Category: technology

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Global warming

The annual update of the global warming indicators (source: Earth system science data 2025-6) gives more reasons to worry about the future of our climate. The objective to limit global warming to +1.5°C, established at the Paris climate agreement in 2015, is no longer achievable. This is the hard evidence based on the global network of scientific data collections and their projections. Fossil fuels are a major cause, deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions as well (Forster et al. 2025). As a consequence, human-induced warming of average surface temperatures and flows of heat into oceans continue. The first consequences, we witness in many parts of the world already. France is particularly affected (Le Monde 2025-6-20, p.7). What used to be called “natural disasters” is better described as long-term consequences of human-induced global changes like global warming. About time to take our CO2 footprint even more seriously. The “All electric society” can reduce reliance on fossil fuels considerably, as of now.

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Fertility Fecundity

The scientific debate around changes in fertility has focused on social, economic and cultural factors to explain the drop in total fertility rates in OECD countries. The baby boom years of the 1950s and early 1960s had come to an end following the spread of new forms of birth control like contraception from the late 1960s onwards. The trend is very obvious and yet, the explanations of the trend might lack a more profound analysis of fecundity in addition to the socio-economic explanations. Shakkebaek et al. (2025) point for example to the little known effects of environmental (pollution) factors on the biological reproduction capability of humans (men and women).
Additionally, psycho-social factors like “the German Angst” fear about future developments in many social and economic fields might have direct effects, but also indirect effects on human biology. We know still very little about such feedback loops or feedback effects. We are more convinced, than we actually have hard evidence, that the BSP, SPB or PSB (B=Bio, S=Social, P=Psycho) spheres are interwoven, but an ambitious research agenda is called for to enlighten the issue. The big invisible elephant in the room might be environmental issues that enter into the fertility equations more than we have expected for many years. A nice working hypothesis for an ambitious and overdue research agenda.

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Ohm … Ohm

In the 21st century most people will interpret “Ohm … Ohm” as the exhalation in yoga  (Hatha yoga). Therefore, take a deep breath, hold it for a while (twice as long) and then exhale (thrice as long), for example. Now you are perfectly set up to read about Georg Simon Ohm (1789 – 1854), the physicist after whom Ohm’s law was named. In the “All electric society” Ohm’s law still plays a fundamental role for all households. The understanding of electric circuits is quite easy, just apply the basic relationship of Ohm’s law. In a resistor the current and voltage are proportional. The sign (SI) for resistance (R in physics) of a conductor is the Greek letter Ω. The proportionality is expressed as R = V/I where V is the Voltage and I the current through the conductor. The units are Ω, Volt V, Ampere A. All you need to know additionally is the calculation of the power P in Watt W where P = V x I for example. If you want or need to dig deeper into your home electricity just study a bit of electrical technology on the basics.
In our homes, apartments or offices we can apply this 200 years old knowledge to guide the safety and energy consumption of our electric installations. Maybe with the help of a spreadsheet programme like excel etc.

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Home cooling

In the summer months, in Europe, the concern shifts from heating your home to cooling your home. For generations this has been possible without use of air conditioning. A natural way of cooling has been for centuries to dig into earth to take advantage of the rather stable and cool temperatures underground. In home building this has also been a tradition for centuries to build cellars underneath a home.
Wine growing regions have used the cellar as a natural cooling facility for long and short term storage of wine. Digging into a mountain of a valley offered a natural cool storage solution for years without additional energy consumption. Modern buildings should return to this practice and gain cold from below the surface to cool buildings in the warm or hot seasons. Good isolation combined with the cool temperatures from below the surface in summer months will substantially save energy and thereby CO2 emissions. Circulation of the cool air from below to the upper floors is the issue as well as dealing with differential humidity levels. The wisdom of previous generations in home building with no access to air conditioning (avoiding the air conditioning paradox) is likely to experience a revival in the coming years.
Coolness is the new and old wisdom.

