Jordana Cepelewicz
Is Consciousness Fractal?
Our subconscious love for fractals may tell an evolutionary story.
It Might Be Time to Stop Touting Eco-Friendly Messages
In this climate, you might wonder whether it’s still possible for companies to tout a “green” message at all. Maybe it’s dead.Photograph by Florida Sea Grant / Flickr Nautilus Members enjoy an ad-free experience. Log in or Join now . In his modestly titled 2010 book Beyond Business: An Inspirational Memoir From a Visionary Leader, […]
Are We Being Too Superficial About the Gender Problem in Science?
Hope Jahren, a geobiologist at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, is “very cynical about efforts to get girls into science.”Photograph by GSK / Flickr Nautilus Members enjoy an ad-free experience. Log in or Join now . Why should the share of women in a given occupation affect its average pay? It’s a curious inverse […]
This Man Is About to Blow Up Mathematics
Harvey Friedman is about to bring incompleteness and infinity out of quarantine.
Spark of Science: Pardis Sabeti
The computational geneticist explains why she chose research over being a doctor.
Spark of Science: Jon Beckmann
The conservation ecologist discusses the plight of animals in a human-dominated landscape.
Spark of Science: Rob Pringle
The Princeton ecologist tells us about the scientists who inspired his work.
How a Defense of Christianity Revolutionized Brain Science
Presbyterian reverend Thomas Bayes had no reason to suspect he’d make any lasting contribution to humankind. Born in England at the beginning of the 18th century, Bayes was a quiet and questioning man. He published only two works in his lifetime. In 1731, he wrote a defense of God’s—and the British monarchy’s—“divine benevolence,” and in […]
Why Presidential Elections Aren’t Really About the Candidates
Political pundits have had some explaining to do since the Presidential election. FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver and other analysts have come under fire for assigning a high likelihood to Hillary Clinton’s victory—their predictions ranged from a 70 percent to 99 percent chance of her winning the Electoral College. Clinton’s loss prompted people to question the trustworthiness […]
Why Primates Kill Their Offspring
There’s something morbidly fascinating about animals that seem to behave pathologically: The female praying mantis engaging in sexual cannibalism, the fish eating its own fry. Nautilus Members enjoy an ad-free experience. Log in or Join now . It was this sort of twisted behavior that first drew anthropologist and evolutionary biologist Sarah Hrdy (pronounced Hur-dee) […]