Being hairless on top has never been in style, but r/bald members encourage one another in the face of insecurity

I was sitting in a cafe a few weeks ago when I overheard a rare bit of sunny talk about advances in medicine and technology when a woman said: “Nobody will be bald in the future.” The way she said it made me think of people in the 1950s imagining the 21st century as a world with flying cars, sassy robot maids and no wars; a world where everybody has hair on their heads is possible.

Bald has never exactly been in style, but these days, it feels like going bald is tougher than ever. It can feel lonely watching all those clumps fall out when you’re in the shower. Yes, there have been plenty of advances in hair restoration, and treatments have been proven to help some people avoid getting to the point where they need a doctor to surgically redistribute the follicles from the back to the front of their heads. But it won’t work for everybody, and people will still lose their hair as long as genetics and hormones have a say.

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‘The first resident that Emma – a social robot – was introduced to was called Peter. After that, Emma assumed they were all called Peter, which everyone found hilarious. Then she broke down’

One morning in July 2025, I arrived in the small, quiet town of Albershausen in south-west Germany. It has only around 4,000 inhabitants. I went to visit a care home where they were piloting a social robot named Emma. A group of residents sat in a circle while Emma stood in the middle. She’s the height of a toddler, with big googly eyes, and was wearing a red hat knitted for her by one of the careworkers. The first resident she was introduced to was called Peter and, after he introduced himself, Emma assumed they were all called Peter, which everyone found hilarious. Then Emma broke down suddenly and the illusion was shattered.

Later on, Emma was working again, and I found her in the dining room with Waltraud, the resident in this photo. It was a calmer, more focused moment. I decided to sit them across from one another at eye level, Waltraud facing Emma. There was a soft light in the room and they both seemed very present with one another. There are also paradoxes in the picture: the large windows showing the landscape outside, contrasting with the inside, which is ordered and clinical. In the middle you have an encounter between an elderly woman and a machine designed for companionship. They began speaking about picking flowers, about their favourite flowers – Waltraud is passionate about them, and Emma has an endless amount of knowledge due to her artificial intelligence. She can remember past conversations and recognise faces, too.

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Economic body found Britain had the biggest increase in ‘tax wedge’ out of 38 member nations last year

• Business live – latest updates

Taxes on workers in Britain rose at the fastest rate among the world’s richest economies last year, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

With Labour under pressure on the economy amid the Iran war, the OECD said a key measure of the total tax paid by workers and their employers rose by the most in the 38-member club of rich nations in 2025.

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Exclusive: Formby, an ally of Jeremy Corbyn who quit role in 2020, says Labour is now ‘in hock to corporate sponsors’

• UK politics live – latest updates

A former Labour general secretary has defected to the Green party, in the latest sign that allies of Jeremy Corbyn are moving in large numbers to Zack Polanski’s party.

Jennie Formby, who managed the Labour party from 2018 to 2020, told the Guardian she had signed up as a Green party member and intended to campaign for it before May’s local elections.

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• Brighton was fifth straight league defeat without scoring

• Interim head coach expected if Rosenior departs

Chelsea are holding a review after a defeat at Brighton that has left Liam Rosenior on the brink of losing his job.

Although club sources have stressed it is standard for debriefs to take place the day after a game, key discussions are taking place at Cobham and a managerial change for the second time this season appears likely. Rosenior, appointed as head coach in January after the departure of Enzo Maresca, has overseen five successive defeats in the Premier League and there are growing concerns that support for him in the dressing room is draining away.

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The civil servant says he was pressured by No 10 to get Mandelson’s vetting done; the PM says he wasn’t informed. Who emerges most damaged?

Do you have an opinion on the issues raised in this article? If you would like to submit a response of up to 300 words by email to be considered for publication in our letters section, please click here.

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Het beschermt ons tegen schadelijke straling vanuit de ruimte en zorgt ervoor dat de naald van ons kompas altijd naar het noorden wijst: het aardmagnetisch veld maakt leven op…

U schreef ons over een andere manier van kijken naar Eftelingkunst, het asielbeleid en de gelijkheid tussen man en vrouw.

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

Thomas Hawk posted a photo:

LONDEN (ANP/RTR) - De brandstofprijzen zijn ook in het Verenigd Koninkrijk fors gestegen. Het gaat om de grootste stijging sinds juni 2022, kort nadat Rusland Oekraïne was binnengevallen. Dat meldt statistiekbureau ONS, de Britse evenknie van het CBS.

De brandstofprijzen stegen in maart met 8,7 procent. Volgens het bureau is dit ook de belangrijkste reden waarom de inflatie is gestegen. De inflatie in het Verenigd Koninkrijk kwam in maart uit op 3,3 procent. Dat is een lichte stijging ten opzichte van de 3 procent in februari.

De Bank of England waarschuwt dat de oorlog in het Midden-Oosten zou kunnen leiden tot een aanhoudend hoge inflatie in het land, maar lijkt vooralsnog de rente niet te verhogen.

