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General Relativity
It will be the most extreme test of Einstein’s General Relativity ever. And we already have the data. With every year that goes by, the total amount of knowledge that humanity […]
With a total of 10 black holes detected, what we’ve learned about the Universe is truly amazing. On September 14th, 2015, just days after LIGO first turned on at its new-and-improved […]
It’s not simply Hubble’s Law anymore, but the real history is far more complex than the stories you’ve heard. One of the most mind-blowing facts in our existence is that space […]
Hubble holds the record, finding a galaxy when the Universe was just 3% it’s age. In just a few years, James Webb will shatter it. One of the great scientific lessons […]
Despite what Hawking told you, it really isn’t about particle-antiparticle pairs at all. Nothing in the Universe lives forever. All the stars that will ever form will someday burn out; distant […]
We speak about it, argue over it, and even fight wars for it. We know it when we see it. But just what is energy, anyway? When it comes to being […]
If antimatter falls up instead of down, countless sci-fi dreams will become scientific reality. One of the most astonishing facts about science is how universally applicable the laws of nature […]
It was Stephen Hawking’s obsession for the last 30 years of his life. Here’s why it matters. When it comes to the sciences, sometimes making two observations or measurements that appear […]
As the Event Horizon Telescope prepares to release its first results, we can expect not just one, but two black hole images. What does a black hole actually look like? For […]
An Oxford physicist tries to cast doubt on dark energy, but the data says otherwise. It was a mere 20 years ago that our picture of the Universe got a […]
Of all the experiments performed and measurements made involving fundamental particles, none has ever violated the Standard Model. Until now. If there’s one thing you can count on physicists for, it’s […]
Our biases, preferences, and ideas of simplicity and elegance can get in the way. Here’s a scientific way to cut through them all. What are the rules governing reality? If you […]
Every physical theory has constants in it. The gravitational constant is remarkably uncertain. When we first began formulating physical laws, we did so empirically: through experiments. Drop a ball off […]
Not everyone is satisfied with the Big Bang. But every alternative is a disastrous failure. It’s treated as though it’s an unassailable scientific truth: 13.8 billion years ago, the Universe […]
Dark matter is our leading theory for a reason. New, detailed studies of the smallest galaxies could kill off the most studied alternative. When you look out at the Universe, […]
Different measurements of the Universe’s rate of expansion give inconsistent results. But this simple solution could fix everything. In 1915, Einstein’s theory of General Relativity gave us a brand new […]
With every second that goes by, tens of thousands of star disappear from our reach. And it’s getting worse. It’s been nearly a century since scientists first theorized that the Universe […]
In General Relativity, even space and time themselves aren’t what they seem. Gravity might have been the first fundamental force ever discovered, but in many ways, it remains the least-well understood. […]
If our current laws of physics can’t predict what will happen, even probabilistically, we need something new. There are two theories we have that explain all the particles and their […]
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 […]
The Universe is expanding, but different techniques can’t agree on how fast. No matter what, something major has got to give. Look out at a distant galaxy, and you’ll see it […]
If you thought LIGO’s recent discoveries were profound and unusual, wait until you meet OJ 287. Recently, LIGO has revolutionized our knowledge of the Universe by discovering merging black holes. The […]
There’s no such thing as a theory that’s too beautiful to be wrong, if it doesn’t agree with experiment. The history of physics is filled with great ideas that you’ve […]
In 2015, Ed Witten, the greatest living string theorist, wrote a piece on why. Here’s the version for everyone. It’s one of the most brilliant, controversial and unproven ideas in […]
As the new Star Wars movie, Solo, premieres, let’s look at the physics of how his most famous achievement might actually be possible. The Millennium Falcon’s greatest achievement, according to […]
Just one equation relates the expansion of space to all the matter and energy we have. If you know this, you can know the fate of the Universe. Last week, […]
If it can stretch the Universe from the size of a subatomic particle to billions of light years in a fraction of a second, why doesn’t Einstein’s relativity forbid it? When […]
Among the general public, people compare it to the aether, phlogiston, or epicycles. Yet almost all astronomers are certain: dark matter and dark energy exist. Here’s why. If you go by […]
It’s the first, most naive question you might think to ask. The solution is a lot more complicated than you imagine. According to a large amount of evidence, the overwhelming majority […]
If everything was hot, dense, and super close-together at the Big Bang, what kept us from collapsing into a singularity? The Big Bang is one of the most counterintuitive ideas […]