May 23 – 27, 2016 Remember Erik’s argument that cultures have their own keywords/cyphers? Guest Sean Treacy says that the keyword for Italian culture is “bella,” beauty, to such an extent that the beautiful also defines the good. Think about that a minute. Every year since he was a kid, Erik’s gone on The Ride […]
This is the latest in a series in which science’s metaphors offer the explanations of and guidance for the most cryptic of life’s problems. A few weeks ago I was at a conference about galaxy evolution. In the titles of many talks was the puzzling phrase, “secular evolution.” Secular? as opposed to religious? so secular […]
May 2 – 6, 2016 Guest Veronique Greenwood’s final post in her series about learning Chinese ends with triumph: she not only argues with a Chinese cab driver, she wins. Meanwhile the rest of the LWONers were inspired, got into the act, and voila! ecco! ¡mira! a whole Week of Learning Languages posts! Richard proposes […]
I’ll start this at the beginning. Recently Friend of LWON, Chris Arnade, posted a picture of himself — which itself was not unusual because Chris is, among other things, a photographer and posts pictures of himself right along with pictures of other people. But the picture was unusual. Chris is a very serious guy and always […]
This post originally ran on November 11, 2013. I rerun it now partly because I liked it and mostly because it’s a conversation with Hope Jahren and Ben Lillie. Hope has a new book out, written with her usual brilliant, nail-gun verve; Ben runs an on-going travelling theatrical anthology that’s like nothing else I’ve heard of. […]
April 4 – 8, 2016 “I must have caught this from that coughing bastard on the plane.” “Obviously, my husband’s little cold mutated into this nasty flu.” You feel like hell, you look around for something to blame. Christie reduxes a post about why you’re wrong. Xenotopias are those weird places that aren’t anything else, […]
Have you ever read a book where someone had pleurisy, or gout, or hysteria, and wondered…how come I never hear about anybody getting that anymore? Well, you’re in luck: It’s Outmoded Diseases Week at LWON, and we’re going to tell you. About some of them, anyway. We’re starting off with neurasthenia, a disease suffered by […]
Feb. 22 – 26, 2016 RadioLab doesn’t run climate change stories. Cassie asks her husband, who works for RadioLab, why not. Cassie’s husband explains about anti-stories. Cassie says, “what the hell.” Jennifer was out in the rain and cold, and was on the receiving end of kindness and empathy. She doesn’t care whether her kind […]