Co-parenting after divorce isn’t easy, but one mom is thanking her lucky stars that she has such a healthy dynamic with her ex-husband. In a sweet video on social media, the remarried woman shared how well her former spouse gets along with her new family. It’s heartwarming to see how much the man cares, not only for their shared son, but for his ex’s other kids as well! This beautiful clip has received over four million views. In the video, Mom’s ex-husband stopped by to pick up their son for the weekend. However, instead of leaving right away, he went inside to catch up with the kid’s stepdad. He also spent some time playing with his ex-wife’s younger children. Overall, the wholesome interaction was way too cute! @mrspinchofficial On my previous post, I can’t believe the amount of men that wouldn’t welcome this!! #mum #mums #moms #mom #parentsoftiktok #motherhood #threeunderthree #momsoftiktokclub #twoundertwo #newbaby #toddlers #mumsoftiktok #newborn #toddlersoftiktok #siblings #5kids #maternityleave #mrspinch #fyp #coparenting ♬ son original – Sp3ed._up._S0ng “When your ex is only supposed to pick up his son… but he comes in to see your husband, and your other children,” the woman wrote over the adorable footage. “I’m so lucky to have two mature men, who have spent the last nine years getting along… for his sake,” she added, referring to her son. “And how nice for my children I’ve had since, to love seeing their big brother’s dad, too.” Screengrab from TikTok Commenters were truly impressed by the kind and respectful relationship between this mom’s current husband and her ex. “That’s two secure men there,” wrote one user. “Love it.” Another added, “Amazing environment for all the children. Well done grown-ups.” A third said, “Maturity in co-parenting. This was so beautiful to watch.” It’s wonderful to see this mom, her husband, and her ex all getting along so well. What a fantastic example they’re setting for their kids! We just know these children are going to grow up feeling so loved. You can find the source of this story’s featured image here. The post Mom’s Ex Comes To Pick Up Their Son, But His Reaction To Her Current Husband Has Her Melting appeared first on InspireMore.

Do you think Dutton will return?

An ancient temple and theater has been identified in Peru as dating back 4,000 years, placing it among the oldest man-made structures in Peru. Located in the northern Peruvian town of Zaña, archaeologists had been alerted by authorities of looting taking place at a site called La Otra Banda / Cerro Las Animas, and a […] The post Ancient Temple and Theater 3,500 years Older Than Machu Picchu Discovered in Peru appeared first on Good News Network.

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—A Southern California school district trains counselors to help students hide their transgender identity from their concerned parents, according to documents obtained by The Daily Signal. Capistrano Unified School District in southern Orange County, California, allows students to change their name and gender in school records without parental permission. The Individual Transition Plan, obtained by the nonprofit law firm Center for American Liberty through a California Public Records Act request, asks the counselor filling it out whether the child’s parents “need to know” about their child’s transition. It later asks the student to respond with “yes” or “no” to the statement: “My parents/guardians are aware of my transition.” Individual-Transition-PlanDownload Parental signatures are optional to finalize the transition plan. The form is not publicly available on the district’s website. The transgender-identifying student and school counselor meet to fill out the form, then make a list of “safe spaces and safe people” on campus, and, lastly, identify who knows about the student’s name change. Capistrano Unified School District confirmed to The Daily Signal that it uses the Individual Transition Plan form. “The Identity Support document is provided to assist District employees in supporting students who have approached staff members regarding their identity and expression and the need for support in the school setting,” Chief Communications and Public Engagement Officer Ryan Burris said. “This document is intended to be a support and is optional, and is meant to assist staff members in establishing and