Lionel Shriver in exile. The novelist has managed to alienate the literati. She's fine with that

New AI model could cut the costs of developing protein drugs

Dario Amodei: “We are near the end of the exponential”

Brickbat: Bad Boss

For Europe, It’s Not Back to Business as Usual

Florida Embraces New Urbanist Mega-Developments

Scientists Create Map of Deadly Scorpion Hotspots  

Keith Haring on Creativity, Self-Doubt, and the Love of Life in the Face of Death

Does Belief in God, not Political Party, Drive Conservatism?

Mary Oliver on What Attention Really Means and Her Moving Elegy for Her Soul Mate

Conflicting Policies, Confused Investors, and the Weak Dollar

Penny, a Doberman pinscher, wins the Westminster dog show

Walking “a fine line between principled opposition and crankdom,” the film critic A.S. Hamrah rails against Rotten Tomatoes, texting at the movies, and digital projection

The novelist George Sand dressed like a man, took a male name and went through lovers like a rake. The life and the work cannot be disentangled 

Fresh starts: how to thrive when you leave academia

The Year of the Starter Home

Chinese nuclear fusion reactor pushes plasma past crucial limit: what happens next

The academic community failed Wikipedia for 25 years — now it might fail us

Open Thread

Our Holiday Reading List

The Education of Kevin McCallister

I’m walking here! A new model maps foot traffic in New York City