Culture
Colonizing Art
The euphoria surrounding generative AI often ignores ethics and rights, especially when it comes to artists whose work may be lifted for free and altered without consent.
Not in Your Head
Doctors sometimes dismiss physically sick patients with psychiatric diagnoses, entering errors into medical records that impede real treatment for years. Here’s how to protect yourself.
By Julie Rehmeyer
Not in Your Head
Doctors sometimes dismiss physically sick patients with psychiatric diagnoses, entering errors into medical records that impede real treatment for years. Here’s how to protect yourself.
By Julie Rehmeyer
Explainer
Cultural Synesthesia
An intermingling of the senses creates not just a different way of perceiving the world, but a window into your past, like psychological amber.
By Meera Khare (the synesthete) and Apoorva Bhandari (the neuroscientist)
Deceptions
Weaponized Empathy
The impulse to look out for other people can be hijacked to spread confusion and misinformation.
By JoBeth McDaniel
Controversies
The Extra Deaths
#DiedSuddenly has been a trending hashtag, and the United States lists 400,000 Covid-era fatalities not formally attributed to the virus itself. Do the numbers add up, and are they dividing us?
By Jill Neimark
Culture
Science for Peace
In tumultuous times, science diplomacy can help keep the world stable — if we let it.
By Fintan Burke
Reads
What We're Reading
Recommended articles from our editorial team on misinformation, cognitive science, and more.
By Jillian Mock
Controversies
The Hidden Cost of Telehealth
What have we sacrificed for the convenience of online doctor visits?
By Jordan Fisher Smith
Explainer
Are You a Climate Culprit?
The carbon footprint and calculator were popularized by Big Oil to shift blame for climate change from industry to the individual. But you can turn the tables and use these tools for good.
By Victoria Clayton
BS Alert
Gaslighting Long Haulers
Despite all the patient voices and validating studies from university labs, long Covid has been dismissed by some doctors and journalists as a contested, even psychiatric, disease. In this column, we push back.
By Ryan Prior
Controversies
The Serotonin Signal
The media exploded when a paper declared that low serotonin doesn’t cause depression— something many scientists had been saying for years. Confusion over the neurotransmitter caused some patients to question effective treatment, exposing an information gap it’s been hard to bridge. We can do better, and here’s how.
By Ben Rein
Solutions
Saving the Tiny Empires
Extinction threatens 40 percent of insect species—not just honeybees—putting global ecosystems and food supplies at risk. We can intervene.
By Oliver Milman
Conspiracies
The Murky History of Lab Leaks
They are almost never fully covered by media and usually shrouded by a fog of disinformation and denial. Could this explain the culture of conspiracy surrounding COVID-19?
By Wendy Orent
Culture
The Emotion Bomb Inside Video Games
Players often develop intense relationships with virtual characters. If those relationships go awry, the results can lead to real-world trauma.