Category: English

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Bruce Schneier, Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School

In 2023, the science fiction literary magazine Clarkesworld stopped accepting new submissions because so many were generated by artificial intelligence. Near as the editors could tell, many submitters pasted the magazine’s detailed story guidelines into an AI and sent in the results. And they weren’t alone. Other fiction magazines have also reported a high number of AI-generated submissions.

This is only one example of a ubiquitous trend. A legacy system relied on the difficulty of writing and cognition to limit volume. Generative AI overwhelms the system because the humans on the receiving end can’t keep up.

This is happening everywhere. Newspapers are being inundated by AI-generated letters to the editor, as are academic journals. Lawmakers are inundated with AI-generated constituent comments. Courts around the world are flooded with AI-generated filings, particularly by people representing themselves. AI conferences are flooded with AI-generated research papers. Social media is flooded with AI posts. In music, open source software, education, investigative journalism and hiring, it’s the same story.

Like Clarkesworld’s initial response, some of these institutions shut down their submissions processes. Others have met the offensive of AI inputs with some defensive response, often involving a counteracting use of AI. Academic peer reviewers increasingly use AI to evaluate papers that may have been generated by AI. Social media platforms turn to AI moderators. Court systems use AI to triage and process litigation volumes supercharged by AI. Employers turn to AI tools to review candidate applications. Educators use AI not just to grade papers and administer exams, but as a feedback tool for students.

These are all arms races: rapid, adversarial iteration to apply a common technology to opposing purposes. Many of these arms races have clearly deleterious effects. Society suffers if the courts are clogged with frivolous, AI-manufactured cases. There is also harm if the established measures of academic performance – publications and citations – accrue to those researchers most willing to fraudulently submit AI-written letters and papers rather than to those whose ideas have the most impact. The fear is that, in the end, fraudulent behavior enabled by AI will undermine systems and institutions that society relies on.

Upsides of AI

Yet some of these AI arms races have surprising hidden upsides, and the hope is that at least some institutions will be able to change in ways that make them stronger.

Science seems likely to become stronger thanks to AI, yet it faces a problem when the AI makes mistakes. Consider the example of nonsensical, AI-generated phrasing filtering into scientific papers.

A scientist using an AI to assist in writing an academic paper can be a good thing, if used carefully and with disclosure. AI is increasingly a primary tool in scientific research: for reviewing literature, programming and for coding and analyzing data. And for many, it has become a crucial support for expression and scientific communication. Pre-AI, better-funded researchers could hire humans to help them write their academic papers. For many authors whose primary language is not English, hiring this kind of assistance has been an expensive necessity. AI provides it to everyone.

In fiction, fraudulently submitted AI-generated works cause harm, both to the human authors now subject to increased competition and to those readers who may feel defrauded after unknowingly reading the work of a machine. But some outlets may welcome AI-assisted submissions with appropriate disclosure and under particular guidelines, and leverage AI to evaluate them against criteria like originality, fit and quality.

Others may refuse AI-generated work, but this will come at a cost. It’s unlikely that any human editor or technology can sustain an ability to differentiate human from machine writing. Instead, outlets that wish to exclusively publish humans will need to limit submissions to a set of authors they trust to not use AI. If these policies are transparent, readers can pick the format they prefer and read happily from either or both types of outlets.

We also don’t see any problem if a job seeker uses AI to polish their resumes or write better cover letters: The wealthy and privileged have long had access to human assistance for those things. But it crosses the line when AIs are used to lie about identity and experience, or to cheat on job interviews.

Similarly, a democracy requires that its citizens be able to express their opinions to their representatives, or to each other through a medium like the newspaper. The rich and powerful have long been able to hire writers to turn their ideas into persuasive prose, and AIs providing that assistance to more people is a good thing, in our view. Here, AI mistakes and bias can be harmful. Citizens may be using AI for more than just a time-saving shortcut; it may be augmenting their knowledge and capabilities, generating statements about historical, legal or policy factors they can’t reasonably be expected to independently check.

Fraud booster

What we don’t want is for lobbyists to use AIs in astroturf campaigns, writing multiple letters and passing them off as individual opinions. This, too, is an older problem that AIs are making worse.

What differentiates the positive from the negative here is not any inherent aspect of the technology, it’s the power dynamic. The same technology that reduces the effort required for a citizen to share their lived experience with their legislator also enables corporate interests to misrepresent the public at scale. The former is a power-equalizing application of AI that enhances participatory democracy; the latter is a power-concentrating application that threatens it.

In general, we believe writing and cognitive assistance, long available to the rich and powerful, should be available to everyone. The problem comes when AIs make fraud easier. Any response needs to balance embracing that newfound democratization of access with preventing fraud.

There’s no way to turn this technology off. Highly capable AIs are widely available and can run on a laptop. Ethical guidelines and clear professional boundaries can help – for those acting in good faith. But there won’t ever be a way to totally stop academic writers, job seekers or citizens from using these tools, either as legitimate assistance or to commit fraud. This means more comments, more letters, more applications, more submissions.

The problem is that whoever is on the receiving end of this AI-fueled deluge can’t deal with the increased volume. What can help is developing assistive AI tools that benefit institutions and society, while also limiting fraud. And that may mean embracing the use of AI assistance in these adversarial systems, even though the defensive AI will never achieve supremacy.

Balancing harms with benefits

The science fiction community has been wrestling with AI since 2023. Clarkesworld eventually reopened submissions, claiming that it has an adequate way of separating human- and AI-written stories. No one knows how long, or how well, that will continue to work.

The arms race continues. There is no simple way to tell whether the potential benefits of AI will outweigh the harms, now or in the future. But as a society, we can influence the balance of harms it wreaks and opportunities it presents as we muddle our way through the changing technological landscape.

