Many of us entered this so-called super-election year with a sense of foreboding. So far, not much has happened to allay those fears. Russia’s war on Ukraine is exacerbating a perception that democracy is threatened in Europe and beyond. In...
Blade Runner: The Final CutEntertainment Pictures/Alamy We have all come across dystopian visions of a bad future, like Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale. Less familiar is the practice of bad futurism, often hidden inside seemingly compelling stories, which promises an...
Blushing chickens People — humans — blush. Chickens aren’t entirely inhuman in that they, too, show emotions on their facial skin. Delphine Soulet at the University of Tours, France, and colleagues have explored how skin redness might be a reliable...
According to Jonathan Haidt’s bestselling book The Anxious Generation, the proliferation of smartphones and subsequent exposure to social media among children and young people has harmed mental well-being, resulting in an “anxious generation”. Hence Haidt’s title. However, a closer look...
The River Wye in the UKLuza Studios/Getty Images The tradition of the English nature writer is long, proud and distinctly genteel. Its origins lie with the pioneering 18th-century curate Gilbert White, writing from his inherited family home in Selborne, Hampshire....
Sodium valproate is an effective epilepsy drug, but it isn’t recommended to take during pregnancyMiljan Zivkovic/Shutterstock The drug rapamycin could prevent the epilepsy medication sodium valproate from causing developmental problems during pregnancy. Sodium valproate is used to treat epilepsy, bipolar...
Ants produce formic acid to defend themselves, and this acid can cause milk to coagulateWILDLIFE GmbH / Alamy Simply placing as few as four live ants into a container of milk provides enough microbes, enzymes and acids to kickstart the...
We can detect signals from black holes merging – but could we also pick up traces of more exotic collisions?VICTOR DE SCHWANBERG / SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY Gravitational wave signals that seem to emanate from black hole collisions may actually come...
October 3, 20243 min readHow ‘River Piracy’ Helped Give Mount Everest a Growth SpurtA model suggests a massive uplift caused by a phenomenon called “river piracy” partly explains Everest’s impressive heightBy Michael Marshall & Nature magazineMount Everest is unusually high,...
Climate change, global pandemics, bioterrorism, nuclear warfare, artificial intelligence run amok—today’s world offers no shortage of homegrown existential risks to worry about. But one of the most worrisome hazards doesn’t come from Earth at all. Rather, it’s from the astronomical...
