Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Nautilus

    Why Won’t This Inspirational Email Chain Letter Leave Me Alone?

    by Uri Bram Jun 24, 2016 4 minutes

    A few times each year, a particular chain letter pops up in my inbox. “We’re starting a collective, constructive, and hopefully uplifting exchange,” it starts, exhorting me to send a “favorite text / verse / meditation” to a previous participant in the chain, and to forward the message to another 20 friends. In my personal social circles, chain emails (“FW: FW: RE: funny!”) largely died out some time in the 2000s. But I first received this message in February 2014—the oldest example I can find online dates from just the same time—and it has gatecrashed my inbox at fairly regular intervals in the three years since.

    You’re reading a preview, subscribe to read more.

    More from Nautilus

    Nautilus6 min read
    A Scientist Walks Into a Bar …
    It sounds like the setup to a joke: When I was starting out as a stand-up comedian, I was also working as a research scientist at a sperm bank.  My lab was investigating the causes of infertility in young men, and part of my job was to run the clinic
    Nautilus7 min read
    The Part-Time Climate Scientist
    On a Wednesday in February 1938, Guy Stewart Callendar—a rangy, soft-spoken steam engineer, who had turned 40 just the week before—stood before a group of leading scientists, members of the United Kingdom’s Royal Meteorological Society. He had a bold
    Nautilus4 min read
    Why Animals Run Faster than Robots
    More than a decade ago a skinny-legged knee-less robot named Ranger completed an ultramarathon on foot. Donning a fetching red baseball cap with “Cornell” stitched on the front, and striding along at a leisurely pace, Ranger walked 40.5 miles, or 65

    Related Books & Audiobooks