Elephants are gentle giants. They are peaceful by nature, and won't attack unless they themselves feel attacked. But throughout the years in sub-Saharan Africa, elephants have struggled. Not only threatened by poachers but also by the ballooning population of humans whose farmlands encroach on the natural habitats of elephants. Thus, food sources have steadily decreased and the elephants have no other choice but to raid people's farms to scavenge for food. It's a problem that Dominique Gonçalves and a team of zoologists and ecologists are addressing.

At the moment, the issue is how to keep the elephants from crossing over the neighbors' fence and ransacking their crops. To begin with, many subsistence farmers in that region do not have the resources to put up expensive wire fences to keep large animals away. This led to instances when conflicts between elephants and humans arose. In one case, five farmers were trampled by elephants while they were out on the field harvesting crops.

After years of researching, Gonçalves' team found a very simple solution: bees. It turns out that the elephants are scared of bees, as much as we would be if we were being swarmed by aggressive buzzing bees. They lined fences along areas where elephants usually crossed toward the croplands. On some of the fences, they hung up beehives filled with one of the most aggressive bee species, the African bee. And they found that this reduced instances of elephants crossing over. For details on the rest of the study, check it out on Nautilus.

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Jesters were the medieval equivalent of comedians, and they are typically depicted wearing a cap with bells on it. But as with comedians of today, the jesters of history have always spoken their minds whether it put their life in danger or not. These days, comedians generally don't have to fear for their lives by telling jokes that may offend or insult the sensibilities of others. But back in the day, jesters could be sentenced to death for saying offensive things. Although, most of them were directed at kings and queens.

One of the earliest records of a jester challenging royalty was in 7th century BC, in China, when he said some innocuous remark about the emperor's dog, and the emperor shot an arrow at him. Thankfully, the arrow did not hit its mark, and he unapologetically doubled down on his jokes which made the emperor laugh, and he was spared. That was not the only instance of jesters literally toying with death. In this short clip from TED-Ed, we get to look at a brief history of jesters who spoke truth to power, sometimes with extreme consequences. -via Aeon

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We know that big-time actors are paid top bucks to appear in movies and the team from Genuine Impact was curious who was the highest paid actor for a single production so they collated all the data and created this simple chart to summarize the top ten actors who were paid the highest, which included both salary and box office royalties.

Topping the list is Keanu Reeves who was paid $156 million for The Matrix franchise. Tied for second were Bruce Willis for The Sixth Sense, Tom Cruise for three different movies, and Will Smith for Men in Black 3, who all received $100 million. Perhaps, it is worthy to note that the only actress on the list is Sandra Bullock who received $70 million for her role in Gravity. -via Digg

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Last month, researchers were able to map majority of the land mass of Zealandia, which was considered the lost eighth continent. This month, a group of Dutch geologists have found another lost continent which is said to have broken off from Australia some 155 million years ago. It's called Argoland, and they have detected tectonic "mega-units" of it scattered on the ocean floor.

After it broke off from Australia, researchers said it drifted westward to Southeast Asia and disappeared until they found traces of it stretched throughout the Indian Ocean and Southeast Asia. Estimates indicate that it once spanned 3,000 miles and parts of it can also be found in Myanmar and Indonesia. From the remnants they had found, the researchers were able to piece together what Argoland looked like until it became fragmented and later sunk at the bottom of the sea.

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While we tend to prioritize happiness and positivity in order to live a fulfilling life or one without stress, researchers suggest that a mix of both positive and negative emotions can lead to the best outcomes. Certainly, we shouldn't neglect negative emotions and why we feel them. There is a reason why they surface. Some people try to suppress those emotions thinking that they only do harm, but it's not the emotions per se that are harmful, rather it's what we do with them and whether they take hold of us instead of us managing them.

In an experiment, researchers showed participants visuals which elicited certain emotional or neutral responses and then presented them with a challenging goal. Based on the results of the experiment, when participants evoked the emotion of anger, it aided them in achieving the goal set before them. Apart from this, the researchers also looked into surveys conducted during the 2016 and 2020 US presidential elections. They found that when voters said that they would be angry if their candidate did not win, they were more motivated to vote.

These findings suggest that anger can become the impetus for people to do something to reach whatever goal they have set or to take action for something that they thought would be unfavorable or detrimental to them. It just shows how negative emotions such as anger, sadness, or even boredom can be effective in pushing people to success. -via Phys

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Human beings are temporal creatures. We move, and live, and breathe subject to time constraints. We depend on time to know when to wake up or go to sleep, to make appointments and hold events, and to finish the tasks for the day. We have schedules which we try to keep, important dates to remember, and goals we want to achieve before or upon reaching a certain age.

During the Industrial Revolution in Britain and Ireland, time was such a luxury for many people. People's livelihoods were dependent on whether they were able to get up on time and go to work on time, otherwise, they would have to find some other means of surviving. But not everybody had the resources to buy clocks or servants to wake them up. So, instead, they relied on the "knocker-uppers". Essentially, these were people whose job it was to wake other people up, like human alarm clocks.

