amid a cost-of-living crisis and debate regarding a past partnership agreement with China. Incumbent prime minister Mark Brown faces a challenge from Cook Islands United leader Teariki Heather. (RNZ) (The Guardian)
- 12 August 2026 –
- The Rapid Support Forces-appointed governor of Sudan's Kordofan region, Hamad Mohammad Hamad Khalifa, resigns and announces he will defect. (Sudan Tribune) (Al-Arabiya)
- 12 August 2026 – Solar eclipse of August 12, 2026
- A total solar eclipse occurs in Greenland, Iceland, and Spain, with partial eclipses visible over much of northern North America, Europe (except most of Ukraine, Greece, Bulgaria and Russia), northwestern Africa and northern Asian Russia. It is the first total eclipse observable in mainland Europe since August 1999. (Time and Date) (EclipseWise)
- 12 August 2026 – MoM-BH*-1
- Astronomers studying a little red dot found by the James Webb Space Telescope announce in Nature the discovery of the first black hole star. The first object classed as such, [[MoM-BH;12 August 2026 – MoM-BH*-1
- -1]], in the constellation of Cetus, is the size of the Solar System and emits a light that outshines its host galaxy. (The Guardian) (PopSci)
- 11 August 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- 2026 Iran war
- 2026 Iran war ceasefire
- Pakistan in the 2026 Iran war
- Pakistani defence minister Khawaja Asif says that a deal between Iran and the United States is "close", including an arrangement over the Strait of Hormuz. (Bloomberg News) (CNBC)
- 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis
- 2026 United States naval blockade of Iran
- The Wall Street Journal reports that a U.S. military helicopter has fired at the rudder of the Panama-flagged container ship Vela Nova after crews ignored the naval blockade re-imposed in July, contradicting British maritime management that it was hit by a missile in the Gulf of Oman. (Reuters)
- Red Sea crisis
- Operation Rough Rider
- The U.S. Department of Defense reports to Congress that the U.S. military strikes against Houthi rebels in Yemen in 2025 killed 153 civilians and injured another 243. (The Hill)
- The Yemeni government reports that six people have been killed in strikes on a cargo ship by the Houthis in the Bab-el-Mandeb. (The New York Times)
- Gaza war
- The Israeli Army Radio reports that the Israel Defense Forces launched a strike targeting a Hamas sniper near the Yellow Line in the Gaza Strip, its first strike on the enclave in 10 days. (AIN) (The Times of Israel) (The Jerusalem Post)
- 11 August 2026 – Sudanese Civil Wars
- Sudanese civil war
- Blue Nile campaign
- A heavy attack on civilians by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) and Sudan People's Liberation Movement–North (SPLM-N) is reported in Geissan in Sudan's Blue Nile state, including on the main market, surrounding farms, and other shops. (Sudan Tribune)
- The International Organization for Migration reports that 2,300 people in the Blue Nile region has been displaced following recent clashes. (Middle East Monitor)
- Attacks by the RSF and SPLM-N are also reported in Qaysān on its provincial headquarters and a market. (Sudan Tribune in Arabic)
- Sudanese nomadic conflicts
- Around 60 people are killed and around 50 others injured in an armed attack during a cattle raid in Tonj North County, Warrap State, South Sudan. (AFP via Arab News) (Radio Tamazuj)
- 11 August 2026 – 2026 Colombia earthquake
- The casualty toll from the Mw 7.4 earthquake in Colombia yesterday increases to over 240 people killed, 570 injured, and at least 3,000 others still missing. President Abelardo de la Espriella declares a national state of emergency. (The Guardian)
- 11 August 2026 –
- At least 44 people are killed when a ferry sinks on Lake Kariba, Zimbabwe. (AFP via RFI)
- Search operations for the landslide from Sunday conclude in Baguio, Philippines, placing the final death toll at ten people. Meanwhile, the national police places the nationwide toll from the tropical cyclones and monsoons at 26. (ABS-CBN News) (Philippine Daily Inquirer)
- At least 18 people are killed and around 30 others are injured in a two-vehicle collision in Ismailia Governorate, Egypt. (Al Ahram)
- Four people are killed and five others are injured after an old residential building collapses in Cairo, Egypt. (Gulf News)
- Three people are killed following a commercial building fire in Giza, Egypt. (Al Ahram)
