Liverpool star Mohamed Salah scored four goals as Egypt trounced Djibouti 6-0, and minnows Lesotho pulled off a shock 1-1 draw in Nigeria in...

When Joe Biden was running for president three years ago, he flew on a white private jet with his campaign logo painted on the side

James Harden threw a club party complete with Daryl Morey Is a Liar signs.

Welcome to Acne Files, a month-long series where we get real about whiteheads, blackheads,cysts, and every bump or blemish in between. From skin-soothing products R29 editors swear by to exclusive deals on the most breakout-friendly beauty brands, we’re kissing the concept of “bad skin” goodbye and exploring why acne goes so much further than skin deep.

“The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now in this very room." So says Laurence Fishburne’s Morpheus in sci-fi classic ‘The Matrix’ as he offers Keanu Reeves’s Neo the choice to find out just how “deep the rabbit hole goes”. Now, just as Neo discovered that the "life" he'd been living was little more than an algorithmic construct, scientists and philosophers are arguing that we could be stuck inside a simulation ourselves. In a paper published earlier this month, physicist Melvin Vopson, of the University of Portsmouth, offered scientific evidence for a philosophical theory known as the simulation hypothesis. This, in a nutshell, posits that the entire universe and our objective reality are just super-advanced virtual reality illusions. Elon Musk is among the well-known fans of the theory, which – as Dr Vopson notes in his paper – has been “gaining traction in scientific circles as well as in the entertainment industry”. The university lecturer also pointed out that recent developments in a branch of science known as information physics “appear to support this possibility”. Information physics suggests that physical reality is fundamentally made up of bits of information. However, Dr Vopson has gone further and is working to prove that information has a physical mass and is a fundamental building block of the universe. He even claims that information could be the mysterious dark matter that makes up almost a third of the universe. In previous research, the physicist proposed that all elementary particles (the smallest known building blocks in the universe), store information about themselves, much like DNA in humans. Then, in 2022, he discovered a new law of physics, christened the second law of infodynamics, which states that entropy – the degree of randomness or disorder – within an isolated information system either remains constant or decreases over time. In other words, the system becomes less and less chaotic, implying that there is some kind of mechanism governing it rather than random chance. “I knew then that this revelation had far-reaching implications across various scientific disciplines,” Dr Vopson said in a statement released by the University of Portsmouth. “What I wanted to do next is put the law to the test and see if it could further support the simulation hypothesis by moving it on from the philosophical realm to mainstream science.” Is the Universe a Simulation? | Melvin Vopson www.youtube.com Dr Vopson employed the law in a range of different fields, including genetics, cosmology and even symmetry. Here, he found that the abundance of symmetry in the Universe (think snowflakes and facial structures) could be explained by the second law of infodynamics. "Symmetry principles play an important role with respect to the laws of nature, but until now there has been little explanation as to why that could be,” he said. “My findings demonstrate that high symmetry corresponds to the lowest information entropy state, potentially explaining nature's inclination towards it." Again, put simply, nature prefers things to be as well-ordered as possible. He continued: “This approach, where excess information is removed, resembles the process of a computer deleting or compressing waste code to save storage space and optimise power consumption.” As a result, this “supports the idea that we’re living in a simulation.” Dr Vopson is serious about this idea and, last year, even launched a crowdfunding campaign to test it. At the time, he announced that he had designed an experiment to determine whether we are all just characters in an advanced virtual world. “There is a growing community out there looking seriously at the possibility that information is more fundamental to everything than we think,” he said in a statement released back in December. “If information is a key component of everything in the universe, it would make sense that a vast computer somewhere is in control. “Assuming the universe is indeed a simulation, then it must contain a lot of information bits hidden everywhere around us. I’ve devised an experiment that proposes a way of extracting this information to prove it’s there.” His proposed experiment is based on his conclusion that information is physical and that elementary particles have a DNA of information about themselves. He posited that the information in an elementary particle could be detected and measured by using particle-antiparticle collision. “We can measure the information content of a particle by erasing it. If we delete the information from the particles, we can then look at what’s left,” he said in the December statement. “This experiment is highly achievable with our existing tools, and I’m hoping the crowdfunding site will help us achieve it.” And whilst the crowdfunder closed well before reaching its proposed £185,000 target, Dr Vopson still hopes to carry out the ambitious test. Following his most recent paper, he suggested the experiment had the power to confirm the “fifth state of matter in the universe” and “change physics as we know it.” Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Son Heung-min has insisted he will respect whatever decision Harry Kane makes on his Tottenham future amid interest from Bayern Munich.

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We're used to wild plot twists when it comes to Donald Trump and his brood, but no one could have seen this one coming. The MAGA commander-in-chief is dead and his son, Donald Jr, is running for president in his place – that is, at least, according to the latter's X/Twitter account. A tweet posted at 1:25pm UK time (8:25am ET) from his verified page read: "I'm sad to announce, my father Donald Trump has passed away. I will be running for president in 2024." The apparent bombshell was followed by a string of further outlandish, offensive and down-right dangerous comments, including jibes at North Korea, Logan Paul and an expletive-filled attack on Joe Biden. It was half an hour before the jaw-dropping thread was removed and, at the time of writing, no official explanation had been given. The safe assumption is that the account was hacked but with no word from the horse's mouth, who can say for sure... Naturally, eagle-eyed social media scrollers seized on the unexpected outburst, with many capturing screenshots to immortalise the embarrassing mishap. And anyone concerned that there was any truth in the announcements needed only turn to Trump Sr's favourite online stomping ground. The former world leader was busy ranting on Truth Social right when things were kicking off. So yes, he's very much still alive. Indy100 has contacted X/Twitter and the Trump Organization for comment. Sign up for our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

SYDNEY--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Oct 23, 2023--

VIDEO: Ricky Stenhouse Jr.'s car caught on fire with him inside it.

Sony's new games preservation engineer has clarified his role in the company.