meeting the student’s needs while complying with applicable laws and the District’s policies.” Burris said the district values communication with students and families, and works with students “whenever possible, to help them with disclosure of information between students and their families.” “The District does not make plans to transition students,” he said. Parents should be the first to know if their child is struggling so they can address it, a Capistrano mother who asked to remain anonymous for fear of retaliation against her elementary-school-aged son, told The Daily Signal. “It just shows and highlights the hypocrisy of the school district, because they will say that they want to be in partnership with the parents and work with the parents, but then they want to keep secrets from the parents, and that’s my biggest concern right there,” the mom said. “Don’t keep secrets from the parents.” A school counselor “argued” with a parent who was upset about being kept in the dark about his or her child’s transition, internal emails obtained through the records request show. “Just had to argue with a parent about a name change that they were unaware of and upset about. But school needs to comply with students wishes if they’re over 12 per AB 1266,” the counselor wrote. For justification, the counselor cited the state’s Assembly Bill 1266, which says students should be treated in accordance with their “gender identity” at school. “A transgender or gender nonconforming student may not express their gender identity openly in all contexts, including at home,” the California Department of Education has said about AB 1266. “Revealing a student’s gender identity or expression to others may compromise the student’s safety. Thus, preserving a student’s privacy is of the utmost importance.” Emails show two school counselors discussing a student’s “legal right” in California to “be referred to by the pronouns they identify with and to use the restroom and locker room they identify with.” Parental permission is not needed to make name and gender changes in the student records, one counselor wrote. “Tom consulted with the district legal team, and it appears that no staff member on campus can tell the parents if the student requests they do not know, unless there’s a ‘need to know,'” the counselor’s email says. Counselors are trained to help kids transition, emails show. An academic adviser sent a training assignment to a school counselor asking her to consider her “personal biases” on LGBTQ issues and the “human costs to transgender students” in a three-to-four-page essay. A counselor warned a school psychologist against changing the student’s name in a portal that parents could access. “What we’ve done, is send out an internal email to teachers after an ITP meeting notifying that X students now goes by Y with such pronouns,” the email says. “That way, student feels accepted at school, and parents don’t necessarily find out (if that makes sense).” A school counselor offered to reach out to a middle school teacher’s potentially gender-confused students to ask whether the students want to go through the transition plan. Parents are not the enemy, the local mother critical of the process said. “The parents just want what’s best for the kids,” she said, “and there just needs to be a team approach, and excluding parents from the conversation is not the right direction.” Parents, not schools, have the right to direct their children’s upbringing, said Mark Trammell, executive director of the Center for American Liberty, the group that filed the records request. “It raises serious red flags when schools keep secrets from parents and ignore legal obligations to make policies and curriculum publicly available,” he told The Daily Signal. “Transparency isn’t merely a request, but a requirement for protecting parental rights and government accountability. The Center for American Liberty is committed to ushering in this transparency so parents can be fully aware of what their kids are being taught in schools.” The post EXCLUSIVE: California School District Helps Students Hide Gender Identity From Parents appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Tails are surely wagging at six city-run animal shelters in L.A. thanks to the 'Biggies and Meow-Meows Adoption Event' where adoption fees are cut 50% for both dogs and cats.

