Do you want to receive more love? First get to know your superego
It ’s the internal voice whose strict, unbending standards can make us miserable. But tuning in to it can change everythingSign up for Well Actually, a free weekly newsletter about health and wellnessWhen I first became her patient, I heard everything my therapist said as a criticism. Almost every word that came out of her mouth, I received as a telling off, a character assassination or a low mark. I thought to myself: “I’m paying this woman to help me and all she’s doing is criticising me! How rude!”Here ’s a made-up example that has a lot of truth in it: if I lost my mobile phone and described my feelings of ...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 14, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Moya Sarner Tags: Health & wellbeing Life and style Society Psychology Source Type: news
World ’s top cosmologists convene to question conventional view of the universe
Meeting at London ’s Royal Society will scrutinise basic model first formulated in 1922 that universe is a vast, even expanse with no notable featuresIf you zoomed out on the universe, well beyond the level of planets, stars or galaxies, you would eventually see a vast, evenly speckled expanse with no notable features. At least, that has been the conventional view.The principle that everything looks the same everywhere is a fundamental pillar of the standard model of cosmology, which aims to explain the big bang and how the universe has evolved in the 13.7bn years since.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 14, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Hannah Devlin Science correspondent Tags: Space Science Research Education Higher education Source Type: news
The disease-busting hybrids that could bring back the majestic English elm
The tree all but vanished in the 1970s. Now, thanks to two amateur nature lovers, it may soon grace our landscapes againConstable painted them. Shakespeare wrote of them. And Francis Drake sailed the world in a ship made from them. English elms were a mainstay of England ’s landscape and culture – until they all but disappeared to Dutch elm disease in the 1970s.Since that devastation, when 25m elms were felled, enthusiasts and academics have searched for varieties resistant tothe fungus spread by Scolytus beetles that kills the trees.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 14, 2024 Category: Science Authors: James Tapper Tags: UK news Trees and forests Environment Science Source Type: news
Wafer-thin, stretchy and strong as steel: could ‘miracle’ material graphene finally transform our world?
The material, discovered in 2004, was meant to be revolutionary. But only now is the technology coming of ageTwenty years ago, scientists announced they had created a new miracle material that was going to transform our lives. They called itgraphene.Consisting of a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a hexa gonal pattern, it is one of the strongest materials ever made and, for good measure, it is a better conductor of electricity and heat than copper.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 13, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Robin McKie Science Editor Tags: Materials science Manufacturing sector Technology sector Technology startups Physics UK news Source Type: news
Dinosaur data: can the bones of the deep past help predict extinctions of the future?
Millions of years ago, animals adapted to become warm-blooded amid huge climactic changes. Now scientists hope these clues from the past could help us understand what lies aheadIn Chicago ’s Field Museum, behind a series of access-controlled doors, are about 1,500 dinosaur fossil specimens. The palaeobiologist Jasmina Wiemann walks straight past the bleached leg bones – some as big as her – neither does she glance at the fully intact spinal cord, stained red by iron oxides fill ing the spaces where there was once organic material. She only has eyes for the deep chocolate-brown fossils: these are the ones containing p...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 13, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Tiffany Cassidy Tags: Palaeontology Climate crisis Endangered species Biodiversity Environment Science US news Source Type: news
‘Smell is really important for social communication’: how technology is ruining our senses
Scientists say an overreliance on sight and sound is having a detrimental effect on people ’s wellbeing and that our devices should deliver a multisensory experience“Wait a minute, wait a minute. You ain’t heard nothing yet.” So went the first line of audible dialogue in a feature film, 1927’sThe Jazz Singer. It was one of the first times that mass media had conveyed the sight and sound of a scene together, and the audience was enthralled.There have been improvements since: black and white has become colour, frame rates and resolutions have increased and sound quality has improved, but the media we consume still ...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 13, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Ned Carter Miles Tags: Technology Health & wellbeing Science Psychology Advertising Media Society Smartphones Food Artificial intelligence (AI) Life and style Business Source Type: news
Bonobos not the peace-loving primates once thought, study reveals
Male-on-male aggression more frequent among bonobos than chimps, but aggression between males and females less commonBonobos are not quite the peace-loving primates they have long been considered, researchers say, after finding that males show more aggression towards each other than chimpanzees.Bonobos and chimpanzees are humans ’ closing living relatives. While chimpanzees are known to show aggression against each other – sometimes to the point of death – bonobos have long been thought to live more harmoniously, with no known killings. The difference has led to the theory that natural selection works against aggress...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 12, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Nicola Davis Science correspondent Tags: Animal behaviour Primatology Biology Science Animals Source Type: news
‘This isn’t how good scientific debate happens’: academics on culture of fear in gender medicine research
