Tour and overview of Commonwealth Fusion Systems tokamak.

Deep Time Reading Group monthly meeting at Cafe Zing

Join Long Now Boston for a special screening of the acclaimed documentary Inundation District, followed by a Q&A with the director, Pulitzer Prize-winning filmmaker and Boston Globe reporter David Abel.

The second meeting of the Deep Time Reading Group was a good time with lots of great ideas from all participants! Meetings will continue to be held the first Sunday of the month at 2pm at Cafe Zing in Porter Square.

Next Meeting: Sunday, Dec 7, 02025 at 2:00 PM. Register here!

On October 14, 02025, Long Now Boston gathered a wide-ranging panel of thinkers to imagine what the city—and the civilization it anchors—might look like two and a half centuries from now. The evening, hosted by Long Now Boston's Gary Oberbrunner, was part of the organization’s mission: to foster long-term awareness and responsibility on a timescale measured not in years or election cycles but in centuries. The question we always ask ourselves is “How can we become better ancestors?”

The inaugural meeting of the Deep Time Reading Group was a good time with lots of great ideas from all participants! Going forward, meetings will be held the first Sunday of the month at 2pm at Cafe Zing in Porter Square.

Long Now Boston joins Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, and the Harvard Library in welcoming Christine Webb—primatologist at Harvard’s Department of Human Evolutionary Biology—for a discussion of her new book The Arrogant Ape: The Myth of Human Exceptionalism and Why It Matters. This event will take place at the Harvard Science Center, Hall D, located at 1 Oxford St, Cambridge. Following the presentation will be a reception and book signing in the Cabot Science Library across the hall from the presentation room.

Steve Strassmann's talk with Long Now Boston explores how large complex systems—biological, political, and artificial—fail through what he calls "governance disease," drawing provocative parallels between cancer, political dysfunction, and AI development. His central thesis is that evolution works at two conflicting scales: individuals competing within groups (seeking promotions, resources, advantages) versus groups competing in external environments (facing predators, competitors, existential threats). When individuals gain the ability to change the rules that govern the group—what happens in both cancer cells and corrupted institutions—the system breaks down.

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, the Harvard Library, and Long Now Boston welcome Peter Brannen for a discussion of his new book. He will be joined in conversation by Phoebe Cohen—paleontologist, science communicator, and Professor of Geosciences at Williams College. 

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, the Harvard Library, Long Now Boston, and the Cambridge Public Library welcome Shahir S. Rizk and Maggie M. Fink for a discussion of their new book The Color of North: The Molecular Language of Proteins and the Future of Life.

You're invited to a unique summer gathering at the lakefront farm of Danny Hillis and Taylor Milsal: conversation, fun and big ideas!

Harvard Book Store, the Harvard University Division of Science, the Harvard Library, Long Now Boston, and the Cambridge Public Library welcome Lisa S. Gardiner—science writer, geoscientist, educator, and author of Tales from an Uncertain World: What Other Assorted Disasters Can Teach Us about Climate Change—for a discussion of her book Reefs of Time: What Fossils Reveal about Coral Survival.