For years, Olga Khazan, a Virginia-based staff writer at The Atlantic, knew she had a big problem: she hated much of her own personality. “I was constantly worried about everything,” she said. “Just never living in the moment. And I didn’t really like doing anything fun with other people. Just wasn’t my thing.” How might … Read more
Simon Element We may receive an affiliate commission from anything you buy from this article. Can you teach an old dog new tricks? Atlantic staff writer Olga Khazan set out to change aspects of her personality she didn’t like by forcing herself outside of her comfort zone, and documented the progress she made in her … Read more
Sydney — Humans beat generative AI models made by Google and OpenAI at a top international mathematics competition, but the programs reached gold-level scores for the first time, and the rate at which they are improving may be cause for some human introspection. Neither of the AI models scored full marks — unlike five young … Read more
No question is too small when Kayla Chege, a high school student in Kansas, is using artificial intelligence. The 15-year-old asks ChatGPT for guidance on back-to-school shopping, makeup colors, low-calorie choices at Smoothie King, plus ideas for her Sweet 16 and her younger sister’s birthday party. The sophomore honors student makes a point not to … Read more
An 8.8-magnitude earthquake, one of the strongest ever recorded, struck Russia’s Far East early Wednesday, prompting tsunami warnings in coastal towns in multiple countries. The earthquake was “on what we call the Pacific Ring of Fire. This is a region around the entire Pacific Rim renowned for significant earthquakes,” Simon Boxall, lecturer in oceanography at … Read more
SpaceX Falcon 9 is scheduled for liftoff Thursday, carrying a crew to the International Space Station. NASA astronaut Zena Cardman is the commander of the mission. She was supposed to launch last year, but issues with Boeing’s Starliner changed those plans. Now set to blast off into space, Cardman has special notes from her father, … Read more
Meet the potato’s unexpected ancestor: the tomato. That’s right, a fruit. Potatoes and tomatoes don’t look alike, smell alike or taste alike, but in a study published Thursday in the journal Cell, scientists said that the potato evolved from a tomato ancestor around 9 million years ago. “We’ve finally solved the mystery of where potatoes … Read more
A lightning flash that extended 515 miles from eastern Texas to near Kansas City, Missouri, in 2017 was recognized Thursday as a new world record. The flash — dubbed a “megaflash,” or a single continuous long horizontal flash that can initiate up to hundreds of cloud-to-ground strikes — happened on Oct. 22, 2017, according to … Read more