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Home extension

Most people think of home extension as some sort of extension of the roof, an additional room or the transformation of a garage into an additional room. However, the digital home requires a home extension of a different kind. In order for all rooms to be included into the digital home a range extender of your wireless might be necessary. Yes, this even includes the bathrooms, because otherwise you can no longer sing along your favourite tune under the shower if you are used to the streaming of the musical or orchestral accompaniment. Additionally, the immediate surroundings of a home with or without garden might make it necessary for your robot to mow properly or your digital letter box to send you the mail for the long awaited love letters while you out of home.
Being out of range in your home, is almost equal to not being home at all. Of course, you don’t have to automatically send an out of home message to all your contacts when you are too far away from your digital home for your digital device, but the comfort of a range extender may avoid the new “digital inequality” between adolescents in your home. Room choices are made according to wireless access points and signal strength rather than the room with the best view. Lots of new issues arise we did not even think we would have 10 years ago. Of course, we follow the suggestions of an AI chatbot that recommends the best location for us after we entered images and descriptions of the consistency of each wall into the system. Just a practical advice, install extensions out of reach of any toddler, because a sudden interruption of the connection will create very unpleasant surprises.

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Home security

Digitalization has made it possible to step up home security at reasonable costs. The video surveillance of homes inside and the immediate surroundings are feasible through the use of connected cameras. The footage can reach sizable amounts of data, but intermittent recordings reduce or the AI-assisted detection of movements on a person’s property have become standard home security. Even for apartments the video enabled door bells and digital locks have improved the security level for those who are willing to invest in home security. A good neighborhood watch system is, of course, in most cases a superior solution. But neighbors change and social interaction is often reduced to minimal contact in most suburban regions. As with heating of homes, home security is also depending on what makes you feel comfortable at home. For some 20 degrees Celsius is enough and a solid mechanical lock is sufficient. Others have made very different experiences and want their digital devices directly linked to a professional security or police service. Like it or not, home security is part of the modern home just like many other digital devices or TV sets. 

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Rainwater Use

The use of rainwater is fairly easy to realize. Most homes in Europe and beyond have a roof drainage system in place. However, for decades the only concern was to get rid of the water as soon as possible. Nowadays, we think twice about it. The recovery and storage of rainwater for a separate use in a household has become a substantial cost saving exercise. In the Paris region in France you can expect on average 650 liters of rainwater per year per square meter. For a roof size of, for example, 70 m2 this yields about 45.000 liters per year. If you take a shower using 40 liters this allows you and your household to take 1125 showers or 3 persons almost one shower every day. Average household consumption in Paris is 120L/day, which adds up to about 44.000 liters per year for washing and toilet use. On a monthly basis with a storage capacity of 4000 liters of rainwater per adult person you should be able to manage your own consumption with your own roof drainage system. It is a rather simple use case. Maybe during dry summer months the calculation is a bit too optimistic, but the potential for a water autonomy of households in Europe is an option. In addition to the dry January, the no mow May, we shall have the no shower July next. 

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Sunny future

The use of solar panels for energy production is a standardized process with decent returns on investment. Combined with heat pumps and the potential of decentralized energy production, storage and consumption makes jointly for reducing emissions. The planning, investment and installation with digital tools allows to reap further benefits through the ease of coordination of all processes. The « All electric society » will take hold of homes and mobility. The climate and business case for this societal change is obvious, but the risk of new forms of inequality may arise between the one able to make such transitions now and the ones without the means to shoulder investments at the same time with other budget restrictions. The change has to start in our minds first before action will follow. In any case, the solar future takes hold of more and more people. Have you checked your amount of solar energy production already today?

Solar panel energy
Screenshot
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Smart Heat Pumps

The potential to reduce CO2 emissions through the replacement of fossil fuels with heat pumps is huge. The technology is well known and has reached a considerable amount of maturity in the mid 2020s. Noise is much less an issue even at higher compression rates and during the use of booster functions to cater for peaks of hot water or home heating. Combined with solar energy the local production and consumption of energy turn each household into a “prosumer” of energy. Besides the initial investment you have to find capable technicians and enterprises that master the installation of the technology with the necessary care and ensure the adequate calculation of the envisaged energy needs of the household. Household and family size matter, and this is not easy to project into the future. Additional saving potentials can be harvested through the use of smart home applications. Switch off the heating before you leave or if a longer than previewed absence occurs. Just do it if you are away from home. Alternatively, just start the heating when you get on your way back home from work rather than at previously estimated, but fixed times. Smart technology is just perfect for such use cases.

