The Best of Salon

Though the United States seems hopelessly addicted to our vehicles, experts say we could rethink our civilization to live without them

Urban renewal under the guise of “going green” isn’t working — for the environment, or for residents

Our collective hunger for cooking as sport is an enduring mainstay, from Medieval Baghdad to modern cable TV

Ultraprocessed foods are often noted as being an insidious mark on our food systems. How do we stop eating them?

Though academics may wring our hands about influencer culture, social media promotion is now a necessary evil

Scientists implanted electrodes into an octopus' head for the first time. The bizarre signals only raised more questions

One-third of the human diet comes from plants pollinated by bees

You can't patent naturally-occurring molecules like psilocybin. That's led to a rush to find a trippy synthetic "blend" as a profitable alternative

Psychedelic shops are openly selling mind-altering fungi in a growing number of cities. Is this just the beginning?

Antonie Philips van Leeuwenhoek, the father of microbiology, was horrified at the appearance of sperm under the microscope

An expanding notion of what "consciousness" is could have profound repercussions

«Panpsychism's appeal may stem partly from the fact that scientists currently can not explain what consciousness – the thing that gives you a mind and makes you self-aware — actually is»

Cold, bathed in radiation and far from Earth, living on Mars would strain our mental and bodily limits. The prospect for a long-term settlement is bleak

Shared by 78

Thanks to its UBI-esque permanent fund dividend, Alaska has "a much lower poverty rate," one economist says

Shared by 846, including Ines Bieler, Stephanie A Kowalski, Katja Evertz

«optimism and creativity often go hand in hand, but also that the status quo or ruminating on the status quo can often lead to a type of pessimism»

In "The Self Delusion," author Gregory Berns explains why our self-perception is a "sort of fiction"

«there are also some universal ground rules to the ways we construct these narratives. One we can all relate to is, for the most part, that episodic aspect of it»

Scientists are baffled at the odd telemetry data being relayed by Voyager 1, which was launched in 1977

Going on a walk makes your mind wander in ways that neuroscience is only just coming to terms with

«Fractal patterns are easy on the eyes, endlessly fascinating to see and hear and even inspire feelings of beauty. »

Some scientists are looking for new drugs in nature rather than synthesizing them in the lab. Here's why