The Gaslighting Over Kamala as Border Czar Has Begun

As Elvis famously crooned: “Wise men say, ‘only fools rush in.’ But I can’t help falling in love with you.” It’s both a romantic song and, according to a new study, a massive red flag – as it turns out that “rushing in” to love may correlate with a higher chance of infidelity in relationships.With the exception of aromantic folks or the extremely unlucky, most of us will “fall in love” at least once in our lives. The process and experience is different for everyone: for some of us, it’s a gradual and rare realization; for others, it’s an immediate and passionate rush. However it comes to you, though, so far appears to be something of a unique character trait – one that researchers have come to know as “emophilia”.“Important individual differences when falling in love pertain to how easily (i.e., how rapidly) and often (i.e., how many times) one falls in love,” explains the study. “These two factors (i.e., how easily and often) reflect one intercorrelated phenomenon, which [is] denote[d] emophilia.”“The two factors of emophilia (i.e., easily and often) are […] normally collapsed into one dimension, due to the high correlation between them,” it adds.So far so good – but it’s important to note at this point that not everyone is convinced that “emophilia” is a real thing. In fact, the researchers themselves went into the new study with a healthy dose of skepticism: “The research on emophilia that has been conducted is quite limited, with few studies, all of which are conducted by or in collaboration with [social psychologist Daniel] Jones,” they point out in the paper, “and most of them include North American samples.”“Given the replication crisis in psychology, it is important that findings are supported by separate studies,” they write. “Further, cross-cultural studies are needed to establish emophilia as a universal trait.”The new study does go a little way towards remedying this, being carried out among Norwegian and Swedish volunteers rather than Americans or Canadians. It’s a variable that might have proven crucial to proving the existence – or otherwise – of the phenomenon, as “love”, and our ideas around the concept, are known to be dependent on culture. Consider the popular idea, for example, that romantic love should go hand-in-hand with friendship and comfort – characterizations that one 2011 study says are virtually unknown in, say, Russia or Lithuania, where “love” was suggested to be conceptualized more as a temporary "fairytale" than in American participants.Basically, before the researchers could start investigating whether emophilia was linked to infidelity, they first had to make sure it was actually a thing for everybody, rather than just being a quirk of North Americans. So, using newspaper ads, they recruited more than 2,600 study participants and sent out online surveys measuring romantic information, personality traits including the “dark triad” and “big five” clusters, and levels of emophilia.The latter category was investigated using the Emotional Promiscuity Scale, or EPS: a “two-factored scale [that] measures how often and easily a person falls in love,” the researchers explain. The first result was encouraging: a quick statistical analysis of the EPS responses confirmed that it’s a pretty reliable measure for emophilia.That checked, the team moved on to investigating the links, if any, between emophilia and other personality traits. For all you hopeless romantics out there, the results may be reassuring: while emophilia had a small positive correlation with Machiavellianism and psychopathy, and a slightly stronger one with narcissism, it was also had a small positive correlation with positive traits like extraversion, agreeableness, and openness.The main question, though, was how emophilia affects your love life – specifically, is it positively associated with a person’s number of romantic relationships and times being unfaithful? The answer appears to be yes.As the team points out, this may not be surprising. “The tendency to fall in love easily and often […] might lead the individual to engage in new romantic relationships more frequently,” they write, while “falling in love easily and often may also explain emophilia’s association with unfaithfulness, as it may lead the individual to develop romantic feelings toward someone outside their relationship.” It’s depressing news for those who love love – but don’t lose heart just yet. Because of the way the study was conducted – being cross-sectional, and based entirely on self-reporting – it’s impossible to say for sure that emophilia causes infidelity or higher numbers of relationships. Indeed, as the researchers themselves point out, it could be precisely the opposite.“It might be that instead of emophilia causing the number of relationships/affairs, the direction could be opposite, in which scores on emophilia were at least in part a consequence of the number of relationships/affairs,” they suggest. “One can reason that those who have been in many relationships, and/or cheated many times, might reason in hindsight that they might also have been in love many times, as it is common, and it is probably more socially desirable, to view relationship formation/cheating as being related to love.”The study is published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology. 

