Discovered: Video games can help dyslexic kids read; pregnancy increases foot size; around 100 million sharks are killed annually; mammalian sperm swims upstream.
After almost four years of guiding controversial decisions on fracking, the Keystone XL pipeline, and coal, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson is stepping down. Now, the hunt is on for a new director who won't be able to please anyone.
Jonathan Cohn on Starbucks and the fiscal cliff, Jacob Sullum on Adam Lanza and mental health, James Bessel on Chuck Hagel and Israel, Leonid Bershidsky on the new cold war, and William H. Janeway on American-made startups.
Discovered: children from poor families are getting less obese; a supervirus may lead the UK to cry over its milk; chicken farmers swap oregano for antibiotics; ultramassive black holes are unfathomably huge.
Shashank Joshi on talking to Iran, Molly Redden on a female Pentagon chief, Mark Bittman on obesity, Susan Crawford on Comcast's power, and Ruth Marcus on inflation inside the fiscal cliff.
Discovered: the new secret of mistletoe; it's actually the lack of thought that counts; why holiday shoppers are so rude; miracle at Christmas market.
With Pitchfork's year-end list arriving Friday, the taste-makers have all revealed their favorites. But when you nit-pick over these choices, you start to notice that they don't square with the original reviews.
Spin has informed its subscribers that they won't be getting a November/December issue. Or any more issues, for that matter. Like Paste, Blender, and Vibe before them, the music magazine is going digital-only.
Kimberley Strassel on corporate America's role in the fiscal cliff, Allen Frances on the cost of the DSM-5, Tim Padgett on Mexico after the end of the world, Terry Glavin on Richard Engel, and Paul Bogard on the danger of the night shift.
Discovered: Singapore is home to the least positive people on Earth; megapiranhas could swallow a turtle; the human hand has evolved to punch things; bats fly above virus vulnerability.
The most noxious, wrongheaded, misleading, silly, and downright awful pieces of punditry to somehow end up in print or online this year.
Jeffrey Rosen on Robert Bork's legacy, Ezra Klein on what would make a good fiscal cliff deal, Adam Gopnik on gun control, Andres Oppenheimer on Latin America and the Senate, and Timothy Garton Ash on Britain and the EU.
Discovered: Once Earth's ruined we should hightail it for the Tau Ceti system; how reindeers get red noses; one in two men will get cancer; what flying squirrels have in common with Top Gun.
Michael Bloomberg on gun control, Matt Miller on gun buyback programs, Lydia DePillis on Instagram, Chris McDermott on the Keystone XL pipeline, and Scott A. Snyder on South Korea's first female president.
Jen Doll rounded up the year's worst words today, setting one of our commenters off on a mini-rant about noun-ified verbs.
Discovered: Data shows Sandy's online outage toll; what MRIs can tell us about freestyle rap; spiders confuse predators with doppelgänger decoys; thoughtful orangutans.
California's biggest music festival is still months away, but Coachella speculation is already in full swing. With the Rolling Stones and Daft Punk among the rumored headliners, let's take a look at the likelihood of them topping the bill.
Jonathan Cohn on the emerging fiscal cliff deal, Frank Bruni on a shooting's aftermath, Jeffrey Toobin on the Second Amendment, Haytham Manna on Syria, and Josh Kraushaar on Tim Scott.
Discovered: We're one step closer to soap-fueled vehicles; a protein that may stave off aging; toxic tides could be claiming thousands of squid lives; pacemakers built from viruses.
The New York Times reported on Newtown residents' thwarted efforts to regulate guns earlier this year. One of our commenters wondered if she should take a firmer stance on gunfire in her neighborhood.
Researchers have found no connection between autism and violence, but that hasn't stopped the mainstream media from harping on Newtown shooter Adam Lanza's apparent bout with Asperger's syndrome. It hasn't stopped the emotional responses, either.
An official at Newtown High School has said that the Sandy Hook shooter appeared to feel no physical pain, suggesting he may have been congenitally insensitive to it. Research has shown that such conditions can sometimes lead to empathy problems.
Patrick Radden Keefe on gun control, Molly Redden on Michigan Republicans, Paul Krugman on the deficit, L. Gordon Crovitz on Internet freedom, and Hannah Beech on Japanese elections.
Discovered: Recent research findings about gun control, autism, mass violence, and PTSD to help put the Newtown shootings in context.
As the Newtown tragedy unfolded, Americans couldn't look away from one of the worst school shootings in history. Here's what we saw.
For some perspective about just how awful the events Sandy Hook Elementary were, here is a list of the deadliest school shootings in history.
