Photo 1: Crete, Greece.

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Long-Distance Relationships.

Ahh…the long-distance relationship – made popular by Westerns, romance novels, and jailbirds alike. While some of these things aren’t as relevant to today’s culture, it still has its place. There’s something both nostalgic and romantic about long-distance relationships that seems to transcend our current shallow microwave, social media, technology society. It forces you to really hone your communication skills and come up with more creative ways to keep your significant other’s attention aside from sexy photos.

It can also serve as a great barometer of how much you truly value that person and their presence in your life. It can cause you to come face to face with tough adult decisions:

1,000: Do you stay separated or do you move?

1,555: Do you make changes in your life to allow them to move closer to you?

12,015: Do you both go somewhere neither of you has ever been to build a new life together?

22,013: Do you give up?

Much more serious than deciding which bar you’re going to frequent tonight.

In a serious relationship where distance becomes a factor after you’re settled in the groove of things, establish a time frame for the distance to shorten. To avoid placing undue strain on your relationship, six months to a year tops sounds reasonable to figure that out. If you meet someone and distance is in the mix from the start, determine what you want from the person and set the same parameters based on your decision. No matter how romantic or nostalgic a long-distance relationship may start off, all good things must come to an end eventually. Whether that’s a happy ending depends on your tolerance and ability to go the distance.

Julia Hawkins, 29 years old, England.

Photo 2: Chania, Crete.

Violence Is Donald Trump’s Mother Tongue.

As the latest episodes reveal, the “Trump and Violence Show” is the president’s cynical attempt to promote a response in the streets that might actually require law enforcement action.

By Michael S. Roth Twitter

AUGUST 4, 2020

Ready To Fight Back?

Teargas, shock grenades, lasers, commercial-grade fireworks. Gunshots, broken storefronts, cars accelerating into crowds, fires set, soldiers in camo swinging batons with abandon: sights and sounds—tragically real—appropriated and accentuated in the latest episodes of the Trump show. President Trump needs these symbols of lawlessness and disorder because he wants to present himself as the candidate of “LAW AND ORDER!”—his tweet echoing the title of the popular television show. The president tweets of anarchists, looters, and violent gangs and, as July comes to a close, he writes, “If the Federal Government and its brilliant Law Enforcement (Homeland) didn’t go into Portland one week ago, there would be no Portland—It would be burned and beaten to the ground.” Burned and beaten, as if burned to the ground were not enough.

“Burned and beaten” rolls naturally off the tongue of Donald Trump, who has always relished violence—usually the carnival type of professional wrestling or the mobster sort as in “guys who know how to get the job done” without letting niceties stand in the way. A coward and a germophobe, Trump isn’t known for mixing it up himself, but he is known for stirring up animosities until they erupt into intense disputes with physical consequences. A climate of fierce intensity is easily transformed into a climate of fear, and this president has a gift for leveraging the fears of others to his own benefit. At the beginning of his presidency, he famously announced that he was the only one who could save a frightened country from carnage. As he nears the end of his term, he doubles down. This summer’s ad features an older woman facing a home invasion and being put on hold when dialing 911: “For rape, please press 1.” Another surge of ads creates an image of urban mayhem: “Dangerous MOBS of far-left groups are running through our streets and causing absolute mayhem…. They are DESTROYING our cities and rioting.”

The destroying and rioting spectacle attracts attention away from everything else. The situation around Portland’s federal courthouse was far from ideal a few weeks ago, as parts of the city dealt with protests and property destruction night after night. But the president needed to make it a bigger, more spectacular problem, and by sending in agents from Homeland Security he created the spectacle that would draw the public’s attention away from its focus on the pandemic. Nor was his threat to send federal police in full combat regalia to other cities just idle posturing. It was Trump’s cynical attempt to promote a response in the streets that in the end might actually require law enforcement action. If people are afraid of getting sick, they look for an expert with credible knowledge. This, the president can’t provide. But if they are afraid of violence, they might turn to an authoritarian leader unafraid to use the power of the state to create law and order.

Fear and distraction are two of the reasons for the “Trump and Violence” show. A third is that violence removes the need for articulate expression. This president has more difficulty expressing himself clearly than any American leader in the last hundred years, and his critics sometimes ridicule his verbal buffoonery. Too often, though, they’re missing the point. Usually, Trump isn’t trying to articulate an argument; he is trying to get audiences to react to what he says. And he is good at it. The chants, name-calling, and mockery rile up rallies of the faithful. He uses speech to incite intense responses—of rage, of resentment, sometimes of laughter. He provokes but does not explain; he attacks but does not console.

Articulate speech is linked to learning, and this is anathema to the president, a man who privileges instinct over education. Articulate speech has traditionally been at the heart of the political realm because through speaking with and listening to one’s fellow citizens, one can discover public purpose. This kind of speech and listening, discussion and discovery demands both sensitive attention and open-ended inquiry. For Trump, these are all elements of a foreign language.

The president’s mother tongue is violence—the opposite of composed, thoughtful speech. The fear he promulgates is meant to fire up his base with longing for a protector. The spectacle of violence is meant to turn people away from the march of a disease that has affected millions of Americans—a march that still has elicited no coordinated response from the federal government. Finally, Trump’s language of violence is offered as a distraction from his inability to articulate a vision for the country at a time of moral reckoning, economic disruption, and international instability.

Instigating more violence, though, will only make everything (apart from Trump’s reelection prospects) worse. One can only hope protesters don’t take the bait. Violence in city streets is a danger to citizens and law enforcement there. The “Trump and Violence” show is a danger to the entire country.

Michael S. Roth TWITTER Michael S. Roth, president of Wesleyan University, is the author of Safe Enough Spaces: A Pragmatist’s Approach to Inclusion, Free Speech and Political Correctness.

Photo 3:

DATING BRAZILIAN MEN: HOW TO GET A BRAZILIAN MAN TO FALL IN LOVE WITH YOU.

By AMOLATINA.COM

Amolatina.com is an International Dating site that brings you exciting introductions and direct communication with Latin men and women from Brazil, Mexico, Columbia, and Venezuela.

Brazil is a country known for its exotic locations, world-famous festivals, and the sensual passions of its people. If you’ve never met a Brazilian man before, you’re in for a real treat!

Here are our top tips for dating a Brazilian man so he’ll fall in love with you:

FIRST, WHAT ARE BRAZILIAN MEN LIKE?

What are Brazilian men like? Well, you can expect them to have the following qualities:

BRAZILIAN MEN ARE EXPRESSIVE.

True or false? Give examples.

From how they talk to the way they move, sexy Brazilian guys are among the most passionate on the planet. You can expect the Brazilian man you meet to be proactive, hardworking, talkative, and an excellent dancer.

THEY LOVE TO HAVE FUN.

All? Or in general?

Going out for late-night parties, going hiking deep in the jungle, and spending a day at the beach are all examples of things that the typical Brazilian man loves to do. Think of it this way: Brazilian men love to live their lives as an adventure.

THEY LOVE TO EAT GOOD FOOD.

What is good food for a Brazilian man?

Brazil is also known for its delicious delicacies, including kibe and empanadas, so it’s only natural that Brazilian men love great food. If you date a Brazilian guy, he’ll be eager to take you out to great restaurants, …and he may expect you to put your culinary skills to the test yourself too!

THEY LOVE FOOTBALL.

True or false these days? Love? Or like, sometimes?

This one shouldn’t be a surprise. Football is huge in Brazil to the point that it’s become a part of the country’s culture. When a game is on the TV, don’t be surprised if the Brazilian man you’re dating is more focused on it rather than you.

FAMILY IS EVERYTHING TO THEM.

True or false in your experience?

Latin America, in general, is very traditional when it comes to culture. Brazilian men are very close to their parents, grandparents, siblings, cousins, and aunts and uncles. He may still be living with his parents before marriage. When dating a Brazilian guy, you can expect him to introduce you to his family very early in the relationship.

WHAT ARE BRAZILIAN MEN LIKE TO DATE?

HE’LL SHOWER YOU WITH COMPLIMENTS.

Brazilian men, just like Colombian men, love beautiful women and therefore have no issues with approaching and complimenting girls whom they find attractive. Nonetheless, just because a Brazilian guy is complimenting you (or even after he’s asked you out on a date) doesn’t necessarily mean that he’s interested in you for marriage or a long-term relationship.

Do Brazilian men compliment women in a bar, in the street?

HE’LL TELL YOU DIRECTLY IF HE WANTS THE RELATIONSHIP TO BE EXCLUSIVE.

True or false?

If the Brazilian guy you are dating is strongly interested in you, then he’ll directly tell you that he wants you to be his girlfriend. The good news is that in the Brazilian dating culture, making a relationship exclusive typically happens much faster than in the American dating culture (usually after a week or so).

HE’LL INVITE YOU TO MEET HIS FAMILY.

Why? So his mother can cook for you?

Even if the Brazilian man you are dating doesn’t directly ask you to be his exclusive girlfriend, a clear sign that he is treating the relationship as exclusive is when he invites you to have dinner with his family.

HE’LL BE VERY AFFECTIONATE WITH YOU.

True or false in general?

If he’s into you, a Brazilian guy won’t hesitate to be physically affectionate with you in public. He’ll sit with his hand on your leg or his arm around your shoulders, smile and kiss you often, and be very expressive and passionate when you’re alone in the bedroom. And what Brazilian men like in a relationship is when you return their affection!

HE’LL TAKE YOU OUT ON ADVENTURES.

Really? Or is it the woman who normally suggests adventurous activities these days?

What do Brazilian men find attractive in a woman above else?

Simple: Women who are open and willing to go on adventures with them.

Remember that Brazilian guys love to have fun and they are not the kind of guys who are just going to sit around at home watching TV all day.

Sure, he’ll watch a movie or TV with you to relax once in a while, but his kind of fun day includes something more active like exploring in the jungle or going to the beach.

True or false? Have you had a Brazilian boyfriend who wanted to walk through Amazonia?

HOW TO GET A BRAZILIAN MAN TO FALL IN LOVE WITH YOU.

Now that we’ve covered what Brazilian men are like and how they are to date, here are the top tips on how to get a Brazilian man to fall in love with you:

STAY READY.

Brazilian men are very spontaneous, and he’ll be more likely to decide what he wants to do right away rather than planning it out in advance. That means that you need to be ready for whatever adventure he wants to do for the day! If you want him to fall in love with you, you have to need to embrace his unpredictability because it’s just his nature.

INTRODUCE HIM TO YOUR FAMILY.

Families are tight-knit in Brazil, and when a Brazilian man is dating you exclusively, he will treat your family as his own. When you introduce him to your family earlier, it will signal to him that you are also taking your relationship very seriously.

RETURN HIS AFFECTIONS.

When a Brazilian man is affectionate with you, he expects you to return the favor. He wants to be touched and caressed by you often, and if you don’t, his feelings for you can quickly diminish. But by displaying just as much affection towards him as he does to you, the more he’ll look forward to spending time with you every day.

SURPRISE HIM OFTEN.

Do you know how Brazilian men don’t plan things very often? You can take advantage of that by surprising him yourself with fun things to do outside for the day!

Surprise tickets to the football game, going on a snorkelling adventure, or reservations for dinner at a nice restaurant are all examples of things that are going to make him happy.

BE LOYAL.

Remember, if a Brazilian man has asked you to make your relationship exclusive, he is expecting you to be fully loyal to him. That doesn’t just mean being faithful to him; it also means investing the same level of time and energy into the relationship as he is.

WRAPPING IT UP.

If you want to get a Brazilian guy to fall in love with you, there are three things you need to do:

1: Be open to having fun and trying new things.

2: Show him affection and loyalty.

3: At least pretend to be interested in soccer.

If you can do these things, you may win his heart, and he’ll be an excellent partner to have by your side for everything in life.

Photo 4: Chania, Crete.

Just like the Black Death, influenza and smallpox, Covid-19 will affect almost every aspect of our of lives – even after a vaccine turns up.

Sun 18 Oct 2020 09.15 BSTLast modified on Sun 18 Oct 2020 19.21 BST

‘A Court for King Cholera’: A cartoon from Punch magazine in 1852 on a cholera outbreak in London. Photograph: Print Collector/Getty Images

On 7 September 1854, in the middle of a raging cholera epidemic, the physician John Snow approached the board of guardians of St James’s parish for permission to remove the handle from a public water pump in Broad Street in London’s Soho. Snow observed that 61 victims of cholera had recently drawn water from the pump and reasoned that contaminated water was the source of the epidemic. His request was granted and, even though it would take a further 30 years for the germ theory of cholera to become accepted, his action ended the epidemic.

As we adjust to another round of coronavirus restrictions, it would be nice to think that Boris Johnson and Matt Hancock have a similar endpoint in sight for Covid-19. Unfortunately, history suggests that epidemics rarely have such neat endings as the 1854 cholera epidemic. Quite the opposite: as the social historian of medicine Charles Rosenberg observed, most epidemics “drift towards closure”. It is 40 years since the identification of the first Aids cases, for instance, yet every year 1.7 million people are infected with HIV. Indeed, in the absence of a vaccine, the World Health Organization does not expect to call time on it before 2030.

