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The hedgehog probes deeply and narrowly; the fox skims lightly and broadly.

A group of companies are coming together to create a new kind of power generator that would harvest energy from currents found at oceans’ deepest depths.

In a market where energy providers compete for business, homeowners now have the option of purchasing 100% renewable energy for a price that’s 10 percent cheaper than the standard utility rate.

A team of scientists have observed that the absence of a specific protein correlated with weight gain, especially when the protein was not present in the body’s stores of brown fat.

Stanford University researchers have succeeded in making an ultra-flexible solar cell that can be peeled off a backing and applied to any surface.

The impending catastrophe has been fueled by a skewed, institutionally enclosed rationality that is widespread within the business community; the basic principle is that short-term power and wealth are more important than human survival.

A company believes it’s got the right mix of technologies to open and operate South America’s first-ever commercial-scale biorefinery producing ethanol from sugarcane waste.

A study published today describes how scientists were able to power a transmitter using the electrochemical potential found in a guinea pig’s cochlea.

The magic “x-factor” that people talk about when they talk about talent is not so magical: it’s simply a matter of hard work. And no other craft reminds one of […]

Scientists at the University of Washington speculate that the goal of a super-intelligent civilization would be to create computer programs simulating other universes—ones such as ours. 

“Now” trends are those with high energy and can be leveraged in the present; “Next” trends will begin to manifest towards the end of 2013 and gain traction through 2014; “Future” trends are fringe signals that will play out in 2015 and beyond.

A new report from the World Resources Institute says that at least 1,199 coal plants are being planned worldwide, with a growing number of them proposed for developing countries.

A new company is looking to provide sanitation services to areas that need them most and then use human waste as a source of energy.

Close to one-fifth of the world has no access to a power grid, and for many others, access is spotty and inconsistent. A New York startup now offers an affordable, lightweight solution.

We aren’t doing enough. The human race is in more danger than it might seem.

By substituting a common plant dye for the metals used to extract lithium, researchers say many of the environmental hazards associated with production and disposal can be avoided.

Photos released from the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) represent the first step in a project that will help astronomers better understand the makeup of the universe and the causes behind its rapid expansion.

I mentioned in my last post that I had attended the Economist’s “The World in 2013” festival. Here are some zingers (paraphrased) that got my attention: Peter Orszag: Life expectancy […]

Flexible displays have been here for a while, but the other components of a device need to be flexible as well. 2013 may very well see their debut.

The Science Channel will re-run all five seasons of the sci-fi cult drama Fringe beginning tonight at 8pm. The two-hour pilot will air along with the first episode, followed by daylong […]

Today, predictive analytics’ all-encompassing scope already reaches the very heart of a functioning society. Several mounting ingredients promise to spread prediction even more pervasively: bigger data, better computers, wider familiarity, and advancing science.   

On February 20, a conservative Christian group, the National Center for Law & Policy (NCLP), filed a lawsuit against the Encinitas School Board for teaching yoga in public schools. The […]

Hurricane Sandy’s the hurricane from hell. It broke all records. It was the storm of the century. It is the hurricane we will tell our grandkids about.But can it happen […]

Over at Edge.org, its impresario John Brockman poses an annual question to his assemblage of scientists, scholars, writers and other insightful people. This year’s (suggested by George Dyson), was this: […]

If you run into violinist Joshua Bell at a cocktail party, don’t tell him you find classical music ‘relaxing.’ “Beethoven’s symphonies are not relaxing,” says Bell, who at 45 is […]

A good thing about ELECTIONS is that they remind us we have a CONSTITUTION. They especially remind us that we’re a really, really constitutional people. Lots of Americans really hate […]

We have a background assumption that we are living in a technologically-accelerating civilization. Peter Thiel has a different view of where we are headed, and he says we need to fight hard to improve our future prospects. 

NASA’s new X-ray telescope chanced upon a rare flare-up taking place in the center of the galaxy, home of the Sagittarius A black hole.

Is the overconsumption of sugar the cause of chronic metabolic disease? 

The Guardian’s Oliver Burkeman explains why new age authors like Deepak Chopra shouldn’t be ignored because they are labeled as pseudoscience. Wisdom needn’t be scientific, says Burkeman.