Popular culture is full of scientific myths. No, the average person does not only use ten percent of their brain; sugar doesn’t make kids hyperactive; and your hair and fingernails don’t continue growing after you die. But there’s one in particular which, on the face of it, seems to have at least some scientific basis: the idea that men can tell when women are ovulating by their scent. It’s an idea that seems to pop up every decade or so. Here’s a study from 2020 that supports it, for example; here’s one from 2009 saying the same. Another study, this time from 2004, reiterates the idea;  here’s one from 2001 suggesting it’s true; you can even go all the way back to 1975 and find papers still saying the same thing. Men, it seems, can smell fertility in women.But just how accurate is this factoid? According to the results of a new study, potentially not very: “Using frequent odor samples from the same women and hormonal assessment of fertility, we assessed potential fertility-related shifts in axillary body odor in a twofold study combining perceptual and chemical evidence,” write the authors. “Overall, there was no compelling evidence that female fertility positively affects male odor ratings.”In fact, not only can men probably not pick up on the changes in a woman’s scent throughout her menstrual cycle, but those changes may not even exist at all: “The chemical composition of a woman’s axillary odor was not affected by her current fertile state,” the team discovered, or her "fluctuating ovarian hormone level.” All of this adds up to the question: where did this notion ever come from?Well, one clue may be in the methodology of this study versus previous research. “In most studies, men assessed fertility information of one woman over her cycle, thus simulating repeated encounters with the same woman,” the authors explain. In contrast, the new study “aimed to investigate whether men are able to detect female fertility from a single encounter.”To that end, the male participants in the study were given 24 odor samples to rate over two separate sessions. No man received a sample from the same woman twice; the samples were distributed completely randomly, and rotated around the room systematically until every man had sniffed every woman.And the results, if anything, showed precisely the opposite of what you’d expect. “In contrast to our predictions, axillary odor was descriptively evaluated as both less attractive and less pleasant at higher conception risk,” the authors noted – though the effect was very weak. Overall, they concluded, “we found no compelling indication that men’s perception of female axillary odors varies with female fertility.”But another reason for the discrepancy between previous studies and the new paper is even more basic. “The majority of [prior] evidence lacks a direct assessment of female reproductive hormones, reliable hormonal confirmation of ovulation and depicts considerable inconsistencies in estimating the fertile window,” the authors point out – or to put it another way: nobody actually checked if the women really were ovulating when they thought they were.This paper, on the other hand, confirmed where in their fertility cycle female participants were via both urinary and saliva samples. Not only that, but the team utilized cutting-edge technology to objectively evaluate the women’s aromas: “Chemical profiles of women’s axillary odor, measured with gas chromatography–mass spectrometry […] were used to assess whether changes in the abundance of chemical compounds occur in association with female fertility,” they explain. Combine all this with the well-documented publication bias against null effects – that is to say, people aren’t that interested in reading studies that don’t tell them weird things like “men can smell when you’re ovulating” – and it basically adds up to a never-ending circle of confirmation bias. So, it may be true that men can subconsciously tell when a woman is ovulating – but not an unfamiliar woman, and not by her scent alone. All in all, the most we can conclude is “more research needed” – including, as the team points out, revisiting some of the old results that got us here in the first place.“We are certainly still at the beginning of understanding the physiological interaction between the gradual fluctuations in fertility and ovarian hormones across the ovulatory cycle and women’s body odor,” the paper concludes. “We strongly encourage further disentangling the physiological basis as well as the social function of olfactory cues to female fertility in humans with the robust methods we have at hand.”The study is published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences.

