Culture

Decoding daylists: The business behind Spotify’s curated playlists

Culture / /

From “lowrider psychedelic soul Thursday early morning” to “delulu masterpiece Saturday afternoon,” Spotify seems to have an uncanny ability to predict our musical needs. However, Spotify’s carefully curated “daylists” are far more than just personalized music — they are part of a business model that turns your listening into data, fueling one of the most […]

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Deprogramming conspiracy believers with debunkbot

Culture, Technology / /

“If we’ve been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We’re no longer interested in finding out the truth.”  These wise words of Carl Sagan in his book “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark,” offer a grave warning against the allure of pseudoscience and conspiracy theories.

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Live music tackles its carbon crisis

Culture, Environment / /

Live music fosters connections between the musicians and their listeners in a powerful way, allowing the artist to spread their influence through a fun and memorable experience. However, recent concerts and music festivals have been criticized for their harmful carbon footprint and overall contribution to the climate crisis. Climate change has catastrophic global health impacts

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Time to make slouching stylish: A retrospective analysis of postural myths

Culture, Health, World / /

Picture this: you are about to enter your freshman year of college. Before you are enrolled, you must strip down to nothing so a faculty member can snap a nude photo of you to check your “posture.” Would you still want to enroll?  College posture tests were commonplace in the early 20th century, beginning in

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The eclipse effect: How do animals react to strange celestial phenomena?

Biology, Culture / /

The event of a solar eclipse transcends the astronomical meaning, occurring when the Moon completely blocks the Sun from Earth’s view and darkens skies across a region. Solar eclipses have been referenced throughout history as a time of change and intention-setting for spiritualists or as the source of several cultural folk stories. The impacts of

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Quantifying common sense: New research suggests it’s not so common

Culture, Psychology, World / /

Common sense, or the practical knowledge shared by the majority of the population regarding everyday matters, is ambiguous: It is difficult to know exactly why something is common sense even though it is intuitively clear. Many often assume that something clear to one person is also clear to another, but this may not be the

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