On this day
Revisit the news, notable people, and historical moments connected to this date.
In 2012, the world population was approximately 7,201,202,485 people[â ]
2012Ding Guangen, Chinese engineer and politician (born 1929)[â ]
Ding Guangen was a Chinese politician who served in senior leadership roles in the Chinese Communist Party during the 1990s. He was a member of the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party between 1992 and 2002, a member of the Central Secretariat, and one of the top officials in charge of propaganda and ideology during the term of Party General Secretary and President Jiang Zemin.
2012George Armitage Miller, American psychologist and academic (born 1920)[â ]
George Armitage Miller was an American psychologist who was one of the founders of cognitive psychology, and more broadly, of cognitive science. He also contributed to the birth of psycholinguistics. Miller wrote several books and directed the development of WordNet, an online word-linkage database usable by computer programs. He authored the paper, "The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two," in which he observed that many different experimental findings considered together reveal the presence of an average limit of seven for human short-term memory capacity. This paper is frequently cited by psychologists and in the wider culture. Miller won numerous awards, including the National Medal of Science.
2012Frank Pierson, American director and screenwriter (born 1925)[â ]
Frank Romer Pierson was an American screenwriter and film director.
2012Syrian civil war: The People's Protection Units (YPG) captured the cities of SerĂȘ KaniyĂȘ and DirbĂȘsiyĂȘ, during clashes with pro-government forces in Al-Hasakah.[â ]
The Syrian civil war is an ongoing conflict in Syria that began with the Syrian revolution in March 2011, when popular discontent with the Ba'athist regime ruled by Bashar al-Assad triggered large-scale protests and pro-democracy rallies across Syria, as part of the wider Arab Spring protests in the region. The Assad regime responded to the protests with lethal force, sparking a civil war that culminated in the fall of the Assad regime in December 2024. All revolutionary factions were united into the Syrian caretaker government by 12 March 2025.
The United States, trying to combat Latin American groups that are using Africa to smuggle cocaine into Europe, has begun training an elite counternarcotics police unit in Ghana.
Even though its owners cannot legally sell âCanyon,â an artwork by Robert Rauschenberg that features a stuffed bald eagle, the I.R.S. wants them to pay $29.2 million in taxes on it.
The N.C.A.A. will announce penalties against Penn State on Monday in the wake of the child sex abuse scandal involving Jerry Sandusky, a former football coach.
The finale of Christopher Nolanâs Batman trilogy took in about $162 million in North America, less than expected, in the wake of the deadly theater shooting in Colorado.
Ernie Els won his fourth major championship when the third-round leader, Adam Scott, bogeyed the final four holes.
Love has no dignity in the Sydney Theater Companyâs glorious production of âUncle Vanya,â starring Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving.
On shows like âIn the Big House,â âMobster Wives,â âMobster Confessionsâ and âI Married a Mobster,â people with gangster ties canât stop talking about it.
Jeffrey Deitch, art dealer turned museum director, has had a tough two years at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles.
A new John Cage biography explores the composerâs philosophical awakening through Zen Buddhism and how that conversion changed the sort of music he composed.
While Yahoo is many things, it leads in media. To succeed, its new chief executive, Marissa Mayer, must come to grips with its sprawling array of content.
As its share price has plummeted, Facebook has scrambled to attract advertisers away from Google. Its first earnings report since going public will indicate how it is doing.
A steady decline in phone bills in Europe may have ended with the European Commissionâs decision to give the biggest operators greater leverage over what they can charge competitors for access.