From Technology Review, an article on the 70 online databases that define our planet. Navigating past nihilism: Thirty years before Nietzsche pronounced God dead, Herman Melville was charting a course out of the abyss. In the age of sharing every tiny scrap of our lives, Devin Friedman socializes with the barely pubescent geniuses of Silicon Valley and asks: What is the endgame of your revolution, and can you promise me it won't suck? America's Most Dangerous Publisher: For Adam Parfrey, publishing the Unabomber's book is all in a day's work. Why are there tax havens? Adam H. Rosenzweig investigates. How not to solve the European debt crisis: The new legal tools Angela Merkel is touting aren't new and won't work. Is Germany and German Prime Minister Angela Merkel to blame for Europe's euro debt crisis? Secrets have long been the governing paradigm in national security and government intelligence, but the scientific challenges we face today demand a new ethic of openness. Turns out it's not that great for most of us: 3 reasons why the mortgage tax break isn't a break. What can we learn from literary frauds? David Bellos celebrates the art of the literary hoax from Plato to the present. Why we treat things like people: Cursing computers, talking to plants, even putting pigs on trial — anthropomorphism may be irrational, but it's how we cope with an indifferent world. What can the first how-to book for fiction still tell us?