- 11 August 2026 – Syria and weapons of mass destruction
- The Syrian transitional government confirms their cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency to purge nuclear materials at a hidden facility following a report by Axios on such plan after an agreement between Israel, Syria, and the United States. Conversely, Israel threatens to bombard the site again if the materials remain, and to prevent access to the site. (AA) (Axios) (The Jerusalem Post)
- 11 August 2026 – Presidency of Ahmed al-Sharaa, War crimes in the Syrian civil war, Prosecution of Syrian civil war criminals
- The Criminal Court in Damascus, Syria, sentences deposed president Bashar al-Assad and his brother Maher to death in absentia, and former Daraa political security director Atef Najib in person, and issue international arrest warrants for all for premeditated murder and crimes against humanity. (AFP via The Standard) (The National)
- 11 August 2026 – Capital punishment in Lebanon
- The Lebanese parliament votes to abolish the death penalty. (BBC News)
- 11 August 2026 –
- A United States Marine Corps soldier is released from Russia after having been detained there since 2022. (Kyiv Independent)
- 11 August 2026 – 2026 Hungarian presidential election
- Former Supreme Court president András Baka is elected as Hungarian president through a supermajority and is scheduled to take office on 19 August. He ran uncontested as the Tisza Party's candidate, as neither Fidesz nor its partner KNDP nominated a candidate. (Reuters)
- 11 August 2026 – Palestinian sports during the Gaza war
- Palestinian Football Association president Jibril Rajoub announces that all football and sport activities will resume in September following a three-year suspension that began after the outbreak of the Gaza war. (Al Jazeera)
- 10 August 2026 – 2026 Iran war
- 2026 Strait of Hormuz crisis
- 2026 United States naval blockade of Iran
- The United States Central Command says that they have redirected 55 vessels linked to Iran since reinstating the blockade in July. (Middle East Eye)
- Impact of the 2026 Iran war on Iran
- Iranian supreme leader Mojtaba Khamenei appoints new leaders for Iran's military to replace their predecessors after they were killed during the initial Israel and U.S. airstrikes, including Ali Abdollahi as chief of staff, Kioumars Heydari as deputy commander, and Hossein Taeb as Basij commander. (The Jerusalem Post) (Al-Monitor)
- 10 August 2026 – Russo-Ukrainian war
- Attacks in Russia during the Russo-Ukrainian war
- Аt least 13 people are killed, including a child, and 39 others were injured in a Ukrainian drone attack on an oil refinery in Nizhnekamsk, Tatarstan, Russia. (Reuters)
- 10 August 2026 – Libyan crisis
- Fawzi al-Mansouri, head of military intelligence for the Libyan National Army, is assassinated as a bomb exploded inside his car in Benghazi, Libya. (AFP via RFI) (Al Jazeera)
- 10 August 2026 – 2026 Colombia earthquake
- A Mw 7.4 earthquake strikes Chocó Department, Colombia, causing widespread and heavy damage, and leaving at least 288 people dead. (El Pais) (BBC News) (Reuters)
- The Cathedral Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary in Manizales is confirmed to be among the buildings damaged after one of the towers collapsed following the earthquake. (The Independent) (The City Paper Bogota) (El Colombiano in Spanish)
- 10 August 2026 – Wildfires in 2026
- A recent wildfire at the Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park in East Java, Indonesia, is extinguished after 550 ha (1,400 acres) were burnt. However, new hotspots are also reported near the caldera. (Reuters)
- 10 August 2026 –
- The Philippine civil defense office reports that at least 16 people were killed across Luzon, including seven in Baguio, by floods, landslides and weather-related accidents after nine days of heavy monsoon rain, while three others remain missing. (AFP via RFI)
- 10 August 2026 – 2026 Ebola epidemic
- The World Health Organization reports that the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo started in February before its declaration, with some cases attributed to malaria and typhoid. (Al Jazeera)
- 10 August 2026 – Colombia–Israel relations, Colombia–Syria relations
- Colombia becomes the second country to recognize the Golan Heights, a region in southwestern Syria that has been under Israeli occupation since 1967, as part of Israel's sovereignty. (AFP via CNA) (The Jerusalem Post)