However, while HIV continues to pose a biological threat, it does not inspire anything like the same fears as it did in the early 1980s when the Thatcher government launched its “Don’t Die of Ignorance” campaign, replete with scary images of falling tombstones. Indeed, from a psychological standpoint, we can say that the Aids pandemic ended with the development of antiretroviral drugs and the discovery that patients infected with HIV could live with the virus well into old age.

The Great Barrington declaration, advocating the controlled spread of coronavirus in younger age groups alongside the sheltering of the elderly, taps into a similar desire to banish the fear of Covid-19 and bring narrative closure to this pandemic. Implicit in the declaration signed by scientists at Harvard and other institutions is the idea that pandemics are as much social as biological phenomena and that if we were willing to accept higher levels of infection and death we would reach herd immunity quicker and return to normality sooner.

But other scientists, writing in the Lancet, say the Great Barrington strategy rests on a “dangerous fallacy”. There is no evidence for lasting “herd immunity” to the coronavirus following natural infection. Rather than ending the pandemic, they argue, uncontrolled transmission in younger people could merely result in recurrent epidemics, as was the case with numerous infectious diseases before the advent of vaccines.

It is no coincidence they have called their rival petition “the John Snow memorandum”. Snow’s decisive action in Soho may have ended the 1854 epidemic, but cholera returned in 1866 and 1892. It was only in 1893, when the first mass cholera vaccine trials got underway in India, that it became possible to envisage the rational scientific control of cholera and other diseases. The high point of these efforts came in 1980 with the eradication of smallpox, the first and still the only disease to be eliminated from the planet. However, these efforts had begun 200 years earlier with Edward Jenner’s discovery in 1796 that he could induce immunity against smallpox with a vaccine made from the related cowpox virus.

With more than 170 vaccines for Covid-19 in development, it is to be hoped we won’t have to wait that long this time. However, Professor Andrew Pollard, the head of the Oxford University vaccine trial, warns that we should not expect a jab in the near future. At an online seminar last week, Pollard said the earliest he thought a vaccine would be available was summer 2021 and then only for frontline health workers. The bottom line is that “we may need masks until July”, he said.

The other way the pandemic could be brought to a close is with a truly world-beating test-and-trace system. Once we can suppress the reproductive rate to below 1 and be confident of keeping it there, the case for social distancing dissolves. Sure, some local measures might be necessary from time to time, but there would no longer be a need for blanket restrictions in order to prevent the NHS from being overwhelmed.

Essentially, Covid-19 would become an endemic infection, like flu or the common cold, and fade into the background. This is what appears to have happened after the 1918, 1957 and 1968 influenza pandemics. In each case, up to a third of the world’s population was infected, but although the death tolls were high (50 million in the 1918-19 pandemic, about 1 million each in the 1957 and 1968 ones), within two years they were over, either because herd immunity was reached or the viruses lost their virulence.

The nightmare scenario is that Sars-CoV-2 does not fade away but returns again and again. This was the case with the 14th-century Black Death, which caused repeated European epidemics between 1347 and 1353. Something similar happened in 1889-90 when the “Russian influenza” spread from central Asia to Europe and North America. Although an English government report gave 1892 as the official end date of the pandemic, in truth the Russian flu never went away. Instead, it was responsible for recurrent waves of illness throughout the closing years of Queen Victoria’s reign.

Even when pandemics eventually reach a medical conclusion, however, history suggests they may have enduring cultural, economic and political effects.

The Black Death, for instance, is widely credited with fuelling the collapse of the feudal system and spurring an artistic obsession with images of the underworld. Similarly, the plague of Athens in the 5th century BC is said to have shattered Athenians’ faith in democracy and paved the way for the installation of a Spartan oligarchy known as the Thirty Tyrants. Even though the Spartans were later ejected, Athens never regained its confidence.

• Mark Honigsbaum is a lecturer at City University of London and the author of The Pandemic Century: One Hundred Years of Panic, Hysteria and Hubris

Photo 5: Florence Nightingale at work.

Florence Nightingale.

In 1954, under the authorization of Sidney Herbert, the Secretary of War, Florence Nightingale brought a team of 38 volunteer nurses to care for the British soldiers fighting in the Crimean War, which was intended to limit Russian expansion into Europe. Nightingale and her nurses arrived at the military hospital in Scutari and found soldiers wounded and dying amid horrifying sanitary conditions. Ten times more soldiers were dying of diseases such as typhus, typhoid, cholera, and dysentery than from battle wounds.

Florence Nightingale at the hospital in Scutari, by Robert Riggs. Courtesy of the Prints and Photographs Collection, History of Medicine Division, National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health.

The soldiers were poorly cared for, medicines and other essentials were in short supply, hygiene was neglected, and infections were rampant. Nightingale found there was no clean linen; the clothes of the soldiers were swarming with bugs, lice, and fleas; the floors, walls, and ceilings were filthy; and rats were hiding under the beds.

There were no towels, basins, or soap, and only 14 baths for approximately 2000 soldiers. The death count was the highest of all hospitals in the region.

One of Nightingale's first purchases was of 200 Turkish towels; she later provided an enormous supply of clean shirts, plenty of soap, and such necessities like plates, knives, and forks, cups and glasses. Nightingale believed the main problems were diet, dirt, and drains—she brought food from England, cleaned up the kitchens, and set her nurses to cleaning up the hospital wards. A Sanitary Commission, sent by the British government, arrived to flush out the sewers and improve ventilation.

Nightingale's accomplishments during the disastrous years the British army experienced in the Crimea were largely the result of her concern with sanitation and its relation to mortality, as well as her ability to lead, to organize, and to get things done.

She fought with those military officers that she considered incompetent; they, in turn, considered her unfeminine and a nuisance. She worked endlessly to care for the soldiers themselves, making her rounds during the night after the medical officers had retired. She thus gained the name of “the Lady with the Lamp,” and the London Times referred to her as a “ministering angel.”

Her popularity and reputation in Britain grew enormously and even the Queen was impressed.

Nightingale's work brought the field of public health to national attention. She was one of the first in Europe to grasp the principles of the new science of statistics and to apply them to military—and later civilian—hospitals.3,4 In 1907, she was the first woman to be awarded the Order of Merit. Nightingale's image has often been sentimentalized as the epitome of femininity, but she is especially remarkable for her intelligence, determination, and an amazing capacity for work.

References

1. Nightingale F. Florence Nightingale: Measuring Hospital Care Outcomes: Excerpts From the Books Notes on Matters Affecting the Health, Efficiency, and Hospital Administration of the British Army Founded Chiefly on the Experience of the Late War, and Notes on Hospitals. Oakbrook Terrace, Ill: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations; 1999:41–45 [Google Scholar]

Photo 6: Chania, Crete.

How to think about cybersecurity in the era of Covid-19.

Sara Brown

Aug 20, 2020

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Why It Matters.

Cybersecurity is more important than ever during the COVID-19 pandemic. Experts lay out new threats and detail ways you should address them.

Cyber incidents are consistently ranked at the top of business concerns, and it’s easy to see why: According to one estimate, the global cost of cybercrime will rise to $6 trillion a year by the end of 2021. And this was before the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted businesses worldwide and offered new opportunities for hackers and bad actors.

Since the pandemic began, Marriott suffered a data breach affecting 5.2 million customers, and a ransomware attack forced Honda to shut down global operations. According to the Federal Trade Commission, by mid-August 2020 there had been more than 172,000 fraud reports related to the pandemic itself, at the cost of about $114.4 million.

“The pandemic has created the perfect amount of fear, uncertainty, doubt, and chaos,” Keri Pearlson, the executive director of Cybersecurity at MIT Sloan, said during a recent online panel session for the 2020 MIT Sloan CIO Digital Learning Series. “The bad guys have upped the game, and we have to do the same.”

Changing cybercrime tactics and a shift to employees working from home elevates the importance of security strategies, according to Pearlson and cybersecurity executives from companies including Mastercard, Booz Allen, Liberty Mutual, and the Mars Co. During two recent webinars, the experts talked about the security threats they are seeing and how their strategies have shifted — or not — during the pandemic, offering some best practices for cyber resilience.

The overall message: Working from home may change a lot of employee behaviour, but relaxed security standards shouldn’t be one of them.

Here is the experts’ top advice for cybersecurity leaders, during the pandemic and beyond:

Look out for pandemic-related scams. Bad actors online have adjusted their methods to take advantage of the pandemic. “Hackers are opportunistic, and that is, I think the biggest change [with COVID-19],” said Alissa Abdullah, also known as “Dr Jay,” deputy chief security officer and senior vice president of cybersecurity technology at Mastercard, at the 2020 EmTech Next conference.

Hackers have pivoted from sending phishing messages asking for bitcoin to “something COVID-19-related or something that’s more personal and pulling on the heartstrings,” she said.

Hackers have also started attacking collaboration platforms — a data breach affected more than 500,000 Zoom users in April. The pandemic and shifting to remote work “has changed the adversary’s opportunities, and shifted their focus on some of the other tools that we’re using,” said Abdullah, who was also the deputy CIO at the White House under President Barack Obama.

Rebecca McHale, vice president and chief information officer at Booz Allen, said these changes happen whenever there’s a crisis. This time, security experts are doubling down on awareness about phishing — emails that try to trick people into sharing personal information or clicking on fraudulent links that upload malware—and smishing, or SMSishing, which is sending phishing messages via SMS text.

Pearlson said pandemic-related email phishing scams can be disguised as information from the World Health Organization or the Centers for Disease Control, or pretend to have information about stimulus checks.

Other areas of added vulnerability during the pandemic identified by Pearlson:

1: Information-stealing scams. Hackers embed code into websites that look real and provide legitimate information about the coronavirus. For example, hackers created an identical version of a map of global COVID-19 cases with embedded malware.

2: Ransomware and malware attacks. Netwalker, a strain of ransomware, is using files with coronavirus in the name so that they look important. The files embed code that will encrypt your files.

3: Work-from-home vulnerabilities. These include unprotected videoconference links or hacked videoconference passwords, which can be used to access a company’s network. Also, some people working from home might be using unsecured networks.

4: Fake products. Several websites purport to sell masks or coronavirus remedies, but take money from customers without providing any product. Others sell fake face mask exemption cards purporting to come from a government agency.

Adjust security for a remote-majority workforce.

In the face of a wide range of threats, companies should begin by reviewing the basics, experts agreed. Pearlson outlined some best practices for cybersecurity, during the pandemic and otherwise:

Employees should beware of any requests for information and verify the source, including unexpected emails or calls from co-workers.

Make sure laptops, cell phones, and apps are updated and install any required patches.

Consider dual-factor authentication.

The sudden shift to working from home has raised other security concerns that experts need to check on.

“We’ve done two years of digital transformation in two weeks,” said Andrew Stanley, chief information security officer at Mars, at the July CIO Symposium. “The real risk I’ve seen is an increase in the use of third parties.”

For example, he said, some workers abroad couldn’t move their laptops from offices to homes, so there was a scramble to get them the new technology and ensure that it was secure. “Is tech set up correctly, are individuals using tech appropriately at home, maybe using personal devices or shared devices or sharing work devices?” he asked.

Danny Allen, the chief technical officer at Veeam Software, said the shift toward remote work accelerated the adoption of multi-factor authentication. “I looked at this as an opportunity, more than anything else,” Allen said.

Pay attention to your employees’ state of mind.

While it might be uncomfortable to think about, employee stress brings an increased risk of inside threats, McHale said. “I do think we have to take that into consideration,” she said. “Folks whose emotional health might be a bit taxed right now, folks in different economic situations than they were previously ... what might make somebody more likely to be an insider threat to the organization?”

Fraud reports related to the COVID-19 pandemic had cost consumers more than $114 million through mid-August of 2020. Also under the umbrella of employee mental health is the question of whether companies should continue with regular “bait-phishing” exercises, in which companies send a phishing-type email to their own employees to make sure they remain alert to potential scams.

While some companies have pulled back on these because of increased stress, Katie Jenkins, the senior vice president and chief information security officer at Liberty Mutual, said her team decided to continue. “I thought now, more than any time, we need to make sure those skills are remaining sharp,” she said.

For one exercise, her team sent employees an email disguised as coming from Zoom, asking for updated credentials. Cyber crisis exercises with the leadership team also continued, Jenkins said.

Stanley said these exercises had been debated at length at his company. “Part of me wanted to leverage this and get people a little more education. Let’s help them understand they’re more vulnerable now,” Stanley said.

In the end, the company went without regular anti-phishing exercises — which normally take place every six weeks — for several months, because of concerns the exercise would be alienating.

Prioritize access more than ever.

