| An Island of Wet Wipes Has Formed in the Thames Posted: 03 Jul 2022 05:35 PM PDT 
Ever since the debut of "flushable" wet wipes, they've been causing environmental problems. While they are designed to be flushed, and will not clog up a toilet, these wipes often cause problems downstream, where they absorb grease and oil and form "fatbergs" that clog up sewage systems. And even rivers. A mass of wet wipes has collected on the side of the river Thames in London, forming an island the size of two tennis courts. It's so massive that, according to the Times, it has changed the course of the river.
Many kinds of wet wipes contain plastic material, so even when they finally disintegrate, they can leave microplastics in the environment, affecting both wildlife and the water supply. Members of Parliament have urged residents not to flush wipes down the toilet, and they are considering a ban on wet wipes that contain plastic. Meanwhile, they are urging manufacturers to spell out more clearly how they should be disposed of. You can read more on this story at Business Insider. -via Fark (Image credit: Edwardx) |
| What is Intellectual Humility? Posted: 03 Jul 2022 01:42 PM PDT 
Have you ever stopped to think about how much smarter and how much more you know now than, say, 20 years ago? You might congratulate yourself on learning some stuff, but what about if we turned that question on its head- think about how dumb you are now compared to what you will know 20 years in the future. That's not quite so easy to grasp, possibly because can't grasp what's in our future. Or it just may be our lack of intellectual humility. We all have some difficulty admitting that we may not know everything, or that we might be wrong about something or other. While we may understand the concept of the Dunning-Kruger effect, we don't see it in ourselves. And we all suffer from it at some time, in some ways, although we may never be aware of it.
Intellectual humility is the mindset that tells us we always have more to learn, as long as we are open to the possibility, and are willing to visit the idea that other viewpoints may be valuable. It could be the one trait that allows us to get smarter than we are. -via Digg
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