Max Fisher on Chuck Hagel, Roger Cohen on oil, Simon Jenkins on North Korea, Jeffrey Goldberg on Australia, and Palav Babaria on Obamacare.
Move over Todd Akin. Step aside Richard Mourdock. Derek Johnson has something totally ignorant to say about rape—namely that women's bodies "will not permit that to happen" if they really don't want it.
In an interview late Thursday night after withdrawing from the running for Secretary of State — and in a new op-ed published overnight — Susan Rice insisted about the Benghazi conflict that ruined her future that "it's our obligation to try to explain it as best we can to the American people."
Damien Hirst—the insanely wealthy British artist-provocateur famous for encasing a dead shark in formaldehyde—has severed ties with the well-heeled Gagosian Gallery, which represented him for the last 17 years.
The Geminid meteor shower—which should be the year's most impressive, according to astronomers—peaks tonight. If skies are clear where you live, be sure to go outside and look up.
Discovered: Pigging out is a bigger concern than starvation; Christmas trees haven't evolved much in 100 million years; Rhesus monkeys have no rhythm; a really, really cute new (and endangered) primate.
A high-brow publishing house is seeking new interns. Job requirements include working for free, having no life, and keeping your mouth shut. So, you know, your soul.
Michael Bloomberg on the fiscal cliff, Ezra Klein on conservative fiscal policies, Amy Davidson on Antonin Scalia, Michael Mazza on North Korea, and Xu Zhiyong on Tibet.
Discovered: Male fish who engage in same-sex flirting lure in female fish; cheese dates back 7.5 millennia; Americans love public transportation once they give it a chance; depressed mice cheer up after brain stimulation.
Can Paul McCartney pull off grunge? That's the question on everyone's mind going into his performance tonight with the remaining members of Nirvana. It's undoubtedly a weird collaboration, but should we really call it a Nirvana reunion?
The sitar maestro died from respiratory and heart problems. Shankar had received heart-valve replacement surgery last week, just after being nominated for another Grammy.
Harold Meyerson on the downside of right-to-work, Adam Ozimek on the upside of right-to-work, Maureen Dowd on Zero Dark Thirty, Francisco Toro on Venezuela after Chavez, and Soner Cagaptay on Turkey.
Discovered: No sign of a gay gene, but homosexuality could start in the womb; childhood obesity is going down; that fish you're eating probably isn't really fish; a new SARS to freak out about.
Ralph Benko on Paul Ryan's decline, Jonathan Chait on Marco Rubio's rise, Pankaj Mishra on Asia's insurgents, Jonathan Steele on Afghanistan, and Noam Scheiber on jumping the cliff.
The "War on Christmas" flames were again stoked today over a statistic citing a majority of Americans wanting to shift the holiday's emphasis from Santa to Jesus. One commenter says neither figure represents his love for the sinister side of Christmas.
Discovered: Hops help prevent severe forms of pneumonia and bronchitis in kids, plus video of an elusive Malaysia cat, what bat autopsies can teach us about AIDS, and why genetic mutations are more common than you thought.
Kathryn Bigelow's movie about the hunt for Osama bin Laden isn't even out yet, and already people are sparring over its depiction of torture. Here's how everyone got so angry so fast, and how to talk about what everyone's talking about.
Aerosmith have been bickering a lot lately, and guitarist Joe Perry says in a new interview that their new album might be their last. Does this mean the self-described Greatest American Rock Band is about to go on a permanent vacation?
Linda Hirshman on DOMA and Prop 8, Gordon G. Chang on China's deindustrialization, Carl F. Nathan on drug-resistant bugs, Michael Jacobs on the Doha climate deal, and Albert R. Hunt on campaign finance.
Discovered: hypercondoms are greening sex; children would rather befriend someone without a drawl; Maori cooking stones can tell us something about magnetic fields; DNA as Legos.
The organization's major global warming conference brought almost 200 countries together in Doha for the last two weeks, and, well, there was a lot of bickering.
The raunchy Latin genre known as reggaeton won't be soundtracking Cuban parties anymore. At least not legal ones. And that's... OK?
John Cassidy on austerity, Paul Krugman on the job crises, Shashank Joshi on Syria, Jamelle Bouie on Bobby Jindal, and Glen Weldon on Bazooka Joe.
Discovered: Wormy discharge heals wounds by suppressing the immune system; drones will keep tabs on endangered animals; fish strike back against birds; memories back you hungry.
Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich used to be the loudest opponent of giving away music for free online. But today he joined Napster founder and erstwhile enemy Sean Parker to announce that his band's entire catalog has gone up for streaming on Spotify.
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