On Tuesday, CNN Newsroom host Jim Acosta brought on political analyst Van Jones, who had a lot of praise to give Vice President Kamala Harris following President Joe Biden’s endorsement of her campaign. Jones described Kamala as a “winner,” a “heartbeat of hope,” and claimed she’s had the best 48 hours in American political history. Acosta began the segment by asking Jones if he thought Donald Trump would “be able to siphon off enough black men to perhaps make a difference” in the upcoming presidential race.     Jones listed several “African American women who are the pillars of the Democratic Party” and stated: They touch people, they counsel people, they help people, and they orchestrated and engineered this outcome, not because Kamala is a black woman, but because they could not see the Democratic Party in disarray and they want to make sure that if there's going to be a loose ball, it landed in the most capable hands. Jones tried to explain that Kamala would be successful as president because she is “someone who's won as district attorney, someone who's won as attorney general, someone who's won as senator, someone who's won as vice president. A winner who has delivered over and over again.” Harris won her race for attorney general in deep blue California by less than one point. Yet, Jones continued, “But then what happened was, nobody necessarily predicted, was we spent three weeks sitting outside the ICU with a death watch for democracy. Watching what would happen after that debate if Donald Trump were able to get back in the White House and it was terrifying.” Portraying Harris as a savior, Jones exclaimed, “Then suddenly a crack open of hope. One little heartbeat of hope. Kamala Harris raising her hand and saying, ‘I'll take care of this’ and you saw an explosion of support and energy.” Jones declared that “young people have taken over TikTok for Kamala Harris” and have made it a “Kamala mania.” He made one last push for Harris as he concluded: This will go down in history as the most successful political effort over a 48-hour period in the history of the United States. There has never been -- there has never been an effort that secured the nomination this quickly, money this quickly, enthusiasm this quickly, it took over pop culture this quickly, and we are on day two of Kamala Harris. Harris also dropped out of the 2020 Primary before Iowa, so perhaps Jones should take it easy. Click "Expand" to view the transcript: CNN Newsroom 7/23/2024 10:04:25 2 minutes 28 seconds JIM ACOSTA:  Yeah and Van, I do want to ask you about this call and the importance of it as well, because I mean, one of the things that a lot of us were talking about before the big shakeup at the top of the Democratic ticket was whether or not Donald Trump was going to be able to siphon off enough black men to perhaps make a difference in that race had it been Joe Biden versus Donald Trump. Has that changed now? How do you make the case that that should change? VAN JONES: Well, I think it's changing and I think that a couple of things are likely to happen. First of all, you know, when you talk about a Donna Brazile, a Karen Finney, a Jotaka Eaddy. These are African American women who are the pillars of the Democratic Party. They do the hard work that nobody sees. They touch people, they counsel people, they help people, and they orchestrated and engineered this outcome, not because Kamala is a black woman, but because they could not see the Democratic Party in disarray and they want to make sure that if there's going to be a loose ball it landed in the most capable hands. Someone who's won as district attorney, someone who's won as attorney general, someone who's won as senator, someone who's won as vice president, a winner who has delivered over and over again. So they engineered the football getting into the right hands and that was the first step. But then what happened was nobody necessarily predicted, was we spent three weeks sitting outside the ICU with a death watch for democracy watching what would happen after that debate if Donald Trump were able to get back in the White House and it was terrifying. It was 2025. It was this horrible speech that he gave. And then suddenly a crack open of hope. One little heartbeat of hope. Kamala Harris raising her hand and saying I'll take care of this and you saw an explosion of support and energy. You know black folks are getting a lot of credit of course, but you have young people who have taken over TikTok for Kamala Harris. You have KamalaMania on Tiktok. You have suburban women who are breathing a sigh of relief. You have a whole – and you have black men taking a different look at the Democratic Party.

We love a good roguelike here at PCGamesN. The infinite replayability, mechanical randomness that makes you think on your feet, and solid gameplay loops are all stalwarts of the genre, but some developers take time to make it all work. Balatro might’ve come out of the gate swinging this year, but contemporaries like Hades 2, Dead Cells, and Enter the Gungeon, are much slower burns. Steam Early Access is perfect for drip-feeding mechanics and listening to player feedback, and this is no more true for Tales and Tactics. Inspired by Slay the Spire and Teamfight Tactics, this early access game is finally, after a long 12 months, coming out in full. Continue reading The Slay the Spire styled Tales and Tactics finally hits 1.0 on Steam MORE FROM PCGAMESN: Best indie games, Best roguelike games, Best autobattler games

Warframe, the free-to-play multiplayer shooter by Digital Extremes first released in 2013, is getting a comprehensive expansion titled 1999. The studios goal to include a romance system is finally coming to fruition within this update and the team is thankful to Baldurs Gate 3 for the extra nudge to get it done.

