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COVID-19 imploded the world we used to live in. Why can’t other earthshaking scenarios do the same?

By Shari Hersh, Ron Whyte and Emma Wu While many people are experiencing pandemic fatigue, understandably eager for a return to normalcy, the COVID-19 crisis remains far from over. India is experiencing a nightmarish second wave that has led to overcrowded hospitals and critical shortages of lifesaving medical equipment. In its neighboring country Nepal, the

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1 min read
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Camden’s flooding problem is daunting today. As sea levels rise and precipitation increases, it’s only going to get worse

It was flooding in the Ablett Village public housing development in Camden’s Cramer Hill neighborhood. It had rained overnight from Saturday, April 24, into Sunday, April 25, and that brought water that pooled in driveways and on the sidewalks running between the area’s long, two-story brick apartment buildings. This is not at all unusual, according

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8 mins read
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Doctors gave this HIV+ West Philadelphia man a month to live. 15 years later, he leads creative, therapeutic workshops

Since ancient greece, and maybe earlier, humans have shared stories of wounded healers—people whose own injuries seem to confer upon them the gift of relieving other people’s pain. Multimedia artist Terrence Gore, 56, of West Philadelphia seems such a person. “Doctors gave me 30 days to live at one point,” he says. “That was 15

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4 mins read
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Citizen scientist seeks to track down fungi discovered by an illustrious Philadelphia mycologist

About 120 years ago a nature enthusiast named Charles McIlvaine explored the Angora Woods of West Philadelphia hunting for mushrooms. While most of the Angora Woods have long since been built up, a fringe of the area remains along Cobbs Creek. It was there that I met up with a modern-day fungi enthusiast, Luke Smithson.

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4 mins read
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PA passed a law to allow delivery robots on our sidewalks—here’s why it’s bad news

While it seems like just yesterday, it was six years ago that a world-famous hitchhiking robot was smashed in Philadelphia. The robot—dubbed hitchBOT—was originally created by a Canadian research team. It “could carry a limited conversation” and “took a photo every 20 minutes,” according to the Associated Press. HitchBOT had previously made its way across

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3 mins read
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Editor’s Notes: Knowing Our Past, Changing the Future

Even our roads reflect our racism. In December 2018, the Delaware Valley Regional Planning Commission (DVRPC) issued a report called “Crashes and Communities of Concern in the Greater Philadelphia Area.” They undertook the study as a means to investigate anecdotal evidence suggesting that people of color were more likely to be victims of severe car

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2 mins read