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Are Ultra-Processed Foods Really all that Unhealthy? - Scientific American (No paywall)
Processed foods have been blamed for many health problems, but dietary research is tricky and nuanced
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Why Feathers Are One of Evolution’s Cleverest Inventions - Scientific American (No paywall)
Fossil and living birds reveal the dazzling biology of feathers
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People Keep Secrets Because They Overestimate Harsh Judgments - Scientific American (No paywall)
Research suggests that people tend to exaggerate how critically they will be viewed if they reveal negative information about themselves to others
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Social Media Reveals How Freeways Damage Social Ties - Discover Magazine (No paywall)
Data from X (formerly Twitter) shows that freeways still choke social ties more than half a century after they were built
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Can't Afford a House? Buy a Piece of One Instead - WIRED (No paywall)
In a chaotic housing market that has shut many buyers out, fractional home ownership and investing trends are taking off.
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An AI startup made a hyperrealistic deepfake of me that's so good it's scary
Synthesia's new technology is impressive but raises big questions about a world where we increasingly can’t tell what’s real.
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Here's the defense tech at the center of US aid to Israel, Ukraine, and Taiwan - MIT Technology Review (No paywall)
This is what the priorities in the $95 billion spending package tell us about four military technologies and the way they’re reshaping how war is fought.
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The Art of Asking Smarter Questions - Harvard Business Review (No paywall)
With organizations of all sorts facing increased urgency and unpredictability, being able to ask smart questions has become key. But unlike lawyers, doctors, and psychologists, business professionals are not formally trained on what kinds of questions to ask when approaching a problem. They must learn as they go. In their research and consulting, the authors have seen that certain kinds of questions have gained resonance across the business world. In a three-year project they asked executives to brainstorm about the decisions they’ve faced and the kinds of inquiry they’ve pursued. In this article they share what they’ve learned and offer a practical framework for the five types of questions to ask during strategic decision-making: investigative, speculative, productive, interpretive, and subjective. By attending to each, leaders and teams can become more likely to cover all the areas that need to be explored, and they’ll surface information and options they might otherwise have missed.
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The Missing Link Between Strategy and Innovation - Harvard Business Review (No paywall)
In too many companies, an innovation team is allowed to pursue its own agenda and imagine itself to be a separate island from the rest of the company. The results are always disappointing: a lot of creative ideas, but a failure to deliver meaningful growth. The root problem is the disconnect between strategy and innovation. To succeed, corporate innovation needs to be bounded by a clear set of strategic priorities that matter to the business. And it needs to play to the strengths of the firm — whether data, customer relationships, or supply chains — that will enable it to outcompete others attempting the same idea. The author offers five steps to help embed strategy into the innovation process.
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Russia's economy is so driven by the war in Ukraine that it cannot afford to either win or lose, economist says - Business Insider (No paywall)
"A protracted stalemate might be the only solution for Russia to avoid total economic collapse," one economist says.
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Saturday 27th April 2024
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