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 S69This New Hand-Painted Video Game Takes Place Inside Claude Monet's Eyeball  /https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/b6/db/b6db89c2-6abe-4f70-95aa-dc5f67452f1f/the_masters_pupil_promo_still_21.jpg) Australian designer and developer Pat Naoum spent seven years creating “The Master’s Pupil”As Claude Monet got older, cataracts began to cloud his vision. This development was particularly troublesome for the French Impressionist painter, who used his eyes—and his paintbrush—to capture the nuances of light and color in the world around him. His vision loss even showed up in his paintings, which, by 1914, had become darker and muddier.
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S1This War Isn't Like Israel's Earlier Wars  On Saturday night, I was seated on the first El Al plane to fly from the United States to Israel since Hamas had attacked my country. Many airlines had canceled flights to and from Israel, but El Al had refused to grant the terrorists that victory. Though we took off after midnight, sleep was impossible. My mind writhed thinking of the reports of unbearable Israeli casualties, the images of the captured and the dead, and the prospect of wider war.Alongside those waking nightmares was an agonizing irony. I’d just come from participating in events in New York marking the 50th anniversary of the Yom Kippur War. Just as in 1973, when Israeli reservists living or vacationing abroad rushed to rejoin their units already in combat, my plane was filled with young men ready to trade the thrills of New York for the horrors of a war under way. Their presence was another reason to reflect on the eerie similarities and stark differences between these two wars, both of which broke out on Jewish holidays—the most solemn, Yom Kippur, and now Simchat Torah, our happiest.
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S2Opinion | No Better Than a Placebo  The news spurred shock and anger over how long ineffective medicines have been for sale. But amid the criticism, there were also some who lamented the possibility that their favorite cold medicine would be taken from them. In their view, it may not work, but it still does something for them.I’m a researcher who studies the placebo effect, and in some situations, it’s powerful. That said, oral phenylephrine sold over the counter should be removed from the market; despite some people’s love of phenylephrine cold medicines, there’s no evidence that the drug even provides placebo benefits. In clinical trials reviewed by the F.D.A. committee, phenylephrine and a placebo affected patients’ perceptions of nasal congestion equally, but the existing trials do not tell us to what extent people felt better because of placebo effects or because their colds simply resolved on their own.
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S3Can the Construction Industry Be Disrupted?  Construction is often maligned as the industry that technology left behind. Industry observers routinely deride the lack of technological sophistication in the construction industry, and have pigeon-holed it as old-fashioned and lagging behind more forward-looking and purposeful industries such as manufacturing. But that view ignores where the industry has advanced — specifically, in information management systems that have created significant gains. Moreover, it fails to take into account why automation and robotics don’t work on jobsites, which is that they’re often a poor fit for the dynamic environments that bear little resemblance to factory floors. Understanding why some tech takes root and why some doesn’t, however, is essential to making smart investments in new tools and systems.
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S4It's Time to End the Battle Between Waterfall and Agile  Too many project leaders think rigidly about Waterfall and Agile project management methodologies and believe that they need to choose between the two. But many projects — especially those with diverse stakeholder needs and complex structures — benefit from a hybrid approach that combines aspects of Waterfall and Agile. The rise of hybrid methods isn’t tied to a particular time or event; instead, they have evolved organically as a response to the needs of modern, complex projects. A review of the key components of Waterfall and Agile allows project leaders to select among them to build a hybrid approach based on the unique demands of each project.
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S5Reflecting on What Matters After a Terminal Cancer Diagnosis  How does someone who’s been told he will die much sooner than expected find contentment in the time he has left? As a former therapist, cofounder of the Deeper Coaching Institute, and business book author, Mark Goulston has spent his entire career trying to help others manage their emotions, improve their communication, and find the right balance between the personal and the professional. Faced with a cancer diagnosis, he’s been reflecting on lessons learned in his own life, things he and clients wish they’d done differently, and how to both prepare for a “good” death and leave a meaningful legacy. He shares his newfound perspective and his advice for early, mid- and late-career leaders.
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S610 Reasons Why Inclusion Is a Competitive Advantage  In their new book, Move Fast and Fix Things, Frances Frei and Anne Morriss outline five strategies to help leaders tackle their hardest problems and quickly make change. Their third strategy is creating an inclusive environment that allows all employees to thrive. Although it can be hard to measure a complex outcome like inclusion, researchers are working to identify and quantify the many effects of inclusion on firm performance, and the insights they’re generating are persuasive.
