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Scientific Method
13.8 billion years ago, the hot Big Bang gave rise to the Universe we know. Here's why the reverse, a Big Crunch, isn't how it will end.
Pseudoscience is science’s shadow.
After years of analysis, the Event Horizon Telescope team has finally revealed what the Milky Way's central black hole looks like.
Drop sodium in water, and a violent, even explosive reaction will occur. But quantum physics is needed to explain why.
The Standard Model may or may not be in trouble, but particle physics definitely needs saving. Here's what the new LHC can do.
Realism in science cannot be completely unmoored from human experience. Otherwise, realism ends up tortured with unreal paradoxes.
The European Space Agency’s Solar Orbiter recently captured images that could help scientists better under the mysterious physics of our Sun.
Single objects rarely change the course of an entire scientific field. Distant object GNz7q, a galaxy-quasar hybrid, might do exactly that.
Fermilab's TeVatron just released the best mass measurement of the W-boson, ever. Here's what doesn't add up.
Multiple lines of evidence — physical, chemical, and biological — must converge for scientists to conclude that alien life has been found.
Despite all that we've learned about the Universe, there remain unanswered, and possibly unanswerable, questions. Could "God" be the answer?
We cannot deduce laws about a higher level of complexity by starting with a lower level of complexity. Here, reductionism meets a brick wall.
If dark matter exists in a large halo in our galaxy, made up of particles, then it's passing through us constantly. But how much?
Einstein's theories of relativity faced fierce opposition. One critic claimed he was attempting to subvert the scientific method.
When reading critiques that inflate the uncertainty of science, ask these 7 questions.
In terms of the planets we've discovered, super-Earths are by far the most common. What does that mean for the Universe?
At a fundamental level, nobody knows whether gravity is truly quantum in nature. A novel experiment strongly hints that it is.
Developing an awareness of and an appreciation for science is what we all truly need, not what we've been doing.
In determining what qualifies as solid science, controversy is inevitable.
A few years ago, the first dark matter-free galaxies were announced, and then immediately disputed. Now, there are too many to ignore.
Science is a method of inquiry about nature, while scientism is philosophy. And scientism is no longer up to the challenge of meeting the most pressing issues of our day.
“To be ignorant of causes is to be frustrated in action.” So wrote Francis Bacon, counsel to Queen Elizabeth I of England and key architect of the scientific method. In […]
No matter how hard we try, we will never reach a final theory that unifies scientific knowledge. The very nature of science doesn't allow it.
No matter how controversial or politicized our world becomes, science remains humanity's best tool for figuring out how things work.
The Miller-Urey experiment showed that the building blocks of life could form in the primordial soup. But it overlooked one key variable.
Scientific pluralism is the notion that some questions must be approached from many angles. How can we integrate these scientific models?
The majority of the matter in our Universe isn't made of any of the particles in the Standard Model. Could the axion save the day?
The most unique interloper into our Solar System has a natural explanation that fits perfectly — no aliens required.
Many still cling to the idea that we live in a deterministic Universe, despite the nature of quantum physics. Now, the "least spooky" interpretation no longer works.