“The Coming Software Apocalypse”

“More and more, critical systems that were once controlled mechanically, or by people, are coming to depend on code. This was perhaps never clearer than in the summer of 2015, when on a single day, United Airlines grounded its fleet because of a problem with its…

“Why We Miss Objects That Are Right in Front of Us”

“In particular, the first time a person examined a photo with a giant object, the object often seemed to be invisible. But it’s not a deficiency, he said: “This is a useful trick the brain does to rapidly process scenes and find what we are…

“When Cities Went Electric”

“Electricity makes it more possible for cities to become much livelier — people could be out and about in a way that just wasn’t true if you were living in rural America. Cities became much more nocturnal places than the countryside: This entire world of nightlife was possible…

“The Unique Merger That Made You (and Ewe, and Yew)”

“The transition from the classic prokaryotic model to the deluxe eukaryotic one is arguably the most important event in the history of life on Earth. And in more than 3 billion years of existence, it happened exactly once…

“Studies Skewed By Focus On Well-Off, Educated Brains”

“when the sample reflected the U.S. population, children’s brains reached several development milestones much earlier.

One of these milestones involved the total surface of the brain’s cortex, which plays a key…

“Your App Isn’t Helping The People Of Saudi Arabia”

“For people like Srinivasan, a vindicating narrative is playing out. A young population craving freedom flocks to new technology, bypassing their oppressive gatekeepers, ultimately to ring in modernity — all while investors enjoy a windfall…

“Why onions make us cry”

“He knew that LF must start off as a different molecule. That’s because it only caused a tearing of the eyes once the onion’s skin was broken. He hypothesized that a chemical reaction must take place as an onion is cut. Block thought this chemical reaction must convert a stable…

“A.I. VERSUS M.D.”

““The two kinds of knowledge would seem to be interdependent: you might use factual knowledge to deepen your experiential knowledge, and vice versa. But Ryle warned against the temptation to think that “knowing how” could be reduced to “knowing that” — a playbook of rules couldn’t teach a child…

“Uncommon Ancestry”

“In Canada, a federal law, the Assisted Human Reproduction Act, was passed in 2004. But it was largely preoccupied with outlawing payment for sperm, eggs, embryos and wombs — which, incidentally, it has failed to do — with much less emphasis on accountability.