Niraj Chokshi

According to a new study, people find even the most groan-inducing one-liners funnier when they are paired with a laugh track. And the type of laughter matters, too: A joke seems even funnier when accompanied by laughter that seems genuine rather than forced.

“If there’s a laugh there, you can’t ignore it,” said Prof. Sophie Scott, the incoming director of the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience at the University College London and one of the authors of the study.

Take this zinger: “What does a dinosaur use to pay bills? Tyrannosaurus checks.”

Participants in the study, published Monday in the journal Current Biology, gave that joke an average rating of about 2 on a 7-point scale, with higher scores awarded to funnier jokes. The average rating increased to more than 2.5 when paired with forced laughter, and to more than three with genuine laughter.

The pattern held for dozens of other one-liners, too.

How do billboards talk? Sign language.

To test the perceived humor of the jokes, researchers at University College London hired a professional comedian to create recordings of 40 jokes, selected for mediocrity to leave room for the possibility that laughter could improve their ratings. Separately, they recorded six adults laughing on command as well as in response to something that each found genuinely funny.

The researchers first established a baseline by asking 20 college students to score each joke without any laughter present. (For reference, “What is the best day to cook? Fry‐day” earned a rating of just under 2.5, and “What state has the smallest drinks? Mini‐soda” earned just under 3.)

What did the hammer say to his homeboys? Nailed it.

Then, the researchers presented more than 70 adults with the same jokes, accompanied by recordings of either forced or genuine laughter.

The researchers included about two dozen adults with autism in the second group, offering an opportunity to measure whether there were any differences in how people with autism process laughter, as previous studies have suggested. Laughter had the same effect on joke ratings among all participants, the study found, although those with autism did find the one-liners funnier overall.

What do you call a deer with no eyes? No idea.

One thing is clear: Perceptions of humor are not objective. As the study’s authors acknowledged, others have found that the perceived funniness of a joke can be affected by factors like delivery and cultural context. Their own findings Monday shed light on the social influences.

“It takes us from people’s emotional lives directly into their social interactions and how those two things can be working,” Scott said.

While the study did not seek to answer how laughter influenced joke ratings, the researchers suggested that the laughter could have been contagious or could have acted as a signal of approval of the joke.

And one last zinger — a word we use lightly — from the study: “What did the duck do when he read all these jokes? He quacked up.”

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/23/us/laugh-track-jokes-humor.html" id="57420c2e-c249-31e0-ad23-5fc2e7bd534e">The New York Times</a>.

Humor, it has been said, “can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process.” Well, get out the scalpels: We have dad jokes to analyze.

With Dad Jokes, a Little Laugh Track Goes a Long Way

All because of an innocuous tweet from former FBI Director James Comey.

Scott Maddock, principal of the Grass Valley Charter School in Grass Valley, California, was unaware of the conspiracy theory when he arrived at work on a normal-seeming Monday morning in late April. But when he checked his voicemail, he heard a man identifying himself as “a patriot,” alerting Maddock to the “threat.”

Maddock wasn’t sure what to make of it. The message was nearly three minutes long, repetitive and inarticulate. But ignoring it wasn’t an option.

Out of an abundance of caution, he contacted police, who began investigating.

It didn’t take long to unearth the roots of the threat, preposterous as they were.

On April 27, Comey had shared a tweet listing a handful of jobs he had held in the past alongside the hashtag #FiveJobsIveHad.

By removing letters, the hashtag could be shortened to “Five Jihad,” they argued. And a search for the abbreviation formed by the first letters of the jobs he listed — GVCSF — led to the Grass Valley Charter School Foundation, whose fundraiser was scheduled for this weekend.

Comey, they concluded, was broadcasting an attack.

Grass Valley police quickly determined that the theory was baseless and that the school, with about 500 students from prekindergarten through eighth grade, was under no threat.

But word traveled fast in Grass Valley, home to about 13,000 people.

Maddock and Wendy Willoughby, president of the foundation, had started to hear from parents who were worried not about the predicted attack, but about the people who believed in it.

What if one of them showed up, armed, to protect against a threat that did not exist, as had happened at a popular Washington pizzeria two years ago? At the same time, some members of the community vowed to attend the event to provide protection.

