Do you really know?

If you use Tiktok, you may well have seen videos of people walking on a treadmill at a steep incline. Many of them claim to have lost weight and improved their fitness, all thanks to the 12-3-30 workout. If you’re thinking those are some oddly specific numbers, you’re right. The method involves walking on a treadmill that is inclined at 12%, for 30 minutes, at a speed of 3 mph. That's it. No runni...

Nitrous oxide, which is also known as laughing gas, is sold in metal canisters and is one of the most commonly used drugs by teenagers and young people. However, heavy use can lead to a host of problems. Prof Alastair Noyce, a consultant neurologist at Queen Mary University of London, told BBC News: "These are young people we are seeing - teenagers and people in their 20s. What's striking now is t...

On the evening of December 24th, as many households in the UK prepare for festive gatherings with traditional roast turkey and yule log, an intriguing Christmas tradition unfolds in Japan. In the land of the rising sun, people aren't bustling around their kitchens; instead, they're braving the winter cold to queue up for a unique holiday feast at KFC.  Many Japanese then return home with a special...

In the UK, Christmas is synonymous with festive meals, Yule logs, and the classic roast turkey. We adorn our homes with red, gold, and green decorations, and the Christmas tree takes center stage – a topic we've previously explored on this podcast. These traditions have become so ingrained in our lives that we rarely question their origins. Take, for instance, the tradition of exchanging Christmas...

You may have heard of AI art generators, tools that use artificial intelligence to create images based on language prompts. For example, you can type “a picture of Elmo from Sesame Street in the style of Pablo Picasso”. These tools are fun and impressive, but they also pose a serious threat to artists who share their work online. AI art generators rely on large datasets of existing images to learn...

According to a World Bank report from March 2023, the global pace of reforms toward equal treatment of women under the law has slumped to a 20-year low. This decline constitutes a potential impediment to economic growth at a critical time for the global economy. Since the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan in 2021, women’s rights have been systematically curtailed. From March 2022, it became the...

Nicknamed the "seventh continent" or “trash vortex" the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is an expanding mass consisting of 1.8 trillion plastic waste pieces in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. According to a study by NGO The Ocean Cleanup, which was published in Scientific Reports in 2018, it covers an area of 620,000 square miles, which is bigger than France, Germany and Spain combined. How was it fo...

As we enter 2023, we’re desperately looking for ways to combat human-induced climate change. It’s a worthy cause, but it’s clear that some irreversible effects have already happened, and that will continue for some time.  So it would be foolish not to prepare for the reality of living on a planet which has undergone significant warming. There’s relatively little known about how our bodies will rea...

The Walt Disney Company is celebrating its centenary this October, but the prevailing mood is far from festive. That’s because Disney's image is taking a hit. In May 2023, Axios-Harris placed it 77th for reputation in a ranking of America’s 100 most visible companies. When you consider that it had figured 4th on that same list as recently as 2019, the impact is clear. On that front, it's not doing...

Prof Kehinde Andrews, the UK’s first professor of Black studies and one of the UK’s leading experts on race, has called for a public holiday to remember the horrors of slavery.  According to Andrews there was ‘really nothing more important to Britain’s development than slavery.’ He feels that an official public holiday is needed to keep its memory alive and preserve a conscience of the horrors of...

Every year, 1st December is World AIDS day. To mark the occasion, let’s look back at the story of the Act Up group. Act Up started causing a buzz in New York in 1987, four years after the AIDS virus had been discovered. The highly organised group met several times a week to discuss their action plan. They demanded more prevention and communication campaigns from the state, better access to care, t...

What is an Advent calendar? If you’re anything like us, you’ll have been eagerly waiting for the clock to go past midnight on December 1st to have the first chocolate from this year’s Advent Calendar! These special festive calendars are used to count down to Christmas, all through the month of December. They traditionally offer simple treats like chocolate, but in recent years, holiday shoppers ha...

