In 2014 researchers at the MIT Media Lab designed an experiment called Moral Machine . The idea was to create a game-like platform that would crowdsource people’s decisions on how self-driving cars should prioritize lives in different variations of the “ trolley problem .” In the process, the data…

Credit Photo Illustration by Tracy Ma/The New York Times; Getty Images (woman and child Skip to contentSkip to site index “I am convinced the devil lives in our phones.” Credit Photo Illustration by Tracy Ma/The New York Times; Getty Images (woman and child SAN FRANCISCO — The people who are closest…

The most influential action movie of this decade doesn’t have a plot. What it has is a setup: A squad of armored cops has to fight its way from the bottom of a dilapidated apartment tower to the top. There sits a drug lord who wants all of them dead. The entire building is populated with criminals…

The former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci, who has written a hagiographic book about Trump, at a launch party for his media company, in October. Photograph by Sam Hodgson / NYT / Redux “I dreamed the American dream,” Anthony Scaramucci writes in his memoir, “ Trump, the…

Istanbul on Wednesday rolled out an alternative currency for commuters who need to top up their subway cards but are short of cash: recyclables. The city is installing “reverse vending machines” at metro stations that allow passengers to add credit to their subway cards simply by inserting a plastic…

Investigators bring Cesar Sayoc's car to an FBI facility in Miramar, Florida. Johnny Louis / Getty Donald Trump condemned a spate of attempted mail bombings this week as “terrorizing acts.” And his Justice Department today charged a suspect with five federal crimes, including interstate…

A definition of fixed gender identity proposed by the Trump Administration would present a new—and incorrect—explanation of sex and gender. Photograph by Sarah Silbiger / NYT / Redux If the Trump Administration sticks with its plan to define gender as immutably male or female, determined at birth by…

The Cat Who Won’t Cop Out: Shaft as the ‘70s Black Superheroby Jason Bailey (The following essay is excerpt from Jason’s new book , It’s Okay With Me: Hollywood, the 1970s, and the Return of the Private Eye .) The first thing John Shaft (Richard Roundtree) does in Gordon Parks’ Shaft , after…

It is easy to fetishize the Concorde, in part because we lost it, and in part because it was so plainly handsome. Photograph by Mario Tama / Getty The progress of technology can seem inexorable—a kind of unstoppable lunge. It’s curious, then, to consider the trajectory of Concorde, the first (and…

The Tip Sheet President Trump boarded Air Force One before traveling to a rally in Texas on Monday. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times Welcome to The Tip Sheet, a daily political analysis of the 2018 elections, based on interviews with Republican and Democratic officials, pollsters, strategists…

Netflix/Ringer illustration The most thrilling and cathartic guitar solo you’ll hear in 2018 is uncorked by Adam Sandler—puerile comedy icon, Netflix pioneer, and invulnerable critical punching bag—deep into his new stand-up special, 100% Fresh . It’s on Netflix, of course; it took me way too long…

The Pixelated Splendor of Michael Mann’s ‘Blackhat’by Bilge Ebiri [Last year, Musings paid homage to Produced and Abandoned: The Best Films You’ve Never Seen , a review anthology from the National Society of Film Critics that championed studio orphans from the ‘70s and ‘80s. In the days before the…

Red Dead Redemption 2, the next game from Rockstar, will be out on October 26. In the final year of development on Red Dead Redemption 2 , the upcoming Western game, the top directors decided to add black bars to the top and bottom of every non-interactive cutscene in hopes of making those scenes…

President Trump on Tuesday ramped up his rhetoric against Saudi Arabia over the death of Jamal Khashoggi, as the U.S. took its first steps to punish the kingdom over the incident that has triggered global outrage. Speaking to reporters at the White House, Trump criticized the operation that killed…

In 1997, Britney Jean Spears was a high school freshman aching to get out of the quiet stretch of Louisiana that bumps up against Mississippi. The most notable thing about her at the time was one off-Broadway credit and her status as a former Mouseketeer. A year later she would become one of the…

The queen is back Simone Giertz didn’t let brain surgery stop her. What’s next? by Morgan Sung The “Queen of Shitty Robots” won’t be stopped. In the six months since the YouTube star and inventor had a large brain tumor that could have left her paralyzed, blind, or a completely different person…

Netflix/Ringer illustration The stated purpose of Making a Murderer, the Netflix true crime docuseries created by Moira Demos and Laura Ricciardi, is for the audience to have “a better understanding of the criminal justice system.” By this standard, the 10-episode first season of the Making a…

During Thursday’s visit to the Oval Office, Kanye West said that he saw Trump as a reference point for his own masculinity, and that he derived superpowers from his Make America Great Again hat. Photograph by Oliver Contreras / Getty Since its inception as a gauche, reality-TV-worthy lark, Donald…

