• Apple puts its devices through some intense durability tests.
• It tests thousands of devices before releasing a product, Apple's engineering head said.
• In the videos, iPhones are submerged in water, dropped on the ground, and sprayed with a hose.

Apple let Marques Brownlee into test labs, and the YouTuber captured some intense iPhone durability tests that would border on science fiction if there wasn't video proof.

Brownlee is known for his tech reviews and explainer videos, and he went behind the scenes to witness iPhones go through rain simulators, a drop test machine, and more.

John Ternus, Apple's senior vice president of hardware engineering, told Brownlee that the tech giant might test "10,000 devices of a particular model" before releasing it to the public.

Dropping your phone in a puddle should be no problem compared to the levels of water tests Apple puts the iPhone through. They range from light rain and low-pressure sprays to a full-blown fire hose and submersion in water, according to a series of videos posted to X by Brownlee.

And for the clumsier iPhone owners, Apple has also anticipated your needs.

"Apparently, Apple has also bought and programmed an industrial robot to be their own drop test machine — to simulate hundreds of different drop angles onto different materials," Brownlee said on X.

A slow-motion video of a phone being dropped by this special machine shows the frame wobble upon impact with the ground (the screen does stay intact, though).

Other demonstrations include a computer-controlled machine that can be seen shaking a Vision Pro lens. Brownlee said its purpose is to simulate the vibrations of a motorcycle engine or the subway, for example.

Although Apple's focus has been mainly on making devices that are harder to break, Ternus told Brownlee that his team is also working to make them easier to repair.

Still, durability is the priority.

"It's objectively better for the customer to have that reliability, and it's ultimately better for the planet," Ternus said.

• China's drills around Taiwan "looked like a rehearsal" for an invasion, a top admiral warned.
• China surrounded Taiwan during the two-day exercises, demonstrating what an assault could look like.
• The head of US Indo-Pacific Command said the US "took note" of the drills and "learned from it."

China's large-scale military exercises surrounding Taiwan last week "looked like a rehearsal" for an invasion, the US' top officer in the Pacific said.

The two-day drills, which included a fleet of nearly 50 ships and bombers that carried out mock attacks, came on the heels of the inauguration of Taiwan's new president and demonstrated what a Chinese blockade or quarantine of the island could look like should Beijing decide to take it by force.

Chinese state media said the exercises were focusing on "joint sea-air combat readiness patrols, joint seizure of comprehensive battlefield control, and joint precision strikes on key targets." CCTV footage showed simulated airstrikes with live missiles.

In the aftermath of the exercises, US lawmakers and officials have been responding with clear shows of support for Taiwan. On Wednesday, US Indo-Pacific Commander Adm. Samuel Paparo said the exercises "looked like a rehearsal" for an invasion, adding that the US had observed them closely.

"We watched it. We took note. We learned from it," he told Japan's Nikkei newspaper. "And they helped us prepare for the future."

Paparo, who assumed command earlier this month, added that the US and its allies had been prioritizing deterrence in the region in order to prevent a conflict between China and Taiwan from breaking out. He also called the US and Japan's relationship "the most important alliance on the planet," signaling the growing threats in the Indo-Pacific region and the US focus on security in the area. The US would be dependent on Japan's bases to threaten a Chinese threat to Taiwan, as President Joe Biden has vowed.

Other US officials echoed similar concerns. Earlier this week, US Rep. Michael McCaul said the exercises were a "preview of what a blockade could look like," and demonstrate what a response from Taiwan "and or possibly the United States" would be. While visiting Taiwan, McCaul also noted that US military aid packages are on their way and noted that maritime assets, such as Harpoon anti-ship missiles, will be a priority going forward.

Last week's exercises weren't the first time China has held provocative exercises around Taiwan. It's the third such event in three years; the first came after former US Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi visited Taiwan in August 2022 and the second happened in April 2023.

The most recent drills appeared to focus on joint combat capabilities, and while Chinese-declared exercise zones only skirted the edge of Taiwan's claimed contiguous zone and territorial waters, the activity still put major pressure on Taiwan and gave China a chance to test how its forces would assault the island.

