Naomi Alderman writes for The Guardian, presents on BBC radio, got a grant to talk writing with Margaret Atwood and wins lots of prestigious awards. With so much of the literary upper crust backing her, I was tempted to be different and find fault with her science fiction novel The…

Scientists have recently taken the first-ever photograph of a black hole, sequenced the DNA of a wooly mammoth and discovered that although the earth may not be flat, the deep-space rock Arrokoth sort of is. Another breakthrough has come from the field of mathematics. In 2019, The American Statistician published…

I, like so many, was saddened this month to learn that author Anne Rice had died. She has left a tremendous legacy. One of the best ways in which we can pay tribute to her memory is to do our best to carry this legacy forward. …

One of the paradoxes of war is that although it is horrible to live through, it is fun to read about. Not only does it make good story material, such scholars as Charles Hill argue that fiction writing is a promising medium for exploring the real-life art of strategy. In…

(Mild spoilers) Those who study world politics spend much of their time contemplating the nature of power. One topic which comes up is the question of what power is for. Does one seek it to advance some ideal, or is the satisfaction of dominating others an end in itself? This…

Most topics worth talking about touch upon science, philosophy and other complex fields of knowledge. Certain people are quick to put forth that few of us understand these fields in enough depth to discuss them intelligently. The self-taught, these people tell us, are but self-deluded. An undergraduate degree takes one…

[Spoiler warning for Avatar: The Last Airbender] Like their scrappy protagonist, the creators of TV’s The Legend of Korra (LOK), seem to seek controversy, and like their protagonist, they find it. LOK is about politics, and many of its villains claim to be idealistic revolutionaries. Certain critics invite us to…