The Turkish president has vowed to reveal the "naked truth" about the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has stopped short of blaming the Saudis, is due to address members of his ruling AK party. Turkish officials say they have…

NK: Let’s start at the beginning of the Gamma Ray Jones project. You could’ve chosen to record any type of album today why revisit a shelved project cop show music from 46 years ago? J-Zone: It’s a lost art and Pablo and I wanted to do something totally different. We’re an instrumental group, so we…

As we age, brain cells that normally fight off infection and repair tissue begin to attack healthy brain cells.Illustration: Andrea Ucini B rain health is key to successful ageing, and it involves several mental functions including memory, reasoning and planning. Memory defines who we are – without…

ITC Entertainment/Ringer illustration “If you believed they put a man on the moon ,” sang Michael Stipe, evincing uncertainty in honor of Andy Kaufman, a peerless put-on artist whose love of masquerade—everything from off-the-clock alter egos to pro wrestling villainy —made him a true icon of…

Hey, Facebook, Don’t Make Journalists Do Your Work Social platforms have a responsibility to address misinformation as a systemic problem, instead of reacting to case after case. The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom…

My Year as a Trump Ambassador Some disorder is normal at the start of an administration. But it was extreme under Mr. Trump. Ms. Jacobson was the United States ambassador to Mexico until May. The flags of Canada, the United States and Mexico, illuminated for a news conference in Washington last year…

There are culture wars at the core of the new Neil Armstrong bio-pic, “First Man,” starring Ryan Gosling, and the film’s director, Damien Chazelle, takes sides in them. Photograph by Daniel McFadden / Universal / Everett When “ First Man ,” Damien Chazelle’s drama about Neil Armstrong’s mission to…

‘At a press conference, Emmanuel Macron made it clear that the EU has done its best to find a deal, but it was up to the UK to make a choice.’Photograph: Xinhua/Barcroft Images D ear United Kingdom, Emmanuel Macron would like you to take responsibility for the mess you have created. The French…

In early 2017, when she was an unknown law student, Lina Khan published “Amazon’s Antitrust Paradox” in the Yale Law Journal. Credit Brandon Thibodeaux for The New York Times Skip to contentSkip to site index With a single scholarly article, Lina Khan, 29, has reframed decades of monopoly law. In…

People gathered at a concert hall in Toronto to watch the “bud drop” at the stroke of midnight, in celebration of the legalization on Wednesday of recreational cannabis use in Canada. Credit Ian Willms/Getty Images MONTREAL — Canada on Wednesday became the first major world economy to legalize…

An employee tending marijuana plants at Canopy Growth’s Tweed factory last month in Smiths Falls, Ontario. Credit Dave Chan for The New York Times SMITHS FALLS, Ontario — Millions of dollars worth of marijuana plants sat under lamps brighter than the noonday sun as employees of Canada’s largest…

In 2018, it’s harder than ever to be independent in the world of movies. With Thanos and T. rexes and computer-animated superfamilies descending upon our multiplexes, the do-it-yourself spirit of film history is being crowded out, one IP blockbuster at a time. But there are still some fearless,…

2018 will go down as the year when it became impossible to ignore the increasing advancements of Chinese smartphone hardware, from superlative camera arrays and super-speed charging to in-display fingerprint scanners and creative ways to stretch the display across as much of the front of the phone…

Every year, Ikea Group and INGKA Holding (the holding company that controls the majority of Ikea’s retail stores) publishes a research report on how people live in and relate to a specific aspect of their homes. Since 2014 it’s dealt with morning routines, food and kitchens, and disagreements at…

In 2018, it’s harder than ever to be independent in the world of movies. With Thanos and T. rexes and computer-animated superfamilies descending upon our multiplexes, the do-it-yourself spirit of film history is being crowded out, one IP blockbuster release at a time. But there are still some…

Photo by Steve Dykes/Getty Images On New Year’s Day 1979, a small software company relocated its headquarters from Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Bellevue, Washington, a suburb of Seattle. For Microsoft founders Bill Gates and Paul Allen, the move was a homecoming — both men were born in Seattle in the…

Nevine and Richard Mann have started planting crops in their garden in Cornwall, England, in case Britain’s departure from the European Union disrupts food supplies. Credit James Beck for The New York Times REDRUTH, England — Her cupboards are jammed with pasta, rice and couscous — enough to feed a…

There’s a moment during one of Nicki Minaj’s nine Beats 1 “Queen Radio” shows so far where she demands a fellatio sound effect , delivered as an aside in the studio to Jean Nelson, of her management team, rather than directly to the listener. She’s handing out that episode’s “cocksucker of the day…

Stormy Daniels in her “60 Minutes” interview with Anderson Cooper CBS via Getty Images On Sunday night at Nowhere Bar, the 60 Minutes watchers were transfixed — not by Stormy Daniels, but by her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, who has eyes as blue as glacial ice and a chin that could slice fine cheese.…