The UK just moved a step closer to requiring companies to provide detailed statements on future carbon emissions

Dillon Danis posted a screenshot of MrBeast trending on X (formerly Twitter) and speculated what might be the reason behind it

Investors in semiconductor stocks face a growing threat to industry valuations: a chronic shortage of water. For Abrdn

History buffs on Facebook were left convinced of time travel after a black and white photograph originating from World War II appeared to show a man speaking on a mobile phone. In the image, the conspicuous figure could be seen leaning against a shop front on a crowded pavement amongst locals as well as US army soldiers deployed there. According to The Sun, the image was taken in Iceland’s capital of Reykjavík in 1943 – long before the invention of the portable telephone devices. The first mobile phone, the Motorola DynaTAC 8000X, was sold in 1973. The man who appeared to be holding a device to his ear was dressed in a light-coloured coat, wore a flat cap and was looking in the direction of the camera that captured the image. The picture which has sparked conspiracy theories of time travel was shared by its owner Kristján Hoffman on the Facebook group Gamlar ljósmyndir, which translates to “Old Photographs”. Hoffman wrote on Facebook: “The American army is taking over Icelandic splendour, as you can see. “One thing that draws attention to this beautiful picture is that above the window, in the corner in the middle of the picture, a man is leaning and is on a cell phone.” The post sparked a lot of debate online as people gave their different theories. One person suggested the man was simply scratching his ear, while another said he was holding his watch up to see if it was working since the man is standing outside a watch shop in the image. But Hoffman stuck to his own beliefs, saying: “He's in a stupor, standing alone and wearing a different headdress than the others and a scarf and acting like we would do today. “He has an overview of the square and nothing like having a conversation with someone on a smartphone.” Another person in the comments joked that Icelanders had “already invented the mobile phone way before anyone else!” Sign up to our new free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

SK Hynix Inc. has opened an investigation into the use of its chips in the latest phone from

Elon Musk’s X is planning to charge users in New Zealand and the Philippines joining via the platform’s web application $1 per year as part of its programme to reduce bot activity. The subscription is part of X’s “Not A Bot” programme, which attempts to “bolster our already significant efforts to reduce spam, manipulation of our platform and bot activity”, the company noted in a help centre post on its website on Tuesday. As part of the pilot programme, new users signing up via the website in the two countries will also be required to verify their account with a phone number, the unsigned post said. It remained unclear why the subscription programme is being rolled out only in these two countries, and exclusively for new users joining via the X website, and not the mobile app. However, Not a Bot’s terms and conditions suggested that people may also subscribe to the programme from X’s iOS and Android apps, while the main help centre post only specified web. X did not immediately respond to The Independent’s request for comment. “As of October 17th, 2023 we’ve started testing “Not A Bot”, a new subscription method for new users in two countries,” the company posted. “This will evaluate a potentially powerful measure to help us combat bots and spammers on X, while balancing platform accessibility with the small fee amount. Within this test, existing users are not affected,” it said. New users from the two countries who opt to subscribe with $1 will for the web version of the platform will be able to post content, like posts, reply, repost and quote other accounts’ posts, as well as bookmark posts, X noted. However, those who opt out of this subscription in the web application “will only be able to take ‘read only’ actions, such as: Read posts, Watch videos, and Follow accounts,” the company stated. “This new programme aims to defend against bots and spammers who attempt to manipulate the platform and disrupt the experience of other X users. We look forward to sharing more about the results soon,” it added. The latest programme is also in addition of X’s premium $8 subscription option. Commenting on a post on X about the new programme, Mr Musk called it “the only way to fight bots without blocking real users.” “Correct, read for free, but $1/year to write. This won’t stop bots completely, but it will be 1000X harder to manipulate the platform,” the multibillionaire said. X’s latest decision is in line with the Tesla titan’s aim to curb bot activity on the platform since before his takeover of then-Twitter in November last year. He has also held from the beginning that charging users would curb bot activity on the social media platform even though it has been found that only a small fraction of users subscribe to its $8 premium service. But the multibillionaire has continued to hold that a subscription fee would make it harder for bots to create accounts since each bot would need a new credit card to register on the platform. “It’s the only way I can think of to combat vast armies of bots,” Mr Musk said last month. “Because a bot costs a fraction of a penny – call it a tenth of a penny – but even if it has to pay a few dollars or something, the effective cost of bots is very high,” he added. Read More EU to investigate X’s handling of disinformation over Hamas attack on Israel EU asks Elon Musk to ‘walk the talk’ on X/Twitter disinformation over Hamas attack How Elon Musk’s Twitter became a haven for fake news and misinformation Viral hate and misinformation amid Israel-Hamas crisis renew fears of real-world violence Instagram Threads adds edit button and voice notes as it attempts to take over from Twitter EU opens investigation into X’s handling of disinformation over Hamas attack on Israel

