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+1 +1
Inside A 1940’s Spy Radio
The RCA CR-88 was a radio receiver made to work in top-secret government eavesdropping stations. As you might expect, these radios are top-of-the-line, performance-wise, at least when they are work…
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+18 +5
Japan was the future but it's stuck in the past
The so-called lost decade has now stretched to three. What went wrong, asks Rupert Wingfield-Hayes.
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+15 +3
Archaeologists discovered a new papyrus of Egyptian Book of the Dead
Dubbed the "Waziri papyrus," scholars are currently translating the text into Arabic.
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+22 +5
Did Aliens Land on Earth in 1945? A Defense Bill Seeks Answers.
The Defense Department’s annual spending bill requires it to review U.F.O. sightings dating to 1945, the year some believe an object from space crashed in the New Mexico desert.
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+20 +2
The Black Death may not have been spread by rats after all
The Black Death ravaged Europe between 1347 and 1353, killing millions. Plague outbreaks in Europe then continued until the 19th century. One of the most commonly recited facts about plague in Europe was that it was spread by rats. In some parts of the world, the bacterium that causes plague, Yersinia pestis, maintains a long-term presence in wild rodents and their fleas. This is called an animal “reservoir”.
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+17 +5
The Corrupt World Behind the Murdaugh Murders
In isolated, poor regions of South Carolina, coming from an élite family offered a feeling of impunity. Did this license lead Alex Murdaugh to commit fraud after fraud—and then kill his wife and son?
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+16 +3
In the ’80s, We Decided Bike Helmets Make Riders Safe. Cyclists Have Paid for It Ever Since.
Some cyclists refuse to wear helmets on principle. They have their reasons.
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+15 +1
Back to the U.S.S.R.: Russophobia is at its peak in Georgia
Quebec journalist Paule Robitaille undertakes a journey through the former Soviet Union, where she lived from 1990 to 1996. As we approach next month’s first anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, she examines how Moscow’s aggression is changing the lives of these people and the fragile equilibrium within these countries.
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+2 +1
Ancient Roman concrete could self-heal thanks to “hot mixing” with quicklime
The famous Pantheon in Rome boasts the world's largest unreinforced concrete dome—an architectural marvel that has endured for millennia, thanks to the incredible durability of ancient Roman concrete. For decades, scientists have been trying to determine precisely what makes the material so durable.
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+20 +4
How an Unorthodox Scholar Uses Technology to Expose Biblical Forgeries
If you spotted Michael Langlois walking along the Seine, in Paris, as I did one overcast morning last spring, you could be forgiven for mistaking this scholar of the ancient Middle East for the bassist in Def Leppard. He wears his long brown hair in a leonine mane, and when I caught up with him on the Pont des Arts he was sporting a pink sweater and salmon-colored pants.
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+21 +3
How Claude Shannon Invented the Future
Today’s information age is only possible thanks to the groundbreaking work of a lone genius.
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+19 +4
The rise and fall of peer review
For the last 60 years or so, science has been running an experiment on itself. The experimental design wasn’t great; there was no randomization and no control group. Nobody was in charge, exactly, and nobody was really taking consistent measurements. And yet it was the most massive experiment ever run, and it included every scientist on Earth.
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+18 +2
Where to start with: Charles Dickens
The great Victorian chronicler of inequality and poverty was also a tremendous – and prolific – storyteller. Here are some of the best ways in to his colossal legacy
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+23 +5
The classic ocean poetry taking on troubling new meanings
We hear the call of the sea in poems from Coleridge and Eliot to Kathy Jetn̄il-Kijiner, but those words also sound a warning – if only we would listen
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+21 +7
How the Puritans once banned Christmas in Massachusetts
You have likely heard the story of "How the Grinch Stole Christmas!" — but what about the one where the Puritans in Massachusetts banned the holiday altogether?
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+20 +3
Designers on acid: the tripping Californians who paved the way to our touchscreen world
Ever wondered why email, trash cans, Google Docs and desktops look the way they do? The answer lies in 1960s hippie culture and LSD-taking creatives
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+22 +4
Panic at the Dacha: How Stalin Hastened His Death by Excessive Security Due to His Fear of Being…
an exceptional book, “The Last Days of Stalin”, that retraces the last days of Joseph Stalin, Joshua Rubenstein tells of the great embarrassment that seized the guards, doctors, and members of his first circle. A fear to act that precipitated his death. Overview of this book, which I invite you to read, in 7 key moments of the last days of the one who finds Vladimir Putin a worthy successor in horror.
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+16 +5
The Secret History: A murder mystery that thrills 30 years on
Thirty years since it was first published, Donna Tartt's debut novel The Secret History continues to enthral new generations of readers, writes Clare Thorp.
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+14 +1
James Cameron plans to prove that Jack couldn't have lived in 'Titanic'
James Cameron has made a documentary that he says will irrefutably prove that Jack Dawson couldn't have lived in Titanic.
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+20 +4
When Argentina Used World Cup Soccer to Whitewash Its Dirty War
'We should not play soccer amid the concentration camps and torture chambers,' wrote proponents of an international tournament boycott that year.
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