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The Biden administration said this week that it opposes gender-affirming surgery on minors, the most outspoken statement yet on the issue from a president who has been a vocal supporter of transgender rights.The White House announcement was sent to the New York Times on Wednesday in response to a report that staff in the office of Adm. Rachel Levine, assistant secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services, had solicited an influential international organization to Transgender health remove minimum age for surgery from treatment guidelines for minors.The interim guidelines would have lowered the minimum age limits to 14 for hormone treatments, 15 for mastectomies, 16 for breast augmentation or facial surgery, and 17 for genital surgery or hysterectomies. The final guidelines, rel...

Rishi Sunak’s gamble was a big one. Five weeks ago, the British prime minister gambled on his belief that a summer election would give his Conservative Party a better chance of holding on to power than waiting until the autumn.Calling a snap election was Sunak’s last throw of the dice. But it has since emerged that in the days before he announced to the country in the pouring rain on May 22 that he was going to the polls, a number of colleagues and underlings were placing bets of a more literal kind.Looking at data from the week before Mr Sunak’s announcement, bookmakers noticed a spike in bets placed on the election date. The amounts wagered were small, totalling just a few thousand pounds, but the sudden flurry of activity was enough to warrant further investigation.The question of wheth...

What does artificial intelligence sound like? Hollywood has been imagining this for decades. Now AI developers are copying from movies, creating voices for real machines based on dated movie fantasies about how machines should talk.Last month, OpenAI revealed updates to its artificially intelligent chatbot. ChatGPT, the company said, is learning to hear, see and converse in a naturalistic voice, much like the disembodied operating system voiced by Scarlett Johansson in Spike Jonze’s 2013 film “Her.”ChatGPT's voice, called Sky, also had a husky tone, a calming effect and a sexy touch. She was nice and shy; it seemed like she was ready for anything. After Sky's debut, Johansson expressed disappointment at the "eerily similar" sound and said she had previously rejected OpenAI'...

The United States is in the midst of an intense diplomatic push to prevent an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah forces in Lebanon, as risks grow that either side could launch a broader regional battle.In recent days, U.S. officials have pressured their Israeli counterparts and conveyed messages to Hezbollah leaders aimed at averting a broader regional conflict that they fear could involve both Iran and the United States.Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant met with several Biden administration officials in Washington this week, largely to discuss rising tensions along Israel’s northern border with Lebanon. That visit was followed last week by one by Israel’s national security adviser, Tzachi Hanegbi, and his strategic affairs minister, Ron Dermer.Also last week, a senior White Hous...

On the surface, abortion rights have had a good run on the Supreme Court this term. Two weeks ago, the justices unanimously let the abortion pill remain widely available. On Thursday, the court rejected a case over Idaho’s strict abortion ban, which has had the effect of allowing the state’s emergency rooms to perform the procedure when a patient’s health is at risk.But the two rulings were so technical as to be ephemeral. They seemed designed to evade and delay, to kick a shaky argument down the road — or at least after Election Day.Some abortion rights advocates called these rulings Pyrrhic victories, fearing they would pave the way for further restrictions, either by the courts or by a second Trump administration.In Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization, the 2022 decision tha...

In the early 1870s, an émigré painter watched from a railway footbridge as a steam locomotive left a station on the outskirts of London. His name was Camille Pissarro and he was developing a style of plein air painting that would soon be called "Impressionism".Pissarro and another émigré, Claude Monet, remained in London for only a few months. In April 1874, they were among the painters who held the first Impressionist exhibition in Paris, the subject of a retrospective that will run until July 14 at the Musée d'Orsay and will open on September 8 at the National Gallery of Art in Washington DCBut London was one of their earliest muses. Monet painted the River Thames and the Palace of Westminster, among other central landmarks, while Pissarro captured suburban scenes where houses and r...

Listen and follow 'Hard Fork'Apple | Spotify | Amazon | YouTubeRecord labels — including Sony, Universal, and Warner — are suing two major AI-powered music companies, accusing them of copyright infringement. Mitch Glazier, CEO of the Recording Industry Association of America, the industry group that represents music labels, talks about their case. Next, we look at defense technology and discuss why Silicon Valley appears to be changing its tune on working with the military. Chris Kirchhoff, who used to run a special Pentagon office in Silicon Valley, explains what he thinks is behind the shift. And finally, we play another round of HatGPT.Guest:Mitch Glazier, president and CEO of the Recording Industry Association of AmericaChris Kirchhoff, founding partner of the Defense Innovatio...

After a tense election campaign featuring harsh attacks on the government by nearly all candidates over the economy, internet restrictions and harsh enforcement of the hijab law for women, Iran called elections on Friday to elect a president.The vote comes at a dangerous time for the country, with the incoming president facing a host of challenges, including internal discontent and divisions, a struggling economy and a volatile region that has brought Iran to the brink of war twice this year.With the race being decided by a three-way battle between two conservative candidates and a reformist, many analysts predict that neither will reach the necessary 50 percent of the vote, necessitating a runoff on July 5 between the reformist candidate and the leading conservative.That outcome could be ...

All Americans 6 months and older should receive one of the new COVID-19 vaccines as soon as they become available this fall, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Thursday.The recommendation comes as the nation faces a summer surge in Covid, with infection numbers rising in at least 39 states and territories.Most Americans have acquired immunity to the coronavirus through repeated infections or vaccine doses, or both. Vaccines now offer an incremental boost, remaining effective for only a few months as immunity wanes and the virus continues to evolve.Yet across every age group, the vast majority of Americans hospitalized for Covid did not receive one of the vaccinations proposed last fall, according to data presented Thursday at a meeting of the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Im...

Uber and Lyft settled a years-long legal dispute with the Massachusetts attorney general on Thursday, agreeing to pay their drivers in the state a minimum rate with some benefits.As part of the settlement, Uber and Lyft will pay $175 million to resolve allegations that the companies violated state labor laws, with most of the money going to gig workers, state officials said in a statement. But if the ride-hailing companies win, drivers will still be classified as independent contractors, not employees.Among the benefits the state obtained for its self-employed workers were a health insurance plan for drivers who work at least 15 hours a week, extended accident insurance and a minimum hourly wage of $32.50 per hour. time spent travelling.The agreement followed similar pay and benefits provi...