Though this may be considered as resourceful or even ingenious by some, taking advantage of the opportunity that the circumstances had presented, the economist Helen Dendy had despised the profession and saw it as mere residual labor, something that doesn't add value to the economy as a whole. Later on, knocker-uppers were replaced by alarm clocks, but some had stayed active and working as late as 1960.

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When it comes to search engines, Google is king. We all know that, and it has practically become synonymous to looking for any kind of information. I remember the days when Yahoo search was still a thing, and I didn't even use MSN or Bing. I was in grade school when Google became a part of my consciousness as most of my classmates had already been using it. So, I used it too. Now, it's ubiquitous and it intends to stay that way, as Google's own senior vice president and search head revealed how much they paid to companies to keep Google as the default search engine.

Currently, Google is locked in the midst of an antitrust trial because of this. Meanwhile, Google defended the need for them to maintain their default status, as it is their means of keeping up with their competitors. In the same vein, keeping Google search as the default also keeps Chrome's value intact. It was also reported that Google paid Apple around $18 billion in 2021 to keep Chrome as the default browser on their devices.

Depending on what the result of the Google antitrust trial will be, the state of the internet will be drastically affected. History shows how these antitrust cases go for the company on the spotlight. IBM had their time. Microsoft came after. And now it's Google's turn. No matter what happens, it will be a game-changer.

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It's been 10 years since the film Her came out in cinemas, and now people are living that movie in reality with ChatGPT's recently added voice features. People have reported that they have been talking for hours with ChatGPT, and not only that, but they say that it also feels natural because of some ticks and noises that they added to make the conversation feel as though you were talking to a human.

On Reddit, people are sharing how they use ChatGPT's voice feature as a brainstorming partner, as a means to pass the time having a chat while driving or walking the dog, and some even developed such an intimate relationship with ChatGPT that they consider it one of their closest friends. Of course, there are still limitations on the chatbot such as a lack of situational awareness, a lack of a long-term memory, and a very stringent filtering mechanism so as to prevent conversations from becoming too personal or intimate.

Though these chatbots along with other AI popping up are giving people an outlet for their emotions or using it as a soundboard, it does make one wonder about how people are doing in terms of their relationships with friends, family, and other humans. Have we become so detached or isolated from others such that we turn to AI to develop meaningful relationships? Maybe not to that extent, maybe people are just curious about this new technology and are trying it out. However, it may not be long before sci-fi turns into reality.

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Public dissections were quite a spectacle in the past. Surgeons would hold anatomical dissections in theaters and crowds would flock them just to get a glimpse of what exactly is inside the human body. We don't hold such public spectacles nowadays since we have already done detailed studies of the human anatomy, and all of those have already been recorded in books. Furthermore, we have mannequins and models that can show which parts go where. But back then, just when the study of anatomy was a nascent subject, public anatomical dissections were the rage.

In 19th century Scotland, there was a surgeon named Dr. Robert Knox who did such public dissections twice a day, which earned him a lot of money. However, due to a few hiccups, there was a shortage of corpses which he could use for his public displays. There were fewer criminals being hanged due to the 1823 Judgment of Death Act, and people were getting annoyed with the growing frequency of grave-robbing. So, two men found a way to bridge the gap between supply and demand.

William Burke and William Hare conspired to make a fortune from corpses which they sold to Dr. Knox. The first one was innocent enough. One of Burke's tenants had died before paying rent of £4. So, they brought his dead body to Knox and got paid £8. The allure of money was quite tempting, and so they began their killing spree. Knox knew that the corpses he had been buying were obtained through illegal means, but asked no questions.

Everything seemed to go swimmingly for the pair until their hubris became their undoing. They were caught after Burke's tenants found a fresh corpse in their room. They were reported to the police and they were sentenced to an end befitting the crimes they committed.

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Roundabouts, if you're not familiar, are those circular intersections which are also called traffic circles or rotaries. Essentially, instead of the usual four-way intersection with right angles and crossroads, it would have smoother edges and you would go around to get across or to turn right or left. You get the picture. Though it may seem like it takes up too much space on the road, the benefits it provides in terms of safety and traffic flow regulation can make up for it.

Some of the things that I have noticed coming across roundabouts is that generally there are no traffic lights that control the flow of traffic. Motorists can freely enter the circle with caution. Of course, there are usually signs that serve as guides for drivers, but you would yield as usual for those who have right of way. One benefit that roundabouts provide is the reduction of potential conflict points. Unlike four-way intersections, cars do not cross over when they have to turn, instead they go around the circle toward their exit point.

Here's a video that explains how to use a roundabout:

Here's another video that shows how a 7-circle roundabout works:

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For those who might be wanting to shed some pounds or regulate your blood sugar levels, you might want to try intermittent fasting. Intermittent fasting, or time-restricted dieting, is characterized by a period of time in the day or the week in which you don't eat. A new study has shown that it is more effective than calorie-controlled eating when it comes to weight loss, and is also very effective for type 2 diabetics.