The Dog That Didn't Bark

The internet was meant to be an “information superhighway” – a place where all human knowledge could be available, allowing humanity to find the truth of any situation at the touch of a button.Instead, it’s a place where anti-vaxxers tout deworming tablets for viruses and people pretend that birds aren't real. It’s a wild west of pseudo- and anti-science – and a recent paper into the two phenomena has now outlined just how dangerous it can get.What is pseudoscience?As therapeutic techniques go, few have quite as established a pedigree as acupuncture. It goes back, most scholars agree, at least a couple of millennia, and even today people swear by its healing power. There are regular calls across the Western world to incorporate the practice into standard medicine, with proponents pointing to its effectiveness for pain relief, addiction recovery, and even as a fertility treatment.So, here’s a question: how does it work?The answer, of course, is that it doesn’t. The benefits are mostly down to the placebo effect – you’re told these magic needles are going to help you feel better, and so they do. But that’s not what you’ll be told by acupuncture believers – ask them how it works, and you’ll be told something about connecting meridians in the body, stimulating blood and lymphatic fluid flow, or tweaking nervous system regulation.It can all sound very scientific – but it isn’t. And it’s that quality that defines pseudoscience: the term refers to “any discourse that kind of mimics the style of science,” explained co-author of the paper Tommaso Venturini, a researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research and associate professor at the University of Geneva’s Medialab.“So, particularly when we're talking about conspiracy theories […] they tend to pretend they are scientific,” he told IFLScience. “If you consider the type of writing that they use, for example, it does resemble a lot that [which] neuroscientists and researchers use.”This is why articles on, say, acupuncture will often cite research supposedly supporting their claims – and it will take a deeper dive on your part to find out just how low-quality or damning those papers really are. Pseudoscientists “quote the same way as researchers do,” Venturini said; “they tend to present what they write, in, you know, sort of similar pseudo-rationalist [ways].”“Of course, it's not the same thing,” he added. “But it looks the same.”What is anti-science?If acupuncture is pseudoscience, then anti-science would be something like the anti-vax movement. It is, essentially, exactly what it sounds like: an explicit rejection of science and scientific authority, often in favor of thought-terminating cliches such as “trust your gut”.“People will very [openly] present their argument as unscientific, or anti-institutional science,” Venturini told IFLScience. “[They will say,] we don't trust those institutions, we don't trust the epistemic authority that you have.”They are not trying to sound scientific – in fact they are specifically trying not to sound scientific.Tommaso VenturiniOf course, skepticism of science is not intrinsically a bad thing. “Science is not the only social authority in our society,” Venturini pointed out, “and to some extent, I think that's right. It is a very specific approach, which people have sometimes criticized, and rightfully so.”Indeed, for some sectors of society, there are good reasons not to trust the scientific establishment. Women and people of color have notoriously been mistreated by scientists over the years, being at best ignored entirely and at worst experimented on without their knowledge. There are still doctors around today who are taught, and believe, stereotypes about various ethnic groups that affect their treatment in dangerous ways.The problem comes, however, when “the scientific method is flawed” becomes “and so I shall trust this meme.” Anti-science doesn’t aim to ape real science, Venturini explained; instead, it “can be something more like entertainment.” “Donald Trump is a very good example of this,” he told IFLScience. “He [has] more of a television style, […] a talk show type of style, which is clearly not one of classic science, right?”“That is very deliberate,” he said. “They are not trying to sound scientific – in fact they are specifically trying not to sound scientific.”Case study: Flat EarthersFor an illustration of the difference between pseudo- and anti-scientific views, let’s turn to one of the oldest conspiracies out there: the Flat Earth.Now, despite what some proponents of the idea suggest, the Flat Earth conspiracy is likely much newer than you realize. “It originated in the mid-19th century,” Venturini and his colleagues explain in their paper, “when Samuel Rowbotham, writing under the pseudonym ‘Parallax,’ published a pamphlet titled ‘Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe’ in 1849.” “This publication laid the groundwork for the modern belief that the Earth is flat,” they write.It took the internet, though, for the idea to really take off. The first website dedicated to spreading the gospel of the flat Earth appears to have turned up in 2004, three years after the Flat Earth Society had already disbanded, and since then it’s gone from strength to strength. Quote-unquote “proofs” of the supposed pancake-like nature of the planet abound on YouTube; there are dedicated subreddits and websites pushing the mythology; there have even been a few spurious celebrity endorsements over the years.And with this new frontier came a change in how the conspiracy was disseminated, Venturini and his colleagues discovered. What was once a mythology at least nominally supported by an attempt at scientific reasoning has now morphed into a virulent anti-scientific meme – and that is likely to make debunking it ever harder, the team predicts.And when Rowbotham first presented his unorthodox idea, he made a real go at proving it. He carried out a series of experiments along 6 miles (10 kilometers) of the Old Bedford River in Cambridgeshire, England – an artificial waterway, chosen for its lengthy and extremely straight path, as well as the stillness of the water within.