- 10 August 2026 – 2026 Nonthaburi shootings
- Nonthaburi Provincial Administrative Organization president Thongchai Yenprasert is killed in a shooting at a government building in Nonthaburi province, Thailand. Former parliament member Chalong Riewrang is taken into custody over corruption. (BBC News) (AFP via CNA) (Thairath)
- 10 August 2026 – Murder of Mir Raza Ali
- The government of Sindh, Pakistan, announces that a judicial commission headed by a judge of the Sindh High Court would investigate businessman Mir Raza Ali's death. The decision followed a recommendation by the Sindh Assembly. (Dawn)
- 10 August 2026 – 2026 Russian legislative election
- Upon petition from Rodina, the liberal Yabloko party is barred from participating in the 2026 Russian legislative election on charges of unregistered funding, a controversial copyright infringement, and extremism by the Supreme Court of Russia. (The Guardian) (The Moscow Times)
- 9 August 2026 – Middle Eastern crisis
- Gaza war
- Gaza peace plan
- Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejects a United States-led plan for peace accepted by Hamas, saying Israel will not withdraw forces until Hamas fully disarms. (AFP via RFI)
- Yemeni civil war
- At least eleven people are killed and at least 40 others are injured in a Houthi missile and drone attack on Mokha, Taiz Governorate, Yemen. (MENA via The New Arab)
- The Governor of Al-Hudaydah Governorate, Yemen, survives an assassination attempt after the Houthis shelled his residence in Al Khawkhah district. (Yemen Online)
- 9 August 2026 – Mali War
- 2026 Mali offensives
Me (incomplete), described in userboxes...
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History and contributions...
Awards and praise I've received over the years...
Tip of the day April 21, 2006: Thanks for helping a newbie!
I just want to thank you for building on my tip and making it a true wikipedia tip of the day. I'm still learning a lot about how to do things around here, so your help was greatly appreciated! Keep up the great work, and keep on Going for it!
Smashing!
Barnstar
Barnstar
Award
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The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar | |
| Your kindess was not random, because you were kind enough to listen to my requests to fix my userpage. Your major kindness will not be ignored, as this BarnStar is my token of appreciation! Kyo catmeow! 01:59, 24 November 2006 (UTC) |
!!!
<O.o --The Prophet Wizard of the Crayon Cake 01:45, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
- You're welcome. The Transhumanist 01:55, 27 November 2006 (UTC)
Barnstar
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The da Vinci Barnstar | |
| Awarded to User:The Transhumanist. Sometimes those who take on large areas of wikipedia organisation seem to be taken for granted, and this is just to show that your work is appreciated by the community. Khukri (talk . contribs) 09:56, 12 December 2006 (UTC) |
!
Cool signature Kamope · talk · contributions 12:58, 22 January 2007 (UTC)
Thanks. The Transhumanist 05:52, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
Thanks so much!
Thanks so much for the hints in your userpage tutorial. 
. I am a new user and familiar with HTML markup, but not so with Wikimark up. Your userpage tutorial really helped! Real96 06:14, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
- You're welcome. I'm glad you found it useful. If you see any way to improve it, by all means, please feel free to do so. The Transhumanist 06:36, 23 January 2007 (UTC)
How can I sum the above up....? Oh yes:
|
The Original Barnstar | |
| For your revamp of The Welcoming Committee, and of the Welcome Page, I award you the original barnstar. Well done! Anthonycfc [T • C] 18:19, 14 February 2007 (UTC) |
WOW!!
as a near- noob, this is by far the most detailed and useful article on wikipedia for me! Excellent! I really wish I had a user page like this after two years...Snailey! 15:42, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar | |
| For all your work with admin coaching, barnstar awarding, Wikipedia-expanding, and various administrative duties (if you can call all that political stuff we Wikipedians must wade through such a name), I, Sharkface217, hereby award you this Tireless Contributor Barnstar. Good job. S h a r k f a c e 2 1 7 19:36, 5 May 2007 (UTC) |
Just a few words...
