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Note to the Reader
The Editors
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forecast
Modeling the End of Monkeypox
Jared Leibowich
The journalistic and public health response to the US monkeypox outbreak was noisy and contentious. What tools do we have for predicting its spread?
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review
What We Owe The Future
Kelsey Piper
William MacAskill’s latest book presents itself as an introduction to the burgeoning longtermist movement. But his views are eccentric – even within the movement he founded.
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interview
Making Sense of Moral Change
Christopher Leslie Brown
A conversation about abolitionism, moral progress, and the pitfalls of historical counterfactuals.
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interview
How to Prevent the Next Pandemic
Kevin Esvelt
Modern technology makes bioterrorism seem increasingly likely. If we can get our act together, there are smart ways to prevent it.
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Rebuilding After the Replication Crisis
Stuart Ritchie
Over a decade has passed since scientists realized many of their studies were failing to replicate. How well have their attempts to fix the problem actually worked?
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Why Isn’t the Whole World Rich?
Dietrich Vollrath
The question of why some countries join the developed world while others remain in poverty has vexed economists for decades. What makes it so hard to answer?
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Is Wine Fake?
Scott Alexander
Wine commands wealth, prestige, and attention from aficionados. How much of what they admire is in their heads?
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China’s Silicon Future
Karson Elmgren
China dreams of competing with global superpowers in the semiconductor industry. Whether its efforts will succeed is far from clear.
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The Illogic of Nuclear Escalation
Fred Kaplan
How much is enough? It’s the most basic question in the nuclear arms race. For over sixty years, few have asked it, and even fewer have received an answer.
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fiction
They May as Well Grow on Trees
Xander Balwit
The Future of Genetically Engineered Livestock
01: Inaugural Issue
Asterisk is a quarterly journal of writing and clear thinking about things that matter. We’re for Bayes’ theorem, acknowledging our uncertainty, wild imaginations, and well-constructed sentences. We’re against easy answers, lazy metaphors, and the end of life as we know it.