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Williams Toyota Lift celebrates 80 years
In the latest business roundup, we share news on Williams Toyota Lift, Liberty HealthShare, Timken, Advanced Industrial Roofing and other companies.
Burcum: This small Minnesota hospital is charting its own path to financial health
As Minnesota health care consolidates, Northfield Hospital + Clinics is a bright spot in a health care landscape characterized by strain, columnist Jill Burcum writes.
Commanders' Marcus Mariota disrespected in new backup QB rankings
Marcus Mariota gets no respect in these new rankings.
Trump Looms Over Pivotal Republican Senate Runoff in Georgia
The president has not yet endorsed Representative Mike Collins or Derek Dooley, a former football coach, in the race to challenge the Democratic senator, Jon Ossoff.
Evaluating Expand Energy (EXE) After Business Shift And Barclays Downgrade
Analyst downgrade meets business reset at Expand Energy Expand Energy (EXE) is back in focus after the company outlined a new emphasis on gas marketing and commercial optimization, while Barclays downgraded the stock, highlighting a weaker gas outlook and fewer clear near term catalysts. See our latest analysis for Expand Energy. At a share price of $92.07, the stock has fallen about 15% to 20% on a 3 month and 1 year share price basis, while 3 and 5 year total shareholder returns remain...
Walmart Lists Gears Of War: E-Day PS5 Ahead Of Xbox Showcase
The upcoming shooter is at the center of a battle over the future of Xbox exclusivity
Hideo Kojima Says He's No Longer Interested In AI
The Death Stranding 2 directly recently appeared in an AI-generated promo for a new art exhibit
Assessing Tencent Music Entertainment Group (NYSE:TME) Valuation After A Prolonged Share Price Decline
Recent performance snapshot Tencent Music Entertainment Group (TME) has been under pressure, with the stock down 2.4% on the day, 1.5% over the past week, and 33.9% over the past 3 months. Over the past year, the stock has declined 48.1%. The current share price is US$9.08 and the market value is about US$14.3b, with reported annual revenue of CN¥33,441 and net income of CN¥8,856. See our latest analysis for Tencent Music Entertainment Group. For context, the stock’s 1 year total shareholder...
The Key Things We Learned about the Vikings This Spring
It’s safe to say the Minnesota Vikings’ offseason is over, as the club reported to organized team activities last week […]
West River Health Science Center graduates 122 nurses in first full year
The West River Health Science Center graduated 122 registered nurses in its first full year. Monument Health says scholarships and partnerships are growing the region’s nursing pipeline.
West River Health Science Center graduates 122 nurses in first full year
The West River Health Science Center graduated 122 registered nurses in its first full year. Monument Health says scholarships and partnerships are growing the region’s nursing pipeline.
'Probably the most visibility the city will receive through sports globally, maybe ever’: Notable quotes from a week of Chattanooga area news
People who had a way with words in the news last week:
Royals 3, Twins 2: Blowing it Scott-Style
Close and late situations are not the friend of the 2026 Minnesota Twins. After a leadoff homer made it 1-0 Royals, Joe Ryan settled down for six innings of one-run ball, as Royal righty Luinder Avila matched him with five two-hit frames, walking three and allowing one run in a bases-loaded, no-out situation that the […]
Walking Forward cancer program returns to Monument Health after decades serving Native communities
Walking Forward is returning to Monument Health, continuing its work to reduce cancer disparities through navigation, education and screenings for Native communities in western South Dakota.
These Vikings Storylines Aren’t Getting Enough Buzz
The major storylines for the Minnesota Vikings are apparent this summer: Will Kyler Murray easily win the quarterback battle? Will […]
Stellar Blade Blood Rain Trailer Reveal Is Raising AI Alarm Bells
Some believe Stellar Blade: Blood Rain's reveal trailer includes elements that are 'very visibly AI slop'
The Popular Vikings Players Who Could Be Cut This Summer
In late August, the Minnesota Vikings, along with 31 other teams, will prune their rosters from 90 to 53 players, […]
Assessing Caesars Entertainment (CZR) Valuation As Digital Growth Supports A 12.4% Undervaluation Estimate
Recent performance snapshot Caesars Entertainment (CZR) has drawn fresh attention after recent trading, with the stock last closing at $29.20. Short term performance has been mixed, with a slight decline over the past day but a small gain over the past week. See our latest analysis for Caesars Entertainment. At around $29.20, the stock has recently posted a 1-month share price return of 5.19% and a year to date share price return of 23.94%. The 1-year total shareholder return of 13.49%...
Vikings-Backed Girls Flag Football Is Taking Off in Minnesota
In a matter of days, Minnesota will see its newest girls’ flag football champion crowned. After officially commencing play in […]
The 5 Most Interesting Vikings Players Entering Summer
The Minnesota Vikings’ summer calendar is about to hit the pause button, but before too long, training camp will heat […]
007 First Light officially sells 2.7 million copies, "probably" at three million
IOI CEO says game has yet to recoup but total cost is well below $200 million previously reported
The Bidens Return With New Book and South Dakota Speech Targeting Trump
The re-emergence of the former first family has been fraught for some Democrats who just want to move on.