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testing testing

Before the installation of the new AI chatbots or other agentic AI, they need profound testing. Wise statistics are quoted with the conviction: it is all about testing, testing, testing. Any systems that build on statistical reasoning (LLMs or machine learning) will behave erratically on what is known as an area with stronger impacts of, for example, statistical outliers. On both ends of the “normal distribution” of events or reasoning the statistical models and algorithms used in AI will produce “spurious” errors or have larger error margins on such topics a bit off the 95% of usual cases.
This means, testing, testing and testing again for the programmers of such AI systems before the release to the public or enterprise specific solutions. The tendency to keep costs of testing phases low  compared to developing costs bears obvious risks to the “precautionary principle” applied in the European Union. Testing is most important to check the WEIRD bias of the most basic AI systems. In this sense AI development has become a sociological exercise as they have to deal with “selection bias” of many kinds that could have very expensive legal consequences.
(Image: Extract from Bassano, Jacopo: Abduction of Europa by Zeus, Odessa Museum treasures at exhibition in Berlin Gemäldegalerie 2025-5).

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AI Workday

Our workdays have seen considerable changes throughout the last few days. The home office boom has allowed employees to work for extended hours from home. The there is an abundant literature on the effects of home office work on well-being or the work-life balance. Productivity gains could be reaped by employers and a better work-life balance was a lasting advantage for employees.
The increased use of AI specific to some occupations has introduced a new form of added  productivity for some occupations or professions, AI as complementarity, whereas other occupations suffered a higher risk of being substituted by AI applications.
Based on time diary data, the study by Wei Jiang et al. (2025) reports that users of AI have longer work time and reduced leisure time. Competitive labor markets increase the pressure to put in even higher hours of work. Nerds, just like workaholics, are likely to be drawn into excessive hours of work with increased health risks. Enterprises and consumers appear to be gaining more than the employees, who are at a higher risk of loosing out on their work-life balance over time.

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Archers destroyed

In the attempt to explain modern warfare to people, the Roman and medieval languages are staging a comeback. The archers have found their way from warfare into art history and back again. George Barros explains recent defensive actions by Ukrainian military forces as the strategy to put the archers out of power rather than the arches.
Destroyed or unfit air planes can no longer launch missiles or bombs. The Russian reserves are, however, fairly numerous, but the air strikes on the modern archers have demonstrated an astonishing military intelligence on the Ukrainian side. The technological advances of the Ukrainian military services may shift the balance or raise the costs of war to Russia, considerably.

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Citizen Walk

Capitals like Paris and Berlin make great efforts to improve the walkability of their cities. After decades of focus on automotive traffic and mobility and the detrimental effects on health for several generations of people, the awareness that walking citizens are part of the solution is spreading. Citizens of Paris voted in a referendum to stop circulation of cars in 500 more streets. In Berlin pedestrians unite to mobilize more people to take to the streets as well and reclaim walking space. In high density spaces like metropolitan areas it is possible to reach all major amenities within a reasonable walking distance. The more spread out suburban area, however, leve fewer options to walk and carry your shopping or do your dily commute to work while walking. Fewer cars and pharmaceutical products sold would mean less „artificial economic growth, but more healthy and happy citizens. It will take decades again to realize such visions.

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Paris Gare

Train stations in metropolitan inner cities are hot spots of traffic and mobility. The number of people passing through these exchanges are impressive. Public transport systems are continuously put to the test of their capacity to handle passengers who want to get from A to B the fastest way possible. In Paris the RER lines, metro and buses to a great job in handling the affluence of passengers. The comparatively small number of passengers arriving and departing nyy taxi, however, still take a disproportionate amount of space. That’s part of the differentiation or inequality of mobility in Paris. Person‘s in need of assistance should have special access to central points of mobility like train stations. Everybody else could rely on shared modes of transportation otherwise the millions of inhabitants will not be able to get around in a comfortable way.

 

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Robot repairs

Robots have been used mostly in industry for assembling, transport or sorting tasks. There is also a role in disassembling to enhance circularity. To repair electric or mechanic devices there is an enhanced version needed which starts with a diagnosis of the problem. Algorithms can sort out promising from dead end routes of repairs. However, the recognition of objects into things that can be repaired and those without repair potential is a worthwhile assistance. Beyond the economic and ecological rationale for repairs, there is an emotional or nostalgic sense to it as well. Maybe, from a life course perspective any object related to the teenager years of a person qualify for nostalgic value. Even simple robots or AI-assisted objects may qualify for this in future. Artificial friends will be like tamagotchis in need of repairs.