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S7S8Why Your Organization Should Use Salary Benchmarking  In a growing number of states and countries, employers are not allowed to ask job candidates’ salary history or even their salary expectations. That means employers must find new ways to determine appropriate compensation. A key solution lies in salary benchmarking — using aggregated market data to establish competitive pay rates. Recent research in collaboration with a leading U.S. payroll processing company revealed that access to robust benchmarking tools doubled the probability of firms setting the “right” salary. Data sources vary from government-released data to crowdsourced information on platforms like Glassdoor. Despite the availability of various tools, ensuring that salary decisions align with market trends is crucial, not just for compliance but also for retaining talent. As pay transparency grows, leveraging high-quality benchmarking sources effectively can optimize employer’s wage expenses and bolster employee retention.
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S9The Future of Mental Health at Work Is Safety, Community, and a Healthy Organizational Culture  A new study exploring the ever-changing landscape of workers’ experiences and perspectives around mental health, stigma, and work has uncovered new insights about how workplace mental health has changed from before, during, and after the pandemic. The findings show that mental health isn’t improving in the U.S., but there are some new bright spots, too. Workers are demonstrating greater awareness around mental health at work and are looking beyond traditional benefits and the latest technologies. What they increasingly want is what the research has always shown works: mentally healthier cultures. The authors break down what employees need and — increasingly expect — from their employers when it comes to mental health support and offer several strategies for leaders to foster sustainable, mentally healthy cultures.
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S10What a record-breaking hurricane looks like  As Hurricane Lee brought large swells and ferocious winds to batter the Caribbean islands, experts said the storm – which quickly and unexpectedly intensified into the highest category five strength – could be a sign of what's to come as the world's oceans warm up.The hurricane, which reached 160mph (258km/h) winds on Friday (8 September), was a category one storm on Thursday but intensified to a category five, increasing by 85mph (137km/h) in just 24 hours. The increase made the hurricane, which meteorologists dubbed "rare", the third-fastest rapid intensification in the Atlantic. According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the definition of rapid intensification is a 35mph (56km/h) over a one-day period – which Lee greatly exceeded.
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S11Where are Fat Bear Week's winners now?  Perched precariously on her posterior at the riverside, bear 409 looks the very epitome of gluttony. After months of gorging on sockeye salmon, she has tucked away enormous stores of fat to see her through the cold winter months. Her impressive size saw bear 409 – or "Beadnose" as she was nicknamed – crowned the 2018 Champion of Alaska's Katmai National Park's annual Fat Bear Week.The competition, which began in 2014, has seen members of the public cast in excess of a million votes in some years for their favourite brown bears; all while the animals gobble down dozens of salmon each day at feeding hotspots on the park's Brooks River, ahead of their winter months spent in a deep sleep known as torpor. Gaining weight is important for the bears, as once they enter their den they will not eat or drink until they emerge again in the spring.
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S12The robot aircraft with a nightmarish nuclear mission  The newsreel whirls into action. "OPERATION CROSSROADS… UNDERWATER BLAST AGAIN ROCKS BIKINI ATOLL…" A site which makes history for the motion picture camera.It is impossible to take your eyes away from the monstrous beauty and obscenity of the nuclear weapon explosion – only the fifth in the history of humanity. Or the sight of target warships shrunk to the size of toys by the vastness of the mushroom cloud, disappearing into the furious white depths of the sea.
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S13Ideas | India's persistent, gendered digital divide  Barkha Dutt, an Emmy-nominated journalist from India, is the founding editor of the multimedia platform Mojo Story. She is the author of two books: “This Unquiet Land: Stories from India’s Fault Lines” and “Humans of Covid: To Hell and Back.”In a society where women, especially unmarried girls, still have to fight to own a smartphone, would men — and institutional patriarchy — really be willing to share political power?
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S14How AI reduces the world to stereotypes  In July, BuzzFeed posted a list of 195 images of Barbie dolls produced using Midjourney, the popular artificial intelligence image generator. Each doll was supposed to represent a different country: Afghanistan Barbie, Albania Barbie, Algeria Barbie, and so on. The depictions were clearly flawed: Several of the Asian Barbies were light-skinned; Thailand Barbie, Singapore Barbie, and the Philippines Barbie all had blonde hair. Lebanon Barbie posed standing on rubble; Germany Barbie wore military-style clothing. South Sudan Barbie carried a gun.The article — to which BuzzFeed added a disclaimer before taking it down entirely — offered an unintentionally striking example of the biases and stereotypes that proliferate in images produced by the recent wave of generative AI text-to-image systems, such as Midjourney, Dall-E, and Stable Diffusion.
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S15Thousands More Puzzling 'Fairy Circles' Have Been Found around the World  These mysterious spots of barren soil have fascinated scientists for years. Now evidence of their existence beyond two known locations is stirring up a fresh round of contentionIn the remote grasslands of southwestern Africa’s Namib Desert and the Pilbara region of Australia some 6,000 miles away, large, barren circles crowd the landscape, like holes stamped out by a cookie cutter in a sheet of dough. The peculiar pockmarks, called “fairy circles,” were thought to exist exclusively in those two arid stretches. But new research published recently in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA has uncovered 263 additional sites where fairy circles might exist in areas from Madagascar to southwestern Asia.