Monster Hunter Wilds Is So Back With Big Ascendance Expansion
Capcom is all in on supporting Nintendo's latest handheld hybrid
Brian Flores Won an Award Out of Nowhere
It is not award season in the NFL by any stretch of the imagination, but that didn’t stop Minnesota Vikings […]
Jets will hold joint practices with Buccaneers during training camp
During OTAs this week Jets head coach Aaron Glenn announced that the team will conduct joint practices with the Tampa Bay Buccaneers ahead of the teams’ preseason game in August. Joint practices with the opponent before a preseason game are becoming more and more common. Teams have become very reluctant to put prominent players on […]
What is Auburn’s pitching plan for its must-win game against Ole Miss?
Who will be Auburn's starting pitcher in its pivotal Game 2 matchup with Ole Miss?
Cowboys news: What the first week of OTAs revealed
Check out the latest news surrounding the Dallas Cowboys!
A total solar eclipse will occur this summer. Everything you need to know
A total solar eclipse will occur on August 12, visible in parts of Greenland, Iceland, Spain and Portugal.
Potawatomi Zoo hosts free admission day for children
Potawatomi Zoo offers free admission for children ages 14 and younger on June 10 during its annual Children's Day event.
2027 NFL Draft Summer Scouting Report: LJ Martin, RB, BYU
BYU has a dynamic offense that doesn't get the shine it deserves, but that doesn't stop LJ Martin.
An Early Mock Trade To Give The Pirates’ Bullpen Help
The Pittsburgh Pirates’ bullpen is about as bad as one can get while not rebuilding. They’ve caused multiple late blown leads and heartbreaking disasters. The unfortunate reality is that no notable relievers are getting moved yet. ESPN’s Buster Olney even reported this. However, there might still be an opportunity for the Pirates to add someone. …
A tiny atomic shift gives scientists powerful control over metals
A team at the University of Minnesota discovered that changing a metal film's thickness by just a few nanometers can dramatically alter how it behaves electronically. The finding reveals a surprising new way to control metals and could help power future advances in electronics, catalysis, and quantum technology.
North Dakota Found Guilty of Tampering Violations
The Hawks will face a series of minor repercussions.
Control Resonant Deals With Trauma And Redemption
If you watch the latest Control Resonant gameplay footage, you’ll see a game that takes the fascinating supernatural world of Control and melds it with the exhilarating and fast-paced melee combat of a character-action game. It’s new territory for Remedy Entertainment, a studio that has primarily made games where protagonists shoot guns, but that genre...
This New Game Wants To Change Cover Shooters Forever
Crossfire's adaptive cover system is amazing and could be a real game changer for the genre
Stranger Than Heaven Resurrects Tupac Shakur
Stranger Than Heaven will feature the digital zombie of Tupac Shakur.
Wie West's journey back ends with missed cut at Riviera
2014 U.S. Women's Open winner Michelle Wie West carded a 75-74 in her two rounds at Riviera putting her behind the projected cut. Here are some other notable names not making it to the weekend.
Trump admin’s cancellation of wind energy projects causes business turmoil
Seven northeastern states have sued US gov't for paying TotalEnergies to withdraw from offshore wind projects.
North Dakota Today - Harmon Entertainment, more than a DJ
recurring recording of North Dakota Today on KVLY
New Elden Ring Footage Seemingly Showcases Switch 2 Performance, And It Looks Good
Nothing tarnished about this
Edina Art Fair, Lionel Richie among Minnesota’s biggest entertainment events in June
A.J. Brown to Patriots, Drake London extension among headlines from OTAs this week that we're tracking for fantasy football
Sony, Amazon Unsure If Their Supply Chains Funded Armed Conflict In 2025
Do PlayStation 5s and Amazon Basics headsets fund armed conflict? Who knows!
Trump administration’s proposed rule would limit some immigrants’ ability to legally work in the U.S.
The proposal would make it harder for several categories of immigrants -- notably those in the U.S. on humanitarian parole as well as DACA recipients -- to obtain or renew legal work authorization.
Brand new direct-feed Elden Ring Nintendo Switch 2 footage released
After much anticipation, Elden Ring Tarnished Edition received its release date on Nintendo Switch 2 yesterday, and now we have some direct-feed footage to follow up on that. What’s interesting is how little we’ve seen of the port so far. We got the announcement trailer for the reveal of Nintendo Switch 2 exactly one year ago, but that was it....
Falcons face pivotal decision on Florida football alum Kyle Pitts
Trade speculation is swirling around former Florida All-American Kyle Pitts after the star tight end comes off an all-pro season.
How Did Summer Game Fest 2025's Biggest Games Do
Resident Evil Requiem and 007 Last Light were big hits while MindsEye and Splitgate 2 were not
‘No known exposures’ after measles detected in Brookings county child, health department says
South Dakota health officials have flagged the state’s ninth case of measles this year, according to the state Health Department.
