Hello!
Greetings from cloudy Indianapolis. As I write to you, I can hear a distant scream of engines two miles south of here: It's Carb Day at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, the last practice before the Indy 500 this Sunday. Besides being the central event in my hometown's cultural calendar, the Indy 500 is also the largest nonreligious gathering of human beings on Earth, and I love it. I love the rituals and traditions; I love watching the cars as they duck down into turn 2; I love seeing friends and family, and having a whole day that's just for fun.
But most of all, I love having something to look forward to. Every year when the trees start to leaf out and the weather warms, I think "The race is coming." Having something to look forward to is, for me, often more enjoyable than the thing itself proves to be. In general, looking forward with excitement and anticipation is much harder for me than looking forward with dread and fear. But the future is too multitudinous, and too unsettled, to be merely terrifying or dreadful. It is also full of birdsong and racecars.
I hope you've got something to look forward to at the moment.
John
You can always email us at [email protected]
This Week in Stuff
Acronymy is on a mission to define every word with an acronym, and you can help! (acronymy.net)
Justin Davies made ice cream out of one of the most hated trees. (YouTube)
We learned about Splash, a search and recovery otter who can smell underwater using bubbles. (Instagram)
WheezyWaiter cooked fast food at home to find out if it’s cheaper than the real thing. (YouTube)
Propeller hats became a must-have lake accessory. (Instagram)
Please send us stuff you think we should feature to [email protected]
China added a Germany-sized electricity grid last year
Hannah Ritchie and Pablo Rosado
We’ll often see headlines quoting how many gigawatts of new solar farms or coal plants China is building. But it’s hard to get a meaningful sense of scale for how electricity generation in China is changing.
The chart puts it in perspective.
In 2025 alone, China’s electricity generation increased by almost 500 terawatt-hours (TWh). This is compared here to the total amount of electricity that whole countries generate each year.
Germany generates almost exactly that amount. That means China effectively added a Germany-sized grid to its electricity system in just one year.
What’s also quite staggering is that almost all of this new generation came from solar and wind. China generated 340 TWh more electricity from solar than the year before.
That’s more than our two home countries, the UK and Spain, generate from all sources each year.
Low-carbon sources grew so much that coal power in China actually fell slightly.
Our World in Data is a UK-based non-profit organization that publishes research and data to make progress against the world’s largest problems. You can find more of their data insights here. Want to receive even more Data Insights like this from Our World in Data directly in your inbox every few days? Sign up for their newsletter!
This Week at Complexly
Make Some Noise for the 2026 Crash Course Coin!
Today’s media landscape is… a lot. We are drowning in information and starved for meaning. This year’s coin design is inspired by Crash Course’s goal to be a signal in the noise. It’s a soundwave, representing our commitment to providing clarity, context, and meaning.
Only available until May 29, these beautiful objects are minted in Arkansas from hand-engraved dies at Shire Post Mint. And each coin represents your ability to help us reach thousands of learners.
Get your (tax-deductible!) Crash Course Coin at crashcoursecoin.com.
Galápagos giant tortoises once numbered in the hundreds of thousands, with at least thirteen species. But now some of those species are gone forever, and the same forces that doomed those tortoises might have ended up helping save others.
Some Games to Play!
Blossom (by Merriam-Webster)
Spellcheck (by Answer in Progress)
This Gubbins postcard was made by Rachel. Send yours to [email protected]
If you post your results on social media, we’d love it if you post a link for folks to subscribe to “We’re Here” (https://werehere.beehiiv.com/subscribe)
The Five S’s with Partners In Health
Partners In Health (PIH), always refers to five key elements: staff, stuff, space, systems, and social support. We call them the “five S’s” and use them to guide our work every day in the 11 countries where we work, responding to emergencies and building and reinforcing strong, long-term health systems, in collaboration with government partners.
Read the first of five pieces focusing on the “five S’s” in action at the MCOE: Building Care with Staff
Weren’t able to join Hank, John, and others on the recent livestream celebrating the grand opening of the Maternal Center of Excellence (MCOE)? You can watch the recording on your own time!
Do you want to join us in building a future where every mother and baby can thrive? You can become a one-time or monthly donor today to ensure your support will have lasting change: www.pih.org/hankandjohn. Aren’t able to donate? Your attention matters - read the stories at the link to learn more and share with others.
Your Dream Podcast Guests
Last week, Hank talked about his new podcast, Humans, and asked who you’d love to hear in an episode. Thank you to everyone who suggested a guest!
My dream guest on the Humans podcast would be David Attenborough. I would love to ask him how he finds hope and optimism despite having a better scientific understanding than most about how ecosystems are changing.
Hannah Ritchie from Our World In Data and author of some great books.
I'd ask her how she manages to stay so optimistic.
I would love to listen to a Humans podcast episode with Levar Burton as a guest. He never fails to bring wisdom, humbleness, curiosity and calm to every interview.
This might be wishful thinking, but I would love to see an Artemis II astronaut (or anyone who worked on the mission!) as a guest so Hank and them could completely nerd out about space.
I imagine this podcast will be a lot like the talk Hank and Destin had during the P4A this year, and that was literally my highlight of the stream. So bring him back! I’d also add Physics Girl, Dr. Laurie Santos, Josh Scherer, Brennan Lee Mulligan, and Marlo Thomas.
I'd say my dream guests on the Humans podcast would have to be Dan & Phil! I'd absolutely love to hear all of your perspectives on mental health, especially around making online content.
I'm telling you, the audience overlap is more than you would expect!!
I would like to hear a podcast with John Darnielle, and NOT just because I was in the middle of seeing The Mountain Goats live when I received the latest We're Here LOL. I didn't know he had so much Oregon in his past as someone who is from Oregon and coincidentally flying out in a few hours to go home for the first time in a few years, so I'd really like to hear about his years in Portland! And also his favorite sad song in a major key that isn't his!
My dream Humans guest would be my Grandma. I just think she's such a kind and interesting person and I would love for other people to get to know her like I do. I'd ask her about her favourite experiences as a postal worker, the first drag show she attended, and any advice she has to share with the audience.
My dream Humans podcast guest is Courtney Dauwalter. She's one of the best ultramarathon runners ever, with a remarkably chill and cheerful disposition.
A few podcasts have featured her and ask her lots about the technical running stuff, which is interesting, but I want to know more about this particular kind of human life she has chosen and why. She often describes wanting to carve out more space in the "pain cave" to test the limits of human capability. How did that goal become her goal? What does she think the value of breaking those boundaries is, for her and for all humans? What is our human relationship to doing really friggin hard things? So many good meaning-questions for Dauwalter and Hank would be the perfect host to ask them.
Unfortunately, my dream Humans podcast guest will never be able to happen. Fred Rogers would have been an amazing guest on this podcast! He spent so many years teaching kids what it means to be a human and how to socially navigate our world. My question to Mr. Rogers would be: How do you approach such complex concepts with such young kids in a way that makes sense to them, stays applicable as they age, but also does not steal their childhood and naivety from them? I would follow it up with asking: Have the hard topics changed drastically overtime or have they stayed pretty similar? If they have changed, have the concepts become more complex or difficult to adapt for the younger kids?
That’s all, folks!
We’d love to know what you’re looking forward to. It can be something big, like the Indy 500, or it can be something small, like grabbing coffee with a friend. Tell us about it!
Send something you’re looking forward to to [email protected].
