George Dyson talks with Martin Eiermann about the definition of life, human progress, and the importance of cognitive autarchy.
The morphology of coelacanths has not fundamentally changed since the Devonian age, that is, for about 400 million years. Nevertheless, these animals known as living fossils are able to genetically adapt to their environment. This is described by Dr. Kathrin Lampert from the RUB’s Department of Animal Ecology, Evolution and Biodiversity along with colleagues from…
A new University of British Columbia study finds that analytic thinking can decrease religious belief, even in devout believers. The study, published in the journal Science, finds that thinking analytically increases disbelief among believers and skeptics alike, shedding important new light on the psychology of religious belief. “Our goal was to explore the fundamental question…
The idea that war is obsolescent may seem preposterously utopian. Aren’t we facing an endless war on terror, a clash of civilizations, the menace of nuclear rogue states? Isn’t war in our genes, something that will always be with us? The theory that war is becoming passé gained traction in the late 1980s, when scholars…
The first-ever mission dedicated to looking for dark matter and dark energy, two mysterious entities believed to explain the composition of the universe as we know it, will be launched in 2020, the European Space Agency said. The 800-million-euro ($1-billion) Euclid project will use a satellite employing a 1.2-metre (four-foot) diameter telescope and special cameras…
An ontology and epistemology that looks only to materialism and reductionism for its explanations of phenomena will have a hard time explaining information itself.
By switching back to the more social, less active jobs of their youth, some honeybees regained the ability to learn quickly.