The perineum is a group of muscles that works like a hammock, stretching from the pubic bone to the tailbone. To pinpoint its location, try coughing; you’ll feel a downward pressure in your lower abdomen.   It provides support for your internal organs, like the rectum and bladder, and for women, the vagina and uterus. It also absorbs physical impact. For example, when you run, the increased abdomi...

AI is transforming many industries and sectors, from manufacturing to healthcare, from education to entertainment which will inevitably affect the way we work. But will AI replace humans or create new opportunities? Artificial intelligence, or AI, is the ability of machines to perform tasks that normally require human intelligence, such as recognizing faces, understanding speech, or making decisio...

According to the Office for National Statistics, the number of smokers in the UK is estimated at 6.6 million. The proportion has been steadily dropping for years now. Given the health risks, you’d think smokers would be delighted to give up, but the prospect of putting on weight is a cause of concern for many. To be fair, it i’s a well-founded fear to some extent. In 2014, Addiction journal report...

Since Elon Musk acquired social network Twitter in October 2022, the company has been pretty much constantly in the spotlight, and not really for the right reasons. It started very shortly after, with controversy erupting when the new owner fired 80% of the company’s workforce, including CEO Parag Agrawal. Of course, the change of name from Twitter to X.com then followed in summer 2023. There’s be...

You may remember that we’ve talked about the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Democracy Index in the past on Do You Really Know, which assigns each of the world’s countries a score from one to ten based on how democratic they are.   But have you ever heard of a kleptocracy? It’s a phenomenon that can creep into democracies and drag down their scores. A kleptocracy is a political system where corrupti...

At a time when Europe faces a "baby bust," the role of children in public spaces is sparking new debate. Increasingly, restaurants, hotels, and even tour operators are rolling out “adults only” policies. Gone are the sounds of crying babies or kids running around tables, but this shift raises questions about individualism in society. In recent years, child-free options have doubled globally, with...

Today, “left” and “right” are the main labels we use to categorise political views, but their origins go back over two centuries. To understand, we have to go back to the French Revolution in 1789. That spring, France’s King Louis XVI convened a meeting known as the Estates General, bringing together representatives from three groups, or “Estates”: the clergy, the nobility, and the Third Estate, w...

Giving Tuesday is a worldwide initiative which encourages people to do good. The movement was created in the United States in 2012, and has since spread to have a presence in 75 different countries as of 2021. In 2022, like every year, Giving Tuesday is celebrated the Tuesday after Thanksgiving and Black Friday, meaning it falls on 29th November. A lot of companies and charities match donations to...

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing was only created in the late 20th century, but it’s since established itself as a popular and increasingly used form of therapy. EMDR is especially recommended for children and adults dealing with trauma from physical or psychological violence, such as sexual abuse. It was discovered relatively recently in 1987, but that doesn’t mean it’s an alternativ...

Vegetarians and vegans, do you ever find it difficult to keep your diet balanced? Meat-eaters, if you’ve ever considered going veggie, was that something that dissuaded you? It’s certainly fair to say that simply loading up on fruit and veg isn’t enough to stick to a balanced meat-free diet. You really need to be including grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds, perhaps not on a daily basis, but as a re...

You may well be aware of Movember, the month-long focus on men’s health that began in Australia in 2003 and takes place in November each year. But it’s actually not the only male-related November trend that’s grown in prominence in recent years. The idea of the somewhat less serious No Nut November challenge came about in 2011, when a user posted about it on Urban Dictionary. But it wasn’t until t...

Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, in his work The Joyful Wisdom, explored this through a thought experiment he called the "eternal return." He asked us to imagine: What if you had to live this very life, exactly as it is—every joy, every sorrow, every thought—over and over, for eternity? How would you feel? Would you embrace it? Or, as Nietzsche suspected, would you recoil in horror? Nietzsche beli...

No doubt at some point in your life you’ve skipped a meal, whether it was to save money, lose weight or just because you were too damn busy with work. Maybe you even do it on a regular basis, without really knowing whether it’s good or bad for you. Skipping meals makes us more likely to snack afterwards, eating food items which are often high in fat and sugar. Another risk is that you compensate b...