Please donate here to support this vital work.
Revealing News For a Better World

Inspirational News Stories
Excerpts of Key Inspirational News Stories in Major Media


Below are highly engaging excerpts of key inspirational stories reported in the mainstream media. Links are provided to the original stories on their major media websites. If any link fails to function, read this webpage. These inspirational stories are ordered by date posted to this list. You can explore the same stories listed by order of importance or by article date. Enjoy your inspirational reading!

Note: This comprehensive list of news stories is usually updated once a week. Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news stories on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.


Watch these hungry waxworms eat through plastic and digest it too
2024-04-24, BBC News
Posted: 2024-05-13 18:36:24
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20240419-the-worms-that-eat-through-plastic

At first glance there's nothing particularly remarkable about waxworms. The larval form of wax moths, these pale wriggling grubs feed on the wax that bees use to make their honeycomb. For beekeepers, the pests are something to swiftly get rid of without a second thought. But in 2017 molecular biologist Federica Bertocchini ... stumbled on a potentially game-changing discovery about these creatures. Bertocchini, an amateur beekeeper, threw some of the waxworms in a plastic bag after cleaning her hive, and left them alone. A short time later, she noticed the worms had started producing small holes in the plastic, which begun degrading as soon as it touched the worms' mouths. The worms were doing something that we as humans find remarkably difficult to do: break down plastic. Not only that, but the worms appeared to be digesting the plastic as though it was food. Bertocchini and her fellow researchers began collecting the liquid excreted from the worms' mouths. They found this "saliva" contained two critical enzymes, Ceres and Demeter – named after the Roman and Greek goddesses of agriculture, respectively – which were able to oxidise the polyethylene in the plastic, essentially breaking down that material on contact. Bertocchini is now chief technology officer at bioresearch startup Plasticentropy France, working with a team to study the viability of scaling up these enzymes for widespread use in degrading plastic.

Note: Explore more positive stories about healing the Earth.


Plastic-eating bacteria can help waste self-destruct
2024-04-30, BBC News
Posted: 2024-05-13 18:34:50
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-68927816

Scientists have developed a "self-digesting plastic", which, they say, could help reduce pollution. Polyurethane is used in everything from phone cases to trainers, but is tricky to recycle and mainly ends up in landfill. However, researchers have come up with a sci-fi like solution. By incorporating spores of plastic-eating bacteria they've developed a plastic that can self-destruct. The spores remain dormant during the useful lifetime of the plastic, but spring back to life and start to digest the product when exposed to nutrients in compost. There's hope "we can mitigate plastic pollution in nature", said researcher Han Sol Kim, of the University of California San Diego, La Jolla. And there might be an added advantage in that the spores increase the toughness of the plastic. "Our process makes the materials more rugged, so it extends its useful lifetime," said co-researcher, Jon Pokorski. "And then, when it's done, we're able to eliminate it from the environment, regardless of how it's disposed." The plastic is currently being worked on at the laboratory bench but could be in the real world within a few years, with the help of a manufacturer, he added. The type of bacteria added to the plastic is Bacillus subtilis, widely used as a food additive and a probiotic. Crucially, the bacteria has to be genetically engineered to be able to withstand the very high temperatures needed to make plastic.

Note: Explore more positive stories about healing the Earth.


Toward truly compostable plastic
2024-02-27, Knowable Magazine
Posted: 2024-05-13 18:32:38
https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/technology/2024/compostable-plas...

Humans have created 8 billion metric tons of plastic. More than half the plastic ever produced –some 5 billion metric tons – lies smeared across the surface of the Earth. Chemists were creating "synthetic" plastics decades before the oil industry took off, from, among other materials, waste oat husks and vegetable oil. One of the tacks toward more sustainable plastics is to turn back to such biological sources. The ideal materials are not just biodegradable but also compostable – a narrower category that indicates the material can break down into organic components that are harmless to plants and animals. Compostability, unfortunately, is not easily achieved. The natural world already supplies promising polymers that are all compostable, says David Kaplan, a biomedical engineer at Tufts University. [Physicist Eleftheria] Roumeli, for example, has mined the promise of algal cells. They're small, and therefore easily manipulable; they contain large amounts of proteins, which are biological polymers, alongside other useful materials. She and her students took powdered algae and passed it through a hot presser. After several trials ... they found they could produce a material that was stronger than many commodity plastics. The material was also recyclable: It could be ground back to powder and pressed again. If it were to be carelessly tossed into the dirt, the material would break apart at the same rate as a banana peel.