“If the earth is a globe, and is 25,000 English statute miles in circumference, the surface of all standing water must have a certain degree of convexity – every part must be an arc of a circle,” he wrote, correctly. “From the summit of any such arc there will exist a curvature or declination of 8 inches in the first statute mile. In the second mile the fall will be 32 inches; in the third mile, 72 inches, or 6 feet […] after the first few miles the curvature would be so great that no difficulty could exist in detecting either its actual existence or its proportion,” he concluded, incorrectly.Rowbotham’s problem was that he had not accounted for atmospheric refraction – as a highly-publicized redo in 1870 by naturalist and qualified surveyor Alfred Russel Wallace made clear. Of course, that didn’t stop believers. “[Rowbotham’s] growing following led to the formation of the Universal Zetetic Society, which aimed to investigate and propagate the belief in a flat Earth,” the paper notes; even after his death, others like William Carpenter picked up the mantle, authoring books with titles like One Hundred Proofs the Earth is not a Globe in an attempt to “prove” their ideas were correct.And over the next century and a half – and despite a few setbacks such as “literal photographic evidence that the Earth is a ball” – the Flat Earth Society “maintained an unwavering commitment to its core principles,” Venturini and colleagues write, “centered on the provision of empirical evidence to substantiate its theories, and actively participating in debates with the scientific establishment.”In other words: they’re wrong, but they’re trying.But while pseudoscientific ideas like this may rule the older, more traditional Flat Earth forums, the modern age has ushered in a new and aggressive form of debate – the anti-science approach.Amply typified by the discourse on Reddit’s r/flatearthsociety, anti-scientific arguments are – well, very much arguments: there is “a high presence of critical and oppositional voices, including mockers or haters who intervene in threads as trolls,” the paper notes, which “makes the communication atmosphere tense and reactive.” Discussions are characterized by “ad hominem attacks, cursing, and personal offenses” along with “a profound diffidence and skepticism also against any internal hierarchy.”Countering anti-science can be difficult precisely because the “debates” are so charged and vague: “the conversational style is simplistic and vague, characterized by highly ambiguous statements, open-ended terms, tongue-in-cheek allusions and vague empirical correlates, which all lend themselves to ex-post reinterpretation according to needs,” the authors write. People who accept the oblate spheroid nature of the Earth are labeled “Globetards”, and extreme paranoia, even about fellow Flat Earthers, is encouraged – even celebrated. “The goal of the conversation is not to establish truth as an intersubjective compromise, but to hammer one’s truth to everyone else through a hyper-simplified logic,” the paper explains. “For example [with] the recurrent claim about photos: ‘Pictures are not valid evidence.’”What can we do about it?Okay, so a few people have some bizarre ideas about the shape of the planet – so what? But what’s behind it is precisely the same kind of conspiratorial thinking that has led to climate change denial, anti-vaxxers, and Pizzagate.“Maybe 10 or 20 years ago, I would have said, just laugh at them, how much traction are they going to get? I no longer feel that way,” Lee McIntyre, a philosopher from Boston University and an expert in the phenomenon of science denial, told Physics World in 2020. “The sort of reasoning that they use is infectious and if you don’t push back against them, it just gets worse and they’re able to recruit new members,” he warned.So, it’s in our best interest to counter this kind of thinking when we see it. But how?Well, it depends on what you’re faced with. “For a long time, conspiratorial thinking tended to abide by a scientific style – which did not make it easier to counteract, but at least we knew […] what we should do.”Indeed, countering pseudoscience is fairly straightforward: “It's probably best counteracted by debunking – by fact checking what they're saying,” Venturini told IFLScience. “Because they are at least claiming the argument is accurate scientifically. So it makes sense to fact check, and show that it is not the case.”It’s not a guaranteed slam-dunk, he cautioned – there are always those who will dig their heels in deeper, or turn up some obscure not-yet-discredited paper or professor to back up their claims. “But there are other people that may say, well, if we are if we are discussing on this level – the level of scientific arguments and demonstration – then one side can provide the best argument, and the best demonstration.”Unfortunately, those are precisely the tactics that will fail hardest against anti-science arguments. “Anti-science is precisely saying ‘don't trust this type of argument,’” Venturini explained – rather, anti-scientists are more likely to make jokes or memes to support their point.Countering it, then “depends on the precise type of anti-science,” Venturini told IFLScience. The key, however, seems to be to meet them on their own terms – don’t try to rationalize them out of the argument, because let’s face it: they certainly weren’t rationalized into it.“For example, if I write a poem about the Flat Earth, it doesn't really make sense to answer with a mathematical demonstration,” Venturini told IFLScience. “If I'm making a joke about the fact that the earth is flat, [don’t] answer ‘well, but look at these measurements.”“What you should say,” he advised, “is that this is bad. This is bad poetry [and] the joke’s not funny.”The paper is published in the journal New Media & Society.

