When Saint Ambrose of Milan was venerated, his life became public property, its meaning expanding with the unique interpretations of each new generation.
Whenever you’re surprised, there’s a good chance that your brain is busy tweaking your memories.
With this unique opportunity to create a totally new world, why does the metaverse already feature such old-world concepts?
Why power generated through nuclear fusion will be the future, but not the present, solution to humanity’s energy needs.
Should we take people’s drunken behavior as evidence of their true character?
Many first-hand accounts from the golden age of piracy were grossly embellished, meaning it’s extremely difficult to separate Blackbeard the legend from Edward Thatch the person.
As viewed by the MeerKAT telescope, this radio view of the Milky Way blows away every other way we’ve ever seen our home galaxy.
Space planes could radically lower the cost of spaceflight.
There really might be extraterrestrials out there, attempting to make contact. Here’s how science, not fiction, is attempting to find them.
Einstein’s theories of relativity faced fierce opposition. One critic claimed he was attempting to subvert the scientific method.
One hundred years ago, a Ukrainian flag flew over Vladivostok and other parts of the “Russian” Far East.
For a long time, important events could only be visualized retroactively through paintings. Photography allowed us to capture history as — or sometimes even before — it happened.
A new analysis of an ancient hominin fossil sheds light on the “Out of Africa” dispersal events that occurred more than one million years ago.
We forget how unnatural a lot of formal education is. “Learning how to learn” requires bridging the gap between the abstract and the natural.
With launch costs dropping and enormous numbers of new satellites filling the sky, can’t we just do it all from space?
In scientific theories, the Multiverse appears as a bug rather than as a feature. We should squash it.
Scientists at UCLA and Penn argue that malfunctioning fat, not necessarily too much of it, is what makes people metabolically unhealthy.
According to Sigmund Freud, our revulsion at taboos is an attempt to suppress a part of us that actually wants to do them.
There are ~400 billion stars in the Milky Way, and ~2 trillion galaxies in the visible Universe. But what if we aren’t typical?
From physics and alchemy to theology and eschatology, Isaac Newton’s research was rooted in a personal pursuit of the Divine.
Elephants mourn the dead, dolphins give names to each other, and insects can recognize faces. The animal world is much smarter than we think.
Math offers good evidence that humans can solve any problem — as long as there’s money in it.
Travel half the distance to your destination, and there’s always another half to go. Despite Zeno’s Paradox, you always arrive right on time.
We know more about the universe than what is beneath our feet. But Earth’s mantle holds subtle clues about our planet’s past.
Iceland consistently ranks as the most gender-equal nation. It is also the nation where men and women are most likely to pursue sex-typical jobs.
The Siege of Leningrad lasted over two years and claimed nearly a million lives. It also inspired writers to record the bleak conditions in which they lived.
More than a decade ago, Armenia made chess a required subject in school because it teaches kids how to think and cope with failure. The U.S. should follow suit.
The Universe is supposed to be the same everywhere and in all directions. So what’s that giant “cold spot” doing out there?
Behind the scenes, Hitler had at least three disastrous relationships, including a short-lived marriage.
Neuroscience research suggests it might be time to rethink our ideas about when exactly a child becomes an adult.