Ahead of the holiday tourist rush, city health officials in New York City reported nearly 14,000 flu cases in the first week of December.

Rainfall on Hormuz Island briefly transformed the coastline of its famed Red Beach into a striking natural scene this week, as soil flowed into the sea and turned the water shades of deep red. The beach is known for its vivid red sand and cliffs, created by high concentrations of iron oxide Continue…

President Trump trumpeted his term’s success so far in a rapid and aggressive speech Wednesday night that also announced a “warrior dividend” for troops. The $1,776 bonus checks will be funded by tariff revenue, Trump said. The president took credit for the economy, forecasting conditions would only…

On International Migrants Day, hundreds of groups across France are mobilizing to highlight migrants’ contributions and struggles as immigration rules tighten and expulsions rise. Migrant workers remain vital to sectors like restaurants and construction, even as many face years of insecurity, with e…

Use our interactive tool to explore the latest flu numbers in your area

arXiv:2512.14851v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Reliable uncertainty estimation is crucial for machine learning models, especially in safety-critical domains. While exact Bayesian inference offers a principled approach, it is often computationally infeasible for deep neural networks. Monte Carlo dr…

The Bank of England cut interest rates to the lowest in almost three years in a pre-Christmas boost for UK households, and suggested inflation is cooling enough for it to ease policy further in 2026. The Monetary Policy Committee voted 5-4 to lower the benchmark rate by a quarter point to 3.75%, min…

The 70-year-old is accused of attacking Edla Marlborough in Oxfordshire between 2022 and 2024.

Quote from: GewoonLukas_ on Today at 08:49 amQuote🇩🇪 Go German New Space: Exolaunch is set to deploy @DCUBEDspace's Dcubed-1 / Araqys-D1, the satellite aiming to be the first that manufactures in free space, on ...

The FT’s guide on what to look out for on Friday

Hundreds of farmers in tractors protested in Brussels against the EU-Mercosur trade deal, disrupting the EU summit. Some countries pushed for stronger agricultural safeguards, while others backed the deal to boost exports. Brazil’s President Lula warned the EU that the deal must be signed now or ris…

arXiv:2512.15584v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: When should we delegate decisions to AI systems? While the value alignment literature has developed techniques for shaping AI values, less attention has been paid to how to determine, under uncertainty, when imperfect alignment is good enough to justi…

Trump Media & Technology Group’s shares rise 37% after deal with TAE Technologies

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Your day-ahead look for Dec. 18, 2025

Morning Report is The Hill's a.m. newsletter. Subscribe here. In today's issue: ▪ GOP moderates go around Johnson ▪ Trump touts record, $1,776 'Warrior Dividend' ▪ Bongino leaving FBI ▪ New Medicaid work requirements A group of moderate House Republicans added to Speaker Mike Johnson‘s (R-La.) heada…

Thursday, Dec. 18, 2025: Your daily feed for the holiday flyby of interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS by Earth.

Trump Media & Technology Group Corp. and TAE Technologies Inc. agreed to combine in an all-stock transaction valued at more than $6 billion.

Plus, Daisy Ridley leads a swath of new stars joining Ti West's take on 'Christmas Carol'.

'Palestinian doctors are still creating, still resisting, still saving lives - one printed piece at a time.'

Psychiatrist Robert Custer spent his life convincing doctors that compulsive gambling was not an impulse control problem. Today, his research is foundational for diagnosis and treatment.

Five-year framework agreement focuses on cloud-native networks, AI-driven operations and advanced 5G capabilities as the operator aligns infrastructure investment with Vision 2030 goals

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. The 8 worst technology flops of 2025 Welcome to our annual list of the worst, least successful, and simply dumbest technologies of the year. We like to think ther…

A historic pact between Texas HIEs establishes bidirectional admission, discharge and transfer data exchange.

We did the research (and taste-testing) to find the best greens powders worth your money. The Bloom Nutrition Superfood Greens Powder is our tried-and-true pick.

The Czech central bank held borrowing costs at its last policy meeting of the year after the new government’s plans blurred the inflation outlook and investors curbed bets on an interest rate hike next year.