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Repairs again

Trying to repair electric or mechanic devices is confronted with multiple obstacles. Spare parts are hard to come by and many pieces needed are no longer in stock. Hence, in many instances the remaining option is to use recovery pieces from other broken or discarded devices. Whereas this is still common for repairs of vintage cars, for example, this is rather rare for consumer electronics like stereo music players or television sets. An aging clientele of the repair market is very used to a specific device and is often reluctant to change habits. 

An additional element in the repair process is access. Only in thinking repairs into the engineering and design of the device will make repairs feasible later on. An economy and business model which is based upon a high turnover as the basis for profitability has no interest in engineering for repairs later on. This makes a preservation of resources tricky. Disassembling is a necessary but not sufficient condition for the repair sector to thrive. At least the basic materials enter into a circular economy as a first step. Further steps consist in preserving the skills needed to disassemble and/or repair more. The habit „buy a new one and throw away the old one“ is hard ro change. 

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Humanoid services

In the shadow of AI enhanced chatbots, agentic AI and generative Ai, the developers make considerable progress in robotics. The humanoid versions like from Persona AI will surround us in months, or maybe a few years from today. Investors believe it is rather sooner than later. There are many use cases for humanoids that may take over dangerous, hazardous or unhealthy tasks from humans. But even simple tasks like carrying home most of our shopping could be done for us by humanoids that follow you around the shopping mall and home. This would be a kind of personal assistant. I even thought of my humanoid robot to walk my dog on some occasions on the usual trail. 

Welcoming visitors at the doorstep could be another function to delegate in offices or even in private homes, although as a sociologist I would recommend to carefully check the sorting algorithm(s) applied to avoid unpleasant situations. The administration of medication might be another option, if only we could trust that the correct dosage would be applied. 

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Berlin building

Yes, 35 years after re-unification Berlin is still building at lots of places. The boom years of building hotels for tourists, offices for ministries, which were moving from Bonn to Berlin, is now followed by a „surprising“ need to have sufficient vacancies in private housing. Berlin is still growing in terms of population and, of course, this creates additional upward pressure on the housing market with particularly high increases on the rental market. In order to achieve a narrowing of the gap between demand and supply, Berlin is building higher as well as digging deeper into its sandy ground. In such huge open spaces near Südkreuz it is then feasible to explore and later exploit geothermal energy for years to come. Maybe it is not a surprise that apparently a Texas (USA) based investor has bought the ground and builds in Berlin. Drilling in Berlin for energy from underneath is a worthwhile business. Hence, drill baby drill has a new Berlin meaning to it. 

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Non-autonomous driving

The more engineers will invest in developing autonomous driving vehicles, the more the value of the few completely non-autonomous cars will rise. A 60 years old car with manual gear changing on the steering wheel like the Peugeot 404 from 1965 (image below) demands a strong effort to steer the car around a city. Apparently, some car producers reintroduce buttons to press or switch on devices since customers seem to prefer some manual activity in addition to the touchscreen technology. Voice guidance and gestures can be helpful for some, but there are also the advantages of manual activities that keep you awake and maybe with better focus. Choice is key to suit diverse user and customer preferences.

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AI-assisted

We used to create and use an artificial word to shorten explications in conversations. It is easy to understand for everyone nowadays to describe an online search as “I googled something” without further concerns about the sources used in answering a question. Apple just announced that its search engine Safari was used less than expected recently. The reason might be that more and more people search online by using AI tools or Apps that directly provide answers to their queries. ChatGTP and Perplexity are 2 AI-programs that might replace the other search engines we have gotten used to over the last decades. Particularly “how to …” queries offer reasonable instructions. In Perplexity you get an answer after you specified a little bit your query and, therefore, the answer is more likely to be right to the point offering text, images and sources. In ChatGPT you enter into a dialogue to further specify your query if unsatisfied with the first response. The judgement of an authoritative response is up to you if you want to follow up. The assistance of an AI-system cares less about the source but about the speed of response that it can provide. For sensitive questions or queries with less obvious or clear answers more interactions with the tools is necessary. The pricing and our willingness or ability to pay in cash rather than through the selling of our data for advertising will determine whether we shall “chat-it” or “plex-it” in future.