After several sleepless nights, Maddock, worried the event could spiral out of control, announced last week that the fundraiser was canceled, as reported by The Sacramento Bee.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/11/us/grass-valley-james-comey-conspiracy.html" id="3b6159c2-1f10-31ae-ae41-9844cdb85b73">The New York Times</a>.

A town in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada recently found itself at the center of a baseless conspiracy theory that predicted an attack on a school fundraiser.

How a James Comey Tweet Fueled a Conspiracy Theory That Upended a California Town

Fans of “Game of Thrones” flooded the internet with japes about a scene in Sunday night’s episode that showed an out-of-place coffee cup in the show’s fantasy world, but now HBO has rewritten Westerosi history.

Less than 48 hours after Episode 4 of Season 8 dropped, the cup was edited out of the scene on HBO’s streaming platform, a spokeswoman confirmed. (Future rebroadcasts on cable TV will also exclude the cup.)

That’s right. While the big, bad Night King failed to “erase the memory of Westeros,” as Bran Stark put it, HBO was able to do so using the magic of digital editing.

The Verge was among the first to report the change and even made a cool GIF, because that’s how we consume and reconsume entertainment media now.

In the episode, titled “The Last of the Starks,” an early scene showed a group of characters celebrating by candlelight after defeating an army of the undead in Episode 3.

For a moment, a coffee cup could be seen on a table in front of Daenerys Targaryen, also known as the “Dragon Queen,” who is on a mission to rid the world of tyrants at any cost.

The show’s obsessive fan base was, of course, quick to make light of it on social media.

Many fans joked that it was a Starbucks order, and the coffee company itself piled on with a joke about its “Dragon Drink,” a sweet, pink concoction. But it was apparently a humble craft services to-go cup.

HBO eventually made light of the error, too, saying that Daenerys had actually “ordered an herbal tea.”

If you must, you may look for the cup that isn’t there about 17 minutes and 38 seconds into the episode on HBO Go or HBO Now.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/arts/television/game-of-thrones-coffee-cup-removed-hbo.html" id="c1762c96-9f9b-35fa-a8d8-0c3c75d842b1">The New York Times</a>.

Cup? What cup?

HBO Erases the 'Game of Thrones' Coffee Cup

Not only has he come to dominate the list of highest single-game payouts, but Holzhauer has also become only the second contestant to earn more than $1 million in regular-season play. On Monday night, he continued his streak, winning his 18th game by just $18.

For some contestants, winning might usher in 15 minutes of fame and a small, unexpected windfall. But for players like Holzhauer, securing records, fame and big winnings can be transformative, creating opportunities and providing a level of financial security unthinkable to many Americans.

We caught up with a few “Jeopardy!” stars to ask them how their time on the show affected their lives.

Ken Jennings

Before he became a “Jeopardy!” legend, Ken Jennings was a 29-year-old computer programmer living in Salt Lake City, wondering if there was any way out of a career in coding.

“My wife says I kept talking about going to law school, that’s how desperate I was,” he joked.

Jennings had double-majored in English and computer science and always wanted to write, but after graduating and getting engaged he took a job at a tech startup to pay the bills. Then he qualified for “Jeopardy!”

In 2004, Jennings won 74 games in a row, earning more than $2.5 million. No one has come close to beating his streak (the nearest challenger won 20 consecutive games), though Holzhauer is closing in.

In April, Holzhauer became the only contestant to join Jennings in earning more than $1 million in regular-season play. (Another contestant, Brad Rutter, has earned more than either of them, but he earned the vast majority of his winnings — more than $4.5 million — in arguably more difficult tournament games.)

For Jennings, “Jeopardy!” significantly altered the course of his life. “It changed what I did every day,” he said.

After the show, Jennings decided to write a book about the history and appeal of trivia in America. In 2006, he published “Brainiac: Adventures in the Curious, Competitive, Compulsive World of Trivia Buffs,” which did well enough for him to keep going.

“Each book sold better than the last, which is what publishers are into,” he said.

His books since include a trivia almanac, a debunking of myths passed down to children, and a book about how comedy has come to dominate culture. Jennings says he is now working on his 13th book, a travel guide to various depictions of the afterlife throughout human history.

(When he isn’t writing books, Jennings writes about travel and trivia online and hosts, with musician John Roderick, a podcast about historical oddities called “Omnibus!”)

More than anything, his time on “Jeopardy!” gave him precious freedom from a rigid career.