The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. AI-generated text is overwhelming institutions – setting off a no-win ‘arms race’ with AI detectors – https://theconversation.com/ai-generated-text-is-overwhelming-institutions-setting-off-a-no-win-arms-race-with-ai-detectors-274720

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Michael J. Socolow, Professor of Communication and Journalism, University of Maine

On Dec. 26, 1926, 16,000 hockey fans packed Madison Square Garden to witness the birth of a rivalry between the New York Americans and the brand-new New York Rangers. The game would later be remembered for establishing a foundation of popularity for the sport in New York City.

The only American playing for the Rangers that night also happened to be the largest player in the history of the NHL up to that point, defenseman Clarence “Taffy” Abel.

Standing over 6 feet tall and weighing 225 pounds, Abel was a brutal behemoth on the ice. Yet off the ice, he was a quiet, personable man who charmed sportswriters.

Despite being a foundational figure in American hockey – an Olympic silver medalist and a two-time Stanley Cup champion – Abel has been largely erased from the national memory. His story is not just one of athletic prowess, but of a secret identity maintained for survival and a career ended by a league that turned against him. As a scholar of Olympic media history, I recognize Abel’s story as an important but overlooked example of how race and labor issues can influence public memory.

Passing as white: Abel’s secret identity

Taffy Abel, who earned his lifelong nickname from his childhood love of candy, was half-Ojibwe, born in 1900 in Sault Ste. Marie, Michigan. One of Abel’s few surviving relatives, George Jones, a nephew by marriage, recalled that his mother, Charlotte, an Ojibwe woman, encouraged Taffy and his sister to “pass” as white to protect them from the era’s rampant racism and the threat of being sent to an Indian boarding school. Though his heritage remained an open secret in his hometown, Abel maintained his whiteness throughout his hockey career.

His mother died in 1939, and it was only after her death – and years after his retirement – that Abel began to speak openly and proudly of his Indigenous roots. This forced silence is a primary reason his legacy remained obscured; for decades, he was categorized simply as a white American athlete, masking his status as a racial trailblazer.

Pioneer on the ice

Abel’s hockey journey was historic. At the 1924 Chamonix Games – the first official Winter Olympics – he was chosen to carry the U.S. flag during the opening ceremony. He led the American team to a silver medal before being recruited by Conn Smythe for the inaugural New York Rangers roster.

Because of his size, and perhaps also because of his biracial identity, which was likely known to many players in the NHL, Abel was forced to fight often in his rookie year. He led the Rangers with 78 penalty minutes, and soon became famous around the league for his jarring and ferocious checking.

In Abel’s second season playing for the Rangers, the team won the Stanley Cup. He became the first American player to win a medal at the Olympic Games and the Stanley Cup, cementing his legacy as one of the finest hockey players in the world. In 1929, he was traded to the Chicago Black Hawks, where he anchored the defense on a team that won the Stanley Cup in 1934.

Hits the wall

The end of Abel’s career was not dictated by age or injury, but by a stand for labor dignity. After the 1934 championship, he held out for a salary that reflected his value as a star attraction. Black Hawks management responded by insulting him in the press, portraying Abel as an ungrateful prima donna.

Around the league, executives mocked Abel’s weight, telling newspapers that Abel walked out because he wouldn’t respect a team-mandated diet. Abel believed a team would sign him for 1935, but it soon became clear he had become effectively banned from the league due to his advocacy for equitable pay.

He had been a star attraction for the Black Hawks, and despite leading the team to the Stanley Cup in his final game, Abel never played another game in the NHL. At age 34, he returned to Sault Ste. Marie, operated a café and coached youth hockey, quietly fading from the national spotlight.

Complicated reckoning

Only recently has the NHL acknowledged Abel’s Native American heritage. However, his story presents a challenge to the league’s historical narrative. To celebrate Abel as a pioneering person of color requires the NHL to confront its own role in the systemic racism that forced him to hide his identity. Only recently has the league’s longtime, historical ban on nonwhite players – dating from its founding in 1917 – been an open and popular subject of public discussion.

Furthermore, the history is messy. Because Abel passed as white during his playing days, some modern observers find it difficult to reconcile his achievements with those of later pioneers who broke the color barrier more overtly.

Ultimately, Clarence “Taffy” Abel was a resilient path breaker who navigated artificial borders – between the U.S. and Canada, and between white and Indigenous identities. He was a charter member of the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame in 1973, and his memory inspired future Indigenous stars like T.J. Oshie.

Yet his name remains largely unknown because, I believe, his life forces a reckoning with a society that dehumanized him. Even Abel’s U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame biography minimizes his heritage, noting “Thought by some to be the first Native American to play in the NHL.”

Abel fought for fair pay, against racism and through physical pain. He died in 1964, but the issues he grappled with – labor exploitation and racial identity – remain at the forefront of the American story today.

Michael J. Socolow does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Clarence ‘Taffy’ Abel: A pioneering US Olympic hockey star who hid his Indigenous identity to play in the NHL – https://theconversation.com/clarence-taffy-abel-a-pioneering-us-olympic-hockey-star-who-hid-his-indigenous-identity-to-play-in-the-nhl-275144

Source: The Conversation – USA – By Brian O’Neill, Professor of Practice, International Affairs, Georgia Institute of Technology

In separate encounters, federal immigration agents in Minneapolis killed Renée Good and Alex Pretti in January 2026.

Shortly after Pretti’s killing, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said he committed an “act of domestic terrorism.” Noem made the same accusation against Good.

But the label “domestic terrorism” is not a generic synonym for the kind of politically charged violence Noem alleged both had committed. U.S. law describes the term as a specific idea: acts dangerous to human life that appear intended to intimidate civilians, pressure government policy or affect government conduct through extreme means. Intent is the hinge.

From my experience managing counterterrorism analysts at the CIA and the National Counterterrorism Center, I know the terrorism label – domestic or international – is a judgment applied only after intent and context are assessed. It’s not to be used before an investigation has even begun. Terrorism determinations require analytic discipline, not speed.

Evidence before conclusions

In the first news cycle, investigators may know the crude details of what happened: who fired, who died and roughly what happened. They usually do not know motive with enough confidence to declare that coercive intent – the element that separates terrorism from other serious crimes – is present.

