Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

Economic prosperity is created in free markets by innovative companies. Over 50 percent of globally operating AI unicorns are located in the U.S., while Europe plays virtually no role. The race for the next future technology is already decided.

It seems that economic history is repeating itself in these months. On the stock markets, companies in the artificial intelligence and data center sectors are being traded feverishly. Massive capital flows into this technology. Much of it resembles the dot-com boom 25 years ago.

Structurally and regionally, little has changed since then: The U.S. and China are fighting for pole position, while the European Union’s economy remains largely on the sidelines, pushed into a spectator role by EU regulators.

Unicorns as a Measure of Innovation

An interesting measure of the EU’s lag in artificial intelligence is the number of so-called unicorns—private startups valued at at least one billion U.S. dollars before going public. This metric is considered a valid indicator of a region’s innovative capacity—and for the EU, the comparison with the U.S. is catastrophic.

About 1,700 such innovative companies currently operate in the U.S., while the EU has only around 280. The U.S. dominates this market with over 50 percent share, whereas the European economy lags far behind with less than ten percent of the global market.

This economic gap is also reflected in investment volume. Hyperscalers such as Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet, and Meta invested over $320 billion in AI and corresponding data center infrastructure this year alone. More than 550 new projects—with a focus in Virginia, Texas, and Arizona—are forming the backbone of a new economy.

Data center capacity in the U.S. grew by around 160 percent this year, while Europe’s capacity increased by only about 75 percent, equaling an investment volume of just under €100 billion.

With investments of around $125 billion, China’s economy also lags far behind the American one. An interesting context—especially from the perspective of European, and particularly German, policymakers—is that nuclear power is gaining noticeable momentum in these regions.

Even if green-minded Germany refuses to acknowledge it due to its ideological stance against nuclear energy, the enormous energy demand of new technologies will in the future be covered to a significant extent by the expansion of nuclear power.

Among the few major projects in the European Union are the Brookfield project in Sweden, with an investment volume of around $10 billion, and the Start Campus in Portugal, which could also activate nearly $10 billion in investments.

Crash of Ideologies

Especially in AI, the ideological clash between the U.S. and the EU can be observed in practice and in all its consequences. While the U.S. relies on deregulation and private solutions, removing barriers for intense competition, EU Europe still adheres to the mantra of political global control. Nothing may happen unless Brussels officials have schemed it at their green table in all their wisdom.

The Draghi motto still applies here: Only massive public investments—credit-financed and centrally planned—will, in the view of EU statist planners, help overcome the enormous gap between Europe and the U.S.

In the simulations of the EU Commission’s master plan, now stretched over seven years under Ursula von der Leyen, everything seems surprisingly simple, almost simplified. The EU’s Invest-AI plan intends to borrow around €50 billion in loans and invest them in selected projects in the coming years. This is supposed to trigger private investments of €150 billion, ultimately creating four AI gigafactories.

Welcome to the socialist textbook world of “Habeckonomics”: a system in which state projects like Northvolt repeatedly fail. Yet as long as public guarantees, subsidies, and state-guaranteed purchase prices are in prospect, the small flame of political hope continues flickering in Europe’s lukewarm wind.

As usual, we also observe the typical European jungle of funding programs, subsidies, and steering projects. These include “Horizon Europe,” which is meant to strengthen computing power in science, the RAISE pilot, and the Gen-AI-4-EU initiative, together investing another billion euros in the EU’s digital infrastructure.

The Power of Competition

The ideological clash between the two major economic blocks, the U.S. and the EU, is producing strange effects. While the open capital market in the U.S. lets startups sprout like mushrooms from fertile soil, EU regulation—especially under the Digital Markets Act—has fostered a predatory mentality. That this was likely the Eurocrats’ goal from the start comes as no surprise.

Brussels imposed more than €3.2 billion in competition fines this year, mainly targeting U.S. corporations. Brussels has degenerated into a bureaucratic leviathan—a parasitic glutton absorbing economic energy and generating ossified structures and economic vacuum.

In EU Europe, the motto is: the regulatory framework matters most—and the state takes its cut. That private industry prefers other locations and withdraws capital matters little to Brussels’ extraction experts.

