Leaning on credit ratings may have deepened the crisis
Bank of England economists say mechanical reliance on ratings lay beneath the financial crisis. Standard & Poor's calls a rating one input to a decision.
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Göbekli Tepe may have put the temple before the farm
Klaus Schmidt argued hunter-gatherers built Göbekli Tepe before anyone farmed. Digs since his death in 2014 have found houses and signs of year-round living.
UK MPs shut the door on Black Rod. Speakers say it isn't defiance
MPs shut the door on Black Rod at the State Opening. Most read it as defiance, but Speakers have ruled it lets the Commons establish who is knocking.
Australia's 1975 dismissal and the palace letters
Sir John Kerr sacked Gough Whitlam in 1975. Letters released in 2020 show the palace told him a week earlier that the reserve powers still existed.
Lightning can travel through your plumbing to the shower
Lightning can reach a shower through the pipes and the water in them. Wait at least 30 minutes after the last thunder before you wash.
A small error today can spoil next week's forecast
A small starting error grows daily inside the atmosphere's chaos, limiting how far a forecast can see. A warmer ocean can ease that limit, research shows.
Two examiners judge a UK PhD in one viva
A UK PhD viva is an oral exam held after the thesis is submitted, where two examiners question the candidate before recommending a result.
A talent agency now forecasts what a product placement will do
Brands reach the screen by paid deal, free product or a writer's own choice. UTA's Jillian Raskin puts that last route at about 90% of placements.
Madhava's circle value missed by two, and no one knows why
A paper tests the series credited to Madhava of Sangamagrama and cannot explain his circle value. Almost nothing about his life is certain.
In the US, one exam can buy a pupil college credit
The US Advanced Placement programme lets high schoolers sit a college-level exam and trade a passing score for credit. It has run since 1956.
South Korea capped its working week at 52 hours
South Korea's 2018 law cut the legal week from 68 hours to 52. A Stanford study found more leisure spending, but rising health costs for precarious workers.
Football mocked an Irishman's penalty kick, then adopted it
A Notts County defender's goal-line handball in an 1891 FA Cup tie broke football's belief that gentlemen never cheat, and helped force in the penalty kick.
Humpbacks tune their bubble nets, and may learn them from others
Humpbacks blow a rising curtain of bubbles to pen krill and fish, tune it as it tightens, and seem to learn the trick by watching other whales.
Migrant workers built Brasília, Brazil's capital, in three years
A capital promised by Brazil's new republic in 1889 waited 67 years. Then Kubitschek, Costa, Niemeyer and 30,000 workers built Brasília in three.
Newborns hear every speech sound, then tune to one language
Perceptual narrowing starts at about six months, vowels first. By a first birthday, a baby tells apart mainly the sounds of the language spoken at home.
Westinghouse underbid GE, and alternating current won
Westinghouse bid $399,000 against General Electric's $554,000 to light the 1893 Chicago fair, and the win helped settle the AC-DC rivalry.
Banner ads on a Magic card site paid for Blue Prince
Tonda Ros funded eight years of work on Blue Prince with ad revenue from a Magic: The Gathering card site. It became one of 2025's indie breakouts.
Five dead as Amazon cargo jet overruns Miami runway
A Boeing 767 freighter flying for Amazon ran off a Miami runway on 2026-09-06, killing five. The NTSB has published a preliminary report on the landing.
France's PACS gives some marriage benefits and ends by letter
A PACS is France's civil partnership, open to couples of any kind. In 2016 France recorded 184,000 PACS and 225,000 marriages.
Canadian airlines owe delay compensation if the fault is theirs
Canada's Air Passenger Protection Regulations let you claim when a delay the airline caused makes you arrive 3 hours late. You have 1 year to claim.
Why Easter's date follows the moon, not the calendar
Easter is the Sunday after the first full moon following the spring equinox. That rule took centuries, and in England a synod at Whitby, to settle.
Learning London's streets grows a cabbie's hippocampus
Trainee London cabbies who pass The Knowledge grow a larger posterior hippocampus. Those who fail do not, a UCL study of 79 trainees found.
Galloping Gertie sent bridge engineers into the wind tunnel
The Tacoma Narrows Bridge fell in a moderate wind in 1940. The inquiry told engineers to test suspension bridge models in wind tunnels.
Can Japan's Ainu language outlive its last native speakers?
Ainu had about 15,000 speakers in 1870 and 350 by 1917. Japanese policy nearly ended it. Laws, classes, radio and now AI are trying to bring it back.