TT, my friend, my mop would never have been gained without your incredible expertise. My kindest regards to you, and drop by as often as possible! Now, a little token of my appreciation...
This, the Golden Wiki Award, the highest attainment level of awards and barnstars, goes to you - The Transhumanist - for being one of the most helpful, kind, resourceful and generous Wikipedians I've had to utmost fortune to meet. Your contributions around the Wiki - at the WikiClassroom, in Dispute Resolution, at the Welcoming Committee, but most of all being a genuinely fun guy, are an amazing feat, and if half the trolls I'll undoubtedly meet after gaining my mop (thanks to you) took a leaf from your book, Wikipedia would be a nicer place.
My kindest possible regards,
Anthony 21:38, 6 May 2007 (UTC)
Barnstar
![](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:"What_a_Brilliant_Idea!"_Barnstar.png) |
What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar | |
| I award you this Brilliant Idea Barnstar for helping others to earn Barnstars and awards through your Award Center! • The Giant Puffin • 13:31, 3 June 2007 (UTC) |
Award
Hello The Transhumanist, (Hold on, can I say that or is it "Hello Transhumanist")
I was going to give you an award but there wasn't one good enough, so I made one better than any that has ever been seen before - This message. Yes, yes, I know, you don't think your worthy of it, but I assure you, you are the only one good enough for it - Pheonix 19:34, 12 August 2007 (UTC)
A Help:Contents Barnstar
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar | |
| As the top contributor to Help:Contents, you deserve this barnstar. Thank you! Jreferee (Talk) 05:59, 23 August 2007 (UTC) |
Barnstar
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The Original Barnstar | |
| For taking up the challenge and improving my command page, I, Sharkface217, hereby award you this Original Barnstar. Another feather in the Transhumanist cap, eh? :-P |
:D
Hi there Trans Face!
X××x××pink×jellocreature××x××X (talk) 01:36, 20 December 2007 (UTC)
You won an award!
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X××x××pink×jellocreature××x××X (talk) awards you the unofficial funniness award! |
You deserve a barnstar for your efforts. I can't think of anyone who has contributed more to Wikipedia, except maybe Jimbo. I'm not sure where to put this on your frontpage, so here it is:
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What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar | |
| For boldly redirecting Debt-based monetary system to Criticisms of fractional-reserve banking, both saving it from deletion while defending Wikipedia from those who would violate WP:FRINGE, and being one of the most helpful editors on Wikipedia, in general. Zenwhat (talk) 03:41, 7 January 2008 (UTC) |
Barnstar
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar | |
| I, Diligent Terrier, award you this "Tireless Contributor Barnstar" for your work in starting the List of basic American Civil War topics article from scratch. Great Job! DiligentTerrier • talk |sign here 22:17, 12 January 2008 (UTC) |
My Userpage
Hi There First id like to thank you immensly for your pages about creating a decent userpage!! They are great and I would be lost without them!! Just one question, On my userpage i have a small welcome banner up the top. How do I make this text larger and change the font? Sorry if you have already covered this somewhere. Thanks in advanceCstubbies (talk) 12:40, 19 January 2008 (UTC)
A valuable service
I think you need recognition for doing the job of ten other editors, and doing it out of altruism and genuine belief in Wikipedia. Not many editors here have the same good attitude and provide the same service as you - I don't have any specific point to put across, but I thought you should just be prodded and reminded that you do a lot of good around here, in the hope you'll keep it up. Kudos! Seegoon (talk) 17:43, 25 January 2008 (UTC)
:)
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The Excellent Userpage Award | |
| Nice page. jaytur1 (talk · contribs) 12:13, 10 February 2008 (UTC) |
Welcoming committee
Just a note, I've made a minor update to your contributions. To reiterate my edit summary, you put in a tonne of effort there, and you deserve to be credited for it :) Feel free to revert, nonetheless. Regards, AGK (contact) 16:44, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
Hi there TTH, Just wanted to thank you for your labors on this page, which is a great resource for us. Bill Wwheaton (talk) 17:48, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
You'd better hope there is a humour barnstar
... because you just gave me the biggest laugh in weeks. Good stuff giving that RfA spammer what-for here. αѕєηιηє t/c 22:03, 1 March 2008 (UTC)
Nice work -- I will withdraw the AfD nom. – ukexpat (talk) 00:55, 15 March 2008 (UTC)
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The Barnstar of Recovery | |
