Marco Altamirano
Do Animals Get Drunk?
Why evolving a taste for getting tipsy could prove adaptive.
How We Remember Last Weekend
High-frequency oscillations that ripple through our brains may generate memory and conscious experience.
The Uncanny Valley of Xenobots
These tiny living robots can now replicate and evolve—and be put to work.
The Mystery of the Dark Asteroid That Scorched Russia
A new theory emerges to explain the enigmatic Tunguska Event.
Why We Love to Be Grossed Out
Disgust may not be a straightforward extension of the immune system’s aversion to harmful substances, but rather “a psychological nebula, lacking definite boundaries, discrete internal structure, or a single center of gravity,” says psychologist Nina Strohminger.Photograph by Star Stock / Flickr Nina Strohminger, perhaps not unlike many fans of raunchy comedies and horror flicks, is […]
Memories Can Be Injected and Survive Amputation and Metamorphosis
If a headless worm can regrow a memory, then where is the memory stored? And, if a memory can regenerate, could you transfer it?Photograph by Rattiya Thongdumhyu / Shutterstock The study of memory has always been one of the stranger outposts of science. In the 1950s, an unknown psychology professor at the University of Michigan […]
Our Strange Relationship to World Cup Probabilities
What this World Cup reveals isn’t that the stats were wrong—far from it, they were insightfully calculated—but rather that we relate to stats and probabilities in strange ways.Photograph by Hey! Play! / Wayfair This year’s World Cup has been full of surprises. Tournament mainstays such as the Netherlands and Italy didn’t even qualify, and Germany, […]
