Bina Venkataraman

Washington, D.C.

Columnist covering topics related to the future

Education: Brown University, bachelor of arts in international relations; Harvard Kennedy School, master of public policy

Bina Venkataraman writes a column on the future for The Washington Post. Before joining The Post, she served as editorial page editor of the Boston Globe, overseeing the news organization’s opinion coverage and its editorial board during two presidential impeachment trials, the 2020 election, the coronavirus pandemic, the murder of George Floyd, the U.S. Capitol insurrection and Boston’s historic 2021 mayoral election. During her tenure, the Globe had two Pulitzer finalists in editorial writing. Venkataraman previously served as a senior climate adviser in the Obama White House, as director
Latest from Bina Venkataraman

The presidential debate’s real mic problem

Harris and Trump would have a better debate if they employed ASL interpreters.

September 5, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris and former president Donald Trump. (AP)

What will the Google antitrust ruling mean for search — and all of us?

Creating more competition could be good for consumers, other tech companies and even Google itself.

August 9, 2024

Who is to blame for AI becoming ever more human?

Is it the tech companies? Or is it us?

May 30, 2024
Text from the ChatGPT page of the OpenAI website is shown in this photo, in New York, Feb. 2, 2023. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

What’s the best way to fight viral disinformation? Look to South Florida.

Latinos are using personal credibility to fight online rumors.

May 30, 2024

Do we actually want AI that seems human?

Chatbots are being made to act and sound like humans. That makes them easier to talk to, but there could be other consequences. As our relationships with artificial intelligence evolve, do we need to draw a brighter line between what is technology and what is us? Opinions columnists Josh Tyrangiel, Bina Venkataraman and Amanda Ripley talk about what we really want out of AI.

May 29, 2024

Why so much fuss about an eclipse?

There’s good reason for people to get excited about a predictable alignment of the Earth, moon and sun.

April 2, 2024
What it looked like in Argentina in 2019. (Marcos Brindicci/AP)

Why you’re always forgetting things, according to a memory scientist

Neuroscientist Charan Ranganath offers a scientifically robust exploration of the brain in his book “Why We Remember.”

February 23, 2024

Flying is a nightmare. But it could be fixed.

Step 1: Stop treating it like a luxury.

February 8, 2024
People whose flights have been delayed are seen sleeping at Kahului Airport in Hawaii on Aug. 10. (Mengshin Lin for The Washington Post)

What it will take to make clean energy affordable — for everyone

We have the technologies to reduce energy bills and cut fossil fuel emissions — if only all states would act.

January 30, 2024
Workers from Solar Solution install solar panels on a home in Southeast D.C. on Feb. 23, 2022. (Robb Hill for The Washington Post)

What a new genetic therapy should teach us about biomedical ‘progress’

A treatment for a disease that primarily afflicts the underprivileged underscores the need to rethink how innovative medicines are brought to market.

December 28, 2023
An electron microscope image shows, at top, a blood cell altered by sickle cell disease. (National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences/National Institutes of Health/AP)