Monthly Archives: September 2022

Biden’s plan to forgive student loans could end up costing over $1 trillion, an analysis says

Becky Pringle, president of the National Education Association, joins student loan borrowers at a rally in front of The White House on August 25, 2022 in Washington, DC. Paul Morigi/Getty Images for We the 45m Biden’s plan to forgive student loans could cost more than $1 trillion, per an analysis. The costs depend on how…

The Download: a universal covid vaccine, and protecting toddlers from polio

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. This nanoparticle could be the key to a universal covid vaccine Long before Alexander Cohen—or anyone else—had heard of the alpha, delta, or omicron variants of covid-19, he and his graduate school advisor…

Review: Lenovo’s ThinkPad Z13 is a bit weird, but Ryzen 6000 is fantastic

Enlarge / Lenovo’s ThinkPad Z13 Gen 1. (credit: Andrew Cunningham) Specs at a glance: Lenovo ThinkPad Z13 Gen 1 Display 13.3-inch 1920×1200 touchscreen (170 PPI) OS Windows 11 Home CPU AMD Ryzen 7 Pro 6850U (eight cores) RAM 16GB LPDDR5 6400 (soldered) GPU AMD Radeon 680M Storage 512GB NVMe SSD Networking Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax), Bluetooth…

Celibacy has surprising evolutionary advantages, according to new research

Enlarge / Nature wants us to reproduce, so how come celibacy evolved? (credit: Carsten ten Brink/Flickr) Why would someone join an institution that removed the option of family life and required them to be celibate? Reproduction, after all, is at the very heart of the evolution that shaped us. Yet many religious institutions around the…

In New Zealand, conservation is buoyed by Indigenous knowledge

Enlarge / The northern kōura (Paranephrops planifrons), or freshwater crayfish, is both economically and culturally significant to the indigenous Māori people of New Zealand. (credit: Cultura RM Exclusive/Richard Robinson) Freshwater crayfish have inhabited New Zealand for millions of years. They have dark, hard, and mottled shells, allowing them to blend in with logs and mud…