Note: Explore more positive stories about healing the Earth.


Compassion is making a comeback in America
2024-04-23, Vox
Posted: 2024-05-05 14:59:39
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/24137520/americans-empathy-new-compassion-...

Since the late 1970s, psychologists have measured empathy by asking millions of people how much they agreed with statements such as "I feel tender, concerned feelings for people less fortunate than me." In 2011, a landmark study led by researcher Sara Konrath examined the trends in those surveys. The analysis revealed that American empathy had plummeted: The average US college student in 2009 reported feeling less empathic than 75 percent of students three decades earlier. A few months ago, [Konrath] and her colleagues published an update to their work: They found that empathy among young Americans is rebounding, reaching levels indistinguishable from the highs of the 1970s. Our biased minds tempt us to see the worst in people. The empathy decline reported 13 years ago fit that narrative and went viral. This decline is almost certainly an illusion. In other surveys, people reported on kindness and morality as they actually experience it – for instance, how they were treated by strangers, coworkers, and friends. Answers to these questions remained steady over the years. As with the decline, we might grasp for explanations for this rise. One possibility is collective suffering. Hard times can bring people together. In her beautiful book, A Paradise Built in Hell, Rebecca Solnit chronicles disasters including San Francisco's 1906 and 1989 earthquakes, Hurricane Katrina, and 9/11. In the wake of these catastrophes, kindness ticked up, strangers stepping over lines of race and class to help one another.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


Loretta Ross doesn't believe in cancel culture
2023-11-04, Boston Globe
Posted: 2024-05-05 14:54:19
https://www.bostonglobe.com/2023/11/02/magazine/loretta-ross-has-a-radical-idea/

[Loretta] Ross has worked at the forefront of the movement for reproductive justice. But recently she has become better known for championing "call-in culture," a philosophy that approaches someone's wrongdoing with accountability and, most importantly, love. In the summer of 2020 ... I felt myself crumbling. I called out snide comments by alumni of my college about Black Lives Matter protests, demanded people boycott the college newspaper ... and used Twitter to call out the behavior of fellow students. Each tactic left no room for discussion. Calling in, by contrast, asks us to always be the bigger person, even in the most hateful and painful situations. I ask Ross: Whose well-being are we prioritizing here? And why isn't it our own? Ross tells me about another Black woman who asked the same question. "I'm confused," Ross recalls the woman saying. "I don't want to fall into the stereotype of the angry Black woman. But I feel like if I embrace the calling-in strategies you're talking about, then I'm ... giving a pass to all this injustice. What should I do?" Ross responds with a question of her own: "Well, who are you inside? Go deep inside and find out who you are. What's the emotion that you feel is true to you?" "Inside, I feel like I'm filled with love," the woman replies. "Then, why aren't you leading with your authentic self?" Ross asks her. Accountability and love are not mutually exclusive, Ross explains.

Note: Smith College Professor and civil rights activist Loretta Ross worked with Ku Klux Klan members and practiced restorative justice with incarcerated men convicted or raping and murdering women. Watch Loretta Ross's powerful Ted Talk on simple tools to help shift our culture from fighting each other to working together in the face of polarizing social issues. Explore more positive stories about healing social division and polarization.


‘Healing spaces' in post-conflict societies
2024-03-01, Christian Science Monitor
Posted: 2024-05-05 14:51:50
https://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/the-monitors-view/2024/0301/Healing-spac...

The Afghanistan Memory Home is a growing online archive of testimonies of endurance by ordinary Afghans during years of conflict and repressive rule under the Taliban. The virtual museum is an example of the kind of community-led initiatives that Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud has described as "healing spaces" – local sites of nation-building where the traumas and resentments of war are salved through traditional forms of civic engagement based on cultural values, spirituality, and listening. These projects in reconciliation quietly persist almost everywhere people seek freedom from conflict or repression, from Afghanistan to Yemen. They often supplant the work of national transitional justice initiatives stalled by political disagreements or lack of cooperation. They also underscore that "justice isn't just punishment or prosecution and presenting evidence against perpetrators," said Ruben Carranza, an expert on post-conflict community healing. In South Sudan, for instance, a local peace and reconciliation process called Wunlit gave grassroots strength to a 2018 national peace agreement. Led by tribal chiefs and spiritual leaders, the "peace to peace" dialogue defused cattle raids and abductions between the Nuer and Dinka communities. In Iraq, the Ministry of Human Rights has relied on tribal, religious, and civil society leaders to help forge local support for a national dialogue on reconciliation. History has "taught us that relying solely on military force will not bring about lasting peace and stability," Hodan Ali, a Somali presidential policy adviser, wrote. The more durable work of peace involves empowering individuals and communities to tell their own stories – and listen to each other.

