Forced displacement in the West Bank could be ‘crime against humanity’, says UN report
Researchers claimed Israeli actions in the Palestinian territory involves ‘ethnic cleansing’ Source link
All posts tagged: Humanity
the secret of this pioneering series was its exploration of humanity, not aliens
When Star Trek first appeared on television screens 60 years ago, audiences expected science fiction to offer aliens, monsters and futuristic technology. What they encountered was something far more ambitious. From its very first broadcast episode on September 8 1966, Star Trek established that its true subject was the exploration of humanity itself. For all its reputation as an action-packed space adventure, the franchise has endured because it repeatedly returned to a universal question: what does it mean to be human? In that first episode, entitled The Man Trap, the alien antagonist survives by appearing to each observer as the person they most wish to see. Dr Leonard “Bones” McCoy meets a lost love from his past; others see figures shaped by memory, expectation, desire and longing. The creature, soon dubbed the “salt vampire” by fans of the series, is not simply a shape-shifter. Its power lies in exploiting human perception. Rather than asking viewers to fear an alien with superior strength or advanced weaponry, the episode asks a more profound question: can we trust …
Humanity Needs an AI Nonproliferation Treaty
America’s biggest AI companies have spent the past few years churning out advanced new models as fast as they possibly can. Now the industry is screaming out with a nearly unified voice: Please, for the love of God, make us slow down. In July, more than 1,300 employees from leading AI firms, including several top executives at OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, and Meta, signed an open letter warning that AI capabilities could soon accelerate “beyond our ability to understand or control the resulting systems.” The letter urges the U.S. government to “develop the technical and governance tools” necessary to “deliberately pace” AI progress. In a comment accompanying the open letter, Shengjia Zhao, the chief scientist at Meta’s Superintelligence Labs, wrote that AI is on the cusp of creating “unprecedented social and safety risks.” Matthew Rahtz, an engineer at Google, warned that coordination was necessary to “avoid catastrophic harms.” And Leo Gao, an OpenAI researcher, compared the current pace of AI progress to “a runaway nuclear chain reaction.” Plenty of others in the industry have warned that …
9 Phrases People Who’ve Lost Their Faith In Other Humans Say In Casual Conversation
After enough broken promises and moments that make you wonder why you keep giving people the benefit of the doubt, you might slowly begin to lose faith in whether or not anyone will ever come through. When someone has been consistently disappointed by their fellow humans, it often shows up in the little things they say. They may not openly announce that they’ve become guarded, but specific language can signal that they’re trusting others less than they used to. If someone is slowly losing their faith in others, they tend to say these phrases in casual conversations 1. ‘I’ll be disappointed eventually’ Miljan Zivkovic | Shutterstock When someone uses this phrase, it usually comes from experience. They’ve likely been disappointed enough times that thinking people will come through no longer feels realistic. Instead of getting their hopes up and being hurt again, they assume that, sooner or later, everyone will fall short. It’s pretty telling because, in most cases, there’s more to it. They simply expect to be disappointed before it happens because they can’t …
Nagasaki mayor says ‘humanity and nuclear weapons cannot coexist’ | History News
NewsFeed Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki says ‘humanity and nuclear weapons cannot coexist’ as Japan marks the anniversary of the US atomic bombing. A memorial ceremony has been held in Nagasaki Peace Park, with ultraconservative prime minister Sanae Takaichi in attendance. Published On 9 Aug 20269 Aug 2026 Click here to share on social media share-nodes Share googleAdd Al Jazeera on Googleinfo Source link
Did Art Really Invent Humanity — as Opposed to the Other Way Around?