“The main thing that the show got me, honestly, is that I don’t work a 9-to-5 anymore,” he said. “I’m a freelancer, so I can be here when my kids come home from school, I can drive them to the bus, I can go to the midday middle school choir concert. To me, that means more than the money, honestly.”

Larissa Kelly

For Larissa Kelly, appearing on the show in 2008 and 2009 provided a lifeline for her and her husband, who were graduate students at the University of California, Berkeley, facing a job market in the throes of the Great Recession.

“Having the money from ‘Jeopardy!’ meant that we had the freedom to think about where do we want to go, what do we want to do,” said Kelly, whose appearances then and since have made her one of the highest-earning contestants in the show’s history, with winnings of more than $660,000.

The money has allowed Kelly and her husband, Jeff Hoppes, to buy a house in Richmond, California, and given them the freedom to pursue jobs related to what they love.

“For the last six or seven years, we’ve both been doing professional trivia, and it was feasible for us to do that in a way that I don’t think it would have been without the cushion provided by ‘Jeopardy!’,” she said.

Kelly now edits questions for National Academic Quiz Tournaments, which runs national quiz bowl championships at the middle school, high school and collegiate levels. Her husband is the organization’s vice president for communication.

Unlike other “Jeopardy!” champions, though, Kelly doesn’t get much opportunity to gloat. Not only were her sister and husband on the show, but Jennings, who beat her husband, is also a colleague at National Academic Quiz Tournaments.

“For a lot of people, it’s likely that they might be the only person at their company who was on ‘Jeopardy!’,” she said. “For me, I am never going to be the premier ‘Jeopardy!’ player at my company.”

Monica Thieu

Monica Thieu was technically still in high school when she first appeared on the show, but because she was enrolled in classes at the University of North Texas, she was allowed to compete in the show’s college championship in 2012.

Thieu won the title and $100,000, a prize that helped her pay for tuition at Stanford University.

“We might not have been able to afford it if we didn’t have the ‘Jeopardy!’ money,” she said.

At Stanford, Thieu worked in a psychology laboratory dedicated to the research of memory. She graduated in three years as a psychology major and is now a Ph.D. student at Columbia University, where she mostly studies how people perceive emotions.

The show, she said, probably enabled that career path.

“If I had gone somewhere else, I might have done something else,” she said. “I might have made my parents happy and been in medical school right now.”

Thieu appeared again on “Jeopardy!” in 2013 and for this year’s “All-Star Games” (in which she played on Jennings’ team).

Since her first appearance, though, Thieu has avoided telling people up front about her time on the show for fear that it would come to define her.

“I don’t want to be the ‘Jeopardy!’ girl,” she said. “I would like to be the girl that has these other hobbies and interests.”

Fortunately, it hasn’t been much of a problem. Aside from a few fan encounters, Thieu has, for the most part, continued to live a life of anonymity.

Roger Craig

Before Holzhauer obliterated the record, the title for most money won in a single game of “Jeopardy!” belonged to Roger Craig. (Before him, it belonged to Jennings.)

Craig became famous among fans of the show not only for that record — which he claimed by winning $77,000 in a single game in late 2010 — but also for how he achieved it.

To prepare for the game, Craig, who was finishing graduate school at the time, used a background in machine learning to analyze tens of thousands of past “Jeopardy!” questions and answers, which he downloaded from a fan-run website. He used his findings to direct his studies for the show and to hone his strategy during the game.

“That was probably the biggest thing that was unique to me, was becoming known for that because it was also related to my line of work,” Craig said.

But unlike other big winners, his life did not hugely change after he appeared on the show.

His sizable winnings gave him some financial freedom, but he still works in machine learning and artificial intelligence, now as a consultant, he said. And while people recognize him from the show, that recognition fades with the passage of time.

Appearing on “Jeopardy!” and in subsequent interviews with journalists did, however, help strengthen Craig’s public speaking abilities.

“Once you’ve done a television show and you’re up there in front of millions of people, to me, speaking in front of a few hundred or a few thousand people is not a big deal,” he said.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/30/arts/television/james-holzhauer-jeopardy.html" id="444639f3-d1cc-39b9-a4e8-d372e8b84735">The New York Times</a>.

James Holzhauer is officially “Jeopardy!” royalty.

