The dignity is in the doing
We tend to assume that meaning comes bundled with the job — that the title, the salary, or the prestige decides whether the work matters. A well-known…
News
Your photos survive a lost phone, but not a wrong tap
Drop your phone in a lake and your photos are fine. Hand that same phone to a grandchild who taps the wrong thing and they can vanish from every device…
A houseplant that glows without a light bulb
You can buy one. The Firefly Petunia, sold by an Idaho company called Light Bio, looks like an ordinary white petunia in daylight and gives off a soft…
New floating metal will not sink
Engineers at the University of Rochester’s Institute of Optics have made an aluminum tube that will not sink. Punch it full of holes, hold it underwater…
Winning the lottery: This guy didn’t need AI. Just math and a pile of money
Beating a lottery has been done, and it was done with a printing press. Stefan Mandel, a Romanian-born mathematician, won 14 jackpots by covering as many…
Orcas have fads. One is sinking boats.
In the summer of 1987, a female killer whale in Puget Sound began swimming with a dead salmon balanced on her head. Within weeks, orcas in two neighboring…
Can AI predict lottery numbers? Here’s what AI says
An infomercial ran a full half hour. Artificial intelligence can predict winning lottery numbers, it promised, and the service is yours for $197. There is…
When your phone no longer recognizes your fingerprint
Sooner or later the phone stops cooperating. You press the button the way you always have, and nothing happens. Press again. Nothing. It is easy to…
Bunco went straight
Walk into a senior community on game night and you may hear a bell ring, followed by someone shouting “Bunco!” It is one of the most sociable games going….
Why bunco works when other games don’t
Ask anyone who runs activities at a senior community why bunco keeps filling the room, and the answer is usually the same. Nobody has to be good at it….