Against the backdrop of Europe’s massive descent into a climate-socialist dystopia, it is surprising that the roots of libertarian economic thinking originate precisely on this continent. Consider the great economist Ludwig von Mises, who repeatedly pointed out that it is the entrepreneur who drives the engine of the market economy through profit-seeking, and that without exception, decentralized processes create prosperity—while state interventions regularly derail it.

Civilization-superior models like the free market sink in the waves of ideological EU infantilism. Its repressive climate socialism promotes the growth of corporatist structures in which politics and subsidized parts of the economy carry out the extraction, eliminating competition.

The rigid adherence to centrally planned control of the new tech industry tragically mirrors the timeline of the dot-com era. What Europe fails to understand is that groundbreaking innovation inevitably triggers an investment boom, often resulting in overinvestment and a stock market crash—but ultimately leaving economically profitable structures permanently woven into the existing economy.

As with companies like Amazon, Google, or Microsoft, Europeans will look back in a few years at these months and examine this intercontinental economic bifurcation through the examples of OpenAI, Gemini, or Perplexity. The energy needed will come from French nuclear reactors and soon also from Polish nuclear power.

Most people know that plastic pollution is a problem, but microplastics (the tiny fragments shed by everyday products) are much more pervasive than many realize.

Microplastics are defined as plastic particles smaller than 5 mm.

These particles are found everywhere: in oceans, soil, drinking water, food, and even the air we breathe. Yet, the origins of these particles are often invisible to consumers.

Using data from the IUCN, CSIRO, and Elsevier, this graphic, via Visual Capitalist, by Made Visual Daily breaks down what actually makes up these particles and where they come from.

A breakdown of microplastic sources, compiled from multiple environmental studies:

The chart shows that the biggest contributor to microplastics is synthetic textiles, which account for 35% of the total. Tires (28%) and city dust (24%) are also major culprits, followed by road markings (7%) and a grab bag of other sources (6%).

How Do These Microplastics Enter the Environment?

Microplastics enter the environment in two main forms: primary and secondary.

Primary microplastics are released directly into the environment at a microscopic size. These include:

• Fibers shed from washing synthetic fabrics like polyester, nylon, or acrylic.

• Rubber dust worn from car and truck tires during normal use.

• Fragments in city dust from the abrasion of paints, soles, furniture, and building coatings.

• Plastic pellets (“nurdles”) lost during plastic manufacturing or shipping.

Secondary microplastics, on the other hand, are formed when larger plastic debris—like bags, bottles, or fishing gear—breaks down over time due to sunlight, wave action, and weathering. These degrade into smaller and smaller pieces, eventually becoming microplastics.

Both types are persistent, pervasive, and increasingly found in even the most remote ecosystems. Research shows that even atmospheric currents can transport microplastic particles across continents and oceans.

The Scale of the Problem

Scientists estimate that roughly 21 million tonnes of primary microplastics have accumulated across land and sea environments, with millions of tonnes found in both agricultural soils and ocean waters. To help readers grasp the sheer scale of this invisible pollution, the graphic visualizes this total as an area filled 10 feet (3 meters) deep across a span of 2 miles (3.2 kilometers).

As highlighted in our previous breakdown of the future of the world’s plastic, the accumulation of these invisible pollutants is a growing concern, with long-term impacts still being uncovered.

What Can Be Done?

Solutions will require both technological and behavioral changes. For instance, innovations like microfiber filters in washing machines, and the development of alternative materials for tires and textiles, could help reduce the release of particles at the source.

In the meantime, understanding where microplastics come from is a critical first step. As this breakdown shows, the issue goes far beyond just plastic straws and bags.

Explore more microplastic visualizations like Visualizing The Size of Microplastics on Voronoi, our data storytelling app.

By Michael Kern of OilPrice.com,

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant in Ukraine, which has been under Russian control since early 2022, could resume operations within a year and a half after a potential end to the war, the head of the plant’s Russian operating company said on Monday. 

“If this (the end of the conflict) happens tomorrow, we will be ready to start up in mid-2027,” Ramil Galiyev, CEO of the Zaporizhzhya NPP Operating Organization, said, as carried by Russia’s state news agency RIA. 

The Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant is not operational and does not produce electricity, but needs power supply from external sources to cool the nuclear material and avoid a nuclear meltdown or disaster.