The Congressional Research Service, which provides policy analysis to Congress, makes a related point: While the term “domestic terrorism” is defined in statute, it is not itself a standalone federal offense. That’s part of the reason why public use of the term can outpace legal and investigative reality.

This dynamic – the temptation to close on a narrative before the evidence warrants it – seen most recently in the Homeland Security secretary’s assertions, echoes long-standing insights in intelligence scholarship and formal analytic standards.

Intelligence studies make a simple observation: Analysts and institutions face inherent uncertainty because information is often incomplete, ambiguous and subject to deception.

In response, the U.S. intelligence community codified analytic standards in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. The standards emphasize objectivity, independence from political influence, and rigorous articulation of uncertainty. The goal was not to eliminate uncertainty but to bound it with disciplined methods and transparent assumptions.

When narrative outruns evidence

The terrorism label becomes risky when leaders publicly call an incident “domestic terrorism” before they can explain what evidence supports that conclusion. By doing that, they invite two predictable problems.

The first problem is institutional. Once a senior official declares something with categorical certainty, the system can feel pressure – sometimes subtle, sometimes overt – to validate the headline.

In high-profile incidents, the opposite response, institutional caution, is easily seen as evasion – pressure that can drive premature public declarations. Instead of starting with questions – “What do we know?” “What evidence would change our minds?” – investigators, analysts and communicators can find themselves defending a superior’s storyline.

The second problem is public trust. Research has found that the “terrorist” label itself shapes how audiences perceive threat and evaluate responses, apart from the underlying facts. Once the public begins to see the term as a political messaging tool, it may discount future uses of the term – including in cases where the coercive intent truly exists.

Once officials and commentators commit publicly to a version ahead of any assessment of intent and context, confirmation bias – interpreting evidence as confirmation of one’s existing beliefs – and anchoring – heavy reliance on preexisting information – can shape both internal decision-making and public reaction.

The long-term cost of misuse

This is not just a semantic fight among experts. Most people carry a mental file for “terrorism” shaped by mass violence and explicit ideological targeting.

When Americans hear the word “terrorism,” they likely think of 9/11, the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing or high-profile attacks abroad, such as the 2005 London bombings and December 2025 antisemitic attack in Sydney, where intent was clear.

By contrast, the more common U.S. experience of violence – shootings, assaults and chaotic confrontations with law enforcement – is typically treated by investigators, and understood by the public, as homicide or targeted violence until motive is established. That public habit reflects a commonsense sequence: First determine what happened, then decide why, then decide how to categorize it.

U.S. federal agencies have published standard definitions and tracking terminology for domestic terrorism, but senior officials’ public statements can outrun investigative reality.

The Minneapolis cases illustrate how fast the damage can occur: Early reporting and documentary material quickly diverged from official accounts. This fed accusations that the narrative was shaped and conclusions made before investigators had gathered the basic facts.

Even though Trump administration officials later distanced themselves from initial claims of domestic terrorism, corrections rarely travel as far as the original assertion. The label sticks, and the public is left to argue over politics rather than evidence.

None of this minimizes the seriousness of violence against officials or the possibility that an incident may ultimately meet a terrorism definition.

The point is discipline. If authorities have evidence of coercive intent – the element that makes “terrorism” distinct – then they would do well to say so and show what can responsibly be shown. If they do not, they could describe the event in ordinary investigative language and let the facts mature.

A “domestic terrorism” label that comes before the facts does not just risk being wrong in one case. It teaches the public, case by case, to treat the term as propaganda rather than diagnosis. When that happens, the category becomes less useful precisely when the country needs clarity most.

Brian O’Neill does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. A terrorism label that comes before the facts can turn ‘domestic terrorism’ into a useless designation – https://theconversation.com/a-terrorism-label-that-comes-before-the-facts-can-turn-domestic-terrorism-into-a-useless-designation-274790

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Keith Musselman, Assistant Professor in Geography, Mountain Hydrology, and Climate Change, University of Colorado Boulder

When viewers tune in to the 2026 Winter Olympics, they will see pristine, white slopes, groomed tracks and athletes racing over snow-covered landscapes, thanks in part to a storm that blanketed the mountain venues of the Italian Alps with fresh powder just in time.

But at lower elevations, where cross-country and other events are held, athletes and organizers have been contending with rain; thin, sometimes slushy snow; and icy, machine-made surfaces.

“Most of our races are on machine-made snow,” 2026 U.S. Olympic team cross-country skier Rosie Brennan told us ahead of the Games. “TV production is great at making it look like we are in wintry, snowy places, but this year has been particularly bad.”

As scientists who study mountain snow, water resources and the human impact of warming winters, we see winter’s changes through data: rising temperatures, shrinking snowpack, shorter snow seasons.

Olympic athletes experience changing winter conditions personally, in ways the public and scientists rarely do. Lack of snowfall and more frequent rain affect when and where they can train, how they train and how dangerous the terrain can become.

We talked with Brennan and cross-country skiers Ben Ogden and Jack Young as they were preparing for the 2026 Winter Games. Their experiences reflect what many athletes describe: a sport increasingly defined not by the variability of natural winter but by the reliability of industrialized snowmaking.

What the cameras don’t show

Snowmaking technology makes it possible to create halfpipes for freestyle snowboarding and skiing competitions. It also allows for races when natural snow is scarce – the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing relied entirely on machine-made snow for many races.

However, machine-made snow creates a very different surface than natural snow, changing the race.

In clouds, each unique snowflake shape is determined by the temperature and humidity. Once formed, the iconic star shape begins to slowly erode as its crystals become rounded spheres. In this way, natural snow provides a variety of textures and depths: soft powder after a storm, firm or brittle snow in cold weather, and slushy, wet snow during rain or melt events.

Machine-made snow varies less in texture or quality. It begins and ends its life as an ice pellet surrounded by a thin film of liquid water. That makes it slower to change, easier to shape, and, once frozen, it hardens in place.

