Annalee Newitz

This Makes Us Happier Than Ever That Revolution Was Cancelled

Revolution was cancelled after two seasons of dystopian floundering. Still, we were tantalized by its moments of brilliant weirdness, promising a better show that never materialized. The season finale — filmed before cast and crew knew it was their final episode — made us glad the show is gone forever. There were so many great…

Read an Excerpt from Karen Healey’s Cryonics Thriller While We Run

Karen Healey’s dystopian novel When We Wake was fantastic, and now she’s published a companion novel, While We Run. The Australian government’s cryonics experiments on teens are getting creepier, and our heroes are struggling to survive. We’ve got an excerpt. https://gizmodo.com/a-creepy-near-future-book-about-government-experiments-5984129 Here’s the plot synopsis, from publisher Little, Brown: Abdi Taalib thought he was moving…

Why Godzilla Kicked Pacific Rim‘s Ass at the Box Office

Though Pacific Rim was arguably a more original and complex movie than Godzilla, it fizzled at the box office — while Godzilla’s formulaic fun earned so much money its first weekend that the studio has already ordered a sequel. What made one giant monster movie succeed where the other failed? Top image: Godzilla concept art…

Possibly the Worst Misuse of Neuroscience Ever

Of all the terrible ways that insights from neuroscience have been twisted for use in unrelated areas, this might be the worst. According to one self-help author, you can “fix your financial impulses in 45 days” by pumping up the dopamine in your brain. Science! In an article on Ready for Zero which is recycling…

Nope, Racial Groups Do Not “Genetically Inherit” Behavior

Former New York Times writer Nicholas Wade recent made a “scientific” argument for white supremacy, claiming that Europeans are genetically predisposed to “nonviolence, literacy, thrift and patience.” Now, Scientific American has published an essay showing why this is complete nonsense. University of British Columbia researcher Eric Johnson has been studying the intersection of politics and…

In My Real Children, Two Believable Versions of the 20th Century

Can the humble romantic choices of one woman alter the course of global politics? That’s the question at the heart of Jo Walton’s fascinating alternate history character study, My Real Children. The book is a masterpiece of personal and political worldbuilding. Like Walton’s last novel, the award-winning Among Others, My Real Children can easily be…

Holy Crap — These Engineers Are Fighting Bushfires with Explosives

Bushfires are one of the most deadly and destructive natural disasters in Australia — they can move at incredible speeds and wipe out a town in minutes. Now a team of engineers believe that they can fight these fires by blasting them with explosive force. In this video, you can see how it works. University…

This Short Film Delivers Intense Action, By Showing One Man’s Face

In the short film Mis-Drop, we watch a soldier’s first and final mission from the perspective of a head-mounted camera trained on his face, as he drops from a starship onto a colonial planet. All we see of the world around him are reflections in his helmet, and yet the suspense is incredible. Plus, the…

Man Attacks Car with Sword in Attempt to Slay the Dark Lord Morgoth

A Portland, Oregon man dressed in chain mail and calling himself a “high elf” claimed to be vanquishing the dark lord Morgoth when he stabbed a woman’s car with a sword. It probably won’t surprise you to learn that this J.R.R. Tolkien fan took LSD shortly before he decided to slay a sedan. What’s great…

This Is the Very Best Graduation Present Ever

In Chile, where students have been protesting the outrageous fees at for-profit universities for decades, college grads received a fantastic gift from local artist Papas Fritas. He broke into the Universidad del Mar, stole $500 million in student loan documents, and burned them. Then, he made a video explaining what he’d done. The Washington Post…

What Is the Most Terrible Plot Hole in the History of Science Fiction?

It’s not that I expect every science fiction story to be entirely rational, or to cleave perfectly to scientific reality. But when something happens out of nowhere, or (for example) a character is able to “blend in” and hide despite being world-famous — well, I’ve fallen into a plot hole and I can’t get out!…

A Drug That Could Destroy Political Movements

As neuroengineering becomes a reality, scientists are grappling with the ethics of changing people’s perceptions and feelings — especially when it comes to love. We’re on the cusp of “anti-love” drugs, that could help people recover from bad love affairs. What could go wrong? A lot. https://gizmodo.com/scientists-need-philosophers-to-solve-this-problem-1578428283 Over at New York Magazine, Maia Szalavitz has…

Thought crimes could prevent you from getting help to cover your medical bills. A woman who needed money to help pay for a dangerous skin condition found that her online fundraising site was demolished, and her money taken away, after she tweeted about pornography.

After 15 Years of Study, a New Theory of What Causes Fairy Circles

In Namibia, at the boundaries between grassland and desert, a strange phenomenon has puzzled people for centuries. Mysterious circles of barren land form in the middle of rich, thick grasses. Dubbed “fairy circles,” their formation has been attributed to everything from termites to poison gas. Now, a group of scientists has a new theory. Photo…

A Semi-Scientific Study of Farting in the Workplace

We know that everybody picks their noses, and now we know that everybody farts too — especially at work. In fact, if this poll is to be believed, people fart at work in lots of places you wouldn’t expect. The intrepid social scientists at Black Sheep conduced a fairly unscientific but nevertheless amusing poll of…

Can Your City Be Brought Back from the Dead?

The signs of a dying city are usually all too obvious. Houses and landmarks stand vacant, their walls crumbling into ruin; businesses are failing while residents’ incomes drop; and young people are fleeing in droves to seek jobs elsewhere. But there are also ways to revitalize a city, and reverse its decline. https://gizmodo.com/how-to-tell-if-your-city-is-dying-5915922 Photo by…

Scientists Say They Need Philosophers to Continue Their Research

At the University of Washington, researchers are pioneering a field of neuroscience called “neuroengineering,” which will one day involve doing things like regulating people’s moods with brain implants. In this fascinating video, they explain how their work spilled over into philosophy. The issues that these neuroengineers are tackling are going to become increasingly important in…

Beringia, the Lost Territory Where Americans Evolved

During the last ice age, an enormous stretch of fertile grassland connected Eurasia and the Americas. Known today as Beringia, this lost landscape was home to a small but important population of humans. Now, the discovery of one skull in an underwater cave tells an intriguing story about what happened to the Beringians when they…

Too Bad About the Boring Humans in this Awesome Godzilla Movie

With its badass giant monster fights and atomic horrors, Godzilla does justice to the venerable kaiju franchise that began in the mid-twentieth century. I mean that in a good way, but also in a not-so-good way too. For those who have never seen a Godzilla movie, this flick is the perfect place to start. You…

The Gray Whale Could Not Be Contained

Despite the museum’s best efforts, the gray whale kept jumping out of the paper on which it had been drawn. It wanted nothing more than to do battle with the shark painted beside it, and every day it strained against the bounds of credulity to do just that. Fiona Tang is a Canadian art student…