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The Food and Drug Administration is considering whether to approve the use of MDMA, also known as Ecstasy, to treat post-traumatic stress disorder. An independent advisory group of experts will review the studies on Tuesday and is expected to vote on whether the treatment is effective and whether its benefits outweigh its risks.The commission will hear from Lykos Therapeutics, which presented evidence from clinical trials in an effort to get the agency's approval to legally sell the drug to treat people with a combination of MDMA and talk therapy.Millions of Americans suffer from PTSD, including military veterans at high risk for suicide. No new treatments for PTSD have been approved in more than 20 years.What is MDMA?Methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA) is a synthetic psychoactive d...

A new tourist tax in Bali. Higher hotel taxes in Amsterdam and Paris. Stricter rules on public alcohol consumption in Milan and Mallorca. Ahead of the summer travel season, leaders of many resort towns have taken steps to tame the tourist crowds – or at least make more revenue from them.All of this can create headaches for travelers, although in most cases the new fares or tax increases represent only a small fraction of the total cost of a trip. The goal is to ensure tourism runs smoothly for both visitors and locals, said Megan Epler Wood, managing director of the Sustainable Tourism Asset Management Program at Cornell University.“All tourism depends on beautiful natural and cultural resources. You need to protect these resources to be a viable tourist destination – and if you don&#...

Anadol said that every artist wants to see “what is beyond reality” and “perceive worlds that don't exist.” Artificial intelligence is a vehicle for the imagination, which he says could represent “hallucinations, dreams, fantasies.”The technology we deal with today is no longer “just a pen, or a printing press” and “not just a car or a wheel”. Instead "it's intelligence", he said, she said. “It's mimicking our reasoning right now and will evolve. It will turn into something else.” And this “has never happened before in our history”.Currently, he explained, artificial intelligence is “50% human, 50% machine”. In the future, she said, artificial intelligence will be “designed from the ground up: to see, to hear, to feel” and to produce “a living art form” that will be “a sy...

The future of art is the main theme of “Your Ghosts Are Mine: Expanded Cinema, Amplified Voices,” a film and video installation that coincides with this year's Venice Biennale. Organized by Qatar Museums and featuring around 40 artists from the region, it speaks to the emergence of the Middle East as a force in various art forms, not to mention the force in changing the narrative on how the region is represented in films and 'art.The future is in the mind of Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, president of Qatar Museums and the Doha Film Institute. Al Mayassa sees this year's Art for Tomorrow conference in Venice, convened by the Democracy & Culture Foundation, with panels moderated by New York Times journalists, as an opportunity to raise the profile of artis...

Using her arms as a makeshift slat, a Sudanese woman in a black hijab and black-and-white kaftan clapped her hands, signaling the start of rehearsals. The other amateur actors, wearing comical stick-on mustaches, moved toward their goals, improvising a scene in a women's beauty salon where a customer's hair is accidentally dyed blue.By the time the scene was over, all the women were hysterical and teasing each other about how they could play their parts better next time. Scenes like this are common at the Kuluhenna Creative Workshop, held in a clubhouse on the outskirts of this Yorkshire town. The workshop is open to all local women, but with a focus on immigrant communities, including refugees and asylum seekers.The 90-minute class, which the Mafwa Theater has been holding sinc...

As the speeches dragged on, eyes drifted to screens. Teenagers scrolled Instagram. One man texted his girlfriend. And men crowded around a phone streaming a soccer match while the group’s first female leader spoke.Just about anywhere, a scene like this would be mundane. But this was happening in a remote Indigenous village in one of the most isolated stretches of the planet.The Marubo people have long lived in communal huts scattered hundreds of miles along the Ituí River deep in the Amazon rainforest. They speak their own language, take ayahuasca to connect with forest spirits and trap spider monkeys to make soup or keep as pets.They have preserved this way of life for hundreds of years through isolation — some villages can take a week to reach. But since September, the Marubo have had hi...

Biden predicted the plan would be unacceptable to some members of the Israeli government, Matthew Miller, a State Department spokesman, said Monday.“And, of course, we've seen some members of the Israeli government already come out and oppose it,” Miller said. But he said the proposal was “in the interests of Israel's long-term security. It is obviously also in the long-term interest of the Palestinian people.”Miller said that since Biden announced the plan on Friday, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken has spoken with the foreign ministers of Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Egypt and the United Arab Emirates. He had also spoken with Benny Gantz, a member of the Israeli war cabinet, and with the Israeli defense minister, Yoav Gallant.“We are completely confident” that Isra...

Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, the former government scientist celebrated and scorned for his work on Covid, forcefully denied Republican charges Monday that he helped fund the research that sparked the pandemic or hid the possibility that it originated in a laboratory, calling the allegations “absolutely false and simply absurd.”In an occasionally testy appearance before the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, Dr. Fauci read aloud a February 2020 email urging a prominent scientist who was then suspicious about a leak from the laboratory "to determine whether your concerns are validated" and, if so, report them "very quickly" to the FBI“It is inconceivable that anyone reading this email would conclude that I was trying to hide the possibility of a lab leak,” Dr. Fauci testified.M...

Nigel Farage, the pro-Brexit activist and serial disruptor of British politics, on Monday announced plans to run in next month's British general election, dealing a fresh setback to the prospects of the country's embattled prime minister, Rishi Sunak.Last month Farage said he would not seek a parliamentary seat because the announcement of the July 4 election had taken him by surprise and because he wanted to prioritize supporting Donald J. Trump's election campaign in the United States.But on Monday Farage reversed that decision and said he would take the helm of Reform UK, the successor to the Brexit Party he once led, and run for a seat in Parliament.“I've changed my mind – it's allowed, you know,” he said. “I will stand for this election,” adding that she will stand...

Elon Musk-owned social media service a person familiar with the plans.The town halls, which will be done in partnership with cable channel NewsNation, have yet to be scheduled and the moderators have not been chosen, said the person, who wished to remain anonymous because the plans have not yet been made public. X users will be able to ask presidential candidates questions during events.In an appearance on NewsNation on Wednesday evening, Mr. Kennedy confirmed his plans to participate in a town hall, adding that Mr. Musk has offered use of the platform.X has undergone a transformation under Musk's ownership, as the billionaire has slashed his workforce, overhauled his technology and used the platform to advance his personal agendas.The town halls follow a March meeting between Trump a...