A huge mass of heat-emitting rock has been found buried beneath the surface of the Moon. The incredible discovery was made beneath one of the Moon’s craters, where a large mass of granite has slowly been releasing heat for years. Experts know that the Moon used to have eruptions and lava fields flowing from it, but until now, they have never uncovered evidence that is reminiscent of Earth-like volcanoes, underneath which granite forms when magma cools and crystalises deep beneath the surface. Now, that has changed after astronomers looked a bit more deeply at what lies beneath the Compton and Belkovich craters, located on the far side of the Moon. There they came across a large piece of granite rock that is emitting heat. The discovery excited experts as granite is not commonly found outside of Earth. Granite on the Moon was discovered using data from both Chinese and American lunar orbiters, and the information has revealed a whole new volcanic process never before witnessed. In a statement, one of the lead researchers, Dr Matt Siegler, from the Planetary Science Institute, said: “Using an instrument looking at microwave wavelengths – longer than infrared – sent to the Moon on both the Chinese Chang’E 1 and 2 orbiters, we have been able to map temperatures below the surface. “What we found was that one of these suspected volcanoes, known as Compton-Belkovich, was absolutely glowing at microwave wavelengths.” He continued: “What this means is that it is hot, not necessarily at the surface, as you would see in infrared, but under the surface. “The only way to explain this is from extra heat coming from somewhere below the feature within the deeper lunar crust. So Compton-Belkovich, thought to be a volcano, is also hiding a large heat source below it.” Using the data, they believe the 12-mile wide dip makes up the caldera, or depression, of the ancient volcano, where the surface temperature is 10°C higher than the surrounding areas. The volcano is thought to have last erupted 3.5 billion years ago and experts believe the heat that is emitting from the granite below is due to trapped radioactive material in the rock. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Fortnite Cybertron Cannons can only be found as floor loot or inside of chests in Chapter 4 Season 3. Collecting one in three matches will earn you 30,000 XP.

Scientists have found an explanation for a 'gravity hole' in the Indian Ocean. A gravity hole is an area where gravitational pull is low, causing the seafloor to sink. Deep beneath the ocean, there is one that is three million square kilometers in size and previously it has confused scientists. Now two researchers from the Indian Institute of Science, Debanjan Pal and Attreyee Ghosh, think they have solved the mystery. More than 1,000 kilometers (621 miles) beneath Earth's crust, they found cold, dense remnants of an ancient ocean plunged into a 'slab graveyard' beneath Africa some 30 million years ago, stirring up hot molten rock. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Pal and Ghosh retraced the formation of the massive geoid by modeling how tectonic plates skimmed over Earth's mantle for the past 140 million years. They ran simulations and compared the shape of the oceanic low those models predicted with observations of the dent itself. The models that reproduced the Indian Ocean geoid low in its current form all had one thing in common: plumes of hot, low-density magma wafting up beneath the low. These plumes, as well as a distinctive mantle structure, are what created the geoid low; if they rise high enough, Pal and Ghosh reckon. "In short, our results suggest that to match the [shape and amplitude of the] observed geoid low, plumes need to be buoyant enough to come up to mid-mantle depths," the pair wrote. The first of these plumes appeared about 20 million years ago, to the south of the Indian Ocean geoid low, and around 10 million years after the old Tethys Sea sank into the lower mantle. As the plumes spread beneath the lithosphere and inched towards the Indian peninsula, the low intensified. But more research needs to be done to work out what is really going on as not all scientists are convinced. Science is crazy. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

