2026-10-02 -- control

#1 · news-in-context Sep 3, 2025

15 states offer school voucher programs, serving nearly 350,000 students

Voucher programs direct public K–12 funding to families in the form of tuition grants for private schools and are typically targeted to low-income or special-needs students.

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#2 · explainers Sep 2, 2025

School choice allows families to use public funds for private education

Some private school advocates support school choice, a broad policy that provides families with public money (sometimes called “vouchers”) to spend on private education, including religiously affiliated schools.

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#3 · longform Sep 23, 2024

The journalist who let AI speak with his voice

Journalist Evan Ratliff became the object of his own story: He opted to clone his voice, feed it into an AI chatbot, and have it do the talking. What could seem like a fun experiment ended up revealing just how far the capacity of artificial intelligence can go in imitating our identities. Hear the ins and outs of how Ratliff achieved this in this fun and thought-provoking episode.

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#4 · explainers Jun 30, 2026

Google invented the foundation of the AI movement—but ChatGPT was a shock

For years, Google was the cutting-edge of the AI world, including the development of the Transformer—the basis of contemporary AI chatbots. But since OpenAI debuted ChatGPT in 2022, the company was had to play catch-up. This is a four-hour deep dive into Google's AI history.

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#5 · curiosity Jul 30, 2025

Google chose Santa Barbara to host its Quantum AI computing project

The project seeks to reduce errors within its quantum computer and integrate 1 million physical qubits (or quantum bits) into the room-sized computer. This powerful device will attempt to solve complex problems in medicine, computing, and more.

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#6 · curiosity Oct 1, 2026

Google fired proton beams at its AI chips to see whether they could survive five years of cosmic radiation in orbiting data centers

High-energy particles from the sun and cosmic phenomena can alter computer code by changing ones into zeroes or vice versa within binary code.

Continuous exposure to the ionizing radiation of cosmic rays can cause circuit components to gradually degrade, shortening the lifespan of electronics.
Researchers bombard microchips with radiation while they are managing workloads to assess error rates and test potential solutions.

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#7 · news-in-context Mar 9, 2026

See worldwide hearing loss by age group and country

This 2023 data from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation shows the estimated number of people with complete hearing loss in different age groups per 100,000 people in the population. Individuals aged 70 or older make up the largest group with this type of hearing deficit.

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#8 · explainers Jun 30, 2026

School choice vouchers have had mixed results

This podcast breaks down the arguments for and against vouchers and untangles what data suggests about them. While some states showed vouchers improving student learning, studies in Louisiana and Indiana showed that students who left public schools for private schools performed worse.

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#9 · experiences May 6, 2026

Create flute, saxophone, trumpet, or violin reproductions of any 15-second piece of audio using machine learning.

Google's "Tone Transfer" tool uses machine learning models that identify patterns in data and Differentiable Digital Signal Processing to map various audio parameters to instrument acoustics and generate instrumental recreations of input audio.

Researchers behind "Tone Transfer" hope the technology will enable musical creation through creative sound combinations.

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#10 · explainers May 20, 2025

In 2024, China announced plans to establish an international lunar research station

The strategy, which runs until 2050, focuses on advancing space science, fostering technological innovation, and exploring habitable planets and extraterrestrial life, beginning with landing astronauts on the moon before 2030.

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#11 · curiosity Feb 19, 2026

A lunar 'satellite catapult' revives a 50-year-old idea for launching rockets

Elon Musk has proposed building a mass driver on the moon to fling satellites into space, exploiting low gravity to cut fuel and costs. The concept dates to 1970s space-settlement studies, highlighting how older industry ideas are resurfacing amid today's AI and space-infrastructure race.

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#12 · curiosity Apr 18, 2023

Who’s in space right now?

Hundreds of people (and a few animals) have been to space since the first creatures flew past the Kármán line in 1947. There are a handful of astronauts aboard the International Space Station at any time, while others may be cresting space in...

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#13 · curiosity Mar 17, 2026

A Tennessee teacher was put on trial in 1925 for teaching evolution in a public school

John Scopes was found guilty and fined $100, but the conviction was later overturned on a technicality. Tennessee's anti-evolution law stayed on the books until 1967, when it was finally repealed.

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#14 · explainers Mar 12, 2026

The federal government offers billions in student aid each year in the form of scholarships, grants, loans, and more

The very first—and necessary—step is to fill out a federal application to get your information into the system. Known as the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA, this key form must be completed by Oct. 1 for the following academic year.

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#15 · longform Sep 30, 2026

Elizabeth Holmes has publicly spoken about the 'hell and torture' of prison since she began serving time.

