PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
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Biodiversity Loss May Drive Climate Change, New Research Shows (Maria)
The author writes, “Tropical forests — and their ability to capture and store carbon — are at the forefront of fighting climate change. New research shows that trees need help from their animal neighbors to fully unlock their carbon-capture superpowers, especially those critters responsible for seed dispersal.”
Trump Orders State Department to Overlook International Human Rights Abuses (Sean)
From The Intercept: “The State Department is gutting its human rights reporting by excising information detailing abuses by foreign governments from the department’s annual reports, The Intercept has learned. Officially called ‘Country Reports on Human Rights Practices,’ the annual documents are required by law to be ‘a full and complete report regarding the status of internationally recognized human rights’ in nearly 200 countries and territories worldwide. … The reports will no longer call out governments for abuses like restrictions on free and fair elections, significant corruption, or serious harassment of domestic or international human rights organizations, according to instructions issued earlier this year to the State Department’s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor.”
As a Heat Wave Roiled Illinois, People Incarcerated Suffered the Most (Laura)
The author writes, “As heat grips Illinois this summer, one group is more vulnerable to extreme heat than any other: Those incarcerated inside the state’s decaying prisons and jails. … In a July 24 letter to Gov. JB Pritzker from Uptown People’s Law Center, the local public interest law firm alleges that people inside multiple IDOC facilities are being kept in dangerous conditions, exacerbated by extreme heat. Some of the concerns that the letter outlines include: lack of access to potable water, lack of access to fans, lack of access to cool spaces, and directives from correctional officers and other staff that discourage people from seeking assistance in the facilities’ health care units.”
They Can’t Get Answers From the Oil Industry. North Dakota’s Oversight Program Hasn’t Helped (Reader Steve)
From ProPublica: “One morning in February 2023, a small group of mineral owners arrived at the North Dakota Capitol on a mission. They had traveled from across the state and other parts of the country to explain to lawmakers how the powerful oil and gas companies had been chipping away at their income. It’s not easy to recruit people to testify during the winter months of the legislative session. Ranchers are busy with the calving season. Snowbirds have relocated to warmer climates. It’s a more than three-hour drive for those living in the Bakken oil field. But those who made it to Bismarck lined up at a podium to share details of their own experiences and the broader concerns affecting the estimated 300,000 people who receive money from the industry in exchange for the right to their underground minerals.”
Popular Sugar Substitute Linked to Brain Cell Damage and Stroke Risk (Mili)
The author writes, “From low-carb ice cream to keto protein bars to ‘sugar-free’ soda, the decades-old sweetener erythritol is everywhere. But new University of Colorado Boulder research shows the popular sugar substitute and specialty food additive comes with serious downsides, impacting brain cells in numerous ways that can boost risk of stroke.”
How Evolutionary Biology Is Reshaping Our Understanding of the New Testament: The Case of the Missing ‘Son of God’ (Dana)
From Arkeonews: “In 1975, inside the ancient walls of St. Catherine’s Monastery — home to the world’s oldest continuously operating library — researchers uncovered a storeroom of long-lost manuscripts in Greek, Syriac, and Arabic. Among them was a remarkable find: an Arabic translation of the Gospels that omitted a key phrase from the very first verse of the Gospel of Mark — ‘the Son of God.’ At first glance, this might appear to be a minor omission. But this variant is part of a much deeper story — one involving over 500,000 known textual variations across New Testament manuscripts. Now, a surprising scientific ally is helping scholars make sense of it all: phylogenetics, a method originally developed to track the evolution of living organisms.”
