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"Are We Heading for a Space Bubble? The supply of new spacecraft, launchers, and spaceports may soon exceed the demand." Technology Review on the booming private space business.
When you smell a ripe strawberry or your morning coffee, what you’re really smelling are hundreds of molecules, says fine fragrance perfumer Chistophe Laudamiel. But that doesn’t mean the brain […]
“For the most part, a lot of those early users were actually Steve and me with aliases. We had silly user names that we just generated in order to make […]
"The tools used by the commercial industry to detect our thoughts and brain states are very different, and somewhat limited, compared to those used in the research lab."
"While eating a varied and balanced diet is the best way to get the micronutrients the body requires, some essential vitamins are difficult to come into contact with naturally."
"Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook in his college dorm room six years ago. Five hundred million people have joined since." The New Yorker profiles the young Internet entrepreneur.
"New antenna made of carbon nanotubes could make photovoltaic cells more efficient by concentrating solar energy." MIT News on where renewable energy and nanotechnology intersect.
"The world’s humanitarian aid organizations may do more harm than good, argues Linda Polman." The writer has a new book on the unintended consequences of humanitarian aid.
"It is a very American thing, that we don't believe too much in obeying the rules. We are not a nation of Hall Monitors; we are a nation that tortures Hall Monitors. We are people who push the rules."
"Reach distils what made Halo such a trailblazer in the first place: the combat is extraordinarily good fun. ... Halo remembers that, above all else, the art of battle is what counts the most."
"These days, the energy market is about as complicated as it gets, with a range of issues buffeting stock prices." The Wall Street Journal breaks down the energy market by sector.
"The real utility of the term 'Islamism' is that it can be applied to any person, position, value, or policy that one wishes to smear as vaguely fascist or fundamentalist."
"America is in the worst spasm of bigotry and paranoia since the McCarthy era. But the irony is that persecuting Muslims at home actually endangers American security abroad."
"The key issue facing everyone in the next decade is figuring out how to use the Internet and how to discern its societal benefits from its over-hyped Utopian promises."
"A result of a certain kind of overparenting, we are learning, is children who are better prepared for college but less prepared for life." Lisa Belkin says parenting has become too sacred.
"The loss of linguistic diversity means permanently shutting the door on a vast wealth of potential scientific knowledge." Obit's Axel Rose on the downside of English as lingua franca.
"There's a better reason for the non-fanatical to return to an antiquated medium like vinyl. Listening to music on a computer or iPod via headphones has become the ultimate in anti-social activities."
"What explains the ascendance of Homo sapiens? Start by looking at our pets." The Boston Globe says our ability to domesticate and control other species accounts for our formidable rise.
"How does one come to have certain ideas about L.A. without actually experiencing it?" n+1 meditates on the sun, fun and doom captured in the novels of Bret Easton Ellis.
"Under our current system of campaign finance, there is a fundamental gap between the interests of voters and of contributors." Harvard's Lawrence Lessig on the Congress' institutional corruption.