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Saturn’s rings are iconic, but new evidence suggests Earth might once have sported one of its own. This ring would have caused chaos on the surface. · We know Earth has gone through a lot of different phases in its lifetime. Early on it was covered in magma oceans, and much later it was a giant snowball for a while. Landmasses have broken up, drifted apart and come back together over hundreds of millions of years. But a period where it sported…

The alleged voyage of King James I in a submarine under the River Thames remains one of the most intriguing mysteries of 17th-century England… · Was King James I and VI of Scotland the first monarch to voyage underwater in a submarine? · It seems unlikely, if not ridiculous, but according to an account in John Wilkins’ 1648 work, ‘Mathematicall Magick’, this may indeed have been the case! · The Origins of the Account: · John Wilkins was a…

Fifty years of six o’clock closing of pubs had ended two days earlier, after a referendum convinced the government to change the antiquated licensing law. · Introduced as a ‘temporary’ wartime efficiency measure in December 1917, 6 p.m. closing was made permanent the following year. · The ‘six o’clock swill’ became part of the New Zealand way of life. In the short period between the end of the working day and closing time, men crowded together…

With millions if not billions of dollars at stake, it’s easy to understand why AI employees hesitate to speak up—at least according to a recent Wall Street Journal article. · Their concerns relate to fears about AI’s threats to humanity and fear of retaliation. Or to introduce a metaphor, what might occur in the Twenty-Fifth Hour. · These are people with the most knowledge as to how AI systems work and believe that the technology could grow out…

Adding 10 per cent to the cost of most goods and services, GST was a key part of the economic reforms of the fourth Labour government – dubbed ‘Rogernomics’ after Minister of Finance Roger Douglas. · Douglas implemented his ‘new right’ reforms after Labour won a landslide victory in the snap election of July 1984. The new government inherited an alarmingly high budget deficit and overseas debt, an over-valued dollar, and rocketing inflation.…

Dairy farmer Stanley Graham killed seven people in Kōwhitirangi on the South Island’s West Coast. One of New Zealand’s largest manhunts ended when Graham was shot on the evening of 20 October. He died of his wounds the following day. · The tragedy began when Graham refused to hand over his rifle to police to assist the war effort. He felt aggrieved that police were ‘persecuting’ him rather than investigating his neighbours, who he believed…

The RW-5 Voxan recently took to the salt flats at Bonneville for flying mile tests, shattering four separate speed records for an electric bike. It was developed via a collaboration between Ohio State University and the Venturi Group. · Venturi is the name behind MVS Venturi, the Atlantique sports car, LM race cars, and even the FLEX rover designed for SpaceX's mission to the Moon. The company owns French bikemaker Voxan, and it is that firm's…

Felix Graf von Luckner earned the epithet Der Seeteufel (the Sea Devil) for his exploits as captain of the German raider SMS Seeadler in 1916–17. · The Seeadler, a converted merchant ship, sank 14 Allied ships in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans between January and July 1917. Von Luckner prided himself on the effectiveness and bloodless nature of his operations; only one person died during his raids. · In August 1917 the Seeadler ran aground on…

It's a major problem. · Declining trust in our society's key institutions undermines their credibility. Kiwis are clearly calling for a return to first principles, and the reality is, protecting free speech is essential if we are to keep public confidence in our key institutions. · When approximately only one in three Kiwis trusts politicians or journalists, you would think this ought to be a wake-up call for our key institutions. · Three…

The sensational case of the Maungatapu murders came to a grisly end when three members of the ‘Burgess gang’ were hanged shortly before 8.30 a.m. at Nelson gaol. Joseph Sullivan, the fourth member of the gang, avoided the death penalty by turning Queen’s evidence and testifying against his co-accused. · Career criminal Richard Burgess approached his death with bravado. He bounded up the steps of the scaffold and kissed the noose as ‘the prelude…