Things have been getting weird on the internet. WSJ reporter Angel Au-Yeung explains what’s behind Moltbook—the viral social network where AI assistants are talking to each other—and how it got started. Plus, WSJ reporter Isabelle Bousquette shares how AI is helping Olympic snowboarder Maddie Mastro improve her jump trick. Belle Lin hosts.
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Rhythm is everywhere. Even if you don’t think you have it, it’s fundamental to humans’ biological systems. Our heartbeat is rhythmic. Speech is rhythmic. Even as babies, humans can track basic rhythm. Researchers wanted to find out if there were more layers to this: Could babies also track melody and more complicated rhythms? So they played Bach for a bunch of sleeping newborns and monitored the babies’ brains to see if they could predict the next note. What they found offers clues about whether melody and rhythm are hard-wired in the human brain or learned over time. We also get into what powers the eating habits of some snakes and chameleons, and insights into the role of sleep in problem-solving.
Have a scientific question you want us to answer? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
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This episode was produced by Jordan-Marie Smith and Rachel Carlson. It was edited by Rebecca Ramirez and Christopher Intagliata. Tyler Jones checked the facts. The audio engineers were Jimmy Keeley and Hannah Gluvna.
He’s discontinuing Tesla’s signature models, taking SpaceX public, and putting more chips on A.I. and robotics. As Elon Musk prepares for his next phase, will he rein in any of his excesses?
And in this week’s Plus segment: Elon in Epstein files.
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Podcast production by Evan Campbell, and Patrick Fort.
Two new books focus on lesser-known chapters of Black history. First, Kings & Pawns tells the story of Jackie Robinson and Paul Robeson, who were pitted against each other during the Red Scare. In today’s episode, author Howard Bryant, a frequent contributor to NPR’s Weekend Edition, speaks with Scott Simon about how the men got caught between patriotism and activism. Then, NPR investigative reporter Cheryl W. Thompson tells NPR’s Ayesha Rascoe about Forgotten Souls, a history of the 27 Tuskegee Airmen who went missing during World War II.
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As the country gears up to commemorate 250 years since the Declaration of Independence, several galleries are exploring the enduring strengths of Native Americans through both traditional and contemporary works. “Paper Trails: Unfolding Indigenous Narratives” at the Museum of Contemporary Native Art in Santa Fe, N.M. aims to stretch the boundaries of the paper medium while also examining Native cultural survival in the face of colonization. “Constellations of Place” at the Center of Southwest Studies at Fort Lewis College is centered on a visual history of Native people in Colorado. And Seattle’s Tidelands Gallery compiles a narrative inspired by “Lushootseed Creation Stories”. We’ll talk with artists and curators about how art inserts itself into the narratives being told about the origin of America.
We’ll also hear about the year-long streaming Native film festival, “Everything is Connected”, developed by Vision Maker Media.
GUESTS
Alana Stone (Sičhą́ǧu Lakȟóta and Diné), curatorial specialist at Vision Maker Media
In Venezuela, families of political prisoners have been rallying outside the Supreme Court in Caracas, chanting for the release of their loved ones. Lawmakers in the country have approved the first step of an amnesty bill introduced by the interim leader, Delcy Rodríguez, in a move towards freeing hundreds of opposition politicians, journalists and human rights activists detained under previous governments.
Also: scandal in Norway as police launch corruption investigation into the former Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland's ties to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Scientists in China find a potential alternative to conventional cervical cancer tests. We find out how South Africa's fight against HIV has been affected by the sweeping cuts to the United States foreign aid programme. Finland becomes the latest country to adopt a priority traffic system, allowing lights to turn green for emergency vehicles. How a previously unknown Michelangelo drawing became an auction sensation. And - why ski jumpers are being accused of a very unusual form of cheating in the run-up to the Winter Olympics.
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Crosby Burns, Chief Digital & Innovation Officer for Marin County, California joins the show for a candid and forward-looking conversation on what digital innovation really means in government today. Together, we explore how a service-first mindset can help governments balance security, accessibility, and trust in an era increasingly shaped by AI, bots, and new digital entry points. We also discuss how Marin County is rethinking public websites as repositories of structured information designed for both humans and machines and how accessibility is about far more than compliance, but about removing friction across the entire citizen journey.
We have another two-for-one special this week, with two more interviews from the floor of re:Invent. First, Ryan welcomes Pathway CEO Zuzanna Stamirowska and CCO Victor Szczerba to dive into their development of Baby Dragon Hatchling, the first post-transformer frontier model, from how continual learning and memory will transform AI to the real-world use cases for longer LLM attention span.
In the second part of this episode, Ryan is joined by Rowan McNamee, co-founder and COO of Mary Technology, to discuss bringing AI into the carefully governed world of litigation and how LLMs are helping lawyers manage and interpret the vast amounts of legal evidence that pass across their desks every day.
Episode notes:
Pathway is building the first post-transformer frontier model that solves for attention span and continual learning.
Mary Technology is an AI for attorneys that turns evidentiary documents into structured, easy-to-review facts.
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