French farmers are protesting the Mercosur trade deal and a livestock disease called lumpy skin disease, which affects cattle with painful nodules and fever. Laura Darnat, a French horse breeder and chicken farmer in Perigueux, spoke to FRANCE 24 about the farmers’ demands. They want cows vaccinated…

Traces of opium found inside an ancient alabaster vase suggest drug use was common in ancient Egypt, not rare or accidental. The discovery raises the possibility that King Tut’s famous jars once held opiates valued enough to be buried with pharaohs—and stolen by tomb raiders.

A team of scientists have created a porous material that keeps windows almost 100 percent transparent while blocking 10 times as much heat as regular glass windows.

Learning Resources is suing the administration, claiming the president’s tariffs are illegal – and millions of dollars are on the line The conveyors whir in the massive warehouse, boxes gliding at fast clip, filling up with toys ready to be shipped out for holiday gifts across the country. They make…

"Things That Matter," a series of planned town halls and debates sponsored by Bank of America, will launch early next year.

arXiv:2512.15319v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Few-shot anomaly detection (FSAD) denotes the identification of anomalies within a target category with a limited number of normal samples. Existing FSAD methods largely rely on pre-trained feature representations to detect anomalies, but the inherent…

Not just any cheese though.

arXiv:2512.14727v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Machine learning (ML) is transforming healthcare, but safe clinical decisions demand reliable uncertainty estimates that standard ML models fail to provide. Conformal prediction (CP) is a popular tool that allows users to turn heuristic uncertainty es…

arXiv:2512.15560v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: The text encoder is a critical component of text-to-image and text-to-video diffusion models, fundamentally determining the semantic fidelity of the generated content. However, its development has been hindered by two major challenges: the lack of an …

After a three-and-a-half-month trial, anaesthetist Frédéric Péchier was sentenced Thursday in Besançon to life in prison for all the charges against him, a verdict he plans to appeal. Péchier is accused of poisoning 30 patients, 12 of whom died, between 2008 and 2017.

CBS will keep making room for a series of new town hall programs, even if the first entry in the format wasn’t the network’s biggest moment. The network said Thursday that it planned to air a series called “Things That Matter,” which would feature town halls and debates involving newsmakers and peop…

Arrests made at protests supporting imprisoned Palestine Action hunger strikers, as Gaza death toll surpasses 70,000.

The token's short-term price action is sluggish, with trading volume spiking during sell-offs. Technical charts show support at $830 and resistance at $845.

Canada prioritizes AI and data sovereignty with robust security, standards and infrastructure.
The post Canada Tempers AI Aspirations with Data Sovereignty appeared first on EE Times.

Stanford researchers have uncovered evidence that deep underwater earthquakes can spur the growth of massive phytoplankton blooms at the ocean surface.

Tight vote disguises a consensus in favour of further monetary easing in 2026

FCA responds to super-complaint from Which? amid concerns over poor customer service

Smith dismissal echoes confusion of opening dayStarc heard through mic calling for Snicko to be ‘sacked’England’s batting coach, Marcus Trescothick, described the use of the decision review system in the third Ashes Test as “not ideal”, at the end of another day of questionable spikes, dubious frame…

Nitish Kumar, a BJP ally, removes the veil of a female doctor during a government event, triggering widespread outrage.

Mockumentary in which Philomena Cunk explores the traditions and trappings of Christmas.

Justice department must release most documents by Friday, and failure to do so would provoke a firestormIn less than 48 hours, Donald Trump’s justice department must release most of the files related to Jeffrey Epstein in its possession. Last month, Congress passed the Epstein Files Transparency Act…

arXiv:2512.15427v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Random matrix theory has played an important role in various areas of pure mathematics, mathematical physics, and machine learning. From a practical perspective of data science, input data are usually normalized prior to processing. Thus, this study i…

Germany will increase federal debt sales by a fifth next year to a record €512 billion ($601 billion) to fund a spending splurge aimed at fixing its crumbling infrastructure and modernizing its armed forces. Ven Ram from Bloomberg MLIV describes it as a "game changer".

Also discussed on the show: …

AMD Ryzen AI Max+ "Strix Halo" is beautifully awesome. Probably my favorite hardware of 2025 whether it's in desktop form with the likes of the Framework Desktop or for very powerful laptops between the Zen 5 CPU cores and very capable Radeon 8060S Graphics within devices like the HP ZBook Ultra G1a…

Jimmy Kimmel has responded to Ted Cruz calling him "unfunny" at a Senate committee hearing.

