PICKS are stories from many sources, selected by our editors or recommended by our readers because they are important, surprising, troubling, enlightening, inspiring, or amusing. They appear on our site and in our daily newsletter. Please send suggested articles, videos, podcasts, etc. to picks@whowhatwhy.org.
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Some EVs Are Losing up to 50 Percent of Their Value in One Year (Maria)
The author writes, “Electric vehicle depreciation is something of a hot topic right now, and for good reason. On one hand, there are some fantastic deals to be had on the secondhand market, but on the other of course, there’s the thorny issue of some EVs losing half of their value in a single year.”
Joy Ride: Upbeat Dems Are Spreading Optimism to a Divided (and Newly Delighted) Nation (Dana)
From Vanity Fair: “After eight years of fear and loathing, Kamala Harris and Tim Walz are energizing the electorate with levity — and an eye toward tomorrow.”
Wyoming Reporter Caught Using Artificial Intelligence To Create Fake Quotes and Stories (Reader Steve)
The author writes, “Quotes from Wyoming’s governor and a local prosecutor were the first things that seemed slightly off to Powell Tribune reporter CJ Baker. Then, it was some of the phrases in the stories that struck him as nearly robotic. The dead giveaway, though, that a reporter from a competing news outlet was using generative artificial intelligence to help write his stories came in a June 26 article about the comedian Larry the Cable Guy being chosen as the grand marshal of a local parade. It concluded with an explanation of the inverted pyramid, the basic approach to writing a breaking news story.”
The Lost History of What Americans Knew About Climate Change in the 1960s (Laura)
From Grist: “By the mid-1960s, climate change was already becoming a matter of concern to the federal government, the new analysis shows. A 1965 report from the National Science Foundation found that the ways humans were inadvertently changing the world — through urban development, agriculture, and fossil fuels — were ‘becoming of sufficient consequence to affect the weather and climate of large areas and ultimately the entire planet.’”
New York’s Promising Experiment in Making the Subways Safer (Russ)
The author writes, “New Yorkers want safer subways, yet they recognize that many people engaged in anti-social behavior are mentally ill. The new approach to untreated mental illness is where [Ameed] Ademolu and the SCOUT program, begun last fall by the city government and the M.T.A., comes in. Unlike earlier homeless-outreach programs, through which workers ask people who appear to be homeless if they would like assistance and are usually rejected, SCOUT employs a nurse — Mr. Ademolu is the first — who walks the train platforms looking for people in distress. (SCOUT works mostly in stations, not trains. Clinicians and police officials are concerned that they could lose control of a situation on an enclosed train.)”
Excess Memes and ‘Reply All’ Emails Are Bad for Climate, Researcher Warns (Reader Jim)
The author writes, “When ‘I can has cheezburger?’ became one of the first internet memes to blow our minds, it’s unlikely that anyone worried about how much energy it would use up. But research has now found that the vast majority of data stored in the cloud is ‘dark data,’ meaning it is used once then never visited again. That means that all the memes and jokes and films that we love to share with friends and family … are out there somewhere, sitting in a data center, using up energy.”
Quantum Entanglement in Your Brain Is What Generates Consciousness, Radical Study Suggests (Sean)
From Popular Mechanics: “It has long been argued that the human brain is similar to a computer. But in reality, that’s selling the brain pretty short. While comparing neurons and transistors is a convenient metaphor (and not completely out of left field), the brain is ultra-efficient, its energy is renewable, and it’s capable of computational feats that even the most advanced computer can’t pull off. In many ways, the inner workings of the human brain make up an unknown computational frontier. Although your brain is superior to your laptop — or even the world’s most advanced supercomputer — these machines run on classical physics. But there’s another kind of a computer out there: a quantum one.”