'Jeopardy!' Champs on Life Beyond the Buzzer

This month, Holzhauer became the only contestant to join Jennings in earning more than $1 million in regular-season play. (Another contestant, Brad Rutter, has earned more than either of them, but he earned the vast majority of his winnings — more than $4.5 million — in arguably more difficult tournament games.)

Before Holzhauer obliterated the record this month, the title for most money won in a single game of “Jeopardy!” belonged to Roger Craig. (Before him, it belonged to Jennings.)

James Holzhauer Is Dominating 'Jeopardy!' But What's Life Like After the Show?

Last year, Americans reported feeling stress, anger and worry at the highest levels in a decade, according to the survey, part of an annual Gallup poll of more than 150,000 people around the world, released Thursday.

“What really stood out for the U.S. is the increase in the negative experiences,” said Julie Ray, Gallup’s managing editor for world news. “This was kind of a surprise to us when we saw the numbers head in this direction.”

For the annual poll, started in 2005, Gallup asks individuals about whether they have experienced a handful of positive or negative feelings the day before being interviewed. The data on Americans is based on responses from more than 1,000 adults.

In the United States, about 55% of adults said they had experienced stress during “a lot of the day” prior, compared with just 35% globally. Statistically, that put the country on par with Greece, which had led the rankings on stress since 2012.

About 45% of the Americans surveyed said they had felt “a lot” of worry the day before, compared with a global average of 39%. Meanwhile, the share of Americans who reported feeling “a lot” of anger the day before being interviewed was the same as the global average: 22%.

When Gallup investigated the responses more closely, it found that being under 50, earning a low income and having a dim view of President Donald Trump’s job performance were correlated with negative experiences among adults in the United States.

But there still is not enough data to say for sure whether any of those factors were behind the feelings of stress, worry and anger.

“We are seeing patterns that would point to a political explanation, or a polarization explanation, with the U.S. data, but can we say that definitively? No,” Ray said.

The findings were not all bleak for the United States. Despite having widespread negative experiences, Americans also generally reported more positive experiences, on average, than the rest of the world did.

Globally, just 49% of those interviewed said they had learned or had done something interesting the day before. In the United States, however, 64% of adults said the same.

The two sets of questions, about negative and positive experiences, are unconnected, according to Ray. An individual can, for example, feel both stressed and well-rested for much of a given day.

“If you think about how you felt yesterday, you didn’t just feel one way the entire day,” she said.

Negative experiences were assessed by asking about physical pain, worry, sadness, stress and anger. Positive experiences were measured by asking whether individuals felt well-rested, felt treated with respect, smiled or laughed, learned or did something interesting and felt enjoyment.

The margin of error in the poll ranged from 2.1 to 5.3 percentage points, depending on the country. The results for the United States, where interviews were conducted from Aug. 13 to Sept. 30, had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

Negative experiences remained at record highs

Worldwide, negative experiences were just as widespread last year as in 2017, which was the darkest year for humanity in more than a decade, according to Gallup. While stress declined globally, anger increased. Worry and sadness reached new heights, and feelings of physical pain were unchanged.

For the first time, Chad topped the list as the country with the highest response of negative experiences in the world.

“The country’s overall score at least partly reflects the violence, displacement and the collapse of basic services in parts of Chad that have affected thousands of families,” Gallup said in the report.

Additional countries that led the world in negative experiences included other African nations, like Niger and Sierra Leone, and some in the Middle East, such as Iraq and Iran.

Nations in Latin America once again led the list of countries where positive experiences were highest, despite the fact that some of the countries that topped the list, like El Salvador and Honduras, are home to some of the world’s highest murder rates.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/25/us/americans-stressful.html" id="e96134e0-68dc-34ee-ad43-0283db69d068">The New York Times</a>.

Americans Are Among the Most Stressed People in the World, Poll Finds

Americans are among the most stressed people in the world, according to a new survey. And that is just the start of it.

When Gallup investigated the responses more closely, it found that being under 50, earning a low income and having a dim view of President Donald Trump’s job performance were correlated with negative experiences among adults in the United States. But there still is not enough data to say for sure whether any of those factors were behind the feelings of stress, worry and anger.

Americans also generally reported more positive experiences, on average, than the rest of the world did. Globally, just 49% of those interviewed said they had learned or had done something interesting the day before. In the United States, however, 64% of adults said the same.

Worldwide, while stress declined, anger increased. Worry and sadness reached new heights, and feelings of physical pain were unchanged.