| For saving List of basic Canada topics from being deleted, I - Milk's Favorite Cookie hereby award you this Barnstar! Congrats! - Milk's Favorite Cookie 01:16, 15 March 2008 (UTC) |
Fictional lists
The deletion review was approved for recreation: Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2008 March 10. Just letting you know, in case you weren't watchlisting it. I'm not sure what you have to do next to get the old version undeleted though (if that's what you wanted :) Nice catch on rescuing that grouping. -- Quiddity (talk) 00:21, 17 March 2008 (UTC)
'Tis for you
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The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar | |
| I've noticed the extra mile you've gone to help a new user, and I wanted you to know it hasn't gone unnoticed. Keep up the good work! Keeper | 76 | Disclaimer 16:40, 5 April 2008 (UTC) |
Barnstar
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The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar | |
| I award this barnstar to The Transhumanist, for being patient and taking four rounds of references from me, until they were all valid. LAAFan 01:21, 17 June 2008 (UTC) |
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The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar | |
| I award this barnstar to The Transhumanist, for putting funny stuff on his discussion page which led me to copy them and put some of those funny stuff on my website. Thanks. Emir34 01:21, 17 June 2008 (UTC) |
Hi Transhumanist, I wanted to note that I saw all of your work on the List of Basic France topics, and I appreciate it! Lazulilasher (talk) 02:12, 8 August 2008 (UTC)
From Zach...
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The da Vinci Barnstar | |
| For helping me so many times. and for my wonderful userpage. Cheers, Zacharycrimsonwolf 04:08, 30 September 2008 (UTC) |
Guidance Star
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The Guidance Barnstar | |
| For helping me to find resources on humanism, which I will hopefully be able to use to improve the articles on it here as well! Scapler (talk) 02:39, 11 November 2008 (UTC) |
Happy Transhumanist's Day!
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The Transhumanist has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, |
Happy The Transhumanist's Day!
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The Transhumanist has been identified as an Awesome Wikipedian, Cheers, If you'd like to show off your awesomeness, you can use this userbox. |
- Congrats. :) –Juliancolton | Talk 23:44, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
I think...
...you need a barnstar for all of the hard work you have put into the WP:WPOOK!
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The Barnstar Barnstar | |
| You deserve two! at-210 discovered elements ∞ what am I? 20:21, 14 June 2009 (UTC) |
Barnstar
Transhumanist my friend,
It's about time you deserve a barnstar for all your contributions to outlines on Wikipedia, and also for being the promoter that you are for outlines. If it wasn't for you we might not have outlines as they are, so it is my honor to present to you the Special Barnstar because no other barnstar could merit what you do for outlines on Wikipedia. :-) Burningview (talk) 03:42, 8 August 2009 (UTC)
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The Special Barnstar | |
| This barnstar is presented to Transhumanist for all the hard work, contributions, coordination, and promotion he does in advancing the idea, coverage, content, and quality of Outlines on Wikipedia. For this he deserves a Special Barnstar Burningview (talk) 03:42, 8 August 2009 (UTC) |
Well done
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The Special Barnstar | |
| This award is in appreciation of the excellent work you have done supporting the development of Outlines on Wikipedia Thruxton (talk) 18:59, 5 December 2010 (UTC) |
Made me laugh
You once said in a AFD: "If you are building a robot, you can start with just the left pinky." I love that. Happy New Year! Jerry delusional ¤ kangaroo 20:34, 31 December 2010 (UTC)
another thanks
I appreciate you pointing me in the direction of a formatted signature. For some reason I couldn't find any reference to how it is done in the years I have been here. Cheers. ◦◦derekbd◦◦my talk◦◦ 12:16, 4 June 2011 (UTC)
Impressed
I just wanted to tell you (probably not the 1st ^^ ) that your are an incredible wikipedia member, your userpage is simply amazing and your contribution is...gigantic? huge? Incredible? not for the number edits (still high) but rather over the appropriateness of the things that you have created, especially the outline project. I wont give you another award, you already have billions, but simply a modest "Bravo!". --
Offiikart (Talk) 05:23, 21 June 2011 (UTC)
Thanks
Hi, thanks a lot for the barnstar, you are truly a user with whom it is pleasant to interact. I greatly appreciate your help, your tips and you recognition on the work done, even if only very minimal compared to the work you have done.