Trump looms large over upcoming primary elections in Washington, DC
Washington, D.C., is gearing up for pivotal primaries this month to elect a new delegate to Congress and a new mayor.
Trump Looms Large Over Upcoming Primary Elections in Washington, DC
WASHINGTON (AP) — The last time Washington, D.C., residents chose a new delegate to Congress and a new mayor in the same election, gas was $1.33 a gallon and George H.W. Bush was president. This fall they will do it again — under starkly different circumstances. As the city heads toward pivotal ...
Iraq: 2026 World Cup Squad, Fixtures and Schedule
Iraq end a 40-year wait at the FIFA World Cup this summer as the Lions of Mesopotamia return to football’s biggest stage for the first time since Mexico 1986.Their last appearance brought three defe...
The Republican lawmakers who tried to modify abortion bans and became political targets
At least four Republican lawmakers across the country have lost reelection bids after anti-abortion groups and key party allies backed their challengers instead. Two others face contested primaries, including one in North Dakota.
Trump unfazed by GOP revolt as lawmakers seek political distance
The president has reacted to recent setbacks, notably the resistance of congressional Republicans, with angry defiance, saying he’ll nominate the unpopular Todd Blanche as attorney general and refusing to admit his payout fund is dead.
The Vikings Receive an Early Gift for Week 1
For only the third time in 66 years, the Minnesota Vikings will play the Green Bay Packers to start the […]
The evolution of in-vehicle entertainment
High-end and flashy infotainment systems on new vehicles are a big draw for modern drivers.
Seahawks’ Cooper Kupp sees room for growth in Year 2 in Seattle
As Cooper Kupp enters his second season with the Seahawks, Seattle appears to finally feel like home, which he says is "definitely helpful."
Vikings' Trayvon Rudolph: Bound for Minnesota
Vikings' Trayvon Rudolph: Bound for Minnesota
Raiders 2026 OTAs
Head inside Intermountain Health Performance Center as the Raiders hold their tenth and final OTA.
Valve Confirms Steam Machine Will Ship This Summer
The company also confirmed that its standalone VR headset will arrive in that same timeframe
Harrisburg tops O'Gorman in South Dakota state softball quarterfinals
No. 2 Harrisburg worked out of a bases-loaded, no-out situation in the top of the seventh to beat No. 7 O'Gorman in the Class AA state quarterfinals.
I Wish Big Corporations Would Leave The Lord Of The Rings Alone
Please stop trying to 'create the highest-quality entertainment products for this IP' and go read a book instead
Small Businesses Dominate May 2026 Hiring, With Annual Pay Looking Strong
Small businesses with one to 49 employees accounted for more than half of private sector hiring in May, adding 67,000 of the total 122,000 jobs created, according to a June 3 report from payroll service company ADP. Employees at small businesses with 20 to 49 employees also saw pay gains, with me
Jacksonville Jaguars: Sign Experienced Corner with 31 Regular-Season Starts
The Jacksonville Jaguars still needed to address their cornerback depth this offseason after losing Greg Newsome II to the New York Giants and failing to select one in the 2026 NFL Draft. Travis Hunter is recovering from a season-ending LCL tear and has been limited to individual drills off to the side during OTAs but […] The post Jacksonville Jaguars: Sign Experienced Corner with 31 Regular-Season Starts appeared first on Gridiron Heroics.
Great River Children’s Museum Teams With Science Museum of Minnesota for “Forces in Motion”
(KNSI) - Kids ready to push, pull, roll, and race will have a place to burn that energy Friday as the Great Ri...
Seahawks RG Anthony Bradford exits OTAs with knee injury
Bradford didn't return to practice, but was able to walk around after coming out.
What To Expect From Geoff Keighley's Summer Game Fest 2026 Showcase
The only confirmed reveal so far is Miss Piggy
Fantasy Baseball Rankings Movers: Miguel Vargas joins third base elite; Nolan McLean, Shota Imanaga take a hit
Rankings movers: Vargas surges and Misiorowski's control issues appear to be a thing of the past
Would Hackney be an Everton fit?
Middlesbrough fan Tom Green has been speaking to BBC Radio Merseyside's Total Sport show about the Toffees' links with midfielder Hayden Hackney. Hackney is said to have a number of suitors but reports this week have said Everton are one of them. Supporter Green, from The Boro Breakdown podcast, says he would expect a fee of between £15-20m for 23-year-old Hackney, who is out of contract in June of 2027.
Rural health network aims to strengthen independent hospitals
The North Shore Health Board received a presentation from Cibolo Rural Health Network on the benefits of the Headwaters Network, a high-value network made up of Minnesota’s rural independent health care providers. “I would say a relevant correlator to the high-value network is that of a farmers’ co-op,” Brittany Sachdeva, chief operating officer for Cibolo,...
Minnesota State Wins 2025-26 NSIC All-Sports Award
BURNSVILLE, Minn. --- Minnesota State won the NSIC All-Sports Awardfor its efforts during the 2025-26 athletic season.
The Bear’s Den, June 4, 2026
The Chicago Bears are in the heart of voluntary OTA’s, and we have news.
