Taking risks is something that we learn as we grow older. As we live our lives, we learn that life is full of surprises, and from this lesson we learn to make better decisions, and we learn to weigh our choices in challenging situations. This is why risk-taking is an important ability that should be taught to every person as early as possible. The problem, however, is that, as children, we tend to fear the unknown and we grow to avoid risks. If that is the case, then how should we encourage children to take risks? It would seem that introducing chess to them could be an answer, according to this paper published in the Journal of Development Economics.

Playing chess has long been considered a game for those with good logical skills, but past research has also shown that good players must also be able to take risks when necessary—sacrificing a knight, for example, if it looks like a move that will ensure victory. In this new effort, the researchers wondered what sort of mental impact playing chess might have on people who play the game in their youth. To find, out, they enlisted 400 school children (ages 15 and 16) in the U.K. who had never played chess before and training them to play chess. Each child was then tested over a year to detect any changes in their cognitive abilities.

The researchers found that most of the children experienced a decrease in risk aversion in a variety of game playing scenarios. They also noticed that playing chess also led to better math scores for some of the students and improvements in logic or rational thinking.

Learn more about the study over at PHYS.org.

(Image Credit: FelixMittermeier/ Pixabay)

The in-laws of redditor /u/Yamaha234 tore up the carpet in home to replace it. They found a complete Monopoly game board underneath! S/he hopes to convince them to just coat it in epoxy so that it can be played in the future. Such huge game boards may have been a trend once upon a time, as other homes have old Monopoly boards, too.

Other redditors propose ideal games for giant floor play. I suppose choosing Twister would be self-defeating.

-via Laughing Squid

Many were skeptical about advanced shoe technology affecting an athlete’s performance when Nike introduced the concept way back in 2017. But it seems that this technology really does affect the performance of athletes, according to a new paper published in Frontiers in Sports and Active Living. The paper found out that advanced shoe technology reduced running times of both male and female athletes.

The study analyzed seasonal best times for elite male and female runners in three race categories—10 kilometers, half marathon and marathon races—between 2012 and 2019. The researchers found a statistically significant decrease in race times after 2017, which coincided with the premiere of the Nike Vaporfly 4%.

Female elite athletes appeared to gain the most benefit from the design improvement, which features a thicker, lighter foam and rigid plate along the midsole. Their seasonal best times between 2016 and 2019 decreased anywhere from 1.7 to 2.3 percent, versus 0.6 to 1.5 percent for the men. For example, the new shoe technology improved female marathon time by about 2 minutes and 10 seconds, a 1.7 percent boost in performance.

"As far as chronometric performance is concerned, it is in our opinion a major advancement," said Dr. Stéphane Bermon, lead author of the paper and director of the World Athletics Health and Science Department.

A revolutionary tech indeed.

(Image Credit: Pixabay)

If you know someone who will get married this year, then you might want to encourage them to make the wedding more fun than it already is. How, you ask? By renting llamas, of course. And no, it’s not a joke. You really can rent a llama or an alpaca, thanks to Mtn Peaks Therapy Llamas & Alpacas.

Just look at how these newlyweds smile.

(Image Credit: Sad And Useless)

The taller buildings get, the more difficult they are to build. Their own weight works against them at increasing heights, and the forces of nature are more dangerous at greater heights. The Burj Khalifa, however unnecessary, is a marvel of modern engineering. This TED-Ed video explains how engineering challenges have been met to make ever-taller skyscrapers. -via Geeks Are Sexy

From her home in Geneva, Celine Rousseau produces La Table. C'est magnifique! Her kitchen gives birth to amazing tarts, pizzas, and charcuterie. This pizza doesn't use cherries, but it does use cherry tomatoes, parmigiano reggiano, and ricotta.

-via Totally Gourmet

Well, the Apple Spring Loaded Event is over, and despite the cheesy action sequences where Tim Cook broke into his own company, there is a lot to be excited about. New iMacs, Airtags, and iPad Pros. Let's break down everything that you might have missed during the Spring Loaded Apple event.

iPad Pro

The new iPad Pro has the M1 chip, the same on the MacBooks and iMac. The M1 seems to be Apple’s CPU for every device. The powerful chip is going to mean that this iPad can run more demanding apps, and will hopefully have a better battery life. The M1 is going to be sort of wasted in iPadOS’s current state, as most apps don’t need a laptop CPU. The iPad Pro is pricey, starting at $1099 for the model with a liquid retina display. 

One day, a particular employee at a hospital in Catanzaro, Italy stopped showing up for work. He still got paid, though, for the next fifteen years. He was paid the equivalent of $646,545 for that time.

The man is now under criminal investigation, as are six other people at the hospital connected to the incident.

How did he get away with it? BBC News explains:

The employee was a civil servant, and was assigned to a job in the hospital in 2005. It was at this point he stopped going into work, the police said.

The police have also accused him of threatening his manager to stop her from filing a disciplinary report against him.

That manager later retired, police added, and his ongoing absence was never noticed by her successor or human resources.

-via Dave Barry | Unrelated photo by Pixabay

A roller coaster got stuck far above the ground in Lithuania. It wasn't clear what the problem was, maybe the track was sticky or something. What to do? Getting out to push was not an option, but the passengers figured out a way to give it push from their seats. -via Digg

Harriet Tubman's father had a cabin and ten acres on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. But the exact location of the cabin, where Tubman herself lived between the ages of 17 and 22, had been lost. The cabin is no more, and the area was privately owned, barred to archaeologists who wanted to search for the site. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service purchased 2600 acres in 2020, opening the area to exploration.  

