PRICE $8.99 DEC. 21 & 28, 2015 WORLD CHANGERS DECEMBER 21 & 28, 2015 13 GOINGS ON ABOUT TOWN 35 THE TALK OF THE TOWN Margaret Talbot on police shootings in Chicago; Trumped; Miranda and Scorsese; Charles III; James Surowiecki on Mark Zuckerberg’s gift. ELIZABETH KOlbert 42 THE SIEGE OF MIAMI What climate change means for Florida. Samanth subramanian 52 THE HIT LIST The Islamist war on secular bloggers. MIKE ALBO AND AMANDA DUARTE 57 APPS TO DOWNLOAD FOR 2016 CAROLYN KORMANN 58 THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS Microscopes and the power of frugal science. DAVID Remnick 66 NEGOTIATING THE WHIRLWIND John Kerry’s Middle East mission. REBECCA Solnit 78 MEDICAL MOUNTAINEERS Basic care in the remote Himalayas. Peter Granser, Judith Thurman 88 HIGH ASPIRATIONS Architectural futurism in Bolivia. FICTION TIM Parks 98 “BEDTIMES” THE CRITICS ON TELEVISION EMILY Nussbaum 102 “Marvel’s Jessica Jones.” BOOKS KelEFA Sanneh 105 A new history of Prohibition. 111 Briely Noted THE ART WORLD Peter schjeldahl 112 A Robert Ryman retrospective. THE THEATRE HILTON Als 114 “Lazarus.” THE CURRENT CINEMA ANTHONY Lane 116 “In the Heart of the Sea,” “Son of Saul.” Continued on page 6 4 THE NEW YORKER, DECEMBER 21 & 28, 2015 POEMS Robert Pinsky 54 “The Robots” Ian Frazier 84 “Greetings, Friends!” George Booth COVER “Holiday Spirit” DRAWINGS Edward Steed, Mick Stevens, Tom Toro, Drew Dernavich, P. C. Vey, John Klossner, Liam Francis Walsh, Bruce Eric Kaplan, Farley Katz, Harry Bliss, Shannon Wheeler, Paul Noth, Barbara Smaller, Jack Ziegler, Zachary Kanin, Tim Hamilton, Emily Flake, David Sipress, Benjamin Schwartz SPOTS Sarah Illenberger “We didn’t want to know the gender in advance.” 6 THE NEW YORKER, DECEMBER 21 & 28, 2015 CONTRIBUTORS Elizabeth kolbert (“THE SIEGE OF MIAMI,” P. 42) won this year’s rebecca solnit (“MEDICAL MOUNTAINEERS,” P. 78) is the author of Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction for “The Sixth Extinction: An many books, including “A Field Guide to Getting Lost” and “River Unnatural History,” which is available in paperback. of Shadows: Eadweard Muybridge and the Technological Wild West,” for which she won a National Book Critics Circle Award. margaret talbot (COMMENT, P. 35), a staf writer, is the author of She is a columnist for Harper’s. “The Entertainer.” ian frazier (POEM, P. 84) wrote his first holiday poem in 2012. william finnegan (THE TALK OF THE TOWN, P. 38) has published sev- The poem’s past authors were Frank Sullivan (1932-74) and Roger eral books, the latest of which is “Barbarian Days: A Surfing Life.” Angell (1976-2009). samanth subramanian (“THE HIT LIST,” P. 52) is a New Delhi-based peter granser (PORTFOLIO, P. 88), an Austrian photographer, has journalist. His second book, “This Divided Island: Life, Death, and won many prizes for his work, among them the Arles Discovery the Sri Lankan War,” comes out this month. Award. He has published seven books, including “J’ai Perdu Ma Tête,” which came out in 2014. mike albo and amanda Duarte (SHOUTS & MURMURS, P. 57) are writer-performers and the co-creators of the faux Playbill for “Hurt tim parks (FICTION, P. 8), who lives in Italy, is the author of, most Locker: The Musical,” which was featured in the recent Tony- recently, “Where I’m Reading From: The Changing World of winning Broadway show “Hedwig and the Angry Inch.” Books” and the novel “Painting Death.” Robert pinsky (POEM, P. 54) teaches in the M.F.A. program at Bos- emily nussbaum (ON TELEVISION, P. 102), The New Yorker ’s television ton University. His most recent book, “Singing School,” is an an- critic, won the 2014 National Magazine Award for columns and thology of notable poems, with commentary. commentary. carolyn Kormann (“THROUGH THE LOOKING GLASS,” P. 58) is a kelefa Sanneh (BOOKS, P. 105) first wrote for the magazine in 2001 member of The New Yorker ’s editorial staf. and became a staf writer in 2008. james surowiecki (THE FINANCIAL PAGE, P. 40) writes about eco- peter schjeldahl (THE ART WORLD, P. 112) is the magazine’s nomics, business, and finance for the magazine. He is the author of art critic and the author of “Let’s See: Writings on Art from The “The Wisdom of Crowds.” New Yorker.” george booth (COVER) is a longtime New Yorker cartoonist. hilton als (THE THEATRE, P. 114), a staf writer, teaches at the “About Dogs” is one of his many cartoon collections. Columbia University School of the Arts. NEWYORKER.COM Everything in the magazine, PLUS more than fifteen original stories a day. ALSO: DAILY COMMENT / CULTURAL COMMENT: Opinions and analysis by THE YEAR IN REVIEW: Richard Brody writes about why 2015 was Jeffrey Frank, Emily Nussbaum, and others. a bad year for Hollywood but a terrific one for movies. Plus, New Yorker contributors on their favorite books from the FICTION AND POETRY: Robert Pinsky reads his poem, and Tim Parks past year. reads his short story. HUMOR: A Daily Cartoon on the news, by Benjamin Schwartz. PODCASTS: On the Political Scene, Ryan Lizza joins Dorothy Wickenden for a discussion about the divisions within the VIDEO: Manu Prakash discusses the Foldscope and the beauty of Republican Party. On Politics and More, Emily Nussbaum talks the microscopic world. And, on the latest episode of “Comma with Lindy West about sexual violence on television. Queen,” Mary Norris talks about how to use the ellipsis. SUBSCRIBERS: Get access to our magazine app for tablets and smartphones at the App Store, Amazon.com, or Google Play. (Access varies by loca- tion and device.) 