Genes can tell tales about you, from who your ancestors were to how likely you are to develop a range of diseases. And it seems probable that in the future they will tell more: your personality type, perhaps, or your intelligence. For these reasons, many countries have laws limiting what use employers and insurance companies can make of such information. America, for example, has the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, which makes it illegal for health insurers and employers to use genetic information to discriminate against customers and employees. There is much, however, that genes cannot reveal. They are blind to…

For the first time, the U.S. government’s highway safety agency has approved a company’s request to deploy a self-driving vehicle that doesn’t need to meet the same federal safety standards for cars and trucks driven by humans. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration granted temporary approval for Silicon Valley robotics company Nuro to run low-speed autonomous delivery vehicles that were designed without any accommodations for human drivers. That means no side and rear-view mirrors, windshield wipers, steering wheels or brake pedals. The vehicles previously were subject to federal standards for low-speed vehicles that travel under 25 miles per hour. Those…