Zaporizhzhia is Europe’s biggest nuclear power plant in terms of installed capacity of 5.7 gigawatts (GW).

Located in Enerhodar, the nuclear power plant supplied about 20% of Ukraine’s electricity before the war. 

Earlier this year, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) began a process to help restore external electricity to the power plant, following weeks of diplomatic engagement with both Ukraine and Russia after the facility again lost all access to the national grid.

IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi announced that work had begun to re-establish off-site power through repairs to the damaged 750 kV Dniprovska and 330 kV Ferosplavna-1 transmission lines.

These lines, located on opposite sides of the front line, are essential for supplying the electricity needed to cool the plant’s six shutdown reactors and spent fuel.

Last week, Russian media claimed that the Trump Administration held talks with Russia over joint management of the Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, including the potential to use its power for crypto mining. The discussions, which have not been independently confirmed, were allegedly held without Ukraine’s participation, and likewise proposed resuming electricity supply to Ukraine, Russian newspaper Kommersant reported on Friday.  

By 2050, 68% of the global population is projected to live in urban centers, up from 55% today.

The world’s largest megacity, when measured by the combination of satellite imagery and census data, is Guangzhou, China.

Strikingly, the population has boomed by nearly 20-fold in just 50 years driven by China’s rapid economic rise.

This graphic, via Visual Capitalist’s Dorothy Neufeld, shows the growth of the world’s megacities, based on data from the European Commission via Our World in Data.

The Rise of the World’s Megacities (1975-2025P)

Below, we show the rise of the top five largest cities worldwide—using satellite imagery and census data—not administrative borders:

Since 1975, the population of Guangzhou has expanded by 40.9 million. It has the equivalent population of the entire country of Canada.

During the 1990s, the city’s population growth accelerated, driven by trade and industrial activity. Located on the Pearl River Delta, north of Hong Kong, it stands as a key port and transportation hub.

Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital and the economic hub of Southeast Asia’s largest economy, has undergone massive expansion. Its population has surged by 29 million over the past five decades, reaching 38.1 million today.

Meanwhile, New Delhi, India has grown 398%, supported by rising incomes and urban migration. By 2030, the city is expected to gain nearly two million more residents, spanning a population of 33.3 million.

To learn more about this topic, check out this graphic on the world’s fastest-growing economies.

Authored by J.Ricardo Martins via journal-neo.su,

Europe’s long-standing security framework is undergoing profound strain, increasingly overshadowed by economic instruments that shape geopolitical influence.

This analysis examines how geoeconomic logics are reshaping Europe’s strategic posture and challenging the foundations of its traditional security order.

1. The Unraveling: How Europe Lost Control of Its Own Security Architecture

The photograph of Steve Witkoff with Vladimir Putin in Moscow is not merely another episode in the long chronicle of American informal diplomacy. It is a symbol of something far more consequential: the definitive erosion of the Euro-Atlantic security architecture that has anchored Europe since 1945. Europe now finds itself a spectator to a negotiation that directly concerns its future but in which it has no meaningful voice.

For decades, European leaders assumed that their security environment was guaranteed through three pillars: American military supremacy, NATO cohesion, and a Russia that could be simultaneously contained and marginalised. The war in Ukraine temporarily sustained this illusion. The European Union interpreted Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as validation of the post-1991 Atlantic order, proof that Europe needed more NATO, more American leadership, more defence spending, and more ideological alignment with Washington.

Europe’s tragedy is not that it is being excluded from the negotiations shaping its own future, but that it does not yet fully grasp the depth of its exclusion

But as the conflict entered its later stages, and as new political dynamics emerged in Washington, a deeper reality became visible: Europe’s vision of security was not aligned with America’s long-term strategic trajectory.

Washington seeks to contain China; Europe seeks to contain Russia. Washington looked to the Indo-Pacific; Europe clung to its Eastern frontier. Washington viewed Russia as a potential co-player in global resource extraction, Arctic development, and strategic balancing; Europe continued to frame Russia as a permanent existential enemy.

The result is a form of strategic misalignment, with Europe still operating inside an architecture that Washington no longer fully believes in.

