Issue 8 | Mar 30, 2026 | Sign up
Studying biology is like crash landing on an alien planet and encountering a technology so terrifyingly advanced it is mystical.
Imagine such a planet where flying creatures navigate by electromagnetic waves. Where swarms of 60,000 insects act as one hive mind. Where slugs absorb plants to inherit their powers of photosynthesis. And where a lone child running on the caloric equivalent of a lightbulb can teach itself to outthink nuclear-powered AI models.
All of that is of course real. It exists today. And it's the topic of the newest issue of Rewild Magazine. In it, we invite you to view tech like AI in context—as a plastic straw wedged in the tree of life—and to marvel at the unbelievable ingenuity of all the real life teeming on other branches.
Within, 10 scientists, artists, makers, and authors—Vlad Ayzenberg, Eve Eden, myself, Lauren Gillespie, Robin Guilhot, Clarissa Kupfer, Steve Peck, Nick Rahaim, Cecilia Seiter, and Jay Standish—reflect on how sometimes, nature has already solved the problem. What can we learn from studying it?
In the feature article, Vlad, a neuroscientist, shares how studying infant cognition can help us make AI models twice as energy-efficient.
Read Rewild Magazine issue 3: Nature Did It Better 🌱
- Editor’s Letter
- Why doesn't AI have a childhood?
- The Clearing for Nature Did it Better
- Finding peace on a perilous sea
- Eventually, everything connects
- How do trees water their highest leaves?
- I choose to portage
- On AI, bees, and the dream job
- Email nurture is powerfully unnatural
This week: Ask: "How has nature already solved this problem?"
That's from Ray and Charles Eames. Their artifact-packed institute in Richmond, California is well worth a visit. And their ideas, worth exhuming.
Fenwick principle: Truth Seekers
We place a high value on bypassing artifice and fluff. We believe that when you help your reader, you advance all humanity. That’s why we used this issue of the magazine to place AI in its broader context, and encourage us all to look to nature as the first and best tonic.
Inside Fenwick
On April 8, Vlad will present his latest research into how studying babies has led academics to train climate-friendlier AI models. So why aren't engineers listening?
Worth reading
Child’s Play. On the profound importance of playtime and why we mustn't lose it as adults.
Solar punk. For those who haven’t heard the term, it’s a play on cyberpunk. Solar’s what comes after.
Power Tools. An acerbic zine. I’m kinda into it.
Did you know bees can breathe underwater? Turns out, there’s a practical reason.
Who will monitor the monitors? Wonderful, raw, relatable, about our new artificial anxieties. Credit James Winter for sharing this.
When you use ChatGPT for everything. Funny. Don’t let the “fruitful friction” go out of your life, as Eve puts it. Otherwise, we’ll soon need brain gyms.
The Brand Age. One of the most important essays by Paul Graham.
You probably spend too much time inside.
Field Innovation Lab. Need to imagine your company’s future? These folks are at the bleeding edge of naturally-encoded wisdom.
My year as a degenerate sports gambler. Another installment in that great journalistic experiment I love so dearly, of people doing the thing so they can report truthfully.
Migration is natural. Only humans criminalize it.
Midnight Moments. Every night at 11:57 pm Times Square’s billboards all give over to a selected artist who often creates physical installations as well. Credit to Damien Bradfield for drawing my attention to this.
