You'd think that galaxies from the young universe would still be thriving, but that's not necessarily the case. Researchers at the Niels Bohr Institute and the National Observatory of Japan have discovered the farthest known dying galaxy (that is, with greatly suppressed star formation) known to date at about 12 billion light-years away. In other…

After laying out his relationship with technology and offering a few examples where innovation has had unintended negative consequences, Pichai makes the case that while AI is powerful and useful, we must balance its "potential harms... with social opportunities." Of course, this call for "balance" leaves some questions about how tight of regulation Pichai is…

Apple had likely hoped for a pair of trophies, as Billy Crudup had won as best actor in a drama series at the Critic's Choice Awards. However, that prize was taken by Peter Dinklage for HBO's Game of Thrones. Another surprise was Amazon's ensemble in a comedy series win for The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, since…

Out of the seven concepts, envisioned by five different designers, the one that got published was a motorcycle-like vehicle called Zero Gravity. While it's supposed to be ridden like a motorbike, it doesn't have wheels -- it was designed with magnetic levitation in mind.Concept art: Karl Dujardin/LexusThe other concepts are just as interesting, though. There's…

We like to think modern culture moves at a dizzying pace, fueled by a relentless parade of new works of music, literature, and technological design. Change in nature, by contrast, seems to follow a slower trajectory as genetic mutations over generations give animals bigger teeth, say, or a better camouflage. But maybe the opposite is…

This story originally appeared on Yale Environment360 and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.As public concern about plastic pollution rises, consumers are reaching for canvas bags, metal straws, and reusable water bottles. But while individuals fret over images of oceanic garbage gyres, the fossil fuel and petrochemical industries are pouring billions of dollars into…

Li Yang grew up in what he thought was a boring town. It was called 404, like the error code, and sat a couple hours from the nearest city, in the sun-beaten Gobi Desert of western China. There was no commercial movie theater—just a zoo with a handful of cages, several small video game arcades,…

Hello, welcome to an all-new edition of The Monitor, WIRED’s entertainment news roundup. What’s been happening the last few days? Lots of television news. Let’s dig in.HBO Likely Won’t Make a Second Season of WatchmenHave you been wondering what happened to Regina King after she stepped into that pool in the season finale of Watchmen?…

"Techlash," the rising public animosity toward big tech companies and their impacts on society, will continue to define the state of the tech world in 2020. Government leaders, historically the stewards of protecting society from the impacts of new innovations, are becoming exasperated at the inability of traditional policymaking to keep up with the unprecedented…

On the outskirts of Zahle, a town in Lebanon’s Beqaa Valley, a pair of aid workers carrying clipboards and cell phones walk through a small refugee camp, home to 11 makeshift shelters built from wood and tarps.A camp resident leading them through the settlement—one of many in the Beqaa, a wide agricultural plain between Beirut…