Is anyone learning anything new from the Democratic debates? Does anyone even know the full list of candidates who are still in this historically large race? Are 90-second prepared speeches any way to educate a national audience on the intricacies of health care policy? Is there a worse word to bring to political analysis than…
Professional athletes at the highest level regularly contend not only with fierce competition from opposing teams or individual athletes but also intense psychological pressures, including performance anxiety, fear of failure, and tensions resulting from miscommunication, particularly in team sports. Professional gamers competing in major esports competitions experience the same kinds of stressors, according to a…
Before becoming a physicist, before being the editor in chief of the Journal of Quantum Electronics, before helping NASA design its largest space telescope, Robert Lang learned to fold paper.Already a numbers whiz at age six, Lang had trouble sitting still during math class. His teacher gave him an origami book to keep him occupied…
Soot kills. Still! Even in America, even in 2019. Those suspended fragments and droplets smaller than 2.5 micrometers across, small enough to be inhaled into the deepest recesses of the lungs and slip into the bloodstream—that’s soot. Or PM2.5 in technical terms. Breathing it in can inflame airways, triggering respiratory troubles, heart problems, even dementia.…
At sunset in winter in Spain, thousands of starlings gather in enormous flocks, named murmurations for the low fluttering thunder of their wings. The birds move in astounding unison, each mimicking its six or seven of their nearest neighbors as they whirl across the sky.It’s breathtaking, sure. But add a hungry hawk or falcon, and…
I can almost remember the very first class I was responsible for. It was a college-level physics lab, and I was a graduate teaching assistant. It was both fun and weird. I wasn’t much older than the students, but there I was, in charge of it all. That was a long time ago.In the years…
When the global economy shifted in the late 19th century, working people were the first to adapt. They moved to cities like Cleveland, Cincinnati, and Toledo and worked long hours in unsafe factories. They drove the Industrial Revolution and changed the nature of work forever. When it became clear that employers were exploiting their productivity,…
Most robot vacuum improvements are iterative—how can we pack a few more software features into the app? Can we make the it a little smaller, or make it run for a little longer? A self-emptying bin, on the other hand, is life-changing.In my two-kid, one-dog house, I can fill a standard 0.6-liter robot vacuum dustbin…
Back in 2012, the US Supreme Court ruled that it’s illegal for the police to attach a GPS tracking device to someone’s car without a warrant. But what if you find a GPS tracking device on your car? Can you remove it?ARS TECHNICAThis story originally appeared on Ars Technica, a trusted source for technology news,…
Iranian hackers have carried out some of the most disruptive acts of digital sabotage of the last decade, wiping entire computer networks in waves of cyberattacks across the Middle East and occasionally even the US. But now one of Iran’s most active hacker groups appears to have shifted focus. Rather than just standard IT networks,…
