Plus, which beloved animal crossed the rainbow bridge, and what bit of papal paraphernalia did Chicago baseball fans get this week?
Details on how ICE cooperation agreements work in practice have been hard to come by. NPR took a close look at how sheriff's deputies in Walton County, Fla., approach immigration-related arrests.
(Image credit: Nicky Quamina-Woo for NPR)
A coalition of landowners, outdoor enthusiasts and business owners that say any work in Big Bend National Park would forever change the place often called "Texas' gift to the nation."
(Image credit: Carlos Morales)
Lawmakers and families raise concerns about conditions aboard USS Lincoln, as the U.S.-Iran war drags on, Iranians seek a break from the conflict, Russian-held Crimea faces Ukrainian drone campaign.
Workers at a Louisiana community center talk about how helping children has enriched their lives.
The Google Pixel 11 range is here with preorders officially underway in Australia, and we’ve covered all the best offers from both retailers and telcos across the country.
While there are plenty of great options out there, for our money, the best preorder deal comes from Vodafone. The telco is quite literally giving away a Sony PlayStation 5 Slim console and an extra DualSense controller for free when you preorder the Google Pixel 11 Pro XL until August 19.
Given that the PS5 Slim has seen multiple price increases since launching in 2020 and discounts are getting harder to come by, this deal is hard to pass up for any gamer looking to upgrade their phone and console at the same time, all from as low as AU$103.30p/m for a 36-month contract.
Google Pixel 11 Pro XL (256GB) | Vodafone Small Plan | 65GB | 24 months | AU$132.45p/m
This offer is available whether you sign up for a 12-, 24- or 36-month plan with the Google Pixel 11 Pro XL. Vodafone is offering the 256GB in only three colours — Canyon, Olive and Obsidian — and the 512GB model is only available in Obsidian. The Small Plan includes 65GB of mobile data, unlimited national calls and texts, unlimited international texts and 5GB of daily roaming for an extra AU$5 per day.View Deal
The Google Pixel 11 Pro XL brings some notable upgrades from its predecessor, headlined by the new Tensor G6 chipset, a brighter display with 3,600 nits peak brightness (up from 3,300 nits) and a new LED notification light in the camera flash module called HiLight.
The cameras also get upgrades, with the main shooter having a new sensor designed to improve low-light performance, as well as boosting the zoom capabilities up to 120x, up from 100x in the Pixel 10 Pro XL.
It’s not all good news, unfortunately, as the base 256GB model only gets 12GB of RAM instead of 16GB in last year’s model (despite the price increase from AU$1,999 to AU$2,099), but it was to be expected given the current climate of component shortages.
Fortunately, this bundle with a PS5 thrown in for free could go some way to softening the blow, and is a deal that you can’t miss if you’re in the market for a new Pixel phone and a new gaming console. The convenience of a monthly payment instead of shelling out AU$3,108 for both devices and a spare DualSense controller makes it an even more compelling buy.
Be quick, as Vodafone is only running this promotion until Wednesday, August 19.
The Pacific-based aircraft carrier USS George Washington has begun heading toward the Middle East as reports have emerged of mental health and supply issues aboard the long-deployed USS Abraham Lincoln.
(Image credit: Victor R. Caivano)
The decision from U.S. District Judge Richard G. Stearns said that President Donald Trump's administration failed to prove an ongoing violation of federal civil rights laws.
(Image credit: Steven Senne)
AeroPress coffee makers are going cheap right now, in a whole rainbow of colours, and you'll find the complete set right here. Almost every colour is 20% off at Rave Coffee right now, except for the rare green model, which is out of stock at most retailers but available with a slightly more modest 16% price cut at Coffee Omega.
These colourful coffee makers are super lightweight, and even more versatile than you might have realised. Did you know that you can use them to make cold brew coffee in just two minutes, for example? No need to spend 24 hours waiting for your drink to brew, and then make a mess straining it through a cheesecloth. Just follow the instructions from AeroPress's official site — and don't forget to stir.
Want to get even more creative? How about using your AeroPress to make an Irish coffee, a carrot cake latte, or a matcha coffee fusion? Once you've picked up your new coffee maker, the sky's the limit.
Colorful AeroPress deals AEROPRESS Coloured AeroPress Coffee Maker — Blue AEROPRESS Coloured AeroPress Coffee Maker — Red AEROPRESS Clear AeroPress Coffee Maker AEROPRESS Coloured AeroPress Coffee Maker — Pink AEROPRESS Coloured AeroPress Coffee Maker — Purple AEROPRESS Coloured AeroPress Coffee Maker — GreenThe dismissal marks the latest setback in swing states' efforts to prosecute fake electors who tried to keep Trump in the White House after he lost to Joe Biden in 2020.
