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Mushroom Madness 
Fungi can cure or kill, nourish life, and also decompose it back into soil. Fossil evidence for fungi is limited, but the ability to analyze molecular data has led to revelations about the evolution of this extraordinary family of...
Fool’s Gold: The Myth of Tiburcio Vasquez 
“And still of a winter’s night, they say,  when the wind is in the trees, When the moon is a ghostly galleon  tossed upon cloudy seas,    When the road is a ribbon of moonlight  over the purple moor,    A...
Billions in Flight: Migratory Birds 
Autumn doesn’t officially begin until the equinox on September 22, but all across North America birds are already on the wing—billions of them. Migration times and destinations vary based on the species and variables like weather and food sources—some...
One-Room Schoolhouse 
Back to school. A hundred years ago in Topanga, it would have been on foot—and often barefoot—to the little, red, one-room schoolhouse by the creek in the bend of the dirt road.  Public education in California was still relatively...
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Caravan 

In Central America’s Forgotten History: Revolution, Violence. And the Roots of Migration (2021), Latin America historian Aviva Chomsky makes the clear case that immigration problems on the United States’ southern border are a direct consequence of an aggressive foreign...
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Bob Lee 

In Robert E. Lee and Me: A Southerner’s Reckoning with the Myth of the Lost Cause, historian Ty Seidule knocks Confederate General Robert E. Lee off his high horse. Seidule is a retired US Army Brigadier General and current...
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A Science Lesson 

In Nature’s Mutiny: How the Little Ice Age of the Long Seventeenth Century Transformed the West and Shaped the Present (2017), best-selling historian Philipp Blom documents the effects of climate change on the development of Western civilization.  As recently...
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Half of Us 

The story of America’s founding has been informed largely by the record of the white men of means at its center. During the past half-century or so, however, a concerted effort has been made to account for the experiences...
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Life is Good 

In Enlightenment Now: The Case For Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress, evolutionary psychologist Steven Pinker defies the persistent drumbeat of negativity that floods our avenues of information. Through six dozen graphs that break down the vitality of the human...
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Uncle Joe 

Dear Uncle Joe, Given the general attitude towards government in the twenty-first century, it occurs to me that the expectations surrounding your recent promotion are rather low. With that said, you have been pursuing this job for quite some...