Following a nearly four-month trial in 2022, the Theranos founder was found guilty of fraud and sentenced to roughly 11 years in prison.

However, Holmes maintains that she is innocent and wants to continue working on her blood-testing technology upon being released from prison.
The former CEO no longer speaks in the low baritone voice she adopted while running Theranos.
Holmes gave birth to her second child with partner Billy Evans three months before she reported to federal prison.

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#16 · explainers Apr 8, 2025

Roughly 1 in 5 cancers are caused by viruses

About 20% of cancers are caused by viruses, with seven specific oncoviruses causing between 10% and 15% of cancers worldwide. These include human papillomavirus and hepatitis B and C viruses, which can lead to diseases such as cervical and liver cancer. Understanding the mechanisms of these viruses is crucial for prevention and treatment strategies.

itk Roughly one in eight cancer cases globally is attributable to infections, including HPV, h own · sim 0.73 · keep 0.75 · score -1

#17 · curiosity Dec 19, 2025

SpaceX has launched thousands of its Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit

Every launched batch of satellites contains roughly 60 of the desk-sized gadgets. The batch is released at random into an initial orbit, and it takes time for them to naturally spread out enough before operators begin unfolding their antennae.

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#18 · curiosity Aug 6, 2026

SpaceX's Starlink is a satellite internet service that provides broadband internet by connecting users to satellites in low Earth orbit, which then communicate with ground stations connected to the internet.

Starlink involves ground terminals wirelessly connected to one of thousands of passing satellites orbiting approximately 550 kilometers (342 miles) above Earth's surface, with each satellite linked to nearby satellites via laser to ensure uninterrupted service as terminals transition between satellite connections.

As of 2026, Starlink is available across most of the Americas and Europe, Australia, Antarctica, and parts of Africa and Asia, with regulatory approval pending in several more nations, including Saudi Arabia, India, Pakistan, Thailand, Turkey, and Vietnam.
Testing shows that latency from data transmission to and from Starlink satellites is about 30 milliseconds, which is sufficiently low to support video calling and some online gaming.

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#19 · explainers Jun 18, 2025

The IRS answers basic questions about 529 savings plans

The plans can be used to pay for any qualifying education expenses from kindergarten to college, including tuition, fees, room and board, and even computers. Anyone can set up as many 529 plans as they want for relatives, friends, or themselves.

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#20 · explainers Aug 12, 2026

Computer systems create artificial voices by stitching together phonemes—individual sounds that make up speech, such as 't,' 'long a,' and 'k' to say 'take.'

Before generative systems, computer software combined prerecorded phonemes to construct words that matched audio maps called spectrograms, much like putting puzzle pieces together to match a source picture.

With machine learning, AI programs are given many voice samples for speech analysis and phoneme pattern identification to produce more natural-sounding speech.
While artificial voice technology improves accessibility by enabling various text-to-speech software, including screen readers and navigation systems, it has also been used to spread misinformation and disinformation via audio deepfakes, in which a synthetic voice impersonates a real person for malicious purposes.

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#21 · explainers Dec 12, 2024

Governments are arguably very dependent on consulting firms like McKinsey and Deloitte

This podcast episode discusses the consultancy industry’s rise and how these firms make billions of dollars, even amid significant scandals.

itk Accenture shares climb 15.8% after the firm's fiscal fourth-quarter report highlighted $18 own · sim 0.43 · keep 0.38 · score -6

#22 · curiosity Apr 16, 2026

ChatGPT was conceived over dinner at a Silicon Valley hotel.

A guest list of tech leaders, including Elon Musk, Peter Thiel, and LinkedIn cofounder Reid Hoffman, met to discuss how to counter Google's efforts to create human-level cognition systems.

The group initially committed a reported $1B to launch the effort.

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#23 · curiosity Aug 2, 2022

Google’s quantum computer completes a 10,000-year task in about 3 minutes

Google used its 53-qubit processor on an extremely difficult problem for traditional computers to simulate to showcase quantum supremacy. IBM later challenged Google’s claim by arguing that its Summit supercomputer could solve the same problem in just 2.5 days using a more efficient method.

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#24 · explainers Jun 18, 2025

The scope of 529 plans has expanded, but 529s still have some drawbacks

The tax-advantaged accounts can be used to pay for K-12 education, apprenticeship programs, and student loans, in addition to their original purpose: paying for college. But 529s have downsides, such as fees and penalties for non-qualified uses.

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#25 · explainers Oct 1, 2026

See how a novel neurological procedure that employs artificial intelligence restored a woman's speech almost 20 years after a stroke.

