A moment that changed me: I went to a death cafe – and learned how to live a much happier life

I felt peace flood over me as I realised I no longer needed to seek validation from others. Rather than saying yes to everything, I became more open, present and patient

‘Are you afraid of dying, or are you afraid of not living?” Last year, I was sitting in a circle of strangers – half Buddhist monks, half morbidly curious members of the public – when someone asked one of the most profound questions I had ever heard. I was at a “death cafe”, at my local Buddhist centre in south London. A plate of biscuits was passed around while people nursed mugs of hot tea. At 29, I was one of the youngest attending the informal chat about death and dying, which was part of an initiative to encourage more open conversations about the ends of our lives.

During the session, people reflected on the lives of those they had lost. Stories were shared about the joyful moments they had had together. A woman asked me why I would want to come to something like this, at my age. I looked around before revealing more than I had ever told my own friends and family.

Published: June 11, 2025, 5:55 am

I can reach orgasm alone – but not with my partner

I love her and find her sexy but can’t climax when we have sex, and am getting increasingly worried about it. Is treatment available?

I think I have a problem sexually. I can ejaculate alone when I masturbate, but not with a partner. This is becoming a problem as my partner is complaining about my inability to ejaculate when I am with her. I am now over 30 and it is starting to get me worried. Is there any treatment or help I can get? I really love this woman and find her sexy, but I am not able to get to the point of ejaculation.

The transition from solo sex to satisfying partner sex is not always easy. Some people become so accustomed to particular types of touch, pressure or strokes during masturbation that they find switching to the different sensations with another person extremely challenging. In addition, some people require intense focus to achieve orgasm or ejaculation, and the anxiety or distraction of intimacy with a partner interrupts their usual process.

Pamela Stephenson Connolly is a US-based psychotherapist who specialises in treating sexual disorders.

If you would like advice from Pamela on sexual matters, send us a brief description of your concerns to private.lives@theguardian.com (please don’t send attachments). Each week, Pamela chooses one problem to answer, which will be published online. She regrets that she cannot enter into personal correspondence. Submissions are subject to our terms and conditions.

Published: June 11, 2025, 7:00 am

What to do if your bike is stolen – and how to break the cycle

Steps you can take to report the theft and check if it’s being resold – as well as how to protect your next one

Whether you use your bike to commute daily, for a quick trips to the shops or long rides to keep fit, having it stolen can be a nightmare. Here’s what to do if yours goes missing.

Report the theft to the police and describe the bike in as much detail as possible, giving the model, make and where it was stolen. You should also include a description of any scratches, dents and marks that could help identify it, and a picture if you have one. You can go into your local police station or call 101 in the UK to file a report. Make sure you get a crime reference number.

Home insurance policies will often cover your bike when it’s at home but you will probably have needed to pay extra to extend this for when you’re out and about, or if you have a valuable bike. Report the loss to your insurer and give it the crime reference number. Your bike will not be covered if you failed to look after it, such as not locking it securely or with a suitable lock.

Declare your bike stolen on BikeRegister, a UK bike database – you can do this even if you have not registered your bike on there before. It will help improve the chances of your bike being recovered if there are pictures and descriptions of the bike, and where it was stolen.

Post on bike and cycling forums, such as Cycling UK Forum, Bike Forum and CycleChat in case people come across it when looking to buy a new bike.

Look on resale sites such as Gumtree, Facebook Marketplace and eBay to see whether someone is trying to sell your bike. You can set up alerts for bikes that are the same make and model. If you find one that looks like yours, alert the police – they may be able to recover it. It is not advisable to set up a sting or try to deal with the case yourself.

Alert the local community on neighbourhood forums such as Nextdoor or local Facebook groups and get in touch any bike shops nearby in case someone comes in to the shop and tries to sell one that matches your description.

Scuff the frame up a bit using sandpaper, paint and stickers so it is less appealing to thieves. Some kitsch, drawn-on hearts might save you a lot of hassle in the future.

Register it on BikeRegister and upload pictures alongside the frame number, which is usually found on the bottom bracket shell between the pedals or on the rear dropouts where the back wheel slots in. This will help the police trace it back to you if it is stolen and recovered.

Invest in two high-quality locks to make your bike less of a target. At least one of these should be a good-quality D-lock. Be sure to attach the frame to the stand when locking up.

Take any removable parts with you whenever you leave it.

Find and apply for your nearest cycle parking. This gives another layer of protection, but be sure to still lock up securely. In cities there are also many cycle hangars, such as Cyclehoop, which are small bike stores on residential streets you can apply for at a small cost each year. Check whether there’s one near you.

Conceal a Bluetooth tracker on your bike to help locate it if it goes missing. The smaller and more discreet the tracker, the better. Good spots to hide them include under the seat or inside the handlebar. Apple AirTag and Tile Sticker are popular among bike owners.

