Somehow, the Universe began with just the right mix of cosmic ingredients to make life possible. It sure doesn’t seem likely. When you take stock of what’s in the Universe on […]
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Two of our biggest science-fiction dreams might not remain fiction for much longer. Here’s how 21st-century science could make it real. For as long as human beings have looked up at […]
Black holes are regions of extreme gravity, but dark matter barely interacts at all. Do they play well together? Black holes are some of the most extreme objects in the […]
The past is gone, the future not yet here, only the present is now. But why does it always flow the way it does for us? Every moment that passes finds […]
The paradox is one that Hawking himself claimed to have a solution to many times, but none of the proposals have held up to scrutiny. The paradox is still unresolved. […]
Before Hawking, black holes were just static points in the background of space. His greatest scientific legacy taught us just how dynamic they are. In 1915, Albert Einstein published his General […]
Instead of eternal expansion, could we just be part of a universal cosmic cycle? There are few questions that can keep us up at night the way pondering the eventual fate […]
When we think about the birth of the Universe, was time already in place? When we look at the Universe today, we know with an extraordinary amount of scientific certainty that […]
Ever hear of Hawking radiation? Or the black hole information paradox? Time to get your fix! In memory of Stephen Hawking’s life, I’ve decided to share the physics behind his greatest […]
The ability to instantaneously jump from one location in space to another clearly violates the laws of physics. Or does it? There are a few rules in the Universe that seem […]
While more controlled psychostimulants like amphetamines and cocaine facilitate a rush of blood to the whole brain, caffeine actually restricts blood flow overall.
In the far future, the last star burns out, stellar corpses get violently ejected, and galaxies accelerate away. And then the fun begins. For centuries, the biggest questions about our Universe […]
A team of researchers reverses the arrow of time in quantum experiments.
If we find the earliest signal from the Universe’s birth, how can we be sure we aren’t fooling ourselves? When it comes to the origin of the Universe, the Big […]
It may seem like the world’s going to hell in a hand basket, but the facts don’t support it.
The ultimate fate of the universe is a mind-bogglingly thing to think about. So what’s the final outcome for it all?
Or maybe it’s already begun.
Even our scientific heroes can’t be right about everything. Let’s learn the lessons that they never did. In the 1960s, a young theoretical physicist named Stephen Hawking rose to prominence as […]
The best books, calendar, accessories and more are all just one click away. Every year, there are no shortage of wonderful, exciting, informative gifts you could get for those who matter […]
It’s a fascinating idea, but how does it fare as a scientific theory? “Something is happening here and this is going to have an impact.” –Robert Dijkgraaf, on Verlinde’s work The […]
Our best physical theories predict that a multiverse exists. But if we can’t test it, is it really scientific? The Universe is all there ever was, all there is, and […]
Was it really a low-entropy state? And what does that mean for the second law of thermodynamics? “Entropy shakes its angry fist at you for being clever enough to organize […]
The theory could solve certain stubborn physics questions such as, where’s all the antimatter.
In this radical view, the universe is a giant supercomputer processing particles as bits.
The latest challenger to dark matter’s throne may not be so difficult to knock off, after all. This post was written by Sabine Hossenfelder. Sabine is a theoretical physicist specialized in […]
This study reminds us that we are stardust, operating under the same laws as any other form of matter.
Is our existence base reality—or are we pawns in a matrix? Cognitive scientist Joscha Bach explains how we might be able to tell.
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And just what did come before — way before — the Big Bang? “We are part of the universe that has developed a remarkable ability: We can hold an image of the world in our […]
One of cosmic inflation’s cofounders came out against it, calling it not even science. But it is… and so much more. “There’s no obvious reason to assume that the very same […]
The past is gone, the future not yet here, only the present is now. But why does it always flow the way it does for us? “Thus is our treaty written; […]