Prior to the exercises, China characterized them as a "strong punishment for the separatist acts of Taiwan's independence forces," as well as "a stern warning against the interference and provocation by external forces," such as the US and Japan.

The drills were also seen as a response to the historic election of the Democratic Progressive Party's Lai Ching-te, who served as the former vice president under Tsai Ing-wen. Lai is particularly disliked by Beijing, who has declared him a "dangerous separatist." Lai's inauguration speech also appeared to ruffle some feathers in Chinese leadership, as he plainly laid out how Taiwan "must demonstrate our resolution to defend our nation." China's leadership views the self-ruled democracy as a breakaway province.

China has long resolved to unify with Taiwan, repeatedly noting that it would prefer to do so peacefully but that force is on the table as an option. Such an event would likely involve some sort of blockade or quarantine, effectively cutting Taiwan off and raising a gray area where the US and its allies may be unsure of how to respond without escalating into full-scale war.

• In the US, the message is clear: sitting up straight is good, and slouching is bad. 
• But Beth Linker, author of "Slouch: Posture Panic in Modern America", says it's more complicated than that.
• In her new book, she unpacks the history of Americans' obsession with "good" posture and questions its scientific merit.

Odds are, you can probably remember the last time you were told to sit up straight. Maybe it came from a parent, a teacher, or a fitness instructor. Or perhaps it was suggested by an ad for posture-correcting devices like special sports bras or wearable sensors.

The message that slouching is bad is everywhere in our society. In fact, it's woven into the very fabric of American history, as Beth Linker, a science historian and former physical therapist points out in her new book "Slouch: Posture Panic in Modern America."

"Slouch" takes readers on a journey through that history, and exposes the role that culture has played in shaping our collective obsession with sitting up straight — not to mention a $1.25 billion global industry built on posture-enhancing products and fitness programs, Linker reported.

That's not to say that there aren't any benefits to practicing good posture. Experts previously told Business Insider that bad posture can cause neck and back pain, wear and tear on joints and discs, decreased flexibility, and other health issues.

In her book, Linker makes no claim about how debilitating poor posture can be. But she does raise questions about the scientific merit of these claims. From her perspective, practicing good posture probably isn't as important as we've been taught to believe it is.

"I don't walk around with a drill sergeant in my head," she said. "I don't think it's going to help the pain that I'm experiencing or the pain I'll have in the future, because it's so much more complex than that."

The posture panic

Americans' fixation with posture dates back to the early 1900s. The very first study on the "poor posture epidemic," as Linker calls it, was published by Harvard University in 1917.

The study found that 80% of students had bad posture and those who slouched the most exhibited a "greater variety and higher percentage of sickness," than those who slouched less, the Harvard Crimson reported.

But the earliest musings about posture date back even further. "Since the time of Plato, naturalists, theologians, and philosophers in the West have remarked on the uniqueness of human posture and bipedalism," she wrote.

These thinkers saw uprightness as a crucial aspect of human nature that sets people apart from animals. Later on, 20th-century medicine labeled poor posture a disease. And culturally, slouching became entangled with racist, classist, and ableist ideologies, Linker argued in her book.

Meanwhile, the science suggesting that posture plays a role in our health — a key argument used to back its importance — is lacking.

A lack of evidence

Despite the general assumption that bad posture leads to a bad back, there's limited science to back that up.

"There have been a few studies that indicate that there isn't solid scientific evidence to show that a person who slouches more is more likely to have back pain," Linker told BI. For example, research has shown that there's little evidence to support that slouching in adolescents is associated with back pain, or predictive of future back pain.

While it's easy to blame bad posture for back pain and other spinal health issues, Linker said that it's actually more complicated.

"After being trained as a physical therapist, it doesn't really add up," she said. There are a myriad of things that impact a person's spinal health, such as diseases like arthritis, amount of exercise, aging, and even psychological conditions like depression and anxiety, according to the Mayo Clinic.

Plus, walking around with a "drill sergeant" in your head constantly reminding you to sit or stand up straight can cause more problems than it solves, Linker said, adding that in general, maintaining the same position for too long, even if your spine is properly aligned, can lead to pain.

