This Week in History, Aug 24 - Aug 30

Aug 24, 79
Vesuvius erupts. After centuries of dormancy, Mount Vesuvius erupts in southern Italy, devastating the prosperous Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum and killing thousands. The cities, buried under a thick layer of volcanic material and mud, were never rebuilt and largely forgotten in the course of history. In the 18th century, Pompeii and Herculaneum were rediscovered and excavated, providing an unprecedented archaeological record of the everyday life of an ancient civilization, startlingly preserved in sudden death.

Aug 25, 1835
The Great Moon Hoax. On this day in 1835, the first in a series of six articles announcing the supposed discovery of life on the moon appears in the New York Sun newspaper. Known collectively as "The Great Moon Hoax," the articles were supposedly reprinted from the Edinburgh Journal of Science. The byline was Dr. Andrew Grant, described as a colleague of Sir John Herschel, a famous astronomer of the day. Herschel had in fact traveled to Capetown, South Africa, in January 1834 to set up an observatory with a powerful new telescope. As Grant described it, Herschel had found evidence of life forms on the moon, including such fantastic animals as unicorns, two-legged beavers and furry, winged humanoids resembling bats. The articles also offered vivid description of the moon's geography, complete with massive craters, enormous amethyst crystals, rushing rivers and lush vegetation.

In today’s world, digital media use begins at a very early age and takes up a large proportion of the informal learning environment, making it essential to assess the effects of the substantial amount of time children engage with media.

A new study provides evidence that, in five days of being limited to in-person interaction without access to any screen-based or media device for communication, preteens improved on measures of nonverbal emotion understanding, significantly more than a control group.

Is it lucky seven? Not actually, we are now more than seven billion people and the population on earth grows by roughly the size of the population of USA every three years, but ninety percent of the growth is in developing counties.

The global population has passed 7 billion and the challenge and an opportunity with implications on sustainability, urbanization, access to health services and youth empowerment. It also offers a rare call-to-action to renew the global commitment for a healthy and sustainable world for all.