Scientists implanted electrodes in a woman's brain that convert her thoughts into speech via a digital avatar, allowing her to express herself verbally.

The digital avatar, created via AI, has a synthesized version of the patient's voice, generated by an algorithm for speech synthesis.
The algorithm was trained on a voice recording of the patient speaking at her wedding.
The avatar simulates and animates facial muscle movements.
The breakthrough work at the time of its announcement (in 2023) still aimed to progress to a wireless version that wouldn't require users to be physically connected to the brain-computer interface.

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#26 · explainers Feb 21, 2026

The Supreme Court limited federal judges' power to issue nationwide injunctions in 2025

In a 2025 decision arising from litigation over a presidential order on birthright citizenship, the Supreme Court held that individual federal judges may not nationwide block executive policies—curbing the use of sweeping injunctions and reshaping how constitutional challenges proceed through the courts.

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#27 · curiosity Oct 1, 2026

China developed an artificial closed ecosystem in preparation for a future lunar base

Yuegong-1, also known as Moon Palace 1, was a Beijing facility where volunteers simulated life on a colony and conducted experiments on bioregenerative life support systems to assess their viability in an off-Earth environment. The longest experiment at the 0.04-acre facility lasted 370 days.

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#28 · curiosity May 7, 2026

The funding behind Google's origin, including an NSF digital libraries grant

Over $4.5M in funding from the National Science Foundation was allocated to the Stanford Integrated Digital Library Project, which aimed to develop the infrastructure for an accessible universal library of digital information sources. Google cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page were working on this project when developing the PageRank search algorithm.

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#29 · explainers Oct 1, 2026

Explore a guide to 529 college savings plans

Investors put after-tax dollars into these education-earmarked accounts, and like a 401(k) or IRA, they invest them into stocks, bonds, or funds. When it comes time to withdraw, investors do not pay any taxes on distributions. However, the money must be used for approved expenses like college tuition, textbooks, and trade schools.

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#30 · explainers Mar 31, 2026

Genetic blood test offers an estimated clock on when Alzheimer's symptoms may appear

The 2026 research finding from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis—if validated in broader populations—suggests that an already available blood test could estimate when Alzheimer's symptoms may begin within a margin of several years. The test detects a protein called p-tau217 found in blood plasma and the researchers incorporated the findings from that blood test into a statistical model to come up with the symptom timeline predictions.

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#31 · explainers Apr 10, 2026

The space race of the 21st century is focused on a permanent lunar outpost

After decades of dormancy, NASA and SpaceX hope the Artemis program will provide opportunities for lunar resource extraction. Countries like India, China, and the UAE have also shown interest in developing future lunar economies.

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#32 · curiosity Jan 9, 2025

Scientists have proposed using lasers to push space trash into Earth's atmosphere

Such projects would allow most debris to burn up and no longer pose a risk to active satellites, telescopes, and astronauts on space stations. Enacting these plans would require substantial investments from private and governmental space agencies and overcoming international laws that prevent the removal of another country's space equipment.

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#33 · curiosity May 29, 2026

Google's early focus on simplicity and user experience drove its future successes

Google Search revolutionized information retrieval in 1998, but additional web-based products, including Gmail, Maps, Docs, and YouTube reinforced the company's core ad business while allowing it to aggregate the world's information. Forming Alphabet protected this business from riskier moonshot projects.

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#34 · explainers May 4, 2026

Watch a breakdown of tax breaks most Americans don't know about

Programs like healthcare savings accounts or flexible spending accounts are tax-free accounts that are designed to help lower healthcare costs. However, many Americans don't use them and don't understand how they work.

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#35 · explainers Apr 3, 2024

Create professional-quality spoken audio from text

Generative AI now makes it possible to create everything from computer-generated written content to beautiful imagery and hyper-realistic videos in seconds from a user’s simple text prompt. Add to that list: High-quality spoken audio, which the AI software company ElevenLabs specializes in. Its natural-sounding speech synthesis and text-to-speech tech can produce human-like speech that mimics a variety of different tones, styles, and accents.

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#36 · explainers Oct 1, 2026

Google's CEO has warned that today's AI boom shows 'elements of irrationality'

An interview with Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai warns that the trillion-dollar surge in AI valuations may contain clear signs of irrationality, echoing past tech bubbles. He says no firm—including Google—would be immune if the boom cools or bursts.

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#37 · curiosity Jan 29, 2026

India's space program began in a church at Earth's magnetic equator

As the US pushed to land a man on the moon, NASA looked for global partners to help map the conditions of the sky above Earth for launches. After Pakistan's initial attempt was sidelined, India pushed to be that partner. This long read details key episodes of frugality and ingenuity in India's space race, including its beginnings at St. Mary Magdalene Church in Thumba.

