Editor’s Note: We’ll be running the article recommendations of our friends at TNR Reader each afternoon on The Plank, just in time to print out or save for your commute home. Enjoy!
The end of odor: Just how bad did Americans smell before Edna Murphey brought us antiperspirant?
Smithsonian Magazine | 8 min (1,985 words)
Could Germany’s circumcision ban be the worst attack on Jewish life since the Holocaust?
Dissent | 9 min (2,233 words)
Mutual Assured Ignorance: Can the Pentagon and the State Department ever work together effectively?
Foreign Policy | 6 min (1,549 words)
Is consciousness a simple matter of firing neurons, or something far more complex? Giulio Tononi imagines Galileo’s quest to find the answer.
Scientific American | 17 min (4,251 words)