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Technology maturation

Technology has its own time of maturation. The time for wind power generation was quite lengthy compared to some innovation cycles in information technologies. Maybe, due to the fact that large wind turbines had only big enterprises or public monopolies as potential clients who were already heavily invested in even bigger nuclear energy projects caused the slow pace of development of this technology. In Germany just like in Denmark, Sweden and the USA the first larger research projects took off in the mid or late 1970s. The technology is explained by Erich Hau in a comprehensive way including the early days like the « Growian » test wind turbine in Germany (extract of image below). Despite the fact that major engineering difficulties were overcome already in the early 80s, the economic and legal challenges took much longer to resolve. Nowadays, we have an additional case of energy sovereignty to add to the cost-effectiveness of power generation from winds offshore and onshore. In the coming years we are likely to see more and more decentral power generation from wind on roof tops or small poles to complement solar energy during cloudy but windy weather or at night. Just like the sunshine we shall praise the windy days for their power generation potential.

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War of drones

The use of drones in warfare is not new in 2025. However, the news reported in the WSJ 2025-05-05 that sea drones from Ukraine with U.S. adapted missiles downed 2 Russian jet fighters made headlines. Compared to jet fighters such drones carrying missiles are a rather cost-effective alternative in warfare. The speed of jets compared to drones made such successful attempts rather unlikely. The information that infrared technology can achieve such identification of targets and guiding missiles is another innovation of the Ukrainian military technology.
Technology is well known to be a game changer in warfare for centuries or across the whole military history. Adaptations of defense strategies will allow Ukraine to hold against the Russian aggression albeit limited financial resources. The defense of air space is one of the crucial elements for Ukraine to deter Russia from moving further ahead through the continuation to increase the costs of war to Russia.
Following a fast moving object and transforming it into a target is an astonishing accomplishment.

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More sensors

The technical games that have largely replaced the traditional electrical train and cars of the boomers and older generations shift towards robotics. This has the touch of more future orientation and fun for the young used to gadgets, automation and the beginnings of AI. Therefore, the robots of our children and the ones they assemble in technical games include more sensors. Infrared emission and reception have been present already for some years, but the capture, use and application of sound in children’s games is a bit more recent. In order to assess and understand the far reaching potential of these additional sensors in our homes and environments it is essential to raise awareness through technical games and own experiences or experiments. Educational games are a useful addition to the repertoire of learning for younger generations. Accompanied learning is more likely to keep young people interested in technology and raise awareness for the potential of intrusion into privacy of technology as well. The robots will be more and more part of our daily lives. A better understanding of limitations and potentials will be necessary for all citizens in the 21st century.

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Robot assistant

Adjustment processes on the labour market take their time. This means that care workers are in short supply in most countries of the OECD. Engineers as well. There are so many robots, care robots I mean, still to develop that the shortage of engineers give little hope that we shall have affordable solutions in this area for the next few years. The issue is mainly about integrating and enhancing already existing solutions. If you are a mechanical engineer you can put together motorised mechanical pieces, small motorised electric devices and, for example, small infrared emitting and receiving devises.
All this is child’s play these days (see image below). The assembling of a small Robot assistant that follows movements or can escape from a small labyrinth makes such simple structures transparent for learners and users. There is nothing magical about it, just adding together small pieces and the electronic devices to steer the movements. The learning tool from KOSMOS has been on the market for 5 years. It is a helpful device to explain basics through hands-on experience. The limits of robotics equally become more evident. Our own health and safety is concerned with larger devices cohabiting with us. A robot assistant can take on easy tasks like to follow me through my living space in old age carrying a mobile phone, keys or an emergency device. More sophisticated tasks need more sensors and AI to train the most needed and best routines. For many years this needs our input and our control as well as supervision of such devices. Most robots will operate as assistants with us in the driving seat or the boss.
This is yet another element of the “all electric society“. We are moving towards the use of more electronics assisting us from year to year.