Note: Explore more positive stories about healing the war machine.


Why do people forgive? It's messy, complex and 'the best form of self-interest'
2024-04-23, Minneapolis Star Tribune
Posted: 2024-04-29 12:44:20
https://www.startribune.com/forgiveness-project-minneapolis-laura-yuen/600360...

Forgiveness is a principle promoted by just about every faith tradition. Even neuroscientists agree on its mental and physical benefits – from lowered risk of heart attacks to improved sleep. Twenty years ago, UK-based journalist Marina Cantacuzino launched the Forgiveness Project, a collection of stories from survivors and victims of crime and conflict, as well as perpetrators who reshaped their aggression into a force for peace. Cantacuzino documented real-life stories of seemingly supernatural examples of forgiveness. A Canadian woman who forgave her husband's killer. An Israeli filmmaker wounded in a terrorist attack. A Minneapolis mother who grew to love the person who murdered her only child. But even Cantacuzino admits it can seem difficult to relate to those who forgive the seemingly unforgivable. Are they morally superior? Extremely religious? Some are, but they are more likely to share the traits of curiosity, empathy and a flexible viewpoint. It feels like those characteristics are harder to come by today. The cacophony of "if you're not with us, you're against us" has divided families and entire communities. One's ability to recognize the pain on both sides of the Israel-Hamas war can evoke outrage, for example. But Cantacuzino continues to support discussions that bring together Israeli and Palestinian victims of the conflict, stories that require people to embrace complexity and contradiction while honoring the "sanctity of every human life ... Stories stick, whereas facts fade," she says. The Forgiveness Project's exhibit has now journeyed to 17 countries, including Kenya, Australia and Israel.

Note: Explore Cantacuzino's latest inspiring book, Forgiveness: An Exploration, which delves into the politics, mechanics and psychology of forgiveness. Explore more positive stories that reveal the power of healing social division and polarization.


A daycare built a ‘forest floor', and it changed kids' immune systems
2020-10-28, The Optimist Daily
Posted: 2024-04-29 12:40:27
https://www.optimistdaily.com/2020/10/a-daycare-turned-their-playground-into-...

One daycare in Finland decided to invest in a playground that replicated the forest floor. The results were amazing. The daycare replaced their sandy playground surface with lawn and added indigenous forest species like dwarf heather and blueberries. They also added planter boxes and allowed children to tend them. After just one month, children at the daycare had healthier microbiomes and stronger immune systems than their counterparts in other urban daycares. Specifically, the children had increased T-cells, increased immune-boosting gammaproteobacteria microbes, and a reduction in interleukin-17A, a contributor to immune-transmitted disease. Environmental scientist Marja Roslund from the University of Helsinki said, "We also found that the intestinal microbiota of children who received greenery was similar to the intestinal microbiota of children visiting the forest every day." These results demonstrate that loss of biodiversity in urban areas can contribute to poorer health outcomes and that easy environmental manipulation can radically change these health dynamics, especially in young children. Children living in rural areas tend to have fewer cases of allergies and asthma which seems to be directly tied to time outdoors. More studies are needed to definitively draw the correlation between time in nature and childhood health, but this experiment strengthens the argument for this link.

Note: Explore more positive stories about healing our bodies.


How Schools in Germany Are Preparing Students for Flexible Futures
2024-04-08, Reasons to be Cheerful
Posted: 2024-04-29 12:37:53
https://reasonstobecheerful.world/german-students-vocational-training-future-...