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S16New Glasses Can Transcribe Speech in Real Time  Glasses that provide subtitles for conversations could be a boon to people with hearing lossWhen Paul Shuttleworth bought himself a very expensive pair of eyeglasses for Christmas last year, it was a peculiar gift. The glasses didn’t improve his eyesight, weren’t particularly stylish and uncomfortably pressed down on his nose.
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S17Broken U.S.-China Science Cooperation Needs Repair, Not Persecution  Science plays an enormous unseen role in keeping international avenues of contact open, even when political doors slam shut. We need to keep those channels open with ChinaWhen Stanford University physicists Steve Kivelson and Peter Michelson received word that the Agreement between the United States and China on Cooperation in Science and Technology might not be renewed just a week before its expiration in late August, they spent the weekend composing a strongly worded letter of objection to the Biden administration. They argued that the agreement, first signed in 1979 and renewed approximately every five years since, should not lapse. Instead every effort should be made to nurture open and transparent scientific cooperation.
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S18Solar Storms Can Hinder Bird Migration  New research suggests that solar storms interfere with the magnetic compass that birds use for long-distance travelThe same solar storms that can paint the polar skies with dancing lights might also interfere with a very different phenomenon: bird migration.
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S19South America's Winter Hot Spell Was 100 Times More Likely with Climate Change  A heat dome that baked parts of South America in late September was made much more likely and at least 1.4 degrees Celsius (2.5 degrees Fahrenheit) hotter by climate changeAugust and September mark the end of winter in the Southern Hemisphere, but a large swath of South America spent much of that period in deadly heat that felt much more like summer. Late in this past winter, millions of people in Brazil, Bolivia, Argentina and Paraguay experienced temperatures that exceeded 40 degrees Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit)—an event that was made 100 times more likely, and significantly hotter, by climate change, according to a new rapid analysis.
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S20Euclid Space Telescope Rescued from Mission-Threatening Glitch  The European Space Agency says a software patch restored stability to its cosmos-mapping Euclid spacecraft — but slower operations could extend the missionShortly after launching on 1 July, the European space observatory Euclid started performing tiny, unexpected pirouettes. The problem revealed itself during initial tests of the telescope’s automated pointing system. If left unfixed, it could have severely affected Euclid’s science mission and led to gaps in its map of the Universe.
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S21Wind Power Will Expand with Larger Turbines but Could Face Pushback  With the expansion of wind power—and the growth of turbines—comes challenges in areas that are unaccustomed to whirring bladesCLIMATEWIRE | What scientists call the Wind Belt may soon expand with the arrival of taller wind turbines and new construction techniques that could result in an 80 percent increase in U.S. land-based clean energy over the next 10 years.
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S22Ancient Skulls Reveal Shifts in Human Violence across Millennia  Levels of murder, assault, torture, and the like fluctuated greatly in the ancient world, according to new researchAnthropologists have long debated whether human societies have become more or less violent since the first states rose to power thousands of years ago. Until recently, viewpoints on the matter divided roughly into two camps: the “doves,” who viewed preclassical civilizations as largely harmonious until the dawn of agriculture, and the “hawks,” who perceived early settlements as brutal, warlike places that became more peaceful after people began farming cooperatively.
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S23How Economic Modeling Can Identify Trends | Kent Smetters  Professor Kent Smetters discusses how nonpartisan, research-based analysis benefits policymakers.Wharton’s Kent Smetters talks about the Penn Wharton Budget Model, a nonpartisan, research-based initiative that analyzes the fiscal impact of federal public policy. This episode is part of a series on “The Economy & You.”
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S243 practices for a life of wisdom  Journalist and podcast host Krista Tippett has spent a career interviewing some of the world's most brilliant people. All these conversations have left her with wisdom on the art of living and what it means to be human right now. Listen along as she offers three practices to help you make sense of the world around you and bring your fullest, most joyful self to it.
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S25The Israel-Hamas war -- and what it means for the world  The Hamas attacks on Israel in October 2023 stunned the world. In this timely conversation, political scientist Ian Bremmer explains the historical context of the conflict, how Israel might respond and what it means for Jews, Palestinians and the world at large. Listen in for analysis of the unprecedented events, how the US may factor into the global response and how to find reliable information amid the breathless media coverage and the fog of war. (This interview, hosted by TED's head of curation Helen Walters, was recorded on October 9, 2023.)
