John “Bud” Benson WilburMIT You have probably never heard of John “Bud” Benson Wilbur, but he is a low-key civil engineering legend. In the mid-20th century, he was chair of the civil and sanitary engineering department at the Massachusetts Institute...
COP a load of this Feedback has been watching bemusedly from a distance as the latest round of international climate negotiations, COP29, struggled along in Azerbaijan. In a previous life, we covered a few COPs, and are still on most...
Optimus robots wandered around the party held after Elon Musk’s Tesla unveiled its robotaxi last month, doling out drinks and chatting with guests. They were also being photographed, as android butlers make for great social media content. Partygoers couldn’t believe...
Intense: Find a quiet spot and expand your mind with these inspiring booksDavid Trood/Getty Images The Burning Earth by Sunil Amrith This year hasn’t been a great one for the environment, so a book about the long history of environmental damage...
Haunted house attractions could provide an unexpected health benefitRobert Stainforth/Alamy They say laughter is the best medicine, but a bit of fear might be a strong contender. This is according to researchers who found that getting spooked in a haunted house...
The temperature is dropping, and rates of a whole host of respiratory illnesses are doing the opposite. Among them is so-called walking pneumonia, a relatively mild form of pneumonia that has been unusually common in young children this year.Pneumonia can...
November 27, 20245 min readChoosing Empathy Is Critical to DemocracyIf we lose sight of why empathy matters, both individual dignity and democracy sufferBy C. Daryl Cameron Denis Novikov/Getty ImagesIn the weeks before and after the U.S. presidential election, many of...
November 27, 20243 min readYour Friends Shape Your Microbiome—and So Do Their FriendsAnalysis of nearly 2,000 people living in remote villages in Honduras reveals who’s spreading gut microorganisms to whomBy Saima Sidik & Nature magazineFriends share more than just food...
A different missile to Oreshnik, the Yars intercontinental ballistic missile, is test-fired from the Plesetsk launch pad in north-western Russia in March 2024Associated Press/Alamy Stock Photo On 21 November a new Russian weapon hit the Ukrainian city of Dnipro, with...
Yuichiro Chino/Getty Images In 1818, Mary Shelley invented a technology that has been used for both good and ill in the centuries since. It is called science fiction. You may not think a literary genre counts as technology, but sci-fi...