Published: June 11, 2025, 6:00 am

Australia has ‘no alternative’ but to embrace AI and seek to be a world leader in the field, industry and science minister says

Tim Ayres says the Albanese government will focus on legislation and regulation but country would benefit from moving quickly

• Australia news live: latest politics updates

• Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcast

Australia must “lean in hard” to the benefits of artificial intelligence or else risk ending up “on the end of somebody else’s supply chain”, according to the new industry and science minister, Tim Ayres, with the Labor government planning to further regulate the rapidly evolving technology.

Ayres, a former official with the manufacturing union, acknowledged Australians remained sceptical about AI and stressed that employers and employees needed to have discussions about how automation could affect workplaces.

Sign up for Guardian Australia’s breaking news email

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:00 pm

Researchers create AI-based tool that restores age-damaged artworks in hours

By slashing time and cost of restoration, technique could be used on paintings not valuable enough for traditional approach

The centuries can leave their mark on oil paintings as wear and tear and natural ageing produce cracks, discoloration and patches where pieces of pigment have flaked off.

Repairing the damage can take conservators years, so the effort is reserved for the most valuable works, but a fresh approach promises to transform the process by restoring aged artworks in hours.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:00 pm

Disney and Universal sue AI image creator Midjourney, alleging copyright infringement

Studios accuse AI firm of ‘piracy’ and seek injunction over alleged use of copyrighted characters

Disney and Universal sued an artificial intelligence company on Wednesday, alleging copyright infringement. In their lawsuit, the entertainment giants called Midjourney’s popular AI-powered image generator a “bottomless pit of plagiarism” for its alleged reproductions of the studios’ best-known characters.

The suit, filed in federal court in Los Angeles, claims Midjourney pirated the libraries of the two Hollywood studios, making and distributing without permission “innumerable” copies of their marquee characters such as Darth Vader from Star Wars, Elsa from Frozen, and the Minions from Despicable Me. Midjourney did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Published: June 11, 2025, 5:05 pm

As big tech grows more involved in Gaza, Muslim workers are wrestling with a spiritual crisis

Is working in big tech halal? Muslim workers are reckoning with the possibility that their jobs go against their religious obligations

Before Ibtihal Aboussad was fired by Microsoft for protesting the company’s work with the Israeli military during a celebration of the firm’s 50th anniversary, she sent two emails.

The first went to all of her colleagues. She appealed to their universal humanity and urged them to stand against Microsoft’s contracts to provide cloud computing software and artificial intelligence products to the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).

Published: June 11, 2025, 12:00 pm

Meta to announce $15bn investment in bid to achieve computerised ‘superintelligence’

Mark Zuckerberg expected to announce Meta will buy 49% stake in Scale AI as race to dominate AI market speeds up

Meta is to announce a $15bn (£11bn) bid to achieve computerised “superintelligence”, according to multiple reports.

The Silicon Valley race to dominate artificial intelligence is speeding up despite the patchy performance of many existing AI systems.

Published: June 11, 2025, 1:46 pm

‘They went too far’: Musk says he regrets some of his posts about Trump

Tesla share price rises as former Doge head seems to retreat from feud and president welcomes apparent apology

Elon Musk has expressed contrition for some of his tweets about Donald Trump last week, in an apparent effort to retreat from an explosive falling out that has threatened to damage the Tesla boss’s business interests.

Musk was by far the biggest donor to Trump’s presidential campaign, but tensions between the two erupted into public view last week and rapidly escalated, as the world’s richest man called for the president’s impeachment and mocked his connections to the sex offender Jeffrey Epstein in a series of posts.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:04 pm

Entrepreneur ‘humiliated’ after London Tech Week turns her and baby away

Davina Schonle prevented from entering event with eight-month-old and had to cancel meetings for tech startup

An entrepreneur has told how she was left feeling “humiliated” after being turned away from London Tech Week, an annual corporate event, because she was with her baby daughter.

Davina Schonle was prevented from entering the event on Monday after travelling for three hours with her eight-month-old and had to cancel meetings with potential suppliers to her tech startup.

Published: June 11, 2025, 8:48 am

Tell us your favourite video game of 2025 so far

We would like to hear about the best new game you have played this year so far and why

The Guardian’s writers have compiled their favourite new games of the year so far – and we’d like to hear about yours, too.

Have you come across a new release that you can’t stop playing? Or one you’d recommend? Tell us your nomination and why you like it below.

Published: June 12, 2025, 11:55 am

‘Addictive fear’: my goosebump-inducing first encounter with Resident Evil Requiem

A gruesome monster munching through a luckless body was just one of the horrors I shuddered at in a brief snippet of the forthcoming Resident Evil 9. Be afraid – and excited

A surprise announcement at the end of the 6 June Summer Game Fest presentation revealed the ninth entry in the iconic Capcom survival horror series: Resident Evil Requiem, coming early next year.