Braves linked to trade idea for Giants' $90M Cy Young finalist, Gold Glover to pair with Chris Sale
The Atlanta Braves are looking to add a starter and have been since the offseason. This deal would give them someone who would make their rotation better for now and October.
Watch Commanders' Jayden Daniels connect with Chig Okonkwo during OTAs
Could the Commanders' WR2 already be on the roster and not who you think?
South Korea: 2026 World Cup Squad, Fixtures and Schedule
South Korea travels to North America for the FIFA World Cup this summer, aiming to recapture the spirit of their greatest tournament performance and push deep into the knockout rounds once again.Hong ...
SEC, Big Ten vs. everybody? 'Protect College Sports' bill politicians rail against Power 2 leagues in pivotal hearing
Clips show Tyrice Knight in great shape at Seahawks' OTAs
The Seahawks have built a talented group of LBs from mostly Day 3 picks in creative ways.
Woman accused of trying to steal $52K through fraudulent refunds at Northwest Freeway business
April Timberlake was arrested after allegedly attempting to process fraudulent refunds totaling approximately $52,000 at her workplace on the Northwest Freeway, according to Harris County Precinct 4 Constable’s Office.
Kyle Shanahan reportedly cancels 49ers' mandatory minicamp as reward for team's stellar attendance, performance at OTAs
God Of War Laufey Creates One Of The Fandom’s Funniest Memes
Kratos and Atreus’ journey is downright serene compared to what Faye is going through
Saints RB Alvin Kamara makes surprise OTA appearance
Despite offseason speculation surrounding his future, the veteran unexpectedly appeared at the facility on Wednesday for practice.
Illinois state Rep. Kam Buckner meets Pope Leo XIV in the Vatican
The week after Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and a delegation of 45 other Chicago notables met with Pope Leo XIV in the Vatican, another Chicago politician got to meet the pope too.
2027 NFL Draft Summer Scouting Report: Ahmad Hardy, RB, Missouri
Another Summer scouting report is ready, this time on Missouri RB Ahmad Hardy.
Buzz For A June Nintendo Direct Is Building As Switch 2 Turns One
Maybe it's Nintendo's way of celebrating the Switch 2's first anniversary
2027 NFL Draft Summer Scouting Report: Gavin Sawchuk, RB, Northwestern
Another Summer scouting report is ready, this time on Northwestern RB Gavin Sawchuk.
May's top PlayStation games by copies sold
Yesterday’s State of Play gave us an idea of where PlayStation’s heading next. But we’ve had our May estimates for a couple of days now (we always update our data daily for clients), so it’s time to look at what performed best on PlayStation last month. We’ve got a new IP at the top, two evergreens doing their evergreen thing, FC26 smashing it ahead of the World Cup Plus pivot, and a quiet but promising result for Lego Batman. Let’s have a look at the state of Play…Station’s top games for May. 007 takes #001 007 First Light sold 1M copies on PS5 in May, easily making it the month’s top PS5 game by copies sold. Over 80% of those May copies were digital, which is broadly in line with where PlayStation’s digital share has settled for new releases this year. To date, 007 First Light has sold through 2.2M copies across platforms (so no unsold retail copies in that figure). The platform split is 55.1% PS5, 33.1% Steam, and 11.8% Xbox (console, Windows, and cloud combined). In gross revenue terms, 007 First Light has generated $150M. Owing to regional pricing and audience composition differences, the consoles make up a higher share of revenue than they do copies. Of the $150M, 60.5% came via PlayStation, 27.6% via Steam, and 12.9% via Xbox. Part of this is because over two-thirds of 007 First Light‘s PlayStation audience is in North America (43.4%) or Western Europe (23.2%), where local currency means the game generates more revenue per player. On Steam, under half of First Light‘s audience is from those same regions (31.8% North America, 15.1% Western Europe). As we covered in last week’s 007 Steam piece, the Steam version is pulling in higher-than-expected numbers in China, which now accounts for 17.3% of First Light‘s Steam audience. 007 is the equivalent of $44 USD in China, which is roughly 37% cheaper than the US price and about 44% cheaper than Western Europe. Subscribe for free to get the most accurate games estimates in your inbox twice a week 🫶 Subscribe The crossover data backs up what we’ve seen all year about launch-window cohorts. 11% of PS5 players who played 007 First Light in May also played Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight, which launched just a few days before. Last month was a great month for Denmark! IO Interactive is Copenhagen-based, and Lego Group is headquartered in Billund (TT Games is UK-based but produces work under Lego Group licence and direction). Speaking of which… A very blocky #2 and #3 Minecraft sold another 788K copies on PlayStation consoles last month. Business as usual, since Minecraft hasn’t sold fewer than 760K copies in a single month all year. With over 350M copies sold across all platforms, Minecraft is the best-selling game in history and one of the strongest brands in the world. Every month, a new cohort of children reaches Minecraft age, which guarantees a constant volume of new sales regardless of what the broader market is up to. The demographic refresh rate is truly impressive, with the audience renewing itself faster than it’s churning. Lego Batman: Legacy of the Dark Knight shifted 757K copies on PS5 last month, bringing its lifetime total on the platform to over 800K. Across all platforms, Legacy of the Dark Knight has now passed 1.5M sold through, so PlayStation accounts for over half of the game’s players. The May crossover data for Legacy of the Dark Knight on PS5 is also useful. 