• A Brief History of the Future: Episode 3

    Wednesday, April 17 at 9 How do the stories we tell shape the boundaries of our beliefs about what is possible? From the dawn of time, stories are how humans have made sense of the world. This episode emphasizes the fundamental role stories play in our lives, our inclination towards dystopian narratives, and the potential for bigger, better stories to unleash the power of human imagination and creativity moving forward.

    • KTVZ

    Decades of design: How American interior design trends reflect our history

    Living Spaces looks at a century of interior design and shows how historical events—from wars to the birth of the internet—changed how we decorate.

    • Axios

    A brief history of Wawa

    Wawa wasn't built in a day — but over two centuries plus. Here's a quick

  • A brief, weird history of brainwashing

    On an early spring day in 1959, Edward Hunter testified before a US Senate subcommittee investigating “the effect of Red China Communes on the United States.” It was the kind of opportunity he relished. A war correspondent who had spent considerable time in Asia, Hunter had achieved brief media stardom in 1951 after his book…

  • A Brief History of Kill Lists, From Langley to Lavender

    The Israeli online magazine +972 has published a detailed report on Israel’s use of an artificial intelligence (AI) system called “Lavender” to target thousands of Palestinian men in its bombing campaign in Gaza. When Israel attacked Gaza after October 7, the Lavender system had a database of 37,000 Palestinian men with suspected links to Hamas More

  • ‘Inceptionism’ and Balenciaga popes: a brief history of deepfakes

    What began as a primitive tool has spawned hyperrealistic fakes with the potential to disrupt elections around the worldConcern about doctored or manipulative media is always high around election cycles, but 2024 will be different for two reasons: deepfakes made by artificial intelligence (AI) and the sheer number of polls.The term deepfake refers to a hoax that uses AI to create a phoney image, most commonly fake videos of people, with the effect often compounded by a voice component. Combined...

  • A brief history of Patanjali’s dangerous claims

    From claiming to cure Covid to defying the Supreme Court, the ayurvedic company founded by yoga guru Ramdev has flouted the law several times.

    • Newser

    'Nature's Weirdos' Have an Issue 'Stranger Than Science Fiction'

    The periodical cicadas that are about to infest two parts of the US aren't

  • Cuba uses drones to apply sterile insect technique

    Havana, Apr 10 (Prensa Latina) Cuba has released, for the second time in Havana, and this time using a drone, male specimens of the Aedes aegypti mosquitos that were sterilized with ionizing radiation, Granma newspaper reported. The post Cuba uses drones to apply sterile insect technique first appeared on Prensa Latina.

  • A brief history of lifetime bans in professional team sports leagues

    Toronto Raptors forward Jontay Porter is not the first person to receive a lifetime ban from a professional sports league in North America. NBA Commissioner Adam Silver announced the ban Wednesday after a league probe found Porter disclosed confidential information to sports bettors and wagered on games. There have been other bans, from the so-called "Chicago Black Sox" to Pete Rose in Major League Baseball to the only other person banned from the NBA during Silver's tenure — Donald Sterling:...

  • Fracking the future: How Congolese oil extraction has shaped its history and its fate

    In 1969, the recently independent Republic of Congo discovered an enormous oil field off its coast. The find represented both a rare opportunity for the burgeoning nation, and a potential threat—the revenue generated by oil extraction could either pave the way for a stable socialist society, or doom the country to exploitation much like that it had endured under French colonialism.

  • Elon Musk xAI Calls on Engineers, Designers to Build the Future

    To strengthen his artificial intelligence (AI) company, Elon Musk urged ambitious individuals to join his groundbreaking initiative, xAI. This wide-ranging project seeks engineers, designers, and staff for product development, data analysis, and infrastructure management."Join xAI," the tech tycoon wrote in a cross-post. Musk shared a link to his AI company's Careers page in the cross-post. Grok, an AI-powered chatbot launched in 2023, is at the forefront of this burgeoning enterprise. xAI is...