How big science failed to unlock the mysteries of the human brain
In September 2011, a group of neuroscientists and nanoscientists gathered at a picturesque estate in…
Our brains exist in a state of “controlled hallucination”
When you and I look at the same object we assume that we’ll both see…
“I understand what joy is now”: An MDMA trial participant tells his story
Nathan McGee was only four years old when he experienced the trauma that would eventually…
What would it be like to be a conscious AI? We might never know.
Jefferson Test / AI subject: Robert / Date: 07.12.2098 Session #54 Interviewer: Hi, Robert. Tell…
Five poems about the mind
DREAM VENDING MACHINE I feed it coins and watch the spring coil back,the clunk of…
I taught myself to lucid dream. You can too.
When I was 19—long before I ever thought I would land a career writing about…
The Taliban, not the West, won Afghanistan’s technological war
Despite their terrible human costs—or perhaps because of them—wars are often times of technological innovation.…
Is Ginkgo’s synthetic-biology story worth $15 billion?
The Boston genetic engineering company Ginkgo Bioworks and its CEO, Jason Kelly, have been spectacularly…
The $3.5 trillion budget bill could transform the US power sector—and slash climate pollution
In the coming weeks, Congress may pass one of the most important climate policies in…
To solve space traffic woes, look to the high seas
Thanks mainly to the rise of satellite megaconstellation projects like OneWeb and SpaceX’s Starlink, the…