I think you, more than everyone else, deserve a special recognition. Here is the first Barnstar I ever awarded :
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The WikiProject Barnstar | |
| To The Transhumanist who created the outline project and tirelessly continues to improve it. A special thanks for your help and your recognition. OffiikartTalk 13:54, 29 June 2011 (UTC) |
ps. I did put the page alert on my watchlist 
A barnstar for you!
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The Original Barnstar |
| Your fine contributions are not overlooked. You are a quality editor, and we are so glad you are here. Thanks to the user:Transhumanist! Pinkstrawberry02™ talk 01:49, 13 October 2011 (UTC) |
Note to user getting this message: Please respond on Pinkstrawberry02's talk page. If for some reason you cannot, please send them a {{talkback}} and reply on your own talk page. Thanks for your understanding in this manner. See ya around the wiki!
barnstar
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The Chess Barnstar | |
| Awarded for many contributions to chess articles, especially the Outline of chess. Bubba73 You talkin' to me? 16:34, 18 October 2011 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Original Barnstar |
| Thanks so much for your work on the Outline of domestic violence, it is so much better that it's astounding how far it's come along. Thanks for making my first outline "sing"! CaroleHenson (talk) 11:11, 21 November 2011 (UTC) |
- You're first one? Wonderful! I can't wait to see what you come up with next. And I also look forward to seeing what you have in store for this outline. Thank you for the barnstar. It's very nice to feel appreciated. The Transhumanist 22:10, 21 November 2011 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
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The Original Barnstar |
| Wow! Thanks for your help on the Future studies project. I can't believe all the pages you've contributed to, but glad you found ours!... RealFuturist (talk) 17:09, 3 February 2012 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Copyeditor's Barnstar |
| Thanks for the ndashes on the Apple outline article. Zach Vega (talk) 00:58, 13 April 2012 (UTC) |
A cookie for you!
 |
Many years ago, back before I had created my current account, I created a humble little userspace navigation menu based off of two of your menus from the User Page Design Center (initially 15, but ultimately 6). Over the years it has grown, but I don't know if I ever would have started it without seeing your menus first. I just want to thank you for putting the effort into creating those menus and then sharing them at the Design Center where they have been helpful for people like me. I hope you don't mind me borrowing from your hard work! Thanks again and take care! Michael Barera (talk) 03:30, 13 January 2013 (UTC) |
Thank you
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The Instructor's Barnstar | |
| This Barnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have performed stellar work in the area of instruction & help for other editors. Just wanted to stop by and say this edit was something I wanted to do but simply did not have the "kahunas" to do so. Thank you for the bold edit :-) Moxy (talk) 07:25, 13 February 2013 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Barnstar of Diligence |
| For your efforts on updating, improving and organising Outline of human anatomy LT910001 (talk) 06:39, 2 January 2014 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar |
| For your work on "Outline of space science" Tetra quark (don't be shy) 05:55, 18 January 2015 (UTC) |
Thank you. The Transhumanist 07:45, 18 January 2015 (UTC)
A cup of coffee for you!
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A cup of coffee for you! masum (talk) 06:10, 5 October 2015 (UTC) |
Thank you. The Transhumanist 06:56, 5 October 2015 (UTC)
At Tip-Of-The-Day: Thank you for your updates & guidance!
Want to let you know the value of your insights & feedback!
Regards, JoeHebda (talk) 21:53, 19 October 2015 (UTC)
- Thank you. Keep up the good work. The Transhumanist 16:50, 21 October 2015 (UTC)
Pony!
Pony!
