The Most Subversive Way to Travel Perhaps the humble bicycle, a transportation mode that puts people in contact with one another and gives them back that control they seem to crave, offers a unique opportunity to remake those realities for the better.

    The Boundaries of Artificial Emotional Intelligence If our virtual assistants and emotional laborers are all turning out to be soothing, female-voiced AI, will it close certain gaps for human women? Or will it ratify them?

    Dreaming Up Inventions for an Afrofuturist World Three magical tools necessary for both liberation and laughter.

    The Power of Play: A Reading List A crash course on how fun and leisure can change the world

    Your Classroom Is Making You Fail Almost everyt traditional classroom design makes it harder to learn–yet the fixes are often simple.

    Was Gamification a Terrible Lie? Turning work into play was sold as a miracle for increasing productivity–but was that ever really plausible?

    Breaking the Cycle

    The future of reproductive health in India, from early ideas about population control to on-the-ground interventions happening now, to a world where men and women share contraceptive responsibility.
    Hannah Harris Green
    Sep 26, 2018

    The Human Machine

    A series about the increasingly blurred lines between us and our machines.
    Ian Steadman
    Aug 23, 2017

    A Visual History of the Future

    Decades ago, artists’ imaginings formed high expectations about the world to come. Were these just fantasies–or was it the work of pioneers whose visions of the future actually helped to shape it?
    Darren Garrett
    May 30, 2018

    Beats: Space

    Space is where we project our dreams–and our nightmares–of the future.

    Beats: Food

    Food structures our day, and food systems shape our world

    Beats: Disability

    “Disable” is an active verb, and disability describes the social and environmental barriers that prevent access just as much as an individual body’s physical reality.

    Beats: Health

    Access to health care is as much a matter of public policy as it is the size of a person’s pocketbook; within a doctor’s office, many factors affect the quality of treatment.

    How 3D-Mapping with Drones Is Changing the Shape of Peruvian Favelas

    A new way to use drones for social good.
    Alice Bell
    Nov 1, 2014 2 min read

    A Submarine With Gills

    Artificial gills mean this submersible might let humans breathe underwater anywhere that fish can.
    Duncan Geere
    Apr 13, 2015 4 min read
    A wooded hillside.

    Sometimes, Hacking the Climate Is a Good Idea

    Here are some of the ways it could, potentially, work.
    Duncan Geere
    May 29, 2015 3 min read