So, "fixing" your posture isn't necessarily guaranteed to cure your back pain. When searching for the right solution, talking to a doctor, physical therapist, or bodywork professional is a great place to start, Linker said. They can help you identify the cause of your pain, and work towards a healthier spine.

She also recommends incorporating movement into your daily routine, especially if you work a desk job. And when it comes to posture-correcting products, be skeptical of their promises, she said. Some can be expensive, and they may not target your specific needs, she said.

• The IRS is making its free direct file tax program permanent after a successful pilot.
• The program launched in 12 states and saw 140,000 accepted returns in five weeks.
• The IRS hopes to expand eligibility and is inviting all states to join the program.

The IRS knows how annoying it can be to sit down and try to crank out your taxes — and get to pay for the honor of doing so. And so, after a successful pilot run, the tax agency has announced that it's making its new free direct file program permanent. It's also inviting every state to sign on.

"Meeting your tax obligations in claiming the credits and deductions for which you're eligible should be easy. But the IRS has been underfunded for decades, so taxpayers haven't gotten the support they deserve," Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in a phone call with reporters. "Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, we are changing this."

The Direct File program first launched in twelve states for the 2023 filing season following a successful pilot. The program was catered towards filers with simple returns — and, according to Yellen, saw 140,000 accepted returns in just five weeks. That was well above the Treasury's goal of a hundred thousand returns.

Filers who used the program saved $5.6 million in tax preparation fees, according to the IRS and the Treasury Department. Nearly half of Direct File users had said they paid for tax preparation the year before, according to IRS Commissioner Danny Werfel. And filing generally took less than an hour, with many filing in just half an hour; Business Insider's Aaron Mok — who declared the program the "best way to do taxes" — said it took him under 40 minutes to file using Direct File.

Werfel said that the agency is also exploring ways to make more taxpayers eligible to use the program, including expanding Direct File's scope to cover more tax situations beyond simple returns.

"Since the direct file pilot was completed in April, we have heard directly from hundreds of organizations across the country, more than a hundred members of Congress, from individual direct file users, and those that are interested in using direct file," Werfel said. "The clear message is that many taxpayers across the nation want the IRS to provide options for filing electronically at no cost."

The new Direct File program has encountered some pushback from paid tax services. In a statement to BI last October upon the announcement of the Direct File pilot, Rick Heineman, a VP of communications at Intuit TurboTax, said that the program is "wholly redundant."

"Direct File is not free tax preparation, but rather a thinly veiled scheme where billions of dollars of taxpayer money will be unnecessarily used to pay for something already completely free of charge," Heineman said.

Werfel said that the IRS had heard from a "limited number" of stakeholders that current free filing options are getting the job done. He said that the feedback points to a tax system with multiple no-cost options, where taxpayers can opt into what works best for them.

Right now, the IRS and Treasury are extending the invitation to all 50 states to join the program, but not every state may opt in. The IRS anticipates reporting later this year which states — and filers — will be eligible.

"The numbers speak for themselves: the Direct File Pilot was a success, saving American taxpayers countless hours and millions of dollars filing their taxes," White House Deputy Chief of Staff Natalie Quillian said in a statement. "Now, we're bringing the program to a national audience. It's just one more example of how President Biden's Investing in America agenda is lowering costs for communities across the country."

Did you use Direct File and save time or money? Contact this reporter at jkaplan@businessinsider.com.

• Liquid Death is giving away a $400,000 Aero L-39 Albatros jet in a new contest.
• The winner will also get a flight helmet, a cockpit cup holder, and six months of free hangar space.
• The campaign pokes fun at Pepsi's 1996 marketing blunder offering a Harrier jet as a joke prize.

In the annals of the all-time biggest marketing snafus, few companies have made bigger or more high-profile errors than PepsiCo. The company once positioned reality TV star Kendall Jenner as the solution to racial strife in America amid the Black Lives Matter protests. It refused to pay up when it accidentally wound up owing $18 billion to Pepsi drinkers in the Philippines. But perhaps Pepsi's most memorable disaster (in the US, anyway) was when it was nearly forced to buy a McDonnell Douglas AV-8B Harrier II fighter jet for one of its consumers.

