The New Yorker-Science & Technology

"The headphones that let the world in, death by soil-dwelling fungus, the science of why we laugh."

Views expressed in this science and technology update are those of the reporters and correspondents.  Accessed on 17 August 2024, 1529 UTC.

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Russ Roberts (https://hawaiisciencejournal.blogspot.com).

 

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In today’s newsletter, how human flourishing depends on fauna, and then: • The headphones that let the world in • Death by soil-dwelling fungus • The science of why we laugh The Veterinarians Preventing the Next Pandemic Most new diseases have their origins in animals. So why aren’t we paying more attention to their health? By Rivka Galchen Illustration by Kyle Ellingson In the summer of 1999, a pathologist at the Bronx Zoo noticed an unusual number of dead crows in the vicinity of the zoo. Then, over Labor Day weekend, one of the zoo’s cormorants died, as did a pheasant, a bald eagle, and three flamingos. In Queens, physicians at Flushing Hospital saw six patients with encephalitis, all within a few weeks. Normally the city saw about ten cases a year, but now similar cases were turning up across the city. The disease presentation suggested a viral cause—but which virus? By the end of September, seven human patients had died, and others had had to be hospitalized for weeks. After the virus was identified as West Nile—a mosquito-borne virus that infects both birds and humans, and which no one expected to see in North America—the dead crows suddenly made sense. Keep reading Our Columnists  Open Questions Are We Living in the Age of Info-Determinism? Increasingly, our networks seem to be steering our history in ways we don’t like and can’t control. By Joshua Rothman  Infinite Scroll Popping the Bubble of Noise-Cancelling Headphones A new Japanese-designed device promises to “unmute the world,” as if it were no longer possible to do so simply by uncovering your ears. By Kyle Chayka If you know someone who would enjoy Science & Technology, please share it. Was this newsletter forwarded to you? Sign up. From the Archive Photograph by Mark J. Rebilas In December of 1977, in central California’s San Joaquin Valley, a forceful wind carried a cloud of loose topsoil and mustard-colored dirt into the sky. The plume rose to five thousand feet, blotting out the sun four counties away and spreading dust over an area the size of Maine. Its remnants lingered in the air for another day, creating a murky haze that stung the eyes and noses of those in its path. Over the next several weeks, more than a hundred cases of cocci, or “valley fever,” were reported—including six fatalities. The disease is caused by inhaling microscopic spores of a soil-dwelling fungus. “Digging—building, drilling, tilling, clearing—stirs it up,” Dana Goodyear explained, in 2014. “And dry, hot, windy conditions, a regional feature intensified by climate change, disperse it.” As one specialist told her, “If you breathe and you’re warm-blooded, you can get this.” Read Dana Goodyear’s “Death Dust” Cartoon by Ellis Rosen More from The New Yorker  Annals of Gastronomy An Ode to Old Bay, the Great American Condiment Marylanders put it on everything; everybody should. By Casey Cep  Dept. of Humor In Search of the World’s Funniest Joke From 2002: The semi-serious science of why we laugh. By Tad Friend P.S. Old Timer, a humpback whale first photographed in 1972, was spotted this summer near Alaska. For a creature to survive so long, amid our current climate crises, is remarkable. In a reflection on the symbolism of whales in a changing world, Amia Srinivasan writes, “​​To be close to a whale, in the wild, not in a boat but in the water itself, is to encounter an embodied agency that exists, across every dimension, on a scale that swallows our own: its physical size, its evolutionary age, its polar voyages.” 🐋

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