Fifty years ago this weekend, on Sept. 6, 1976, Lt. Viktor Belenko of the Soviet Air Defense Forces climbed into a MiG-25 “Foxbat” near Vladivostok and turned an ordinary training flight into one of the Cold War’s most extraordinary defections. Flying low to evade Soviet radar, he crossed the Sea of Japan and entered Japanese airspace. Unable to locate his intended destination, Chitose Air Base, he made a hazardous landing at Hakodate’s civilian airport, overshooting the runway and damaging the aircraft. In a matter of minutes, Japan acquired four problems:…
The New York Chronicle
In Taika Waititi’s “Klara and the Sun”, which stars Jenna Ortega and Amy Adams, a robot delivers lessons on humanity. The dystopian drama is based on Nobel Prize-winning author Kazuo Ishiguro’s 2021 bestseller of the same name and set in a technologically advanced future, following what one character describes as a third world war triggered by the abuse of the internet. Ortega plays Klara, an outdated model of an Artificial Friend, an android companion whose sell-by date is fast approaching when, to her relief, teenager Josie (Mia Tharia) and her…
Government experts are meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, to work towards a possible negotiating mandate on autonomous weapons systems (AWS). These are military systems that can select and engage targets without human intervention. This major international gathering follows a recent call by the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) for urgent controls on these weapons, sometimes dubbed “killer robots” in descriptions by the media. Recent events in Ukraine have further consolidated concerns that a slide towards weapons with full autonomy (and without meaningful human control) is well…
The famous words of General de Gaulle – “How can you govern a country where there are 246 varieties of cheese?” – show just how closely regional identities are linked to a country’s cheesemaking heritage that seems to be rooted in ancient history. And yet this is both true and false, as this tradition that the French are so proud of only dates back five or six generations. Exploring the subject of cheese produced by the distant and not so distant ancestors of modern-day France, proves difficult for various reasons.…
The results of Germany’s Saxony-Anhalt state election on September 6 were far worse than feared for the country’s mainstream political parties. The far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) came close to winning a majority of votes, with 43.8%. This was about 4% higher than polls had suggested. Support for the centre-right Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), on the other hand, imploded. It won 17.2% of the vote, down from 37.1% in 2021, performing substantially worse than predicted. At nearly 78%, turnout was up substantially compared with 2021 – in a…
Media are invited to hear from NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 astronauts during a news conference beginning at 2:45 p.m. EDT, Wednesday, Sept. 16, from the International Space Station. NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev will discuss their upcoming return to Earth. Learn where to watch online: Media interested in participating must contact the newsroom at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston no later than 5 p.m., Tuesday, Sept. 15, at 281-483-5111 or [email protected]. To ask questions, media must…
Chinese President Xi Jinping warned President Trump about tensions between Washington and Beijing over Taiwan during their first meeting in Beijing on Thursday, according to China’s Foreign Ministry. “Safeguarding peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait is the biggest common denominator between China and the U.S.,” Xi told Trump, according to a post on social platform X from ministry spokesperson Mao Ning. The White House, meanwhile, described the summit as “a good meeting.” Trump signaled in his opening remarks at the meeting that he’s ready to do business with China. The host…