Remembering the Harrier fiasco, Liquid Death — the self-described "funny beverage company who hates corporate marketing as much as you do" — is poking fun at Pepsi's biggest fail by giving away a Czech-made Aero L-39 Albatros trainer jet. The new contest will last from May to September 2024, part of Liquid Death's ongoing "evil mission is to make people laugh and get more of them to drink more healthy beverages more often."

Pepsi's 1996 "Drink Pepsi, Get Stuff" campaign started off like any other branded merchandise giveaway of the 1990s: if you buy enough products, you could earn enough "Pepsi Points" to redeem for T-shirts, duffel bags, and even a mountain bike. The company's now-infamous Super Bowl commercial accurately represented how many points were required to get the shirt (75 points), jacket (1,450 points), or sunglasses (175 points) but also included a throwaway joke, offering a Harrier for a number of points that should have been out of reach — except for two key failures.

The first failure was that the commercials' producers cut the number of points for the Harrier down from 700 million to 7 million, so the number would be easier to read in the commercial, according to the Netflix documentary, "Pepsi, Where's My Jet?" The second failure was that the contest rules allowed Pepsi Points to be purchased for cash at 10 cents each, meaning that the Harrier could be purchased for just $700,000 — a steal for a fighter valued at $37 million at the time.

It was a deal John Leonard was willing to make, and he would sue PepsiCo. for his Harrier. He never got it, but the memory of his attempt has long outlived the Pepsi Points campaign.

Liquid Death's new sales campaign, however, is starting with the fighter jet, an Aero L-39 Albatros called "The Dehydrator" (because it can go so fast you'll pee yourself) that's currently valued at $400,000. The L-39 was first developed in communist Czechoslovakia as a light attack jet. Today, it's also used as trainer aircraft by many countries, especially members of the former Warsaw Pact. Updated versions of the L-39 are still in production, although "The Dehydrator" is a lightly used model with a top speed of around 470 miles per hour and a ceiling of 37,000 feet (it's also never been armed).

"We like to poke the bear," Andy Pearson, Liquid Death's vice president of creative, told Adweek. "And I've heard that others have had the idea to give away a jet, but no one's ever pulled it off … It's the biggest thing we've ever done."

Along with the Albatros, the lucky winner will also receive six months of free hangar space, a pilot's helmet, a year's supply of Liquid Death ("to rehydrate after you puke and pee your pants"), and a cockpit cup holder for all that water or tea. All you need to do is visit the giveaway site and start a text chain, buy a Liquid Death product from a physical store, and text a photo of the receipt. The company swears entrants to the jet contest will not have to take them to court to get the prize.

Each product purchase between May 21, 2024, and September 4, 2024, counts as one entry, with a maximum of 400 entries. You can also mail them a postcard for four entries, as per the official rules. And if you don't want a jet, you can opt for a briefcase filled with $250,000 instead.

• Billionaire Nelson Peltz is no longer an investor in Disney.
• Peltz fought a pricey proxy battle with Disney CEO Bob Iger over its board but lost.
• He's now sold all his Disney shares, which marks the likely end of the power struggle.

Billionaire hedge fund founder Nelson Peltz has sold his stake in The Walt Disney Company after losing a pricey proxy battle with CEO Bob Iger.

Peltz, the activist investor who founded Trian Partners, once controlled about $3.5 billion in Disney stock. But he has now sold all his shares, according to The New York Times.

Peltz became a vocal critic of Disney, hammering its streaming division's losses, unstable stock performances, and uncertain succession plans. Peltz eventually nominated himself and former Disney CFO Jay Rasulo to Disney's board of directors in December 2023.

But in April, shareholders voted to support Iger and Disney's current board, blocking Peltz and Rasulo from taking the two spots.

Peltz's decision to sell his shares now appears to be the end of his war with the entertainment company.

Representatives for The Walt Disney Company did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment. Representatives for Trian declined to comment.

