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USA medallist shares shocking state of Olympic bronze

<p>An Olympic medallist has shared the shocking state of his bronze medal, just one week after winning it. </p> <p>US skateboarder Nyjah Huston won bronze in the Men’s Street event on his skateboard at the Paris Olympics, and returned to the USA after his win. </p> <p>Huston, 29, has been staying in Laguna Beach in California, enjoying his break with friends and soaking up the sun as well as showing off his new medal.</p> <p>However, the medal is no longer looking as clean as it was when awarded to him, as she showed off in a video he posted to Instagram. </p> <p>In the clip, the medal could be seen looking battered and peeling.</p> <p>Hutson insisted that the quality of the metal may not be as “high” as he initially thought and called for it to be improved.</p> <p>He said, “Alright, so the medals look great when they are brand new."</p> <p>“But they look worse after I let them sit on my skin with some sweat for a little while and let my friends wear them over the weekend."</p> <p>“They are apparently not as high quality as you would think. I mean look at that thing, it is looking rough."</p> <p>“Even the front is starting to chip off a little so I think the Olympic medals need to step up the quality a little bit.”</p> <p>In a separate post, he added, “Medal looking like it went to war and back. I guess the medals are meant to be in cases. Not meant for the send.”</p> <p>Huston then posted a follower’s reply to his Instagram story that read, “Looks like ya won that thing in 1982 mate.”</p> <p>Many were quick to comment on his post, assuming the medals would be of higher quality.</p> <p>One person wrote, “What a piece of trash from the Olympics,” while another asked, “Did you keep the receipt?”</p> <p><em>Image credits: Instagram </em></p>

Travel Trouble

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Canberra takes out bronze in worldwide healthy city rankings

<p dir="ltr">The world’s healthiest cities have been crowned for 2022, with Australia’s capital claiming bronze.</p> <p><span id="docs-internal-guid-d9998b29-7fff-7f0e-603c-b9722c8b99bb">A <a href="https://www.money.co.uk/mortgages/healthiest-places" target="_blank" rel="noopener">new study</a> from Money.co.uk has ranked Canberra in third place, two places higher than last year’s rankings.</span></p> <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/CaOaNydoLR5/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CaOaNydoLR5/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Visit Canberra (@visitcanberra)</a></p> </div> </blockquote> <p dir="ltr">The study analysed a range of factors, including obesity levels, life expectancy, air pollution, the number of sunlight hours, and safety, along with some related to the pandemic such as healthcare accessibility and the number of healthcare professionals in each country.</p> <p dir="ltr">Though the study ranked Japan as the healthiest country to live in, the top two healthiest cities were both in Spain, with Valencia retaining the top position for another year.</p> <p><span id="docs-internal-guid-72c27626-7fff-aa9f-16b9-d60a9b53a913"></span></p> <p dir="ltr">Australia also cracked the healthiest countries list, coming in 16th place.</p> <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cagbx_5qF8I/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cagbx_5qF8I/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp;utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Visit Canberra (@visitcanberra)</a></p> </div> </blockquote> <p dir="ltr">According to the study, Canberra significantly improved from 2021 to 2022. It is one of the safest cities in the world, has a high average life expectancy at 82.9 years, and experiences a whopping 2,813.7 hours of sunlight each year.</p> <p dir="ltr">In fact, the capital city ranked second when it came to cities with the cleanest air, followed by Wellington.</p> <p dir="ltr">Other Australian cities that made the list include Adelaide in 9th place and Brisbane in 16th place.</p> <p dir="ltr"><span id="docs-internal-guid-a9970f9c-7fff-e0d6-ea6e-255dfb6c5763"></span></p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Image: @visitcanberra (Instagram)</em></p>

