Think of wooden furniture, and most of us picture defined shapes, even lines and symmetry. Of course, that isn’t always the case. Historically, wood was left with uneven live edges when furniture was made quickly out of necessity, not as a design choice. While raw edges, twig construction ...
Norway is, by almost any metric, a profoundly successful nation. It’s rich, democratic and relatively corruption-free. It’s not a socialist country, but fans of a robust welfare state and high taxes see much to admire in the very progressive Norwegian model. It also benefits from having the biggest and arguably best-run sovereign wealth fund in the world. And yet, Norway nearly ruined its children. In 2016, flush with cash and progressive values, Norway gave every child in the country, starting at the age of 5, their own iPad or similar digital device. A decade later, young ...
Dear Annie: My brother-in-law is constantly making offensive and over-the-top jokes. Whenever I call him out, he tells me I’m “too sensitive.” To me, that’s the same as saying, “I don’t care about your feelings and I’m going to blame this conflict entirely on you!” I always point this out, but it seems to fall on deaf ears. This is gaslighting of the worst kind. How can I respond in the future to make him take some actual accountability? — Oversensitive Dear Oversensitive: Your brother-in-law’s trick is to shift the spotlight from his joke to your reaction. ...
DEAR DR. ROACH: I want to know what you think about vagus nerve stimulation (VNS), both the surgically implanted type as well as the external noninvasive device for rheumatoid arthritis (RA) and other indications. What kind of doctor does this? Just reading about it gives me hope that less drugs are being used to treat these conditions. — L.L. ANSWER: VNS uses electrical impulses to trigger some of the many actions of the vagus nerve. VNS is approved by the Food and Drug Administration for some types of drug-resistant epilepsy, headache disorders, and drug-resistant depression. For ...
Your memories will try to trick you. I thought about that as I was driving down a street near my house the other day, when I spotted a father walking down the sidewalk, his young daughter slung over his shoulder like a sack of coal he was hauling out of a mine. Her hair bounced along on his back and she looked thrilled. They had been out on a stroll, and she’d asked for a ride: That was the story the image told me. Adorable, I thought, for a second. But wait. What was that look of resignation on the dad’s face? Did I recognize that parental exhaustion myself, that feeling of ...
Around the world, people plan to plant more than 1 trillion trees this decade in an ambitious effort to slow climate change and reduce biodiversity loss. But if the past is prologue, many of those planted trees won’t survive. And if they do, they could end up as biological deserts that lack the richness and resilience of healthy forests. It doesn’t have to be this way. The United Nations declared 2021-2030 the Decade on Ecosystem Restoration to encourage efforts to repair degraded ecosystems. Tree planting has become a centerpiece of that effort, championed by initiatives such ...