The man entered the cathedral just before 8 p.m. but was turned away by a church security officer, according to John Miller, the Police Department’s deputy commissioner of intelligence and counterterrorism. As the man exited, some gasoline spilled on the floor.

The security officer then notified two police officers outside the cathedral, who caught up to the man and began to question him. While he was cooperative, his answers were inconsistent and evasive, Miller said at a news conference.

“His basic story was that he was cutting through the cathedral to get to Madison Avenue, that his car had run out of gas,” Miller said. “We took a look at the vehicle. It was not out of gas, and at that point he was taken into custody.”

The man was also carrying two bottles of lighter fluid and two extended butane lighters, Miller said. The man was uninjured and the church was undamaged.

“The individual was stopped as he tried to come into the cathedral,” the Archdiocese of New York said in a statement. The man, the statement continued, “was turned over to the police. Nothing happened inside the cathedral.”

Charges were not immediately filed against the man, whose name the police did not release. “He is known to police,” Miller said, without elaborating.

The episode drew a heavy police presence. About a dozen officers gathered on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 50th Street in Manhattan, while another officer directed traffic at the corner. Another half-dozen officers stood outside the entrance to the church.

The encounter happened two days after a fire tore through the Notre Dame cathedral in Paris, one of that city’s most famous monuments. Investigators are still looking into the specific cause of that fire, though it was believed to be accidental.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral seats about 2,200 people and opened its doors in May 1879.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/17/nyregion/st-patricks-cathedral-marc-lamparello.html" id="7d06a9f6-e8a2-3b24-ac27-2a05c7a73332">The New York Times</a>.

Man With Two Full Gas Cans Arrested After Entering St. Patrick's Cathedral

NEW YORK — A 37-year-old New Jersey man carrying a pair of full two-gallon cans of gasoline was arrested Wednesday night after entering St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York, police said.

The new measure, signed into law by Gov. Mike DeWine, a Republican, would ban abortions as early as six weeks, before many women realize they are pregnant. The law is set to take effect in July, but that may be held up by legal challenges. The American Civil Liberties Union has already said it plans to sue.

At the bill signing, DeWine said the measure would “protect those who cannot protect themselves,” but he also acknowledged its potential to be used as a tool in the fight against Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion before a fetus is viable outside the womb, usually about 24 weeks into a pregnancy.

“Taking this action really is the time-honored tradition, the constitutional tradition, of making a good-faith argument for modification, reversal of existing legal precedent,” DeWine said, according to Cleveland.com. “So this is exactly what this is, and the United States Supreme Court will ultimately make a decision.”

Ohio is the third state to enact a fetal heartbeat bill this year, joining Kentucky and Mississippi, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. Georgia is expected to become the fourth. Iowa and North Dakota have passed similar measures in recent years as well.

The laws are unlikely to go into effect anytime soon, and similarly restrictive bans are routinely struck down in court, but anti-abortion activists continue to bring such measures forward in order to lay the groundwork for a Supreme Court challenge.

In Ohio, conservatives had previously brought forward a fetal heartbeat bill, but they were newly energized by the appointments of Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.

“The makeup of the Supreme Court is probably the most conservative we’ve seen in a generation, and that certainly emboldens those of us who deeply desire that Roe v. Wade be overturned,” said Jamieson Gordon, spokeswoman for Ohio Right to Life, which opposes abortion.

Since John Kasich became governor of Ohio in 2011, the state has enacted more than 20 abortion restrictions, and the number of full-service abortion clinics there has fallen to seven from 16, according to Kellie Copeland, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio, an abortion-rights group that plans to fight the new law.

While the measure is the first major abortion restriction signed by DeWine, who took office in January, his support for the bill was hardly a surprise to abortion-rights supporters given his role as attorney general under Kasich, a fellow Republican.

“The reaction from our supporters has been exactly what we knew it would be, which is defiance,” Copeland said. “We are not accepting the barriers that these politicians are trying to put on our bodily autonomy.”

Nationally, more than 300 abortion restrictions were introduced in the first three months of this year, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which described the flurry of legislative activity as a “surge.” At the same time, though, some state lawmakers have sought to expand abortion rights.

In January, Gov. Andrew Cuomo of New York, a Democrat, signed into law a bill that permits abortion after the 24th week of pregnancy as long as the fetus is not viable or the abortion is necessary to protect the mother’s life or health.