‘They’re faster, icier and carry more risk’

When artificial snow is being made, the sound is piercing – a high-pitched hiss roars from the pressurized nozzles of snow guns. These guns spew water mixed with compressed air, and it freezes upon contact with the cold air outside, creating small, dense ice particles. The drops sting exposed skin, as one of us, Agnes Macy, knows well as a former competitive skier.

Snow machines then push out artificial snow onto the racecourse. Often, the trails are the only ribbons of snow in sight – a white strip surrounded by brown mud and dead grass.

“Courses built for natural snow feel completely different when covered in man-made snow,” Brennan, 37, said. “They’re faster, icier, and carry more risk than anyone might imagine for cross-country skiing.”

There’s nothing quite like skiing on fresh snow. After a storm brings a blanket of light, fluffy powder, it can almost feel as though you’re floating. The snow is forgiving.

On artificial snow, skiers carry more speed into downhill runs. Downhill racers may relish the speed, but cross-country skis don’t have metal edges like downhill skis do, so step-turning or skidding around fast, icy corners can make an athlete feel out of control. It “requires a different style of skiing, skill sets and strengths than I grew up learning,” Brennan said.

How athletes adapt, with help from science

Athletes must adjust their technique and prepare their skis differently, depending on the snow conditions.

At elite levels, this is science. Snow crystal morphology, temperature, ski base material and structure, ski stiffness, skier technique and environmental conditions all interact to determine an athlete’s speed.

Before cross-country, or Nordic, races, ski technicians compare multiple ski pairs prepared with different base surfaces and waxes. They evaluate how quickly each ski glides and how long it maintains that glide – traits that depend on the friction between the ski and the snow.

Compared to natural snow, machine-made snow generally provides a more durable and longer-lasting surface. In cross-country racing, that allows for more efficient and stronger pushes without skis or poles sinking deep into snow. Additionally, improvements in the machines used to groom snow now provide harder and more homogeneous surfaces that permit faster skiing.

While fast skiing is the goal, ski crashes are also the most common cause of injury in the Winter Olympics. With machine-made snow, ski jump competitors and anyone who falls is also landing on a harder surface, which can increase the risk of injury.

Why winters are changing

Weather can always deal surprises, but long-term climate trends are shifting what can be expected of a typical winter.

In the Alps, air temperature has increased by about 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit (2 degrees Celsius) since the late 1800s, before rising fossil fuel use began increasing the levels of greenhouse gases trapping heat in the atmosphere. Globally, 2025 was the third-warmest year on record, following 2024 and 2023.

For mountain regions, these warmer conditions have consequences. Snow melts earlier and more frequently in midwinter, especially during warm spells that used to be rare.

Midwinter snowmelt events are occurring more often at higher elevations and earlier in the season across many mountain ranges of western North America. At the same time, the snow line – the elevation where precipitation shifts from snow to rain – is moving upslope.

Warming in high mountain environments is also causing the threshold where rain turns to snow to rise by tens of meters per decade in some regions. This means storms that once blanketed entire valleys in snow now may deliver snow only to upper slopes, with rain falling below.

Together, these changes mean that many winter storms produce less snow, over less area, and for shorter durations than they did a generation ago.

Training venues

The changing winter landscape has also transformed how athletes train. Traditional training venues, such as glaciers once used for summer skiing, have become unreliable. In August 2025, the Hintertux Glacier – the only year-round training center operating in Austria – announced its first temporary closure.

“It’s been increasingly hard to make plans for locations to train between races,” Brennan said. “Snow reliability isn’t great in many places. We often rely on going to higher elevations for a better chance of snow.”

Higher-elevation training can help, but it concentrates athletes in fewer places, reduces access for younger skiers due to the remoteness and raises costs for national teams. Some of these glaciers – like Canada’s Haig Glacier or Alaska’s Eagle Glacier – are accessible only by helicopter. When skiers can’t get to snow, dryland training on rollerskis is one of the only options.

Winter athletes see the climate changing

Because winter is their workplace, athletes often notice subtle changes before those changes show up in long-term statistics.

Even athletes in their earlier 20s, like Young, said they have noticed the rapid expansion of snowmaking infrastructure at many racing venues in recent years. Snowmaking requires large amounts of energy and water. It is also a clear sign that organizers see winters becoming less dependable.

Athletes also witness how communities are affected when poor snow conditions mean fewer visitors. “In the Alps, when conditions are bad, it is obvious how much it affects the communities,” Ogden, 25, said. “Their tourism-based livelihoods are so often negatively affected, and their quality of life changes.”

Many winter athletes are speaking publicly about their concerns. Groups such as Protect Our Winters, founded by professional snowboarder Jeremy Jones, work to advance policies that protect outdoor places for future generations.

A wintry look, but an uncertain future

For athletes at the 2026 Olympics, the variability within the Olympic region – snow at higher elevations, rain at lower ones – reflects a broader truth: The stability of winter is diminishing.

Athletes know this better than anyone. They race in it. They train in it. They depend on it.

The Winter Games will go on this year. The snow will look good on television. But at the same time, winter is changing.

Keith Musselman receives funding from the National Science Foundation. He is a member of the Science Alliance for the non-profit Protect Our Winters.

Agnes Macy receives funding from the National Science Foundation.

– ref. What Olympic athletes see that viewers don’t: Machine-made snow makes ski racing faster and riskier – and it’s everywhere – https://theconversation.com/what-olympic-athletes-see-that-viewers-dont-machine-made-snow-makes-ski-racing-faster-and-riskier-and-its-everywhere-274806

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Megan Bryson, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, University of Tennessee

In many religions and cultures, women who are menstruating or who just gave birth are not allowed to enter sacred sites, such as temples, or participate in religious rituals. This is because they are often seen as ritually impure.

Early Christians cited menstruation as the reason for not allowing female deacons or priests. Modern Catholic teachings do not express this attitude directly, but some Catholic feminists argue that views of women’s blood pollution still influence the church’s position against women’s ordination.