8 THE NEW YORKER, DECEMBER 21 & 28, 2015 THE MAIL MIND AND MACHINE intelligence globally, allowing people to understand, acknowledge, and temper Nick Bostrom’s work on superintelligence, their behavior. Will that take five hun- as described in Rai Khatchadourian’s dred years? Do we have that much time? article, envisions the Singularity involv- Paul Farrell ing an “intelligence explosion”—the de- Cambridge, Mass. velopment of A.I. that can improve it- self and rapidly achieve intelligence In discussing the extinction potential greater than that of humans—and of technology, Khatchadourian men- weighs the potential efects for good or tions Bostrom’s relative dismissal of ill (“The Doomsday Invention,” No- natural threats, writing, “NASA spends vember 23rd). But there may be much forty million dollars each year to de- more likely scenarios. In order to reach termine if there are significant comets an intelligence explosion, there would or asteroids headed for Earth. (There have to be an incremental advancement aren’t.)” This is not reassuring: as Carl of A.I.—before we get to the super A.I. Sagan used to remind us, absence of brain, we will need to develop a lot of evidence is not evidence of absence. mediocre A.I. brains. What if human- The most obvious failing of the cur- ity finds A.I. mediocrity good enough? rent research program is that it focusses What if something fundamental in hu- on near-Earth objects to the exclusion manity itself prevents A.I. from getting of distant long-period comets, which, to the point of an intelligence explo- given their typical speed and size, may sion in the first place? Or, what if ad- not be discovered soon enough for us versarial groups of humans develop to be able to do anything to stop them competing A.I. systems that get along from colliding with Earth. The pow- no better than their inventors do? Imag- ers that be argue that the minuscule ining a one-way path to an intelligence chance of such a comet wreaking havoc explosion—no matter how fascinating does not justify mounting a Manhat- or how far in the future—can leave out tan Project-size efort in preparation. a lot of messy, but much more proba- Yet Bostrom’s own observation refutes ble, details. this line of reasoning. As Khatchadourian Randy Levine writes, “No matter how improbable ex- Denver, Colo. tinction may be, Bostrom argues, its consequences are near-infinitely bad; In the Khatchadourian piece, a scien- thus, even the tiniest step toward re- tist claims that A.I. could resolve cli- ducing the chance that it will happen mate change, disease, and poverty in is near- infinitely valuable.” We have ways beyond human capacity. But these the means, both technological and systemic problems are not only the re- financial, to add insurance to our sur- sult of a lack of intelligence or resources vival, and we do nothing. Perhaps the or logistics. There is plenty of food, most likely cause of human extinction money, and even plain old human in- is faulty reasoning. telligence devoted to confronting these Joel Marks, Professor Emeritus of problems. What we don’t have is the Philosophy, University of New Haven ability to overcome outmoded and Bioethics Center Scholar, Yale counterproductive evolutionary sur- University vival urges: hoarding against famine Milford, Conn. becomes greed, self-protection becomes aggression, alertness to danger becomes • xenophobic fear, the reproductive im- Letters should be sent with the writer’s name, address, and daytime phone number via e-mail perative for survival becomes overpop- to [email protected]. Letters may be ulation. Expecting A.I. to solve all of edited for length and clarity, and may be pub- lished in any medium. We regret that owing to this for us is asking for it to outsmart the volume of correspondence we cannot reply us. The alternative is fostering human to every letter or return letters. GOINGS ON ABOUT TOWN DECEMBER WEDNESDAY • THURSDAY • FRIDAY • SATURDAY • SUNDAY • MONDAY • TUESDAY 2015 16TH 17TH 18TH 19TH 20TH 21ST 22ND 23RD 24TH 25TH 26TH 27TH 28TH 29TH girl groups of the nineteen-sixties helped cement themes in American pop that have stuck to this day: glamour, adolescence, scandal, and the tension between capturing old, universal sentiments classical music | art and instituting new ones.