27% of those players also played Fortnite, 16% Roblox, 16% FC 26, and 14% NBA 2K. That’s the household-and-family cohort showing up, plus the launch-window cohort of core gamers who buy practically everything. FC 26 gets players through the door ahead of the World Cup FC 26 sold 411K copies on PlayStation last month (90% via PS5), the fewest copies FC 26 has sold all year and down heavily from April’s 700K. Part of this dropoff is because FC 26 has been available as a PlayStation Plus monthly game since 6 May, cannibalising premium sales. Subscribe for free to get the most accurate games estimates in your inbox twice a week 🫶 Subscribe The strategic logic is straightforward for EA, which is sacrificing premium unit sales in May to build up the player base ahead of the FIFA World Cup, which kicks off on 11 June. Obviously, a bigger player pool going into the tournament means a bigger pool of potential Ultimate Team spenders during the period when football attention is at its peak. The early returns are around what you’d expect, with 4.4M new players accessing FC 26 via PS Plus last month – a substantial new spender pool. Anecdotally, a few of my mates who were ‘’skipping FIFA and Ultimate Team this year’’, were drawn back in via PS Plus. Lo and behold, one of them is buying packs like it’s going out of fashion. Whether this is all a smart trade for EA depends entirely on the Ultimate Team conversion rate over the next six weeks. Either way, the short-term engagement impact on the game as a whole is evident. FC 26‘s MAUs hit a record 24M on PlayStation in May, up 30% from the previous record set in April. GTA V does what GTA V always does Rounding out the top five is another evergreen title. Grand Theft Auto V shifted another 387K copies on PlayStation last month. No matter what else is happening in the industry, GTA V keeps pulling players in. It’s sold another 1.8M copies on PS5 in the first half of this year alone, helping the franchise pass the 230M-sold milestone across all platforms. Subscribe for free to get the most accurate games estimates in your inbox twice a week 🫶 Subscribe I have a theory that Minecraft and GTA V are doing the same thing at different demographic levels. Both are functioning as generational gateway games that the audience ages into faster than it ages out of. Minecraft captures kids around age 6-10, GTA V captures much of the same audience around age 12-15 (unofficially, of course). The crossover data suggests this: 40% of GTA V‘s monthly PlayStation players typically play Fortnite in any given month, while 30% play Roblox. Household accounts aside, that’s not the original GTA V audience from 2013. Of course, the under-12 audience would love to get their hands on GTA, too. It’s always been the way of things, and some parents are happy to oblige. Mine did too back in the day, and I turned out just fine. Right? Right!? Want to get your hands on our data for yourself – for free? We’re offering a free trial of our platform for games companies. Send us a message here, or reply to this email, and we’ll set you up. The last word Reply to this email – or reach out here – if you have any feedback for the newsletter – or want to request a game for us to cover. [Alinea Analytics boasts the most accurate PC and console estimates in the business. Game makers use our platform to understand their audience, keep an eye on the competition, monitor sales trends, and spot new opportunities. We equip game studios and financial institutions with accurate data and the confidence to make smarter, data-driven decisions. Want to talk about all things games market data? We’d love to chat!]
Open Thread: June 3, 2026
The Open Thread/Daily Merengue is a place where you can discuss anything and everything related to football. Feel free to discuss the topics presented here, or start your very own discussions! The Open thread will be posted every day by one of the mods you’d totally do a movie marathon night with: Valyrian Steel, Felipejack, […]
There’s Indeed a Science to Airline Cockpit Diplomacy
Maintaining civility is critical in a dynamic safety environment like an airline cockpit.
Texas universities show sharp differences in health insurance premiums, Baker Institute report finds
Annual health insurance premiums for faculty and staff vary by more than $5,000 per employee across Texas universities, according to a new report from Rice’s Baker Institute for Public Policy. For PPO (or POS plans) — the only plan type offered at every institution in the sample — the report finds that the total annual cost of individual coverage, combining employer and employee contributions, ranges from $8,095 for Texas universities belonging to Employees Retirement System of Texas (such as the University of Houston) to $15,742 at Trinity University.
