MIT Press

Utility alone cannot explain why humans seek out beauty. After all, a sunset or a sonata yields no evolutionary benefit. For Nicholas Humphrey, humans seek out beauty because it helps us “provide the training sets for our own minds.”

Hey, New Yorkers! Join us on Thursday, October 29 for our NYC book launch event at P&T Knitwear from 6:30pm - 8:00pm. Please note that this is a ticketed in-store event with limited amphitheater-style seating. Register here: shorturl.at/oe5Sx

Congratulations to John Hultgren, whose book "The Smoke and the Spoils: Anti-Environmentalism and Class Struggle in the United States" won the Michael Harrington Book Award from @npsjournal.bsky.social. "The Smoke and the Spoils" is available to read #OpenAccess: mitpress.mit.edu/978026255237...

A great companion read: "The Machine and the Microchip" (out in January) takes readers inside ASML, a little-known Dutch company at one of the world’s most consequential technological chokepoints: mitpress.mit.edu/978026206414...

"ELIZA shaped not only the way we think about interacting with computers but also how we think about them. It began to give a reality to the science fiction stories of how we expect computers to work." An excerpt of "Inventing ELIZA" @spectrum.ieee.org.

"Creating a safe environment is as important as landing a trick." An excerpt from "True World Skate" highlights Dencity, a Nigerian women's skate crew: pghrev.com/starting-a-s...

"Nothing is more foreign to a Kafkian protagonist than giving up in despair."

Pasadena and LA metro friends! I'll be talking with Andy Maltz at @vromansbookstore.bsky.social on October 30 at 7. How can we thrive when AI and tech are moving at breakneck speed? Come join the conversation! @mitpress.bsky.social @lissawarren.bsky.social vromansbookstore.com/event/2026-1...

"An ode to the remarkable ‘plasticity’ or adaptability of the brain and body during and after pregnancy." @liisagalea.bsky.social reviews "A Mother's Brain" for @nature.com: nature.com/articles/d41...

Virginia Mcgee Richards' photograph "Witness Tree, Wadmalaw Island" is a @lensculture.bsky.social Editors Pick! Originally featured in "The Inner Passage," her entry for the Black & White Photography Awards 2026 will be included in the online Competition Gallery: www.lensculture.com/photo-compet...

"The bee must know about the patterns and which flowers belong together... but the bee never asks, 'Why is it there? Who made this for me? Aren’t I lucky?' I think that’s a unique human emotion." Nicholas Humphrey discussed his new book, "Why Is the World So Beautiful?," with @nautil.us.

If you missed Fran Berman discussing her book, BETTER TECH: Putting People First in Cyberspace, with @wamc.org's @joedonahue.bsky.social at @albany.edu's @nyswi.bsky.social, you can watch it here: bit.ly/4zOJXt9 @mitpress.bsky.social

Black Elegies: Meditations on the Art of Mournng, published in the On Seeing #openaccess book series by @brown.edu + @mitpress.bsky.social wins the John Hope Franklin Prize for Best Book in American Studies! Congrats @kjuanitabrown.bsky.social #OAWeek @aupresses.bsky.social @oipassoc.bsky.social

"New and fascinating territory, even for readers well-versed in the canon of contemporary space science nonfiction." @americanscientist.org reviews "Becoming Martian" by @scottsolomon.bsky.social: www.americanscientist.org/article/one-...

Joseph Weizenbaum's creation of ELIZA proved to be a foundational moment in #AI. For @nybooks.com, James Gleick reviews "Inventing ELIZA," a history of the influential chatbot. @berrydm.bsky.social @markcmarino.bsky.social @sarahciston.com @davidmberry.bsky.social

New and #OpenAccess: "[Machine Voices] is a wide-ranging tour of the machinic voicescape, and Edward Kang is an expert guide, taking us behind the facades of computers that listen and unsettling what ‘listening’ and ‘talking’ even mean." — @nickseaver.website mitpress.mit.edu/978026205472...

We are proud to offer #OpenAccess publishing options for every one of our journals. Coming soon, NeuroNexus will integrate research and real-world applications in the psychology, neuroscience, and engineering of intelligence. mitpress.mit.edu/the-mit-pres... #OpenAccessWeek

Franz Kafka, though a writer, is also a kind of literary philosopher, whose works probe humanity’s greatest questions. In an interview, Aaron Schuster explains how the writer’s work turns philosophy into “an object of wonder for itself.” Read more: thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/wondering-at...

Published in The Atlantic Monthly between 1869 and 1870, Edward Everett Hale used deft literary realism to tell the first pioneering story about an artificial satellite, "The Brick Moon." thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-teenager...