Moore to the Point - Coup-Contrecoup

In addition to iOS and Android mobile devices, the GameSir G8 Plus works with the Nintendo Switch. | Image: GameSir GameSir’s latest mobile controller has an added bonus — it also works with the Nintendo Switch. In addition to turning iOS and Android smartphones into handheld consoles not dependent on finicky touchscreen controls, the new GameSir G8 Plus can replace the Switch’s Joy-Cons with more ergonomic alternatives that will never succumb to joystick drift. Unlike many clamp-on gaming controllers for mobile devices that physically connect through a USB-C or Lightning port, the GameSir G8 Plus uses Bluetooth. That’s what allows it to connect to smartphones, tablets, the Switch, and even PCs without requiring users to pick a version with a specific connector. The tradeoff is that the gamepad relies on a pair of 500mAh rechargeable batteries. That... Continue reading…

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge Google is bringing a handful of new features to its Google Play store on Android today. There are new categorized “collections” that highlight content from apps you’ve already installed. The company’s rewards program is adding more prizes including Pixel hardware. Google’s Play Pass subscription service is introducing more versatile gaming capabilities. And in Japan, Google is rolling out a curated space for comics, which will let people dive into first chapter previews without needing to install third-party apps first. Taken together, these changes are intended to make Google Play “an end-to-end experience that’s more than a store.” The company previewed some of the latest updates at a media briefing in New York City on Tuesday. Google... Continue reading…

The iPhone 16 is just around the corner, and we keep seeing new reports about the future of the iPhone 17. However, analyst Ming-Chi Kuo is years ahead as he just revealed an important change that may be coming to the iPhone supply chain in 2026. According to the leaker, the iPhone 18 could ditch Sony as Apple's CIS supplier for Samsung. In a post on X, Kuo says the iPhone 18 will adopt a new 1/2.6-inch 48MP ultra-wide CMOS image sensor made by Samsung. If that turns out to be accurate, it would mean Samsung would break the years-long Sony monopoly in producing camera sensors for the iPhone. At the moment, it's unclear what benefits this change could bring, but it would be a major victory for Samsung. Besides that, we also know some display rumors for this upcoming iPhone, as display analyst Ross Young shared an iPhone roadmap until 2027. Previously, he said the iPhone 17 would feature under-panel Face ID. However, this technology has been pushed for the 2026 iPhone 18 Pro. Cupertino has been reportedly working on this technology for at least since the iPhone 15 Pro when it was revealed that OTI Lumiotics was trying to secure under-panel Face ID orders. With that, it’s possible that the TrueDepth sensor might not be working as expected when added below the OLED display. Still, even though Apple might not tweak the design of the iPhone 17 Pro models, Young expects the company to add a low-temperature polycrystalline oxide display to all 2025 models. This means Always-On Display is still scheduled for the regular iPhone 17 models, making it more similar to the Pro iterations. That said, this is the new iPhone roadmap from now until 2027: iPhone Pro: 2024: Pill shape 2025: Pill shape 2026: Under panel Face ID: + hole 2027: Under panel face ID + under panel camera Regular iPhone: 2024: Pill shape without AOD and ProMotion 2025: Pill shape with AOD and ProMotion 2026: Pill shape with AOD and ProMotion 2027: Under panel Face ID + hole with AOD and ProMotion Don't Miss: iPhone 16: Rumors, release date, A18, AI, Capture button, and more The post iPhone 18 camera sensor rumor would be a major victory for Samsung appeared first on BGR. Today's Top Deals Exclusive deal: GEEKOM Mini PC IT12 is 15% off in this post-Prime Day sale Best Fire TV Stick deals for July 2024 7 ECOVACS Prime Day deals to save money on the ultimate robot vacuums & mops eufy Smart Lock C33 is the lock I’ve been searching for, and it’s $99.99 ahead of Prime Day