A spade-toothed whale, the world’s rarest whale species, has been found washed ashore on a beach in Otago, New Zealand, one of only six specimens to have ever been documented.While marine mammal strandings are relatively common in New Zealand – there are around 85 per year – when experts from the Department of Conservation (DOC) and The Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa turned up to investigate reports of a dead, beached whale near the small fishing village of Taieri Mouth on July 4, what they saw may not be common at all.They believe the 5-meter-long (16-foot) male beaked whale to be the rarest whale species of them all – a spade-toothed whale.Beaked whales are fairly elusive as it is, as they typically swim fast and deep and don’t make such a prominent spout compared to other types of whale when breathing at the water’s surface.Spade-toothed whales, however, really do take the rarity biscuit – only six specimens, including this latest find, have ever been recorded. While its identity still needs to be confirmed via DNA testing, if all goes as expected, this makes the male that washed up in Otago a particularly significant find.“Spade-toothed whales are one of the most poorly known large mammalian species of modern times,” said DOC Coastal Otago Operations Manager Gabe Davies in a statement. “Since the 1800s, only six samples have ever been documented worldwide, and all but one of these was from New Zealand. From a scientific and conservation point of view, this is huge.”Until 2010, the species had only ever been known from skeletal remains found in New Zealand and Chile, with scientists using these to declare the spade-toothed whale as a brand-new species back in 1874.The first intact specimens of a mother and calf were then discovered in 2010, with another single specimen following in 2017, finally allowing researchers to properly describe the species’ color pattern.While much of what there is to know about the spade-toothed whale is likely to remain a mystery until we see one alive, the freshness of this latest specimen might provide the first-ever opportunity for dissection, which could provide all kinds of insights into its biology.Having already taken samples to get genetic confirmation of its identity, the whale has since been placed in cold storage. It’ll be kept here until decisions have been made about how to best move forward – this might take a while, said Davies, given the potential importance of the discovery.The DOC are also working with Te Rnanga tākou as part of this process. “It is important to ensure appropriate respect for this taoka is shown through the shared journey of learning, applying mātauraka Māori as we discover more about this rare species,” concluded Te Rnanga takou chair Nadia Wesley-Smith.

A day after an assassination attempt on former US President Donald Trump, a prophecy video (see below) has been going viral. A self-styled Christian pastor, Brandon Biggs had predicted the assassination bid on Trump four months ago and its accuracy has shocked the people. Brandon Biggs, a pastor did an interview four months ago during which he spoke about how he saw an assassination attempt on Donald Trump. Four months later, an attack did happen on the Republican Presidential candidate and Biggs’ prediction have come true, word-by-word. The video that is going viral is an interview which was released on March 15, 2024 and at 11:06 minutes, prophet Brandon Biggs talks about the assassination bid on the former US President. In his words, “Then I saw an attempt on his life… this bullet flew by his ear and it came so close to his head that it busted his ear drum.” He further said, “And I saw he fell to his knees during this time frame and he started worshipping the Lord; he got radically born during this time.” The pastor went on to say that he saw Trump winning the presidency; however this is yet to be ascertained because the US Presidential Elections will take place on November 5, 2024. The post Prophet predicted an assassination attempt on Trump months ago appeared first on Anomalien.com.