Cass review found professionals in the field are scared to discuss views amid risk of reputational damage and online abuseCritical thinking and open debate are pillars of scientific and medical research. Yet experienced professionals are increasingly scared to openly discuss their views on the treatment of children questioning their gender identity.This was the conclusion drawn by Hilary Cass in her review of gender identity services for children this week, which warned that a toxic debate had resulted in a culture of fear.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 12, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Hannah Devlin and Ian Sample Tags: Transgender NHS Medical research Children Young people Science Society UK news Source Type: news
The week in wildlife – in pictures: greedy pelican and capricorn rising
The best of this week ’s wildlife photographs from around the worldContinue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 12, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Pejman Faratin Tags: Wildlife Animals Zoology Photography World news Biology Source Type: news
Banquet room with preserved frescoes unearthed among Pompeii ruins
‘Black room’ with frescoes inspired by Trojan war described as one of most striking discoveries ever made at site in southern ItalyA banquet room replete with well preserved frescoes depicting characters inspired by the Trojan war has been unearthed among the ruins of Pompeii in what has been described as one of the most striking discoveries ever made at the southern Italy archaeological site.The 15-metre-long, six-metre-wide room was found in a former private residence in Via di Nola, which was ancient Pompeii ’s longest road, during excavations in the Regio IX area of the site.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 11, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Angela Giuffrida in Rome Tags: Italy Archaeology Science World news Europe Source Type: news
Feeling angry? Here ’s how to deal with it | Letters
Readers respond to Japanese research on anger management techniquesYour article (Write down your thoughts and shred them to relieve anger, researchers say, 9 April) reminded me that, in the 1960s, after visiting a preschool group in a monitoring capacity, I felt aggrieved by the way I ’d been received. On returning home, I wrote a letter to the person involved, but then calmed down sufficiently to decide not to send it. I screwed up the paper and threw it on to the open fire. I did feel better after that.Fast forward to the early 2000s, while working with a bereavement organisation, my client expressed negative thoughts ...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 11, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Guardian Staff Tags: Psychology Mental health Society UK news Source Type: news
Nostalgia: A History of a Dangerous Emotion by Agnes Arnold-Forster review – no place like home
This absorbing exploration of nostalgia raises questions about its slippery nature, and shows how it has been chillingly deployed in politics, from the cold war to TrumpismIn the 1970s there were American press reports of an Iowa man who was tormented by his yearning for the 16-year stretch of time that ran from 1752 to 1768. His misery was the result of not being able to find anyone who shared this deep nostalgia for a period when electricity was still a rumour and America was proud to think of itself as British.But does this really count as nostalgia? Is it not, actually, a bid for...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 11, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Kathryn Hughes Tags: History books Psychology Society books Culture Brexit Source Type: news
The senior Swiss women who went to court over climate change, and won – podcast
This week, in a landmark case, the European court of human rights ruled that Switzerland ’s weak climate policy had violated the rights of a group of older Swiss women to family life. Ian Sample talks to Europe environment correspondent Ajit Niranjan about why the women brought the case and what the ruling could mean for future climate policy.Read Ajit Niranjan ’s article about the court caseContinue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 11, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Presented by Ian Sample, with Ajit Niranjan, produced by Madeleine Finlay, sound design by Tony Onuchukwu, the executive producer is Ellie Bury Tags: Science Climate crisis European court of human rights Switzerland Environment Source Type: news
Remembering physicist Peter Higgs – podcast
The Nobel prize-winning British physicist Peter Higgs has died aged 94. The confirmation in 2012 of the existence of the Higgs boson particle, five decades after Higgs had first theorised its existence, paved the way for his 2013 Nobel win. Nicknamed ‘the god particle’, the Higgs boson was part of an attempt to explain why the building blocks of the universe have mass. Ian Sample and Madeleine Finlay look back on the life and legacy of a giant of scienceRead an obituary of Peter HiggsContinue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 10, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Presented by Madeleine Finlay with Ian Sample, produced by Joshan Chana, the executive producer is Ellie Bury Tags: Science Physics Peter Higgs Cern Large Hadron Collider Particle physics Source Type: news
Fox bones at ancient burial site suggest animal may have been kept as pet
Clues at Argentina site raise possibility mammal was buried with human owners about 1,500 years agoThe remains of a fox unearthed at a human burial site in Argentina dating back 1,500 years has raised the possibility the animal may have been kept as a pet, research suggests.Experts say the remains predate the arrival of domestic dogs in Patagonia, which occurred about 700 –900 years ago, with a number of clues suggesting the fox was seen as valuable, and may even have been a companion to the hunter-gatherers it lived with.Continue reading... (Source: Guardian Unlimited Science)
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - April 9, 2024 Category: Science Authors: Nicola Davis Science correspondent Tags: Animal behaviour Animals World news Science Biology Argentina Americas Pets Life and style Heritage Culture Source Type: news
