Tag: Science

World’s Oldest Art Identified in Half-Million-Year-Old Zigzag

I've noted before that I think capabilities like human language didn't pop into being 50-75 thousand years ago, but developed over hundreds of thousands of years (if not millions).  Well, it looks like another piece of behavioral modernity may predate anatomically modern humans: World's Oldest Art Identified in Half-Million-Year-Old Zigzag. A zigzag engraving on a … Continue reading World’s Oldest Art Identified in Half-Million-Year-Old Zigzag →

The number of senses, free will, and productive reality

Christian Jarrett has an interesting article at BBC Future on the number of senses that we have. The principle of five basic human senses is often traced back to Aristotle’s De Anima (On the Soul), in which he devotes a separate chapter to vision, hearing, touch, smell and taste. Today, the five senses are considered … Continue reading The number of senses, free will, and productive reality →

How Farming Almost Destroyed Ancient Human Civilization

Annalee Newitz has a fascinating article at IO9 on early neolithic societies: How Farming Almost Destroyed Ancient Human Civilization. Roughly 9,000 years ago, humans had mastered farming to the point where food was plentiful. Populations boomed, and people began moving into large settlements full of thousands of people. And then, abruptly, these proto-cities were abandoned for … Continue reading How Farming Almost Destroyed Ancient Human Civilization →

Dark matter might cause neutron stars to collapse into black holes

ratamacue0 called my attention to this interesting article on the possibility of dark matter "eating" neutron stars: Dark matter: Devourer of stars | Ars Technica. Neutron stars are collapsed stars that have used up all of their fusion fuel.  Typically what happens at that point in a star's life is that they collapse, but the extent of … Continue reading Dark matter might cause neutron stars to collapse into black holes →

Digitization is increasing the accessibility of old scientific papers, and of history

Apparently, scientific papers have tended to fade away as they got older, with most papers only getting citations within the first decade or so after their publication.  But a Physics arXiv entry reveals that, with digitization, that is changing. The results show a clear trend. “Our analysis indicates that, in 2013, 36% of citations were … Continue reading Digitization is increasing the accessibility of old scientific papers, and of history →

The decline of religion in western societies

Huffington Post UK has published the results of a survey showing that half of Britain thinks religion does more harm than good, and that you don't need it to be a good person.  This seems to be a trend in Europe that was started in the Scandinavian countries.  It's in contrast to the United States, … Continue reading The decline of religion in western societies →

E.O. Wilson: Science, not philosophy, will explain the meaning of existence

Well, in remarks that I'm pretty sure are guaranteed to rile up philosophers, E.O. Wilson, who apparently has a new book out on the meaning of human existence, disses both philosophy and religion, saying that scientists will provide the meaning of of existence. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lx26k8LTCdI I can agree with a lot of what Wilson says in … Continue reading E.O. Wilson: Science, not philosophy, will explain the meaning of existence →