As the Earth wraps up another trip around the sun, we, its citizens, tend to reflect on our accomplishments. So it goes something like this: we went to sleep 365 times and woke up the next morning; we laughed, cried, spent countless hours scrolling through TikTok, and learned a new hack. Some bought a house, some sold a house, some made a new friend, some lost a few, and so on. However, beyond the daily grind of regular folk, this year also witnessed events that will undoubtedly be recorded in history.
Here are 10 events that not only shaped our year but might just make it into the history books. This is what went down in 2023 – the big, the impactful, the unforgettable.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Wafa.
Donald Trump made history
Donald J. Trump indeed made history in 2023, though not in the way he might have hoped. Over a period of four and a half months, the former president of the U.S. faced charges in four separate criminal cases in four different jurisdictions at both the state and federal levels, in matters related to his political career and his business.
The potential 2024 Republican presidential nominee faces 34 felony charges in New York over hush money payments to an adult film actress, 40 felony counts in Florida for possessing classified documents and obstructing their recovery, four felony charges in Washington, D.C., for trying to reverse the 2020 election outcome, and in Georgia, 13 felony counts for alleged election interference. The total of 92 felony charges makes Trump the only former or sitting president of the U.S. to get indicted. The former president pleads not guilty across the board and continues his 2024 election campaign, claiming he’s been falsely indicted more times than the notorious gangster Al Capone. Fact check: That’s not true.
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Turkey-Syria Earthquake
On February 6, 2023, a massive 7.8 magnitude earthquake hit southeast Turkey and war-torn Syria. Reported as the fourth deadliest earthquake of the 21st century, the devastating disaster resulted in the deaths of at least 56,000 people in both countries and more than 107,204 injured.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Onur Erdoğan.
The planet also reached record high…not in a good way
While the debate over global warming and climate change remains a hot topic among differing viewpoints, the planet’s surface is getting warmer as we speak. According to scientists and weather experts, we are all in a “hot mess.” According to the EU’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), 2023 is on track to become the warmest year ever recorded, surpassing the previous record set in 2016. The year witnessed the warmest October on record globally, with an average surface temperature of 15.3 degrees Celsius (59.54 degrees Fahrenheit), significantly above the preindustrial levels. The ocean temperatures also hit a record-high of 20.96 degrees Celsius (69.7 degrees Fahrenheit)—the highest ocean temperature recorded since tracking began in 1979.
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Prince Charles finally ascended to the throne after 70 years
After standing in line for the throne for roughly 70 years and earning the title of history’s longest-reigning Prince of Wales, King Charles III ascended to the royal throne in Westminster Abbey on May 6, 2023. Although Charles had been serving as Britain’s King since the death of his mother, Queen Elizabeth II—the monarch with the longest reign in British history—in September 2022, his coronation in May formally marked the transition to the throne after seven decades.
The monarchy plays more of an entertaining than a functional role in Britain today and the coronation ceremony was a spectacle of tradition and pageantry. As The Guardian put it, it was “Pure theatre.”
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Scientists created the first human synthetic embryos
In June 2023, a team of US and UK scientists announced they had created the world’s first synthetic human embryo-like structures from stem cells, without using sperm, eggs, or womb. While these embryo-like structures are at the very earliest stages of human development and don’t have a brain or a beating heart, scientists claim they could help in studying genetic diseases. Dr. Magdalena Zernicka-Goetz, one of the researchers, said this is an exciting scientific breakthrough that might pave the way toward the discovery of why miscarriages happen.
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Titan submersible implosion
On June 18, 2023, a vessel that set out to reach the Titanic shipwreck met an ironically poetic fate when it suffered a catastrophic implosion, instantly killing all five passengers onboard. Officials have been reporting recovered debris and human remains from the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, months after the submersible Titan operated by American tourism and expeditions company OceanGate disappeared. Experts say this expedition was a tragedy waiting to happen as nothing good can come from a 22-foot-long submersible weighing 23,000 pounds, encountering overwhelming pressure at 12,500 feet below the surface. According to Northeastern University physics professor Arun Bansil, this pressure is equivalent to the force exerted by a whale’s bite.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Madelgarius.
A movie about based on Mattel toy broke all the records
Back in July, when the Greta Gerwig-directed movie “Barbie” was released, Republicans went to see it so they could be loud about how much they hated it; Democrats went to see it so they could be loud about how much they loved it; uninformed parents, thinking it was a children’s movie, brought their kids. Regardless of the motive, moviegoers dressed in every shade of pink swarmed the movie theaters, making the movie a smashing success. One month after its release, “Barbie” had amassed a worldwide total of $1.442 billion, setting records as the highest-grossing live-action comedy ever, outperforming “Home Alone” in domestic earnings and “The Hangover Part II” globally, and marking the first time a film directed by a solo female director crossed the $1 billion mark, achieved on August 6, 2023.
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AI has become an integral part of our everyday life
The predominant fear of Artificial Intelligence replacing humans went beyond Sci-Fi dystopian novel themes and became a stark reality in November 2022 when a non-profit organization released its AI language model ChatGPT. In one year, we all went from “Wow, this is cool, Hey ChatGPT, write a poem about a banana,” followed by “OMG, AI will steal my job” to “Hey, ChatGPT, write an informal email to my mom, about skipping Christmas dinner this year. The rise of AI sparked the investment frenzy this year as well, as underway funding for generative AI start-ups reached $15.3 billion in the first half of 2023.
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Israel–Hamas war
On October 7, Hamas, the Palestinian political and military organization governing the Gaza Strip, launched an unprecedented assault against Israel, resulting in approximately 1,200 deaths and the taking of around 240 hostages. In retaliation, Israel initiated air strikes on Gaza and a ground offensive, which, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, led to at least 13,300 fatalities in Gaza. This complex and devastating conflict has since sparked a global divide, with movements aligning along pro-Palestinian or pro-Israeli lines.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons/Wafa.
Disney turned 100
In 2023, the Walt Disney Company celebrated one century of storytelling and big bucks. In October 1923 Walt Disney and his brother Roy opened the Disney Brothers Studios in Hollywood. A century later, Disney Studio has come a long way transforming from a hand-drawn studio run by a young businessman to a global phenomenon worth over $150 billion with 220,000 employees.
This article was produced and syndicated by MediaFeed.
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