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Aerial view of a large pipeline construction site with machinery and vehicles cutting through green fields and hills under a partly cloudy sky.

Land loneliness

To survive, we are asked to forget that our lands and bodies are being violated, policed, ripped up, silenced, sacrificed

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Aerial view of a large pipeline construction site with machinery and vehicles cutting through green fields and hills under a partly cloudy sky.
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essay

Nature and landscape

Land loneliness

To survive, we are asked to forget that our lands and bodies are being violated, policed, ripped up, silenced, sacrificed

Kelsey Day

Popular this month

Painting of a person in a striped dress, resting their head on their hand, sitting next to a table with bottles, and a green background.
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Pleasure and pain

Me versus myself

I work against myself through procrastination, distraction and addiction. Why do I consistently sabotage my own life?

Eliane Glaser

Ancient Mayan ruins, including a prominent stone pyramid, surrounded by dense green jungle under a cloudy sky.
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Archaeology

Beyond kingdoms and empires

A revolution in archaeology is transforming our picture of past populations and the scope of human freedoms

David Wengrow

Black and white photo of people sitting at a café, taken through a window with reflections. A sign saying ‘BUFFET FROID’ is visible.
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Meaning and the good life

Philosophy was once alive

I was searching for meaning and purpose so I became an academic philosopher. Reader, you might guess what happened next

Pranay Sanklecha

A young girl in a pink dress stands on a step, holding the hand of an adult. Four adults are partially visible around her.
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essay

Biography and memoir

The adoption paradox

Even happy families cannot avoid the reality – my reality – that adoption is predicated on transacting the life of a child

Fiona Sampson

Newborn baby being held by a person wearing blue gloves, with another masked individual looking at the baby in a medical setting.
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Human reproduction

Baby talk

When babies are born, they cry in the accent of their mother tongue: how does language begin in the womb?

Darshana Narayanan

Residential street with terraced houses and power plant cooling towers in the background, one of which has a mural depicting a sun and mountains.
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video

Food and drink

Local tensions simmer amid a potato salad contest at the Czech-Polish border

14 minutes

Black-and-white photo of three Black men sitting at a table with microphones during a press conference. One of the men has a bandage on his head.
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essay

History of ideas

All that we are

The philosophy of personalism inspired Martin Luther King’s dream of a better world. We still need its hopeful ideas today

Bennett Gilbert

A person with a prosthetic leg stands in a room filled with plastic-wrapped prosthetics and limbs, showcasing orthopaedic supplies.
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video

Technology and the self

A filmmaker finds a tactile beauty in the creation of her prosthetic leg

11 minutes

Black and white snowy mountain scene with vehicles, overlaid by a large smear of vivid blue paint in the upper right area.
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video

Knowledge

An Indigenous myth and a geological survey elicit two ways of knowing one place

4 minutes

Still life with musical instruments, sheet music, books, and a small statue on a table draped with a richly patterned red and gold curtain.
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essay

Music

A novel kind of music

So-called ‘classical’ music was as revolutionary as the modern novel in its storytelling, harmony and depth

Joel Sandelson

A black-and-white photo of soldiers in uniform checking documents of several men standing outdoors, with laundry hanging in the background.
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Psychiatry and psychotherapy

Decolonising psychology

At times complicit in racism and oppression, psychology has also been a fertile ground for radical and liberatory thought

Rami Gabriel

Two beetles with translucent wings flying against a pink background.
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video

Biology

Beetles take flight at 6,000 frames per second in this perspective-shifting short

9 minutes

A close-up drawing of a face with detailed patterns and a hand touching the face, using earthy tones and texture on a brown background.
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Meaning and the good life

Beyond authenticity

In her final unfinished work, Hannah Arendt mounted an incisive critique of the idea that we are in search of our true selves

Samantha Rose Hill

Weather map showing temperature, cloud cover, and other meteorological data across Ireland, the UK, and part of mainland Europe. Isobars are also depicted.
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video

War and peace

A war meteorologist’s riveting account of how the Allies averted a D-Day disaster

6 minutes

Aerial view of an industrial site emitting smoke, surrounded by snow-covered buildings and landscape, under a clear blue sky with birds flying overhead.
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Politics and government

Governing for the planet

Nation-states are no longer fit for purpose to create a habitable future for humans and nature. Which political system is?

Jonathan S Blake & Nils Gilman

Close-up of two black optical devices with visible yellow light inside the lenses, set against a blurry background.
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video

Physics

What does it look like to hunt for dark matter? Scenes from one frontier in the search

7 minutes

Three women in traditional attire stand outdoors in a dry landscape. One person carries a child on their back while another holds a walking stick.
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essay

Anthropology

The Ju/’hoansi protocol

Hunter-gatherer societies are highly expert in group deliberation and decision-making which respects both difference and unity

Vivek V Venkataraman

Abstract art depicting DNA sequencing, with vertical bands of vibrant colours including yellow, red, blue and green, blending into each other with a glossy, reflective texture.
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Genetics

We are not machines

Welcome to the new post-genomic biology: a transformative era in need of fresh metaphors to understand how life works

Philip Ball

Old photograph of a girl sleeping in a chair, a ghostly boy kneeling before her, and a ghostly girl standing by a wall with a religious tapestry.
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video

Technology and the self

How the magic of photography brought Victorian England closer to the spirit realm

16 minutes

Silhouette of a man, a child, and a cow with large horns sitting on the ground at sunset.
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Progress and modernity

In praise of magical thinking

Once we all had knowledge of how to heal ourselves using plants and animals. The future would be sweeter for renewing it

Anna Badkhen

Close-up of a dog with blue and brown eyes, grey and white fur, looking directly at the camera.
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video

Neuroscience

Dog vision is a trendy topic, but what can we really know about how they see?

11 minutes

Aerial view of concentric snow tracks around a phone booth and street light. The artist walks in circles away from the center, dragging a suitcase behind her.
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video

Home

An artist endeavours to bring the Moon down to Earth in a ritual of yearning

5 minutes

Illustration of various human skulls and profiles with captions detailing different ethnic groups and regions, from a historical anthropological study.
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essay

History of ideas

Baffled by human diversity

Confused 17th-century Europeans argued that human groups were separately created, a precursor to racist thought today

Jacob Zellmer

Ancient Mayan ruins, including a prominent stone pyramid, surrounded by dense green jungle under a cloudy sky.
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essay

Archaeology

Beyond kingdoms and empires

A revolution in archaeology is transforming our picture of past populations and the scope of human freedoms

David Wengrow

Yellow warning sign with a black palm tree bent over in strong wind, signifying severe weather or wind conditions.
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video

Information and communication

An animation built from road signs is a whirlwind study of flash communication

2 minutes

Black and white photo of people sitting at a café, taken through a window with reflections. A sign saying ‘BUFFET FROID’ is visible.
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essay

Meaning and the good life

Philosophy was once alive

I was searching for meaning and purpose so I became an academic philosopher. Reader, you might guess what happened next

Pranay Sanklecha

Microscopic view of various microorganisms and particles in a blue liquid, showing a large oval-shaped microorganism amidst smaller particles.
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video

Biology

An elegy for a dying microbe explores what we really mean by ‘death’

9 minutes

Painting of a riverside scene with a large windmill, boats on the water, and three women standing on the bank next to a dock, under cloudy sky.
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History of technology

Learning to love monsters

Windmills were once just machines on the land but now seem delightfully bucolic. Could wind turbines win us over too?

Stephen Case