Beyond the pandemic, cybersecurity has shifted away from a perimeter-based security model where all assets inside a network are trusted, according to McHale. Instead of these system-centric security models, companies are looking at protecting access to information and emphasizing identity as part of trust.

Companies should adopt zero-trust architecture, McHale said — the idea that individuals, devices, and applications cannot be trusted by default, and need to be authenticated and authorized.

Guiding principles include:

Assume there’s been a breach.

Never trust, always verify.

Follow the principle of least privilege access — giving the fewest people access to data and information as possible.

At the same time, McHale said, security professionals should consider design thinking and customer experience. “Security can’t be viewed as an obstacle, or users are incentivized to go around it,” McHale said.

Embrace industry collaboration.

Companies benefit from working together and sharing cybersecurity best practices. Abdullah said Mastercard collaborates with other financial institutions through the Financial Services Information Sharing and Analysis Center (FSISAC).

“We, as fintechs, get together and share a sense of what controls we have in place, and we share some of the signatures we’re seeing,” Abdullah said.

Fintech is the second most frequently attacked industry, she said, going back and forth with health care for first place. “We get nowhere holding that information [to ourselves],” Abdullah said. “Reach out to others. Your network is bigger than you think it is. People will share more than you think. As we continue to be a sharing community, we will continue to help with the cybersecurity resilience of us all.”

Stick to your enduring principles.

Looking forward, experts said, companies should be making sure their information is secure, plans are in place in case of breaches or illnesses, and their employees are holding up during a stressful time. Some of the cyber experts said they’d formally named backups for themselves and others in case of illness, and they are checking with employees to see how they are doing, and urging people to continue taking breaks and using vacation time.

“I think employees understanding that as an organization we have their backs, it’s allowed them a little more space to extend a hand to a colleague and say ‘Is there anything I can do to help because I recognize we’re all going through this together,’” Jenkins said.

Photos 7 & 8: Santorini, Greece.

The future of work:

"Is the office finished?"

The fight over the future of the workplace.

Leaders Sep 12th 2020 edition.

Sep 12th 2020

Editor’s note: Some of our covid-19 coverage is free for readers of The Economist Today, our daily newsletter. For more stories and our pandemic tracker, see our hub

Most people associate the office with routine and conformity, but it is fast becoming a source of economic uncertainty and heated dispute. Around the world workers, bosses, landlords and governments are trying to work out if the office is obsolete—and are coming to radically different conclusions (see article). Some 84% of French office workers are back at their desks, but less than 40% of British ones are.

Jack Dorsey, the head of Twitter, says the company’s staff can work from home “forever” but Reed Hastings, the founder of Netflix, says home-working is “a pure negative”. As firms dither, the $30trn global commercial property market is stalked by fears of a deeper slump. And while some workers dream of a Panglossian future without commutes and Pret A Manger, others wonder about the threat to promotions, pay and job security.

The disagreement reflects uncertainty about how effective social distancing will be and how long it will take before a covid-19 vaccine is widely available. But it is about more than that: the pandemic has revealed just how many offices were being run as relics of the 20th century, even as it triggered the mass adoption of technologies that can transform white-collar work. As a result, the covid calamity will prompt a long-overdue phase of technological and social experimentation, neither business as usual nor a fatal blow to the office. This era holds promise but also brings threats, not least to companies’ cultures. Instead of resisting change, governments need to update antiquated employment laws and begin reimagining city centres.

Two hundred years ago steam power brought workers to factories where they could use new machines. As corporate giants emerged in the late 19th century, staff were needed to administer them. They held planning meetings and circulated memos, invoices and other paperwork to record what they had done. All of this required workers to be close together and created the pattern of people commuting by car or train in order to meet in a central office.

This system always had glaring shortcomings, some of which have become worse over time. Most people hate the hassle and expense of commuting, which eats up over four hours a week for the average American worker. Some dislike the noise and formality of offices or suffer from discrimination within them. Office-bound workers find it harder to look after their children, a growing issue as more families have two working parents.

You might think that new technologies would have shaken up this unsatisfactory status quo. After all, the pdf electronic document was born in 1991, the cost of bandwidth collapsed in the 2000s, and Zoom and Slack, two firms whose technology powers remote working, are both nearly a decade old. Yet inertia has allowed the office to escape serious disruption. Before covid-19 struck, for example, flexible-office companies (including the troubled WeWork) had a tiny global market share of under 5%. Most businesses were unwilling to switch wholesale to remote-working technologies before their clients did or to write off sunk costs in the form of property assets and leases.

Covid-19 has upended all this. Before the pandemic only 3% of Americans worked from home regularly; now a huge number have tried it. Even Xerox, a firm synonymous with office printers spewing unread pages, has many of its staff working from home. As more people adopt remote-working technologies there is a powerful network effect, with each new customer making the service more useful. Together, Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Meet and Cisco Webex now have well over 300m users. Bureaucratic hurdles to remote work have been blasted out of the way. Civil courts are operating remotely. Notaries have gone online and some banks have eliminated the need for new customers to enter a branch to confirm their identity and open an account.

How much of this change will stick when a vaccine arrives? The best available guide is from countries where the virus is under control. There the picture is of an “optional office”, which people attend, but less frequently. In Germany, for example, 74% of office workers now go to their place of work, but only half of them are there five days a week, according to surveys by Morgan Stanley. The exact balance will depend on the industry and city. In places with easy commutes more workers will go to the office; megacities with long, expensive journeys may see fewer.

Companies will have to adapt to this pattern of sporadic attendance in which the office is a hub, not a second home. There is a risk that over time a firm’s social capital erodes, creativity flags, hierarchies ossify and team spirit fades, as Mr Hastings fears (see article). The answer is more targeted staff interactions, with groups gathering at specific times to refresh friendships and swap information. New technologies that “gamify” online interactions to prompt spontaneity may eventually supersede the stilted world of Zoom. As they retool their cultures firms will need to rejig their property: sober investors expect a reduction of at least 10% in the stock of office space in big cities. With the typical corporate lease lasting at least half a decade, this will take time to play out.

For governments, the temptation is to turn the clock back to limit the economic damage, from the collapse of city-centre cafés to the $16bn budget shortfall that New York’s subway system faces. Britain’s government has tried to cajole workers back to the office. But rather than resist technological change, it is far better to anticipate its consequences. Two priorities stand out.

First, a vast corpus of employment law will need to be modernised. Already the gig economy has shown that it is out of date. Now new prickly questions about workers’ rights and responsibilities loom: can firms monitor remote workers to assess their productivity? Who is liable if employees injure themselves at home? Any sense that white-collar workers are getting perks will create simmering resentment in the rest of the workforce.

The second priority is city centres. For a century they have been dominated by towers filled with swivel chairs and tonnes of yellowing paper. Now complex urban planning rules will need a systematic overhaul to allow buildings and districts to be redeveloped for new uses, including flats and recreation. If you step back into the office this month, sit down and log on to your computer—but don’t get too comfortable.■

This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition of The Economist under the headline "Office politics"

Photo 9: Santorini, Greece.

FOUR THINGS YOU HAVE THAT OTHERS DON’T – BUT THEY NEED.

From The Muse.

September 21, 2020

“I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.” Bonnie Ware, Top Five Regrets of the Dying.

Stop working so hard to fit in.

What is your unique contribution? What do you have that others don’t?

Conformity makes you average. Otherness makes you remarkable.

We fear that which makes us unique. Sadly, fitting in incapacitates exceptional contribution.

Conformity and similarity:

Organizations require conformity. Rules enable teams to function, innovate, and perform.

“Birds of a feather flock together.” Connection accelerates when someone says, “You started a business? So did I.”

Conformity – shared values or experiences, for example – make you reasonably predictable.

Similarity is the foundation to connection, but uniqueness empowers meaningful contribution.

Uniqueness within conformity:

All golfers play the same game. But there are individual ways to play the game.

Everyone in your organization plays the same game. Absolute uniqueness makes you irrelevant. The shared mission gives meaning and power to uniqueness. But being unique within represents exceptional potential.

Conformity enables connection. Uniqueness empowers contribution.

4 things you have that others don’t:

#1. Patterns of thought, feeling, and behaviour constitute a unique personality. For example,…

a: Introversion or extroversion.

b: Optimistic or pessimistic.

c: Free-spirited or methodical.

d: Pushy or agreeable.

e: Flexible or rigid.

#2. Activities that increase or drain your personal energy.

Monitoring energy – yours and team members’ – is a neglected leadership skill.

Do things that fuel energy.

#3. First inclinations.

How do you naturally respond to new ideas, for example? Many give reasons new ideas won’t work. But a few find reasons new ideas will work. How might you maximize that difference?

#4. Experiences.

How might you integrate your personal story into your leadership? The things you wish to hide may reflect points of deep connection and your power of greatest contribution.

Story enhances contribution.

What makes people unique?

How might leaders maximize the power of uniqueness within conformity?

Thanks for sharing.

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Photos 10 & 11: Port Royal, Jamaica.

Now a relatively quiet fishing village, Port Royal was once so notorious that it was considered by many to be ‘the wickedest city on Earth’ – until it sank into the sea.

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By James March

21 September 2020

At 08:09 on the morning of 20 January 2020, an event took place that many Jamaicans thought they would never see. For the first time in 40 years, a cruise ship docked at Kingston’s historic Port Royal. An innovative new floating pier extended out and welcomed 2,000 smiling guests onto the island, with the vast Marella Discovery 2 dwarfing everything else in sight as they walked off.

Port Royal turned into an unhinged haven of alcohol, money and sex.

It was a moment of pride for Kingston and its people, something that had long been talked about but had never come to fruition, thanks largely to political disputes and Port Royal’s lack of development. The arrival also marked a bright new chapter in the eventful history of Port Royal, a history that’s known to many Jamaicans but is seldom spoken about beyond its shores.

While Port Royal is now a relatively quiet fishing village at the end of a 29km sandbar extending out from Kingston, in the late 17th Century its reputation was so nefarious that it was considered by many to be “the wickedest city on Earth”. Controlled by the Spanish for more than 150 years due to its strategic location, Jamaica was attacked by an English expeditionary force in 1655 and quickly turned into a profitable possession. The English lack of manpower, however, meant that to protect the island, then-governor Edward D’Oyley was forced to recruit a coalition of pirates and privateers.

Port Royal was once so notorious that it was considered to be "the wickedest city on Earth".

This, combined with the riches brought from trading slaves, sugar and logwood, saw Port Royal turn into an unhinged haven of alcohol, money and sex. Famous for a quarter of its buildings being either a bar or a brothel, the town quickly grew in wealth, and the pirates’ rapacious taste for excess and debauchery became the stuff of legend. Attracting famous seafaring names of the age such as Captain Henry Morgan, they attacked and plundered the poorly-defended Spanish ports of the region (Morgan himself led violent sackings of Panama City and Maracaibo) while rapidly spending their riches on absurdly hedonistic lifestyles.

“These buccaneers had a free hand to literally do as they pleased, as they were viewed as being the defenders of Jamaica. The authorities had no option but to let them alone,” explained local historian Peter Gordon. “Imagine a city where lots of gold was born with these men of questionable character, and freedom to do what they wanted. Brothels, bars and churches were of equal numbers so you can imagine the rough atmosphere that was Port Royal.”

On the morning of 7 June 1692, however, that atmosphere and Port Royal itself were changed forever. Two thousand lives were lost as a massive earthquake destroyed much of the city. Port Royal would never be the same.

Port Royal is believed to be one of the best-conserved underwater heritage sites in the West.

“The earthquake decimated Port Royal and its landmass, which was about 52 acres,” explained Selvenious Walters, technical director of archaeology at the Jamaica National Heritage Trust. “Approximately two-thirds was destroyed and sank into Kingston harbour. The earthquake decimated the buildings and a lot of people died from collapsing walls. Approximately, more than half of the population perished.”

The macabre nature of the Port Royal story makes its unfamiliarity outside Jamaica somewhat surprising. However, it’s the pristine condition of the underwater remains of the former pirate city that make the site truly remarkable. Lying just metres below the water’s surface in an oxygen-depleted environment, the submerged ruins are a time capsule of everyday life in a 17th Century colonial port town.

“It is believed to be one of the best-conserved underwater heritage sites in this hemisphere,” said Walters. “And it is perhaps the only one of its kind in this part of the world. So, it is very important not only for Jamaica but the world as a whole, that we protect and preserve this valuable heritage asset.”

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Photos 12 & 13: Gretna Green, Scotland.

GRETNA GREEN'S RUNAWAY PAST

In the middle of the 18th-century English law, lords approved new laws to tightened marriage arrangements. Couples had to reach the age of 21 before they could marry without their parents' consent and their marriage had to take place in a church.

Scottish law, however, was different: you could marry on the spot, in a simple 'marriage by declaration', or 'handfasting' ceremony, only requiring two witnesses and assurances from the couple that they were both free to marry.

With such a relaxed arrangement within reach of England, it soon led to the inevitable influx of countless thousands of young couples running-away to marry over the border. Gretna Green was the first village in Scotland and conveniently situated on the main route from London into Scotland.

