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I used Gmail wrong for years, here's the setup that actually works

My routine was basic. I would open my inbox, scroll through dozens of emails, delete promotional messages, star important conversations, and leave everything else sitting there until I needed it again. Recently, I…

Small Phones Have Vanished. Enough Phone Wants to Bring Them Back

Choose between stock Android or an anti-distraction operating system. Courtesy of Enough Phone Do you hate the size of modern-day smartphones ? Wonder why Apple stopped manufacturing iPhone Minis ? Turned off by the…

Arrival is 10 years old. This first-contact film is as brilliant as ever

That isn’t a blessing we’re often afforded. More remarkable still is that each of the four films he has released in this period has been a success – and his fifth, the final part of the Dune trilogy, out this December…

If every ship were taken out of the water, would sea levels change?

This means that a ship with a total mass of 100,000 tonnes displaces 100,000 tonnes of seawater, equivalent to about 97,560 cubic metres, given a seawater density of approximately 1.025 tonnes per cubic metre. The ship…

Why don’t dogs look up when a low-flying plane passes overhead? Part 6

Hubel and Wiesel worked extensively on kittens, finding that if certain visual cues were removed from a kitten’s environment in the period when the animal’s brain was wiring its visual pathways, it wouldn’t be able to…

Why do people look better in a mirror than in a photograph? Part 3

A photograph shows your face without mirroring, and it can be unfamiliar and surprising with the two sides of your face swapped. Advertisement Of course, you could always spend a lot of time looking at photographs of…

A dyslexia diagnosis can help struggling children, but what about the rest?

Today, of course, we are much more enlightened – now we label many of these children as “dyslexic”. But perhaps this label is still a bad idea. Picture two 9-year-olds reading at the level of an average 6-year-old. One…

The DNA is backwards on The Selfish Gene’s cover – again

We have been here on the back pages for many years, endlessly pushing a boulder up a hill and trying to take joy in the effort. This means, every so often, we are forced to repeat ourselves – because the world repeats…

This week’s new questions

To answer a question or ask a new one, email lastword@newscientist.com Advertisement To answer this question – or ask a new one – email lastword@newscientist.com . Questions should be scientific enquiries about everyday…

Global data breaches jump 13% as UK leaks more than double — and Ukraine rockets up the rankings

The UK overtook France as Europe's most breached country, while Ukraine jumped from 47th to 6th globally. The US still accounts for almost a third of all leaks, and experts say limiting what you share is your best…