On:

People are avoiding long lines at the cash register by shopping online this year. A recent survey shows that almost half of all US shoppers say they plan to buy gifts online this holiday season, up from about a third last year. In order to get more Christmas customers into their premises, store managers are trying to make potential shoppers happier while they’re waiting in line.

Meanwhile, the shoppers would like to know the mathematics of shopping efficiency–is it better to stay in the same line or jump to a shorter one? Mathematicians and psychologists are trying to understand how people perceive waiting in line.
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On:

There’s more confirmation from CERN (the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, Switzerland) that the God particle–the Higgs boson–has been glimpsed (NOTE: Subscribers can still listen to this show). The Higgs is a sub-atomic particle that is predicted to exist, but has not yet been seen (until now).

Supposedly it explains how particles interact and is the means by which everything in the universe obtains mass. However, CERN won’t be sure they’ve really seen the Higgs until there is less than a one in a million chance that the data spike they’ve seen is a statistical fluke.
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We have a difficult relationship with Mexico and politicians in the Southwest are trying to get elected by using campaign rhetoric that stresses keeping out Mexican immigrants–especially those peddling drugs across the border. While they may be harming us, we are also harming them in a way that the average American has never heard of: We are sending spent batteries that have been turned in for recycling to Mexico, where their lead can be extracted by crude methods that are illegal here. This exposes workers and local residents to dangerous levels of lead.
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On:

Here’s a secret not everybody knows: Creative people are more likely to cheat than less creative people, probably because they CAN. Their creativity increases their ability to rationalize their actions.

Psychologist Francesca Gino says, "Greater creativity helps individuals solve difficult tasks across many domains, but creative sparks may lead individuals to take unethical routes when searching for solutions to problems and tasks." Gino conducted a series of experiments to test her thesis that more creative people would cheat under circumstances where they could justify their bad behavior.
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