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S26Live Updates: The Trial of FTX Founder Sam Bankman-Fried  When Sam Bankman-Fried’s FTX crypto exchange collapsed, customers lost billions of dollars. A New York court will decide whether it was fraud.Welcome to our live coverage of the trial of FTX founder Sam-Bankman-Fried, or SBF for short. Check out our explainer for everything you need to know about the trial. And follow along here each day as we report on the drama inside and outside the courtroom.
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S27The Best October Prime Day TV Deals  Black Friday is almost synonymous with great deals on TVs. But increasingly Amazon Prime Day TV deals compete with the original American shopping holiday, which has featured bargain televisions going back to the days of big-screen sets that weighed as much as a refrigerator. In July, Prime Day deals on TVs were plentiful, including screaming sales on sets from LG, Samsung, and Vizio. We expect similar sales this Prime Big Deals Days.Maybe it's the start of the NFL season and fall TV schedule, but some of the current TV deals are actually on par with what we've seen before. Here are the best Prime Day TV deals in October, tracking prices closely on top WIRED-recommended TVs, soundbars, and 4K streaming devices.
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S286 Best Prime Day Sex Toy Deals on Vibrators and Strokers  A hungering darkness has devoured the sky. We're now in the midst of Prime Day 2: The Reckoning. Regular Prime Day deals on sex toys can be tough to find, but this time around we're finding some pretty good bargains on our favorite sex toys. In the spirit of this dark new unholiday, manufacturers all over the web are getting in on the action and offering their own deals on sex tech, and we've combined the best of both worlds here for your viewing pleasure. If you buy something using links in our stories, we may earn a commission. This helps support our journalism. Learn more.
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S29The 17 Best Shows on Apple TV+ Right Now  Slowly but surely Apple TV+ is finding its feet. The streaming service, which at launch we called “odd, angsty, and horny as hell,” has evolved into a diverse library of dramas, documentaries, and comedies. It’s also fairly cheap compared to services like Netflix—and Apple often throws in three free months when you buy a new iPhone, iPad, Mac, or Apple TV.Curious but don’t know where to get started? Below are our picks for the best shows on the service. (Also, our picks for the best movies on Apple TV+ are here.) When you’re done, head over to our guides to the best shows on Netflix, best movies on Hulu, and best movies on Amazon Prime, because you can never have too much television.
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S30The Best October Prime Day Lego Deals  “What?" you ask, slowly blinking. Didn't we already have Prime Day? Have you fallen into a wormhole through space and time where every day is Prime Day? (Ssshhh! Don't give Amazon any ideas!) The second Prime Day of 2023 is called Prime Big Deal Days and runs through October 11. This mid-October timing is perfect for those of us who are parents and have just started thinking about shopping for holiday presents. If you have a Lego enthusiast (or several!) in your life, big sales events are a great time to pick up brand-new Lego sets (which can be quite expensive). Yes, Lego bricks are made of plastic. Still, they tend to get reused, saved, and resold quite often. Lego also has licenses with every major entertainment franchise. They're great gifts for the budding fan in your life.
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S31The Best October Prime Day Mattress and Sheet Deals  If you need a new mattress, any sales event is a good time to look for one. Most mattresses are marketed with "discounts" most of the year, but Amazon Prime Day mattress deals are usually significantly better than the discounts on an average Tuesday. We track prices to highlight when a deal is actually a deal. This Amazon Prime Day—technically called Prime Big Deal Days—offers some solid prices, whether you're buying a bed from Amazon or not. There are also some deals on sheets and other sleep accessories, like weighted blankets. The prices below are for queen sizes.We test products year-round and handpicked these deals. Products that are sold out or no longer discounted as of publishing will be crossed out. We'll update this guide periodically throughout the sale event.
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S32The Best October Prime Day Deals Under $50  Prime Day is here again. Actually, Amazon's second coming of Prime Day is now called Prime Big Deal Days—a bold choice, to say the least. We'll still be calling it Amazon Prime Day, and you hereby have permission from this humble WIRED writer to do the same. If you're hunting for the best cheap deals, well, you're in luck. We've rounded up the best Prime Day deals under $50— nothing feels more like a deal than when it's affordable, but it can be hard to find what's a good cheap deal and what isn't. We did the work for you (you're welcome!).We test products year-round and handpicked these deals. Products that are sold out or no longer discounted as of publishing will be crossed out. We'll update this guide periodically throughout the sale event.
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S33The Best Prime Day Deals on Apple Devices  Discounts on Apple products are few and far between. Luckily, with Amazon's second big sale event of the year (officially called Prime Big Deal Days), we've found a variety of Prime Day Apple deals. That includes iPads, Apple Watches, iPhone cases, and MagSafe accessories. These deals aren't just at Amazon either—we've linked to other retailers like Best Buy when available.Updated October 10: We added new deals on power banks and chargers we recommend using with Apple products, such as Nomad's Base One Max and Anker's 737 power bank.
