Weekend Reads

Scientists discover a lake under the sea: Those who swim there never come back alive

The water in the "lake within the sea" is about five times as salty as the water surrounding it. It also contains highly toxic concentrations of methane and hydrogen sulfide and can thus not mix with the surrounding sea.

Google AI invents its own cryptographic algorithm; no one knows how it works

The AIs were not told how to encrypt stuff, or what crypto techniques to use: they were just given a loss function (a failure condition), and then they got on with it.

The Curious Have Won

Monkey 'tools' raise questions over human archaeological record

The capuchins make the fragments unintentionally while bashing rocks into dust, the researchers find. Some scientists say that the results call into question whether some stone tools have been incorrectly attributed to hominins — including 3.3-million-year-old artefacts from Kenya that are the oldest on record.

The Great Republican Revolt

The angriest and most pessimistic people in America are the people we used to call Middle Americans. Middle-class and middle-aged; not rich and not poor; people who are irked when asked to press 1 for English, and who wonder how white male became an accusation rather than a description.

'Planet Nine' Can't Hide Much Longer, Scientists Say

Those Martian settlements sound great, but something important is missing

Beer Company Develops Edible Six-Pack Rings That Feed, Rather Than Kill, Marine Life

The rings are created from beer by-products during the brewing process, such as barley and wheat, and are completely safe for humans and fish to eat. In addition, the invention is 100% biodegradable and compostable.

What Happened When I Moved My Company To A 5-Hour Workday

In exchange, though, I had a big ask: I needed each of my team members to be twice as productive as the average worker. We had a high bar of productivity to clear before this, and that didn't change. I told them they just needed to figure out how to do it all in just five hours now—but there'd be support: we'd all need to figure it out and were in this together.

What It's Like To Quit Your Job To Be A Competitive Drone Racer

Finding practice space can be difficult. Pilots sometimes practice in abandoned, graffitied warehouses, factories or other buildings — in part for the dramatic footage — or parks when they're not crowded. Zachry Thayer, one pilot at the DR1 race, said he was from California but recently moved to Colorado with another pilot, in part because the airspace was less crowded.

Hello Goodbye

This Celebrity Chef Wants to Revolutionize Your Burger

Indeed, Patterson and his business partner, Los Angeles food truck king Roy Choi, admit that their mission is a little crazy: They promise to use high-quality ingredients and pay employees a living wage—all while keeping prices low. (A cup of coffee is $2 and a cheeseburger costs $5.)