The Disneyfication of Atomic Power

John Jay Hopkins’s visit to Japan in 1955, as an informal emissary of “Atoms for Peace,” must have seemed surreal to everyone… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Witness Is a Whale

In their film, The Witness Is a Whale, filmmakers Nick and Cheryl Dean take us on a remarkable journey to understand the private lives… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Heliosphere, Safety Belt of Our Solar System

David McComas has a favorite “astrosphere,” the environment created by a star’s stellar wind as it buffets the surrounding interstellar… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Math of the Amazing Sandpile - Issue 107: The Edge

Remember domino theory? One country going Communist was supposed to topple the next, and then the next, and the next. The metaphor… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Safety Belt of Our Solar System - Issue 107: The Edge

David McComas has a favorite “astrosphere,” the environment created by a star’s stellar wind as it buffets the surrounding interstellar… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Order Flocking Out of Chaos - Issue 107: The Edge

At first, they trickle in: one bird here, a few birds there. Then, at dusk’s cue, a dark smudge materializes on the horizon. Thousands… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Disneyfication of Atomic Power - Issue 107: The Edge

John Jay Hopkins’s visit to Japan in 1955, as an informal emissary of “Atoms for Peace,” must have seemed surreal to everyone… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Bridge from Nowhere (2014)

The question of being is the darkest in all philosophy.” So concluded William James in thinking about that most basic of riddles:… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Nature’s Fear Factor

When Mozambique’s civil war ended in 1992, more than 1 million people had lost their lives. Another 5 million were displaced. And… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

David Attenborough’s Life in Color

The natural world is a feast of color and pattern, but what is it all for? An orange tiger seems awfully conspicuous stalking its… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Nature’s Fear Factor - Issue 107: The Edge

When Mozambique’s civil war ended in 1992, more than 1 million people had lost their lives. Another 5 million were displaced. And… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

David Attenborough’s Life in Color - Issue 107: The Edge

The natural world is a feast of color and pattern, but what is it all for? An orange tiger seems awfully conspicuous stalking its… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Looking for Life on Mars - Issue 107: The Edge

Terri Randall’s hope when he makes films about space exploration—like Chasing Pluto, for example, or Death Dive to Saturn—is… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Witness Is a Whale - Issue 107: The Edge

In their film, The Witness Is a Whale, filmmakers Nick and Cheryl Dean take us on a remarkable journey to understand the private lives… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Rise of RNA Therapeutics - Issue 107: The Edge

Most American newborns will arrive home from the hospital and start hitting their developmental milestones, to their parents’ delight.… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

How to Build a Society for All to Enjoy - Issue 107: The Edge

Structuresstructure (noun): the arrangement of or relation between the parts of something complex; the organization of interrelated… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Ian and the Limits of Rationality

Setting: Chesterfield High, an unusual school in the suburbs of Ohio.The teacher writes on the board:2, 3, 5, 7, ...How, he asks,… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Why These Children Fell into Endless Sleep

I had barely stepped foot over the threshold and I already felt claustrophobic. I wanted to turn back. People shuffled into the room… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Hidden Link Between “Genetic Nurture” and Educational Achievement - Facts So Romantic

The genes that shape how educated you eventually become don’t necessarily have to be passed on to you.Photo Illustration by Peshkova… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Why These Children Fell into Endless Sleep - Issue 107: The Edge

I had barely stepped foot over the threshold and I already felt claustrophobic. I wanted to turn back. People shuffled into the room… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Neurologist Who Diagnoses Psychosomatics - Issue 107: The Edge

Our brains can play the worst tricks on us. They are always looking to explain and categorize incoming stimuli, sometimes perceiving… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Ian and the Limits of Rationality - Issue 107: The Edge

Setting: Chesterfield High, an unusual school in the suburbs of Ohio.The teacher writes on the board:2, 3, 5, 7, ...How, he asks,… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

What Is Life? – Issue 106: Intelligent Life

Let me tell you what it’s like to be an astrobiologist.I painted a white picket fence this summer. No one asked me to. It was a… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Why Understanding Space is so Hard

The overwhelming success of Einstein’s theory was the final blow for Newton’s absolute space—but without absolute space, we… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Existential Comfort Without God