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S34The Best October Prime Day Laptop Deals  Past your Prime? Your laptop, that is. Well, it's a good day to upgrade! Today is Amazon's second Prime Day of the year, called Prime Big Deal Days. Here, we've rounded up all the top Prime Day laptop deals we could find, from discounted MacBooks and Windows laptops to PC accessories and peripherals.We test products year-round and handpicked these deals. Products that are sold out or no longer discounted as of publishing will be crossed out. We'll update this guide periodically throughout the sale event.
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S35The Absolute Best October Prime Day Deals  Amazon Prime Day Part II is here, and that means a fresh batch of Prime Day deals. Technically Amazon calls this Prime Big Deal Days, but like most people, we think of it as Prime Day Deux. As usual, most of these Prime Day deals require a Prime membership, but you can snag a 30-day free trial to make the most of the event. We've been combing Amazon's website to bring you the best discounts on laptops, tablets, kitchen and home gear, headphones, and plenty more.We test products year-round and handpicked these deals. Products that are sold out or no longer discounted as of publishing will be crossed out. We'll update this guide regularly throughout Prime Day by adding fresh deals and removing dead deals.
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S36Attoseconds aren't fast enough for particle physics  One of the biggest news stories of 2023 in the world of physics was the Nobel Prize in Physics, awarded to a trio of physicists who helped develop methods for probing physics on tiny timescales: attosecond-level timescales. There are processes in this Universe that happen incredibly quickly — on timescales that are unfathomably fast compared to a human’s perception — and detecting and measuring these processes are of paramount importance if we want to understand what occurs at the most fundamental levels of reality.Getting down to attosecond-level precision is an incredible achievement; after all, an attosecond represents just 1 part in 1018 of a second: a billionth of a billionth of a second. As fast as that is, however, it isn’t fast enough to measure everything that occurs in nature. Remember that there are four fundamental forces in nature:
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S37The unexpected impact of AI on animals  Philosopher Peter Singer explores the impact of AI on animals, using historical parallels in how humans have previously used technology to exploit nature. He discusses AI’s current applications in factory farming and wildlife management, which are already raising ethical concerns.Singer believes AI should not only serve human interests and that we should consider how it impacts all sentient beings as we continue to develop it.
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S38Iran's Persian Constitutional Revolution reveals the complicated relationship between Islam and democracy  With the recent terrorist attack against Israel by Hamas, global attention inevitably will shift to Iran and what role it played, if any, given that it has been one of the group’s major benefactors for about 30 years. But that funding has come from the government, not the people. Indeed, the people of Iran have staged high-profile protests against their oppressive government over the past year following the murder of Mahsa Amini by the “morality police.” To gain a better understanding of Iran today, we need to delve a bit into its history.Important revolutions are often remembered through engaging but highly simplified narratives. Usually, they are about ordinary people standing up against a despotic ruler. The American Revolution was fought between the American colonies and the British Empire. In the French Revolution, the citizens of France demanded the abdication of Louis XVI. During the Russian Revolution, the Russians demanded the same thing of their czar, Nicholas II.
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S39Is there such a thing as "Japanese philosophy"?  The West had been in East Asia for hundreds of years in the form of the Dutch East India Company, among other trading companies, but, in the late 19th century, they turned up with guns and warships. They booted down the door to Japan, locked by the Tokugawa Shogunate’s policy of isolationism (sakoku) for more than 250 years, because they wanted to “trade.” Of course, the agreements they came to were hardly fair and, in later decades, came to be referred to as “unequal treaties” (fu byōdō jōyaku). They did not just take from Japan, though: Westerners also brought philosophy with them. Nishi Amane invented a Japanese neologism for philosophy (tetsugaku) in 1874, the Chinese characters for which were also used in Korea (cheolhak) and China (zhexue). The Japanese themselves rapidly began learning English, French, and German to make sense of imported philosophical texts, and many were sent by the government to Europe to study there.
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S406 ways voice tech can transform your company  Beginning the work of incorporating voice as a tool to activate and enhance your existing customer apps, rather than imagining that some future version of Alexa or Siri will do it for you, is a challenging and important job. The work begins with identifying your voice cases: looking closely at every significant process within your business system. That includes interactions among your employees and interactions between your company and its customers. In each case, ask yourself how information and instructions are being transmitted. What modes of connection are being used? Where is friction apparent — instances where an interaction is time-consuming, awkward, error-prone, or simply annoying? And how can those interactions be streamlined, accelerated, made more accurate, reduced in cost, or otherwise improved?
