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Spring is the time of year when my friends remember what a strange job I have, because a stripy insect has just appeared in their kitchen and they are panicking. “It’s huge!” one squeals. “Help! What do I do? I swear it’s that murder hornet I saw on social media.”

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The current UK government and its recent predecessors have shown a reluctance to encourage and enable lifestyle changes that reduce our collective demand for energy.

In 2023, the World Health Organization declared loneliness and social isolation as a pressing health threat. This crisis is driving millions to seek companionship from artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots.

Approximately 170,000 people die every day around the world – that’s around 62 million deaths in 2024 alone. The cumulative effect of this has led to what has been termed a “burial crisis”, with most urban areas where burial remains the norm expected to run out of interment space by…

The Burren region of County Clare, Ireland, is famous for its distinctive limestone habitat, coastal landscape, rich wildlife and unusual archaeology. Several hundred farmers also manage livestock on this land.

As the planet gets hotter and freshwater sources dry up, cities and towns will not be able to continue the global norm of using millions of litres of clean, drinkable water to flush toilets. South Africa’s Water Research Commission recently commissioned a study into using seawater to flush toilets in…

If you’re a young person today, you’ve probably felt the sting of being called lazy, or caught yourself wondering if you are. Do you sometimes feel guilty when not being productive, or find yourself pretending to be busy?

Congress may soon consider whether to cut spending on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the main way the government helps low-income Americans put food on the table. The Conversation U.S. asked Tracy Roof, a political scientist who has researched the history of government nutrition programs, to explain what’s going on…