Current Events
A new online religion is spreading misinformation and phony products.
Rich data on the global state of our feathered friends presents plenty of bad news — but also some bright spots.
The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline relaunched last year with a new number, yet few Americans are aware of the helpline and its purpose.
One of Apple’s key innovations serves as a psychological breakthrough, as its technology eliminates the isolating feel of headset use.
In a time when we dislike and distrust our politicians, why can’t we get more popular leaders like Kim Jong Un and Bashar al-Assad?
Cyberattacks are growing in number and sophistication.
The pandemic and the Great Resignation fed into a perfect storm of inflation — and some restaurateurs cleaned up.
A panel of healthcare professionals much preferred responses that came from the chatbot in a recent study.
Is Eliezer Yudkowsky the same false prophet that Paul Ehrlich was?
Changes in the world population are determined by two metrics: the number of babies born, and number of people dying.
Burj Al Babas may one day be full of wealthy vacationers, but for now it’s a ghost town in the center of Turkey.
Unmasking a “convenient untruth” in U.S. politics.
Modern robotics are creating a kind of cultural paradox, where the best religion is the one that eventually involves no humans at all.
Nevada has the fewest number of native-born citizens.
Estonia has long been seen as a pioneer in digitizing the democratic process.
Instead of giving the 239 suffering families and the public a true story, Netflix exploited a horrifying tragedy to push conspiracy theories.
Social media has made yelling past each other all the easier.
The restoration of public confidence is crucial for strong democratic governance around the world.
Are anti-workers the lazy children of privilege or the brave vanguard of a utopic upheaval?
The state of global democracy is relatively strong — but there are clear signs of recent erosion.
An innovation’s value is found between the technophile’s promises and the Luddite’s doomsday scenarios.
The typical car is parked 95% of the time.
How to separate the reality from the conspiracy theory.
Telegrams were the “Twitter of the 1850s and 1860s” — and they elicited the exact same overblown fears as Twitter does today.
ChatGPT doesn’t understand physics, but it memorizes very well and puts in extra effort.
If you lost your religion, it might be because the internet and social media are having a secularizing effect on American society.
The danger posed by conversational AI isn’t that it can say weird or dark things; it’s personalized manipulation for nefarious purposes.
Even if a balloon flies directly overhead, attempting to shoot it down with a conventional firearm is stupid, ineffective, and dangerous.
Spying is not usually done these days with balloons because they’re an easy target and are not completely controllable.
Was it the enormous magnitude of the quake, or is the problem with the buildings?