The cult of objectivity has broken consciousness science
With 22 competing theories and no consensus in sight, the science of consciousness is lost. In this exclusive IAI interview, Berkeley psychedelics researcher and bestselling author of a new book on consciousness Michael Pollan insists that even though consciousness lies beyond traditional forms of scientific investigation, we should resist becoming dualists who see it as something radically different from ordinary stuff in the world. Instead, he makes the case for reimagining science itself: it must stop reaching for objective descriptions of physical reality, and instead embrace subjectivity as the indispensable core of all inquiry. Alasdair Craig: How did your experiences with psychedelics get you interested in consciousness?Michael Pollan: One of the things that happens on psychedelics is that they foreground consciousness. What formerly seemed perfectly transparent and ever present—and yet, non-existent, as water is to fish—suddenly you see it. The metaphor I use in the book is that psychedelics sponge the windscreen. Suddenly you realize: wow, there’s a windscreen, there is this phenomenon that’s mediating my relationship to reality. This is not an unusual realization on psychedelics. I think a lot of people are called to think about consciousness after psychedelic experiences. So that was the proximate inspiration for A World Appears: A Journey Into Consciousness (2026).And then there was a more specific way in which psychedelics influence the book. That was a particular experience I had on psilocybin. I had the sensation that the plants in my garden were conscious and returning my gaze, with their own point of view and agency, and I got curious as to how to evaluate an insight like that. I mean, what’s the truth quotient of insights you have on psychedelics? And I was reading William James—who, of course, wrote beautifully about mystical experience—and he said, we can’t judge the metaphysics here, but we should pay attention to two criteria: (1) How useful is it to think this is true? He was a pragmatist, of course. And (2) can we subject it to other ways of knowing to validate it? Because maybe we should treat these insights as hypotheses. And that’s kind of how I approach psychedelics, as a great generator of hypotheses, but they need to be tested against other ways of knowing. And so that led me down this long path exploring the science of plant intelligence and plant sentience.AC: I love your phrase, “smudging the windowpane of conscious experience.” So do you now start to think, actually, even when I’m not on psychedelics, I’m just seeing a screen all the time, which is not reality, but rather is my conscious experience, behind which reality is hidden?MP: Well, you know, not when I’m brushing my teeth and making breakfast! But yes, in meditation, certainly. I mean, one of the things you realize is that my experience happens to be this way now, but it could be another way. And many things can affect it. My morning coffee changes the screen in various ways, sharpens certain things.___The only tool we have to understand consciousness is consciousness.___There’s this wonderful metaphor in Aldous Huxley’s book, The Doors of Perception, where he thinks we channel consciousness, and that what the brain does is edit it, and there’s a reducing valve. And psychedelics open the reducing valve wider. I don’t know that I’m ready to buy into the idea that consciousness exists outside brains, but I do love that metaphor because there are times when you are more conscious than others. I know I’ve switched from window pane to valve, but you know, a camera aperture can open wider or narrower. And I do have a sense of that. I have a sense of when I’m being less conscious, and when I’m being more conscious, by which I mean, you know, more present, taking in more sensory information. So when you start thinking about consciousness as a matter of degree, that changes things also.I think when we scroll on social media, obviously, we’re conscious. But minimally so, because we don’t have to generate our own thoughts. We’re basically taking these little hits from other people and thinking their thoughts.The process of writing this book made me kind of relativize everyday consciousness as just one type, which is exactly what William James said. Normal consciousness is one type, separated by the flimsiest of screens from the other types.AC: If we stick with the metaphor of the smudge on the window that you get when you take psychedelics, it seems like we’re saying that consciousness has become like an object that you’re looking at, right? You’re looking at the smudge and that just is consciousness. But sometimes we’ll talk about consciousness as a state that you’re in, rather than an object you can perceive. You’re either conscious or you’re not conscious. So it’s difficult to really know what sort of thing we’re talking about when we talk about consciousness, right?MP: Yeah. When you say that consciousness is an object, what’s the subject? Consciousness also? The only tool we have to understand consciousness is consciousness. So we’re in a closed loop and when we get a perspective on consciousness, we’re not achieving any distance from it. That’s one of the problems with studying consciousness. Science is predicated on an objective, God’s eye view of things, and you never get that. There’s no such thing. SUGGESTED VIEWING The brain filters consciousness With Àlex Gómez-Marín But, yeah, there is this sense, I think, that consciousness is something you can approach. Certainly, when you’re writing and trying to recreate a conscious experience, it’s a fiction, but you’re standing back from it, and looking at it. But there’s no real subject-object distinction.AC: That’s so interesting, because when philosophers start talking about consciousness, they often talk about what they call “qualia”, which is their word for the felt experience of, say, the color red. And I think that way of speaking often makes us think of the qualia as an object, which you can see out there: the redness of red. But, as you say, we also want to collapse the subject-object distinction when we talk about consciousness. So there’s something strange going on here…MP: Oh, yeah, there are many strange things going on! *AC: Let’s talk about the varieties of consciousness. Apart from perceptions, there are, pains, emotions, thoughts, and so on. What is it that holds all this diversity together so that they all count as instances of consciousness? What is it that they all have in common?MP: Yeah, that’s a really good question. I mean, there is sensory information, right? Which we perceive coming from the world outside ourselves. And then there’s internal information, which is what’s called interoception. And this is very important too. This is where feelings come from—what are sometimes called homeostatic feelings—that are intended to get the brain to keep us in these narrow ranges of temperature and glucose and so on. That’s a very important part of consciousness. And according to some researchers, who I think are probably right, this is where consciousness begins, with these very primal feelings, like hunger and thirst and warmth and itch, and things like that. And then there’s this third thing, which is our thinking about thinking.And what holds all this together is, I think, the sense of self. Consciousness generates a self: it is probably an organizing principle. All this stuff is happening to the self. It’s a construct, I think, but it is very useful. It can connect all these different streams of consciousness to a single being or a place, metaphorically speaking.