2015 World Cup update #8: Sri Lanka edges Afghanistan in a thriller

If the current cricket World Cup has demonstrated something, it is that I am absolutely terrible at predicting outcomes. You can bet against me and win each time. For yesterday’s games, I predicted that both Sri Lanka and South Africa would have easy wins over Afghanistan and India respectively and what happens? Afghanistan almost pulled off a historic victory and India simply hammered South Africa, getting them out for 177 in just 40.2 overs after scoring 307/7. And let’s not even talk about my predicted dark horse team Pakistan struggling to avoid missing qualifying for the quarterfinals.
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Beware of the blob!

I came across this video that shows what happens when you embed ferromagnetic particles into putty to make it magnetic and then put a neodymium magnet (these are very strong magnets) near it. The caption to this video says that it was taken over 1.5 hours at three frames per second and then played back at 24 fps. (This cannot be right because then the playback should be a little over ten minutes and not 52 seconds.)
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NSA and GCHQ have accessed your phone’s encryption keys

Investigative reporters Jeremy Scahill and Josh Begley have an explosive article in The Intercept based on yet more documents provided by Edward Snowden that shows that the intelligence agencies of the US and Britain have no compunction whatsoever about engaging in illegal actions and hacking into private companies in their desire to get as much spying power over everyone as they can.
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Consent explained

The issues of sexual harassment, assault, and rape have been much in the news recently. It should be obvious that there should clearly be mutual consent. But for many people, the issue of what constitutes consent seems to be a little unclear. This video tries to clarify the issue, using other everyday exchanges that have none of the tension of sexual interactions, to illustrate the point.
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2015 World Cup update #6: New Zealand clobbers England

Yesterday’s match between England and New Zealand turned into a rout with England batting first and being dismissed for a paltry 123 off 33.2 overs, thus earning the dubious distinction of having the lowest score and batting for the fewest overs so far in the tournament. While I had predicted that England would not win this tournament, this performance was far worse than even I expected and can only be described as an utter humiliation. New Zealand, on the other hand, cemented their reputation as the team to watch in this tournament.
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Why memories are unreliable

We all know that our memories are unreliable. We forget things that happened and we ‘remember’ things that didn’t. Recent events have put back in the spotlight the issue of false memories. I have written about my own experience with false memories. The fact that people can spontaneously create false memories or have them implanted by others have in the past led to the kinds of miscarriages of justice that occurred during the epidemic of reported abuse in day care centers a few decades ago.
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John Oliver takes on the tobacco companies

Tobacco companies are clearly in the running for the title of the most evil, lying, despicable companies on Earth, relentlessly marketing a product that when used as intended causes disease and death. Last Week Tonight takes on the issue of how tobacco companies are targeting people in other countries as the anti-smoking campaigns in the US cut into their profits here. In the process, he shows how news can be investigative, informative, and hard-hitting and yet interesting and worth watching.
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2015 World Cup update #5

This cricket World Cup has seen some fine performances by teams that are low-ranked. In addition to Ireland beating West Indies, we saw Scotland making New Zealand work hard for their win. Scotland was dismissed for only 142 in 36.2 overs, setting NZ up for an easy win. But NZ, showing an uncharacteristically cavalier attitude perhaps because they faced such an low target, lost seven wickets before reaching the score in 24.5 overs.
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