📌 Human Rights, War Escalates, More

The 2024 Global Rights Project (GRIP) report by the University of Rhode Island reveals a global decline in human rights protection.

The report uses data from the CIRIGHTS Data Project, which measures 24 human rights in each country, drawing from sources like the US Department of State and Amnesty International, with 62% of countries receiving failing grades.

Iceland, Estonia, Denmark, Finland, and Monaco are the top-ranking countries for human rights, scoring in the 'A' range. The lowest-ranking countries are Iran, Afghanistan, North Korea, Yemen, and South Sudan, all receiving 'F' grades.

Democratic countries generally show better human rights adherence. The US ranks 66th with a 'D' grade, criticized for issues like police violence, political imprisonment, and poor worker rights.

The report found civil and political rights (freedom of movement, freedom from political imprisonment, freedom from extrajudicial killing) are the most protected rights worldwide, while economic rights (freedom from child labor, the right to unionize, the right to reasonable work hours and safe working conditions, freedom from human trafficking) are the least protected.

A ballistic missile with multiple warheads fired Thursday by Russia on Ukraine departs from the Cold War doctrine of deterrence.

Experts say that ballistic missiles with multiple warheads, known as “multiple independently targeted reentry vehicles,” or MIRVs, have never been used to strike an enemy.

Videos of the strike showed multiple warheads falling at different angles on the target. While the warheads dropped on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro were not nuclear, their use in conventional combat operations is certain to raise more uncertainty in a world already on edge.

The highly destructive capacity of MIRVs means they are potential first-strike weapons and targets, Hans Kristensen and colleague Matt Korda at the Federation of American Scientists wrote in a study. That’s because it’s easier to destroy multiple warheads before they are launched than try to shoot them down.

Russia alerted the US to the missile beforehand. But even with that advanced warning, any further launches by Putin’s regime will inevitably ratchet up fears across Europe, with many asking the question: Has deterrence just died?

Ukraine's parliament has canceled today's session, citing the risk of a Russian missile attack on the district of Kyiv, where government buildings are located.

A Wisconsin man who faked his drowning so he could abandon his wife and three children is communicating with authorities.

“The great news is we know he is alive and well,” Green Lake County Sheriff Mark Podoll said. “The bad news is we don’t know exactly where Ryan Borgwardt [the missing man] is, and he has not yet decided to return home.”

The sheriff later showed a video that Borgwardt had sent the sheriff’s office that day. Borgwardt said he was in his apartment and briefly panned the camera, but it mostly showed just a door and bare walls. He said he was “safe and secure.”

Borgwardt told authorities he traveled about 50 miles from his home in Watertown to Green Lake, where he overturned his kayak, dumped his phone in the lake and then paddled an inflatable boat to shore. He said he picked that lake because it’s the deepest in Wisconsin at 237 feet.

After leaving the lake, the sheriff said he rode an electric bike about 70 miles through the night to Madison. From there, he took a bus to Detroit, then boarded a bus to Canada and got on a plane, the sheriff said.

Whether Borgwardt returns will be up to his “free will,” Podoll said. “He thought his plan was going to pan out, but it didn’t go as planned,” the sheriff said. “And so now we’re trying to give him a different plan to come back.”

Astronomers have captured a "zoomed-in" image of a star outside the Milky Way for the first time. The team used the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) to bring the vast red supergiant star, designated WOH G64, into focus. WOH G64 is located a staggering 160,000 light-years away in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a satellite dwarf galaxy companion of the Milky Way. Astronomers have known about this star's existence for some time. It has earned the nickname the "behemoth star" because it is an incredible 2,000 times the size of the sun. The VLTI could see this distant star in such detail that it also revealed its surrounding cocoon of gas and dust. These outflows of material indicate that WOH G64 is dying, in the final stages of its life leading up to a massive supernova explosion. Astronomers have captured tens of “zoomed-in” images of stars within the Milky Way, but only now has a star been captured beyond it with similar detail. Ohnaka and colleagues studied WOH G64 with the VLTI in the Atacama Desert of Northern Chile in 2005 and 2007.

Scientists worldwide are making headway in compiling a Human Cell Atlas — a deep dive into the myriad types of cells in the body.

Over 3,600 scientists from 100 countries have been working to catalog over 100 million cells obtained from a diverse group of over 10,000 people.

New papers provide insight into "how the placenta and skeleton form, changes during brain maturation, new gut and vascular cell states, lung responses to Covid, and investigating how genetic variation impacts disease.”

Tissue and organ samples obtained from people worldwide, including Asia and Africa, "demonstrate the remarkable power of large-scale international scientific collaboration," said Partha Majumber, the co-chair of the Human Cell Atlas Equity Working Group.

Sarah Teichmann of the Cambridge Stem Cell Institute in Britain was equally optimistic, calling the atlas “a kind of 'Google Maps' for cell biology.” She said it “lays the groundwork for more precise diagnostics, innovative drug discovery, and advanced regenerative medicine approaches."

The cost of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner has fallen for the second year. But shopping for it might not feel cheaper.

A Thanksgiving meal for 10 people will cost $58.08 on average this year, according to a survey of grocery store prices from the American Farm Bureau Federation. That's 5% less than in 2023, the Federation said. But prices for many products, including several grocery essentials, remain higher.

“We are seeing modest improvements in the cost of a Thanksgiving dinner for a second year, but America's families, including farm families, are still being hurt by high inflation,” Zippy Duvall, the federation's president, said in a statement.

Prices for many ingredients fell, including frozen peas, sweet potatoes, and pie crusts. Others, such as fresh cranberries and dinner rolls, were higher than in 2023.

The federation's survey found that the price of turkey fell 6% over last year. “The American turkey flock is the smallest it's been since 1985 because of avian influenza, but overall demand has fallen,” the federation said.

Cryptocurrency entrepreneur Justin Sun spent over $6 million on a banana duct-taped to a wall at an auction in New York City.

The banana is part of an artwork called Comedian, created by the Italian artist and satirist Maurizio Cattelan. “I am honored to be the proud owner of this iconic work and look forward to it sparking further inspiration and impact for art enthusiasts worldwide.”

His $6.2 million purchase awarded him a roll of duct tape, instructions on how to "install" the banana properly and, most importantly, a certificate of authenticity guaranteeing the artwork, when reproduced by Sun, as an original work of Cattelan’s.

“In the coming days, I will personally eat the banana as part of this unique artistic experience, honoring its place in art history and popular culture," Sun said.

“What you buy when you buy Cattelan’s Comedian is not the banana itself, but a certificate of authenticity that grants the owner the permission and authority to reproduce this banana and duct tape on their wall as an original artwork by Maurizio Cattelan,” David Galperin, Sotheby’s head of contemporary art.