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I’ve started a list of blogs that relate to the topics I’m going to cover here. I constructed the list from familiarity, memory, and whatever I’ve come across while putting together this network of Human Nature pages. I’m sure I’ve forgotten to include a lot of good sites, no doubt including some that belong to friends and other deserving folks. I can’t put everyone on the list, but if I’ve left out a site you think is worth including, please let me know. You can email me at human@slate.com, or, better yet (since I have trouble keeping up with that email account), post your nomination in the discussion thread I’ve started in the Fray. I’ll review the nominations in that thread and periodically update the list. Feel free to nominate non-blog sites as well: magazines, newspaper sections, columnists, institutions, etc.
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In the right margin of this blog, you’ll see a column of links called “Human Nature Network.” This is the team of pages through which I’ll try to cover developments in the field of science, technology, and life. The home page summarizes the latest updates from each part of the network. If you’re looking for a page to bookmark, that’s the page I recommend, since it can take you almost everywhere else. The news page has the latest stuff, but only as headlines with links. The purpose of this page is to plug you into all the interesting news I see every day that I don’t have time to write about. The hot topics page is for tracking other current commentary on the Web: magazines, journal articles, blog posts, etc. These are the two places to go for regular updates and variety. The blog is for the narrower range of stuff I have something to say about. I expect it to be pretty informal and provisional. The essays section is for the topics I set aside to research and think through more fully. The discussions link takes you to the Human Nature Fray, where you can start or join a thread on whatever topic interests you. The books page lists recent books in this area. The links page shows you where to find the best news in science, tech, and health, plus my blogroll.
We’re trying to set this up so you can get to almost any page on the network from any other. If you think there’s a better way to design anything in the network, please let us know by posting your ideas in the feedback thread.
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Slate has always taken an experimental approach to journalism. New formats, new designs, new beats, new media. Human Nature has been one such experiment: a department that covers science and technology from the standpoint of culture and politics.
It's time once again to experiment within the experiment.
If you've followed Human Nature for the last three years, you've seen two formats: essays of around 1,000 words and short news items of around 100 to 150 words. The short items were designed to compress news and debates to save reading time. The downside is that in terms of research and analysis, they've been pretty laborious. And I've often felt that I was compressing and simplifying material somewhat artificially to fit the format. I needed more flexibility to fit the variety of stuff this department covers. So I'm chucking the items. Instead, I'm going to try covering subjects in three ways. I'll still write essays as I come across topics that merit them. For news that's just weird and interesting, I'll supply headline-only links. For stuff that's in between, I'll use this blog. It'll be more loose and conversational than the items were. I'll try to honor the spirit of science, the Internet, and healthy debate: reflective but provisional.
If you're new to Human Nature, here's its basic idea: We live in an age of science and technology. Discoveries about ourselves and the world, coupled with our increasing power to transform both, are changing how we live, what we think, and who we are. Human Nature is a place to learn, think, and talk about these changes. It's not an elite science journal or a medical news digest. It's a place for people who are interested in what's driving politics and society. What's driving them, increasingly, is science.
So let's get started.