(Image credit: John Locher)
Betting on what people say is becoming an increasingly popular category of prediction market sites. Now, federal officials have opened a probe examining whether those markets are a magnet for manipulators.
(Image credit: Erin Hooley/AP Photo/Erin Hooley)
Mild spoilers for Stuart Fails to Save the Universe episode 4 ahead.
Four episodes into Stuart Fails to Save the Universe on HBO Max and we've seen four surprise Big Bang Theory characters return: Raj (Kunal Nayyar), Penny (Kaley Cuoco), Bernadette (Melissa Rauch) and Amy (Mayim Bialik).
With one new face per episode, you might be wondering whether the remaining six episodes in the series will continue the trend.
Most notably, Sheldon (Jim Parsons) and Leonard (Jonny Galecki) have yet to make an appearance — and considering they built the machine that Stuart (Kevin Sussman) broke that got him into this mess, it feels fitting that they should reappear. Howard (Simon Helberg) has also yet to reappear.
However, a return isn't necessarily guaranteed, especially if the creators want Stuart Fails to Save the Universe to be picked up for a second season (which they definitely do). Why give us what we want now if they can drag it out?
But after speaking to Chuck Lorre, Bill Prady and Zak Penn, it turns out the reason for the season 1 cameos is actually boringly straightforward: it all came down to who was available to film.
'It was what was necessary for the storytelling'(Image credit: HBO Max)"It was availability and what was necessary for the storytelling" Lorre responds when I ask him about this season's cameos. "It was wonderful to have Melissa play a demonic character, for example. That just made sense."
Penn adds "Who we had something good to write for," with Prady agreeing "I also loved finding out that Amy is married to Golden Age Flash. That made me very happy."
Perhaps we should be focusing on these Easter egg details, rather than what cameos may or may not appear. Why was Golden Age Flash such a good choice? Because he's Sheldon's favorite DC superhero, and the reason why, nearly every time we see him, he's sporting the iconic T-shirt with the Flash logo.
I don't want to brag, but I called this the moment that a Stuart Fails to Save the Universe DC crossover was revealed. But as for continued cameos, I'm not as confident.
It's probably more likely that we'd see every variant of Flash known to man before Sheldon shows up, because TBBT feels like something that's resolutely a part of Parsons' past.
However, adult Sheldon did show up for the Young Sheldon season 7 finale, so anything is possible. But if we're going there, I need George Cooper to be resurrected more than I need to see adult Sheldon again.
In fact, now that we've had Christine Baranski appear as herself, let's get Laurie Metcalf (who played Mary Cooper) back on the scene instead. HBO Max... call me.
Human personality has traditionally been measured by asking people questions and comparing their answers across established psychological frameworks.
A new study published on iScience suggests GPT-4 can go further by estimating how people collectively respond to personality questions before answering begins.
Researchers Rotem Monsa, Aviv Zohar, and Shahar Arzy of the Hebrew University and Hadassah Medical School tested whether the model could infer patterns in human responses from language alone, rather than merely generating plausible questionnaire wording.
GPT-4 predicted responses before humans answeredThe team used GPT-4 to create personality questionnaires from two very different textual sources.
One questionnaire drew on the DSM-5, the standard clinical manual used worldwide by psychiatrists to diagnose personality disorders with precision.
The other version pulled statements from an astrology textbook that assigns particular personality traits to each of the twelve zodiac signs.
"We wanted to choose texts that describe human personality in very rich detail but also sit on opposite ends of a spectrum in terms of scientific grounding," said Rotem Monsa, lead author of the study.
“The DSM-5 was refined through decades of clinical research and is the standard diagnostic manual in clinical psychiatry, known worldwide.”
Both questionnaires were then given to 600 participants alongside the Big Five Inventory, the most validated personality measurement tool available.
Before collecting those responses, GPT-4 estimated average scores for individual questions using a five-point Likert response scale.
This gave the researchers a way to compare predictions against subsequently collected evidence.
The model's estimates correlated strongly with actual participant averages, reaching 0.71 for DSM-derived questions and 0.85 for astrology-derived questions.
This decent internal consistency for DSM-5-based questionnaires suggests that traits that typically appear together in real life also correlated in responses.
The astrology questionnaire, by comparison, showed a noticeably weaker internal consistency across most of the personality traits it measured overall.