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#38 · curiosity May 29, 2026

How SpaceX Made Space Affordable

SpaceX has cut launch costs by over 95%—from $54,000 per kilogram to around $2,000—reshaping how we access space.

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#39 · explainers Apr 8, 2026

Connecticut recently became the first state to create and launch a baby bond program, a government-funded savings or investment account that is seeded when a child is born.

The program invests $3.2K for a baby born after July 2023, who is covered by the state's Medicaid program.

When the child turns 18, they can use the funds for college, retirement, to buy a home, or invest in a business.
Supporters say baby bonds could help reduce wealth inequality, while critics argue that existing programs like the Child Tax Credit offer similar benefits.

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#40 · explainers Jul 3, 2024

Chronological versus biological age

Science has come to understand different types of aging. What we call age is simply the number of years since birth, or chronological age. At the cellular level, biological aging happens at different rates for different people, and explains why some seem to age more quickly (or slowly).

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#41 · explainers Oct 2, 2026

The seven viruses that cause human cancers

Certain viruses have been linked to the development of human cancers. These viruses account for up to 20% of cancers worldwide, causing cancer by interacting with host proteins, proliferating within weak immune systems, and commandeering susceptible human cells. Unlike other viruses, human tumor viruses don't kill host cells, allowing them to establish persistent infections. The seven viruses include the Epstein-Barr Virus, the Human Papillomaviruses, and more.

itk Roughly one in eight cancer cases globally is attributable to infections, including HPV, h own · sim 0.65 · keep 0.50 · score -2

#42 · curiosity Mar 4, 2026

Construction of orbital hyperscale data centers is largely impractical because, although space is cold, its vacuum lacks the matter needed to efficiently remove thermal energy.

Earth-based data centers are kept cool by circulating fluids, such as air or water, that continuously remove thermal energy from hot computing equipment and release it into the surrounding environment.

In space, a floating data center without circulating fluid can only lose thermal energy by radiating, which is significantly less efficient and would require massive radiation panels.
Without surrounding fluids, hyperscale data centers would require radiator panels thousands of times larger than those on the International Space Station to radiate enough energy to maintain operating temperatures.
Orbital hyperscale data centers would require substantial solar power, introduce greater latency by replacing fiber-optic cables with radio communication, and be susceptible to data corruption and hardware damage from cosmic rays.

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#43 · curiosity Oct 1, 2026

Explore a timeline of the International Space Station National Lab

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan called for establishing a human presence in space, which began with NASA astronaut Bill Shepherd and Russian cosmonauts Yuri Gidzenko and Sergei Krikalev on November 2, 2000. Humans have continuously occupied the ISS every day since.

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#44 · explainers Feb 17, 2026

Federal government supports—but doesn't run—K-12 schools

The Department of Education contributes about 8% of K-12 funding and administers targeted grants, civil‑rights enforcement, research, and data collection. Crucially, it is legally prohibited from directing curriculum, personnel decisions, or instructional content, leaving that control to states and districts.

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#45 · explainers Nov 11, 2025

Doctors use three key physical markers to determine biological aging

The length of the ends of chromosomes (known as "telomeres"), the gradual change in collections of DNA molecules called "methyl groups", and the secretion of inflammatory proteins are all used as indicators of biological age.

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#46 · explainers Sep 21, 2026

Some argue that America has become too dependent on consulting.

Many major companies in America—not to mention the federal government—spend a significant amount of money each month paying to contract top consulting firms.

These consulting firms are valuable to those who contract them in part because they help clients avoid taking the blame for any changes the consulting firm decides to make within the organization.
The global consulting industry’s size was valued at roughly $710B as of 2023.

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#47 · curiosity May 1, 2026

The Russian Federal Space Agency enabled the first space tourism journey

NASA refused to take Dennis Tito, who had no formal training as an astronaut, up to the International Space Station. Instead, the American engineer and entrepreneur traveled aboard the Soyuz TM-32 mission and described the initial experience of microgravity after engine shut-off as the "most spectacular" part of the flight.

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#48 · curiosity May 2, 2026

See how SpaceX has impacted costs throughout spaceflight history.

The cost of one SpaceX launch today is estimated to be 97% less than the price of a Russian Soyuz rocket in the 1960s, a price reduction providing access to many smaller manufacturers and transforming the industry.

