500 Million Years of Change

🪨Critical mineral-rich countries

🧠Pregnancy brain

🐮Greenwashing beef

🛰AI-powered surveillance

And more

Ad-free everything

Your What Can I Do? profile: save & favorite your action steps, connect with other Shit Givers

Vibe Check: Our news homepage, curated daily just for you. Never doomscroll again, thx

Seriously?: The frameworks, models, history, and pop culture we use to understand what’s happening now and next

Half Baked: Weekly briefs to help you think and act on specific, timely issues as they happen

Not Important: My favorite books, art, movies, music, apps, and more that have nothing to do with the jet stream slowing down

Lifetime thanks for directly supporting our work

The youth get a lot of attention in the climate change fight, and they should, but people over 60 have an integral role to play too

Big Tech is underreporting their emissions (which have skyrocketed due to the AI boom) by about 662%, while the Big Three money managers are rejecting ESG resolutions

Microsoft has agreed to buy electricity from the (soon to be reopened) Three Mile Island nuclear power plant

🌎 As we replace coal, oil, and gas with renewables and batteries, the demand for critical minerals is rising. Here are the countries that have the reserves

🌎 Research shows that people in the US and Europe who have endured climate disasters like fires, floods, and heat are still not likely to change how they vote

We know that a woman’s body goes through rapid changes during pregnancy. But what about how hormonal shifts impact the brain? Scientists have developed the first-ever map of the brain over the course of pregnancy

Overdose deaths in the US dropped by 10.6 percent, falling for the first time since 2020

Schools are starting to monitor indoor air quality, so that we can start to set policy to regulate it

Despite the fourteen states that have enacted abortion bans post Dobbs, the number of abortions in the US has risen, with 170,000 people traveling out of their home state to receive abortion care in 2023

Government scientists were pressured to make new chemicals seem safer than they were, and when they pushed back, some of them were removed from their positions

When a product is labeled “recyclable”, most consumers assume that means it won’t end up in a landfill. But trade groups are pressuring regulators to loosen the definition to make plastic appear more sustainable

In other greenwashing news, a major food producer is being sued for labeling their beef as “climate-friendly”

🌎 Floods across Africa could result in dam bursts and disease outbreaks

The hidden environmental costs of food means that plant-based menus could be a better way to spend government money on things like school lunches

Food prices are getting out of hand, to the point that it is becoming a major election issue. And real policy options to lower grocery bills exist

🌍 Google is helping spot wildfires faster by funding an AI-powered satellite constellation

In a move to address growing concerns of the harms of social media to minors, Meta has made teen accounts of Instagram private by default

The CEO of Oracle is pitching an extensive AI-powered surveillance system to improve public safety and police accountability, but many of these systems already exist and have proved to be problematic

Many states are looking to crack down on the use of AI in political campaigns

Mis- and disinformation researchers are struggling due to attacks from politicians, media, and the tech industry

Donate to PowerLines, a group advocating for public interest as the utility regulatory system is modernized through the clean energy transition.

🌍 Volunteer to test your beliefs by using DeBunkBot, a conspiracy debunking AI built by researchers at MIT.

🌍 Get educated about the best global health practices in early childhood development by taking this self-paced course from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health.

Be heard about getting DC statehood and urge your representation to support the Washington DC Admission Act.

🌎 Invest in climate tech that measurably moves the needle by using The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis to help you separate hype from reality.