According to certain Hindu texts, menstruating women should be cut off from the rest of the household and avoid participating in ritual life. In Hinduism, as well as other religions and cultures, traditional taboos related to menstruation and childbirth are, however, no longer practiced widely.

An extreme attitude toward the ritual pollution of menstruation and childbirth appears in a Chinese Buddhist text called the “Blood Bowl Scripture,” which I have studied in my research on East Asian Buddhism.

This text, written in China by the 13th century, spread to Japan soon after. It describes a complicated chain of events in which a woman gives birth at home, then washes her bloody clothes in a nearby river. People downriver don’t realize that the water has been polluted with the blood of childbirth, and they use the water to make tea that they offer to the gods. As punishment for offending the gods with tainted water, the woman who gave birth is condemned to fall into the “Blood Pond Hell” after she dies.

Rebirth in the hells is one possible form of reincarnation in Buddhism, which teaches that the quality of people’s karma in their present life determines where they are reborn in their next life. The “Blood Pond Hell” is one of many kinds of hells found in traditional Buddhism. According to Buddhist worldviews, people are reborn in the hells when their bad karma severely outweighs their good karma. However, after people serve their time in the hells, they can be reborn in other realms.

Japanese Buddhists expanded on this idea to claim that the pollution of menstrual blood alone led to rebirth in the Blood Pond Hell, which condemns all menstruating women to this kind of suffering.

Most educated Buddhist monks in premodern China rejected the Blood Bowl Scripture because it didn’t come from India. Buddhism originated in India, and Buddhist scriptures are supposed to be the words of the Buddha, so the Blood Bowl Scripture was not included in official scriptural catalogs. But the text and its practices became an important part of popular Chinese Buddhism.

For example, a famous Chinese novel from the 17th century, “The Plum in the Golden Vase,” describes its female characters practicing rituals based on the Blood Bowl Scripture.

Blood Pond Hell beliefs and practices still exist today. However, they are not as common as they used to be – and women have developed new interpretations.

Beliefs in modern China

For most women in human history, giving birth has been a requirement, not a choice. Yet, for women in premodern China and Japan, fulfilling the social obligation to have children simultaneously condemned them to “Blood Pond Hell.”

The “Blood Bowl Scripture” encourages adult children to hire Buddhist monks to perform rituals that will save their mothers from this unpleasant fate.

Though not all Buddhists today believe in the hells, including the “Blood Pond Hell,” some do. Visitors to temples and Buddhist theme parks in Asia may find paintings or three-dimensional dioramas of women in a bloody pond.

People who do not believe in the hells may still perform the rituals to save their mothers from the “Blood Pond Hell” to show love and gratitude. In some parts of China, women preemptively save themselves from the “Blood Pond Hell” by performing their own rituals, usually as part of women’s religious associations.

Emphasizing mothers’ self-sacrifice

In many parts of China, middle-aged and older women form voluntary religious associations. The religious associations get together twice a month and on holidays to recite scriptures, make offerings to the gods and go on pilgrimages to sacred sites.

Most women who participate are already menopausal, with grown children. Pre-menopausal women are allowed to participate if they aren’t menstruating.

In the religious associations of southeast China’s Fujian province, women perform a ritual called “Returning to the Buddha” that aims to purify them of bad karma before they die. In this ritual, women atone for different kinds of bad karma, which includes spilling the polluted water they used to clean up after childbirth.

Women’s religious associations across China also recite scriptures to repay mothers’ kindness. Reciting scriptures is seen as creating good karma, which the women dedicate to their mothers. These scriptures still portray uterine blood as polluting, but they also recognize the sacrifices mothers make in bringing their children into the world.

One such scripture describes how mothers sacrifice for their children first in life, then in death when they fall into the “Blood Pond Hell.” The women who recite these texts both express gratitude for their mothers’ sacrifices and recognize their own sacrifices as mothers.

Reframing the female body

In addition to reinterpreting the “Blood Pond Hell” through the lens of mothers’ sacrifice, women in modern China have developed new interpretations of how female bodies are portrayed in “Blood Pond Hell” beliefs and practices.

Buddhist texts often claim that being reborn as a woman is a karmic punishment, and some texts describe female bodies with disgust. For example, a repentance text for saving women from the “Blood Pond Hell” claims that menstruation is caused by 12-headed worms living in the birth canal that vomit blood and pus once a month.

However, in my research I encountered a sermon about this repentance text by the Taiwanese nun Venerable Shi Changyin. She claims that “worms” really meant “bacteria” or “cells,” but premodern people lacked the biomedical terminology to express this properly.

Changyin’s reinterpretation of worms as cells reflects other ways for women to think about the blood of menstruation and childbirth. The negative views of female bodies expressed in the “Blood Bowl Scripture” are one perspective among many in contemporary Chinese culture.

Buddhist teachings that downplay the importance of gender, traditional Chinese medicine, and biomedicine offer other perspectives on reproduction and female bodies. Many scholars and practitioners of Chinese Buddhism reject “Blood Pond Hell” beliefs as remnants of negative attitudes toward female bodies in early Buddhism.

They see Mahayana Buddhism, the main form practiced in China, as promoting gender equality. In traditional Chinese medicine, blood is an important part of women’s health as a source of vitality rather than impurity. And biomedicine avoids concepts like purity and pollution when treating issues related to menstruation and childbirth.

A narrative of empowerment

The “Blood Bowl Scripture” demonizes the blood of menstruation and childbirth and, by extension, reproductive female bodies in general. Yet many women, past and present, have participated in the scripture’s rituals to save their mothers or themselves from this fate.

It is important not to just dismiss women’s participation as internalized misogyny, but to understand what women get out of these practices.

Women in Chinese Buddhism have taken the initiative in emphasizing maternal self-sacrifice over ritual pollution and in using other frameworks to make sense of menstruation and childbirth.

Megan Bryson does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. How women are reinterpreting the menstrual taboos in Chinese Buddhism – https://theconversation.com/how-women-are-reinterpreting-the-menstrual-taboos-in-chinese-buddhism-272175

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Alessandro Piazza, Assistant Professor of Strategic Management, Rice University

When U.S. Border Patrol agents entered a Target store in Richfield, Minnesota, in early January, detaining two employees, it marked a new chapter in the relationship between corporate America and the federal government.