Diehard fans of the series (which has spawned films, television shows and more) immediately began picking apart the trailer, which highlights protagonist Grace Ashcroft, the daughter of Alyssa Ashcroft, featured in 2003’s Resident Evil Outbreak. Requiem appears to be set in Racoon City, the fictional location in the franchise that was famously nuked to try and stop the spread of the zombifying T-Virus.

Resident Evil Requiem is out on 27 February 2026 on Xbox, PlayStation 5, and PC.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:00 pm

Everything that happened at Summer Game Fest 2025, from marathon game sessions to military helicopters

This year’s event showcased gaming’s evolving landscape, from blockbuster titles to standout indie projects

• Don’t get Pushing Buttons delivered to your inbox? Sign up here

As protests exploded in Los Angeles last weekend, elsewhere in the city, a coterie of games journalists and developers were gathered together to play new games at the industry’s annual summer showcase. This week’s issue is a dispatch from our correspondent Alyssa Mercante.

Summer Game Fest (SGF), the annual Los Angeles-based gaming festival/marketing marathon, was set up to compete with the once-massive E3. It’s taken a few years, but now it has replaced it. 2025’s event felt like a cogent reminder that the games industry has dramatically changed since the pandemic. Whereas E3 used to commandeer the city’s convention centre smack in the middle of downtown LA, SGF is off the beaten path, nestled among the reams of fabric in the Fashion District, adjacent to Skid Row. There are fewer game companies present, it’s not open to the public and there’s no cosplay, unless it’s for marketing purposes.

Published: June 11, 2025, 11:15 am

From Resident Evil to 007: the 15 best games at 2025’s Summer Game Fest

There’s a lot to take in at the yearly live video event: from Paralives to Felt That: Boxing, Dosa Divas to Resident Evil Requiem, here are our favourites

The ninth mainstream instalment in the survival horror series returns us to the wreckage of Racoon City and promises a blend of cinematic action and psychological horror. FBI agent Grace Ashcroft appears to be the main character, but is anything in this series ever what it seems?

Published: June 11, 2025, 9:00 am

Fossils found in 1970s are most recent ancestor of tyrannosaurs, scientists say

Researchers identify new species named Khankhuuluu mongoliensis from skeletons unearthed in Mongolia

Tyrannosaurs might evoke images of serrated teeth, massive bodies and powerful tails, but their most recent ancestor yet discovered was a slender, fleet-footed beast of rather more modest size.

Experts say the new species – identified from two partial skeletons – helps fill a gap in the fossil record between the small, early ancestors of tyrannosaurs and the huge predators that evolved later.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:00 pm

Sun’s south pole revealed for first time, in images from Solar Orbiter spacecraft

Groundbreaking observations map chaotic patchwork of magnetic activity, said to be key to understanding how sun’s field flips

The sun’s uncharted south pole has been revealed for the first time in striking images beamed back from the Solar Orbiter spacecraft.

The joint European Space Agency (ESA) and Nasa mission swooped below the planetary plane and, for the first time, captured the sun’s mysterious polar regions. The groundbreaking observations also mapped a chaotic patchwork of magnetic activity at the sun’s pole that scientists say is key to understanding how the sun’s field flips roughly every 11 years.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:40 pm

Researchers create AI-based tool that restores age-damaged artworks in hours

By slashing time and cost of restoration, technique could be used on paintings not valuable enough for traditional approach

The centuries can leave their mark on oil paintings as wear and tear and natural ageing produce cracks, discoloration and patches where pieces of pigment have flaked off.

Repairing the damage can take conservators years, so the effort is reserved for the most valuable works, but a fresh approach promises to transform the process by restoring aged artworks in hours.

Published: June 11, 2025, 3:00 pm

How to Save the Amazon part 3: ask the people that know – podcast

As a companion to the Guardian’s Missing in the Amazon podcast, global environment editor Jon Watts goes in search of answers to the question Dom Phillips was investigating when he was murdered: how can we save the Amazon?

In the final episode of a three-part series, Jon encounters a radical new view of the Amazon’s history being uncovered by archaeologists. Far from an uninhabited wilderness, the rainforest has been shaped by indigenous peoples for thousands of years. Jon finds out how their expert knowledge could be harnessed to secure the Amazon’s future

Listen to Missing in the Amazon

Support the Guardian: theguardian.com/sciencepod

Published: June 12, 2025, 4:00 am

Scientists develop methanol breathalyser that could prevent thousands of poisonings each year

Prototype is able to detect small concentrations of the toxic substance in alcoholic drinks or on someone’s breath

Australian researchers have developed a prototype methanol “breathalyser” capable of detecting small concentrations of the toxic substance in alcoholic drinks or on someone’s breath.

Methanol poisoning is a problem that affects thousands of people every year, killing 20-40% of victims, according to Doctors Without Borders. In November, Australian backpackers Holly Bowles and Bianca Jones, along with British lawyer Simone White, were among six tourists to die in a suspected mass methanol poisoning in Laos.

Published: June 11, 2025, 12:00 pm