With Gretna Green perfectly placed to take advantage of the differences in the two countries' marriage laws and with an angry father-of-the-bride usually, in hot pursuit, the runaway couple could not waste time. Therefore as soon as they reached Scottish soil in Gretna Green, they would find a place of security where they could marry at haste!

Photo 14: Santorini, Greece.

The first bordellos were in the temples of Babylon, while in Ancient Greece they were run by the state.

As the Government announces the latest attempt to control prostitution, Paul Vallely romps through the colourful story of the whorehouse.

Saturday 21 January 2006 01:00

If prostitution is the oldest profession, then the brothel must be the oldest public institution. The Government's plan to make brothels legal - albeit only small ones, with a maximum of two prostitutes and a receptionist - may sound bold to those in Middle England who fear the woman next door may turn to a bit of home working. But the debate on whether prostitutes are best confined to brothels or allowed to walk the streets is hardly a new one.

The "oldest profession" tag is, of course, almost certainly wrong. Not just because, as some feminists have pointed out, it is probably the profession of midwife that qualifies for the label.

Anthropologists suggest prostitution did not actually seem to exist at all in what were once called primitive societies. There was no sex for sale among the Aborigines of Australia before the white man arrived. Nor, apparently, were there brothels in societies ranging from the ancient Cymri people in Wales to recently discovered tribes in the jungles of Burma. Prostitution seems to be something to do with what we call civilisation.

The first recorded instances of women selling themselves for sex seem to be not in brothels but in temples. In Sumeria, Babylonia and among the Phoenicians, prostitutes were those who had sex, not for gain, but as a religious ritual. Sex in the temple was supposed to confer special blessings on men and women alike. But that was very different to just doing it for money.

There's plenty of that in the Bible, though prostitutes in the Jewish scriptures seemed to ply their trade from home, such as Rahab, the prostitute in Jericho who aided the spies of Joshua and identified her house with a scarlet rope - the origin, some say, of the "red light" (though that may, more prosaically, come from the red lanterns carried by railroad workers left outside brothels while they were inside).

The first brothels proper seem to have been in ancient Egypt. Some historians suggest prostitution was not common until the influence of Greek and Mesopotamian travellers took hold. But, in the times of the later Pharaohs, dancing women and musicians were used to recruit men into brothels. Herodotus said a Greek prostitute called Rhopopis was so successful in Egypt she built a pyramid from her takings.

But certainly, it was the Greeks who first put the brothel on an official footing. The celebrated Athenian lawmaker and lyric poet Solon founded state brothels and taxed prostitutes on their earnings in the 5th century BC. They were staffed by hetaerae (companions) who ranged from slaves and other low-class women to those of the upper ranks. The cost of sex was one obole, a sixth of a drachma and the equivalent of an ordinary worker's day salary. For that you got intercourse but nothing oral, which Greek women had a distaste for, although hetaerae were commonly beaten for refusing.

The Romans were keen on sex. There can be few languages richer than Latin in the pornographic, with dozens of terms for prostitutes and different sexual acts. Waitresses in taverns usually sold sexual services. Prostitutes set themselves up at the circus, under the arches (fornices - hence fornication). Official prostitutes were registered by the police and their activities were regulated. Rent from a brothel was a legitimate source of income for a respectable man.

Not all brothels were the same. Those in the Second District of the City were very dirty but the brothels of the Peace ward were sumptuously fitted. Hairdressers stood by to repair the ravages of amorous combats. Aquarioli, or water boys, waited by the door with bidets for ablution. The superior prostitutes had an immense influence on Roman fashions in hair, dress and jewellery.

To attract trade, the houses had an emblem of Priapus in wood or stone above the door "frequently painted to resemble nature more closely" as one ancient historian delicately put it.

DAILY CORONAVIRUS BRIEFIN

Several such advertising standards have been recovered from the ruins of Pompeii where a large brothel was found called the Lupanar - lupae (she-wolves) were a particular kind of sex worker known to be skilled with their tongues.

Among the fossilised ruins were what our delicate historian called "instruments used in gratifying unnatural lusts" which "in praise of our modern standards of morality, it should be said that it required some study and thought to penetrate the secret of the proper use of several of these instruments".

The ambivalence towards the brothel - the simultaneous urge to license and to regulation - continued into medieval times. Prostitution was tolerated because it was held to prevent the greater evils of rape and sodomy. No lesser figures than St Augustine and St Thomas Aquinas argued that prostitution was a necessary evil: a well-ordered city needed brothels just as it needed good sewers. The medieval brothels were under the authority of the state, city or prince.

Rules were set in place. Brothels were situated in special streets. Ecclesiastics and married men weren't allowed to visit. Prostitutes, who had to wear distinctive dress, were allowed to ply their trade just outside the town walls but not within. Special houses were built for repenting prostitutes.

Places as varied as the town of Sandwich and foreign municipalities such as Hamburg, Vienna and Augsburg, built public brothels. Such systems of regulation continued in many places for three centuries - until a great epidemic of syphilis swept over Europe in the 16th century and these official medieval brothels were closed.

By Elizabethan times, the sale of sex was more diverse. In London, Southwark was the red-light district. Brothels, usually whitewashed, were called "stews" because of their origins as steambath houses. But prostitutes were active in the theatres. Celebrated theatrical impresarios and actors, such as Philip Henslowe and his son-in-law, Edward Alleyn, owned a profitable brothel.

Henry VIII, in 1546, tried to close the bawdy houses but without much success; some were moated and had high walls to repel attackers. And again the Tudor whorehouse catered for both poor and rich - one 1584 account records that a young man might have to part with 40 shillings or more in a brothel for "a bottle or two of wine, the embracement of a painted strumpet and the French welcome [syphilis]".

But in Paris, the French were, by the end of the 17th century, demanding a medical examination of prostitutes who also had to wear a distinct dress with a badge and live in a licensed brothel. Many approved. Bernard Mandeville, a Dutch doctor in London in 1724 wrote a defence of public stews, "for the encouraging of public whoring will not only prevent most of the mischievous effects of the vice," he said, "but even lessen the quantity of whoring in general and reduce it to the narrowest bounds which it can possibly be contained in".

But others disapproved. In Vienna in 1751, Empress Maria Theresa outlawed prostitution and imposed fines, imprisonment, whipping and torture for violations. She even banned female servants from taverns and forbade all women from wearing short dresses.

Throughout the ages, there have been plenty of folk determined to outlaw the trade. In France in 1254, Louis IX ordered all courtesans to be driven out of the country and deprived of their money, goods and - a bit dodgy this one - even their clothes.

When he set out for the Crusades, he destroyed all brothels, with the result that prostitutes mixed more freely than ever with the general population.

In Russia, not long after Marie Therese's purge, the Czarina Elizaveta Petrovna ordered a "find and catch" of all prostitutes both Russian and foreign. And her successor, Tsar Paul I ordered all those caught in Moscow and St. Petersburg to be exiled to Siberia.

In 1860, the Mayor of Portsmouth tried the same thing, turning all the city's prostitutes on to the streets but, at the end of three days, the condition of the place was so bad that he allowed them to return to their former premises. Practically the same episodes were repeated in Pittsburgh and New York in 1891.

Originally legal in the United States, prostitution was outlawed in almost all states between 1910 and 1915 largely due to the influence of the Woman's Christian Temperance Union which was influential in the banning of drug use and was a major force in the prohibition of alcohol. But whoring survived just as boozing did, with brothels opening and closing with regularity, and women switching between prostitution and working as chorus girls in the brothels that lined West 39th and 40th streets in New York alone.

The intervening years have only told the same story, with many countries oscillating between phases in which the sex industry was tolerated or cracked down upon. In 1885, Rotterdam, with regulation, had more prostitution and venereal disease than Amsterdam, a city without regulation. In 1906, Denmark abandoned regulation. Amsterdam adopted it in 1911. The brothels of Germany, Austria, Hungary and Italy were banned in the 1920s. In 1949, Paris abandoned its brothels after two centuries.

Neither the permissive nor the prohibitive approach is successful because the problems they try to address - protecting public morals, controlling sexually transmitted disease, improving health and working conditions for the prostitutes, reducing the exploitation of women and the sex-slave trade are not amenable to common solutions.

What assists the one, detracts from another. Yet still, we try, changing policy here, shifting it there. The only true lesson of history, it seems, is that we never learn from history.

Photo 15: Malta, an English-speaking nation in the Mediterranean (near Sicily).

IDEAS MADE TO MATTER.

SOCIAL MEDIA

The promise and peril of The Hype Machine

Sinan Kayhan Aral

Sep 15, 2020

Why It Matters.

A new book investigates how social media is reshaping the world for good and bad — and how to protect society and democracy from its threats.

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Sinan Aral will discuss “The Hype Machine” at virtual events on Sept. 23 and Sept. 24 hosted by the MIT Center for Information Systems Research. Click here for more information and to register.

2020 has brought highs and lows for the communication ecosystem created by social media — what MIT Sloan professor Sinan Aral calls the “Hype Machine.” People used digital social networks to stay connected with friends and loved ones during a pandemic, while at the same time misinformation and disinformation about COVID-19 spread through the same websites. Some businesses used social media to connect with customers quarantined at home; others joined a boycott of Facebook to protest the way the company handles hate speech. And with a presidential election approaching, campaigns reached voters through the Hype Machine amid concerns about how foreign actors use the networks to sway election results. Social media holds the potential for both promise and peril and we’re at the crossroads.

In his new book “The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health — And How We Must Adapt ,” excerpted below, Aral, Director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy, lays out the path to achieve the promise of social media. This includes understanding the forces at play and the science behind the Hype Machine, and what social media companies, policymakers, and users need to do to achieve the promise and avoid the peril of this new social order.

Every minute of every day, our planet now pulses with trillions of digital social signals, bombarding us with streams of status updates, news stories, tweets, pokes, posts, referrals, advertisements, notifications, shares, check-ins, and ratings from peers in our social networks, news media, advertisers, and the crowd. These signals are delivered to our always-on mobile devices through platforms like Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, YouTube, and Twitter, and they are routed through the human social network by algorithms designed to optimize our connections, accelerate our interactions, and maximize our engagement with tailored streams of content. But at the same time, these signals are much more transformative — they are hypersocializing our society, scaling mass persuasion, and creating a tyranny of trends. They do this by injecting the influence of our peers into our daily decisions, curating population-scale behaviour change, and enforcing an attention economy. I call this trifecta of hypersocialization, personalized mass persuasion, and the tyranny of trends the New Social Age.

In 2013, a false tweet briefly wiped out almost $140 billion in U.S. stock market value.

The striking thing about the New Social Age is that fifteen years ago this cacophony of digital social signals didn’t even exist. Fifteen short years ago, all we had to facilitate our digital connections was the phone, the fax machine, and email. Today, as more and more new social technologies come online, we know less and less about how they are changing us.

Why does fake news spread so much faster than the truth online?

How did one false tweet wipe out $140 billion in stock market value in minutes?

How did Facebook change the 2012 presidential election by tweaking one algorithm?

Did Russian social media manipulation flip the 2016 U.S. presidential election?

When joggers in Venice, Italy, post their runs to social media, do joggers in Venice, California, run faster?

These questions contemplate the disruptive power of social media. By answering them, we can better understand how the Hype Machine impacts our world.

The Hype Machine has created a radical interdependence among us, shaping our thoughts, opinions, and behaviours. This interdependence is enabled by digital networks, like Facebook and Twitter, and guided by machine intelligence, like newsfeed and friend-suggestion algorithms.

Together they are remaking the evolution of the human social network and the flow of information through it. These digital networks expose the controls of the Hype Machine to nation-states, businesses, and individuals eager to steer the global conversation toward their ends, to mold public opinion, and ultimately to change what we do. The design of this machine, and how we use it, are reshaping our organizations and our lives. And the Hype Machine is even more relevant today than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic pushed the world onto social media en masse.

By now we’ve all heard the cacophony of naysayers declaring that the sky is falling as new social technologies disrupt our democracies, our economies, and our public health. We’ve seen an explosion of fake news, hate speech, market-destroying false tweets, genocidal violence against minority groups, resurgent disease outbreaks, foreign interventions in democratic elections, and dramatic breaches of privacy. Scandal after scandal has rocked social media giants like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in what seems like a backlash from which they can never recover.

But when the social media revolution began, the world’s social platforms had an idealistic vision of connecting our world. They planned to give everyone free access to the information, knowledge, and resources they needed to experience intellectual freedom, social and economic opportunity, better health, job mobility, and meaningful social connections. They were going to fight oppression, loneliness, inequality, poverty, and disease. Today, they’ve seemingly exacerbated the very ills they set out to alleviate.