“The events of the last several months absolutely validate the decisive actions taken by New York to legally protect abortion — and more states must follow suit so that people can continue to access the care they need when they need it,” Elizabeth Nash, senior state issues manager at the Guttmacher Institute, said in a statement.

Among the restrictions introduced this year was a bill in Texas that appeared to have stalled this week and would have criminalized abortions outright, potentially allowing women and physicians to receive the death penalty.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/12/us/ohio-abortion.html" id="5baf2ef8-4910-30de-ac63-4081598481ee">The New York Times</a>.

Ohio on Thursday became the latest state to ban abortion at the first signs of a fetal heartbeat, the latest front in the decadeslong campaign by conservatives to overturn Roe v. Wade.

Ohio's Fetal Heartbeat Abortion Ban Is Latest Front in Fight Over Roe v. Wade

While the measure is the first major abortion restriction signed by DeWine, who took office in January, his support for the bill was hardly a surprise to abortion rights-supporters given his role as attorney general under former Gov. John Kasich, a fellow Republican.

Ohio is the third state to enact a fetal heartbeat bill this year, joining Kentucky and Mississippi, according to the Guttmacher Institute, a research group that supports abortion rights. Georgia may soon become the fourth.

In a letter read to mourners who had filled the Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles, former President Barack Obama praised Hussle, 33, for overcoming the circumstances of his youth and becoming an advocate for South Los Angeles.

“While most folks look at the Crenshaw neighborhood where he grew up and see only gangs, bullets and despair, Nipsey saw potential,” Obama said in the letter, read aloud by hip-hop media personality Karen Civil.

“He saw hope,” the letter continued. “He saw a community that, even through its flaws, taught him to always keep going.”

Hussle, born Ermias Joseph Asghedom, was fatally shot outside his clothing store March 31. Within days, authorities arrested Eric Holder Jr., 29, the man suspected of shooting him. Holder has pleaded not guilty to the murder.

In the letter, Obama said that he had learned about Hussle’s “transformation and his community work” after being introduced to the rapper’s music by his daughters, Sasha and Malia.

Obama also praised him for giving back to his community, which Hussle did, in part, by opening the Marathon Clothing store and a coworking space in Crenshaw dedicated to increasing diversity in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

Hussle “set an example for young people to follow,” Obama said, adding that his “is a legacy worthy of celebration.”

“I hope his memory inspires more good work in Crenshaw and communities like it,” Obama said.

Later in the service, Hussle’s family and friends shared memories of his love, curiosity, passion and drive.

“He had such beautiful energy,” said his mother, Angelique Smith. “He’s intelligent, he’s radiant, he’s a superhero.”

Smith also shared memories from Hussle’s childhood, relaying how he sprang to action when her car caught fire and fondly recalling his love of amusement park rides.

Hussle’s brother, Samiel, remembered watching with amazement as Hussle built a computer when they were kids, and later started a music career and amassed friends left and right.

Hussle’s partner, actress Lauren London, described him as a “majestic” soul.

“He was the strongest man that I ever knew, a gentle father, a patient leader, a divine light,” she said.

The free tickets to the service, hosted in the 21,000-seat arena, were claimed online within minutes of being released this week.

The service began with Hussle’s songs “Right Hand to God” and “Victory Lap,” the title track from his most recent album and major-label debut.

Others who paid tribute to Hussle included Stevie Wonder, Snoop Dogg and Louis Farrakhan, the leader of the Nation of Islam.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/11/us/obama-nipsey-hussle.html" id="1291e736-65e3-340d-aa1d-55011ce0589a">The New York Times</a>.

Nipsey Hussle, the Grammy-nominated rapper, was remembered by a lineup of celebrities and respected figures at a funeral service Thursday. Among them: the 44th president of the United States.

Barack Obama's Letter at Nipsey Hussle's Funeral: 'He Saw Hope'

“While most folks look at the Crenshaw neighborhood where he grew up and see only gangs, bullets and despair, Nipsey saw potential,” Obama said in the letter, read aloud by the hip-hop media personality Karen Civil.

Obama on Nipsey Hussle: 'Nipsey Saw Potential. He Saw Hope.'