AI expectations, valuations, interest rates all could weigh on equities next year.

Quarter-point cut widely forecast in City following steep fall in inflation and weak economic dataThe Bank of England has cut interest rates by a quarter point for the fourth time this year, delivering a pre-Christmas boost to the struggling UK economy.After leaving borrowing costs on hold in a spli…

US companies developed Venezuelan oil fields until the country nationalised its oil reserves in the 1970s.

Take your cybersecurity more seriously in 2026 with this 5-year subscription to AdGuard VPN, on sale now for $49.99 (reg. $359.40).

What's new to streaming on Netflix, Prime Video, HBO Max, and more for the week of Dec. 18, 2025?

The biotech sector is turning profitable, reaching an inflection point that generalist investors will notice.

Sulthiame reduced breathing interruptions in sleep apnea patients, pointing toward a viable drug treatment. A European clinical trial has found that the drug sulthiame can reduce breathing pauses and improve sleep quality in people with obstructive sleep apnea, with researchers from the University o…

Mr. Musk has ambitions to remake education, but his latest effort to open an elementary school in Texas appears to have faltered.

arXiv:2510.04943v3 Announce Type: replace-cross
Abstract: We show that it is undecidable to determine whether the commuting operator value of a nonlocal game is strictly greater than 1/2. As a corollary, there is a boolean constraint system (BCS) game for which the value of the Navascu\'es-Pironio-…

arXiv:2510.01899v2 Announce Type: replace
Abstract: Healthcare data now span EHRs, medical imaging, genomics, and wearable sensors, but most diagnostic models still process these modalities in isolation. This limits their ability to capture early, cross-modal disease signatures. This paper introduc…

Brazilian President Lula has warned the EU to sign the long-delayed EU-Mercosur trade deal now or risk losing Brazil’s participation altogether. France and Italy are blocking progress over concerns about protecting their agricultural sectors, while supporters such as Germany and Spain argue the deal…

Britain and the European Union agreed on December 17, 2025 to allow UK students to rejoin the bloc's popular student exchange programme Erasmus+ from 2027, a small but symbolic sign of improved relations after Brexit.

The influential progressive third party announced Thursday that it was putting out a recruitment call for candidates specifically opposed to data centers.

Parliament Question: Major Space Missions of ISRO [Dec 17, translated]QuoteTo further strengthen launch vehicle capabilities to meet the expanded space vision, ...

Iran’s currency depreciated to record lows against the dollar this week as multiple challenges including oil sanctions, regional tensions and spiraling inflation plague the economy.

OpenAI is the latest to make a political hire as big tech spreads its tentacles around the world. So what’s the attraction?George Osborne getting a new job isn’t exactly news. Since leaving frontline politics, the former chancellor has served as the chair of the Northern Powerhouse Partnership, edit…

arXiv:2512.14971v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: The innovative agriculture system is revolutionizing how we farm, making it one of the most critical innovations of our time! Yet it faces significant connectivity challenges, particularly with the sensors that power this technology. An efficient sens…

The West handed China the advantage, and now we will suffer.

President Lula has indicated he will veto legislation but conservative lawmakers likely to overturn his decision Brazil’s congress has approved a bill to reduce the prison term of Jair Bolsonaro, the former president who was sentenced to more than 27 years in prison for masterminding an attempted co…

To kick off Colbert's new series Under the Covers.
St. Vincent Covers David Bowie’s “Young Americans” on Colbert: Watch
Trey Alston

Intel ISPC 1.29 released on Wednesday as the newest feature update to this Implicit SPMD Program Compiler as a C variant able to target Intel hardware from their CPUs to GPUs for SIMD programming...