One thing I’ve learned, from twenty years researching and working with social media, is that these technologies hold the potential for exceptional promise and tremendous peril — and neither the promise nor the peril is guaranteed. Social media could deliver an incredible wave of productivity, innovation, social welfare, democratization, equality, health, positivity, unity, and progress. At the same time, it can and, if left unchecked, will deliver death blows to our democracies, our economies, and our public health. Today we are at a crossroads of these realities.

The argument of “The Hype Machine: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health” is that we can achieve the promise of social media while avoiding the peril. To do so, we must step out of our tendency to armchair-theorize about how social media affects us and develop a rigorous scientific understanding of how it works. By looking under the hood at how the Hype Machine operates and employing science to decipher its impact, we can collectively steer this ship away from the impending rocks and into calmer waters.

Unfortunately, our understanding and our progress have been impeded by the hype surrounding the Hype Machine. We’ve been overwhelmed by a tidal wave of books, documentaries, and studies of one-off events designed for media attention but lacking rigour and generalizability. The hype is not helpful because it clouds our vision of what we actually know (and don’t know) from the scientific evidence on how social media affects us.

While our discourse has been shrouded in sensational hysteria, the three primary stakeholders at the centre of the controversy—the platforms, the politicians, and the people—have all been pointing their fingers at each other. Social media platforms blame our ills on a lack of regulation. Governments blame the platforms for turning a blind eye to the weaponization of their technology. And the people blame their governments and the platforms for inaction. But the truth is, we’ve all been asleep at the switch. In the end, each of us must take responsibility for the part we are playing in the Hype Machine’s current direction.

We must step out of our tendency to armchair-theorize about how social media affects us and develop a rigorous scientific understanding of how it works.”

Not only are we all partly to blame, but we are all partly responsible for what happens next. As Mark Zuckerberg himself has noted, governments will need to adopt sensible, well-informed regulations. The platforms will need to change their policies and their design. And for the sake of ourselves and our children, we will all need to be more responsible in how we use social media in our digital town square. There is no silver bullet for the mess we find ourselves in, but there are solutions.

Achieving the promise of the New Social Age, while avoiding its peril, will require all of us—social media executives, lawmakers, and ordinary citizens—to think carefully about how we approach our new social order. As a society, we will need to utilize the four levers available to us: the money (or financial incentives) created by their business models, the code that governs social platforms, the norms we develop in using these systems, and the laws we write to regulate their market failures. Along the way, we will need to design scientific solutions that balance privacy, free speech, misinformation, innovation, and democracy. This is, no doubt, a monumental responsibility. But considering the overwhelming influence, the Hype Machine has on our lives, it is a responsibly we cannot abdicate.

Excerpted from the book THE HYPE MACHINE: How Social Media Disrupts Our Elections, Our Economy, and Our Health—and How We Must Adapt by Sinan Aral. Copyright © 2020 by Sinan Aral. Published by Currency, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin Random House LLC. All Rights Reserved.

SUP+in+Gozo+_+Stephanie+Wild+_+Gozo,+Mal

Photo 16: Malta.

World's richest 1% cause double CO2 emissions of poorest 50%, says Oxfam.

The charity says the world’s fast-shrinking carbon budget should be used to improve the lot of poorest.

Fiona Harvey Environment correspondent.

Mon 21 Sep 2020 00.01 BSTLast modified on Mon 21 Sep 2020 04.37 BST.

The wealthiest 1% of the world’s population were responsible for the emission of more than twice as much carbon dioxide as the poorer half of the world from 1990 to 2015, according to new research.

Carbon dioxide emissions rose by 60% over the 25-year period, but the increase in emissions from the richest 1% was three times greater than the increase in emissions from the poorest half.

The report, compiled by Oxfam and the Stockholm Environment Institute, warned that rampant overconsumption and the rich world’s addiction to high-carbon transport are exhausting the world’s “carbon budget”.

Such a concentration of carbon emissions in the hands of the rich means that despite taking the world to the brink of climate catastrophe, through burning fossil fuels, we have still failed to improve the lives of billions, said Tim Gore, head of policy, advocacy and research at Oxfam International.

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“The global carbon budget has been squandered to expand the consumption of the already rich, rather than to improve humanity,” he told the Guardian. “A finite amount of carbon can be added to the atmosphere if we want to avoid the worst impacts of the climate crisis. We need to ensure that carbon is used for the best.”

The richest 10% of the global population, comprising about 630 million people, were responsible for about 52% of global emissions over the 25-year period, the study showed.

Globally, the richest 10% are those with incomes above about $35,000 (£27,000) a year, and the richest 1% are people earning more than about $100,000.

Extreme heat has become more common in recent years

Carbon dioxide emissions accumulate in the atmosphere, causing heating, and temperature rises of more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels would cause widespread harm to natural systems. That accumulation gives the world a finite carbon budget of how much carbon dioxide it is safe to produce, which scientists warn will be exhausted within a decade at current rates.

If left unchecked, in the next decade the carbon emissions of the world’s richest 10% would be enough to raise levels above the point likely to increase temperatures by 1.5C, even if the whole of the rest of the world cut their emissions to zero immediately, according to Monday’s report.

Oxfam argues that continuing to allow the rich world to emit vastly more than those in poverty is unfair. While the world moves towards renewable energy and phases out fossil fuels, any emissions that continue to be necessary during the transition would be better used in trying to improve poor people’s access to basic amenities.

“The best possible, morally defensible purpose is for all humanity to live a decent life, but [the carbon budget] has been used up by the already rich, in getting richer,” said Gore.

He pointed to transport as one of the key drivers of growth in emissions, with people in rich countries showing an increasing tendency to drive high-emitting cars, such as SUVs, and take more flights. Oxfam wants more taxes on high-carbon luxuries, such as a frequent-flyer levy, to funnel investment into low-carbon alternatives and improving the lot of the poor.

“This isn’t about people who have one family holiday a year, but people who are taking long-haul flights every month – it’s a fairly small group of people,” said Gore.

While the coronavirus crisis caused a temporary dip in emissions, the overall impact on the carbon budget is likely to be negligible, according to Gore, as emissions have rebounded after lockdowns around the world. However, the experience of dealing with the pandemic should make people more aware of the need to try to avert future catastrophe, he said.

"Population panic lets rich people off the hook for the climate crisis they are fuelling." by George Monbiot.

Caroline Lucas, the Green party MP, said: “This is a stark illustration of the deep injustice at the heart of the climate crisis. Those who are so much more exposed and vulnerable to its impacts have done least to contribute to the greenhouse gas emissions that are causing it. The UK has a moral responsibility here, not only because of its disproportionately high historic emissions but as hosts of next year’s critical UN climate summit. We need to go further and faster in reaching net zero.”

World governments are meeting virtually for the 75th UN general assembly this week, with the climate crisis high on the agenda. Boris Johnson, the UK prime minister, is expected to set out his vision for the next UN climate summit, called Cop26 and to be convened in Glasgow in November 2021, after the coronavirus crisis forced a year’s delay to the event.

As host nation, the UK government is being urged to set out its plans for reaching net-zero emissions by 2050, a target enshrined in law last year, but for which there are still few national policies.

Photo 17: Valletta, the capital of Malta.

How to Write a Cover Letter.

Traditional cover letter wisdom tells you to start a cover letter with something to the effect of:

Dear Sir or Madam,

I am writing to apply for the position of Marketing Manager with Thomas Company.

We say: The days of cookie-cutter cover letter intros are long gone.

Here’s the thing: Your cover letter is the best way to introduce to the hiring manager who you are, what you have to offer, and why you want the job—but you have an extremely limited amount of time to do all of those things. So, if you really want to get noticed, you’ve got to start right off the bat with something that grabs your reader’s attention.

What do we mean? Well, we won’t just tell you, we’ll show you—with 31 examples of original cover letter introductions. We don’t recommend copying and pasting them because, well, your cover letter should be unique to your stories, background, and interests, but you can most definitely use them to get inspired for your next application.

Examples 1-6Start With a Passion.

If truly loving data is wrong, I don’t want to be right. It seems like the rest of the team at Chartbeat feels the same way—and that’s just one of the reasons why I think I’d be the perfect next hire for your sales team.
I’ve been giving my friends and family free style advice since I was 10, and recently decided it’s time I get paid for it. That’s why I couldn’t believe it when I found a personal stylist position at J. Hilburn.
After about three years of trying out different roles at early-stage startups around San Francisco, watching more “find your passion” keynotes than I’d like to admit, and assuring my parents that, yes, I really do have a real job, I’m starting to come to terms with the fact that I’m only really good at two things: writing great content and getting it out into the world.
When I was growing up, all I wanted to be was one of those people who pretend to be statues on the street. Thankfully, my career goals have become a little more aspirational over the years, but I love to draw a crowd and entertain the masses—passions that make me the perfect community manager.
When I graduated from Ohio State last May, my career counsellor gave me what I consider to be some pretty bad advice: “Just get any job, and figure the rest out later.” While I think I could have gained good transferrable skills and on-the-job experience anywhere, I wanted to make sure my first step gave me opportunities for professional development, mentorship, and rotations through different departments. Enter: Verizon.
The other day, I took a career assessment, which told me I should be a maritime merchant. I’m not quite sure what that is, but it did get me thinking: A role that combines my skills in business development with my lifelong passion for the ocean would be my absolute dream. Which is how I found this role at Royal Caribbean.

Start With Your Love of the Company.

Similarly, many companies want to hire people who already know, love, eat, and sleep their brand. And in these cases, what better to kick off your cover letter than a little flattery? Bonus points if you can tell a story—studies show that stories are up to 22 times more memorable than facts alone.

Of course, remember when you’re telling a company why you love it to be specific and genuine. Because, um, no one likes an overly crazed fangirl.

I pretty much spent my childhood in the cheap seats at Cubs games, snacking on popcorn and cheering on the team with my grandfather. It’s that passion that’s shaped my career—from helping to establish the sports marketing major at my university to leading a college baseball team to an undefeated season as assistant coach—and what led me to apply for this position at the Chicago Cubs.
Most candidates are drawn to startups for free food, bean bag chairs, and loose dress code. And while all of those things sound awesome coming from my all-too-corporate cubicle, what really attracted me to Factual is the collaborative, international team.
It was Rudy, my Golden Retriever, who first found the operations assistant opening (he’s really excited about the prospect of coming to work with me every day). But as I learned more about Zoosk and what it is doing to transform the mobile dating space, I couldn’t help but get excited to be part of the team, too.
When I was seven, I wanted to be the GEICO gecko when I grew up. I eventually realized that wasn’t an option, but you can imagine my excitement when I came across the events manager position, which would have me working side by side with my favourite company mascot.
When I attended SXSW for the first time last month, I didn’t want to leave. So I decided I shouldn’t—and immediately went to check out job openings at the company.
If I could make the NYC apartment rental process better for just one person, I would feel like the horrors of my recent search would all be worth it. So, a customer service role at RentHop, where I could do it every day? I can’t think of anything more fulfilling.
Having grown up with the Cincinnati Zoo (literally) in my backyard, I understand firsthand how you’ve earned your reputation as one of the most family-friendly venues in the State of Ohio. For 20 years, I’ve been impressed as your customer; now I want to impress visitors in the same way your team has so graciously done for me. (Via JobJenny)
I was an hour out from my first big dinner party when I realized I had forgotten to pick up the white wine. In a panic, I started Googling grocery delivery services, and that’s when I first stumbled across Instacart. I’ve been hooked ever since, so I couldn’t help but get excited by the idea of bringing the amazingness of Instacart to shoddy planners like me as your next social media and community manager.
Though I’m happily employed as a marketing manager for OHC, seeing the job description for Warby Parker’s PR director stopped me in my tracks. I’ve been a Warby glasses wearer for many years, and have always been impressed by the way the company treats its customers, employees, and the community at large.

Start With an Attribute or an Accomplishment.

The unfortunate reality of the job-hunting process is that, for any given job, you’re going to be competing with a lot of other people—presumably, a lot of other similarly qualified people. So, a great way to stand out in your cover letter is to highlight something about yourself—a character trait, an accomplishment, a really impressive skill—that’ll quickly show how you stand out among other applications.