Kein Abschluss ohne Anschluss (KAoA) – or "no graduation without connection" – [is] a program that has been rolled out across the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia to help students better plan for their futures. Young people get support with resumes and job applications; in ninth grade, they participate in short internships with local businesses and have the option of doing a year-long, one-day-a week work placements in grade 10. "You don't learn about a job in school," said Sonja Gryzik, who teaches English, math and career orientation at ... Ursula Kuhr Schule. "You have to experience it." Students in Germany can embark on apprenticeships directly after finishing general education at age 16 in grade 10, attending vocational schools that offer theoretical study, alongside practical training at a company. College-bound kids stay in school for three more years, ending with an entry exam for university. Businesses in Germany seem keen to participate in vocational training. Chambers of commerce and industry support company-school partnerships and help smaller businesses train their interns. Students are even represented in unions, said Julian Uehlecke, a representative of the youth wing of Germany's largest trade union alliance. The goal of apprenticeships is to offer training in the classroom and in the workplace. The system gives students "a pretty good chance of finding a well-paid stable job," said [policy researcher] Leonard Geyer.

Note: Explore more positive stories about reimagining education.


At four, I was kidnapped and sex-trafficked for years. Now I fight for the powerless – and win every case
2024-03-25, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
Posted: 2024-04-22 22:09:59
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2024/mar/25/at-four-i-was-kidnapped-...

Although it happened more than 60 years ago, Antonio Salazar-Hobson remembers every detail of his kidnapping. After being snatched from his back yard, he is taken into a nightmarish landscape of sex trafficking, violence and exploitation. Rather than being broken by what he experienced, he instead rose from the ashes of his stolen childhood to accomplish extraordinary academic feats and become one of the US's most successful labour rights attorneys, representing vulnerable and powerless communities, and dedicating his life to justice and compassion. "I chose not to be obliterated by the abuse and trauma I was forced to endure," he says. "Instead of being swallowed by the darkness, I survived by walking towards the light." He has taken on multibillion-dollar corporations, represented First Nation people and LGBTQ+ farm worker communities, and won every case. "I'm used to people underestimating me, this poor Chicano boy going up against rooms full of corporate lawyers in suits, but I always prevail," he says. He now plans to dedicate the rest of his life to the anti-trafficking movement. "It is my hope that somehow my story can be of service to the community of survivors of sexual assault and trafficking; what happened to me can show other kids that they don't have to be ashamed, that they can rise up to become whoever they want to be. I want to show them that I refused to be broken and, in the end, I ... made it home."

Note: Explore more positive stories about ending human trafficking.


Doctors deliver healthy baby 117 days after mother's brain-death in world first
2019-09-03, The Independent (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
Posted: 2024-04-22 22:07:54
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/baby-brain-death-mother-birth...

Czech doctors have delivered a healthy baby girl 117 days after her mother was declared brain dead. The baby was born by Caesarean section weighing 2.13kg (4.7lb) and measuring 42cm (16.5in) on 15 August, setting a new world record in the process, Brno's University Hospital has said. It said the 117 days she had been kept alive in the womb were believed to be a record for the longest artificially-sustained pregnancy in a brain-dead mother. The mother had suffered a stroke in April and was declared brain dead shortly after reaching the hospital. Doctors immediately began battling to save her child. They put the 27-year-old woman on artificial life support to keep the pregnancy going, and regularly moved her legs to stimulate walking to help the child's growth. The baby was delivered in the 34th week of gestation, with the husband and other family members present. Medical staff then disconnected the mother's life support systems and allowed her to die. "This has really been an extraordinary case when the whole family stood together ... without their support and their interest it would never have finished this way," said Pavel Ventruba, head of gynaecology and obstetrics at the hospital.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


They're Not Cops. They Don't Have Guns. But They're Responding to More 911 Calls.
2024-03-23, The Marshall Project
Posted: 2024-04-22 22:06:00
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2024/03/23/police-emergency-mental-health-911

People experiencing mental or behavioral health crises and addiction have often been subject to police use of force, arrest and incarceration. [There are] efforts around the country to change that. One of the most common new approaches ... are civilian co-responder programs, in which behavioral health specialists, often social workers, show up to certain emergency calls alongside police. These can include situations like suicide threats, drug overdoses, and psychiatric episodes. Typically, the officers on the team have special training in crisis intervention. Generally, these teams aim to de-escalate any crisis or conflict, avoiding arrest and solving the reason for the emergency call, especially if it's a simple one. This week, the New Jersey Monitor reported that one call "for a welfare check on a woman with anxiety ended with the [state] trooper picking up her new cell phone from the post office and fixing a broken toilet" and the emergency call screener setting up her new phone. The Monitor also found that the program avoided arrests or police use of force in 95% of responses. The B-HEARD program in New York City, which is just three years old in a diverse city of 8.5 million, responded to roughly a quarter of mental health calls in precincts where it operated in the first half of 2023. Mental health calls make up 10% of all 911 calls in the city. In Denver, a study of the city's STAR program found the alternative response model reduced low-level crime.