We worden als ouders aangespoord om onvoorwaardelijk lief te hebben, veel te prijzen en weinig te verbieden. Maar juist daar schuilen drie opvoedingsfouten die kinderen niet sterker, maar kwetsbaarder en narcistischer kunnen maken: overdreven lof, voorwaardelijke liefde en het ontbreken van duidelijke grenzen.

Narcisme is geen modewoord uit sociale media, maar een ernstige persoonlijkheidsstoornis die wordt gekenmerkt door extreme zelfgerichtheid, hunkering naar bewondering en een schrijnend tekort aan empathie. Naast aanleg speelt opvoeding een grote rol bij het ontstaan van narcistische trekken, benadrukt de Duitse psychologe Christine Geschke in een recent interview. Zij wijst drie goedbedoelde maar riskante patronen aan die in veel huiskamers voorkomen: kinderen voortdurend ophemelen, liefde koppelen aan prestaties en geen consequente grenzen stellen.

De eerste fout is overmatige bewondering en verwennen: elk tekeningetje is “geniaal”, elk optreden “het beste ooit”. Kinderen leren dan dat ze vooral geliefd zijn omdat ze uitzonderlijk en beter dan anderen zouden zijn, niet om wie ze gewoon zijn. Dat kan leiden tot een opgeblazen zelfbeeld en een sterke claimcultuur: later in relaties en op het werk verwachten ze bewondering zonder dat daar evenveel inzet tegenover staat.

De tweede fout lijkt het tegenovergestelde, maar werkt vergelijkbaar destructief: emotionele kilte en liefde die alleen geldt bij goed gedrag of hoge cijfers. Kinderen die structureel te weinig warmte ervaren, proberen het gat te vullen met externe bevestiging – status, succes, likes – of gaan juist extreem negatief gedrag vertonen om tenminste íéts van aandacht af te dwingen.

Derde fout: een opvoeding zonder duidelijke grenzen of gevolgen. Een kind dat zelden “nee” hoort en nooit consequenties ondervindt, leert niet dat eigen gedrag impact heeft op anderen. Het risico is een volwassene die zich altijd in zijn recht waant, slecht tegen tegenspraak kan en moeite heeft met samenleven in een egalitaire omgeving.

Samen schetsen deze drie patronen een ongemakkelijke conclusie: niet alleen tekortschietende liefde, maar óók verkeerd vormgegeven liefde kan kinderen kwetsbaar maken voor narcistische trekken. De uitdaging voor ouders is dus niet méér liefde of méér vrijheid, maar een volwassen mix van realistische waardering, emotionele beschikbaarheid en heldere grenzen. In een tijd waarin het kind steeds vaker middelpunt van het gezin is, wordt het misschien wel de grootste daad van liefde om het níet steeds in het centrum te zetten.

NASA's Curiosity rover has identified a diverse set of organic molecules on Mars, including a nitrogen-bearing compound similar in structure to DNA precursors. The finding strengthens the case that ancient organic material can survive in the Martian subsurface, though it does not prove past life because the compounds could also come from geology or meteorites. Phys.org reports: The study was led by Amy Williams, Ph.D., a professor of geological sciences at the University of Florida and a scientist on the Curiosity and Perseverance Mars rover missions. Curiosity landed on Mars in 2012 to find evidence that ancient Mars had conditions that could support microbial life billions of years ago; the Perseverance rover, which landed in 2021, was sent to look for signs of any ancient life that might have formed.

Among the 20-plus chemicals identified by the experiment, Curiosity spotted a nitrogen-bearing molecule with a structure similar to DNA precursors -- a chemical never before spotted on Mars. The rover also identified benzothiophene, a large, double-ringed, sulfurous chemical often delivered to planets by meteorites. "The same stuff that rained down on Mars from meteorites is what rained down on Earth, and it probably provided the building blocks for life as we know it on our planet," Williams said. The findings have been published in the journal Nature Communications.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

DirtyGlassEye has added a photo to the pool:

Manipulation of light often gets a bit more complicated in some spots. In this instance, natural light is coming in from the lip of the cave which is just around the bit and you can see it reflecting off the rock's wet surfaces and the pacific water coming in. The shadows take hold around the corner and it 0 natural brightness takes hold past that, leaving people like us to install man made light to illuminate the inner cave walls.
For how little space there was to operate down here in the Sagamiko sea caves, I was only to find a lot of compositions. I had my tripod out the whole time but to get that next cave I had to jut out more, so on one of the walkways next to the inflow, I held my camera out over the railing to get this field of view (not to fret, I had a strong strap). If I recall, the light on the room I was in changed a bit, the colored lights in the next room definitely did, so I'm glad I got a regular yellow light to highlight the black and orange wall in a certain mood.
In editing my first step was ofcourse to raise the shadows and saturation. Some of the highlights on the outer room were blown out so I toned them down so they didn't stand out, and the inner walls had more clarity.

Jamelle Bouie on the truly unprecedented open corruption of the Trump regime. I’ve found it useful to think of DJT’s 2nd term primarily as a heist: a theft of money & power from the American people by a con man who finally found the perfect score.