In the last 60,000 years, humans have emerged as an ecologically dominant species and have successfully colonized every terrestrial habitat. Our evolutionary success has been facilitated by a heavy reliance on an ever-advancing technology. Understanding how human technology evolves is crucial to understanding why humans have enjoyed such unprecedented evolutionary success.

Not everyone pays the most attention to AM radio. To some, talk is talk and fuzzy signals are exactly that. Still, it'd be odd if the same broadcast looped continuously for eight years without anyone noticing—but it's not impossible.

You can’t bullshit a bullshitter. Well, that’s the saying — but is it true? Shane Littrell and colleagues at the University of Waterloo, Canada, set out to investigate. And in a new paper in the British Journal of Social Psychology they report that, in fact, people who bullshit more often in a bid to impress or persuade others are also more susceptible to bullshit themselves. The reason for this — also uncovered by the team — is truly fascinating.

My father, John Mortimer, brought me up to believe that you can be a good person and kill someone and a perfectly awful person who never gets so much as a parking ticket your whole life. It’s an education I’m proud of. He was an author and a criminal defense barrister — in his words, “the only playwright ever to have defended a murderer in the central criminal court at the Old Bailey” — and his prowess in both professions rode on his ability to see past easy morality and to respect the fact that the truth is never one-sided and therefore art should not be, either.

Hаllоween seems аn аррrорriаte time оf yeаr tо shаre the stоry оf the Сhаffin fаmily аnd hоw а ghоst helрed deсide а disрute оver аn inheritаnсe. Jаmes L Сhаffin оf Mоnksville, Nоrth Саrоlinа, died аfter аn ассident in 1921, leаving his estаte in full tо his fаvоurite sоn Mаrshаll аnd nоthing tо his wife аnd three оther сhildren. А yeаr lаter Mаrshаll died, sо the hоuse аnd 120 асres оf lаnd went tо Mаrshаll’s widоw аnd sоn.

Excellent analysis of cults.

Innovation is the “main event” of the modern age. It’s the reason why after millennia of comparative stagnation, the last several hundred years featured sudden, dramatic improvements in technology and therefore living standards: from steam engines to search engines, from vaccines to vaping.

A farmer in northern B.C. captured a wild cat he found in his chicken coop Sunday, picking it up by the scruff of the neck and gently scolding it before relocating it to the bush.

My partner and I are both book nerds–we met working at a bookstore–but we don’t have a lot of overlap in our reading. He tends towards science fiction and horror, and I read YA, literary fiction, and queer lit of all genres. When we do both read the same book, though, it’s always an interesting experience for me. I tend to immerse myself in books, absorbing the general emotions I get from the story, or the big ideas that it grapples with.

We've all seen what "good flirting" looks like, and you've probably seen some "bad flirting" in action, too. Sometimes the distinctions are quite obvious, but other times the line between flirting wins and flirting fails is sometimes hard to pinpoint until you've crossed it. How can you be a "better" flirt?

Users of Comcast’s Internet Essentials plan will be getting a significant speed increase on March 1st. The service, which currently runs at 25Mbps, will be automatically upgraded to 50Mbps without requiring additional fees or action from customers. Upload speeds are also being increased from 3Mbps to 5Mbps. Faster access for the same price should be a relief for many families struggling to adapt to having work, school, and entertainment largely shifted to the internet during the pandemic.

They actually got some of this right. Anyway,if you need a good laugh,this will do it.

“How much LEGO can you get up your bum?” Honestly, if this isn’t a question you’ve asked your closest pals, are you even really friends in the first place? In The Inbetweeners, it’s just another casual conversation between classmates. Scaringly, though, it’s the most accurate depiction of what it’s really like to be in high school.

Maria Fernandes died at the age of thirty-two while sleeping in her car in a Wawa parking lot in New Jersey. It was the summer of 2014, and she worked low-wage jobs at three different Dunkin’ Donuts, and slept in her Kia in between shifts, with the engine running and a container of gasoline in the back, in case she ran out. In the locked car, still wearing her white-and-brown Dunkin’ Donuts uniform, she died from gasoline and exhaust fumes.

Scientists may have discovered physical evidence of King Solomon entwined in 3,000-year-old strands of purple wool. Using radiocarbon dating and a special chemical analysis technique, a team of researchers from Israel has identified three textile samples dating to approximately 1000 BCE from the Timna Valley region of Israel. The fibers were dyed "true purple," using special salt-water mollusks found in the Mediterranean.

It takes a certain amount of financial acumen to understand exactly what happened earlier this eventful week on Wall Street. The simplest explanation, however, is that a bunch of Redditors reenacted the climax of Trading Places, using stock for the still-chugging-along Donkey Kong retailer, GameStop. The cleverly coordinated market manipulation has moved even some unlikely voices to rejoice around the so-called little people sticking it to Master of the Universe-types by exploiting their own exploitative loopholes and practices.

A Harvard astrophysicist thinks a mysterious object that swung by our solar system in 2017 was from an extraterrestrial civilization.

When I was teaching a class on opinion writing, I always ended the semester with a warning not to go into journalism. I felt bad about that, because I love my job, and wish everyone could have it. But I have spent my entire career watching the industry struggle with collapsing advertising revenue--half expecting an implosion at any moment, wearily unsurprised when it finally came.

Logicians don't rule the world or get the most done. Could it be that a consistent world view is neither desirable nor achievable? If we abandon the straightjacket of rationality might this lead to a more powerful and exciting future, or is it a heresy that leads to madness?