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Centuries ago, the plague forced people into quarantine for years. Isaac Newton and Galileo used the time to revolutionize the world.
From 1974 to 1978, the chimps of Gombe Stream National Park in Tanzania were at war with each other, the first time conservationists saw chimps engage in calculated, cold-blooded killing.
One player’s pawn is another’s farmer. And at one time, the queen was a rather powerless virgin.
If you put very fine black powder powder in a confined space it explodes in a cloud of heat, gas and noise.
Haters and disrespect aside, fruitcake is still a robust American tradition.
The gospels imply that Jesus became famous as much for his exorcisms as his ministry.
The German-American cartoonist introduced the idea that Santa Claus traveled with a sleigh and reindeer.
It's that time of year when the hours of meticulous wrapping of Christmas toys are viciously undone in seconds by tiny children.
Bears, chimps, or humans? A track of five poorly preserved footsteps at Laetoli has puzzled paleontologists for decades. Now, a research paper from Nature claims to have solved the mystery.
Cities overstimulate our senses and are full of people we don't know. Maybe humans were meant for this.
Far from acting as the conduits of a benevolent deity, these religious leaders threw the teachings of their own church out of the window.
Washington believed that particular Thanksgiving in 1789 was a crucial occasion.
The early colonists thought they were being pulled by God into a void left by plague.
We haven't seen a partial eclipse lasting this long since 1440, and won't again until 2669. North America is perfectly positioned for 2021's.
Although equal parts Hollywood blockbuster and Putinist propaganda, "Trotsky" still manages to capture the good, the bad, and the ugly of Russia’s revolutionary past.
Looking with lasers, researchers discovered that many Olmec and Mayan ruins seem to have been constructed from the same blueprint.
Our views from the red planet’s surface are more spectacular than ever. Ever since the earliest spaceflight, humanity has reached for Mars. This photo composite shows Meande Ring, a river on […]
The Crab Nebula goes back to 1054, opening a window into our cosmic past. On July 4, 1054, Chinese astronomers recorded a “guest star” in the Taurus constellation. A ‘guest star’ […]
After a wait of 397 years in orbit, we’re finally getting a truly ‘Great’ Conjunction. Recently, December 21, 2020, Jupiter and Saturn finally met. Looking towards the southwest skies from […]
Known as the ‘North Star,’ Polaris won’t stay that way forever. Planet Earth spins a full 360°, about its axis, every 24 hours. The Earth in orbit around the Sun, with […]
It contains more water than all the Great Lakes combined, and the science of our planet explains why. Although practically all of Earth’s human population lives on dry land, our surface […]
This year’s June solstice coincides with a new Moon and an annular solar eclipse. Here’s how rare it truly is. As the Earth orbits the Sun, it rotates on its axis. […]
And if you have a friend at the same longitude, you can even measure its circumference. This year’s equinox, on March 19/20 of 2020 (longitude-dependent), is Earth’s earliest in 124 […]
No one has seen an equinox this early since the 19th century. And you’d better get used to it. This year, on March 19, 2020, the equinox will occur. For a […]
A fascinating new book tells the untold stories of two women, Jackie Cochran and Jerrie Cobb, who could have been first. On June 18, 1983, the Space Shuttle Challenger launched with […]
If you were to compress the entire history of the Universe into one calendar year, everything we love happens on December 31st. Our Universe has been around for 13.8 billion years […]
For decades, one of the Big Bang’s greatest predictions was shrouded in doubt. The answer was always there on Channel 3. When it comes to the question of how our Universe […]
On May 9, 2016, the prior transit of Mercury occurred, and was photographed many times on a practically continuous basis by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory. Transits of Mercury are rare, […]
Even with the best preparation imaginable, sometimes you have to get lucky, too. Even from our perspective in 2019, 50 years later, humanity’s achievements from July, 1969, still mark the pinnacle […]
The small step that one man took would never have happened without this narrow escape. On July 20, 1969, history was made as humanity set foot on the Moon for the […]