My last boss once told me that my phone manner could probably diffuse an international hostage situation. I’ve always had a knack for communicating with people—the easygoing and the difficult alike—and I’d love to bring that skill to the office manager position at Shutterstock.
Among my colleagues, I’m known as the one who can pick up the pieces, no matter what amount of you-know-what hits the fan. This is why I think there’s no one better to fill Birchbox’s customer service leader position.
Last December, I ousted our company’s top salesperson from his spot—and he hasn’t seen it since. This means, I’m ready for my next big challenge, and the sales manager role at LivingSocial just might be it.
After spending three years managing the internal communications for a 2,000-person company, I could plan a quarterly town hall or draft an inter-office memo in my sleep. What I want to do next? Put that experience to work consulting executives on their communications strategy.
While you won’t find the title “community manager” listed on my resume, I’ve actually been bringing people together online and off for three years while running my own blog and series of Meetups.
If you’re looking for someone who can follow orders to the T and doesn’t like to rock the boat, I’m probably not the right candidate. But if you need someone who can dig in to data, see what’s working (and what’s not), and challenge the status quo, let’s talk.
Ever since my first job at Dairy Queen (yes, they DO let you eat the ice cream!) I’ve been career-focused. I completed my first internship with a professional football team while I was still in college. I was hired full-time as soon as I graduated, and within six months I was promoted into a brand new department. I thought I knew it all. But as I’ve progressed in my career, I finally realized…I absolutely do not. Shocker, right? Enter The Muse. (Via Kararuns729).
You might be wondering what a 15-year veteran of the accounting world is doing applying to an operations role at a food startup like ZeroCater. While I agree the shift is a little strange, I know you’re looking for someone who’s equal parts foodie and financial guru, and I think that means I’m your guy.
Over the last 10 years, I’ve built my career on one simple principle: Work smarter. I’m the person who looks for inefficient procedures, finds ways to streamline them, and consistently strives to boost the productivity of everyone around me. It’s what’s earned me three promotions in the supply chain department at my current company, and it’s what I know I can do as the new operations analyst for SevOne.

Start With Humour or Creativity.

OK, before you read any of these, we feel we have to stamp them with a big disclaimer: Do your homework before trying anything like this—learning everything you can about the company, the hiring manager, and whether or not they’ll appreciate some sass or snark. If they do, it’s a great way to make them smile (then call you). If they don’t? Well, better luck next time.

I’m interested in the freelance writer position. But before I blow you away with all the reasons I’m going to be your next writer, I would like to tell you a little about myself: I didn’t grow hair until I was about five years old, which made everyone who crossed my stroller’s path believe me to be a boy (my name is Casey, which definitely didn’t help). Hope I got your attention. (Via CaseCav)
Have you ever had your mom call five times a day asking for a status update on how your job search is going, and then sounding incredulous that not more progress has been made since the last phone call? That’s my life right now. But I’m hoping that soon my life will revolve around being your full-time social media manager. The good news is, I bring more to the table than just an overbearing mom. Let me tell you more.
Thank you so much for offering me the marketing manager position at Airbnb! I wholeheartedly accept. OK, I know we’re not quite there yet. But if we were, here are just a few ideas of what I would do once in the role.
You’ve slept on it. You’ve made lists of pros and cons. You’ve talked to your life coach, your hairdresser, and every barista on your block. So why haven’t you made your decision yet? When you’re looking for advice, what you need is not more, but better. If you’re constantly plagued with tough career decisions and presentation-day butterflies, you need an advocate, a listener, and sometimes, a kick in the pants. You need me!
I considered submitting my latest credit card statement as proof of just how much I love online shopping, but I thought a safer approach might be writing this cover letter, describing all the reasons why I’m the girl who can take STYLIGHT’s business to the next level.
I never thought that accidentally dropping my iPhone out of a second-story window would change my life (it’s a funny story—ask me about it). But thanks to my misfortune, I discovered iCracked—and found my dream job as an expansion associate.
If we were playing “Two Truths and a Lie,” I’d say the following: I’ve exceeded my sales quotas by at least 20% every quarter this year, I once won an international pie-eating contest, and I have an amazing job at Yext. The last, of course, is the lie. For now.

Photo 18: Great Mediterannean food in Malta, and great views, too.

10 High-Fat Foods That Are Actually Super Healthy.

Ever since fat was demonized, people started eating more sugar, refined carbs and processed foods instead.

As a result, the entire world has become fatter and sicker.

However, times are changing. Studies now show that fat, including saturated fat, isn’t the devil it was made out to be (1, 2Trusted Source).

All sorts of healthy foods that happen to contain fat have now returned to the “superfood” scene.

Here are 10 high-fat foods that are actually incredibly healthy and nutritious.

1. Avocados

The avocado is different from most other fruits.

Whereas most fruits primarily contain carbs, avocados are loaded with fats.

In fact, avocados are about 77% fat, by calories, making them even higher in fat than most animal foods.

The main fatty acid is a monounsaturated fat called oleic acid. This is also the predominant fatty acid in olive oil, associated with various health benefits.

Avocados are among the best sources of potassium in the diet, even containing 40% more potassium than bananas, a typical high potassium food.

They’re also a great source of fiber, and studies have shown that they can lower LDL cholesterol and triglycerides while raising HDL (the “good”) cholesterol.

Even though they are high in fat and calories, one study shows that people who eat avocados tend to weigh less and have less belly fat than those who don’t.

BOTTOM LINE:

Avocados are fruit, with fat at 77% of calories. They are an excellent source of potassium and fiber, and have been shown to have major benefits for cardiovascular health.

2. Cheese.

Cheese is incredibly nutritious.

This makes sense, given that an entire cup of milk is used to produce a single thick slice of cheese.

It is a great source of calcium, vitamin B12, phosphorus and selenium, and contains all sorts of other nutrients.

It is also very rich in protein, with a single thick slice of cheese containing 6.7 grams of protein, the same as a glass of milk.

Cheese, like other high-fat dairy products, also contains powerful fatty acids that have been linked to all sorts of benefits, including reduced risk of type 2 diabetes.

BOTTOM LINE:

Cheese is incredibly nutritious, and a single slice contains a similar amount of nutrients as a glass of milk. It is a great source of vitamins, minerals, quality proteins and healthy fats.

3. Dark Chocolate.

Dark chocolate is one of those rare health foods that actually taste incredible.

It is very high in fat, with fat at around 65% of calories.

Dark chocolate is 11% fibre and contains over 50% of the RDA for iron, magnesium, copper and manganese.

It is also loaded with antioxidants, so much that it is one of the highest-scoring foods tested, even outranking blueberries.

Some of the antioxidants in it have potent biological activity and can lower blood pressure and protect LDL cholesterol in the blood from becoming oxidized.

Studies also show that people who eat dark chocolate 5 or more times per week are less than half as likely to die from heart disease, compared to people who don’t eat dark chocolate.

There are also some studies showing that dark chocolate can improve brain function, and protect your skin from damage when exposed to the sun.

Just make sure to choose quality dark chocolate, with at least 70% cocoa.

BOTTOM LINE:

Dark chocolate is high in fat but loaded with nutrients and antioxidants. It is very effective at improving cardiovascular health.

4. Whole Eggs.

Whole eggs used to be considered unhealthy because the yolks are high in cholesterol and fat.

In fact, a single egg contains 212 mg of cholesterol, which is 71% of the recommended daily intake. Plus, 62% of the calories in whole eggs are from fat.

However, new studies have shown that cholesterol in eggs doesn’t affect the cholesterol in the blood, at least not in the majority of people.

What we’re left with is one of the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet.

Whole eggs are actually loaded with vitamins and minerals. They contain a little bit of almost every single nutrient we need.

They even contain powerful antioxidants that protect the eyes, and lots of choline, a brain nutrient that 90% of people don’t get enough of.

Eggs are also a weight loss friendly food. They are very fulfilling and high in protein, the most important nutrient for weight loss.

Despite being high in fat, people who replace a grain-based breakfast with eggs end up eating fewer calories and losing weight.

The best eggs are omega-3 enriched or pastured. Just don’t throw away the yolk, that’s where almost all the nutrients are found.

BOTTOM LINE:

Whole eggs are among the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet. Despite being high in fat and cholesterol, they are incredibly nutritious and healthy.

5. Fatty Fish.

One of the few animal products that most people agree is healthy, is fatty fish.

This includes fish like salmon, trout, mackerel, sardines and herring.

These fish are loaded with heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acids, high-quality proteins and all sorts of important nutrients.

Studies show that people who eat fish tend to be much healthier, with a lower risk of heart disease, depression, dementia and all sorts of common diseases.

If you can’t (or won’t) eat fish, then taking a fish oil supplement can be useful. Codfish liver oil is best, it contains all the omega-3s that you need, as well as plenty of vitamin D.

BOTTOM LINE:

Fatty fish like salmon is loaded with important nutrients, especially omega-3 fatty acids. Eating fatty fish is linked to improved health and reduced risk of all sorts of diseases.

6. Nuts.

Nuts are incredibly healthy.

They are high in healthy fats and fibre, and are a good plant-based source of protein.

Nuts are also high in vitamin E and loaded with magnesium, a mineral that most people don’t get enough of.

Studies show that people who eat nuts tend to be healthier and have a lower risk of various diseases. This includes obesity, heart disease and type 2 diabetes,

Healthy nuts include almonds, walnuts, macadamia nuts and numerous others.

BOTTOM LINE:

Nuts are loaded with healthy fats, protein, vitamin E and magnesium, and are among the best sources of plant-based protein. Studies show that nuts have many health benefits.

7. Chia Seeds.

Chia seeds are generally not perceived as a “fatty” food.

However, an ounce (28 grams) of chia seeds actually contains 9 grams of fat.

Considering that almost all the carbs in chia seeds are fibre, the majority of calories in them actually comes from fat.

In fact, by calories, chia seeds are around 80% fat. This makes them excellent high-fat plant food.

These aren’t just any fats either, the majority of the fats in chia seeds consists of the heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acid called ALA.

Chia seeds may also have numerous health benefits, such as lowering blood pressure and having anti-inflammatory effects.

They are also incredibly nutritious. In addition to being loaded with fibre and omega-3s, chia seeds are also packed with minerals.

BOTTOM LINE:

Chia seeds are very high in healthy fats, especially an omega-3 fatty acid called ALA. They are also loaded with fibre and minerals and have numerous health benefits.

8. Extra Virgin Olive Oil.

Another fatty food that almost everyone agrees is healthy, is extra virgin olive oil.

This fat is an essential component of the Mediterranean diet, which has been shown to have numerous health benefits.

Extra virgin olive oil contains vitamins E and K and is loaded with powerful antioxidants.

Some of these antioxidants can fight inflammation and help protect the LDL particles in the blood from becoming oxidized.

It has also been shown to lower blood pressure, improve cholesterol markers and have all sorts of benefits related to heart disease risk.

Out of all the healthy fats and oils in the diet, extra virgin olive oil is the king.

BOTTOM LINE:

Extra virgin olive oil has many powerful health benefits and is incredibly effective at improving cardiovascular health.

9. Coconuts and Coconut Oil.

Coconuts, and coconut oil, are the richest sources of saturated fat on the planet.

In fact, about 90% of the fatty acids in them are saturated.

Even so, populations that consume large amounts of coconut do not have high levels of heart disease and are in excellent health.

Coconut fats are actually different from most other fats and consist largely of medium-chain fatty acids.

These fatty acids are metabolized differently, going straight to the liver where they may be turned into ketone bodies.

Studies show that medium-chain fats suppress appetite, helping people eat fewer calories, and can boost metabolism by up to 120 calories per day.

Many studies show that these types of fats can have benefits for people with Alzheimer’s, and they have also been shown to help you lose belly fat.

BOTTOM LINE:

Coconuts are very high in medium-chain fatty acids, which are metabolized differently than other fats. They can reduce appetite, increase fat burning and provide numerous health benefits.

10. Full-Fat Yogurt.

Real, full-fat yoghurt is incredibly healthy.

It has all the same important nutrients as other high-fat dairy products.

But it’s also loaded with healthy, probiotic bacteria, that can have powerful effects on your health.

Studies show that yoghurt can lead to major improvements in digestive health, and may even help fight heart disease and obesity.

Just make sure to choose real, full-fat yoghurt and read the label.

Unfortunately, many of the yoghurts found on store shelves are low in fat but loaded with added sugar instead.

It is best to avoid those like the plague.

Valletta rooftop bar quarterdeck-bar-hil

Photo 19: Valletta, Malta.

Who do you think you are?

Modern neuroscience, says Geoffrey Carr, is groping towards the answer to the oldest question of all: who am I?

Special reportDec 23rd 2006 edition

Dec 23rd 2006

ON SEPTEMBER 13th 1848 a navvy called Phineas Gage was helping to build a railway in Vermont. As gang foreman, he had the job of setting explosive charges to blast a path through the hills near a town called Cavendish. While he was tamping down one of the charges with an iron bar, it went off prematurely, driving the bar clean through his head.

Accidents on construction projects happen all the time. The reason that people remember Gage's is that he survived it. Or, rather, his body survived it. For the Gage that returned to work was not the Gage who had stuck the tamping rod into that explosive-filled hole. Before, he had been a sober, industrious individual, well respected and destined for success. Afterwards, he was a foul-mouthed drunkard, a drifter and a failure. His identity had been changed in a specific way by specific damage to a specific part of his brain.

Gage's accident was intriguing because it cast light on the question of dualism. This is the idea that although the mind—the self—inhabits the brain, it nevertheless has an existence of its own and thus should not be equated with the brain. The sudden change Gage underwent suggested that brain and mind are not independent. If the essence of individuality can be changed by a physical accident, it implies that the brain is a mechanism which generates the self, rather than merely an organ which houses it. This observation moves the question “who am I?” from the realm of philosophy into the realm of science.