Note: Explore more positive stories about repairing the criminal justice system.


The new science of death: ‘There's something happening in the brain that makes no sense'
2024-04-02, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
Posted: 2024-04-15 12:36:04
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/apr/02/new-science-of-death-brain-ac...

Jimo Borjigin, a professor of neurology at the University of Michigan ... took the first close look at the record of electrical activity in the brain of Patient One after she was taken off life support. After Patient One was taken off oxygen, there was a surge of activity in her dying brain. Areas that had been nearly silent while she was on life support suddenly thrummed with high-frequency electrical signals called gamma waves. In particular, the parts of the brain that scientists consider a "hot zone" for consciousness became dramatically alive. Since the 1960s, advances in resuscitation had helped to revive thousands of people who might otherwise have died. About 10% or 20% of those people brought with them stories of near-death experiences in which they felt their souls or selves departing from their bodies. According to several international surveys and studies, one in 10 people claims to have had a near-death experience involving cardiac arrest, or a similar experience in circumstances where they may have come close to death. That's roughly 800 million souls worldwide who may have dipped a toe in the afterlife. If there is consciousness without brain activity, then consciousness must dwell somewhere beyond the brain. Parapsychologists point to a number of rare but astounding cases. One of the most famous is about a woman who apparently travelled so far outside her body that she was able to spot a shoe on a window ledge in another part of the hospital where she went into cardiac arrest; the shoe was later reportedly found by a nurse.

Note: Read more about the fascinating field of near-death experiences. Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


How I rewired my brain in six weeks
2023-09-18, BBC News
Posted: 2024-04-15 12:34:23
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20230912-how-i-hacked-my-brain

There is growing evidence that simple, everyday changes to our lives can alter our brains and change how they work. Our brain has an incredible ability to adapt, learn and grow because by its nature, it is plastic – that is, it changes. This is called neuroplasticity, which simply means the brain's ability to adapt and evolve over time in structure and function. Every time we learn a new skill, our brain adapts. Neuroscientists and psychologists are now finding that we have the power to control that to some extent. And there's good reason to want to boost our brain – an increasing number of studies suggest it can play a role in delaying or preventing degenerative brain diseases. Research has found that after only a few months of mindfulness training, certain depression and anxiety symptoms can ease – though as with any complex mental health problem, this may of course vary depending on individual circumstances. There's more to it. Mindfulness can change the brain. That's because when the stress hormone cortisol increases and remains high, "it can become toxic for your brain", says [psychologist Thorsten] Barnhofer. Stress can also directly inhibit neuroplasticity, so managing it allows the brain to remain more plastic. What's fascinating about this area of research is that mindfulness, which appears to be such a simple process, can have a measurable effect. "What mindfulness does is it can buffer stress, you become aware of challenges," explains Barnhofer.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


These athletes suffered life-changing injuries. Then, they turned to psychedelics
2024-02-26, CNN News
Posted: 2024-04-15 12:32:34
https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/19/sport/psilocybin-athletes-life-changing-injuri...

Daniel Carcillo wanted two things in life: to play hockey and to be a father. By 30, he was a two-time Stanley Cup winner. By age 31, he was suicidal. After seven diagnosed concussions, Carcillo tells CNN that he was suffering from "dementia-like" symptoms, along with depression, anxiety and headaches. Carcillo says he also suffered from insomnia and disrupted sleep. He spent over $500,000 on prescription medications and treatments at stroke rehabilitation centers, brain centers, and concussion centers, as well as holistic therapies. Then in a "last-ditch effort" to try and alleviate his symptoms, he says he took a dose of psilocybin – the main psychoactive ingredient in magic mushrooms – in Denver, which became the first US city to decriminalize hallucinogenic mushrooms. "And I woke up the next day and I describe it as feeling the way I should," said Carcillo. "I felt like, for the first time in a very, very long time, I had a zest for life. All I wanted to do was get on FaceTime and call my wife and call my kids and get back home." Carcillo isn't the only athlete – former or current – openly talking about using psychedelics to treat various conditions. In 2022, residents in Colorado joined Oregon in voting to legalize psilocybin. Small clinical trials have shown that one or two doses of psilocybin, given in a therapeutic setting, can make dramatic and long-lasting changes in people suffering from treatment-resistant major depressive disorder.