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S41Study: Patients remember the experience of death after cardiac arrest  Every year, up to 750,000 Americans experience cardiac arrest, with only about 10% surviving to relate their experiences. Although it is widely assumed that patients are unconscious during the event, there are reports of brain activity during cardiac arrest as well as the process of dying, and survivors often report having conscious awareness. Research published in the journal Resuscitation now provides further evidence of conscious awareness and cognition during cardiac arrest, and shows that “normal” brain activity associated with consciousness can emerge after up to one hour of cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR).
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S42Can we stop time in the body?  The ceremony takes place on the night of the full moon in February, which the Tibetans celebrate as the coldest of the year. Buddhist monks clad in light cotton shawls climb to a rocky ledge some 15,000 feet high and go to sleep, in child’s pose, foreheads pressed against cold Himalayan rocks. In the dead of the night, temperatures plummet below freezing but the monks sleep on peacefully, without shivering.Footage of the ritual exists from the winter of 1985 when a team of medical researchers led by Herbert Benson, a Harvard cardiologist, were allowed in as observers at a monastery just outside the town of Upper Dharamsala in northern India.1 Benson had the blessing of the Dalai Lama, with whom he had developed a friendship; the physician was driven to understand the physiological mechanisms that allowed the monks to survive the night. Their bodies had entered a state that required years of meditative and physical practice that the Dalai Lama called miraculous. Had Benson’s research taken place today, it is very likely he would have called it “biostasis.”
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S43S44Newly found rooms in Sahura's Pyramid challenge what we know of such structures  Over a century after a British archaeologist noted a blocked passageway in the ruins of Sahura's Pyramid in Egypt and suggested it might lead to additional rooms, a team of Egyptian and German archaeologists have cleared out that passageway to prove the archaeologist right. They discovered several previously undocumented storage rooms and used 3D laser scanning to produce a map of the interior, shedding additional light on the structure's architecture.
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S45S46Google will now make passkeys the default for personal accounts  Google is taking a big step toward making passkeys the default login option for its users. Starting today, users logging in to personal Google accounts will be prompted to create and use passkeys instead of passwords when possible. (Passwords will still be used in some contexts where they are not yet supported.)
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S47S48S49Adobe's AI image generators get beefy updates, including vector graphics  On Tuesday, Adobe announced major updates to AI image synthesis features across several products, including Photoshop, Illustrator, and Adobe Express. The updates include three new generative AI models—Firefly 2, Firefly Design Model, and Firefly Vector Model—which improve its previous offerings and add new capabilities. With the vector model, Adobe is notably launching its first text-to-vector AI image generator.
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S50The best Apple deals on Amazon Prime Big Deal Days, all in one place  Apple gear can be a great option, but it's not often you can find a real deal. We share small Apple deals when we find them, but Amazon's Prime Day sales are among the few times when we see significant discounts on some of Apple's hottest tech. If you've been waiting to pull the trigger on an iPad, a shiny new pair of AirPods, or even a new MacBook, now is your moment. Here are all the best deals we've found on Apple's best gear during Amazon's Big Deal Days sales event.
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S51A year from launch, the Europa Clipper spacecraft nears finish line  KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla.—The launch window for one of the most expensive robotic space missions in NASA's history opens one year from Tuesday. Coming in at $5 billion, Europa Clipper will try to help scientists answer a bold question commensurate with its eye-popping cost: Are there places below the surface of Jupiter’s icy moon, Europa, that could support life?
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S52There Are No Rules  States and quasi-states are using extreme, uninhibited violence against civilian populations.The “rules-based world order” is a system of norms and values that describe how the world ought to work, not how it actually works. This aspirational order is rooted in the idealistic aftermath of the Second World War, when it was transcribed into a series of documents: the United Nations Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the UN Genocide Convention, and the Geneva Conventions on the laws of war, among others. In the more than seven decades since they were written, these documents have frequently been ignored. The UN Genocide Convention did not prevent genocide in Rwanda. The Geneva Conventions did not stop the Vietnamese from torturing American prisoners of war, did not prevent Americans at Abu Ghraib from torturing Iraqi prisoners of war, and do not prevent Russians from torturing Ukrainian prisoners of war today. Signatories of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights include known violators of human rights, among them China, Cuba, Iran, and Venezuela. The UN Commission on Human Rights deteriorated into parody long ago.
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S53The Reckoning  Israel must grapple first with its enemies, and then with the failures of its own government.On April 22, 1979, four Palestinian terrorists set out from southern Lebanon on a rubber dinghy and landed on the Israeli coast, near the northern town of Nahariya. They proceeded to an apartment building, breaking through the front door of the Haran family. Inside, they seized Danny Haran and his 4-year-old daughter, Einat. Meanwhile Danny’s wife, Smadar, hid in the attic with her 2-year-old daughter, Yael.
