At this stage it's a trope that people imitate, perhaps without really thinking about it. Originally it was almost certainly an ironic joke about the value of the medals, playing on the old-fashioned bite tests that would be used for for items of dubious worth
Makes total sense: who's working for whom? Is wheat making an effort to till the soil and find fertiliser to help us grow, or is it the other way round?
It would make a lot more sense if humans could just lay some sort of egg sac which we could keep in the garage for 9 months until it hatches. I honestly don't know why biologists and geneticists haven't dealt with this by now
These things only become meaningful when you look at emissions per capita AND remember that China manufactures large amounts of the world's stuff. All your iPhone emissions count as China's because it was manufactured there, but they really belong to your country. Same for loads of other stuff. Careful you don't fall for the tenor of this article, because it's probably intended to distract you ("Why should I bother when China is really bad?") and keep you consuming
Important to know that real-world testing shows that PHEVs are rarely plugged in and just burn oil much of the time
Let's leave aside the fact that everything produced today by so-called AI is absolute dogshit. Let's pretend it produces things that it's asked to produce. Even in this version, where's the pleasure in watching a story you've just created with prompts? The point of story is to be taken on a ride by somebody else - ideally someone you trust to give you a satisfying ride and not waste your time.
Blaming individuals for systems failures is the oldest trick in the book for avoiding fixing things. Google "The nut that holds the wheel" if you want to learn more, eg this article
Don't ask online strangers for medical advice. Go to a doctor if you're worried
As it's Microsoft, you can be pretty sure the option to turn off the new look and feel will be removed in 6 months
I know that's a solution, but as a solution to bad design it's a little bit "Just wear a rubber glove to stop your oven electrocuting you". Yeah sure, but maybe design it better?
A really large number of them are references - possibly dated references - to other things. Sometimes cultural phenomena (the movie Ishtar, which was before my time and I'm really old) but often scientific or other phenomena. In one of his books he mentioned a biology teacher who pinned a load of his comics to the wall and, week by week, the students would go "Ah, now I get that one" as they learned something about chimpanzee communication, eye spots, or whatever.
Of course, some are just whimsy. And others are warning us about those sneaky sneaky cows...
2 and 3 are massive. I'm on Mastodon, but am having a much better time on Bluesky. Mastodon is full of gatekeeping and policing and people complaining - Bluesky is just fun and interesting, like Twitter 12 years ago