Across the Twin Cities, federal immigration enforcement operations have turned businesses into sites of confrontation — with agents in store parking lots rounding up day laborers, armed raids on restaurants and work authorization inspections conducted in tactical gear.

Some retailers report revenue drops of 50% to 80% as customers stay home out of fear. Along Lake Street and in East St. Paul, areas within the Twin Cities, an estimated 80% of businesses have closed their doors at some point since the operations began.

Then came the killing of U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti, the latter of which came a day after widespread protests and a one-day business blackout involving over 700 establishments.

The response of corporate America to those killings was instructive — both for what was said and left unsaid. After the Pretti killing, more than 60 CEOs from Minnesota’s largest companies — Target, 3M, UnitedHealth Group, U.S. Bancorp, General Mills, Best Buy and others — signed a public letter organized by the Minnesota Chamber of Commerce. The letter called for “peace,” “focused cooperation” among local, state and federal officials, and a “swift and durable solution” so that families, workers and businesses could return to normal.

What it didn’t do was name Pretti, mention federal immigration enforcement or criticize any specific policy or official. It read less like moral leadership and more like corporate risk management.

As a researcher who studies corporate political engagement, I think the Minnesota CEO letter is a window into a broader shift. For years, companies could take progressive stances with limited risk — activists would punish them if they remained silent on an issue, but conservatives rarely retaliated when they spoke up. That asymmetry has collapsed. Minneapolis shows what corporate activism looks like when the risks cut both ways: hedged language, no names named and calls for calm.

A shifting pattern

In 2022, after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, corporate America was remarkably quiet compared with its vocal stances on LGBTQ+ rights or the war in Ukraine.

The explanation: Companies tend to hedge on issues that are contested and polarizing. In my research with colleagues on companies taking stances on LGBTQ+ rights in the United States, I’ve found that businesses frame their stances narrowly when issues are unsettled — focusing on workplace concerns and internal constituencies like employees rather than broader advocacy. Only after issues are legally or socially settled do some companies shift to clearer activism, adopting the language of social movements: injustice, moral obligation, calls to action.

By that logic, the Minnesota CEOs’ caution makes sense. The Trump administration’s federal immigration enforcement policy is deeply contested. There’s no clear legal or social settlement in sight.

But something else has changed since 2022 — something that goes beyond any particular issue.

For years, corporate activism operated under a favorable asymmetry that allowed them to stake out public positions on controversial topics without much negative consequence.

That is, activists and employees pressured companies to speak out on progressive causes, and silence carried real costs. Meanwhile, conservatives largely subscribed to free-market economist Milton Friedman’s view that the only social responsibility of business is to increase its profits. They generally didn’t demand corporate stances on their issues, and they didn’t organize sustained punishment for progressive corporate speech.

That asymmetry has collapsed

During the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020, corporations rushed to declare their commitments to racial justice, diversity and social responsibility. Many of those same companies have since quietly dismantled diversity, equity and inclusion programs, walked back public commitments and gone silent on issues they once called moral imperatives. It appears that their allegedly deeply held values were contingent on a favorable political environment. When the risks shifted, the values evaporated.

The turning point may have been Disney’s opposition to Florida’s “Don’t Say Gay” law in 2022. The company faced criticism from employees and activists for not doing enough – and then fierce retaliation from Florida’s government, which stripped Disney of self-governing privileges it had held for 55 years.

In other high-profile examples, Delta lost tax breaks in Georgia after ending discounts for National Rifle Association members following the Parkland shooting. And Bud Light lost billions in market value after a single social media promotion that featured Dylan Mulvaney, a transgender influencer.

Conservatives learned to play the game that progressive activists invented. And unlike consumer boycotts, government retaliation carries a different kind of weight.

Minneapolis reveals the new calculus

What makes Minneapolis distinctive is that the federal government isn’t a distant policy actor debating legislation in Washington. It’s a physical presence in companies’ daily operations. When federal agents can show up at your store, detain your employees, raid your parking lot and audit your hiring records, the calculation about whether to criticize federal policy looks very different than when the worst-case scenario is an angry tweet from a politician.

Research finds that politicians are less willing to engage with CEOs who take controversial stances – even in private meetings – regardless of local economic conditions or the politicians’ own views on business. The chilling effect is real. As one observer noted, Minnesota companies communicated through industry associations specifically “to avoid direct exposure to possible retaliation.”

“De-escalation,” then, has become the corporate buzzword of choice because, as one news report in The Wall Street Journal noted, it “sounds humane while remaining politically noncommittal.” It points to a process goal – reduce conflict, restore order – rather than a contested diagnosis of responsibility.

This is the triple bind facing businesses in Minneapolis: pressure from the federal government on one side, pressure from activists and employees on the other, and the economic devastation from enforcement itself — comparable in some areas to the COVID-19 pandemic — crushing them in the middle. It’s a situation that rewards silence and punishes principle, and most companies are making the predictable choice.

And yet the situation within companies is also full of internal tensions, whether they’re companies headquartered in Minnesota or not. At tech company Palantir, which holds contracts with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, employees took to internal Slack channels after Pretti’s death to express that they felt “not proud” to work for a company tied to what they described as “the bad guys.” Similar sentiments could be seen at elsewhere, where rank-and-file employees expressed far more vocal outrage than their bosses.

What comes next

The Minnesota CEO letter is what corporate political engagement looks like when the risks run in every direction: no injustice framing, no attribution of blame, no names named — just calls for stability and cooperation.

As a local Minneapolis writer put it in an op-ed: “Stand up, or sit down … because the Minnesotans who are standing up? We don’t recognize you.”

It’s not cowardice, exactly. It’s what the research predicts when an issue is contested and the costs of speaking cut both ways.