The American Pivot, the European Panic

Donald Trump’s return to the international stage accelerated this divergence dramatically. Trump’s strategic re-imagination of Russia, as an asset rather than an adversary placed Europe in a state of near-panic. His willingness to undermine NATO commitments, his explicit distrust of European leaders, and his understanding of geopolitics as business diplomacy all contribute to Europe’s strategic anxiety.

Trump’s humiliation of Europe is deliberate. By sending Witkoff, an adviser with no diplomatic obligations, to Moscow repeatedly while ignoring Kyiv, Trump signals that the centre of gravity has moved. The peace process will not be mediated through Brussels, Berlin, or Paris; it will be mediated through a Washington–Moscow axis, bypassing European institutions entirely.

Europe’s refusal to speak with Moscow is interpreted in the Kremlin not as principled resistance but as strategic self-sabotage. And Washington, sensing opportunity, is willing to exploit this fracture.

As many analysts warned—both sympathetic and critical—Europe is discovering too late that its security cannot be maintained through moral rhetoric, sanctions, or rearmament without industrial foundations. Europe wants to contain Russia, but it no longer has the political, military, or economic tools to do so.

2. The Dealmakers: How Trump, Putin, and Business Networks Are Writing Europe Out of Its Own Future

Shadow Diplomacy as the New Geopolitics

Witkoff’s shuttle diplomacy represents a structural shift: diplomacy is no longer the domain of foreign ministries but of political families, corporate intermediaries, and resource-based alliances. This is why Kushner’s presence in Moscow matters profoundly. The December talks were not simply high-level negotiations; they were the emergence of a new system of geopolitical conduct, in which trust between individual power networks outweighs institutional protocols.

The Trump–Putin paradigm is built on three principles: (i) commercial logic over ideological confrontation; (ii) resource extraction as the foundation of geopolitical stability; and (iii) bilateral trust over multilateral institutions.

This is profoundly humiliating for Europe, which traditionally sought legitimacy via multilateralism. For Washington and Moscow, however, Europe’s exclusion is not an oversight but a feature. The old European security architecture depended on Europe’s centrality. The new one does not.

The Economic Heart of the New Architecture

The emerging Washington–Moscow understanding is grounded in four economic pillars:

– Arctic and Northern Sea Route Resource Extraction: Joint participation in Arctic minerals, hydrocarbons, and rare earths is central. The US is far behind Russia in icebreaker capacity and Arctic infrastructure, and cooperation is a pragmatic solution.

– Energy Corridors and Post-War Reconstruction: American investors eye Russian energy as an undervalued frontier market. Simultaneously, reconstruction of Ukraine (potentially funded by frozen Russian assets) creates massive opportunities for US construction and energy firms.

– Reintegrating Russian hydrocarbons into global markets: This is a long-term American objective, both to stabilise global energy prices and to manage China’s growing leverage over Russia.

– Replacing NATO’s military logic with economic interdependence: This is the core of Trump’s thinking: build a Washington–Moscow axis rooted in profitability, thereby reducing the incentive for armed confrontation.

Why Europeans Are Desperate

Because Europe has tied its industrial base to sanctions, decarbonisation, and American military dependency, it is now structurally weaker than both Washington and Moscow in the emerging configuration.

Europe is discovering three painful truths:

– It cannot defend itself without the US. NATO’s European pillars lack ammunition, industrial capacity, and high-end military technology.

– Sanctions have weakened Europe more than Russia. Energy-intensive industries in Germany, Austria, and Italy are relocating to the US. Deindustrialisation is underway in Europe.

– The peace negotiations will not include Europe as a co-author. Europe will receive the final document, but not be invited to shape it.

This is why European strategists are furious: the security architecture that defined the continent is being rewritten over their heads.

3. After Ukraine: What the New European Security Order Might Look Like

Will NATO survive as Europe’s central pillar?

NATO will not disappear. It remains too deeply institutionalised, too symbolically powerful for Europeans, and too useful for Washington’s basing structures and arms exports. But it will be downgraded, transformed from the core of the European security order into a secondary framework, increasingly dependent on: US political will, a fragmented European defence sector, reduced American enthusiasm for European commitments, and a US–Russia modus vivendi that Europe does not control.

