Mixed Feelings: The Emotional Labor of Listening to Men Complain
In the first installment of “Mixed Feelings,” a science-based advice column, Mandy Catron offers counsel on handling a partner’s obsession with their ex.
...more
Posts Tagged: science
Weekly Geekery
The hot young things of science fiction. Avoid IKEA with your lover today. Love, loss, and a spritz of psychology.
...moreWeekly Geekery
He loves me, he loves me not: science fiction’s relationship with L. Ron Hubbard. Babies will stop the bullies! The key to reckoning with climate change and nuclear bombs? Stories.
...moreWeekly Geekery
The big bad wolf’s name is Big Data. Michael Chabon messes with our memories. Snape was always a little crabby…
...moreWeekly Geekery
Writers gonna smoke (smoke, smoke, smoke, smoke). Find a Swedish latte papa to father your kids, says science. Fiction loves it some talking trees.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Ladies: we’re more likely than men to cannibalize. Diversity dilemmas and the Hollywood sci-fi industrial complex. Oedipal orcas? Male killer whales need menopausal mom to survive.
...more
The Rumpus Interview with Lucy Jane Bledsoe
Lucy Jane Bledsoe discusses her latest book, A Thin Bright Line, uncovering the remarkable story of her aunt, and illuminating history through the lens of imagination.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Lizard brain, meet the one-sentence novel. Sea slugs: the key to why you’ll remember this article. Are millenials “empty inside”? New books reveal the truth!
...moreWeekly Geekery
Are cheetahs sprinting toward extinction? Chinese-American writer Ken Liu brings “silkpunk” to science fiction. Self-publishing coaches—the new sexy in a Fifty Shades world.
...moreThis Week in Short Fiction
Tomorrow night, we denizens of planet Earth will gather with friends and family, or with complete strangers at a bar somewhere, or with a mob of people in an over-crowded and freezing square, or we will stay home alone, taking a bubble bath and with a bottle of wine (or two), and enjoy our solitude because […]
...moreWeekly Geekery
Your new chatbot therapist recommends volunteering. Womp womp: those productivity hacks are making you less productive. A quick-and-dirty primer to the “Anthropocene.”
...moreWeekly Geekery
Is Star Wars the Death Star of science fiction? Rat nirvana: being tickled till your ears turn pink. 250-million-year-old rocks might soothe science-religion conflict.
...more
Arrival: A Metaphor for Polemic Times
We are disconnected. Connection fails when we fail to take the time to literally, and therefore metaphorically, see each other.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Want to craft spy thrillers? Learn science writing. The science infusing Fantastic Beasts, and where to find it. This is why you talk like a cowboy. Turn off Beyoncé if you want to actually write today—lyrics hurt productivity.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Why Finnish women matter to the history of science fiction. Holiday science books: let visions of squid and sarcophagi dance in their heads. Astronauts survive thanks to a black female mathematician. This robot could make your toddler Mark Zuckerberg. (Minus the billions.)
...moreWeekly Geekery
Don’t dis slang—it’s older than you are. Regarding the pain of fish (and humanities-loving robots). Fake scientists are real. Sexism messes up men’s mental health, too. Aimee Bender and the Ladies of Contemporary Fairytale.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Math reveals the six plots of fiction (and yoga). Messy room affecting your mood? These pessimistic pigs agree! Money buys happiness—if you pay in advance. That smile makes you look like a sucker. Arrival, CP Snow, and a place for the humanities.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Harry Potter reduces prejudice towards immigrants. Why facts don’t change your mind. Kafka (unsurprisingly?) had insomnia. A new clue in the great German crime drama of 1694. Hands-free typing with your brain: now a thing.
...more
Mr. Clarke, the Real Hero of Stranger Things
He’s the teacher who encourages questions beyond the class assessment, who always gets his students to open the “Curiosity Door.”
...moreWeekly Geekery
Fan fiction writers, rejoice: the future of TV is yours. Yoda-like lizard extracts water from sand without moving a muscle. Holy relics, bacteria, and the Ivy League reveal how to be a better liar. Why modern science rejected modernism. Hankering for a camel or zebra-horse? Try Missouri.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Los Angeles: capital of science fiction? The latest Rx craze: novels. Richard Dawkins on Robert Frost. The scariest costume yesterday? A mite. Evolutionary biologists have a grudge against Frankenstein’s bride. The future of books: a bunch of Norwegian spruce trees.
...moreThis Week in Indie Bookstores
Inquiring Minds in Saugerties, New York installed a window display with the words “Make America Hate Again,” along with a swastika, to protest Trump. Hilarity Protests ensued. Minnesota has some cozy bookstores. Barnes & Noble wants to build smaller stores with more coffee and alcohol to compete with independent stores that serve as community centers. A London, […]
...moreWeekly Geekery
Goethe, book reviews, and why you shouldn’t use TripAdvisor. The brother-figures of bear conservation. Barack Obama talks brain-bots and “chasing the unicorn.” Meet your future neighbors: oysters. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and 19th-century fatal fashion.
...moreWeekly Geekery
The plot thickens: literary fiction may not affect empathy after all. China’s solution to producing entrepreneurs? Science fiction. Kids of all races prefer black and Latinx teachers to whites. Science says: everything you learned about sexuality is wrong. Take back dinosaurs from the children!
...moreThe Rumpus Interview with Jonathon Keats
Experimental philosopher Jonathon Keats discusses Buckminster Fuller, three-wheeled cars, domed cities, climate change, and cameras with a 100-year exposure time.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Is HBO’s bookish Westworld poised to give science fiction the Game of Thrones treatment? Antelopes, Bollywood, climate change, Brönte. National Geographic‘s autumn book recommendations—sushi, hiking, murder, oh my! Elon Musk name-drops Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. (Also, we’re going to Mars?) Spotting dementia through diction in Agatha Christie.
...moreThe Rumpus Interview with Bronwen Dickey
Bronwen Dickey discusses Pit Bull: The Battle over an American Icon, her examination of one of the most feared dog breeds, how the media changes perceptions, and what Eliza Doolittle might have to say about this.
...more
The Rumpus Book Club Chat with Michael Helm
The Rumpus Book Club chats with Michael Helm about his new novel After James, the line between paranoia and caution, and the use of poetry as a plot device.
...moreWeekly Geekery
Love = addiction. And both hijack the brain’s learning circuit. Langston Hughes and Edna St. Vincent Millay, resurrected on YouTube. The top traits of bestselling books. (Hint: Not sex.) The language you speak affects your morality. Sand avalanche! In your brain!
...moreWeekly Geekery
Forget yoga—hallucinogenic ayahuasca is the new health cure du jour. H.G. Wells’s BFF was editor of Nature. Also from Nature: Wave goodbye to the 10,000-hours rule. Neurofiction, or stories that read your brain. Accurate AI models of existence? Not until robots dance.
...more