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More People, in More Cities, Living Longer
In 2050 there will be about 9 billion people in the world. The vast majority of them will live in urban areas, and will have a significantly higher average age than people today. -
War Films Should Make Us Duck Real Bullets
The author and former vet wishes war movies could give audiences a taste of reality, and that warmongering politicians would risk their own lives on the front lines. -
Is Life Suicidal?
Peter Ward’s “Medea Hypothesis” suggests that all multicellular life is doomed to kill itself off in the long run. Intelligence, he says, may be the only loophole. -
Money for Nothing
There isn't enough funding for research on aging.
Topics
Life & Death
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IdeaFeed
Have Scientists Found HIV's Achilles' Heel?
1 day ago
What's the Latest Development? A team of Japanese scientists have discovered a way to circumvent one of HIV's most potent defense mechanisms. The discovery involves a family of chemical compounds known as pradimicin A1 which stick strongly to the exterior coating of the HIV virus, called mannose ... Read More
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IdeaFeed
Heart Disease Tied to Y Chromosome
1 day ago
What's the Latest Development? In a survey of 3,000 British men, scientists have found an important link between a particular version of the Y sex chromosome and heart disease, meaning the predisposition to illness is passed down from father to son. Researchers found that 90 percent of the men ... Read More
Latest Ideas
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Your Storytelling Brain
29 days ago
The left hemisphere of the brain is always trying to make sense of past thoughts and experiences. Cognitive Neuroscientist Michael Gazzaniga ponders our need to hear and tell coherent stories about ourselves. Read More
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How to Regrow a Limb
about 1 month ago
What's the Big Idea? The loss of a human limb is a tragedy. We know that once they’re gone, mammalian arms and legs can't ever be restored. But if you cut off a salamander's leg - or tail - it will reappear in just a few weeks. The enigma of amphibian organ regeneration has puzzled scientists since ... Read More
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Is Necrophilia Wrong?
about 1 month ago
Cemeteries are not for the dead, but for the living. The dead will not thank us for the coffins made to their specifications, nor compliment us on the choice of flowers or gravestones. They cannot do so, since they are, by definition, dead: they feel nothing, they cannot communicate, they are no ... Read More
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Pinsky: "Americans Are Not Just Gluttonous Dupes." What's Your Favorite Poem?
about 1 month ago
What's the Big Idea? As the United States Poet Laureate and Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, Robert Pinsky founded the Favorite Poem Project, a program dedicated to celebrating, documenting and encouraging poetry's role in Americans' lives. Pinsky asks Americans to submit videos ... Read More
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Call for Cold War Approach on Iran
2 months ago
What's the Latest Development? Pressure is growing for tougher action on Iran and some Israeli leaders are threatening attack to prevent it making atomic weapons. The US Congress wants to cripple Iran’s economy by punishing any country that does business with its central bank. But the Christian ... Read More
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The Man Who Used to Have HIV
3 months ago
There are so many advances going on right now in biotechnology that really have a wow factor," says Arrison. "Gene therapy to cure cancer and tissue engineering, growing brand new tracheas in the lab, also to cure cancer or to cure damage from infection. You see them once in the newspaper and you say, ah, that’s great - and then you forget about it." Read More
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The Age of Regenerative Medicine: How to Heal Faster
3 months ago
What's the Big Idea? In most species, the body of an organism loses its innate ability to heal over time (salamanders are a notable exception). While a kid can skin her knee and not even remember it two days later, an adult might feel the effects for weeks. But what do we really know about aging ... Read More
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Lab Mice Can Live Forever. Soon, So Will You.
3 months ago
Melton describes an experiment on parabiotic mice that may hold the key to eternal life for human beings. Read More
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Consider the Slime Mold: How Amoebas Form Social Networks
4 months ago
It turns out we’re not the only species that assembles ourselves into networks, says sociologist Nicholas Christakis. Consider the slime mold. Read More
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Humanity 2.0: The New Normal
5 months ago
What's the Latest Development? Sociologist Steve Fuller says we're headed for a new humanity which will no longer take as given the "normal human body". A good example would be cosmetic neurology, which is essentially plastic surgery for the brain. Where you go in every so often and you get a tune ... Read More
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