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Day and Night to Get Equal Billing Monday As Fall Equinox Arrives (Maria) 

The author writes, “Day and night will get equal time for a brief moment Monday as much of the world heads into fall. The autumnal equinox arrives Monday, marking the start of fall for the Northern Hemisphere and spring in the Southern Hemisphere. On the equator, the sun will be directly overhead at noon. Equinoxes are the only times when both the north and south poles are lit by sunshine at the same time. In the Northern Hemisphere, sunlight will diminish each day until the winter solstice on Dec. 21. Equinoxes have been celebrated worldwide for centuries.”

Pennsylvania NPR Station May Be First in US To Go Dark Following Trump’s Cuts (Reader Steve) 

From The Philadelphia Inquirer: “The school plans to wind down WPSU’s operations and lay off employees by the end of June 2026, though the station could go dark sooner as staffers leave to find employment elsewhere. David Kleppinger, the chair of Penn State’s board of trustees, called the closing ‘an incredibly difficult decision,’ but a necessary one given the perfect storm facing both higher education and public media during the Trump administration. ‘This is not going to be an organized shutdown,’ Hughes said. ‘Decades of content, documentary series, things that have real value to society could end up in a dumpster, for all I know.’”

National Park To Remove Photo of Enslaved Man’s Scars (Dana) 

The author writes, “The removals were in line with President Donald Trump’s March executive order directing the Interior Department to eliminate information that reflects a ‘corrosive ideology’ that disparages historic Americans. National Park Service officials are broadly interpreting that directive to apply to information on racism, sexism, slavery, gay rights or persecution of Indigenous people…The latest orders include removing information at Harpers Ferry National Historic Park in West Virginia, two people familiar with the matter said, where the abolitionist John Brown led a raid seeking to arm slaves for a revolt.”

Saudi Arabia and Pakistan Sign Mutual Defence Pact as Regional Tensions Escalate (Sean) 

From The Guardian: “Saudi Arabia and nuclear-armed Pakistan have signed a formal mutual defence pact in a move that significantly strengthens a decades-long security partnership amid heightened regional tensions. The enhanced defence ties come as Gulf Arab states grow increasingly wary about the reliability of the US as their longstanding security guarantor – concerns heightened by Israel’s attack in Qatar last week.”

AI Has No Idea What It’s Doing, but It’s Threatening Us All (Mili) 

The author writes, “The age of artificial intelligence has transformed our interactions, but threatens human dignity on a worldwide scale, according to a study led by Charles Darwin University (CDU). Study lead author Dr Maria Randazzo, an academic from CDU’s School of Law, found the technology was reshaping Western legal and ethical landscapes at unprecedented speed but was undermining democratic values and deepening systemic biases.”

Scientists Discover Creature That Exists Between Life and Not-Life (Sean) 

From Popular Mechanics: “Viruses typically aren’t considered ‘alive,’ as many core biological functions are outsourced to their hosts. But a newly discovered organism appears to straddle the line between virus and cell. Like a virus, this new organism ‘Sukunaarchaeum mirabile’ outsources some functions to its host, but can still create its own ribosomes and RNA. Its genome is also surprisingly small, and is roughly half the size (238,000 base pairs) of the next-smallest archaeal genome.”