The Hypothesis
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How a science fiction obsession led me to psychological war
April 9, 2024
I've spent the past three years researching and writing a book about the history of psychological warfare in the United States. It’s called Stories Are...
Commodify your intelligence
November 7, 2023
There are many problems with the idea of artificial intelligence, but one of the worst is that it assumes “intelligence” can be measured objectively. And...
I prefer not to admire problems
August 11, 2023
I'm back from a long hiatus on this newsletter, most of which was spent touring for my novel The Terraformers, and finishing up my forthcoming nonfiction...
Moose romance, sentient trains, and you
January 24, 2023
My novel The Terraformers comes out on January 31, just a week from now! I can't wait to show it to you. Pre-orders matter a lot -- they are used by...
The singularity is officially over
November 18, 2022
Last week I published a column in New Scientist about how the singularity is no longer a helpful model for thinking about the future. Here’s an excerpt from...
Sad amoebas are studying the early universe
October 6, 2022
I can never resist a weird scenario, especially when it’s scientifically plausible. In my short story “A Hole in the Light,” published a few days ago in the...
Twitter is becoming a lost city
August 7, 2022
Hey friends. It’s been a while since I’ve sent out a newsletter, and it’s nice to be back! I’ve been hard at work on finishing up my novel The Terraformers...
Mercenaries and subversives in the gender war
September 20, 2021
It's been a while since I sent out a newsletter, but I'm back to bring you irregular updates on current scientific and historical discoveries, as well as my...
Here's why Substack's scam worked so well
March 17, 2021
I think of myself as having decent critical faculties, but somehow I got suckered again by a bog-standard publishing venture masquerading as a useful...
The weirdness of the virtual book tour
March 1, 2021
Of the many strange experiences I’ve had during the pandemic, perhaps the strangest was my socially distanced book tour in February. Four Lost Cities was one...
The internet as we know it is doomed
February 22, 2021
There’s an odd piece of data about the late Neolithic in the Mediterranean region. Roughly 7500 years ago, during the last gasp of the stone age before we...
The moose in the swimming pool, and other urban futures
February 15, 2021
Whenever I think about the future of urban life, there’s a YouTube video that pops into my mind. In it, a magnificent, very calm moose stands in a backyard...
Last night a podcast saved my life
February 6, 2021
The Berliner Gramophone Company record matrix room, where master recordings were stored, Montréal, 1910 My pandemic days are measured out in walks, and my...
Nine things to know before you visit an archaeological dig
January 30, 2021
I’ve been writing about archaeology for several years, and that often means traveling to the places where researchers are excavating. Every site has...
Let's put that 45,000 year-old pig into context
January 23, 2021
This picture of a warty pig is giving me life. It’s from a cave in Sulawesi, Indonesia, where people drew it roughly 45,000 years ago, along with several...
What lies beneath the world's oldest city
January 15, 2021
I first became obsessed with Çatalhöyük about ten years ago, when I first read about the 9,000 year-old settlement in central Turkey that was among the...
What ancient Roman hospitality workers can teach us about this moment in history
January 9, 2021
The remains of a taberna, a type of bar or restaurant, which are found all over Pompeii. They would have been a cornerstone of the local economy. When I...
This chilling challenge is to find a way out
December 25, 2020
I grew up a few miles away from Disneyland, so naturally I visited the park a lot. My dad, who’d grown up in L.A., knew the secret to a perfect Disneyland...
Shells, furs, and propaganda
December 19, 2020
I’m taking a MOOC from the University of Alberta called Indigenous Canada, and it’s the perfect history class for anyone who is curious about the way...
Five possible cures for space madness
December 11, 2020
Many of us have reached the space madness phase of the quarantimes, but here are five things that might keep you sane for another week. Brain implants for...
The last good pharmacist in America
December 4, 2020
The first wave of Covid-19 vaccines are just weeks away. But before you obliterate your memories of 2020, we need to prepare for the next pandemic with a...
History for people who are sick of queens and moguls
November 27, 2020
Fans are going nuts over The Crown, but I suggest you watch another TV series that brashly exposed a different side of British history: Harlots. It’s the...
They turned my gender into a dictionary word
November 20, 2020
“They” is the pronoun I waited my entire life for. I’ve been nonbinary for fifty years, which is a complete pain in the ass if you have no word for it. When...
She keeps taking baths on my balcony and singing
November 13, 2020
I continue to invent new ways to communicate with the birds who hang out in my backyard. This week, I attempt to discuss anthropomorphization with a black...
Screw the Mars hype. Here's why we should move to Venus.
November 6, 2020
Elon Musk wants to park a Tesla on Mars. Let’s go to Venus instead, and build a new way of life. It’s possible that life already evolved on Venus, and you...
White people have ruined Halloween again
October 30, 2020
It’s spooky season in the United States. We’re putting on costumes, eating a ton of candy, and voting for the least scary devils on the ballot. Plus, we’re...
2,000 year-old vitrified human brain yields secrets of the ancient world
October 23, 2020
Hey! It’s the first issue of my newsletter! Thanks for being here! Today we’re going to talk about a guy whose head exploded almost 2,000 years ago — and the...
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