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On November 30, 2022, OpenAI quietly released what it called a research preview   of a conversational AI system. The instructions were modest; internally, staff were told not to treat it like a product launch. The rest of the world didn’t get the memo. Within weeks, that low-key experiment – ChatGPT - had become the fastest-growing consumer app in history, crossing 100 million users in about two months. But what is ChatGPT? Is it a search engine with better manners? A glorif

If you wanted to explain Roger Federer to someone who has never watched a tennis match, you could start with a single, startling piece of math. Over a 25-year career, Federer played 1,526 singles matches and won 1,251 of them - a towering 82% win rate , one of the best in the history of the sport. He collected 20 Grand Slam singles titles and 103 career titles along the way. And yet, in those same matches, he won only 54% of all the points he played  That tension - dominance

The ginkgo leaf holds two distinct lobes on a single stem. You can think of one lobe as the independent practice  and the other as the corporate practice . They look separate, even pull in slightly different directions, but they’re joined at the same base: the veterinary profession’s oath to relieve suffering, protect animal welfare, and serve the bond between people and their animals. Hold the leaf up to the light and you see those veins radiating out like a river delta. Tha

There is a Ginkgo tree at the end of my street .... In summer it is almost forgettable. Just another green shape among poles and power lines. But in late autumn it does something extraordinary. Overnight, the leaves turn a clear, unwavering yellow, and then, sometimes in a single windy day, they let go. The footpath becomes a carpet of fan-shaped coins, as if someone had spilled a jar of sunlight at the cul-de-sac. Standing there with a rake in my hand, it’s easy to think thi

Leonardo of Pisa, better known as Fibonacci , never saw a sunflower. Yet the sequence of numbers he revealed in 1202, namely 0, 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, describes the hidden architecture of nature itself. Spirals in pine cones, seeds, shells, and galaxies all whisper the same mathematical poetry. Each new term born from the sum of the two before, each life form echoing the balance between order and chaos. Fibonacci and the Logic of Life In plants, Fibonacci numbers are not a

Early morning light reveals them. Silken mandalas suspended between stems, shimmering with dew. Orb webs are among nature’s most exquisite creations, spun by spiders whose patience and precision rival any architect’s. Yet, within these masterpieces lies an even deeper mystery. A decoration, often bright white and geometric, stitched into the web’s center. Scientists call it the stabilimentum , though its true purpose has long been a puzzle. Not for Strength, but for Story The

There are words that feel like memories even when we hear them for the first time. Halcyon Days  is one of those phrases. Soft, nostalgic, and strangely luminous. It evokes warmth, calm seas, and a sense of time suspended. We use it to describe the peaceful chapters of our lives, yet its origin is not in leisure or luxury, but in love, grief, and transformation. The Myth Beneath the Calm In Greek mythology,  Alcyone  was the daughter of Aeolus , the god of the winds, and wife

The 2025 State of the Climate Report  published today (29 October 2025) in BioScience offers the clearest warning yet. The planet’s vital signs are in crisis. Of the 34 indicators that scientists track to measure Earth’s health, from atmospheric carbon and ocean heat to ice loss and biodiversity, 22 have reached record levels . “Earth’s systems are nearing tipping points that could plunge the planet into a ‘hothouse’ regime,” warns William Ripple, co-lead author and professo

Twenty years ago, preparing to give a lecture at a conference meant embarking on a logistical expedition. My suitcase was packed not with clothes but with boxes of Kodachrome slides, each one labeled and numbered. Preparing a single slide could take hours. Photographs had to be scanned or re-photographed. Text had to be shot onto diazotype film. Then came the anxious wait for slide processing, hoping the lab didn’t scratch or miscut a frame. There was no margin for error and

The Australian Club  in Sydney was founded in 1838 as a private gentlemen’s club, located at 165 Macquarie Street in the center of Sydney, overlooking The Royal Botanical Gardens and Sydney Harbour. It is the oldest gentlemen’s club in the southern hemisphere. Early on, the Club  provided a space for Sydney’s elites to meet, dine, stay, and network. Merchants, lawyers, bankers, and those with social standing. 1838–1840:  After being founded in 1838, the Australian Club was f

For centuries, humans have drawn a sharp line between instinct  and consciousness . René Descartes, in the seventeenth century, argued that animals were mere automatons. Biological machines responding mechanically to stimuli. Only humans, he insisted, possessed souls capable of thought and language. That view, deeply embedded in Western philosophy, still echoes in the language of science today. When a dog feels pain, we often speak of responses to stimuli . When a human does,

He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead. Albert Einstein Every so often something stops us in our tracks. A whale rises through the waves. A bird lifts into a cloudless sky. And for that moment, we are weightless. Our breath caught somewhere between disbelief and gratitude. That is awe . And the questions that follow. Why? How? What else might be true? That’s wonder . Together, they are the twin forces

It’s a quiet autumn evening. You’re watching TV when a shadow scuttles across the rug. A large house spider, Tegenaria domestica , on the...

It slips into our sentences almost unnoticed. “She was, like, exhausted.” “And I was, like, what just happened?” We hear it everywhere....

Sydney Harbour has long been defined by two icons. The curve of the Opera House sails and the steel arc of the Harbour Bridge. These are...

When painter Alex Katz  was asked, late in a career most artists would envy, if he still worries about new work failing, he laughed and...

If you’ve heard that dopamine is the brain’s feel-good molecule , you’ve only got the movie trailer, not the full film. Dopamine is less...

Street photography is the making of unstaged photographs of everyday life in public spaces , using observation and timing to reveal a...

In 1787–88 the First Fleet , eleven ships under Captain Arthur Phillip (two naval escorts, six convict transports, and three store...

Long before the Berlin Wall or the US–Mexico border fence, the British built a living barrier across the heart of India. A hedge so vast...