Author copies of 'The Idealized Brain: Uniting Philosophy of Science and Computational Neuroscience' (MIT) have arrived. Exciting! Stay tuned for its official open access release on 15 December 2026. For more information about the book, see mitpress.mit.edu/978026205492...

Some paper should back that! www.somebody-book.com @mitpress.bsky.social @dryan149.bsky.social @michaelbrownstein.bsky.social

"Clear solutions for today’s deadliest health threats." — @elizkolbert.bsky.social "The Formula for Better Health" by @drtomfrieden.bsky.social is available in paperback: mitpress.mit.edu/978026205096...

"AI can optimize a definition of fairness once we give it one. But AI cannot decide which definition society should value. That remains a human decision. " Maxime Cohen, author of "Pricing in the Age of AI," writes on the new politics of pricing for @polrightsrev.bsky.social.

What makes a toy a good toy? To Jess Uhre Rahbek, who spent years developing a theory of play while studying with LEGO's in-house design team, it’s all about creating objects that foster “playful tension.”

Today is the day! DATA BY DESIGN is out in the world! With immense gratitude to the entire project team, to @gita2.bsky.social, and to @mitpress.bsky.social, for turning this vision into reality. We're so excited to be able to celebrate with all of you!

60 years after the article that launched ELIZA, the first chatbot is back in CACM! Such a treat to see them celebrate the 4 years of close reading the code in our book! cacm.acm.org/news/the-man... #criticalcodestudies #critcode @mitpress.bsky.social @sarahciston.com

Out today: The Radical Unpresent (MIT Press). First NYC launch: Nov 5 at Printed Matter, in conversation with Naeem Mohaiemen. My launch essay, ordering info, and upcoming events: gregorysholette.substack.com/p/the-radica... @mitpress.bsky.social

In his new book “Morbid," Dr. Saul Newman argues that “aging science” has fallen under an avalanche of grift and mail-order marketing scams. His AMA starts in just a few minutes. Join him at r/IAmA and ask him anything! www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comme...

Thursday 3pm, go meet Peggy Weil at the MIT Presss bookstore! She'll be there to sign copies and chat. Go talk with her and with ELIZA, or rather, DOCTOR.

We offer #OA publishing options for all our journals. Minds, Machines, and Brains aims to advance scientific understanding of the principles of intelligence & cognition that cross-cut natural & artificial minds and brains. Follow @mmb-journal.bsky.social for more. #OpenAccessWeek

DATA BY DESIGN comes out tomorrow, which means you can still preorder your copy today! And if need a little more encouragement, here are some very kind words from some of my honest-to-goodness design heroes:

Preparing for my Political Campaigns class this week and discussing political ads. This is one of the readings I've assigned. I'm surprised at how well it has aged. Are there any specific influencer campaigns we should view? #Election2026 #PoliSky #Commsky truthinadvertising.org/blog/campaig...

Khiara M. Bridges is coming to Houston! Join the author of "Expecting Inequity" at Kindred Stories on Thursday, October 29th, for a conversation with Deborah D.E.E.P Mouton, Q&A, and book signing. Link to register: kindredstorieshtx.com/products/aut...

To my friends in the Toronto area, you're invited to the launch for The Broken Machine, this Wednesday 21 October. ihpst.utoronto.ca/events/book-.... Join us for refreshments and complimentary copies of the book while they last. @mitpress.bsky.social @ihpst-uoft.bsky.social

Kudos to Ideas on Fire authors Kristine Ask, Ashley Guajardo, Tanja Sihvonen, and Jess Tompkins on the release of Play Like a Fangirl: Creative Desire in Video Games, out now from @mitpress.bsky.social. 🎊 www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/830546... #IoFAuthors

Most aging researchers don’t want to extend the human life span. "If extra years turn out to be a side effect of keeping people healthy longer, well, that’s great," Steven Austad, the author of "Methuselah's Zoo," told @nytimes.com. "But that’s not the goal." www.nytimes.com/2026/10/13/w...

"When culture becomes content" by Paul Chan. thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/when-culture... Excellent, thought-provoking read.

The Teenagers Who Imagined GPS Before the Civil War By: Alexander MacDonald thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/the-teenager... Books by Edward Everett Hale at PG: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/autho... #books #science #technology

"A tribute to the under-appreciated men and women who helped make the world a better place by learning from tragedy." Kevin Dickinson recommends "Nary a Horse Left Standing" in his list of 5 books to give your brain a workout via @bigthink.com.

Yep. So, so, so much of the current "longevity" industry is based on total BS‼️ Increasingly, "longevity" = wellness woo 2.0. Longevity Research Has a Bullshit Problem thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/longevity-re... #Health #Longevity via @mitpress.bsky.social