Contemplating cave art, Ottawa essayist J. F. Martel offers an interesting thesis at Aeon, as to the origin of humanity — Humans did not invent art. Art invented us: Image Credit: acongar – Adobe StockCave paintings of Altamira, 36000 years ago. Think about empirical science. In order to have it, we must believe that the Universe is intelligible in principle. Somehow, we humans have the cognitive equipment to think about the world as it is. We must be able to trust our senses enough to believe that the conceptual and mathematical ideas we derive from sensory experience can tell us something about what the world is like beyond sensory experience. The basic realism of science, then, rests upon the following claim: the Universe is such that facts can be plainly stated within it, even though the facts themselves need not be plain. “How art invented humanity,” July 30, 2026 It’s a longish essay (nearly 5000 words) so I can only touch on a couple of the points he makes: In beauty, we encounter a gap …
What drove Venezuela’s decision to leave the ICC? | Crimes Against Humanity News
Venezuela’s Foreign Minister Felix Plasencia announced on Friday that the country had formally notified the United Nations of its withdrawal from the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC). The instructions came from Interim President Delcy Rodriguez, said Plasencia on X, calling the decision “firm and irrevocable”. He said the ICC had shown a “demonstrated geographical bias” by disproportionately targeting countries in Africa and Latin America. Recommended Stories list of 4 itemsend of list The United States quickly welcomed the decision, praising Rodriguez for joining “American-led efforts to dismantle the corrupt and worthless ICC”. The US Department of State said in a statement that the court had spent years “investigating” former Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro “with no result” and called on all ICC member states to withdraw from the Rome Statute. While Venezuela’s decision to leave the ICC is unlikely to stop a long-running investigation into alleged crimes against humanity, analysts say it’s the latest sign of the country’s rapidly changing foreign policy under Rodriguez, bringing Caracas closer to Washington …
The value of time off isn’t better productivity — it’s your humanity
As humans, we instinctively understand that time has profound worth, regardless of any workplace benefits. This is what sabbatical alumni mean when they ascribe a feeling of humanity to their time off. Unfortunately, the burden of proof for many is to somehow provide an equation of increased productivity. While this misses the point of what taking time off is all about, there is a lens from psychology that can help us understand the benefits in more tangible terms: conservation of resources theory. Broadly speaking, there are two ways to evaluate whether a break from work is beneficial. The first asks: Were you better off during your time away? The second asks: How long did that positive effect persist upon your return? Most of us focus entirely on the second question when justifying time off. We expect the break itself to feel good. That’s a given. What we really want to know is whether we’ll return as better, more effective employees. Will we be more creative? More focused? Less likely to burn out again? This is …
The best graphic memoirs of the year (so far) offer hope and humanity
Earlier this year, my favorite place to buy graphic novels didn’t have the book I was looking for, and I thought, No worries, I’ll see if my second-favorite place to buy graphic novels has it. And then I got a little verklempt: We have never been this spoiled for choice. Though they are now the third best-selling genre in North America (behind general fiction and romance), the legitimization of the nonfiction graphic novel as a literary form is relatively new. Beyond the brisk sales, they’re among the most popular titles in elementary-school libraries, they win Pulitzer Prizes and National Book Awards, and they get adapted into movies and streaming shows. The now–expansive embrace of graphic novels makes the recent death of “Persepolis” creator Marjane Satrapi earlier this month feel like even more of a blow. Satrapi’s 2003 memoir of growing up in Iran during and after the country’s 1979 revolution became one of the genre’s first blockbuster hits, one of the most widely read (and widely challenged) graphic novels of all time. Earlier this year, …
“Disclosure Day” is Steven Spielberg’s last word for humanity
Steven Spielberg is Hollywood’s perennial Pollyanna. Through half a century of creature features, epic disasters, sprawling adventures, quirky character studies and electrifying political thrillers, Spielberg has maintained his hope. He’s also let his hand get heavier, painting his optimism in broad, unmistakable strokes for anyone searching for something to hold onto in an increasingly divided and combative world outside the movie theater. But his highly anticipated return to the sci-fi summer blockbuster, the brilliant and beguiling “Disclosure Day,” is Spielberg’s most shameless appeal toward idealism yet. So unabashed, in fact, that his earnestness makes a familiar allegory take on powerful new resonance, as if Spielberg were trying to convey that humanity can still have a do-over. Desperately trying to retrieve a trove of stolen government secrets that will prove the existence of extraterrestrial life, Noah Scanlon (Colin Firth) — the director of a secret military contractor, Wardex — warns of the ramifications to a Wardex defector, Hugo (Colman Domingo). “It is a virus for which humanity has no cure,” Noah tells his former colleague, implying …