Thirteen years after the incident in Cavendish, a French neurologist called Paul Broca systematised the study of how brain damage affects the mind with the discovery that certain sorts of speech defect are the result of damage to part of the brain called the left temporal lobe (see article for a refresher course on brain anatomy and function). Local brain damage of this sort is known to neurologists as a lesion. Studying it, therefore, became known as the lesion method.

Broca's new method was taken up quickly. All sorts of strange neurological symptoms are now explained by specific brain damage. For example, an inability to perceive movement (even though the individual can see stationary objects) results from damage to part of the temporal lobe, and an inability to recognise faces is caused by damage to the fusiform gyrus. No one now questions the idea that particular parts of the brain specialise in particular activities.

Broca's revolution, though, is incomplete. On the face of things, its discoveries might have meant the end of dualism, but the world was not quite ready to embrace the mechanical explanation of self that the work of Broca and his successors implied. For much of the 20th century, a watered-down version of dualism based on the idea of the psyche prevailed. The distinction that psychiatry drew between neurological and psychiatric illness implied that there was a psyche (whisper not the word soul) that could somehow go wrong independently of physical symptoms in the brain.

When that idea was challenged by the effectiveness of physical drugs, such as antidepressants, in treating psychiatric illness, dualism returned in a different guise. Many people, most of whom would not regard themselves as dualists, think of the brain as being like a computer, and the mind as being like a piece of software that runs on that computer. But this analogy, too, is flawed. You do not have to do much damage to a computer to stop it from being able to run programs. Yet as the case of Gage and numerous subsequent individuals has shown, the self can plod on, albeit changed, after quite radical brain damage.

The self in action

Broca's heirs, though, now have a range of new techniques with which to investigate the question. The best-known is a way of scanning the brain called functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). What makes it so powerful is that it records activity as well as anatomy. It can, if you like to put it that way, see the self in action. All you need to do is put someone inside an fMRI machine, give them a task to do and see which bits of the brain light up.

Naturally, the revolution in neuroscience brought about by this new technology has its critics. They point out that big conclusions are often drawn from small samples, that the changes in activity observed by fMRI are indirect (the technique measures blood flow and oxygen consumption rather than the electrical activity of nerve cells) and that the resolution is poor (individual points in an fMRI picture represent two or three cubic millimetres of brain tissue, which means hundreds of thousands of nerve cells). All these criticisms are justified. But these are early days. In science, time tells. The good studies are repeated and make the textbooks. The bad ones cannot be replicated and vanish down the memory hole.

Modern neuroscience has taken many directions, and this survey will not attempt to look at all of them. Instead, it will concentrate on four areas that may shed light on individual identity: the study of the emotions; the nature of memory; the ways that brains interact with each other; and the vexed question of what, exactly, consciouness is.

Such science is very much work in progress. Indeed, it is science of a type that would have been familiar to Broca and his contemporaries, for in many cases the researchers have only the haziest idea of where they are going. In the 19th century, when scientists were feeling their way towards big concepts such as the laws of thermodynamics, electromagnetics and the periodic table without really knowing what they were looking for, that was normal. These days there seem to be fewer new big concepts around, and experiments are often conducted in the expectation of particular results. But neuroscience is one area where big concepts certainly remain to be discovered. And when they are, they are likely to upend humanity's understanding of itself.

Who do you think you are? the brain

This article appeared in the Special report section of the print edition under the headline "Who do you think you are?"

Photo 20: Malta.

Jack Welsh. How to be a good leader (csun.edu)

#1 LEADERS RELENTLESSLY UPGRADE THEIR TEAM, USING EVERY ENCOUNTER AS AN OPPORTUNITY TO EVALUATE, COACH AND BUILD SELF-CONFIDENCE.

The team with the best players usually does win. And that is why, very simply, you need to invest the vast majority of your time and energy as a leader in three activities.

You have to evaluate—making sure the right people are in the right jobs, supporting and advancing those who are, and moving out those who are not.

You have to coach—guiding, critiquing and helping people to improve their performance in every way.

And finally, you have to build self-confidence—pouring out encouragement, caring and recognition. Self-confidence energizes, and it gives your people the courage to stretch, take risks and achieve beyond their dreams. It is the fuel of winning teams.

Too often, managers think that people development occurs once a year in performance reviews. That's not even close. It should be a daily event, integrated into every aspect of your regular goings-on.

Customer visits are a chance to evaluate your sales force. Plant tours are an opportunity to meet promising new line managers. A coffee break at a meeting is an opening to coach a team member about to give his first major presentation. Think of yourself as a gardener, with a watering can in one hand and a can of fertilizer in the other. Occasionally you have to pull some weeds, but most of the time, you just nurture and tend. Then watch everything bloom.

#2 LEADERS MAKE SURE PEOPLE NOT ONLY SEE THE VISION, THEY LIVE AND BREATHE IT.

Leaders have to set the team's vision and make it come alive. How do you achieve that? First of all, no jargon. Targets cannot be so blurry they can't be hit. You have to talk about vision constantly to everyone.

A common problem is that leaders communicate the vision to close colleagues and it never filters down to people in frontline positions.

If you want people to live and breathe the vision, "show them the money" when they do, be it with salary, bonus, or significant recognition. To quote a friend of mine, Chuck Ames, the former chairman and CEO of Reliance Electric, "Show me a company's various compensation plans, and I'll show you how its people behave."

#3 LEADERS GET INTO EVERYONE'S SKIN, EXUDING POSITIVE ENERGY AND OPTIMISM.

An upbeat manager with a positive outlook somehow ends up running a team or organization filled with ... well, upbeat people with positive outlooks. A sourpuss somehow ends up with an unhappy tribe all his own. Unhappy tribes have a tough time winning.

Work can be hard. But your job as a leader is to fight the gravitational pull of negativism. That doesn't mean you sugarcoat the challenges. It does mean you display an energizing, can-do attitude about overcoming them.

#4 LEADERS ESTABLISH TRUST WITH CANDOR, TRANSPARENCY AND CREDIT.

Your people should always know where they stand. They have to know how the business is doing. And sometimes the news is not good—such as imminent layoffs—and any normal person would rather avoid delivering it. But you have to fight the impulse to pad hard messages or you'll pay with your team's confidence and energy.

Leaders also establish trust by giving credit where credit is due. They never score off their own people by stealing an idea and claiming it as their own. They don't kiss up and kick down because they are self-confident and mature enough to know that their team's success will get them recognition, and sooner rather than later. In bad times, leaders take responsibility for what's gone wrong. In good times, they generously pass around the praise.

#5 LEADERS HAVE THE COURAGE TO MAKE UNPOPULAR DECISIONS AND GUT CALLS.

There are times you have to make hard decisions—let people go, cut funding to a project, or close a plant. Obviously, tough calls spawn complaints and resistance. Your job is to listen and explain yourself clearly but move forward. You are not a leader to win a popularity contest—you are a leader to lead. Don't run for office. You're already elected.

Sometimes making a decision is hard not because it's unpopular, but because it comes from your gut and defies a "technical" rationale. Much has been written about the mystery of gut, but it's really just pattern recognition, isn't it? You've seen something so many times you just know what's going on this time. The facts may be incomplete, but the situation feels very, very familiar to you.

Sometimes the hardest gut calls involve picking people. You meet a candidate who has all the right stuff. But something nags at you, and you're left with that uh-oh feeling. Don't hire the guy.

#6 LEADERS PROBE AND PUSH WITH A CURIOSITY THAT BORDERS ON SKEPTICISM, MAKING SURE THEIR QUESTIONS ARE ANSWERED WITH ACTION.

When you are an individual contributor, you try to have all the answers. When you are a leader, your job is to have all the questions. You have to be incredibly comfortable looking like the dumbest person in the room. Every conversation you have about a decision, a proposal, or a piece of market information has to be filled with you saying, "What if?" and "Why not?" and "How come?" Questioning, however, is never enough. You have to make sure your questions unleash debate and raise issues that get action.

#7 LEADERS INSPIRE RISK-TAKING AND LEARNING BY SETTING THE EXAMPLE.

These two concepts often get lip service—and little else. Too many managers urge their people to try new things and then whack them in the head when they fail. And too many live in not-invented-here worlds of their own making. If you want your people to experiment, set the example yourself.

Consider risk-taking. You don't need to be preachy or sombre about your errors. In fact, the more humorous and lighthearted you can be, the more people will get the message that mistakes aren't fatal.

As for learning—again, live it yourself. Just because you're the boss doesn't mean you're the source of all knowledge. Whenever I learned about a best practice that I liked at another company, I would come back to GE and make a scene. Maybe I overstated the case, but I wanted people to know how enthusiastic I was about the new idea.

#8 LEADERS CELEBRATE.

Why does celebrating make managers so nervous? Maybe throwing a party doesn't seem professional, or it makes managers worry that they won't look serious to the powers that be, or that, if things get too happy at the office, people will stop working their tails off.

There is just not enough celebrating going on at work—anywhere. I harped on the importance of celebrating for 20 years. But during my last trip as CEO to our training center in Crotonville, N.Y., I asked the 100 or so managers in the class, "Do you celebrate enough in your units?" Even knowing what I wanted them to say, less than half answered yes.

What a lost opportunity. Celebrating creates an atmosphere of recognition and positive energy. Imagine a team winning the World Series without champagne spraying everywhere. And yet companies win all the time and let it go without so much as a high five. Work is too much a part of life not to recognize moments of achievement. Make a big deal out of them. If you don't, no one will.

I am often asked if leaders are born or made. The answer, of course, is both. Some characteristics, like IQ and energy, seem to come with the package. On the other hand, you learn some leadership skills, like self-confidence, at your mother's knee, and at school, in academics and sports. And you learn others at work—trying something, getting it wrong and learning from it, or getting it right and gaining the self-confidence to do it again, only

better.

Reference: Welch, Jack with Suzy Welch (2005) How to be a Good Leader. Newsweek Magazine April 4, 2005 Retrieved and excerpted from: newsweek.msnbc.com

Photo 21: Valletta, capital of Malta.

Captain Kirk's revenge

Emotion is essential to human survival

Special reportDec 23rd 2006 edition

Dec 23rd 2006

ONE neuroscientist who could not be accused of dealing in small samples is Tor Wager, of Columbia University in New York. Dr Wager studies emotions—or, rather, he studies other people's studies of emotion. He has gathered together every fMRI study of emotion that he can lay his hands on—a total of some 150—and performed what statisticians call a meta-analysis. The result, illustrated below, is as close as anyone has yet come to producing an emotional map of the brain.

The experience of emotion is one of the most fundamental parts of an individual's identity. Most neuroscientists now recognise six basic emotions: anger, disgust, fear, joy, sadness and surprise. Dr Wager's map is a neat illustration of how fMRI can be used to see the links between different parts of the brain that are involved in a single process.

That people like Dr Wager can now study emotion scientifically shows how far things have come. For much of the 20th century, psychology sought to purge itself of the sin of anthropomorphism—that is, inappropriately ascribing human motives and feelings to other species.

The tradition known as behaviourism approached animals as “black boxes”. Behaviourists stimulated them in different ways and recorded what happened. They did not ask what the animals felt. That both stymied comparative studies of emotion and put out of the scientific arena the question of how emotion evolved. Meanwhile anthropology, in a parallel ideological fit caused by the abuses of the eugenics movement, sought to expunge the idea that human behaviour had much in the way of a genetic underpinning. This was the infamous nature/nurture debate that lingers to this day.

Two people in particular came to the rescue: Paul Ekman and Joseph LeDoux. From the 1970s onwards, Dr Ekman, a psychologist at the University of California, San Francisco, challenged the anthropologists. He was responsible for the general agreement on the six basic emotions. He showed that the facial expressions associated with these emotions are universal, and therefore almost certainly plumbed in genetically.

In the 1980s Dr LeDoux, who is at New York University, challenged the behaviourists. Instead of rejecting anthropomorphism, he embraced it—though he did so carefully, noting the crucial importance of the word “inappropriately” in the ascription of human feelings to animals. He therefore studied fear, an emotion that no zoologist would doubt that mankind shares with other species, and used some of those other species to look inside the black box of the brain.

Now, as Dr Wager's ability to collect so many research papers suggests, studying emotion is all the rage. A glance at his map shows that many emotional pathways converge on two structures called the amygdalas. These are part of the limbic system, a collection of specialised structures in the middle of the brain, and it was Dr LeDoux who demonstrated their importance in a series of experiments carried out initally on rats. He used several techniques to confirm that the amygdalas are the most active part of the brain when the subject is afraid. He also produced fear by stimulating the neurons of the amygdalas with electricity. Subsequent work has shown that the amygdalas have the same role in people. Lose parts of them, as happens sometimes as a result of disease or surgery, and you may lose your ability to experience or recognise fear.

To start with, therefore, the amygdalas were thought of as the organs of fear. This, perhaps, is a good example of the sort of premature conclusion that critics worry about—because things turned out to be more complicated.