At its height, Trian controlled about 1.8% of Disney's shares, most of which belonged to Ike Perlmutter, a former Marvel Entertainment chairman Disney fired in March 2023.

Peltz's proxy battle may have been the most expensive in history, with various parties spending an estimated $70 million on the campaign.

Despite losing the battle, Peltz may have made up to $300 million from its investments in Disney, according to The Wall Street Journal.

• "The Apprentice" producer Bill Pruitt says Donald Trump used the n-word.
• Pruitt wrote in Slate that the moment was captured on tape, but will likely never surface.
• A Trump campaign spokesperson called Pruitt's account a "completely fabricated and bullshit story."

A producer on "The Apprentice" said Donald Trump used the n-word in a moment caught on tape that will likely never see the light of day.

In an op-ed for Slate, Bill Pruitt writes that he was one of four producers on the show's first two seasons. He signed an NDA that expired this year — roughly 20 years after "The Apprentice" first premiered.

Pruitt writes that off-camera deliberations about contestant firings were filmed in case the show was ever questioned by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), which disallows fixing outcomes on game shows.

Pruitt said Trump used the slur while discussing first-season finalists Bill Rancic and Kwame Jackson.

As one of Trump's employees and advisors on the show spoke positively about Jacson, Pruitt claims Trump asked, "Would America buy a n— winning?"

A Trump campaign spokesperson told Slate that Pruitt's account was a "completely fabricated and bullshit story that was already peddled in 2016." The spokesperson said the claims were resurfacing due to "desperate" Democrats.

Pruitt writes in Slate that producers who'd heard Trump's remarks never discussed the incident in the moment, and he believes the tapes will never be found.

A rep for NBCUniversal declined to comment.

Pruitt isn't the first person involved with "The Apprentice" to claim Trump used the n-word.

Omarosa Manigault Newman, who also appeared on the first season of the show and formerly worked in the Trump administration, said she'd listened to tapes where Trump used the slur. Trump denied the existence of the tapes at the time, calling Manigault Newman "wacky and deranged."

Rumors of "Apprentice" outtake tapes have swirled for years.

Mark Burnett, the reality TV megaproducer and creator of the show, denounced Trump before the 2016 election. But Burnett said he had no legal rights to release any tapes. An MGM lawyer, whose studio bought Burnett's production company, also confirmed at the time that they did not have the rights to release any footage.

"MGM, not Mark Burnett, owns 'The Apprentice.' MGM has agreements with artists across a wide spectrum of creative properties, including 'The Apprentice.' These agreements typically contain provisions related to confidentiality and artist's rights," Marvin S. Putnam, MGM's outside counsel, said in a statement at the time.

• Archaeologists discovered secret structures in Giza, Egypt with ground-penetrating high-tech methods.
• The methods revealed an L-shaped structure and a deeper, larger anomaly hidden beneath bare sand.
• The findings could explain why a large section of the densely packed Western Cemetery is empty.

Egypt holds many secrets to its ancient past, and archaeologists may have discovered a new one hidden beneath the sands of the Western Cemetery in Giza.

The Western Cemetery holds hundreds of rectangular tombs called mastabas that line the base of Giza's Great Pyramid. These mastabas belong to elite citizens and relatives of the Ancient Egyptian king Khufu, who ruled around 4,500 years ago.

However, in stark contrast to the many rows of tombs, one area of the cemetery is bare, with no structures. Below the sand, it's a different story, archaeologists recently discovered.

What appears to be a flat, sandy surface might hide long-forgotten structures built thousands of years ago. Only a couple of feet below the surface lies what appears to be an L-shaped structure. Even deeper, there's another, larger structure connected to the first.

The L-shaped structure's corners are "too sharp" to be naturally occurring, researcher Motoyuki Sato, who helped find the anomaly, told Live Science.

That suggests humans constructed it and might explain why such a large swatch of the crowded necropolis remains empty above the sand, the researchers reported in a paper they recently published in the peer-reviewed journal Archaeological Prospection.

Both features could be remnants of an ancient tomb, according to the researchers. However, the discovery still leaves many unanswered questions.

