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History & Society
Trace how culture, power, and ideas shape societies across time.
Genetic analysis reveals that a specimen collected in 2019 is the same subspecies as one caught more than a century earlier.
Science and the sacred both allow us to retain our sense of wonder, even as disaster seems to swirl around us.
Three out of four Russians accused of witchcraft were men.
The way to understand the earliest moments of creation is to recreate those conditions and study them. Why would we stop now?
Symbolic gestures often speak to our psyche in ways no rational action could ever speak to our intellect.
The Netflix show about a Birmingham crime family and their personal demons concluded earlier this month.
The architecture and infrastructure found may well have required the greatest amount of skilled labor of any construction from the same time period in the entire continent.
The weird and wild ways mummy fever swept through Europe.
Unlike other world rulers, Genghis Khan was laid to rest not inside an elaborate mausoleum but an unmarked grave somewhere in Mongolia. Maybe.
Modern cosmology conjectures different possible fates for the Universe and thus for the end of time. Details depend on which model is right.
From the explosions themselves to their unique and vibrant colors, the fireworks displays we adore require quantum physics.
Before gunpowder was introduced to the West, medieval Arabs devised grenades using crockery.
1859's Carrington event gave us a preview of how catastrophic the Sun could be for humanity. But it could get even worse than we imagined.
In the Canaan religion, Yahweh was a lesser god, who was assigned the land of Israel. Here's how he became "God Almighty."
Since at least 600 BC, people have been mesmerized by the concept of the infinite.
Can Detroit get its comeback right?
Here's what the weather phenomenon baking large parts of the country actually means.
In 200 years, the mortality rate for children under the age of five (per 1,000 live births) has dropped from 40% to 3.7%.
A philosopher unpacks the paradox in using the word "evil."
Deaths of despair are skyrocketing in the U.S., while at the same time, they are falling in other wealthy countries. What are we doing wrong?