Last month, Harvard University named a new Chief Chaplain: Greg Epstein, an atheist. As reported in The New York Times,1 Epstein,… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Where Aliens Could Be Watching Us - Issue 106: Intelligent Life

Do you ever feel like someone is watching you? They could be. And I’m not talking about the odd neighbors at the end of your street.This… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

What Is Life? - Issue 106: Intelligent Life

Let me tell you what it’s like to be an astrobiologist.I painted a white picket fence this summer. No one asked me to. It was a… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Existential Comfort Without God - Issue 106: Intelligent Life

Last month, Harvard University named a new Chief Chaplain: Greg Epstein, an atheist. As reported in The New York Times,1 Epstein,… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Radio Enthusiasts Are Listening to Earth’s Symphony (2015)

Stephen McGreevy looked nervously at the sky. Outside his camper van in Nevada’s Black Rock Desert, angry black clouds gathered… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Problem with Depression Doping

If we medically insulate, or precipitously shield, emerging adults from introspection and struggle, from the work of figuring out… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Problem with Depression Doping - Facts So Romantic

If we medically insulate, or precipitously shield, emerging adults from introspection and struggle, from the work of figuring out… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Hard Problem of Consciousness Has an Easy Part We Can Solve

Our General Resonance Theory of consciousness, a framework with a panpsychist foundation, may, at least in theory, provide more complete… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

No Species Is an Island

The following is adapted from a speech Roger Payne gave at this year’s Interspecies Internet conference. His remarks have been lightly… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Man Who Seduced the World with Whale Songs - Issue 105: Whale Songs

It’s been more than 50 years since biologist Roger Payne brought whale song into the lives of millions via the popular album, Songs… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Whale Who Will Come Soon - Issue 105: Whale Songs

The beachfront narrows to an ocherous ribbon, belted by blue, above and below. After a while, a handful of shearwaters appear in the… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

No Species Is an Island - Issue 105: Whale Songs

The following is adapted from a speech Roger Payne gave at this year’s Interspecies Internet conference. His remarks have been lightly… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Hard Problem of Consciousness Has an Easy Part We Can Solve - Facts So Romantic

Our General Resonance Theory of consciousness, a framework with a panpsychist foundation, may, at least in theory, provide more complete… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Universe Has Already Made Almost All the Stars It Will Ever Make

Our human world is soaked in light. For starters there are the 100,000 trillion photons arriving every second at every square centimeter… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

My Personal Quest to Study Supernovae on Mars

I walked out of the airlock onto the blood-red Martian surface. My mind was crystal clear and laser focused. There was no room for… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

My Personal Quest to Study Supernovae on Mars - Issue 104: Harmony

I walked out of the airlock onto the blood-red Martian surface. My mind was crystal clear and laser focused. There was no room for… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

We Have to Talk About Doubt - Issue 104: Harmony

What is the role of reasonable doubt in advancing science? And how should we contrast scientific doubt with the cavilling doubt of… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Universe Has Already Made Almost All the Stars It Will Ever Make - Issue 104: Harmony

Our human world is soaked in light. For starters there are the 100,000 trillion photons arriving every second at every square centimeter… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

Here’s Where Our Minds Sharpen in Old Age - Facts So Romantic

There are ways we get smarter with age, even in the domain of fluid intelligence.Photo Illustration by meboonstudio / ShutterstockMany… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Electromagnetic Force of Fridge Magnets

Science is not just something we do at school or professionals undertake in labs. It is at the heart of how everything works. With… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

I Escaped My Troubles Through Science

“Occasionally, when Ammu listened to songs that she loved on the radio, something stirred inside her. A liquid ache spread under… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

In high school, Daniel Stein built a solar-powered car and drove it across the country. “I got to see the possibility of doing something… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

The Electromagnetic Force of Fridge Magnets - Issue 104: Harmony

Science is not just something we do at school or professionals undertake in labs. It is at the heart of how everything works. With… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago

How I Escaped My Troubles Through Science - Issue 104: Harmony

“Occasionally, when Ammu listened to songs that she loved on the radio, something stirred inside her. A liquid ache spread under… | Continue reading


@nautil.us | 3 years ago