Under a Trump presidency, NATO has become a transactional umbrella, not a strategic alliance. Its credibility will depend entirely on the personal relationship between Trump and Putin—and Europe hates this because it strips the continent of agency.

The Impact of the War and the Coming Peace on Europe’s Architectural Future

The conflict in Ukraine revealed Europe’s structural vulnerabilities: lack of ammunition, lack of production capacity, overreliance on sanctions, and strategic incoherence. The peace will reveal something even more uncomfortable: Europe cannot enforce the consequences of the settlement on its own.

If the US and Russia craft the final settlement, Europe must either accept it or refuse and confront the consequences alone. Neither Paris nor Berlin is prepared for the latter scenario.

Ukraine, tragically, will be the ultimate pressure point. Its sovereignty will be negotiated by outsiders. Europe knows this but cannot alter it.

Can Europe Hold the Architecture Without the US?

The honest answer is no, not in the short or medium term. Europe lacks nuclear deterrence autonomy, military-industrial depth, cohesive political will, strategic consensus, energy security, technological parity with the US, and the capacity to contain Russia without American leadership.

The idea of European strategic autonomy remains aspirational rhetoric. The EU has military instruments, but not a military. It has ambitions, but not the industrial base to sustain them.

The Asian Century and the Decline of Europe

The more Washington and Moscow converge economically, the more Europe’s global relevance declines. The Russia–China axis strengthens, India emerges as a balancing pole, and the BRICS expand their economic and political weight. Europe becomes a peninsula of a Eurasian supercontinent that it does not control, increasingly marginal to global power centres.

Whether Asia can provide stability depends on the trust networks forming between Beijing, Moscow, New Delhi, Riyadh, and Tehran. Europe is not part of those networks.

Conclusion: A Continent in Suspension

Europe’s tragedy is not that it is being excluded from the negotiations shaping its own future, but that it does not yet fully grasp the depth of its exclusion.

The Moscow meetings are not a negotiation between equals; it is a negotiation between systems of power. Trump and Putin understand one another because they speak the language of transactional geopolitics. Europe speaks the language of norms, laws, and bureaucratic procedures—in a world that is no longer governed by them.

A new European security architecture is being drafted, and it is not being drafted in Brussels. It is being drafted in Washington and Moscow.

Europe must confront a stark question: Can a continent that has lost strategic agency recover it before the next geopolitical cycle closes?

Via The Cradle

The Chinese Foreign Ministry released a statement on Monday condemning Israel’s recognition of the separatist Republic of Somaliland, after Taiwan became the first state to welcome Tel Aviv’s move. 

China opposes the Israeli recognition of Somaliland as an “independent sovereign state” and the decision to “establish diplomatic relations” with it, said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Lin Jian. “No country should encourage or support other countries’ internal separatist forces for its own selfish interests,” he added, while urging the country of Somalia to halt “separatist activities and collusion with external forces.”

The spokesman made the comments during a news briefing. “China firmly supports Somalia’s sovereignty, unity, and territorial integrity, and opposes any moves that undermine Somali territorial integrity,” he went on to say.

A day earlier, Taiwan became the first state to welcome Israel’s recognition of Somaliland. The Taiwanese Foreign Ministry said in a statement that Israel, Taiwan, and Somaliland are “like-minded democratic partners sharing the values of democracy, freedom, and rule of law.“

Last week, Israel became the first state to formally recognize Somaliland, which broke away from Somalia in 1991 but had never been recognized by any UN member state. Somali officials slammed the move. 

The Israeli government has been aiming for Somaliland to serve as a potential destination for Palestinians that Tel Aviv aims to forcibly displace from Gaza, according to multiple reports over the past year. 

Somali Prime Minister Hamza Barre said that Israel was “searching for a foothold in the Horn of Africa” and called on it to recognize and accept a Palestinian state instead. 

Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud referred to the move as a “naked invasion” and said it poses a “threat to regional stability.”

The Arab League, Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), African Union, and Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) also strongly rejected the Israeli recognition of Somaliland. Iran’s Foreign Ministry called the move “malicious.”

China’s rejection of the recognition coincided with a report by Hebrew newspaper Maariv, which claimed that after recognizing Somaliland, Israel is now considering recognizing the UAE-backed Southern Transitional Council (STC) in Yemen, hoping for strategic cooperation on the Red Sea coast against Ansarallah.