But it does mean Americans shouldn’t expect corporations to lead when government power is directly at stake. The conditions that enabled corporate activism on LGBTQ+ rights — an asymmetry where speaking out was relatively low-risk — don’t exist here.

Until the political landscape shifts, the hedged statement and the cautious coalition letter are the new normal. Corporate activism, it turns out, might always have been more about positioning than principle.

Alessandro Piazza does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Why corporate America is mostly staying quiet as federal immigration agents show up at its doors – https://theconversation.com/why-corporate-america-is-mostly-staying-quiet-as-federal-immigration-agents-show-up-at-its-doors-274746

Source: The Conversation – USA (3) – By Amy J. Sheer, Associate Professor of Medicine, University of Florida

GLP-1 drugs have ushered in a new era in weight loss.

In just a few years, medications such as semaglutide and tirzepatide, known by the brand names Ozempic, Wegovy, Mounjaro and Zepbound, have gone from niche diabetes treatments to household names, reshaping how America thinks about weight loss.

A November 2025 Kaiser Family Foundation poll found that 1 in 8 U.S. adults have tried a GLP-1 medication for weight loss, diabetes or another condition. And we expect that number to rise now that one of these drugs, Wegovy, has become available in pill form, increasing its accessibility for many people.

These drugs’ ability to help patients lose anywhere from 15% to 20% of body weight has made them one of the most powerful nonsurgical obesity treatments ever seen.

GLP-1, short for glucagon-like peptide-1, is a hormone your gut normally makes that helps control blood sugar and appetite after eating. It signals the pancreas to release insulin when blood sugar rises and slows how quickly food leaves the stomach, which helps people feel full sooner.

Modern GLP-1 medications are designed to amplify these effects, leading to better blood sugar control and substantial weight loss for many patients.

But success brings a new question that millions of people are confronting: What happens after the weight comes off? And just as importantly, what should patients do when their progress suddenly stalls, even while still on the medication?

As an obesity medicine physician, I’ve seen firsthand how life-changing GLP-1 drug therapy can be for my patients. But I also remind each of them that no medication – GLP-1s included – replaces the foundational importance of nutrition, physical activity, sleep and mental health. These lifestyle pillars are essential for maintaining muscle and bone health, preventing significant weight regain and supporting long-term cardiovascular and metabolic health.

The key is simple but critical: Every weight-loss or health plan must be tailored to each person.

How the body responds to weight loss

In 2023, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that more than 40% of American adults live with obesity. For most people, the real challenge isn’t losing weight – it’s keeping it off.

Researchers have known this for decades. As early as the mid-20th century, studies of commercial diet programs showed that while short-term weight loss was common, regaining weight long term was the norm.

This is because when people lose weight, the body’s natural inclination is to return to its previous weight – a phenomenon called metabolic adaptation. As a result, the brain releases more of the hunger hormone ghrelin and dials down leptin, one of the hormones that signals fullness and energy sufficiency.

The net effect is simple: After weight loss, people are hungrier, feel less satisfied after eating and burn fewer calories than expected. The body interprets weight loss as a threat to survival and responds by slamming the brakes on metabolism through sophisticated energy-conserving mechanisms. Put plainly, when there’s less body weight to maintain, the body does less work – but it also becomes extra efficient, burning fewer calories than predicted and nudging weight back up.

Add to that an environment filled with ultraprocessed foods, oversized portions, high stress and limited time for movement, and it’s no surprise that so many people’s weight ends up yo-yoing despite their best efforts.

Putting GLP-1 drugs to the test

Clinical trials on GLP-1 medications also follow these well-established patterns. A pivotal 2021 clinical study of more than 1,900 adults, known as the STEP 1 trial, laid the groundwork for the use of these drugs as a treatment for weight loss.

But a follow-up 2021 study, known as STEP 4, showed that within 48 weeks of no longer taking semaglutide, participants regained approximately two-thirds of their prior weight loss, while those who remained on GLP-1 drug therapy continued to lose weight.

This is not because people lack discipline, but rather because their biology fights hard to return to its old set point.

Lower-cost, longer-term maintenance

Although obesity is now widely recognized as a chronic disease, clinical guidance has not kept pace with this new generation of highly effective medications.

For most patients, the most effective long‑term strategy after achieving a target weight is to continue GLP‑1 treatment. Clinicians aim for the lowest dose that still helps regulate appetite and stabilize weight.

Another option patients may pursue is to slowly taper off the drugs over about three to six months and to focus on reinforcing lifestyle choices that support goals for overall health and weight maintenance.

When your weight plateaus on a GLP‑1 drug

Plateaus in weight loss are normal, even on GLP‑1 drug therapy.

In clinical trials, weight loss with GLP-1 medications tends to follow a predictable curve: rapid early losses during drug initiation and dose increases, a gradual slowing and eventual plateau. A plateau, typically defined as little or no weight change for eight to 12 weeks, is not a sign of failure but rather the body adapting to a lower weight.

But before assuming that a GLP-1 medication has stopped working, clinicians will typically consider how the patient is using the drug, such as whether it’s being taken properly, with little to no missed doses, and whether it is being stored properly.

Clinicians will also evaluate a patient for medical conditions that might make weight loss more challenging, such as perimenopause or hypothyroidism, which is underactive thyroid.

They will also take into consideration whether the patient is on other drugs that might be obesogenic, meaning causing weight gain, or if they are using an FDA-approved GLP-1 drug versus a compounded medication, which can have variable quality and unknown efficacy.

Balancing weight loss with bone health

Helpful strategies to prevent weight regain related to diet include building meals around lean protein and noticing where calories might be creeping in, such as snacks, sugary drinks and alcohol.

With GLP-1 drugs, the goal for nutrition has shifted from calorie restriction to calorie quality. Aim for a healthy balance of vegetables, lean proteins and whole grains. And make sure your water intake is sufficient, especially since GLP-1 medications not only reduce hunger but can also reduce feeling thirsty.

When it comes to movement and exercise, people can add resistance training, increase their exercise intensity or both.

