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History and Society
Do grim sci-fi scenarios crush our hopes for real-world growth? Author Michael Harris looks elsewhere to unblock the road to a better future.
The $21.5-billion project could involve tunneling hundreds of feet under Lake Geneva.
The Uros of Lake Titicaca live on floating islands made from reeds. How did they get there?
Beyond the planets, stars, and Milky Way lie ultra-distant objects: galaxies and quasars. Here's how far back we've seen throughout history.
We don’t yet know if these strange “obelisks” are helpful or harmful.
The study suggests that human ancestors expanded across Europe faster than previously thought.
Human civilization has always survived periods of change. Will our rapidly evolving technological era be an exception to the rule?
If the daily grind feels like Sartre's phony act of "bad faith," Heidegger's sense of "being" can help redefine your role.
The discovery suggests that the "Boring Billion" period of evolution on Earth wasn't so boring after all.
Five times in U.S. history, American presidential candidates have ascended to leadership despite lacking the popular vote. Here's how.
Economics and religion help to explain the gap.
"She understood me and I understood her. I loved that pigeon.”
The futuristic weapon could be ready for the battlefield in 5 years.
Without wormholes, warp drive, or some type of new matter, energy, or physics, everyone is limited by the speed of light. Or are they?
The world’s highest mountain is also the world’s highest cemetery, with some bodies serving as creepy landmarks for today’s climbers.
Adrie Kusserow, an anthropologist and scholar of Buddhism, shares how her study of the religion and its history has reshaped her view of the world — and herself.
New DNA analyses raise questions over the theory that Christopher Columbus and his men brought syphilis to Europe.
Skilled hunters adapted to the changing landscape and left tantalizing clues to who they were.
No shots fired. No flags raised. And no dry land gained. Still, the U.S. effectively grew by the size of about two Californias in December.
Valles Marineris is the Solar System's grandest canyon, many times longer, wider, and deeper than the Grand Canyon. What scarred Mars so?
Our own galaxy, the Milky Way, is both completely normal and absolutely remarkable in a number of ways. Here's the story of our cosmic home.
Millennia ago, philosophers like Anaximander grasped that nature is the ultimate recycler.
On the largest cosmic scales, galaxies line up along filaments, with great clusters forming at their intersection. Here's how it took shape.
Uncovering the story of Milan Hausner, the Sadská clinic, and LSD psychotherapy behind the Iron Curtain.
Do the benefits of plastics outweigh the costs?
College students once stood out from the pack on IQ tests. Today, they're about average.
Here in our Solar System, we only have one star: a singlet. For many systems, including the highest-mass ones, that's anything but the norm.
There is a cross-country correlation between democracy and health. Is there good evidence to suggest it is causal?
The pattern 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, etc., is the Fibonacci sequence. It shows up all over nature. But what's the full explanation behind it?
London’s busiest airport seems to be rebounding well from the pandemic — but Istanbul has better prospects in the long run.