* AC: The first half of your book is about the science of consciousness. Is consciousness just another thing, like black holes or the origin of life, which we don’t yet understand, but which we should have every hope that science will one day get to the bottom of, or is there something special about consciousness that makes this unlikely?MP: It depends how you define science. As we define science now, it’s going be very difficult. Science since Galileo has had a set of rules or assumptions, which is that the proper remit of science is to deal with the objective, quantifiable, third-person world. And the physical sciences have done amazing work under that set of limitations. Galileo—for tactical reasons, not for philosophical reasons—said science should not deal with the soul, which at the time was what consciousness was considered to be. So what is subjective, what is qualitative, what is first person, we’re going to leave to the church, he said. And this was a good agreement, and it probably kept many scientists from getting burned at the stake. But it leaves science in an awkward spot, now that it wants to venture into that territory of qualities, of first-person experience. And I don’t think it has the proper tools. I think it will have to add to its toolkit in some way, and find a way to bring in phenomenology, or lived experience and introspection, which science is usually dismissive of.The challenge—we alluded to it earlier—is that the only tool you have to study consciousness with is consciousness. And what I mean by that is, the whole scientific enterprise is a manifestation of consciousness. As much as scientists like to flatter themselves with this idea that they attain a godlike perspective on what they study, when it comes to consciousness, there’s no such thing. And it’s fine for all the things you can step outside of and study from that perspective. But two areas it won’t work are consciousness and cosmology.___It could be that we live in this anomaly of not believing nature is conscious. And maybe psychedelics are teaching us something we’ve forgotten.___With cosmology, too, you have to study the universe from inside the universe. It’s not that cosmologists haven’t made progress. We know a lot about the age of the universe and expansion and things like that. But we can’t penetrate what happened before the Big Bang. We just don’t have the tools because we can’t stand outside.The fact that there are 22 full-scale theories of consciousness tells you all you need to know: we’re kind of lost. And I was surprised to find that we are more lost than I thought we were when I started this. I thought that there’d be leading theories, or that we had experiments that we could conduct that would nail some of this down. And the fact is, we don’t.So, I don’t know if science can solve it. But, of course, we can change the rules of science. A really influential book for me was a book called The Blind Spot, by two physicists, Marcello Gleiser and Adam Frank, and a philosopher, Evan Thompson. It’s a reminder that science is a social practice. It’s organized in a certain way and it can be organized in a different way. But it has this huge blind spot at the center of it, which is its failure to recognize that it is a form of consciousness itself, and it doesn’t have a good way of taking account of lived experience.AC: On the one hand, I think you want to resist traditional dualism, which would say that consciousness is something magical, something supernatural, right? But on the other hand, you’re accepting that there is this division in reality between the stuff that you can investigate objectively and measure, and so on—the stuff that science has been good at finding out about—and consciousness, which, for some reason, you can’t objectively measure. Some would take this to suggest that the dualism is actually right. Is there a way of reconciling these two strands of your thinking?MP: To call it magical is full of value judgement. I mean, you could just say immaterial. The interesting thing is, I think, that intuitively we’re all dualists. And I don’t know whether that’s because we’re children of Descartes and other cultures are less dualist than we are. Or it may be because that’s how consciousness feels. It feels different than the body. It feels separate from the body. But I don’t think we should trust that intuition.AC: So let’s think about ways that science might be changed to get at consciousness. I suppose the starting point would be the way that you begin the second half of your book. You have this nice line from William James, where he says, “We now begin our study of the mind from within.” Could you give us some sense of the ways of studying the mind from within? What does this involve?MP: I don’t know what that science looks like. But one of the points I’m making is that it depends on the humanities. I found that I learned as much, if not more, about consciousness, from reading novels and poetry. There is a sense of the fullness and complexity of consciousness that you don’t get in any scientific account. I interviewed this stream-of-consciousness writer and I approached her as an expert on consciousness, and she is. So I think that dialogue is really important.I’m reading Ben Lerner’s new novel, Transcription. Just read the first page of this novel: it’s a man falling asleep on a train, going to conduct an interview, and there is the experience of being in the train, facing backwards, there’s the view outside, but there’s a reflection of himself through which he’s seeing outside. There’s the memory of dropping his kids off at school. All this is going on in one moment of consciousness. Scientists aren’t going anywhere near that. But I think it’s useful for them to think about. That’s where we’re trying to go: like, how does such a layered experience happen? You know, it also makes you wonder, could a computer ever do this? And it gives you some doubt.