First, although the amygdalas do orchestrate fear, they seem to do so in the role of conductors as much as players. Certainly this emotional orchestra cannot play without the conductor, but the absence of the other instruments, whose functions are shown in Dr Wager's map, will also be noticed.

Second, the amygdalas also conduct other emotions. Since Dr LeDoux's pioneering work, further studies have linked anger, sadness and disgust with the amygdalas. They have also started to link other parts of the brain with particular emotions. Joy, for example, involves the amygdala's neighbour, the hypothalamus.

Genetics is starting to contribute to the study of emotion as well. The breakthrough came in 1993, with the discovery of a family (in the Netherlands, as it happened) that included an abnormally large number of violent criminals. The common factor in the criminal members of the family turned out to be the absence, due to a faulty gene, of an enzyme called monoamine oxidase A. This enzyme regulates a group of neurotransmitters that includes serotonin and dopamine. Serotonin- and dopamine-based neurons are both important for emotional responses.

At the time, the finding about monoamine oxidase A was widely reported as the discovery of “a gene for violence”. But violence is the expression of anger. Men without the gene were more easily angered. They had shorter fuses and were thus prone to spontaneous violent acts.

The Dutch study was followed up by one carried out in New Zealand by Terrie Moffitt, now of the Institute of Psychiatry in London. She took the nature/nurture question head on by demonstrating that the two interact, and in predictable ways. Again, the gene in question was the one for monoamine oxidase A. Like all genes, its activity is regulated by a DNA switch called a promoter. Monoamine-oxidase-A promoters come in two versions. Dr Moffitt found that a combination of one version and abuse during childhood really pushed people over the edge. The promoter alone, or abuse alone, resulted in some violent tendencies, but it was the mixture that made people really angry.

Illogical, captain

Humans share the basic emotions identified by Dr Ekman's work with other mammals. That helps to make them easy to study. But there is also a range of what are referred to, for want of a better phrase, as higher emotions. These are feelings thought to be confined, if not to humans alone, then to a small subset of large-brained mammals, several of whom are related to humans.

The list of higher emotions is not as well defined as that of the baser ones, but they include things such as guilt, embarrassment, shame and sympathy. What they have in common is that they depend not merely on what the person feeling them thinks about others, but on what the person feeling them thinks others are thinking about them. It is not the guilt or shame of the act itself, but the risk of being found out that provokes the emotion.

The evolution and function of these emotions is bound up with an area of research called theory of mind, to which this survey will return later. But, like basic emotions, the higher ones seem to have reliable neurological circuits whose location can be identified by fMRI.

Yoshiro Okubo, of Nippon Medical School in Japan, for example, has used fMRI to look at guilt and embarrassment. It is not easy to evoke such feelings in someone lying inside an MRI machine, but Dr Okubo thinks he has managed it. The results suggest that these emotions are handled in the medial prefrontal cortex (the middle of the front of the frontal lobe), the left posterior superior temporal sulcus (one of the furrows towards the side of the brain) and the visual cortex (towards the back of the brain).

It is surely no coincidence that much of the activity Dr Okubo found is in that characteristically human part of the brain, the enlarged cerebral cortex, rather than in the limbic system. And, as Dr Okubo points out, some of these areas are also associated with theory of mind.

The involvement of the frontal lobes is significant for another reason, though: it is the place where Phineas Gage took his hit. And that throws light on the question of what, exactly, emotions are for.

It is widely assumed that emotion and rationality are somehow opposed to each other, and that rational decisions are better than emotional ones. In fact, emotion and reason work closely together, as has been demonstrated by Antonio Damasio, the man who revived Gage's 19th-century fame in the 20th century.

Dr Damasio, who now works at the University of Southern California, is both a clinician and a researcher. He draws a parallel between Gage's case and those of some of his own patients. In particular, he has a patient called Elliot (in neuroscience, patients are often referred to by single names or initials to preserve their privacy) whose frontal lobe was damaged by a brain tumour. When the tumour was removed by surgeons, the damaged tissue was taken out too.

Like Gage, Elliot was a responsible individual with a good job (and in his case a family, too) before he suffered his brain damage. The outcome was somewhat different in that Elliot did not become a foul-mouthed wastrel; rather, he became obsessed with detail and stopped being able to make sensible decisions. The overall result was similar, though. He lost his job and his wife and ended up an outcast.

At first, Dr Damasio thought that Elliot's tumour had damaged his reason (both lesion studies and fMRI have shown that the frontal cortex is also the seat of the brain's reasoning powers). Tests, however, showed that what had gone instead were his emotions. Elliot no longer felt anything, and although he could summarise the choices available in a given situation as well as anyone else, without his emotions to guide him he could not actually make a choice. And, as probably happened with Gage, that loss of emotion also changed his self.

The survival value of things like fear, disgust and joy is obvious: run away from it; don't eat it; do more of it. But the idea that emotions shape all activity in adaptive ways is quite a subtle one. Rationality has its place.

In the end, though, as fans of “Star Trek” will remember, it is Captain Kirk, the emotion-ridden human, not Mr Spock, the emotionless Vulcan, who has the nous to run the spaceship.

Photo 22: Valletta, capital of Malta.

As others see us

Dealing with people changes our minds.

Special reportDec 23rd 2006 edition

Dec 23rd 2006

IN COUNTRIES where physical torture is illegal, the cruellest punishment that can be inflicted on an individual is solitary confinement. The “I” that exists by itself will surely go mad. Indeed, many students of the field think the evolutionary pressure that drove the enlargement of the human brain was not a need to survive in the natural environment but a need to negotiate the social one.

The most obvious human attribute is language, and that is meaningless if there is no one to talk to. Less obvious, but just as important, is the ability to think oneself into the mind of another—in other words, to have a theory of mind. It is a combination of language and theory of mind that makes human society possible.

In science, as in other fields of endeavour, it helps to have a good slogan. “The language instinct”, coined by Steven Pinker, of Harvard University, is an excellent way of describing human powers of communication. But although Dr Pinker came up with the label, the idea of such an instinct was originally dreamed up by Noam Chomsky, who referred to it as “deep, universal grammar”. Ambitious claims about language have been made for other species, from parrots to dolphins to chimpanzees. None of these, however, has been shown to engage in the complexity of communication that people do.

Though Dr Pinker and Dr Chomsky disagree about the details—in particular on how the instinct evolved—there is a lot of behavioural evidence that the basic idea is right. The speed with which children learn the rules of speech is one piece of that evidence. It is hard to see how this could happen if what babies hear is not being plugged into some pre-programmed circuitry. Oddly, the difficulty of teaching the rules of writing is another piece of evidence. Writing is an artefact. Written language is no more complex than the spoken variety, but it is a recent invention and has not co-evolved with the language instinct.

Children therefore struggle to master it. Perhaps the most persuasive behavioural evidence, though, is the way that the children of migrants in mixed-language communities (for example, sugar-producing islands in which slaves spoke different languages from each other and from their masters) are able to make up their own fully functional languages, known as creoles, in a single generation.

Besides the behavioural evidence, the mere existence of Broca's area, which governs speech production, and the speech-recognition area discovered a few years later by Carl Wernicke, points powerfully to the idea that a language instinct is hard-wired in by genetics. This is an area where fMRI has built convincingly on the original lesion studies. It has provided evidence that different parts of speech are dealt with by different parts of Broca's and Wernicke's areas. Not only are nouns and verbs processed in separate locations, but different types of noun may have their own areas, rather in the way that Dr Kanwisher's visual categories do. Such specialised locations have been claimed for categories such as animals and tools.

Nor is language processing merely a matter of decrypting and encrypting sound. Deaf people who communicate using sign languages (which have all the grammatical and syntactic features of spoken language) also do their processing in Broca's and Wernicke's areas. If they suffer damage to these areas, it shows up in exactly the same way that it does in those who can hear.

Taking the evidence in total, therefore, it seems likely that the Chomsky/Pinker theory is substantially correct. People have a specialised language instinct. The question is, why?

The Machiavellian mind

It is here that theory of mind—the ability not only to hypothesise what other minds are thinking, but to hypothesise what they are thinking about what you are thinking—enters the explanation. The evolutionary value of this is that people can anticipate the actions of others in a way that helps them. But with language, they can not only anticipate the actions of others, they can try to manipulate them. This idea was dubbed “the Machiavellian mind” by two of its originators, Andrew Whiten and Richard Byrne of St Andrews University in Scotland.

One of the most intriguing ideas about theory of mind comes from another sort of lesion study, an examination of the puzzling condition known as autism. People with autism find it hard to relate to their fellow human beings. Sometimes the condition is part of a wider range of problems, including low intelligence. But many people have autism pure and simple. Their intelligence is normal—indeed, it is often significantly above average—but their social relations are peculiar.

Simon Baron-Cohen, of Cambridge University, and Uta Frith, of University College London, think that autism results when an individual fails to develop a proper theory of mind. (Dr Baron-Cohen believes it is also an extreme manifestation of a general male tendency to be less “empathic” than females are.) All well and good, but modern neuroscience demands a mechanism. If one could be found, it might illuminate the way that theory of mind evolved in the first place.

Vilayanur Ramachandran, a researcher at the University of California, San Diego, thinks he may have found that mechanism: a failure of what are known as mirror neurons. A mirror neuron is one that is active both during the execution of a particular action or the production of a feeling by the individual concerned, and also when that individual observes the same action or feeling in another individual. In other words, it mirrors the actions and thoughts of others.

The first mirror neurons discovered (in the brains of monkeys) were concerned with predicting movement. However, mirrors of emotion have now been found as well, and it is these that interest Dr Ramachandran. He and his group showed, by looking at electrical signals, that the mirror-neuron system does not work properly in autistic children. The absence of relevant mirror neurons, he suggests, means the absence of theory of mind. For example, many autistic people have to learn the meaning of facial expressions by rote so that they can react appropriately.

That work has been followed up by Marco Iacoboni, of the University of California, Los Angeles, using fMRI. Dr Iacoboni discovered that the mirror neurons involved in grasping the intentions of others are in part of the right hemisphere that corresponds to Broca's area in the left hemisphere, and both also correspond with mirror-neuron sites in monkeys. Though no one has yet proved the case, it looks as though the evolution of language and the evolution of theory of mind might not only be two sides of the same coin, but might actually be different specialisations of the same basic structure.

Who do you think you are? the brain

This article appeared in the Special report section of the print edition under the headline "As others see us"

Reuse this content: The Trust Project

Published since September 1843 to take part in “a severe contest between intelligence, which presses forward, and an unworthy, timid ignorance obstructing our progress.”

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Long-Distance Relationships.

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Violence Is Donald Trump’s Mother Tongue.

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As the latest episodes reveal, the “Trump and Violence Show” is the president’s cynical attempt to promote a response in the streets that might actually require law enforcement action.

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By Michael S. RothTwitter

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AUGUST 4, 2020

Ready To Fight Back?

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DATING BRAZILIAN MEN: HOW TO GET A BRAZILIAN MAN TO FALL IN LOVE WITH YOU.

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By AMOLATINA.COM

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FIRST, WHAT ARE BRAZILIAN MEN LIKE?

BRAZILIAN MEN ARE EXPRESSIVE.

True or false? Give examples.

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THEY LOVE TO HAVE FUN.

All? Or in general?

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THEY LOVE TO EAT GOOD FOOD.

What is good food for a Brazilian man?

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THEY LOVE FOOTBALL.

True or false these days? Love? Or like, sometimes?

​

FAMILY IS EVERYTHING TO THEM.

True or false in your experience?

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WHAT ARE BRAZILIAN MEN LIKE TO DATE?

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HE’LL SHOWER YOU WITH COMPLIMENTS.

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HE’LL TELL YOU DIRECTLY IF HE WANTS THE RELATIONSHIP TO BE EXCLUSIVE.

True or false?

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HE’LL INVITE YOU TO MEET HIS FAMILY.

Why? So his mother can cook for you?

HE’LL BE VERY AFFECTIONATE WITH YOU.

True or false in general?

HE’LL TAKE YOU OUT ON ADVENTURES.

Really? Or is it the woman who normally suggests adventurous activities these days?

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HOW TO GET A BRAZILIAN MAN TO FALL IN LOVE WITH YOU.

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STAY READY.

INTRODUCE HIM TO YOUR FAMILY.

RETURN HIS AFFECTIONS.

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SURPRISE HIM OFTEN.

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BE LOYAL.

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WRAPPING IT UP.

References

How to think about cybersecurity in the era of Covid-19.

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Why It Matters.

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Adjust security for a remote-majority workforce.

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Pay attention to your employees’ state of mind.

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Prioritize access more than ever.

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Embrace industry collaboration.

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Stick to your enduring principles.

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The future of work:

"Is the office finished?"

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FOUR THINGS YOU HAVE THAT OTHERS DON’T – BUT THEY NEED.

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By Michael S. Roth Twitter