Is it possible to preserve and read memories after someone has died? Robert McIntyre thinks it is, and that the technology is closer than most people realize. His company Nectome is working on documenting the physical properties of memory formation, and studying ways to preserve those physical properties after death. McIntyre has already won . . .   Read More

The future is a kind of history that hasn’t happened yet. The past is a kind of future that has already happened. The present moment vanishes before it can be described. Language, a human invention, lacks the power to fully adhere to reality. We live in a very short now and here, since . . .   Read More

The ambition to think on the scale of thousands, millions, even billion of years emerged in the 19th century. Historian and author Caroline Winterer chronicles how the concept of “deep time” has inspired and puzzled thinkers in cognitive science, art, geology (and elsewhere) to become one of the most 
influential ideas of . . .   Read More

As the world is becoming more technologically connected, finding time for oneself and face-to-face connections is becoming increasingly difficult.  Many of our talks at Long Now have aimed to help expand our collective now by centuries or even millennia, but what about our personal present?  Tiffany . . .   Read More

Introducing wide-scale refrigeration to a nation’s food system brings about massive changes. Podcaster and journalist Nicola Twilley was able to witness those changes in real-time during a visit to China, where the amount of refrigerated space has grown more than 20x in the past ten years. . .   Read More

The process of world-building in science fiction isn’t just about coming to grips with the consequences of your narrative arc and making it believable. It’s also about imagining a better world.

Primatologist Elizabeth Lonsdorf shares the story of Jane Goodall and Dian Fossey, two of the three ‘Trimates’ who revolutionized the field of primatology with their studies of gorillas and chimpanzees.

From the Conversation at The Interval, “Growing Up Ape: The Long-term Science of Studying Our Closest Living Relatives” by. . .   Read More

Stewart Brand explains the theory behind the Pleistocene Park project, which for the last 3 decades has been placing grazing animals on Siberia’s tundra to recreate the mammoth steppe habitat of the Pleistocene epoch.

From the Conversation at The Interval, “Siberia: A Journey to the Mammoth Steppe. . .   Read More

In our opening Conversation at The Interval for 02019, Stewart Brand, Kevin Kelly and Executive Director Alexander Rose discuss a 02018 research trip that witnessed the ongoing restoration of a part of Siberia back to its Pleistocene-era ecosystem. The team brought back DNA samples to evaluate for mammoth de-extinction, and lots of photos. . .   Read More

In a recent talk at The Interval, Kim Stanley Robinson, Ursula K Le Guin’s student 40 years ago and now a celebrated science fiction writer himself, reflects on Le Guin the teacher, 
her impact on his work, and how she changed the world. Watch the full video here. . .   Read More