The naked human is a vulnerable creature. Lacking the fur of our mammalian ancestors and relatives, we have bare skin that offers little defense against the sun’s brutal rays or wind’s biting chill. So instead, we have had to invent a technology to replace our long-lost fur: “portable thermal protection,” as the archaeologist Ian Gilligan calls it or, more simply, clothing.Without clothing, humans would never have reached all seven continents.

Recently, I drove along Israel’s northern border, west to east. To my American sensibility, it is the best road trip in Israel—a 90-minute version of a trip that would take many hours on California back roads—from the ocean through scrubby hills and finally to the Golan Heights.

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.Rock and roll is full of legends who should retire. But some bands know how to get back onstage without making fools of themselves—or of their fans.First, here are three Sunday reads from The Atlantic:
A very, very expensive emoji
Future-proofing your town sounds great, until you try it.

Because if you can survive
the violet night, you can survive
the next, and the fig tree will ache
with sweetness for you in sunlight that arrives
first at your window, quietly pawing
even when you can’t stand it,
and you’ll heavy the whining floorboards
of the house you filled with animals
as hurt and lost as you, and the bearded irises will form
fully in their roots, their golden manes
swaying with the want of spring—
live, live, live, live!

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.Early in 2023, my colleague Caroline Mimbs Nyce chatted with the writer Oliver Burkeman about New Year’s resolutions. Burkeman is an expert on productivity, but he’s arguably also an expert on getting real about the time human beings have on Earth.

A new calendar year frequently conjures up visions of radical self-transformation. This year, we tell ourselves, will be the one where we finally lose 20 pounds, take up gratitude journaling, or read 100 books. New year, new you! But then inertia slowly creeps in, inconveniences arise, and by June our New Year’s resolutions are a distant memory.Changing oneself is harder than perky how-to guides and self-help books suggest.

Between making time for work, family, friends, exercise, chores, shopping—the list goes on and on—it can feel like a huge accomplishment to just take a few minutes to read a book or watch TV before bed. All that busyness can lead to poor sleep quality when we finally do get to put our head down.