This is not to say however, that traditional dieting doesn't work at all. The setup for their research was that participants were divided into three groups: one group who did intermittent fasting, another group that went on the calorie-controlled diet, and the control group. They observed that both experimental groups had the same reduction in blood sugar levels, however, they noticed that the intermittent fasting group had an easier time following the prescribed regimen than those in the calorie-control group. Moreover, the intermittent fasting group also lost more over the six-month trial period compared to their counterparts.

It is possible too that the results are more visibly significant because of other factors. The average age of the participants was 55, and the group had a diverse ethnic cohort. Still, the benefits of intermittent fasting certainly favor those with diabetes, as the usual recommendation by doctors is to cut down on calories. But as this study has observed, it is much easier for people to watch when they eat as opposed to how much they eat.

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What could be more terrifying than a horror show in the late 1960s that only ran for six episodes and was taken off the air, supposedly due to complaints from viewers that it was "too scary"? Well, the story goes that after it had been removed from the broadcasting slate, all six episodes had vanished. So, who knows how scary it really was? Who else can attest to it other than those who have actually watched it. And from bits and pieces of memory from first-hand viewers, we can only surmise that the tale was true, and that it was the scariest horror show at the time.

That show was called Late Night Horror, and it first went on air on the BBC in April 1968. It was produced by Harry Moore, who had promoted the show as the "first horror series ever", and he had wanted to make the show as vividly visceral as it could be. Though it wasn't the first horror series on TV, it was the first horror show to be done in color. And so, Moore and his production team went all out with the blood and gore. Presumably, it was working, as after six episodes, it was never renewed for a second season, and two years after it first ran, they had completely taken it out of circulation. Then, it went missing.

The reason why it went missing isn't so mystical or esoteric as one would assume however. It was simply because of budget restrictions. Tapes were expensive at the time and the BBC could not afford keeping tapes which cannot be shown again, so along with many other shows in the 60s and 70s, it's thought that the episodes of Late Night Horror had been erased so that the tapes could be reused. Until Chris Perry, a TV archivist, tracked down one of the surviving tapes of Late Night Horror's six-episode run.

It took Perry and his team, an organization called Kaleidoscope, 50 years to recover the lost tape, and have been able to restore it. Currently, the episode titled "The Corpse Can't Play" from Late Night Horror is available on DVD.

(Video credit: Atlas Obscura)

For many people, coffee is in their blood, quite literally. It's part of their daily routine. Every morning, they must have a sip of their cup of joe, and without it, they feel lethargic and sluggish throughout the day. Caffeine, at the right doses, keeps us awake and zaps our brains so that we can stay mentally alert throughout the day. It's a nice boost of energy that can help us be productive. However, studies have shown that higher doses of caffeine can cause nausea, anxiety, and overall shakiness. Not to mention, the occasional heart palpitations.

Noah Whiteman, author of the book Most Delicious Poison: The Story of Nature's Toxins - from Spices to Vices, shares the reason why he switched from using a French press to make his coffee to an automatic drip machine or by pour-over. Also, he has taken the habit of using mesh filters to make his coffee. He recounts a 2020 study involving more than half a million people in Norway which found that people who consume unfiltered coffee faced a significant risk of dying over 20 years than those who drank filtered coffee or didn't drink at all.

For those coffee addicts, who cannot function without caffeine in their system, you may want to read his article here on Science Friday.

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Being able to stay longer in bed may be one of the upsides of daylight saving time, but it can also pose some health problems if we're unaware of how to manage the transition. One more hour of sleep may be very beneficial for us, however, once we shift back to our usual schedule, our circadian rhythms might have trouble adjusting, and you might begin to experience cluster headaches, which is a type of headache characterized by intense, sharp pain in or around one eye, or one side of your head.

Cluster headaches may jolt you from your sleep, and the period it lasts can range from a couple of weeks to even several months. The root cause for these cluster headaches can be found in our hypothalamus, which is also responsible for regulating our circadian rhythm, thus the connection to daylight saving time.

Dr. Rajkumar Dasgupta spoke with Madeline Holcombe to share what are the things to watch out for, how to prepare for the end of daylight saving time, and some possible ways to mitigate the effects of the change in our circadian rhythm. Check it out at KWWL.

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I didn't know this was a thing until I read this article on Bustle. Apparently, there is subgroup, if you can call it that, of men who, in dating, are called lowercase boys. As the name implies, they use exclusively lowercase letters when texting. Furthermore, there seems to be a perception of aggressive casualness that surrounds such people. They have built an image of nonthreatening flirtiness that, to some, gives off 'creepy' vibes but not so much as to offend or be offputting.

There was a time when I had used lowercase in communicating online, but that was all because I was too lazy to capitalize my sentences. Certainly I wouldn't do it in emails, but it also seemed like a fun and carefree way to text, so I had ventured into it, though I never once had an inkling that it was being used in this way to capture women's hearts. Of course, now that I'm using an iPhone, capitalization is a default means of texting for me.

Nowadays, in the new generation, I think emojis are the thing. Though I could be wrong. Still, to each their own, and at the end of the day, the way one texts won't fully capture how they are as a person. As long as they're honest and open, it shouldn't matter how they text.

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