Early in the pandemic, some headlines argued that covid-19 was the great equalizer—because anyone, no matter their circumstance, could catch it. In reality, it was clear that the virus was affecting some groups of Americans in disproportionate, devastating ways. Black Americans, Hispanic Americans, Indigenous communities, and other people of color have been affected the most, and...
Early this winter, I took a long walk in the Salt Lake City park in which I had been arrested for bathing in a river when I was homeless. About 30 minutes into that walk, I stood across from the park’s granite meditation temple, thinking: Three and a half years ago, I slept under that building’s awning. I can still feel how hard that temple’s cold stone floor was; I remember how people...
NASA has just released the first videos and images taken by the Perseverance rover as it landed—as well as the first sounds ever recorded from the surface of Mars. What happened: On February 18, NASA’s Perseverance rover landed safely on Mars, the end of a journey that began last July. The spacecraft survived its “seven minutes of terror”—its entry through the Martian atmosphere and...