GPT-4 also estimated relationships between individual questions, producing correlations of 0.74 and 0.69 for DSM and astrology questionnaires, respectively.
The researchers therefore argue that GPT-4 appears capable of capturing population-level response tendencies embedded within language and questionnaire content.
However, they specifically caution that predicting average responses does not establish that the resulting questionnaire accurately measures individual personality differences.
(Image credit: iScience)Testing the limits with an oven manualThe researchers also tested whether GPT-4 would generate personality-style questions when given material containing no explicit personality information.
They supplied the model with a Bosch oven manual and a literary description of a landscape from The Lord of the Rings.
GPT-4 still produced questionnaire items resembling personality assessments, even though neither source was designed around psychological traits.
That result suggests the model has learned strong associations between language patterns, personality descriptions, and familiar questionnaire structures.
Yet the researchers found that unrelated source material could produce items that were semantically weak, narrow, or poorly connected.
This distinction matters because a convincing question does not necessarily measure the psychological characteristic that researchers intended to examine.
The study also found important differences between the questionnaires when researchers examined their underlying statistical structures.
The Big Five questionnaire most closely matched its expected organization, while the DSM and astrology questionnaires showed weaker confirmatory factor-model fits.
Astrology-derived items also failed to preserve their intended elemental structure, instead forming broader patterns resembling established personality dimensions.
The results nonetheless showed comparable predictive performance across many life outcomes, although astrology-based measures performed worse for mental-health outcomes.
For now, the evidence supports a narrower claim: GPT-4 can anticipate aggregate human response patterns from textual information with measurable accuracy.
“Given that personality traits are reflected in language, LLMs may have learned the structure of human personality as a natural byproduct of their training,” Monsa added.
“So, while they were not taught specifically psychology or personality theories, these are already embedded in the language that LLMs learn from.”
A new Quordle puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Thursday's puzzle instead then click here: Quordle hints and answers for Thursday, August 13 (game #1662).
Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,500 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today — or scroll down further for the answers.
Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.
Quordle today (game #1663) — hint #1 — VowelsHow many different vowels are in Quordle today?• The number of different vowels in Quordle today is 4*.
* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).
Quordle today (game #1663) — hint #2 — repeated lettersDo any of today's Quordle answers contain repeated letters?• The number of Quordle answers containing a repeated letter today is 2.
Quordle today (game #1663) — hint #3 — uncommon lettersDo the letters Q, Z, X or J appear in Quordle today?• Yes. One of Q, Z, X or J appears among today's Quordle answers.
Quordle today (game #1663) — hint #4 — starting letters (1)Do any of today's Quordle puzzles start with the same letter?• The number of today's Quordle answers starting with the same letter is 2.
If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:
Quordle today (game #1663) — hint #5 — starting letters (2)What letters do today's Quordle answers start with?• S
• M
• S
• G
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.
Quordle today (game #1663) — the answers(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)The answers to today's Quordle, game #1663, are…
I really messed up today’s game and lost my win streak in the process.
Instead of playing tactically and getting MYRRH sooner (I spotted too late that without vowels there was only one possibility) I persisted in trying to get a word with too many options and ran out of guesses.
Daily Sequence today (game #1663) — the answers(Image credit: Merriam-Webster)The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1663, are…
A new NYT Connections puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Thursday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Connections hints and answers for Thursday, August 13 (game #1159).
Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.
What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc's Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.
NYT Connections today (game #1160) - today's words(Image credit: New York Times)Today's NYT Connections words are…
What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?
Need more clues?
We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…
NYT Connections today (game #1160) - hint #2 - group answersWhat are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Connections today (game #1160) - the answers(Image credit: New York Times)The answers to today's Connections, game #1160, are…
This is the first game of Connections I’ve lost since March 2025 and apart from BLACK-AND-YELLOW I had no idea what any of the groups were about.
Things got off to a bad start when I guessed SILO instead of CHARLIE BROWN, but after I corrected that I was utterly in the dark; I had a couple of pairs in INDIA INK and DIP PEN, and HIVEMIND and BUBBLE, but beyond that i was clueless.
What is extra annoying is that I cannot blame my loss on cultural differences and being based in the UK — especially as the relatively obscure BASS ALE is a British brand.
Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Thursday, August 13, 2026, game #1159)NYT Connections is one of several increasingly popular word games made by the New York Times. It challenges you to find groups of four items that share something in common, and each group has a different difficulty level: green is easy, yellow a little harder, blue often quite tough and purple usually very difficult.