Last fall, Julie Schablitsky, chief archaeologist at the Maryland Department of Transportation State Highway Administration, was running a metal detector over an abandoned road in the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge when she found a coin minted in 1808, the year of the Tubman parents’ wedding. Nearby, Schablitsky unearthed ceramic fragments dated to between the 1820s and 1840s. At that point, the archaeologist tells the Times, she knew that she had found the location of Tubman’s one-time home.

“She would’ve spent time here as a child, but also she would’ve come back and been living here with her father in her teenage years, working alongside him,” says Schablitsky in a statement. “This was the opportunity she had to learn about how to navigate and survive in the wetlands and the woods. We believe this experience was able to benefit her when she began to move people to freedom.”

The site is now being thoroughly excavated, and just in time, since it is expected to be underwater by 2100. Read about the discovery and what it could mean at Smithsonian.

Fallout from nuclear bomb tests in the 1950s and '60s spread radiocesium (radioactive cesium) into the upper atmosphere, which settled over the eastern United States. That was more than 50 years ago, but it's still around. Geologist James Kaste of William & Mary asked students to bring local foods back from spring break, and was surprised to find a sample of North Carolina honey that had a cesium level 100 times that of other foods.

So Kaste and his colleagues—including one of his undergrads—collected 122 samples of locally produced, raw honey from across the eastern United States and tested them for radiocesium. They detected it in 68 of the samples, at levels above 0.03 becquerels per kilogram—roughly 870,000 radiocesium atoms per tablespoon. The highest levels of radioactivity occurred in a Florida sample—19.1 becquerels per kilogram.

The findings, reported last month in Nature Communications, reveal that, thousands of kilometers from the nearest bomb site and more than 50 years after the bombs fell, radioactive fallout is still cycling through plants and animals.

They say the level of cesium in honey is not dangerous, but just think about what the levels may have been like in decades past. How much East Coast honey did you eat back in the day? Read about the findings at Science magazine. -via Damn Interesting

(Image credit: aussiegall)

The Japanese company Kandeko gives us a lovely ad for its Smart X electro-conductive thread, in which we see a miniature city light up with tiny LEDs. While I would never have the patience to create something on this scale, the idea of electricity-conducting thread is intriguing. Is it hard to work with? Can it shock you? What if it gets cut while the lights are on? How fire safe is it? I'd like to know more, but the product page is in Japanese.  -via Laughing Squid

A glacial lake was spotted in a remote region in the Northeast Himalayas. The reddish-brown lake was discovered thanks to satellite images taken over the past 20 years. The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) reported that the body of water is situated 5060 meters above sea level, near the Zanskar valley, Ladakh in the Himalayan range: 

It is 11 kilometers (~7 miles) from the nearest village, and covers an area of approximately 0.2 square kilometers — about the size of New York City’s Grand Central Station. The lake is being fed by a northeasterly glacier, and the researchers suggest that it has either been formed or expanded due to glacial melt caused by climate change. 

The team predicts that the reddish hue of the lake is caused by the dissolution or mixing of iron-rich minerals such as hematite and goethite in the area; a reaction likely catalyzed by chlorine levels in the water or microbial weathering of sub-glacial bedrock. Because of the unique geochemistry in the area, the molecules in the lake are reflecting light at longer wavelengths, giving the lake the reddish color. 

The researchers hope to conduct a field study of the lake in the coming summer to better understand the ecology and glacial geochemistry. 

Image via Massive Science

Urban archaeologist Scott Jordan has been shoveling through the trash for nearly five decades. He takes the different items he finds and transforms them into new artworks. His findings offer a glimpse into the culture and lifestyle of the previous generations that resided in New York City, as Colossal details: 

A new documentary produced by Kaleidoscope Pictures chronicles Jordan’s lifelong practice that involves digging and uncovering items that he then transforms into new artworks. Dubbed “The Artifact Artist,” the short film by the same name follows the archaeologist and historian as he pulls glass bottles, Civil War-era garments, and small toys from the earth. While Jordan cleans and restores much of the pottery and well-preserved items, he utilizes the rest to create jewelry and assembled, sculptural works that nestle into shadowboxes, which he then sells at flea markets.

Watch the full documentary below, and find more information on Jordan’s site, Things Found NYC, which he runs with Belle Costes. Shop the pair’s findings on Etsy. 

Image via Colossal 

how do you have huge stacks of books *and* a cat. i gotta know the secret

— tea ☕️ (@ahumblebunnie) April 19, 2021

Over the past year, we've developed a habit of judging people's chosen backgrounds when they appear on TV from their homes. This is not limited to television, however. Susan Sarandon, who you may know from movies such as Thelma and Louise and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, posted a picture on Twitter featuring her cat. But what got everyone's attention was the books stacked vertically with hats on top. How does she retrieve a book that's not near the top? And how do they stay stacked with a cat in the house? My cats would've launched themselves at the hats at first sight, toppling the stacks. The replies came in, exhibiting a lot of anxiety among book lovers and cat lovers. At least one person offered to buy her a bookcase. How does this work? Continue reading to find out.