What it's like to be in the middle of a conspiracy theory (according to a conspiracy theory expert) Mike Rothschild has spent years studying the rise of QAnon and antivaccine conspiracism. After his house in Altadena, California, burned down, he found himself mired in similarly sticky webs of misinformation. On a gloomy Saturday morning this past May, a few months after entire blocks of Altadena, California, were destroyed by wildfires, several dozen survivors met at a local church to vent their built-up frustration, anger, blame, and anguish. As I sat there listening to one horror story after another, I almost felt sorry for the very polite consultants who were being paid to sit there, and who couldn't do a thing about what they were hearing. Hosted by a third-party arbiter at the behest of Los Angeles County, the gathering was a listening session in which survivors could "share their experiences with emergency alerts and evacuations" for a report on how the response to the Eaton Fire months earlier had succeeded and failed. It didn't take long to see just how much failure there had been. After a small fire started in the bone-dry brush of Pasadena's Eaton Canyon early in the evening of Tuesday, January 7, 2025, the raging Santa Ana winds blew its embers into nearby Altadena, the historically Black and middle-class town just to the north. By Wednesday morning, much of it was burning.

Why do so many people think the Fruit of the Loom logo had a cornucopia? And while some people may laugh and move on, others spend years searching for an explanation. There is a shirt currently listed on eBay for $2,128.79. It was not designed by Versace or Dior, nor spun from the world's finest silk. In fact, a tag proudly declares, "100% cotton made in Myanmar"--but it's a second tag, just below that one, that makes this blue button-down so expensive. "I looked at it and I was like,," says Brooke Hermann, the 30-year-old Kentucky-based reseller who bought the top for $1 at a secondhand sale in 2024. "This doesn't look like any other Fruit of the Loom tag I've ever seen." Quick question: Does the Fruit of the Loom logo feature a cornucopia? Many of us have been wearing the casualwear company's T-shirts and underpants for decades, and yet the question of whether there is a woven brown horn of plenty on the logo is surprisingly contentious. According to a 2022 poll by the research company YouGov, 55% of Americans believe the logo does include a cornucopia, 25% are unsure, and only 21% are confident that it doesn't, even though this last group is correct.

Turns out many believers do respond positively when presented with the right evidence and arguments. It's become a truism that facts alone don't change people's minds. Perhaps nowhere is this more clear than when it comes to conspiracy theories: Many people believe that you can't talk conspiracists out of their beliefs. It turns out that many conspiracy believers respond to evidence and arguments--information that is now easy to deliver in the form of a tailored conversation with an AI chatbot. In research we published in the journal this year, we had over 2,000 conspiracy believers engage in a roughly eight-minute conversation with DebunkBot, a model we built on top of OpenAI's GPT-4 Turbo (the most up-to-date GPT model at that time). Participants began by writing out, in their own words, a conspiracy theory that they believed and the evidence that made the theory compelling to them.

How conspiracy theories infiltrated the doctor's office Every day, physicians and therapists work to keep their patients safe. As anyone who has googled their symptoms and convinced themselves that they've got a brain tumor will attest, the internet makes it very easy to self-(mis)diagnose your health problems. And although social media and other digital forums can be a lifeline for some people looking for a diagnosis or community, when that information is wrong, it can put their well-being and even lives in danger. Unfortunately, this modern impulse to "do your own research" became even more pronounced during the coronavirus pandemic. We asked a number of health-care professionals about how this shifting landscape is changing their profession. They told us that they are being forced to adapt how they treat patients.

Virgin Media O2 is set to become the first mobile operator to offer UK customers automatic connectivity via satellite in places without mobile signal. O2 Satellite will be an optional service due to launch in the first half of 2026. The firm has not yet revealed how much it will cost, but it will be an additional fee to pay each month. O2 has partnered with Elon Musk's satellite business Starlink to offer the service. Enabled smartphones will automatically switch to satellite coverage in parts of the UK where there is no terrestrial signal available - for example in rural areas.

Google sets a new standard with a full IP68 rating for foldable phones. Google sets a new standard with a full IP68 rating for foldable phones. The Guardian's journalism is independent. We will earn a commission if you buy something through an affiliate link. G oogle's third-generation folding phone promises to be more durable than all others as the first with full water and dust resistance while also packing lots of advanced AI and an adaptable set of cameras.

Japan's HTV-X resupply vehicle arrives at the International Space Station where a robot arm operated by astronaut Kimiya Yui awaits early Thursday. Japan's newly developed HTV-X resupply vehicle arrived at the International Space Station in the small hours of Thursday Japan time. Japanese astronaut Kimiya Yui, 55, successfully caught the craft with a robotic arm around 12:58 a.m. and attached it to the ISS. "Thank you for entrusting me with this important task today," Yui said in communication with ground control soon after that. "Congratulations on the capture," fellow Japanese astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, 56, responded from the control room at NASA in the United States.

Sumitomo President Shingo Ueno says the evolution of generative artificial intelligence is transforming business operations across various fields. Trading house Sumitomo has announced its plan to make Tokyo-based major information technology service provider SCSK a wholly owned subsidiary through a takeover bid valued at some ¥882 billion ($5.77 billion). Sumitomo already holds a 50.6% equity stake in SCSK. The purchase price is set at ¥5,700 per share, according to the announcement on Wednesday, about 30% higher than SCSK's closing price of ¥4,334 on the same day. By fully acquiring SCSK, Sumitomo aims to improve management efficiency and strengthen its artificial intelligence business.

Who is Rob Jetten, tipped to become youngest Dutch prime minister? Rob Jetten's achievement in dragging his socially liberal D66 party from fifth place to the top of Dutch politics in less than two years has been extraordinary. But politically, all the stars were perfectly aligned for the 38-year-old to do so. The result of Wednesday's election is too close to call, with Jetten vying with anti-Islam populist Geert Wilders for the most seats in parliament. No other political leader commanded as much screen time during the campaign as Jetten and his smile and cheerful message resonated with voters, while his rivals sometimes struggled.

Three of the biggest US tech companies reported record profits and record infrastructure spending on Wednesday, fueling speculation about a possible AI market bubble. Three of the biggest US tech giants--Microsoft, Meta, and Google--sent investors a blunt message when they reported quarterly earnings on Wednesday: Their lavish spending on AI infrastructure is only just getting started. Meta said that its capital expenditure would total between $70 billion and $72 billion this year, up from its previous lower forecast of $66 billion to $72 billion. Next year, Meta's chief financial officer Susan Li said that she expected the company's spending would be "notably larger." The social media giant's soaring investment matches its soaring revenue: Meta reported raking in $51.24 billion last quarter, up 26 percent year-over-year.