On the plus side, you don't technically need to solve the final one, as you'll be able to answer that one by a process of elimination. What's more, you can make up to four mistakes, which gives you a little bit of breathing room.
It's a little more involved than something like Wordle, however, and there are plenty of opportunities for the game to trip you up with tricks. For instance, watch out for homophones and other word games that could disguise the answers.
It's playable for free via the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
A new NYT Strands puzzle appears at midnight each day for your time zone – which means that some people are always playing 'today's game' while others are playing 'yesterday's'. If you're looking for Thursday's puzzle instead then click here: NYT Strands hints and answers for Thursday, August 13 (game #893).
Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.
Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.
SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.
NYT Strands today (game #894) - hint #1 - today's themeWhat is the theme of today's NYT Strands?• Today's NYT Strands theme is… Discovered by accident
NYT Strands today (game #894) - hint #2 - clue wordsPlay any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.
• Spangram has 10 letters
NYT Strands today (game #894) - hint #4 - spangram positionWhat are two sides of the board that today's spangram touches?• First side: top, 3rd column
• Last side: bottom, 4th column
Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.
NYT Strands today (game #894) - the answers(Image credit: New York Times)The answers to today's Strands, game #894, are…
There were so many Vs in today’s game that I convinced myself that the word “vinyl” was in the grid somewhere and that the theme was all about crate digging and finding some secret album.
I could not have been more wrong. Something I only learned after two hints gave me SLINKY and VELCRO and I realized I had wasted five minutes daydreaming about record shops.
It was not until I got the spangram — and eliminated the last of the Vs — that I finally realized what the search was about and how one of the greatest medical discoveries of history was connected to a spring that goes downstairs.
Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Thursday, August 13, game #893)Strands is the NYT's not-so-new-any-more word game, following Wordle and Connections. It's now a fully fledged member of the NYT's games stable that has been running for a year and which can be played on the NYT Games site on desktop or mobile.
I've got a full guide to how to play NYT Strands, complete with tips for solving it, so check that out if you're struggling to beat it each day.
Mountainous terrain and densely packed city blocks across Japan can obstruct ordinary satellite positioning signals from reaching receivers on the ground.
Standard Global Positioning System coverage was never built with those obstacles in mind, leaving gaps in accuracy across parts of the country.
Japan has spent more than a decade building its own answer to that gap, and this week that effort reached a new milestone.
Why Japan built its own systemJapanese authorities developed the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System, a constellation designed to guarantee near-constant coverage and sharper location accuracy across the archipelago.
Japan's Cabinet Office states that the system complements GPS by ensuring a navigation satellite remains almost always somewhere above the country.
Japan's islands span latitudes between 20° and 45° North, a spread too wide for one geostationary satellite to cover alone.
The QZSS satellites therefore fly an inclined geostationary orbit that traces a figure-eight pattern when viewed from the ground.
The newest satellite in that constellation, known as Michibiki No. 7 or QZS-7, reached its intended orbit early Tuesday local time aboard an H3 rocket.
This orbit causes satellites to move more slowly while above the Northern Hemisphere, spending roughly 13 hours near the equator each cycle.
The first configuration used four satellites, and one of them appeared over Japan every eight hours during that early arrangement.
One satellite remained at an elevation of 70° or higher at all times, though not always at the exact zenith overhead.
That detail about elevation, rather than reaching the true zenith overhead, is actually what gave the constellation its distinctive quasi-zenith name.
A troubled rocket finally deliversThe H3 rocket, which carried the QZS-7, is the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's (JAXA) newest mid-range launcher, and Tuesday's flight was the rocket's ninth mission since its debut.
Two of those nine missions failed the rocket's short operational history so far.
The most recent failure occurred in December 2025, when a glue-related fault destroyed the navigation satellite payload it was carrying.
That lost satellite was QZS-5, an earlier orbiter meant to expand Japan's navigation constellation before its launch attempt failed.
The first experimental QZSS satellite went into space in 2010, followed by four production satellites launched between 2017 and 2021.
Japan's government later decided to expand the constellation further, growing the planned fleet from four satellites to seven satellites total.
QZS-6 launched successfully in February 2025, arriving in orbit months before the failed December attempt to launch QZS-5 occurred.
Officials say three more satellites are planned sometime during the 2030s, though no direct replacement for QZS-5 has yet been confirmed.
Tuesday's success suggests Japan now holds nearly all of the satellite navigation coverage it originally set out to build.
It also offers JAXA a measure of reassurance that the H3 rocket, despite its rocky record, can still serve as a dependable workhorse for future missions.
Via The Register