Note: Read more about the the healing potential of psychedelic medicine. Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


Device Pulls Dozens of Liters of Water from the Air–Already Being Installed in Jordanian Desert Homes
2023-04-20, Good News Network
Posted: 2024-04-08 23:03:31
https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/device-pulls-dozens-of-liters-of-water-from-t...

Entrepreneurs in Jordan have created a sophisticated machine that pulls water from the desert air at a rate that could cure the country's water woes. 1,000 units of their flagship device have already been pre-ordered by the Jordanian government, and the success of the invention has allowed the innovators to attract dozens of promising scientists who can hopefully expand on their success and bring water resources up to speed in the relatively-stable Near Eastern nation. Aquaporo [is] a relatively straightforward, air conditioning-sized machine that can harvest 35 liters of water every day in a desert climate of 20% humidity. Aquaporo CEO Kyle Cordova and engineering director Husam Almassad got their start at Jordan's Royal Scientific Society. Their invention looked a bit like a chest freezer. Inside, rows of nanomaterials formed into tubes and other shapes act like a sieve that filters water out of the air. The physics behind it are much the same as those found in this Classical Indian architectural feature and takes advantage of air's tendency to speed up as it moves through a narrow passageway; called the Venturi Effect. It leaves behind the heavier water vapor, which condenses, drops into a collection apparatus, and is fed then into a reservoir. Research on the efficacy of Aquaporo's invention shows it can achieve levels of water purity greater than Nestle brand bottled water, and collects it from the air at double the rate of existing moisture capture technology.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


The Alternative by Nick Romeo review – moral substitutes for the free market model
2024-01-08, The Guardian (One of the UK's Leading Newspapers)
Posted: 2024-04-08 23:01:33
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2024/jan/08/the-alternative-how-to-build-a-...

You can't help but applaud Nick Romeo for showing the workable alternatives to capitalism and the moral driver behind them – everything from the way companies are incorporated to how employees are hired, paid and enabled to share in the value they create. There is no need for ordinary workers to be pawns in a system that makes humanity and ethics secondary to the unbending logic of the marketplace and blind, selfish capital. He takes us to the Marienthal job guarantee programme in Austria. Today the town is piloting the impact of a universal jobs guarantee for all of its out-of-work citizens. Essentially there is a job for anyone unemployed for more than 12 months – you can even have a hand in designing what it is you will do with your time when you work – and you get paid up to Ł2,000 a month. People opt to work rather than receive welfare benefit, and there is ample evidence it raises their self-worth while delivering a service – care to the elderly or tidier parks – that was not there before. Better still, it costs the state virtually nothing because unemployment benefit is simply transferred to the now employed worker's pay packet. Romeo takes his reader from one inspiring example to another – from the Purpose economy programme in the US, in which firms are dedicated to delivering greater purpose in perpetuity, to examples of companies paying genuine living wages to their employees to encourage commitment. Around 7,000 B Corps, which commit in their founding constitution to put social goals before profit, now trade in more than 90 countries – there were effectively none 25 years ago.

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


Deep underground, robotic teamwork saves the day
2023-07-20, Knowable Magazine
Posted: 2024-04-08 22:59:37
https://knowablemagazine.org/content/article/technology/2023/deep-underground...

