your science briefing for 05.14.2025

Letting SpaceX litter in orbit to its heart's content, the stunning failure rate of "AI-first" projects, the dead internet continues to die, and more...

Space is a very big place. Lower Earth orbit, however, is not. It’s full of junk that’s very difficult to clean up, and if we let the problem get bad enough, we could trigger what’s known as a Kessler cascade, and get stuck on our planet because space travel would become too dangerous to reasonably attempt for centuries. So, of course, the Trump administration is shutting down efforts to figure out how to prevent this because Elon Musk has satellites to launch and doesn’t need to be bothered to do it responsibly, or in a way that doesn’t endanger the future of space exploration… (The Guardian)

Inflammation is killing you. No, really. Inflammation caused by stress, inactivity, injury, immune overreaction, and malicious genes has been linked to everything from obesity to cancer. Basically, it’s your body working too hard for too long, doing things it really shouldn’t be doing for extended periods of time, damaging itself in the process. Given this foundation, it seems almost natural that mental conditions could be triggered by a bad bout of inflammation. What’s surprising is that psychedelics, when used properly, in clinical doses and settings, can lower that inflammation and change the interaction between the brain and immune system for the better… (ScienceAlert)

Automation is reshaping every facet of our lives, challenging everything from our long held ideas about politics, economics, and society, to how we see humanity change in the very near, and very far, future. But for now, we still appear to be a necessary evil. A fintech company named Klarna bragged about moving to AI and eliminating a quarter of its agents for years. Now, it’s quietly admitting that dealing with too many chatbots just made customers upset, quality dropped, and it needs to bring humans back. Even more telling, this backpedaling on AI-first strategies is the norm, as only one in four AI projects manage to deliver on their promises to any degree… (Fortune)

The web is dying and chatbots are eating it alive. Google was already facing backlash from users over its less than accurate results, complete disregard for where it gets its searchable information and how it treats writers and publishers. But now, it might also be in hot water with its investors as more and more people are using chatbots instead of searching on Google. Not only does that mean less ad revenue for the giant, but an incoming flood of bad information from frequently hallucinating LLMs that confidently lie to its users without knowing any better… (Platformer)

In yet another edition of our MAGA Nurgle RFK Jr., a living menace to public health put in charge of the future of American healthcare, sabotaging good things, we have very promising results from Phase III trials of a new combination flu and COVID vaccine. It’s meant to be a convenient and effective way to protect yourself from the two seasonal menaces in one injection, its data looks great, but new and medically unethical rules by the anti-vaccine crank and the fact that it uses mRNA technology, might doom the shot from coming to a pharmacy or doctor near you anytime soon… (Gizmodo)