There’s a lot of negativity in the news these days – wars, climate disasters, election angst and more. If you’re looking for more positive things to think about, we’ve got an essay from UMass Amherst English professor David Toomey making the case that play is fundamental to life, with diverse examples from the animal kingdom.

In his new book, “Kingdom of Play: What Ball-bouncing Octopuses, Belly-flopping Monkeys, and Mud-sliding Elephants Reveal about Life Itself,” Toomey explores what researchers have learned from studying play in animals, including the possibility that it has a role in evolution. As he explains, play shares many features with the process of natural selection – for example, they both are undirected, open-ended and create many forms of beauty. In Toomey’s view, there’s a good argument that to live is to play.

Also in this week’s science news:

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Jennifer Weeks

Senior Environment + Cities Editor
Throw it to me! Mike Linnane / 500px via Getty Images

At its core, life is all about play − just look at the animal kingdom

David Toomey, UMass Amherst

Reduced to its essence, the process of natural selection would look a lot like play.
Resist demonizing the ‘other’ side. Moor Studio/DigitalVision Vectors via Getty Images

Dealing with election anxiety? A psychiatrist explains how to channel your fears and break out of tribal thinking

Arash Javanbakht, Wayne State University

The human tendency to form group affiliations and vilify outsiders can help ramp up your anxiety during a contentious election cycle. But you can push back on those fears.
A growing body of evidence points to MDMA’s therapeutic potential for managing an array of hard-to-treat conditions like PTSD and depression. Antonio Ciufo/Moment via Getty Images

FDA rejects MDMA-assisted therapy for PTSD treatment – a drug researcher explains the challenges psychedelics face

Benjamin Y. Fong, Arizona State University

The FDA’s decision shines a light on some of the unique obstacles that psychedelic drugs may face on the path to approval.

Mammary glands in a dish − what miniature organs reveal about evolution, lactation, regeneration and breast cancer

Gat Rauner, Tufts University

Organoids of mammary glands can help researchers more efficiently study lactation, with findings that could apply to fields ranging from agriculture to medicine.

Rat poison is moving up through food chains, threatening carnivores around the world

Meghan P. Keating, Clemson University

Modern rodenticides can kill rats with a single dose and readily pass up the food chain to larger carnivores. They are widely used and largely unregulated.

Birth of a hurricane: What meteorologists look for as they hunt for early signs of a tropical cyclone forming

Xingchao Chen, Penn State

New techniques are helping forecasters spot potentially dangerous storms earlier than ever.

If you want Americans to pay attention to climate change, just call it climate change

Wändi Bruine de Bruin, USC Dornsife College of Letters, Arts and Sciences; Gale Sinatra, University of Southern California

Phrases like ‘climate crisis,’ ‘climate emergency’ or ‘climate justice’ might seem to escalate the urgency, but a large survey shows they don’t help and may actually hurt.

AI helps lighten the load on the electric grid – without skimping on people’s energy use

Zoltan Nagy, The University of Texas at Austin

Smart buildings can team up to be more energy efficient while keeping the people inside comfortable.

Wildfires don’t just burn farmland − they can contaminate the water farmers use to irrigate crops and support livestock

Andrew J. Whelton, Purdue University

Just like fires can contaminate municipal water systems by melting pipes, farms’ and ranches’ water supply systems are at risk. A first-of-its-kind study after the Maui fires explores the harms.