Sean Carroll: The multiverse might be impossible to test directly. Even if such a theory were true, the worry goes, how would we ever know? Is it scientific to even talk about it?
Business ethics may trump social ethics, but individuals are struggling in the light of revelations of suicides and inhumane labor conditions among some workers in China who make many Apple products.
The universe is filled with high-energy radiation, much of which is made of gamma rays belched out by strange pulsing stars and the remnants of supernova explosions. But a new study of some of most extreme objects has turned up a mystery: nearly one-third of all gamma-ray emitting objects seen to date defy identification. The…
Some scientists are searching not just for any life out there in the universe, but for our distant relatives. Earth may have seeded life on other planets if an asteroid smacking into Earth sprayed DNA into space, researchers suggest. Now a team of researchers is searching for siblings of the sun — stars born from…
East Asia’s status as the world’s main “extinction hotspot” is confirmed in the new Red List of Threatened Species, unveiled at the Rio+20 sustainable development meeting. The International Union for the Conservation of Nature, which compiles the list, says it shows the importance of nature for human wellbeing. One of the themes of the Rio…
The dawn of the 21st century has been called the decade of the drone. Unmanned aerial vehicles, remotely operated by pilots in the United States, rain Hellfire missiles on suspected insurgents in South Asia and the Middle East. Now a small group of scholars is grappling with what some believe could be the next generation…
With the successful landing and deployment of the Mars Curiosity Rover, humanity has been treated to a sneak peek at the Red Planet for the first time. The possibility of establishing space colonies has been a scientists’ dream for decades, but working out a way to keep humans alive on the outside Earth’s protective shell…