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S54What Madonna Knows  The artist is always one step ahead—and has a unique power to scandalize each generation anew.We like our female icons, as they age, to go quietly—to tiptoe backwards into semi-reclusion, away from our relentless curiosity and our unforgiving gaze. Tina Turner managed this arguably better than anyone else, holed up for the last decade of her life in a gated Swiss château with an adoring husband and a consulting role on the hit musical about her life, watching a younger performer step nimbly into her gold tassels. Joni Mitchell retreated to her Los Angeles and British Columbia properties for so long that when she reappeared for a full set at the Newport Folk Festival last year, it was as though God herself was suddenly present, ensconced in a gilded armchair, her voice still so sonorous that practically every single person onstage with her wept.
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S55Why Conservatives Are Getting More Moderate on Abortion  Abortion foes thought Roe v. Wade’s reversal would usher in a more pro-life America by finally clearing the legal obstacles to the eventual abolition of abortion. But in the 16 months since Roe fell, everywhere abortion has been on the ballot—including red states such as Kansas, Ohio, Montana, and Kentucky—voters have instead supported measures that protect abortion rights. Even some Republican presidential candidates, who in previous cycles might have pressed for sweeping abortion restrictions, are instead advocating for a 15-week limit, a policy that would protect the vast majority of abortions. Donald Trump, the front-runner for the nomination, and a man who has called himself “the most pro-life president” in American history, labeled Florida’s de facto abortion ban a “terrible thing and a terrible mistake.”The conservative calls for moderation should sober pro-life activists. Now more than half a century old, their movement seems trapped by internal tensions. Its bold demand for a new society that rests on rights for all humans—born and unborn—has been its singular strength, inspiring a level of devotion matched by few other causes. Having spent countless hours interviewing and observing its activists, I know at least one thing with certainty: They sincerely consider themselves human-rights crusaders. Supporters of abortion rights who don’t see this are underestimating what they’re up against.
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S56Hiking Needs New Rules  We need to restrict outdoor recreation to certain places during certain parts of the year for the well-being of wildlife.Nestled among the Rocky Mountains, in a yawning stretch of sagebrush, granite rocks, and flowing hills near Gunnison, Colorado, is the Hartman Rocks Recreation Area, one of the first spots to clear of snow in spring. Which means that it is one of the first spots to give cooped-up humans a place to stretch their legs and fill their lungs—to ride their bikes.
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S57Biden Will Be Guided by His Zionism  The president is committed to supporting the Jewish state, but the conflict threatens his other regional priorities.On Sunday morning, Joe Biden got on the phone with Benjamin Netanyahu. After the barbaric attack launched against Israel the day before, the Israeli prime minister was able to offer a granular account of what was already known about the unfolding catastrophe. According to two Biden-administration officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity, he gave Biden a vivid set of details about the assault on the music festival in the south of his country. The death toll, he reported, was well over 200—part of the more than 800 Israelis already reported killed in the Hamas assault. Netanyahu’s anger and despair poured through the phone.
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S58The Kamala Harris Problem  This article was featured in One Story to Read Today, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a single must-read from The Atlantic, Monday through Friday. Sign up for it here.On a Thursday morning in April, I met with Vice President Kamala Harris at Number One Observatory Circle, the Victorian mansion that, for the past two and a half years, she and the second gentleman, Doug Emhoff, have called home. She can be a striking presence when she walks into a room, with a long stride and an implacable posture that make her seem taller than she is (about 5 foot 2). By the time I saw Harris at the residence, I had already traveled with her to Atlanta, New York, Los Angeles, and Reno, Nevada, as well as to Africa, trips on which she had carried herself with ease and confidence.
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S59Your Sweaters Are Garbage  The quality of knitwear has cratered. Even expensive sweaters have lost their hefty, lush glory.In much of the United States, you can already feel it. There’s a hint of a chill in the night air. The morning light looks somehow more golden. The pumpkin-spice latte has finished its annual transit across the cosmos and returned to its home at your local Starbucks. Sweater weather approaches. Cooler temperatures bring rich textures and many layering opportunities. What this time of year no longer brings to most people, though, is amazing new sweaters. Or even good ones.
