Governments should use fiscal policies to atone for technology-related carbon emissions, urges report
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Governments faced with economic upheaval caused by artificial intelligence should consider fiscal policies including taxes on excess profits and a green levy to atone for AI-related carbon emissions, according to the International Monetary Fund.
The IMF said unlike previous technological breakthroughs such as the steam engine, generative AI – the term for computer systems such as ChatGPT that can produce convincing, human-like text, voices and images from simple hand-typed prompts – can spread “much faster” and advances in the technology are happening at “breakneck speed”.
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Breaking Waves: Ocean News
06/17/2024 - 07:48
Cities in midwest and north-east brace for heatwave with some to experience highs of 105F – 25 degrees above normal
Extreme heat has begun to hit the US, delivered by a high-pressure weather pattern that the federal weather prediction center says will be “potentially the longest experienced in decades for some locations”.
According to meteorologists with WeatherBELL Analytics, about 265 million people in the US are forecast to see air temperatures reach or exceed 90F (32C), with many of them experiencing heat indices of about 105F by next Sunday.
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06/17/2024 - 07:12
Band say carbon emissions for vinyl production will be reduced by 85% thanks to new method, as they announce 10th studio album
Coldplay are aiming to make the most ecologically sustainable vinyl record yet, for their newly announced album Moon Music.
Each 140g vinyl copy of Moon Music, released 4 October, will be manufactured from nine plastic bottles recovered from consumer waste. For a special “notebook edition”, 70% of the plastic has been intercepted by the environmental nonprofit The Ocean Cleanup from Rio Las Vacas, Guatemala, preventing it from entering the Gulf of Honduras and the Atlantic Ocean.
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06/17/2024 - 06:30
The birds have not been seen for at least a decade – some for more than 100 years – but the authors of a new list of missing species have not given up hope
The coppery thorntail and New Caledonian lorikeet are among the 126 birds “lost” to science, having not been seen for a decade or more, according to the most comprehensive list of missing species composed to date.
The new tally is based on millions of records collected by enthusiastic birders and amateur scientists documenting wildlife in some of the planet’s most remote locations. To be part of the dataset, the bird must not have a recorded sighting in at least a decade, and not be assessed as extinct or extinct in the wild by the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species.
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06/17/2024 - 02:49
With tickets doubling as public transport passes and recycled props, Hans Otto Theater is embracing a €3m federal project to make culture climate neutral
A handful of Spanish conquistadors fight through thick undergrowth to emerge in the ivy-clad ruins of a fallen civilisation during a rehearsal of Austrian playwright Thomas Köck’s Your Palaces Are Empty.
Premiered last month at the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam, south-west of Berlin, the bleak and unforgiving drama probes the wounds of a shattered capitalist world that has exploited its people and the planet’s resources.
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06/17/2024 - 02:16
David Littleproud claims Australia doesn’t need ‘large-scale industrial windfarms’ like the planned offshore zone south of Sydney
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David Littleproud has claimed Australia doesn’t need “large-scale industrial windfarms” like the planned offshore zone south of Sydney, adding the Coalition will “cap” federal government investment into renewable energy if elected.
The Nationals leader visited Wollongong on Monday, where he promised the opposition would instead offer a “calm” and “methodical” energy pathway to net zero by 2050.
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06/17/2024 - 02:00
The founder of the Seahorse Trust explains how his life-long fascination with the enigmatic creatures helped us to understand and protect them
I saw a seahorse for the first time when I was 14. There is something very unfishlike about the way seahorses swim upright, and their constantly moving eyes – it made me feel completely in awe of them. Fifty-one years later, and that feeling has never gone away. Even now, if I’m on a dive and I see one, I find it amazing.
Seahorses are fish that don’t fit into any category; they seem like an amalgam of lots of different creatures. They have horse-like heads, kangaroo-like pouches and prehensile, monkey-like tails – which often seem to have a mind of their own – plus they can change colour like a chameleon. It’s quite remarkable.
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06/17/2024 - 00:00
Beavers’ dams have created more places for water voles to hide from predators and hopefully flourish, say experts
Beavers reintroduced to a Scottish rainforest 15 years ago may have created the right habitat for the area’s endangered water voles to flourish.
The voles, once abundant in Scotland but now one of the country’s most threatened native animals, could thrive in the “complex boundary between water and land” that beavers have created in Knapdale in Argyll and Bute since their reintroduction there in 2009.
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06/16/2024 - 22:28
The Australian Bureau of Statistics updated its methodology and says there are 4 million more cattle than previously estimated
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Official figures have underestimated the number of cows in Australia by about 20%, the Australian Bureau of Statistics has found, after researchers suggested there could be as many as 10 million unreported cattle in Australia.
ABS agriculture statistics, released on Friday, estimated there were 27.8 million beef cattle across the country in 2023, a significant increase on previous years.
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06/16/2024 - 18:18
Jordanians died in Saudi Arabia after suffering heatstroke, said officials, with temperatures reaching 47C in Mecca
At least 14 Jordanian pilgrims have died while on the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia as temperatures soar in the kingdom.
Jordan’s foreign ministry said “14 Jordanian pilgrims died and 17 others were missing” during the performance of hajj rituals. It said its nationals had died “after suffering sun stroke due to the extreme heatwave” and that it had coordinated with Saudi authorities to bury the dead in Saudi Arabia, or transfer them to Jordan.
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