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The origins of money

<div> <p><span style="font-size: 14px;">From cowrie shells to native resources and animals, currency in some shape or form has long been a part of human history. </span></p> <div class="copy"> <p>A currency of sorts was first thought to emerge as trade and exchange, with trade being tracked through the archaeological record, starting in the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/10.1146/annurev.anthro.31.040402.085416" target="_blank">Upper Palaeolithic</a>, when groups of hunters traded the best flint weapons and tools. Throughout the years, various objects were used as units of value until nearly 5,000 years ago, when the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/when-and-why-did-people-first-start-using-money-78887#:~:text=The%20Mesopotamian%20shekel%20%E2%80%93%20the%20first,gold%20coins%20to%20pay%20armies." target="_blank">Mesopotamian shekel</a> emerged as the first known form of currency.</p> <p>Now, researchers from Leiden University in the Netherlands are adding an Early Bronze Age piece to the currency puzzle. They’re proposing that Bronze Age people may have used rings and axe blades as an early form of standardised currency. </p> <p>“Archaeology can provide a unique perspective on the development of money and systems of weighing over space and time, but the discipline has difficulties with the identification of objects that functioned either as commodity money or as weights,” the authors write in their paper, <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0240462" target="_blank">published</a> in the journal <em>PLOS ONE.</em></p> <p>The authors compared objects from Early Bronze Age Central Europe. Based on the similarity in weight and shape of the objects, they suggest that ancient people used bronze objects that were standardised in shape and weight as currency. </p> <p>“Found in bulk, sometimes in hoards containing multiple hundreds, many of the rings, ribs and axe blades are considered to have no other practical function besides their tentative use as ingots, or rough-outs for further production,” the authors write.<em> </em></p> <p>“Moulds, made of clay, stone or casted directly in sand made serial production possible, which led to some degree of unintentional standardisation. However, there are indications that for some types of objects, a deliberate effort was made to achieve a specific weight interval, meaning that weight mattered.”</p> <p>The researchers studied just over 5,000 objects made of bronze in rings, ribs and axe blades from more than 100 ancient hoards.</p> <p>The objects’ weights were compared using a psychology principle known as the <a rel="noreferrer noopener" href="http://apps.usd.edu/coglab/WebersLaw.html" target="_blank">Weber fraction</a>, which suggests if objects are similar in mass, a human being weighing them by hand can’t tell the difference. </p> <p>Around 70% of the rings were similar enough in weight – they averaged about 195 grams – and would have been indistinguishable by hand, as were subsets of the ribs and axe blades. </p> <p>Standardisation is a key feature of money. However, the researchers say this can be difficult to identify in the archaeological record since ancient people had inexact forms of measurement. </p> <p>“Commodity money displays rough similarities in terms of shape and weight, because of standardisation, without necessarily following a strict metrological system,” the authors write.</p> <p>“Though archaeologists have no insight in the transactions that took place, there can be no doubt that at least the rings and ribs conform to the definition of commodity money.”</p> <p>More precise weighing tools appear in the archaeology record later, in the Middle Bronze Age of Europe, along with an increase in the availability of scrap bronze.</p> <!-- Start of tracking content syndication. Please do not remove this section as it allows us to keep track of republished articles --> <img id="cosmos-post-tracker" style="opacity: 0; height: 1px!important; width: 1px!important; border: 0!important; position: absolute!important; z-index: -1!important;" src="https://syndication.cosmosmagazine.com/?id=135363&amp;title=The+origins+of+money" alt="" width="1" height="1" /> <!-- End of tracking content syndication --></div> <div id="contributors"> <p><em><a rel="noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/history/the-origins-of-money/" target="_blank">This article</a> was originally published on <a rel="noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com" target="_blank">Cosmos Magazine</a> and was written by <a rel="noopener" href="https://cosmosmagazine.com/contributor/amelia-nichele" target="_blank">Amelia Nichele</a>. Amelia Nichele is a science journalist at The Royal Institution of Australia.</em></p> </div> </div> <p><em>Image: </em><em>M.H.G. Kuijpers</em></p>

Money & Banking

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Mack Horton’s controversial refusal to share podium with "drug cheat" causes furore

<p>Mack Horton has received a flurry of criticism online through his social media platforms from furious Chinese swimming fans.</p> <p>The Australian swimmer sparked a heated debate after refusing to stand on the podium next to his Chinese rival "drug cheat" Sun Yang at the swimming championships on Sunday night.</p> <p>The bold move of refusing to stand next to Yang by Horton made international headlines.</p> <p>Sun underwent a three-month doping suspension in 2014 and is now being investigated again finishing first in the 400m freestyle – beating Horton by 0.73 of a second.</p> <p>The Australian Olympian made his anger apparent by snubbing the medal podium where he would stand next to Yang – a clear protest to show he was unhappy with the Chinese swimmer being allowed to compete in the eight-day championship.</p> <p><img style="width: 500px; height: 281.25px;" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/7828825/new-project.jpg" alt="" data-udi="umb://media/9c9a3591c0ac4d3b90f22c561d1ca172" /></p> <p style="text-align: center;"><em>Silver medalist Mack Horton of Australia, gold medalist Sun Yang of China and bronze medalist Gabriele Detti of Italy.</em></p> <p>The incredible move and bitter rivalry between the two has sparked an intense international debate after Yang accused Horton of disrespecting China.</p> <p>“I was aware that the Australian athlete had dissatisfaction and personal feelings towards me,” Yang said via an interpreter.</p> <p>“But it was unfortunate because disrespecting me is okay but disrespecting China was very unfortunate and I felt sorry about that.</p> <p>“I’m aware of the rumours (about his alleged hammer attack). (But) I think this has been the greatest achievement in history for the Chinese (swimming) team.”</p> <p>10-time world champion Yang is accused of smashing vials of his blood during a clash with drug testers last year, however, he was allowed to compete in the eight-day swimming event while he awaits a Court of Arbitration for Sport hearing in September.</p> <p>Horton has not been shy of his feelings on Yang, suggesting <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.oversixty.com.au/news/news/aussie-team-stands-by-mack-horton-in-china-swimming-feud" target="_blank">he was a “drug cheat” at the 2016 Rio Olympics.</a></p> <p>The Olympian admitted on Sunday he was unhappy with the results of the race.</p> <p>“Frustration is probably it,” Horton said after the race.</p> <p>“I think you know in what respect.”</p> <p>Andrew Horton, father of the swimmer, told 3AW Radio their family have a “huge respect” for China.</p> <p>“There’s a lot of commentary about China. We have huge respect for China. This is about ensuring that there are systems and processes in the sport that keep the sport clean,” he said.</p>

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