High-tech archaeology uses radar and other tools to find buried secrets

In the early days of archaeology, it took years of careful digging to uncover the shape and size of a structure. Now, newer technologies can help scientists map previously unknown buildings without removing even a shovelful of dirt.

That's how researchers from Higashi Nippon International University, Tohoku University, and the National Research Institute of Astronomy and Geophysics in Egypt uncovered this latest hidden piece of history.

Between 2021 and 2023, the team studied the location using not one but two high-tech methods: ground-penetrating radar (GPR) and electrical resistivity tomography (ERT). GPR uses electromagnetic waves to map shallow underground features in high resolution. For deeper structures, ERT can locate walls, shafts, and similar anomalies but without as much detail.

Combining GPR, ERT, and satellite data, the researchers discovered an L-shaped structure measuring roughly 32 by 50 feet buried 1.6 feet to 6.5 feet under the sand. They also found evidence of a 1,000-square-foot structure about 11.5 feet to 33 feet below ground, deeper than the L-shaped anomaly.

The next step is excavation

At some point, the shallower L-shaped structure was filled with sand, which could be a clue to its purpose. It may have served as a kind of passageway to a lower tomb, according to the researchers. Ancient Egyptians often filled up such shafts to keep out the living.

While GPR and ERT can offer a more complete picture of sub-surface archaeological finds, these techniques can only take archaeologists so far. The researchers noted that the two methods' data didn't precisely match, and the techniques can sometimes make anomalies appear larger than they are.

Other mysteries remain, too. They don't know what, if anything, is in the deeper structure. It could be filled with sand or totally empty.

To answer some of these questions, the archaeologists needed to start digging, literally. They're currently excavating the site, Live Science reported.

• Tesla rebuked Glass Lewis for urging shareholders to reject Elon Musk's $55 billion pay plan.
• Tesla said the firm demonstrated faulty reasoning in a letter to shareholders.
• Tesla is seeking approval from shareholders for the pay plan and moving its incorporation to Texas.

Tesla was quick to fire back at Glass Lewis after the advisory firm encouraged shareholders to vote against the company's $55 billion compensation plan for Elon Musk.

In a letter to shareholders on Wednesday, Tesla slammed Glass Lewis, accusing the firm of "scaremongering" and faulty reasoning.

"In its report, Glass Lewis omits key consideration, uses faulty logic, and relies on speculation and hypotheticals," Tesla wrote in a letter to investors titled "What Glass Lewis Got Wrong About Tesla."

The automaker hit back at multiple claims presented in Glass Lewis' 71-page report that was published Saturday and first reported by Bloomberg. Glass Lewis called Musk's pay package — which was originally approved in 2018 but struck down by a Delaware judge in January — "excessive" and advised investors to reject Tesla's bid to move its incorporation from Delaware to Texas.

In response, Tesla called the firm's claim that rescinding the award is acceptable "absurd." The company called Glass Lewis' concerns regarding moving the company's state of incorporation to Texas "scaremongering" and took issue with the firm's worries about Musk's commitment level to the company, saying its CEO created significant market value for investors between 2018 and 2023.

"Glass Lewis may believe that Elon should have done so with more 'focus,' but the fact is that Tesla's performance speaks for itself," Tesla wrote. "Stockholders should care enormously about value creation (which Glass Lewis inexplicably ignores), and not about whether Elon's perceived 'focus' was strong enough."

A spokesperson for Glass Lewis did not immediately respond to Business Insider's request for comment ahead of publication.

Tesla appears to be facing mounting pushback from institutional investors. On Wednesday, the CEO of CalPERS, the largest public pension fund in the US, said the fund plans to vote against the pay package. And earlier in May, a group of shareholders filed a letter with the Securities and Exchange Commission calling for investors to vote against both Musk's pay package and the proposal to reelect James Murdoch and Kimbal Musk.

For its part, Tesla has been pulling out all the stops to promote the proposal and encourage shareholders to participate. On Wednesday, the company began offering investors the chance for a tour of Tesla's Texas gigafactory alongside Musk in exchange for proof they'd voted ahead of the annual shareholder meeting. Tesla has also argued the compensation plan is "critical to the future success of Tesla" and has even paid for a handful of advertisements promoting the pay plan.

