This is an edition of The Wonder Reader, a newsletter in which our editors recommend a set of stories to spark your curiosity and fill you with delight. Sign up here to get it every Saturday morning.
Back in 2017, Kelly Conaboy had it out for the neck pillow: “This half-ovate, toilet-seat cover-esque object reigns as King of Travel Accessories, while failing miserably at its intended sole use,” she wrote.
This article was originally published by Hakai Magazine.
Stingray 12 is surprisingly calm for an animal that’s getting squeegeed. The ray, roughly the size of a dinner plate, is submerged in the sand of a tank about the size of a chest freezer; even the golden eyes on top of her head are buried in the sediment.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi seemed subdued when India’s election results were declared on June 4. His Bharatiya Janata Party still had the most seats in Parliament; however, with 63 fewer than in the previous election, it had failed to secure a majority, meaning it will have to work with others in order to govern. This was not the triumphant spectacle that Modi and many of his Hindu-nationalist supporters had anticipated; rarely had a victory felt more like defeat.
Here are three takeaways from POLITICO’s discussion of these topics on Thursday.
Four ways the Supreme Court decision could serve the anti-abortion movement.
The move may signal the beginning of a broad turn on the right against IVF, an issue that many social conservatives see as the “pro-life” movement’s next frontier.
Friday’s good jobs numbers may be a boost. But boosts haven’t yet materialized into political benefits.
The president is getting more micro in his economic sales pitch as the landscape loses its luster.
Friday’s government report showed that last month’s hiring gain was down sharply from the blockbuster increase of 315,000 in March.
Biden and Trump are both campaigning on warped economic statistics, cherry-picking weird data from the Covid crisis.
Israel and Hamas are both facing calls to support the U.S.-backed ceasefire and hostage deal that was endorsed by the U.N. Security Council earlier this week. While Hamas has welcomed the proposal, Israeli leaders have yet to publicly commit to its terms, including a full end to the war rather than just a pause in the fighting for the exchange of captives. This comes as a major new U.N.
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Hot dogs. The Fourth of July. An opportunely timed Netflix special. Joey Chestnut’s sponsorship dustup is an all-American tale.
First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:
Wildfire smoke is a public-health emergency.
Hussein Ibish: For Hamas, everything is going according to plan.
This is Atlantic Intelligence, a limited-run series in which our writers help you wrap your mind around artificial intelligence and a new machine age. Sign up here.
Earlier this week, Apple announced that it will soon lace its devices with generative AI, bringing “Apple Intelligence” to iPhones, iPads, and Macs later this year. Users will be able to allow the machine to write emails for them, create custom emoji and other synthetic illustrations, transcribe and summarize phone calls, and so on.
This spring, the Los Angeles Unified School District—the second-largest public school district in the United States—introduced students and parents to a new “educational friend” named Ed. A learning platform that includes a chatbot represented by a small illustration of a smiling sun, Ed is being tested in 100 schools within the district and is accessible at all hours through a website.
Summertime in North America is becoming smoke season. Last summer, when a haze from catastrophic Canadian wildfires hung over the continent—turning Montreal, where I lived at the time, an unearthly gray and my home city of New York a putrid orange—plenty of people seemed untroubled by this reality. Relatively few people wore masks; infamously, an outdoor yoga class continued on a skyscraper terrace in Manhattan.
The leaders of both Israel and Hamas seem content for the war in Gaza to grind on into the indefinite future. Such is the upshot of their ambiguous, but essentially negative, responses to President Joe Biden’s peace proposal, which is now fully backed by the United Nations Security Council. And the reasons are obvious.
Trump’s closed-door advice represents a gamble not only for him, but for the Republicans in Congress.
We continue our conversation with Christian Cooper, author of Better Living Through Birding: Notes from a Black Man in the Natural World and host of the Emmy Award-winning show Extraordinary Birder. Cooper shares stories of his life and career, including his longtime LGBTQ activism and how his father’s work as a science educator inspired his lifetime passion for birdwatching. “Birding forces you outside of yourself [and] whatever your woes are,” says Cooper.
New York City’s chapter of the Audubon Society has officially changed its name to the New York City Bird Alliance as part of an effort to distance itself from its former namesake John James Audubon, the so-called founding father of American birding. The 19th century naturalist enslaved at least nine people and espoused racist views. Christian Cooper is a Black birder and a longtime board member of the newly minted New York City Bird Alliance.
The Supreme Court has unanimously rejected a challenge from anti-abortion groups to the nationwide availability of the abortion medication mifepristone, which is available by mail and can be taken at home in many states. However, advocates warn the far-right-dominated court’s ruling on the FDA’s authority to regulate the pill was purely on procedural grounds, and could even offer a “roadmap” for future challenges. Mifepristone is used in roughly two-thirds of all U.S.
The move may signal the beginning of a broad turn on the right against IVF, an issue that many social conservatives see as the “pro-life” movement’s next frontier.
His new anti-vaccine persona could have far-reaching consequences if he’s elected to a second stint as president with far-reaching administrative powers.
Friday’s good jobs numbers may be a boost. But boosts haven’t yet materialized into political benefits.
The president is getting more micro in his economic sales pitch as the landscape loses its luster.
Friday’s government report showed that last month’s hiring gain was down sharply from the blockbuster increase of 315,000 in March.
Biden and Trump are both campaigning on warped economic statistics, cherry-picking weird data from the Covid crisis.
Here are three takeaways from POLITICO’s discussion of these topics on Thursday.
This is an edition of The Atlantic Daily, a newsletter that guides you through the biggest stories of the day, helps you discover new ideas, and recommends the best in culture. Sign up for it here.
Some of the people who once supported Donald Trump seem to want him to win, but without the moral stain of voting for him themselves.
First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:
American women are at a breaking point.
Four ways the Supreme Court decision could serve the anti-abortion movement.
This story contains spoilers for the entirety of Bridgerton Season 3.
The resident bully of Bridgerton, Cressida Cowper, has changed—really. After several humbling seasons on the marriage market, the character played by Jessica Madsen has stopped trying to insult-sling her way to the top of the eligible-bachelorette pile. Instead, in the show’s third season, she makes a bold claim that could cast her out of Regency London’s high society altogether.