David Autor named head of the Department of Economics

David Thomson spent 60 years celebrating cinema. Now he thinks movies may have ruined us

James Webb Space Telescope Captures the Cigar Galaxy’s Brilliant Stellar Halo in Pristine Detail

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The Renaissance didn't begin in Florence. It began six thousand years ago in the Middle East. So argues a new book

Open Thread

Thursday Poem

Reflecting Pool Debacle Is a Shorthand for Trump's Failing Second Term

Guns, Property Rights, and the Second Amendment

What happens when environmental change outpaces life’s ability to adapt?

Democratic Socialism Remains an Elite Phenomenon

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Meet the leader of the Department of Biology’s all-important “kitchen”

Cities Show How Climate Action Makes Life Better

Open Thread

Why U.K. Socialism Could Soon Be America's Problem

The Secret Origins of 'Conspiracy Theory'

Dinosaurs, crocodilo-pythons, and other monsters populated the “lost world” novels that thrived between the 1880s and 1920s

Open Thread

America's Founders Blended Liberalism and Religion

The Reflecting Pool Water’s Fine