Lego abandons effort to make bricks from recycled plastic bottles Lego has stopped a project to make bricks from recycled drinks bottles instead of oil-based plastic, saying it would have led to higher carbon emissions over the product’s lifetime. Tags: additivism, environment, lego, plastic, plasticene, recycling, toys

High-flying microplastics could pose a threat to the ozone layer Microplastics may float higher in Earth’s atmosphere than previously thought, posing a risk that they might release chemicals that damage the ozone layer. Tags: additivism, air, environment, microplastic, plastic, plasticene, pollution

Capitalism is dead: long live Technofeudalism I once heard an elderly Friedrich von Hayek begin a tirade against socialist planning with a charming personal tale. “The other day,” he said playfully, “I went into a shop. Tags: .teaching, additivism, capitalism, module, progress, technofeudalism

We Don’t Need Another Antihero In Walter Isaacson’s new biography of Elon Musk, the focus on psychology diverts us from the questions we should be asking about the world’s richest man. This past December, Elon Musk’s extended family gathered for Christmas. Tags: .teaching, additivism, big tech, elon musk, ethics, identity, politics

Scientists Collect Entirely New Type of Virus From Marianas Trench Ocean Abyss Scientists have discovered a novel marine virus that lives at an astonishing depth of 8,900 meters (roughly 5.5 miles) under the ocean surface, making it the deepest known isolated phage ever found in the global seas, reports a new study. Tags: additivism, deep ocean, deep sea, life, marianas trench, ocean, science, virus, viruses

Paper straws contain more potentially toxic ‘forever chemicals’ than plastic. Should you give them up? Picture the scene: you are sitting at a cafe on a hot summer’s day and decide to order a glass of lemonade. It arrives ice cold and you smile in contentment until the waiter asks if you want a straw. Now you have to choose to either take a straw or not. Tags: additivism, environment, manufacturing, mass production, materials, ocean, plastic, recycling, straws, toxic, waste

NASA Brags That in Just Two Years, It Generated Enough Oxygen for a Small Dog to Breathe for 10 Hours Since 2021, NASA's Perseverance rover has been roaming the desolate surface of Mars, collecting samples and probing the area for signs of ancient microbial life. Tags: additivism, dogs, nasa, oxygen, space

Robots Are Already Killing People The AI boom only underscores a problem that has existed for years. The robot revolution began long ago, and so did the killing. One day in 1979, a robot at a Ford Motor Company casting plant malfunctioned—human workers determined that it was not going fast enough. Tags: .teaching, additivism, ai, imperialism, progress, robotics, robots, technology, war

Florida Man Arrested for Trying to Cross Ocean in "Hamster Wheel"... Again If at first you don't succeed, try, try again — well, until the Coast Guard arrests you. The Florida resident, who's also a former professional cyclist, was stopped about 70 miles into his planned 4,000-mile oceanic trek. Tags: additivism, law, ocean, travel, usa

Tags: additivism, biomimicry, insects, mimicry, nature, parasites, parasitism, superorganisms, termites, weird

Dinosaur Legs Grown On Genetically Modified Chicken Embryos In World First Sixty-six million years ago, the age of the dinosaurs came to a dramatic close as a huge asteroid impact accelerated them on a path towards extinction. Not all of them died out, however; those that survived went on to become today’s birds. Tags: additivism, dinosaurs, genetic engineering

The Monstrous Crochet Creations of ChatGPT Like a lot of people, Alex Woolner was instantly fascinated by ChatGPT, the AI-powered chatbot which took the internet by storm when it launched in November 2022. Tags: .teaching, additivism, ai, art, chatgpt, crochet, design, generative ai, generative art, glitch, glitch art, knitting, language models, weird

Raspberry Pi Tells Your Fortune with ChatGPT and Game Boy Parts We’ve seen our fair share of Raspberry Pi-powered fortune teller projects over the years, but this is the first one we’ve seen that’s housed inside a full-sized arcade cabinet made with recycled Game Boy components. Tags: .teaching, additivism, ai, chatgpt, hacktivism

Climate Justice in the Anthropocene: An Introductory Reading List As the alarm bells have made it urgently clear—humanity has breached planetary boundaries—causing anthropogenic climate change and environmental disaster across the world. Tags: activism, additivism, anthropocene, climate change, climate justice, environment, syllabus