The Trump administration’s goal of releasing housing giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac from government control will take far longer than many investors realize, and there are underappreciated risks for retail traders who’ve driven a threefold surge in their shares, according to a new Bloomberg Intel…

Venezuela on Wednesday said its crude oil exports were not impacted by US President Donald Trump's announcement of a potentially crippling blockade, insisting it was proceeding with business as usual.

arXiv:1810.12277v3 Announce Type: replace
Abstract: We propose a new arrangement problem on directed graphs, Maximum Directed Linear Arrangement (MaxDLA). This is a directed variant of a similar problem for undirected graphs, in which however one seeks maximum and not minimum; this problem known as…

The parents of 10-year-old Matilda, the youngest of the Bondi shooting victims, recalled the moments leading up the shooting, saying they thought the gunshots were “fireworks” or a “bad joke.” Matilda was one of at least 15 people who were killed after two gunmen opened fire on a Hanukkah event at A…

arXiv:2512.15365v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Traditional search applications within Research Data Management (RDM) ecosystems are crucial in helping users discover and explore the structured metadata from the research datasets. Typically, text search engines require users to submit keyword-based…

North Carolina was among the GOP-led states this year that redrew congressional lines mid-decade in an attempt to benefit Republicans.

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arXiv:2512.15120v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Designing effective reward functions remains a central challenge in reinforcement learning, especially in multi-objective environments. In this work, we propose Multi-Objective Reward Shaping with Exploration (MORSE), a general framework that automati…

A new, EU-only feature called Notification Forwarding allows the iPhone to forward notifications to a third-party watch.

The director of Deepfaking Sam Altman created a “Sam Bot” when he couldn’t get an interview with the OpenAI CEO. Watch an exclusive trailer for the documentary, which comes out in January.

New measures are part of decade-long push to encourage individuals to invest in region’s companies

Companies want workers to embrace AI — but a hardline ultimatum will backfire

Streams of soil turn sand and surrounding water red, creating sharp contrast with blue waters of Persian GulfRainfall on Iran’s Hormuz Island briefly transformed the coastline of its Red Beach into a striking natural scene this week, as red soil flowed into the sea and turned the water shades of dee…

Sainsbury’s, Barclays and University College London have all drawn on themes created by IWD site run by London business with no link to UNNobody owns International Women’s Day, but if you asked the 193 countries, countless businesses and NGOs that mark it each year, they would probably agree it has …

North Korea-linked hackers drove a record year for crypto thefts, favoring rare but massive attacks on centralized services, led by Bybit’s $1.4 billion breach.

arXiv:2512.14740v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Value Driver Trees (VDTs) are conceptual models used to illustrate and analyse the causal relationships between key performance indicators and business outcomes, thereby supporting managerial decision-making and value-based management. Despite their i…

arXiv:2512.15674v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Large language model (LLM) activations are notoriously difficult to understand, with most existing techniques using complex, specialized methods for interpreting them. Recent work has proposed a simpler approach known as LatentQA: training LLMs to dir…

Cantor Fitzgerald Analyst Brett Knoblauch expects the bitcoin miner turned AI infrastructure provider to generate $6.9 billion in income from the 15-year lease.

Nearly a third of businesses were lossmaking last year as rising costs and volatile weather hit household income

Ollie Pope's old frailties returned in Adelaide and his wretched dismissal leaves him with one innings to save his England place, writes Matthew Henry.

This story was originally published by Vox and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration. There’s a reason dengue infections are also called “breakbone fever.” Along with a mild fever, symptoms of the mosquito-borne illness include bone-deep, aching pain in the joints and behind t…

2025 was the year of tariffs and a global shift in economic power.

arXiv:2512.15621v1 Announce Type: new
Abstract: Autonomous driving requires a persistent understanding of 3D scenes that is robust to temporal disturbances and accounts for potential future actions. We introduce a new concept of 4D Occupancy Spatio-Temporal Persistence (OccSTeP), which aims to addr…

Hundreds of Arabic words are used in the English language today, and there are surprising stories behind them.

As of Dec. 18, the JBL Tune 770NC headphones are still at their lowest-ever price of $79.95 at Amazon, 47% off their list price of $149.95.

The Duffer Brothers appeared on "The Tonight Show" and used Funko dolls to give a clue as to how the show might end.

After a decade of painstaking measurements, scientists have delivered a major plot twist in particle physics: a long-hypothesized “mystery particle” likely doesn’t exist. Using the MicroBooNE experiment at Fermilab, researchers analyzed neutrinos from two powerful beams and found no evidence for a s…

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