Hurt Grokker: “Even though pain is universal, there has not been a way to objectively measure its intensity.” That could change. New research suggests chronic pain can be objectively measured using brain signals. (What, the smile-frown pain chart wasn’t accurate enough for you?)

+ Financing on the Ceiling: “A judge in Boston has ordered a hearing next week on one of the key arguments that President Joe Biden has the legal authority to ignore the debt limit statute and continue to pay the federal government’s bills.” Court sets legal showdown on debt limit 14th Amendment argument. (The hearing isn’t for another week, which is just about the time the debt ceiling must be raised. In the meantime, it’s back to negotiating something that should never be negotiated with people who should never be negotiated with.)

+ False Starting: “A false report of an explosion at the Pentagon, accompanied by an apparently AI-generated image, spread on Twitter on Monday morning, sparking a brief dip in the stock market.” (This is just a little warmup.)

+ The Recidivist: E. Jean Carroll won a $5 million sexual abuse and defamation award against former President Donald Trump. Trump then went on CNN and further defamed her. Now she’s suing for an additional $10 million. Upon learning this, Trump defamed her again. (You’ve got to give him this: Trump has always been remarkably good at losing money.)

+ Ten Part Lesson Plan: WaPo: “Texas lawmakers are scheduled to vote Tuesday on whether to require that the Ten Commandments be posted in every classroom in the state, part of a newly energized national effort to insert religion into public life.” (It’s about religion, from the SCOTUS to the state house.)

+ State of Church: Here’s the least surprising lede of the day/decade: “A multi-year investigation into child sex abuse by members of the Catholic clergy in Illinois found at least 1,997 children across the state were sexually abused.” Wait, I thought it was the drag shows we had to watch out for?

+ Prom and Circumstance: “While politicians demonize trans children and their families, the organizers behind prom say that trans kids deserve a chance to just be kids—with all the rites of passage that come with growing up.” Trans Kids Want to Go to Prom, So They Threw It for Themselves.

+ Revenge of the Herds: “A spate of encounters between orcas and boats off the Iberian coast has puzzled scientists and sailors recently, as seemingly coordinated ambushes by the killer whales led to the sinking of three vessels. The reason for the attacks, according to one scientist who has studied the phenomenon, may be revenge.”