The secessionist STC has recently swept across large swathes of central and southern Yemen with the hopes of creating an independent state. According to recent reports, Israel and Taiwan have also been enhancing their relationship.

Taiwanese Foreign Minister Francois Wu recently made a secret visit to Israel, sources told Reuters on 11 December. In October this year, Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te said that Israel serves as a model for the island to strengthen its defenses.

Weeks earlier, Taipei City unveiled the T-Dome system – inspired by Tel Aviv’s Iron Dome missile defense system. Taiwan and Israel do not have formal diplomatic relations. Pressure from China, which views Taiwan as one of its provinces, has left Taipei with very few diplomatic ties to other states.

A large U.S. cohort study has found that individuals consuming the highest levels of ultra-processed foods face a significantly greater risk of developing lung cancer, even after adjusting for smoking and other factors.

Research published in the journal Thorax analyzed data from more than 101,000 participants in the Prostate, Lung, Colorectal and Ovarian Cancer Screening Trial. Over an average follow-up period of 12 years, researchers identified 1,706 incident cases of lung cancer, including 1,473 cases of non-small cell lung cancer—the slower-growing form—and 233 cases of the more aggressive small cell variant.

Participants in the top quartile of ultra-processed food consumption, adjusted for energy intake, showed a 41% higher risk of lung cancer compared with those in the lowest quartile (hazard ratio 1.41). The associations held for both non-small cell (37% higher risk) and small cell (44% higher risk) subtypes.

Ultra-processed foods typically include items formulated with multiple industrial processes and additives, such as preservatives, emulsifiers and artificial flavors. Examples in the study ranged from ice cream, packaged sauces and confectionery to soft drinks, ready-made burgers, pizza and processed meats. On average, the energy-adjusted ultra-processed food consumption was 2.8 servings per day, with lunch meat contributing 11.1% to total UPF intake, diet or caffeinated soft drinks 7.3%, and decaffeinated soft drinks 6.6%, the study found. UPFs are described as nutritionally poor, with high energy density, low fibre, fewer micronutrients, and excessive sugars, sodium, fats and additives.

Examples: 

• Sugar-sweetened beverages
• Processed meats
• Packaged snack cakes & pastries
• Instant noodles & boxed meals
• Frozen prepared pizzas & entrées
• Sugary breakfast cereals
• Flavored/sweetened dairy products
• Reconstituted meat products
• Packaged refined breads & buns
• Processed cheese products

The findings build on prior evidence linking ultra-processed foods to a range of adverse health outcomes, including cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and reduced life expectancy. In the U.S. and Britain, such foods comprise more than half of daily caloric intake for many individuals.

“You can’t say from this study that UPFs cause cancer as it’s observational, so we’re looking at associations, not direct effects. But it does strengthen the case for looking more closely at the food environment many people are living in, where UPFs are cheap, convenient, and heavily marketed, making them a go-to for many,” Rob Hobson, author of Unprocess Your Family Life, told The Independent.

“That might mean cooking more from scratch where possible, adding in more whole foods like vegetables, beans and grains, or just becoming more aware of how often UPFs show up in your day,” Hobson added. “It’s not about being perfect, it’s about balance and understanding how your food choices could be supporting or undermining your long-term health.”

Authored by Makai Allbert via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

A minute is always a minute, except when it isn’t.

This idea was put to the test in a 2023 Harvard study. Researchers induced minor bruising on participants’ forearms and then had them sit in rooms where the clocks ran at normal speed, half-speed, or double-speed.

Crucially, the actual elapsed time was identical across all conditions—28 minutes—but the clocks ticked at different rates.

The results surprised the researchers. Wounds healed faster when people thought more time had passed, and slower when they thought less time had passed. “Personally, I didn’t think it would work,” lead author Peter Aungle told The Epoch Times. “And then it did work!”

A century ago, Albert Einstein demonstrated that time is relative—not fixed. He explained the idea with a simple, humorous example: “Put your hand on a hot stove for a minute, and it seems like an hour. Sit with a pretty girl for an hour, and it seems like a minute. That’s relativity.”

Now, psychologists and neuroscientists are finding that our sense of time is not only inherently subjective but also highly malleable.