By Steven Scheer JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Wix.com, which helps small businesses build and operate websites, reported a higher-than-expected rise in quarterly

Scientists have finally found a “demon” subatomic particle that was predicted to exist nearly seven decades ago and speculated to play an important role in the behaviours of a range of metals and alloys, including superconductors. Physcist David Pines in 1956 theorised that electrons, which normally have a mass and negative electric charge, can under some conditions combine to form a composite “demon” particle that is massless, neutral and does not interact with light. These theorised interesting properties, however, made these particles elude detection – until now. After a nearly 70-year search for these subatomic entities, researchers, including those from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, have finally found signatures of Dr Pines’ “demon” particles in the metal strontium ruthenate. “Demons have been theoretically conjectured for a long time, but experimentalists never studied them. In fact, we weren’t even looking for it. But it turned out we were doing exactly the right thing, and we found it,” study co-author Peter Abbamonte said. Electrons – which are distributed in different energy bands within atoms – are known to lose their individuality in solids with electric interactions making the particles combine to form collective units. With some threshold energy, studies have also shown electrons can form composite particles called plasmons with a new charge and mass. However, the mass is so large that these plasmon particles cannot form with the kind of energies available at room temperature. Revelations on room-temperature semiconductors are considered to be one of the “holy grails” of physics. But Dr Pines theorised that if a solid has electrons in more than one energy band, as many metals do, their respective plasmons may combine in an out-of-phase pattern to form a new plasmon that is massless and neutral – a demon. Since these special particles are massless, he argued they can form with any energy and may exist at all temperatures – leading to speculation that the demons have important effects on the behaviour of some metals with multiple energy bands. “The vast majority of experiments are done with light and measure optical properties, but being electrically neutral means that demons don’t interact with light,” Dr Abbamonte explained. So a completely new experiment was needed to detect them. In the research, scientists were studying the compound strontium ruthenate as it is similar to high-temperature superconductors – a special kind of material where electrical resistance vanishes. For a survey of the metal’s electronic properties, they synthesised high-quality samples of the metal. They then applied a technique to study the metal that uses energy from electrons shot into the metal to directly observe the metal’s features, including plasmons that form. During their observation of the electron interactions, scientists found something unusual – an electronic mode with no mass. “At first, we had no idea what it was. Demons are not in the mainstream. The possibility came up early on, and we basically laughed it off. But, as we started ruling things out, we started to suspect that we had really found the demon,” Ali Husain, another author of the study, said. Researchers then sought to calculate how electrons are distributed across bands inside strontium ruthenate. Predictions by Dr Pines indicate there are specific conditions when “demons” are likely to form, and it remained unknown whether strontium ruthenate would have the particle. “We had to perform a microscopic calculation to clarify what was going on. When we did this, we found a particle consisting of two electron bands oscillating out-of-phase with nearly equal magnitude, just like Pines described,” found Edwin Huang, another author of the study. “Our study confirms a 67-year-old prediction and indicates that demons may be a pervasive feature of multiband metals,” scientists wrote in the study. Read More Superconductor breakthrough could represent ‘biggest physics discovery of a lifetime’ – but scientists urge caution LK-99: Excitement rises over possibly revolutionary ‘miracle material’ – but there is still no good reason to believe it exists Superconductivity: The technology that could change everything if we just knew how it worked ‘Vampire child’ with padlocked ankle unearthed in Polish ‘necropolis’ Two new kinds of mole discovered in mountains of Turkey Scientific discovery casts doubt on our understanding of human evolution

Artificial intelligence-powered tools like ChatGPT have mesmerized us with their ability to produce authoritative, human-sounding responses to seemingly any prompt. But as more people turn to this buzzy technology for things like homework help, workplace research, or health inquiries, one of its biggest pitfalls is becoming increasingly apparent: AI models sometimes just make things up.