What’s different about the Sri Lanka attacks; FBI’s facial recognition accuracy falls short; Greenland is falling apart, and more

Most parents aren’t necessarily reading medical journals online to formulate their ideas, said Glassman, who surveyed and interviewed mothers who won’t vaccinate. What they think is what they see posted by like-minded people on their social networks, she said, adding, “It’s like politics that way. You join Facebook groups about this, and it becomes an echo chamber.”
Such people begin to believe they possess inside information that even doctors lack, said Janet Chrzan, a nutritional anthropologist at Penn. “They validate each other, and make their belief systems seem rational.”

A scholar of extremism on how religious conflict shapes Sri Lanka (Isaac Chotiner, New Yorker)
To discuss Sunday’s atrocities and the political situation in Sri Lanka, I spoke by phone with Amarnath Amarasingam, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue who studies extremism in Sri Lanka and the region. During our conversation, which has been edited for length and clarity, we discussed social media’s role in exacerbating ethnic conflict, concerns about Islamic extremist groups gaining a foothold in Sri Lanka, and the Buddhist majority’s “majority within the minority” complex.

What people don’t get about why planes crash (Christine Negroni, Vox)
A former airline investigator explains.

70+ new measles cases reported across the U.S. (Daily Beast)
Seventy-one additional cases of measles across the country have been reported in the last week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports. Since the beginning of the year, the agency reports 626 cases have been confirmed—up from 555 last week and closing in on the highest number in a decade. The figures suggest that outbreaks—fueled by disinformation-spewing anti-vaxxers and international travel, according to officials—are continuing to spread. Several cities have imposed emergency measures to try to stem the spread of the highly contagious disease, which was considered eradicated in 2000.

Climate change: Slightly stronger but fewer hurricanes, one expert says (Kimberly Miller, The Palm Beach Post)
According to a presentation given this week at the National Hurricane Conference in New Orleans, climate change is expected to intensify storms by about 3 percent, or a few miles per hour, by the year 2100.

New Mexico border militia leader allegedly said group planned to assassinate Obama, Clinton (Julia Arciga, Daily Beast)
Larry Mitchell Hopkins allegedly said his vigilante group was training to kill Hillary Clinton, George Soros, and Barack Obama, because of their ‘support of Antifa.’

Say freeze? FBI’s facial recognition accuracy unmeasured for three years, warns watchdog (Jack Corrigan, Defense One)
GAO says the FBI has implemented none of its six key recommendations made in 2016, questioning the bureau’s use of facial recognition in criminal investigations.

What’s different about the attacks in Sri Lanka (Krishnadev Calamur, The Atlantic)
Investigators have to determine how the militants went from defacing places of worship to launching a devastating attack.