We can’t stop the clock, but by understanding how we perceive time, we can make minutes feel longer, heal faster, and even expand our memories.

How the Mind Affects Reality

The Harvard healing experiment is a pivotal piece of evidence that mind and body are not only connected, but may be one and the same. “We weren’t really manipulating time itself. We were manipulating expectations,” Aungle said.

“If they [people] think more time has passed, they expect more healing—and those expectations can shape the body.”

Most people think of mind-body effects only in terms of emotion, he added. Yet, “psychology is embedded in everything the body does. I would argue the mind influences every physiological outcome to some degree.”

Expectations are not the only time bender. While believing time has sped up aids healing, high-arousal negative emotions, such as fear, significantly dilate our perception of time, making it feel slower.

In one study, participants watched frightening clips from “The Shining” or “Scream.” Afterward, a blue circle was presented in the center of the computer screen. Participants perceived that the circle lasted longer after watching frightening movies than after watching neutral or sad films.

Sylvie Droit-Volet, the lead researcher of the study, told The Epoch Times that subjective expansion is likely because “fear accelerates the internal clock, making time seem to pass more quickly and prompting action”—the fight or flight response.

Because the internal clock is ticking faster, measuring more units of time per second, the external world appears to move in slow motion. The time dilation allows the brain to process information with higher resolution during life-threatening situations.

Slowing Time

We can also make time feel longer in positive ways, such as by seeking out moments of awe.

A 2012 study published in Psychological Science found that feeling awe, whether from a story or a memory, makes time feel more abundant.

Awe acts as a reset button for the brain. It brings people intensely into the present moment. According to the “extended-now theory,” focusing on the present moment elongates time perception because we are not mentally rushing toward the future. By filling the present with vastness, awe offsets the feeling that time is slipping away, making life feel more satisfying.

The study also found that people who felt awe were less impatient, more willing to help others, and preferred experiences over material products.

We can also slow our perception of time through the practice of savoring.

“Savoring is putting a highlighter pen on our experiences,” psychologist Tamar Chansky told The Epoch Times. Savoring does not require extra duration, but rather a shift in attention.

For the time-starved, Chansky suggested taking “two more bites” of an experience—whether tasting coffee or looking out a window—to engage the brain’s awareness. This simple act creates “invisible, little expanders” within our finite days. It is a way of feeding the spirit without requiring a restructuring of one’s schedule, she said.

“We could rush through a whole day so easily … and we might feel somewhat or even very productive at the end of the day, but we might not feel good. So finding these little pockets … helps us to feel that expansion within.”

Chansky’s insight aligns with research findings that training attention, such as through meditation, can change how we perceive time.

Experienced meditators feel time passes more slowly during meditation and in their daily lives than people who do not meditate.

Being in nature also slows our experience of time.

In one study, participants overestimated the duration of a walk by nearly two minutes when it took place in nature, whereas their estimates were accurate for urban walks. Nature exposure increases mindfulness and reduces stress, states that are theoretically linked to a slowing of the internal clock. If you need to “buy” yourself a little time, you can find it in the wild. “Time grows on trees,” the study concluded.

Memories and Time

Why do childhood summers feel endless while adult years appear to fly by? The answer lies in how our brains process novelty. Our brains measure time based on how many new memories are created.

When we encounter unexpected stimuli, our brains process more information, leading to a subjective expansion of that duration. In experiments where a low-probability stimulus—called an oddball—appears in a stream of repetitive standard stimuli, the oddball, or novelty, is consistently judged to last longer.

“The more unique, meaningful, or changing experiences we have, the longer the stretch of time feels in memory,” Marc Wittmann, a research fellow at the Institute for Frontier Areas of Psychology and Mental Health in Germany, said. On the other hand, routine compresses time in memory by halting the recording of details it already knows. When neurons fire repeatedly in response to the same stimulus, their response diminishes; they become efficient but record less data.

Therefore, to stretch your subjective life, introduce variation.

“A fulfilled and varied life is a long life,” Wittmann told The Epoch Times. This effect is not about simply filling a schedule with busyness—it is about “deep emotional resonance with the world.” A hundred days of routine collapse into a single memory unit in the brain; a week of travel or new experiences remains distinct and expansive.