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Archi health

The links between architecture and human health are manifold. There are direct effects of healthy versus unhealthy materials in construction. For the purpose of making buildings fire proof or more resistant to heat asbestos had been used for decades which still causes health hazards nowadays in the removal of this cancerous material. Paint has to be chosen wisely as well as isolation materials. Indirect or second round effects of materials have to be considered additionally. Cement in construction uses a lot of energy in its production and has only been recycled since a few years in significant amounts. Room climate or even psychological effects of architecture have been considered to be important more seriously in recent years. A new discipline entitled “neuro-architecture” may be developed soon. Schools, sports facilities, hospitals or community centers benefit from healthy architecture. Cost benefit analyses which take into account long term effects and even recycling of materials shift the balance much in favor of health considerations also in architecture. “Fast and dirty” will be much more expensive than “slow and healthy”. Future generations will be thankful. (Image: Spreewald Primary school Berlin).

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Dysprosium 66

Dysprosium figures as Nr. 66 in the periodic table (short: Dy). This metal was given this Greek name, which translates to “hard to get”. Although more common than gold on earth, Dysprosium is part of the so-called rare earths on earth. Since it is very temperature resistant before becoming fluid and at the same time having good isolation properties, for example against radiation in combination with lead, the nuclear energy industry has a definite use case.
Additionally, wind turbines, electric vehicles and some smart phones use these characteristics of the metal only known to us since the late 19th century.
The major exploitation happens in China and, therefore, the recent tariffs have complicated the trading. Prices tend to rise and products that contain Dysprosium are likely to become more expensive. However, there is the other side of the coin, which means recycling and reuse of Dysprosium is also more interesting to companies. Hence, the price increase will likely enhance circularity of the metal from obsolete products into newer ones. In this respect it is good news that smartphones receive longer updates of their operating systems and security as of 2025-6-20 in the EU. This will also reduce the amount of rare earths needed in the production of the rapidly changing technical specifications of smart phones and tablets. Repairing the devices makes more economic sense before “programmed” obsolescence.
(Image: extract from Willem van der Vliet (attributed), The money counter. early 17th century, Brussels MRBAB).

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Archi Octagon

The architecture we see around us has lots of interesting mathematical features. Some are the basis for more complicated calculations. The octagon shape is not that common, but with some formulas the calculations become easier and construction in the real world is more feasible. Well worth to dig a bit deeper into this shape. The geometry of angles and circumference follows rules that have been laid out a long time ago. The webpages explaining this are manifold and it is a project of its own kind to compare them and recommend the best ones. My current favorite is: mathmonks. A reasonable choice is in most cases also wikipedia, the long running amazing knowledge project also for the octagon.

Image: Berlin Europa Center 2025.

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Archi Geometry

Architecture has an obvious and visible link with geometry. Clear lines, rectangular or triangular shapes have dominated for centuries since the Greek temples. Geometry was a discipline that has attracted many scholars and particularly architects. Nowadays the shapes are much more diversified and sometimes complex. The calculation of surfaces, curved lines and shapes have become an issue of more complicated mathematics. Volumes of irregular shapes are a challenge for most people to calculate and heating or cooling sich buildings adds considerable complexity. It is, however, rather relaxing and fascinating to look at the marvels of modern shapes in architecture. Technology and material science have allowed us spectacular progress and designs in recent years. Paris offers a splendid perspective on such developments. 

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Kids Gaming

The pressure on children and their parents is high to succumb to the temptation of digital and online gaming. Albeit there are many funny and learning alternatives for them if they are accompanied by an instructor to build or invent their own game. With some adaptations it is possible to assemble for example a coordination game for children which directs a small ball through a labyrinth. Add speed and tricky holes to the “parcour” and the race is on. It is little bit like hands-on physics as the speed and acceleration patterns across the parcour varies a lot. Planning, building and playing are an ensemble in this simple game. Probably also more fun than the x-th repetition of a digital game.

(Inspiration from: Berliner Kultur gestalten, workshops for children).

 

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Owners Dispute

Renovations of housing with distributed ownerships can be a challenging experience. In Berlin you can find a few places with visible long-term disagreement about what kind of modernization should be done. More luxurious additions like balconies or triple window isolation and so on are sometimes hotly debated and contested in courts. For most buildings you cannot spot disagreements on the outside, but some constitute exceptions to this rule. One size does not fit all preferences. In a metropolitan city there is a place and a space for all such exceptions to the rule and most people after years do no longer think about such kind of diversity in preferences or budgets available for modernization. Cities put our level of tolerance to a continuous test. You probably learn to love this or eventually you leave the inner city. There are subtle differences in urban versus rural lifestyles. In the social sciences we continue to try to understand the attraction of cities as on a global scale millions of people flock to cities.