*AC: Before we get to computers, perhaps we could talk briefly about plants. How did you come to feel that they are sentient?MP: Well, it was a psychedelic experience, and it’s not unusual on psychedelics. In fact, there’ve been studies about how people become animists during psychedelic experience. Their belief in animism arises after a single psychedelic experience.You know, most scientists would say this is all a myth. But we have only 400 years of the age of enlightenment and science. Before that, we were animists, and if you go around the world, most indigenous cultures are still animists, and children are animists, by and large, until they go to school. So it could be that we live in this anomaly of not believing nature is conscious. And maybe psychedelics are teaching us something we’ve forgotten.As I said, I wanted to test this idea, and see whether there was conventional scientific evidence for it. And there’s fascinating work going on in a field that calls itself—in a rather cheeky way—plant neurobiology. These are people who fully realize there are no neurons in plants, but they’re trolling conventional botanists! And they’re doing experiments that are demonstrating that plants can learn and remember, which is kind of amazing: how do you store a memory without neurons? They’re finding plants that can solve problems, that can hear and see. In fact, they have 20 senses to our five or six. For example, a bean plant looking for something to twine, and given a pole within eight inches or so of it, knows where that pole is and will aim its spiraling reach at that pole. What is that about? Is it bouncing signals off of it?One of the spookiest things is the fact that the same anesthetics that put us out put plants out. You might think that plants are already out, but they’re not. They’re just slow. If you take a plant with a fast behavior, like a Venus flytrap, and give it an anesthetic, it will stop reacting. So you have to ask yourself, what is lost when the plant is anaesthetized? Some state of alertness, of awareness, of its environment, of reactivity. I’m not prepared to call that consciousness, but maybe it’s sentience—which is a simpler form of consciousness, and involves the ability to sense what’s going on in your environment and assess what’s good and bad for you and act appropriately. That may be a universal quality of life.AC: Let’s turn from plants to AI. You point out that LLMs are trained on the internet rather than direct interactions with reality. You put this really nicely when you say the internet is not the world so much as a shadow cast by the world. So LLMs are living in this kind of shadow world, or in Plato’s cave, as you put it. What’s the significance of this for AI consciousness and moral consideration? And, to recall the beginning of our conversation, if we’re stuck behind a veil or screen of consciousness, are we also stuck in a kind of shadow world?MP: I don’t think they’re the same shadow worlds because our world includes nature and other people. And even if it’s mediated in some ways... There is a reality out there, and we are in relation to it, through consciousness. There’s friction with it. What’s missing from the LLMs is that friction with the real world. There’s more to the world than human representation, which is what they’re dealing with. And that means that so far, AI is a cultural technology for combining thoughts we’ve already had. SUGGESTED VIEWING Cracking the code for thought With Roger Penrose, Sabrina Gonzalez Pasterski, Max Tegmark, Güneş Taylor Genuine creativity is more than collage. A lot of what AI does now is tantamount to collage, putting this with that and you know, that’s part of art, certainly. But there are also genuinely new ideas that come into the world that don’t come in through manipulating the representations we already have. So it remains to be seen whether AIs can be truly creative in that more radical sense.But my arguments against AI becoming conscious have to do with the fact that the idea of AI consciousness is based on this faulty metaphor that the brain is a computer. There are dimensions in which the brain is like a computer—it certainly does its share of computation. But computers have this sharp distinction between hardware and software, and brains don’t. In a brain, hardware and software are identical. Every memory is a physical change to the brain. Brains are not interchangeable in the way computers are. So this idea that you could take the consciousness out and somehow run it on another substrate, a silicon substrate, seems foolhardy.Anyway, it’s a more extended argument, and I may be wrong. And when we move to computers that aren’t based on silicon—neuromorphic computers and things like that—all bets may be off.AC: Regarding your point about LLMs being stuck in the world of our representations—the internet or whatever—and not being able to interact with reality, are these representations, the world of the internet, themselves part of reality? We’ve created the internet, but it’s still a real thing that exists. And so while the LLMs may be trapped within that part of reality, they’re nevertheless within reality and interacting with it and so on. So it’s not obvious that there’s a barrier there to them becoming conscious and being creative.MP: Yeah, I mean, if our consciousness is built out of human culture, which is what we’re talking about with all those representations. But I tend to think consciousness comes a bit more out of nature and friction with the natural world, but...AC: So there’s a fundamental divide between the natural world and human artefacts?MP: And we lose track of that, and especially people in this computer world. You know, the people who are creating these AI systems, my guess is they’ve been into video games since the age of three, and they didn’t go outside a lot. And their own contact with nature is somewhat limited. I could be wrong, it’d be a very interesting thing to ask, all the wizards of AI, whether they like to go fishing and hiking and do things like that. Or were they on computers from a very early age? I interviewed Blake Lemoine, the Google engineer who came to believe that LaMDA, the Google LLM out at the time, was conscious and deserved personhood. It was very clear that he didn’t see a distinction between this bubble in which he lived and the real world. And I think we’ve all been distanced from the natural world, and this is taking us even further away. But it’s still there, you know, and we still have bodies, and we’re still mortal, and we don’t live in a simulation.AC: I think that’s a great place to finish. Michael Pollan, thank you very much!
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