Wittmann’s recent research adds a nuance: cognitive capacity also plays a role. As we age, the perception that the last decade flew by is partly due to cognitive decline, which affects our ability to encode complex memories. However, this effect is moderate. People who stay mentally and physically fit and continue to seek novel, emotionally rewarding experiences can subjectively expand their sense of time, regardless of age.

Read the rest here…

Since 2020, blockbuster game launches have arrived across every major platform and in a variety of genres, from cozy life sims to sprawling open-world adventure RPGs.

This visualization, via Visual Capitalist’s Niccolo Conte, ranks the best-selling video games from 2020 to 2025 based on global unit sales using data from Video Game Sales Wiki (Fandom).

Animal Crossing Dominates as the 2020s’ Best-Selling Game

At 48.2 million units, Animal Crossing: New Horizons stands alone at the top of the ranking.

The game released on March 20, 2020, right as much of the world began to lock down due to the COVID-19 pandemic. As such, the latest addition to the Animal Crossing series made for the perfect time-sink amidst a period of global uncertainty and inactivity.

The table below shows the full ranking of the top 20 best-selling games from 2020 to 2025:

In second place is Hogwarts Legacy with 34.0 million, making the gap between #1 and #2 a sizable 14.2 million units. Hogwarts Legacy had the advantage of being tied to one of the world’s best-known franchises, Harry Potter, and delivered the open-world wizardry experience many fans had been waiting years for.

After that, the leaderboard tightens dramatically: four different games sit at exactly 30.0 million units (Elden Ring, Cyberpunk 2077, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, and Call of Duty: Vanguard).

Nintendo Games Continue to Lead Sales

Several of the best-sellers are instantly recognizable Nintendo franchises. With six games in the top 20 best-sellers since 2020, Nintendo continues to be a development and publishing powerhouse in the world of gaming.

The six Nintendo titles together reached 144.7 million in sales, with no other singular publisher or developer coming close.

The company’s continued refinement of well-established franchises like Pokemon, Super Mario Bros., and The Legend of Zelda has proven fruitful, with the company still able to produce hits across genres.

With the Nintendo Switch 2 console selling well since its June 2025 launch, Nintendo’s dominance doesn’t seem like it’s fading anytime soon.

To learn more about the global video game industry, check out this graphic that breaks down video game revenue by country on Voronoi.

By Tsvetana Paraskova of OilPrice.com

CNOOC Ltd, China’s top offshore crude oil and natural gas producer, has announced the discovery of a major new oilfield in the Bohai Sea. 

The Qinhuangdao 29-6 discovery in the shallow Neogene formations of the Bohai Sea is yet another oilfield estimated to hold more than 100 million tons of crude, or about 730 million barrels, and discovered by CNOOC recently, the company said.  

Through continued exploration, the proved in-place volume of Qinhuangdao 29-6 Oilfield has exceeded 100 million tons of oil equivalent. 

The oil property of the major new discovery is medium-heavy crude, the Chinese major added.  

The Qinhuangdao 29-6 Oilfield is the second one-hundred-million-ton-class lithological oilfield discovered in the mature exploration area of the Shijiutuo Uplift, CNOOC said. This further highlights the value of exploration and consolidates the resource base for increasing CNOOC’s reserves and production, according to the company. 

In the middle of 2025, CNOOC launched production of heavy crude from its Kenli 10-2 Oilfields Development Project, which is the largest shallow lithological oilfield offshore China.  

The project in the southern Bohai Sea will see 79 development wells commissioned, including 33 cold recovery wells, 24 thermal recovery wells, 21 water injection wells, and 1 water source well.  

CNOOC expects the project to achieve peak production of about 19,400 barrels of oil equivalent per day (boepd) in 2026.  

Similarly to all other state majors in China, CNOOC is boosting domestic oil and gas production and exploration per orders by the Chinese authorities who seek to reduce China’s dependence on imported oil and gas. 

CNOOC has managed to post record high production in recent years, with an all-time high output in 2024, and another record-high expected for 2025.

Outside China, CNOOC is a minority partner in many major offshore developments, including in the Exxon-led consortium that has found more than 11 billion barrels of oil equivalents offshore Guyana and is currently the only producing consortium in the South American country.