Congratulations! For all your hard work on redirect repair at Glossary of North American horse racing and general wikignoming along the way of articles such as Easy Goer, you have received a pony! Ponies are cute, intelligent, cuddly, friendly (most of the time, though with notable exceptions), promote good will, encourage patience, and enjoy carrots. Treat your pony with respect and he will be your faithful friend! We need more wikipedia editors like you! Montanabw(talk) 02:22, 1 November 2015 (UTC)
To send a pony or a treat to other wonderful and responsible editors, click here.
Thank you for being one of Wikipedia's top medical contributors!
- please help translate this message into the local language
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The Cure Award |
| In 2015 you were one of the top 300 medical editors across any language of Wikipedia. Thank you from Wiki Project Med Foundation for helping bring free, complete, accurate, up-to-date health information to the public. We really appreciate you and the vital work you do! Wiki Project Med Foundation is a user group whose mission is to improve our health content. Consider joining here, there are no associated costs, and we would love to collaborate further. |
Thanks again :) -- Doc James along with the rest of the team at Wiki Project Med Foundation 03:59, 29 February 2016 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar |
| Great work with the Outlines :) Pratyush (talk) 21:07, 26 September 2016 (UTC) |
Thank you. The Transhumanist 15:31, 28 September 2016 (UTC)
Love the outlines
Hi there! I just wanted to let you know that I think your planet outlines are really cool. I have long thought it was a shame that only Wikipedians seem to know about Books or Portals, because they are really great tools for structuring knowledge (while everyone loves diving down the Wikipedia rabbit hole, we could really do with some better content organization). The outlines strike me as a great way to bring that sort content organization to mainspace, where it will actually reach a large number of readers. I notice that I am the first one to edit them besides yourself, and I hope you know that I do so with love.
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What a Brilliant Idea Barnstar | |
| Great idea with the outline articles - a great solution to a need for better mainspace-based content structuring! I see from WP:Outlines that you actually came up with this concept some years ago, but this is the first I've noticed it. A2soup (talk) 02:46, 8 February 2017 (UTC) |
A Barnstar for you!
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The Portal Barnstar | |
| The Portal Barnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have made significant contributions to topic portals. Awarded to Transhumanist for his overly enthusiastic efforts regarding the portal system and WikiProject Portals. – Lionel(talk) 11:02, 30 April 2018 (UTC) |
- Transhumanist, thank you for your extraordinary efforts on behalf of portals. It reminds me of the time when a series of attacks on scientific bibliographies led to the formation of WikiProject Bibliographies. I don't understand why your detractors are so passionate about deleting portals, but your actions have been a model for how to deal with an attack constructively. RockMagnetist(talk) 16:10, 5 May 2018 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you!
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The Article Rescue Barnstar | |
| May all who see this barnstar know that The Transhumanist made a valiant and commendable effort for defending the portal namespace from deletion. It preserved countless hours of work initially invested into creating the content. Moreoever, The Transhumanist, is doing a yeoman's job in attempting to improve the content within with portal namespace. RightCowLeftCoast (talk) 00:24, 26 May 2018 (UTC) |
@RightCowLeftCoast: Thank you. I feel honored. Please keep in mind that I have not been working alone. Credit goes to the nearly 400 editors who came forward to speak up for the keeping of portals. And although the RfC to delete all portals is over, the job of defending portals from deletion is not. For the portal namespace to be retained in the long term, the portals in it will need to be improved to a worthy quality level, otherwise we may see more deletion attempts. This task is far more than a single editor can handle. Fortunately, many editors have come forward to meet the challenge. Working to develop portals and the entire portal system, is a team of 80 editors who are diligently redesigning, upgrading, updating, and maintaining portals. They are the members of the Portals WikiProject, and without them there might be no portals. They are doing a wonderful job, and I am very proud of them. Thank you. — The Transhumanist 17:22, 26 May 2018 (UTC)
Precious
thinking-related topics
Thank you for organising a list of thinking-related topics, for Shift work sleep disorder and the index of oral health and dental articles, for your thoughts and efforts regarding portals, and beginnings such as Portal:Thinking/Selected picture, - you are an awesome Wikipedian!
Precious
portals
Thank you for your thoughts and efforts regarding portals, for the concept of outlines, for sectional redirects, for articles such as Life Extension Foundation, for service from 2006, including portal philosophy and user page design center, - repeating (1 & 4 June 2009): you are an awesome Wikipedian!