A spokesperson for Tesla did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Are you a Tesla investor, do you work for the company, or have a tip? Reach out to the reporter via a non-work email and device at gkay@businessinsider.com or 248-894-6012

• Jurors in Trump's hush-money trial asked the judge to re-read his 'rain metaphor' instructions.
• The jury is weighing 34 counts of falsifying business records related to Stormy Daniels.
• Jurors seem to want clarity on how to gauge Trump's intent in the hush-money scheme.

The jury in Donald Trump's criminal hush-money trial knows what it wants.

In another note to the judge at 9:32 a.m. Thursday, jurors asked the judge to re-read a portion of his instructions starting from what they called "the rain metaphor."

It suggests the jury is examining Trump's intent as it weighs whether to find the former president guilty.

The jurors are considering 34 counts of whether Trump falsified business records as part of a scheme to cover up a hush-money payment to Stormy Daniels ahead of the 2016 presidential election. They began deliberating at around 11:30 a.m. on Wednesday.

In the afternoon, they asked for the judge to read back four parts of the testimony. The segments indicate they were deep into the details of the alleged conspiracy to influence the 2016 election by keeping Daniels quiet about an affair she says she had with Trump.

The jury also asked New York Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan to read back the entire hourlong jury instructions they received.

But on Thursday morning, they narrowed down the request to only instructions on how to evaluate the evidence in the case.

The "rain metaphor," which the jury note referenced, is often used by judges in jury instructions.

It tells the jurors that they can infer certain facts from the surrounding circumstances using their common sense.

"Suppose you go to bed one night when it is not raining, and when you wake up in the morning, you look out your window. You do not see rain, but you see that the street and sidewalk are wet and that people are wearing raincoats and carrying umbrellas," Merchan told the jurors. "Under those circumstances, it may be reasonable to infer — that is, conclude — that it rained during the night."

"In other words, the fact of it having rained while you were asleep is an inference that might be drawn from the proven facts of the presence of the water on the street and sidewalk, and people in raincoats and carrying umbrellas," he continued.

Jurors are paying close attention

Trump, who is 77 years old, does not use email or send text messages.

There is no evidence that he ever typed up a memo saying something like, "I'm going to falsify documentation of payments to my lawyer Michael Cohen in order to violate section 17-152 of the New York Election Law, also breaking campaign finance and tax laws along the way."

So in order to find Trump guilty, jurors would need to infer his role in the hush-money scheme based on the testimony and documents in the case surrounding him.

Thursday morning's jury request may show that jurors are trying to parse out that evidence.

As Merchan re-read the instructions Thursday, they appeared to be at heightened attention.

Juror 3, a young corporate lawyer, and Juror 5, a charter school teacher, each leaned forward in their seats in the front row of the jury box as Merchan read the so-called "rain metaphor."

Juror 4, a young male security engineer who sat between them, took notes.

Also taking notes was Juror 7, a middle-aged lawyer who had said during jury selection that "I'm a litigator, so I take the law seriously and I take the judge's instructions very seriously."

As the judge described how to infer Trump's intent "beyond a reasonable doubt," all of them scribbled hard.

Meanwhile, Juror 12, a physical therapist, held her hand to her chin as if she were concentrating during the recitation of the rain metaphor. And Juror 10 took notes as the judge explained how Trump may have violated campaign finance laws — a possible path to finding him guilty of the business falsification charges.

After the judge completed his recitation of the jury instructions, two of the court stenographers re-read portions of the testimony. They playacted as the questioning lawyers and the witnesses who previously took the stand.

A middle-aged court stenographer with glasses sat in the witness stand seat and played the roles of ex-National Enquirer publisher David Pecker and of Michael Cohen.

The jurors had also asked if they could have a pair of headphones with a 35-millimeter jack so that they could listen to audio recordings included on the laptop of evidence they have with them in the jury deliberations room.

The judge said they could. And that he'd throw in speakers, too.