Extreme weather impacted almost 62 million people in 2018, according to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), while the fallout from Cyclone Idai in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi continues. At one degree of warming above pre-industrial levels, freak floods, heatwaves, and prolonged cold snaps have devastated lives across the globe, the WMO’s State of the Climate report revealed.

At worst, the discriminatory effects of voter identification laws tend to prove minimal, mainly because their effect on elections overall has proven minimal, despite the intent to push down turnout among groups more likely to vote for one party over the other. These are results that have been repeated in the political science literature: Even though the effect in the short term falls primarily on minorities and the elderly, the overall effect on all but the closest of elections is minimal at best.

If Wagner does prove to be too controversial or if we finally admit that the Ring Cycle is too long and stuffier than a Lord of the Ring marathon, Strauss, Weber, and Beethoven can give us that German opera fix (as well as many other Austria-Germanic composers, such as Mozart, Schoenberg, and Berg, if we choose not to care too much about political borders and the like). If film witticism and quirk ala Woody Allen is what you’re craving, Noah Baumbach, Sofia Coppola, and Wes Anderson will save the day. And there is definitely no shortage of white male actors and poets. 

Women are not only far less likely to whack you over the head for your watch, or juggle the account books in your office, they are also harder-working and more responsible. In interviews with scores of factory managers, corporate presidents, restaurant managers and industrial bosses in places as far afield as Tokyo and Tashkent, Northern Ireland and South Africa, Sydney and Shanghai, I have been told repeatedly that women report on time, stay later and are more quality-conscious than men. 

The Trump administration is now facing multiple legal battles over its new rule in Title X, the federal family planning grant program, that would, among other things, cut funding to clinics that provide or refer patients to abortion services. This week, 20 states’ attorneys general — including California AG Xavier Becerra — separately announced they were suing the administration to block these restrictions.

Aurora ended up getting diagnosed for ADHD and starting seeing a therapist. This changed her perspective dramatically. She started recognizing when her feelings or actions were symptoms of depression or ADHD, helping her to stop negative thought spirals and taking healthier actions to feel better. As a result, she became better at communicating with her boyfriend in ways that didn’t project. “[Getting diagnosed and being in therapy] made it a lot easier to recognize when I didn’t talk. It made it easier to be able to tell my boyfriend, ‘I love you but I’m not feeling that well today,’ in order to have the space to process and overcome those feelings by myself,” said Aurora.  

When there is a need to save money on energy costs, the concept of a green roof such as designs seen across New York City over the last decade (even the Empire State Building has one) has seen a huge rise. Designing a living roof or wall can often be the most innovative and efficient insulators in keeping buildings cool in the summer and warm during winter. In some cases, they can even be structured to cover an existing roof.

In the U.S. alone, women entrepreneurs generate $1.1 million in revenue on average across retail, professional and personal service businesses that have operated for 11 years. This stat comes from Visa’s new ‘State of Female Entrepreneurship’ report, which informed their recently announced program, She’s Next, Empowered by Visa, a global initiative to support and champion women in their efforts to grow their small businesses. This highlights the important role women entrepreneurs play in the prosperity and economic development of local communities. 

Meanwhile in Indonesia, the two presidential candidates – incumbent Joko Widodo (known as Jokowi) and ex-army officer Prabowo Subianto – have given vague promises of environmental protection but few details. That said, Jokowi, who won as an outsider populist in 2014, has done more than some expected to tackle deforestation. As of 2015, Brazil was home to 12 percent of total forest global cover, the DRC nearly 4 percent and Indonesia 2 percent, according to the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization. 

Puzzling has been around since the dawn of time (almost). Greek mathematician Archimedes puzzled around 250 B.C. to solve geometry problems. He cut a square into 14 pieces, and then examined how many different configurations could be made from those 14 pieces. This puzzle was recently solved by Bill Cutler, a mathematician from Cornell University, who showed the puzzle has 536 truly distinct solutions.