Thank you. I looked, but couldn't figure out what 1 & 4 June 2009 were referring to. Just curious. — The Transhumanist 19:26, 4 June 2018 (UTC)
- Follow the link "awesome W." and look for your name: 2 others said it before me! --Gerda Arendt (talk) 09:48, 5 June 2018 (UTC)
Executive director of portals
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The Portal Barnstar | |
| Not sure if a simple barnstar can express the communities gratitude to the portal work that you're doing. Your an indispensable member of our community. Moxy (talk) 18:08, 7 June 2018 (UTC) |
Moxy, thank you. I'm honored, and I receive this praise for the team, without whom there would be very little progress on portals. They are literally transforming them into something new. I'm glad to be a part of that. — The Transhumanist 18:20, 7 June 2018 (UTC)
A Barnstar for you
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The Portal Barnstar | |
| The Portal Barnstar is awarded to Wikipedians who have made significant contributions to topic portals. Thanks for the great work you have been doing in the WikiProject. Dreamy Jazz talk | contribs 22:15, 4 July 2018 (UTC) |
You are welcome, formerly Wpgbrown. Nice new name. ;) — The Transhumanist 10:26, 6 July 2018 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
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The Technical Barnstar |
Good to see others of the view we have as to the need to know more. Im a research person here just of this week and your views relate to my work here. take care.
Tleesd (talk) 17:56, 5 September 2018 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thank's for updating the Portal:Seventh-day Adventist Church. You deserve this star for your good work. Catfurball (talk) 15:28, 12 October 2018 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Tireless Contributor Barnstar |
| For your excellent work on Portals. Everyday the portal project improves. Your dedication and willingness to get people involved really pays off. Cannot wait to continue working with you and the Portal team. Thank you for your work. AmericanAir88(talk) 00:30, 30 October 2018 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Random Acts of Kindness Barnstar | |
| Thank you for helping me in my first attempt in creating a portal page ‑‑V.S.(C)(T) 10:51, 23 December 2018 (UTC) |
Some barnstars for you!
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for creating Portal:Hummingbirds when I asked for it. Keep doing a good job! Catfurball (talk) 00:01, 4 January 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for making Portal:Capsicum. Catfurball (talk) 19:38, 5 February 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for making Portal:Peaches. Catfurball (talk) 21:11, 5 February 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for creating Portal:Woodpeckers for me. Catfurball (talk) 19:15, 14 February 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for creating Portal:Tyrant flycatchers for me. Catfurball (talk) 19:16, 14 February 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for creating Portal:Plums, you do a great job creating portals. Catfurball (talk) 18:45, 21 February 2019 (UTC) |
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The Graphic Designer's Barnstar |
| Thanks for creating Portal:Cotingas for me. Catfurball (talk) 19:07, 22 February 2019 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Portal Barnstar | |
| For your tireless dedication to creating, maintaining, and improving portals, as well as your active involvement in making improvements to the system of portals itself. I'm sorry to hear that you're temporarily unable to create them, but your work is greatly appreciated 🙂 Brendon the Wizard ✉️ ✨ 14:17, 23 March 2019 (UTC) |
A Barnstar for you
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The Original Barnstar | |
| message Ambuj Shukla 19:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC) |
You have made immense contributions to outlines over the years, and have encouraged many more Wikipedians to follow your lead. The impact of your contributions are great. Keep doing the good work! — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ambujshukla2004 (talk • contribs) 19:16, 2 November 2019 (UTC)
- Thank you. — The Transhumanist 00:06, 19 November 2019 (UTC)
A barnstar for you!
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The Outline Barnstar | |
| Hello The Transhumanist, you are receiving this award for the creation and continued dedication to WikiProject Outlines. You deserve this barnstar more than anyone. Jerium (talk) 19:18, 12 November 2023 (UTC) |
A barnstar for you!
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The Barnstar of Good Humor |
| I appreciate you reviving the User page design center! I used this when I was new. Also, everyone has a phases where they religiously obsess over their user page (especially userboxes), and this tool is a good way to show them how to have fun with it. Panini! • 🥪 23:59, 2 June 2024 (UTC) |
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Categories:
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