Inside Zoo

Inside Pyongyang

Caroline Campbell | Atlas Obscura | 3rd January 2023

On the urban planning of the Kim dynasty. After their decades in power, the only old building left in this 3,000-year-old city is the Potong Gate from the 6C. It has been left deliberately to create a vista contrasting this “small, encircled and unimpressive” edifice from Korea's history with the unfinished Ryugyong Hotel, “a sci-fi rocket-like concrete structure which seems to pierce the sky” (3,000 words)

Are We Stuck With The Zoo Hypothesis?

Matt Williams | Universe Today | 2nd January 2024

Why is there still no definitive evidence that the Earth is known to extraterrestrial civilisations? Three possibilities: there is no other advanced life in the universe, it just has yet to make contact, or the “Zoo Hypothesis” is true. This argues that aliens are “deliberately avoiding interaction and have set aside the area in which we live as a zoo”. The latter theory is surprisingly popular (1,900 words)