Do we really live longer than our ancestors?
“There is a basic distinction between life expectancy and life span,” says Stanford University historian Walter Scheidel, a leading scholar of ancient Roman demography. “The life span of humans –…
In Search of Lost Smell and Taste
“Even though we don’t pay that much attention to our sense of smell, as humans we’re constantly engaged subconsciously with the smells in our world, and that gives us a…
Why Computers Won’t Make Themselves Smarter
We’re a long way off from being able to create a single human-equivalent A.I., let alone billions of them. For the foreseeable future, the ongoing technological explosion will be driven…
Novel HIV vaccine approach shows promise in “landmark” first-in-human trial
The vaccine was able to target the desired immune cells and could become the first stage of a multi-step vaccine strategy to combat HIV and various other viral diseases. {read}
These Iron Age Swedish Warriors Were Laid to Rest on Luxurious Feather Bedding
Researchers say the various types of bird feathers used may hold symbolic significance {read}
What You Need to Know About COVID-19 Vaccines, Birth Control, and Blood Clots
The blood clots that might be linked to the new vaccines are part of a condition known as cerebral venous sinus thrombosis (CVST), and they have not been well studied.…
Fermi paradox
The Fermi paradox, named after Italian-American physicist Enrico Fermi, is the apparent contradiction between the lack of evidence for extraterrestrial civilizations and various high estimates for their probability (such as…
There Is Little Evidence That Mass Transit Poses a Risk of Coronavirus Outbreaks
“many have blamed subways and buses for coronavirus outbreaks, but a growing body of research suggests otherwise.” The piece noted that epidemiologists use the term “cluster” to describe major coronavirus…
The Great Silence
Ted Chiang’s very short story, “The Great Silence” adds another set of questions to these speculations. Why, he asks, are we so interested in finding intelligence in the stars and…
Ted Chiang Uses Science to Illuminate the Human Condition
I think science and religion could more peacefully coexist if we could agree that they are trying to answer different questions; science is investigating the question, “how does the universe…