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S60Lizzo Was a New Kind of Diva. Now She's in a New Kind of Scandal.  Before she decided to sue Lizzo for sexual harassment, assault, and a number of other offenses earlier this year, the backup dancer Arianna Davis wondered if she was blowing her concerns with her work environment out of proportion. Touring with the widely beloved rapper and singer, she had witnessed some bizarre things: The lawsuit she filed with two other dancers includes the words “bananas protruding from the performers’ vaginas.” (More on that in a bit; Lizzo has denied all the allegations.) But something about her experience seemed familiar, like it fit a script. Davis told CNN, “I just chalked it up to, you know, Oh, Lizzo might be a diva.”Davis was voicing a common idea: Some kinds of artists can’t help but make the people around them feel a bit like trash. The term diva has long been tinged with misogyny and awe, and rather than grow obsolete with the progress of pop-culture feminism over the years, it has only become more relevant. Today I have a book out called On Divas, focused on soloists—mostly women—who voice their desires in ways that cause spectacle and controversy. I didn’t set out to write so frequently about these sorts of performers. But it kept happening, probably because divas are the most important entertainers of our time—though, as Lizzos’s scandal shows, the demands of divadom are in flux.
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S61Winners of the 2023 Epson International Pano Awards  The top-scoring panoramic photos entered in the 14th Epson International Pano Awards were recently announced. Organizers reported that they received 4,414 entries from 1,104 professional and amateur photographers in 102 countries this year, competing for the top spots in four categories for several special awards and for some of the cash prizes offered. Contest organizers were once more kind enough to share some of the winners and top scorers below. Swimming With Whale Sharks in Cebu, 45th Place, Open—Nature / Landscapes. Taken in Oslob, South Cebu, Philippines. #
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S62When Hamas Tells You Who They Are, Believe Them  “Not every German who bought a copy of Mein Kampf necessarily read it … But it might be argued that had more non-Nazi Germans read it before 1933 and had the foreign statesmen of the world perused it carefully while there was still time, both Germany and the world might have been saved from catastrophe.”How many Israelis, or Jews, or anyone else for that matter, have read the 1988 Hamas Covenant or the revised charter that was issued in 2017? With 36 articles of only a few paragraphs’ length each in the former, and 42 concise statements of general principles and objectives in the latter, both are considerably shorter and more digestible than the 782-page original German-language edition of Mein Kampf. Moreover, unlike Hitler’s seminal work, which was not published in English until March 1939, excellent English translations of both the original Hamas Covenant and its successor can easily be found on the internet.
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S63The World Needs a Unified and Resolute America  This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.The rest of the planet does not pause while Washington sorts out its internal food fights. Republicans—and other Americans—need to put aside their childish squabbles.
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S64'Be absolutely quiet. Not a word.'  The Israeli journalist Amir Tibon and his family were trapped inside a safe room in their house on the Israel-Gaza border when they heard gunshots outside. Tibon speaks Arabic, so he knew what was happening. Hamas terrorists had somehow made it into their Israeli village. Tibon spoke with me and my colleague Yair Rosenberg about the experience, and in this episode of Radio Atlantic we hear Tibon’s story—hiding out with his two young children, their improbable rescue—and his first, raw thoughts about why this happened to them.Amir Tibon: Saturday, six in the morning, and we hear a very familiar sound: the sound of a mortar about to explode. It’s like a whistle. It’s almost like this [whistles].
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S65Why do so many people think they are in a bullshit job? | Psyche Ideas  is a staff writer at Psyche. Her science journalism has appeared in Vice, The New York Times and Wired, among others. She lives in Brooklyn, New York.Mark described the majority of what he did for his job as ‘ticking boxes’. Working as a senior quality and performance officer in a local council in the UK involved ‘pretending things are great to senior managers, and generally “feeding the beast” with meaningless numbers that give the illusion of control,’ he told the late anthropologist David Graeber, as quoted in Graeber’s book Bullshit Jobs (2018).
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S66More Mammals Can Glow in the Dark Than Previously Thought /https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/ec/6d/ec6d48a7-7aa6-4ec0-80c7-5ca7735e5066/rsos230325f02.jpg) A new study found that 125 different mammal species are fluorescent under ultraviolet light, suggesting the property is widespreadMore mammals are fluorescent under ultraviolet light than previously thought, according to a study published last week in the journal Royal Society Open Science. By examining museum specimens, researchers documented the glowing property across 125 mammal species.
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S67Did Shakespeare Perform on These Newly Discovered Floorboards? /https://tf-cmsv2-smithsonianmag-media.s3.amazonaws.com/filer_public/80/cd/80cdaec3-1eaf-432a-b83b-0de0a5a20d45/gettyimages-168625734.jpg) William Shakespeare famously wrote, "All the world's a stage"âand now, officials at a theater in Norfolk, England, claim they've found the only surviving stage where the Bard once performed.During recent restorations, the boards were discovered under layers of flooring at St. George's Guildhall in King's Lynn, the United Kingdom's oldest working theater. The large oak boards are almost 30 centimeters (12 inches) wide and 15 centimeters (6 inches) thick, and they're held together by wooden pegs instead of nails.
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