With any weight loss, no matter the method, people lose not only fat but also some muscle and bone. In clinical trials of GLP-1 medications, fat loss far outweighs losses of lean mass. However, any loss of lean mass matters because it can affect physical function, fracture risk and how well the body maintains weight and metabolic health over time.

Weight loss reduces the mechanical load on bones, which can lead to lower bone density and, in some people – such as those who are postmenopausal, as well as people over age 65 – an increased risk of fracture. Because bones adapt to the weight they carry, losing weight means less stress on the skeleton, and over time this can lead to small decreases in bone strength. This underscores the importance of resistance exercise for strength training, adequate protein intake during GLP-1 therapy and close monitoring for patients who are at higher risk of fracture.

Next-generation therapies, which include combinations of GLP-1 drugs and other peptides, are being studied for their potential to better preserve muscle and bone compared with GLP-1 drugs alone.

Patients on GLP-1 drugs who are experiencing a plateau may also want to talk with their doctor about considering a dose adjustment, medication switch or adding an additional drug.

If GLP-1 medication doses cannot be increased due to side effects, doctors will consider all options for other medications and for optimizing lifestyle, such as nutrition, exercise and sleep, to support the patient’s goals.

Amy J. Sheer has received consultant (honorarium) funding from PeerView. I am also in discussion with Eli Lilly about being a speaker, but I have not started in this role.

– ref. You’ve reached your weight loss goal on GLP-1 medications – what now? – https://theconversation.com/youve-reached-your-weight-loss-goal-on-glp-1-medications-what-now-270413

Source: The Conversation – USA (2) – By Gidon Jakar, Assistant professor of sport management, University of Florida

Detroit’s population reportedly grew in 2023 for the first time in 60 years, a trend that has continued in recent years. Over the past decade, the city center has experienced substantial private and public investments and development.

I personally witnessed some of the changes in Detroit while I was studying for my Ph.D. at the University of Michigan’s sport management program. I am now an assistant professor at the University of Florida, where I research how sport affects local economies.

One of the changes I witnessed was the construction of Little Caesars Arena and its opening in 2017. The venue cost an estimated US$863 million, including $324 million in public money – a substantial amount, especially considering it was allocated so close to the city’s bankruptcy filing in 2013. The financing deal also included property development agreements, some of which have yet to materialize.

The arena’s primary users and operators are the NBA’s Detroit Pistons and the NHL’s Detroit Red Wings. The Red Wings are owned by the Ilitch family, which founded Little Caesars pizza in Detroit in 1959.

My colleagues Nasim Binesh, Kyriaki Kaplanidou and I recently published research examining how much impact the arena had on the hospitality industry in Detroit.

Sport venues and the promise of financial gains

A persistent debate on the benefits of sport venues to local economies is taking place at the same time public officials continue to commit substantial resources toward them.

In just the past five years, in cities such as Buffalo, Las Vegas and Nashville, local and state officials have partnered with sports teams to build new stadiums, frequently offering the franchises incentives, including tax write-offs, free rent and construction cost-sharing.

Far less often, these attempts to build stadiums fail. That happened recently in Kansas City – where voters rejected a new stadium – and Philadelphia, where the team reversed its decision to build the arena near the city’s Chinatown.

As I note in a study co-authored with Mark Rosentraub, a professor at the University of Michigan, cities are competing with each other for new residents and tax revenue from development and economic activity. Some officials clearly perceive maintaining or obtaining “major league” status as an advantage so important that they are willing to spend tax dollars to assist wealthy franchises.

This may explain why it happens, but it does not necessarily justify it.

Little Caesars Arena and the lodging industry

In our study, we examined the lodging industry, including hotels and short-term rentals, which experienced substantial growth coinciding with Detroit’s economic growth.

Short-term rental data was purchased from AirDNA, and hotel data was obtained from STR. Both of these sites compile and sell data, primarily to investors and owners of short-term rentals and hotels.

Our quantitative analysis examined millions of records from 2015 to 2022. Rentals within the city’s boundaries increased from 462 units in 2015 to 2,582 in 2022. A healthy cluster near the city’s downtown grew substantially over this period.

In 2015, 24,592 nights were booked in short-term rentals. By 2022, that number had increased to 161,952. Over the same period, demand for hotel rooms decreased by 19%.

However, hotel rates increased over the same period from an average of $128.20 in 2015 to $197.05 in 2023, meaning that despite the decreased demand, annual hotel revenues increased from $229.6 million in 2015 to $306.1 million in 2023.

Hotels and short-term rentals in Detroit are subject to the state’s 6% sales tax. Hotels also must pay citywide lodging taxes ranging from 3% to 6%, depending on the number of rooms. Lodging taxes are not currently collected for short-term rentals.

The arena opened, then what?

So, how much did the new arena affect the supply and demand for lodging?

To answer that question, we compared Detroit’s numbers with short-term rental data from Grand Rapids, the second-largest city in the state.

The answer is not that much.

Detroit’s short-term rental growth was not dissimilar to that in Grand Rapids – even though no major league franchises play there and no major stadium had been built there. Demand in Grand Rapids grew 1,210% versus 1,284% in Detroit. The number of units available grew by 702% in Grand Rapids, compared to 674% in Detroit.

Regarding the impact of Little Caesars Arena, our study suggests sport events there do not appear to have a positive impact on the lodging industry.

While sporting events had little impact, the arena also hosts concerts with big-name acts, including Harry Styles, Jay-Z and The Weeknd. Our research shows these concerts significantly increased occupancy rates in short-term rentals – although the effect did not translate to hotels.

But the rentals needed to be very convenient to the venue. Increases on concert nights were more than three times higher in short-term rental units located within a mile of the arena compared to the city as a whole.

Gidon Jakar does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

– ref. Has Little Caesars Arena boosted economic activity in Detroit? We looked at hotel and short-term rental industry data to find out – https://theconversation.com/has-little-caesars-arena-boosted-economic-activity-in-detroit-we-looked-at-hotel-and-short-term-rental-industry-data-to-find-out-272421