features
Dirty Coal, Clean Future
To environmentalists, clean coal is an insulting oxymoron. But because coal so dominates the world economy, any meaningful effort to arrest climate change will require using dirty coal in more-sustainable ways. Quiet collaboration between American and Chinese businesses and scientists is pointing the way.
Video: James Fallows flies his plane over West Virginia coal country and discusses the coming transformation.
The Danger of Cosmic Genius
The physicist Freeman Dyson has reshaped thinking in fields from math to astrophysics to medicine. Yet he is also one of the world's foremost global-warming skeptics. How could someone as smart as Dyson be so wrong about the environment? A cautionary tale about science and faith.
From the Archives: Thirty years of Atlantic articles on climate change, clean tech, and Freeman Dyson.
The Drone Wars
In Pakistan, the CIA's remote-controlled bombing campaign heats up.
“God Help You. You're on Dialysis.”
Shockingly error-prone and brutally expensive, our federally funded system of dialysis care is failing. A year-long investigation reveals why—and what may lie ahead for health-care reform.
Your Child Left Behind
A new ranking shows that even privileged kids in our best public-school systems do poorly compared with their peers in other countries.
Multimedia: An interactive graphic rates the U.S. education system against the rest of the world.
A Matter of Degrees
U.S. universities are still on top, but Asia is rising.
Poll: The Atlantic asked 30 university and college presidents about tenure, student preparedness, and other hot issues.
dispatches
The Battle of Rio
With the 2016 Olympics looming, the city’s embattled police invade the favelas.
Tabloid Feminist
An antidiscrimination icon finds a new frontier in trash culture.
Deal With a Dictator
Getting supplies to Afghanistan may be worth cozying up to Uzbekistan—for now.
Playing Doctor
How to spin pharmaceutical research
Bringing the Coffin Industry Back From the Dead
How barcodes and touch screens are resuscitating a casket factory
My Year at Sea
Recalling the splendid isolation of travel by freighter
Take the Data Out of Dating
Online matchmaking is getting better at telling us whom we ought to like—and that's not good.
books
Books of the Year 2010
The Atlantic's literary and national editor selects the best in a crowded field.
Runners Up: See 15 additional picks by The Atlantic’s books editor
The Frugal Divorcée
How to survive—and even thrive—in the new age of austerity
Cover to Cover
Bill Bryson brings it all back home; England's gilded monuments; and more
columns
Paging Dr. Luddite
Information technology is on the brink of revolutionizing health care— if physicians will only let it.
The Tragedy of the Talk Show Host
Miscast in the age of viral humor, the late-night star remains eternally freaky—and oddly reassuring.
