The Invention of “Sesame Street” Renata Adler’s 1972 review of the program that revolutionized children’s television.

“Sesame Street” and its sequel, “The Electric Company,” were, “with lapses, the most intelligent and important programs in television,” Renata Adler wrote, in 1972.

John Williams Hasn’t Stopped Composing. His Latest? A Piano Concerto.

The great John Williams is still composing, and attending a premiere tonight of a new piano concerto of his.

A livestream of the concert should start around 8 p.m. EDT on WAMC:
www.wamc.org/listen-live-...

Background:
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/25/a...

Pseudoscience and COVID-19 — we’ve had enough already The scientific community must take up cudgels in the battle against bunk.

I wrote this piece 👇 in 2020. Even MORE relevant now.

For far too long we normalized – or laughed off ("haha, jade vagina eggs!?") – health bunk.

This helped to facilitate the descending Dark Age 2.0.

Speak up! 💪

Pseudoscience – enough already www.nature.com/articles/d41...

💯

Louisa May Alcott’s Utopian Feminist Workplace Novel In “Work: A Story of Experience,” Alcott fictionalizes her own stints as a servant, a seamstress, a governess, and a lady’s companion—and asks whether a wage counts as freedom for women.

www.newyorker.com/louisa-may-a...

‘Total infiltration’: How plastics industry swamped vital global treaty talks Petrostates and well-funded lobbyists at UN-hosted talks are derailing a deal to cut plastic production and protect people and the planet

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

We applaud Sen. Warren and @John Kennedy for introducing the Build Now Act of 2025.

It's a budget-neutral approach to our nation’s zoning crisis, focusing on the highest-cost communities that are persistently slow-growth.

What it does ⬇️

blogs.elconfidencial.com/economia/la-...

Raise your hand if Jeffrey Epstein was NOT invited to your wedding? 🙋‍♂️

Opinion | I Watched It Happen in Hungary. Now It’s Happening Here.

Former US ambassador to Hungary: "After years watching Hungary suffocate under the weight of its democratic collapse, I came to understand that the real danger of a strongman isn’t his tactics; it’s how others, especially those with power, justify their acquiescence." (h/t @bnovak.bsky.social)

Healthy environment a human right, UN court says in landmark climate ruling Court’s decision expected to be used in future litigation and to support political negotiations by vulnerable states

🚨BREAKING🚨 ICJ ruling that a healthy environment is a human right could be a real turning point in setting out governments’ legal responsibility to tackle #climate crisis 👇

Top UN court says countries can sue each other over climate change The decision from the world's highest court has been welcomed by developing nations at most risk from climate change.

www.bbc.com/news/article...

If you think it won't happen to you, think again...

Art by @dennisgoris.bsky.social

From your grocery bill to your paycheck, monopolies are making you less financially secure and ultimately less free. For The Illusion of Choice: How Big Business Controls Your Life (ft. Lina Khan)

For too long, our government stopped vigorously enforcing laws that keep Corporate America in check.

Corporations got more powerful while our basic economic freedoms went unprotected.

Former FTC Chair Lina Khan explains.

Is America Still a Free Country? Six months in, it’s looking an awful lot like soft authoritarianism.

www.persuasion.community/p/is-america...

YouTube video by Buitenhof Do we overlook the crisis of western democracy? | Eliot Higgins #buitenhof #shorts

Some thoughts I had about the thread to Western democracies that seem even more relevant today
youtube.com/shorts/fuZgg...

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert to end in 2026 as CBS cancels show Colbert told shocked audience he only found out the night before, as CBS announced it will end the entire Late Show franchise after 33 years

www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio...

Ellesmere Chaucer, mssEL 26 C 9, folio 153v, Tale of Melibee with portrait of Geoffrey Chaucer. The Ellesmere Chaucer (Huntington Library, San Marino, California, MS EL 26 C 9) is one of the most famous illuminated manuscripts of Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales, produced in England in the early 15th century, likely around 1400–1410. Folio 153v contains the beginning of the Tale of Melibee. In the upper margin, there is a finely executed portrait of Geoffrey Chaucer himself. He is depicted as a mature man in a dark hooded robe, with a forked beard, holding a rosary and gesturing as if speaking — visually reinforcing his role as the narrator and participant in the tales. This small portrait is one of several scattered throughout the manuscript, each illustrating the different pilgrims telling their stories. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Canterbury_Tales#/media/File:Ellesmere_Chaucer,_mssEL_26_C_9,_folio_153v_color_enhanced.jpg

A 600-year-old Chaucer mystery may finally be solved

A medieval sermon packed with 'memes' and simple spelling mistakes could explain a baffling line in 'The Canterbury Tales.'

By Andrew Paul

www.popsci.com/science/chau...

Cantebury Tales at PG:
www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/searc...

#OldManuscript

‘It’s always been some white dude’: how Ethiopia became the world leader in uncovering the story of humankind Housed in an unremarkable office block in the captial, the country’s national museum is home to the most extensive collection of the remains of modern humans’ ancestors – and a team of world-leading s...

www.theguardian.com/global-devel...

How We Misread the Social World—and Why That Matters - The Data Science Institute at Columbia University Most people assume they have a clear sense of the social world around them. They think that they know who spends time together, who confides in whom, and which relationships … Continued

datascience.columbia.edu/news/2025/ho...

www.bbc.com/audio/play/w...

‘History’s most devastating document of war’: the simple yet graphic details of the Bayeux tapestry Hand-stitched depiction of Battle of Hastings pulls viewers into story of friendship and betrayal, vengeance and despair

www.theguardian.com/culture/2025...

4.6 Billion Years On, the Sun Is Having a Moment In the past two years, without much notice, solar power has begun to truly transform the world’s energy system.

Globally, roughly a third more power is being generated from the sun this spring than last. If this exponential rate of growth can continue, we will soon live in a very different world, @billmckibben.bsky.social writes.

Deafening my nun

Landmark ruling finds Russia shot down MH17 with 298 people on board Europe’s top human rights court finds Boeing 777 flying from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur was shot down by Russia in July 2014

Landmark ruling finds Russia shot down MH17 with 298 people on board www.theguardian.com/world/2025/j...

Opinion | The Grip That Race and Identity Have on My Students

www.nytimes.com/2025/07/08/o...

Linda Yaccarino stepping down as CEO of Elon Musk’s X Yaccarino announced she is leaving the company after two years as the chief executive officer

www.theguardian.com/technology/2...

I finished this book over the weekend and you NEED to read it, seriously, if you want to know how we got to (gestures at everything)

Can A Sneaker Brand’s Ambitious Plan Help Counter Amazon Deforestation? | Atmos Advocates for a bioeconomy say markets for rubber, açaí, and other forest products can help preserve the Amazon—not everyone is convinced.

I visited the Brazilian Amazon in May to see how traditional rubber tappers are preserving the rainforest—fending off climate change, deforestation, and cattle ranching.

Their way of life hangs in the balance. And as one rubber tapper told me, what happens there will echo around the world. 🌎🧪