When a Manhattan parking garage collapsed in April this year, rescuers were reluctant to stay in the damaged building, fearing further danger. So they used a combination of flying drones and a doglike walking robot to inspect the damage, look for survivors and make sure the site was safe for human rescuers to return. Soon, rescuers may be able to call on a much more sophisticated robotic search-and-rescue response. Researchers are developing teams of flying, walking and rolling robots that can cooperate to explore areas that no one robot could navigate on its own. And they are giving robots the ability to communicate with one another and make many of their own decisions independent of their human controller. Such teams of robots could be useful in other challenging environments like caves or mines where it can be difficult for rescuers to find and reach survivors. In cities, collapsed buildings and underground sites such as subways or utility tunnels often have hazardous areas where human rescuers can't be sure of the dangers. As robots become better, teams of them may one day be able to go into a hazardous disaster site, locate survivors and report back to their human operators with a minimum of supervision. "More work ... needs to be done," [roboticist Viktor] Orekhov says. "But at the same time, we've seen the ability of the teams advanced so rapidly that even now, with their current capabilities, they're able to make a significant difference in real-life environments."

Note: Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


I'm a Black musician who has befriended and encouraged over 200 Ku Klux Klan members to give up their robes.
2023-06-02, Business Insider
Posted: 2024-04-01 14:36:17
https://www.businessinsider.com/daryl-davis-ku-klux-klan-kkk-musician-racism-...

In 1983, I was out playing at the Silver Dollar Lounge. I had just finished playing the first song when someone put an arm around my shoulder. It was a white guy. He said it was his first time sitting with a Black guy, and I asked why. The man looked at me and said, "I'm a member of the Ku Klux Klan." I thought he was joking. But he pulled out his wallet and handed me his KKK membership card. It only dawned on me a couple years later that I blew my chance to ask them the question that had been plaguing me since I was 10 years old: How can you hate me when you don't know me? Who better to ask that of than someone who went out of their way to join an organization that has, for over 100 years, practiced hating people who don't look like them? I spent the next several years traveling across the country, interviewing the man from that night, Klan leaders, and Klan members, and eventually writing a book about it. I did not convert anybody. Over 200 Klan members have converted themselves. The more we conversed, the more people would change. One time, someone said we should put Black people down. But I sat there calmly, and they'd be curious about why I didn't fight back. Now their ears are open. Now we can nourish those seeds, water them, and, in most cases, they bloom. Of course, some people go to their graves with hatred in their hearts. But what gives me hope, despite the current state of this country, is the fact that I've seen it work. I've seen people change.

Note: Daryl Davis has successfully persuaded more than 200 KKK members and other white supremacists to disavow their allegiances. Read more about the power of calling people in with love, rather than criticism and judgment. Explore more positive stories like this in our comprehensive inspiring news articles archive focused on solutions and bridging divides.


Paraplegic Veteran Uses Skydiving to Reclaim Lost Sensation in His Legs and Soul
2024-03-12, Good News Network
Posted: 2024-04-01 14:34:28
https://www.goodnewsnetwork.org/paraplegic-veteran-uses-skydiving-to-reclaim-...

There was a lot that Army veteran Alex Dillman lost when he became a paraplegic after an IED blew up under his legs in Afghanistan, but now an unlikely activity has allowed him to take some of what he lost back. Hurtling through the air at 120 mph, Dillman doesn't need his wheelchair to skydive; he doesn't really need his legs either. In that unique state of concentration and freedom, he says he's "expected to perform," a do-or-die state of mind that he says he hasn't felt since his old life on deployment. Dillman originally saw adventure therapy as a way to combat depression and PTSD he suffered from in the wake of his lost abilities, but he never imagined it would help him get some of those abilities back. Now he's part of an adventure therapy non-profit called Skydive First Project, where he utilizes outdoor adventures to assist individuals suffering from PTSD and depression. Based in Tampa, activities encompass hiking, kayaking, rock climbing, horseback riding, scuba diving, and tandem skydiving. "[The] great thing about skydiving is that it gets me out of the chair," said Dillman. "I don't bring my chair with me, so I'm in a free state. I don't need to be in the chair to perform the act of skydiving." "I can feel my legs and my feet to a certain extent. I can get a better sense of my overall being, feel what my legs are doing, feel what my hips are doing. Having that feeling again ... even if it's for 30 seconds or 60 seconds ... is enough for me!"

Note: Read more inspiring news articles on incredible people with disabilities.


Important Note: Explore our full index to revealing excerpts of key major media news stories on several dozen engaging topics. And don't miss amazing excerpts from 20 of the most revealing news articles ever published.

Kindly donate here to support this inspiring work.

Subscribe to our free email list of underreported news.

newsarticles.media is a PEERS empowerment website

"Dedicated to the greatest good of all who share our beautiful world"