PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
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Miami’s Sargassum Problem Is Exploding. How Much Is Climate Change To Blame? (Maria)
From the Miami Herald: “Sargassum is washing up on South Florida beaches in mountainous amounts, rotting into a gag-worthy mush. It’s scaring away tourists and costs millions to clean up. In January, satellite images showed some of the largest masses of sargassum ever for that month, according to Chuanmin Hu of University of South Florida. … ‘What is scary to me as a scientist is [that] more historical records are being reached,’ Hu said. So why the increase, and how much of it may be due to climate change?”
The Trump Administration Is Deleting Government Data. From Infant Deaths to Hunger, Here Are Five Ways It’s Hurting Americans (Dana)
From The Guardian: “When we think of what governments do, we think of everything from building highways to waging war. What they also do is capture the world in the form of information. The US government may be the foremost producer of information in the world. For decades, federal agencies have gathered data on everything from climate risk to the rising cost of childcare. It is information funded by taxes, and that belongs to the American people. This data is often how the government decides what to do: what is a problem, what is a policy priority, what should be funded. It tells the story of America. But over the past year, the Trump administration has been altering and removing decades’ worth of datasets as part of a sweeping campaign targeting so-called ‘woke programs,’ ‘racial equity,’ ‘gender ideology,’ and ‘climate extremism.’ This censorship has affected not just datasets, but also a wide swath of federal resources: tools that helped the public access data, ongoing surveys and, perhaps most concerning, the agency staff that made it all possible.”
Israeli Troops Get Prison for Desecration of Virgin Mary Statue in Lebanon (Reader Steve)
The author writes, “Two Israeli soldiers will spend weeks in military prison for desecration of a Christian object after one stuck a cigarette in the mouth of a statue of the Virgin Mary in southern Lebanon and the other photographed it. The photo of the soldier, a cigarette dangling from his own mouth, went viral and sparked widespread outrage. It was the latest act by Israeli forces to be denounced as anti-Christian in southern Lebanon, where Israel launched a ground invasion earlier this year to target the Iranian-backed Hezbollah militant group. Israel’s military said the soldier posing would get 21 days in military prison and the soldier who photographed it would get 14. The military ‘views the incident with great severity and respects freedom of religion and worship, as well as holy sites and religious symbols of all religions and communities,’ spokesperson Lt. Col. Ariella Mazor wrote [on] X.”
Cities Are Rehearsing for Deadly Heat. Will It Help When Disaster Comes? (Laura)
From Grist: “On a sunny Friday afternoon in October 2023, some 70 children filed into a cool, dark tunnel in the south of Paris to help the city rehearse for its increasingly hot future. The tunnel, part of the abandoned Petite Ceinture railway encircling the city, is always 64 degrees Fahrenheit (18 degrees Celsius), making it the perfect safe haven from the potentially lethal heat imagined outside. Once underground, each youngster was asked to simulate the effects of extreme temperatures that might become reality in their lifetimes. Some pretended to have been poisoned by food that spoiled during a power outage. Others faked the effects of carbon monoxide leaking from a faulty generator. Meanwhile, Red Cross workers scrambled to decide who to send to overwhelmed hospitals. Around them, dozens of others — fire fighters, city officials, teachers — did their best to simulate the chaos and cascading impacts a heat wave of unprecedented duration and intensity might force them to confront.”
Trump Posts More Than 50 Times in Nonsensical Late-Night Rant on Truth Social (Reader Jim)
From The Independent: “President Donald Trump posted over 50 times on Truth Social late on Monday, reiterating long-standing grievances and unfounded conspiracy theories against political adversaries. His posts included baseless accusations against Barack Obama, alleging a ‘coup plot’ and saying that he prevented Hillary Clinton’s prosecution after her emails were leaked.”
Scientists Uncover 1,700+ Protein-like Molecules in the ‘Dark Proteome’ (Sean)
The author writes, “Scientists at the Institute for Systems Biology (ISB) have helped uncover a vast, previously hidden layer of human biology, positively identifying more than 1,700 new protein-like molecules in the human genome from more than 7,000 sequences that could reshape our understanding of health and disease. The international study reveals that large portions of the human genome once thought to be biologically inactive are, in fact, producing small, previously undetected molecules. These findings expand the known landscape of the human proteome and introduce a new class of biological entities researchers are calling ‘peptideins.’”
The Secret Door (Bethany)
The author writes, “When we read, we make believe. We aren’t duped or ensorcelled. Deep down we decide. We make ourselves believe. We know the characters in stories aren’t real, but our feelings for them are. We know the things in the stories never happened, but we can’t wait to learn what happens next. It’s make-believe when adults take a photo in front of 221B Baker Street, the London address of Sherlock Holmes, which is marked by a plaque, installed in 1990, between 237 and 241. These people don’t care that Sherlock Holmes is a fake detective or that (and I’ve double-checked my math on this) 221 is not a number between 237 and 241. They’re making believe. So are the people who travel to Dublin on June 16 to follow the path through the city that Leopold Bloom takes in Ulysses. So is the reader who says, about the characters in a favorite series, ‘I feel like these people are my friends,’ or the one who finishes a long novel and keeps saying sadly, ‘I’m just going to miss living in that world.’ So when adults read, we make believe too. It’s just that kids are much better at it.”