Laugh (or cry) at the absurdity of the news
Back in 1982, Jeremy Leven — psychiatrist, novelist, and part-time prophet of digital damnation — published Satan: His Psychotherapy and Cure by the Unfortunate Dr. Kassler, J.S.P.S. In it, Lucifer didn’t show up with horns, hooves, or a blues riff. He booted up. The Prince of Darkness manifested as a computer. Behold: the Original Algorithm. Forty years…
Over the past week the headlines have been coming in like biblical plagues, if the Bible had been written by CNN’s breaking news ticker: Spain battles record wildfires even as the end of a heat wave brings lower temperatures Fire Season Is Starting Earlier Thanks to Climate Change, New Study Finds Four years after war…
Yes, friends, while sea levels rise, wildfires torch continents, and earthquakes toss cities like a toddler with a Lego set, Wall Street has cooked up yet another high-yield thrill ride for investors who like their portfolios shaken, not stirred—with a tsunami chaser. According to a paywalled Financial Times article that somehow managed to keep a…
In the wreckage of World War II, amid bombed-out cities and broken economies, the United States emerged as the world’s banker. The old gold standard, too fragile and limited for the rising demands of postwar global trade, was shelved. The dollar, backed by the U.S. Treasury and a well-armed smile, stepped in to assume gold’s…
A political consultant leans in close to a tired-looking voter in a swing state Waffle House and says: “Okay, here’s our act. First, we spend thirty years promoting the slow abandonment of the working class, privatizing everything Reagan didn’t get to, and apologizing every time the Republicans call us ‘socialists.’ We say ‘compromise’ but mean…
By now, you’ve probably read that the United States—once famed for putting people on the Moon and inventing Pop-Tarts—is doing a rather enthusiastic job of canceling science. Not accidentally, like when you spill coffee on a lab notebook, but actively, gleefully, and with the sort of techbro gusto usually reserved for buying up a failing…
Congratulations, worker!You’ve survived another day of employment under late-stage capitalism’s hottest new management trend: Surveillance as a Service™. Because when your employer said they wanted “full transparency,” they meant you—not them.We now present a very real, completely not terrifying at all guide to the brave new tools reshaping your workday, your bathroom break, and possibly…
Bad news for anyone hoping climate change would just politely ruin other people’s countries: A new study, boldly titled Reconsidering the Macroeconomic Damage of Severe Warming has horrifyingly revealed that global warming’s economic devastation will be worse than everyone assumed. Previous climate models reassuringly predicted only mild to moderate global economic destruction, presumably comforting enough…
It used to be that when billionaires got bored, they bought a yacht, opened a museum, or ran for political office and (usually) lost spectacularly. Now they want to replace democracy with a Reddit thread. Elon Musk and his merry band of tech broligarchs are on a mission. No, not to make money. That’s for…
NASA: It’s Just a “Normal” Star Burp, Don’t Worry About It (Too Much) As if we didn’t have enough existential threats to worry about—climate change, AI overlords, Trump being back in office—now scientists are reminding us that the Sun, our benevolent life-giver, occasionally hurls cosmic temper tantrums that could fry our entire civilization like an…