The scheme, which authorities described as one of the largest health care frauds in U.S. history, centered on the alleged overprescription of medically unnecessary back, shoulder, wrist and knee braces. Twenty-four people were charged, according to the Justice Department.

“These defendants — who range from corporate executives to medical professionals — allegedly participated in an expansive and sophisticated fraud to exploit telemedicine technology meant for patients otherwise unable to access health care,” Brian Benczkowski, assistant attorney general for the department’s criminal division, said in a statement.

Some of the accused scammers were owners of durable medical equipment companies that paid kickbacks and bribes to doctors to write prescriptions for braces that were medically unnecessary, according to authorities.

An international telemarketing network with call centers in the Philippines and Latin America would reach out to Medicare beneficiaries, convincing them to get the free or low-cost braces. The doctors would sometimes write prescriptions without speaking to the patient.

“The defendants took advantage of unwitting patients who were simply trying to get relief from their health concerns,” Craig Carpenito, the U.S. attorney for New Jersey, said in a statement. “Instead, the defendants preyed upon their weakened state and pushed millions of dollars’ worth of unnecessary medical devices, which Medicare paid for, and then set up an elaborate system for laundering their ill-gotten proceeds.”

Authorities said the defendants laundered the proceeds through international shell companies and used the money to buy exotic cars, yachts and luxury real estate around the world.

Charges related to the payment of bribes, illegal kickbacks, money laundering and conspiracy to commit health care fraud were brought against people in California, Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Texas.

The individuals charged included the chief executives or employees of five telemedicine companies, the owners of dozens of durable medical equipment companies and three licensed medical professionals, the Justice Department said.

This article originally appeared in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/09/us/billion-dollar-medicare-scam.html" id="2dda408e-aae5-3714-a8c4-80464d643d2f">The New York Times</a>.

Federal officials said Tuesday that they had dismantled a $1.2 billion Medicare scam that spanned continents and ensnared hundreds of thousands of unsuspecting elderly and disabled patients.

24 Charged in $1.2 Billion Medicare Scam, Federal Officials Say

The scam was investigated by the FBI and the Health and Human Services inspector general, and was prosecuted by the Justice Department. The IRS and 17 U.S. attorney’s offices also took part in the crackdown.

Chicago, Houston and Dallas are the most dangerous cities for birds traveling at night based on their prime location along one of North America’s busiest migratory routes and the light pollution that they produce, according to the new research.

“The lights will pull those birds in, they’ll circle and they’ll become disoriented,” said Kyle Horton, a postdoctoral researcher at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology and the lead author of the study, published this month in the journal Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment.

Overall, scientists estimate that anywhere from 365 million to nearly 1 billion birds are killed in such collisions each year in the United States. And while researchers are still investigating the causes, experts believe that many can be attributed to the disorienting allure of artificial light.

Lights can confuse birds, causing them to fly into one another or a structure. They can also prompt the birds to fly in circles, burning through precious energy reserves stored up for the sometimes long migratory journey.

To better understand that danger, Horton and his colleagues set out to identify the cities where the greatest numbers of birds encounter the most artificial light during nighttime migration.

“Coming up with rankings was priority No. 1: Where are the greatest threats and how do those threats vary by season?” he said.

To measure light pollution, he and his colleagues collected monthly NASA satellite snapshots over six years. To measure migration, they analyzed activity recorded at nearly 150 weather radar stations over more than two decades.

During spring migration, the cities that pose the greatest threat to birds are Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Los Angeles and St. Louis, they found. (New York ranked eighth.) During fall migration, the most dangerous cities are Chicago, Houston, Dallas, Atlanta and New York.

The researchers also found that, on average, about half of all migrating birds pass through a given city over six nights in the spring and seven nights in the fall. (The nights are not necessarily consecutive.) That, Horton said, could help direct efforts to save the birds.

“Minimal changes can have a big consequence,” he said. “We don’t expect that cities are going to turn their lights off for 90 straight days, but if they were willing to do it in a dynamic way — they were willing to do it for seven nights — that could be quite impactful.”

It is still not fully understood why birds find artificial lights so disorienting, but the phenomenon has long been documented. Bird deaths have been observed at lighthouses, for example, for more than a century.

Every year, millions of birds migrating at night, often distracted by bright city lights, die by flying into U.S. buildings. Now a study shows where they may be most at risk — and how efforts to save them might be honed.

Niraj Chokshi

Articles written by the author

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