On Friday evening, the far-right United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit attempted to cut off access to the abortion drug mifepristone. If you’re experiencing déjà vu, you should be, because in 2023, the far-right United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit also attempted to cut off access to the abortion […]

Cole Tomas Allen, the suspect in the attempted White House Correspondents’ Dinner shooting, is unusual among attempted assassins — in his normalcy.  His political grievances, laid out in a manifesto and social media posts, are not dissimilar from those of an ordinary Democrat. He believed that President Donald Trump was a lawless, corrupt leader who […]

Being a Supreme Court justice is a pretty sweet gig. The Court typically hears about 60 cases a year, plus a smattering of “shadow docket” cases that receive expedited review. Like schoolchildren, the justices take their summers off — typically wrapping up their pending cases in June and then skipping town in early July. And […]

Over the last few decades, wildfires, farmers, and cattle ranchers have razed millions of acres of tropical forests across the planet. Much of that deforestation has occurred in three countries: Brazil, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Indonesia. But in the last few years, another, smaller nation has risen in the ranks of nations with […]

Sentience is hot these days. Partly because of the development of impressive new AI systems, everyone seems to be asking: How do we know if something is sentient?  While consciousness means simply having a subjective point of view on the world — a feeling of what it’s like to be you — sentience is the […]