Before Elon Musk started SpaceX, he attempted to purchase ballistic missiles in Europe and Russia in hopes of launching a rocket carrying a plant or animal to Mars to spark global interest in colonizing the planet, but found them too expensive.
Musk cut costs with SpaceX in part by implementing a vertically integrated supply chain—where materials are manufactured in-house—and by urging his team to test and simplify every manufacturing rule and process.
The reusability of the company's two-stage Falcon 9 rocket has also revolutionized spaceflight economics.

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#49 · explainers Sep 2, 2025

Private K-12 schools rely on tuition; colleges rely on funding for research

Tuition, endowments, donors, and grants often fund private schools, allowing them to eschew national curriculum standards. Private colleges and universities also charge tuition, but often rely on federal funding for research.

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#50 · explainers Feb 3, 2026

Studies show AI tools can result in passive learning with less retention

Although ChatGPT, Google's AI overviews, and other similar software can save time, a study of more than 10,000 adults showed that reliance on them yielded work products that were more generic and included fewer facts than those produced solely by Google search. Weaker brain connectivity has also been observed when users write using AI.

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#51 · explainers Jan 20, 2026

The Supreme Court has greatly expanded executive power in recent years

In Trump v. United States, the court ruled that a former president enjoys absolute immunity for "official acts" in his constitutional core powers. In Trump v. CASA, Inc., the court limited federal courts' ability to block executive enforcement through nationwide injunctions—decisions that shifted power toward the executive branch.

itk Supreme Court agrees to consider whether Trump administration can detain noncitizens indef own · sim 0.48 · keep 0.17 · score -4

#52 · curiosity Dec 24, 2025

Orbital spaceflight requires reaching 23 times the speed of sound

After the spacecraft accelerates up to at least 17,500 miles per hour, space tourists can travel in elliptical orbits hundreds of miles above Earth for days or weeks at a time. Suborbital flights instead max out at about 2,200 miles per hour and travel only 50 to 70 miles above Earth's surface for a few minutes.

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#53 · curiosity Apr 23, 2026

Overcoming industry skeptics, SpaceX provides low-cost, high-publicity spaceflights

From recovering and reusing rocket components to launching a mannequin and Tesla into orbit to the tune of David Bowie's "Starman," Elon Musk drove public interest and government contracts to his company as he transformed space launches into spectacles.

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#54 · explainers Jun 30, 2026

Super-agers: seniors 80 and above with the memory ability of people in their 50s

Studies show the number one indicator of whether someone is a "super-ager" is not diet or genetics, but the extent of their social relationships. Moreover, scans reveal noticeable physical differences in certain parts of the brain in patients with extensive social networks.

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#55 · explainers Apr 10, 2026

Brain training game creates long-lasting changes in the brain that may help protect against dementia.

Findings published in 2026 that tracked more than 2,000 older adults, examining dementia onset and completion of cognitive speed training activities, provide some of the strongest evidence yet that cognitive training games can help protect against dementia.

Participants who underwent speed training and received booster sessions had a 25% reduction in the risk of dementia diagnosis compared with the control group.

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#56 · explainers Apr 13, 2026

Tech giants like SpaceX and Meta are increasingly behaving like sovereign powers

Companies now make unilateral decisions once reserved for nation-states, such as controlling satellite internet access in active war zones and influencing global information flows. Lawmakers and the international order are struggling to keep up with technological developments, let alone regulate them.

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#57 · curiosity May 2, 2026

Starship is the space travel ship that rides atop the world's largest rocket

SpaceX hopes to use the vehicle for both interplanetary travel and shorter flights around Earth. At 30 feet wide, it allows for more storage and headspace for inhabitants than previous NASA spacecraft.

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#58 · curiosity May 1, 2026

In 2001, a $20M ticket officially kicked off space tourism

On that day, American businessman Dennis Tito became the first paying passenger to visit space, spending a week aboard the International Space Station. Since then, space participants have been members of suborbital flights, which do not require intensive training to prepare for.

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#59 · explainers Feb 11, 2026

How reading and writing can lower dementia risk by almost 40%

Research published in 2026 that tracked almost 2,000 older adults for an average of nearly eight years suggests that lifelong exposure to intellectual stimulation, such as learning a language, reading, and writing, can lower dementia risk by as much as 40%.

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#60 · explainers Jun 16, 2026

Aging is a complex biological process affecting our cells, tissues, and organs.

With each passing decade, researchers uncover additional causes and effects of this seemingly unstoppable process.

This visually stimulating video dives into our current understanding of aging, complete with the biological hallmarks researchers use to study aging at the cellular level (biological age).

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Death Penalty Pause, Speech Clock, and the Best of September