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Nature has released an audio long read discussing concerns that heavy reliance on large language models could weaken people's critical thinking abilities. The episode draws on research from education and cognitive science specialists who study how reasoning skills develop and can be maintained. It outlines practical strategies researchers suggest for staying cognitively sharp while using AI tools.
Nature's careers team hosted a 60-minute webinar last month examining whether graduate students' growing use of AI tools for literature searches, presentations, coding and paper summaries is weakening core doctoral skills. The session, moderated by science journalist Julie Gould, featured three panellists and a live audience Q&A, and a recording is now publicly available.
A short opinion piece contends that calling any group of people 'stupid' is itself a sign of not thinking carefully. The author argues intelligence is better understood as an action—thinking things through—rather than a fixed trait, and that jumping to conclusions, including the conclusion that others are stupid, is the real failure of reasoning.
Journalist James Marriott's book 'The New Dark Ages: The End of Reading and the Dawn of a Post-Literate Society' argues that reading built modern civilization, including science and democracy, and that its decline threatens rational thought. Marriott contends that even popular fiction engages readers with complex ideas in ways film, television and video games cannot replicate.
According to Axios, leadership at major AI labs including OpenAI and Anthropic are privately running scenario-planning exercises for a catastrophic incident in which an AI system disrupts critical infrastructure such as finance, telecom, or utilities. OpenAI confirmed it conducts such preparedness exercises but said the scenarios are not treated as inevitable. Anthropic has separately listed existential risk to humanity as a factor in its IPO prospectus.
The FBI and Justice Department announced the seizure and disabling of two hacking tools, 'Microscan' and 'FishHub,' used by the group known as Flax Typhoon to scan networks and conduct phishing attacks. Targets reportedly included a U.S. power company, airports in Japan and Poland, Taiwanese universities, an international NGO, and Taiwanese infrastructure firms. Officials say the operation was run by China-based Integrity Technology Group, which the FBI identifies as the actual entity behind Flax Typhoon.
Brimstone announced in early 2025 that its innovative process can extract not only materials for cement and concrete but also smelter-grade alumina and various critical minerals like steel, magnesium, and titanium from silicate rocks. The company claims this integrated approach could tap into a $2.4 trillion global market and reduce energy use and waste compared to traditional methods.
Physicists at Brookhaven National Laboratory's RHIC facility analyzed about 1 billion gold-nuclei collisions and found that particle momentum variations, instead of changing smoothly with collision energy, dipped before rising again. The STAR collaboration published the results on Sept. 22 in Physical Review Letters, noting the signal is statistically robust but not yet proof of a long-theorized transition point in nuclear matter.
The University of Vermont's Larner College of Medicine is leading a research project awarded as much as $38 million to study whether digital twins can simulate how critically ill patients respond to treatments. The initiative targets ICU decision-making, where clinicians must weigh variables such as unusual immune responses when choosing therapies.
In her new book Better Tech: Putting People First in Cyberspace, computer scientist Francine Berman argues that digital technologies like search engines and social media should be regulated with the same seriousness as roads, power grids and financial systems. She contends search engines crossed the threshold into critical infrastructure once online search became the primary way people find information and make decisions.
A commentary published in Nature contends that patent activity alone cannot guarantee reliable supply chains for critical minerals used in clean energy and technology manufacturing. The piece suggests that intellectual property metrics fail to capture the broader industrial, geopolitical and infrastructure factors that determine whether minerals can actually be extracted, processed and delivered.
Recorded Future's Insikt Group reports that Russia is combining influence operations, cyberattacks, and physical incursions across Europe as part of its broader war effort against Ukraine. Examples cited include the CopyCop network impersonating European news outlets with AI-generated content, drone incursions near Estonia's border, and a Russian drone intercepted near Romania's Neptun Deep gas project in the Black Sea.