Today’s stories range from As the Large Hadron Collider Revs Up, Physicists’ Hopes Soar to Four Things Physicists Still Wonder about the Higgs Boson, and much more.
Knowing if you’re awake seems simple. Why has it vexed philosophers for centuries?, asks Aeon.com. “this TED-Ed animation tackles how thinkers from Al-Ghazali in medieval Persia, to René Descartes and Thomas Hobbes in 17th-century France and England, to neuroscientists today have approached the question of whether we can ever truly know we’re awake.”
As the Large Hadron Collider Revs Up, Physicists’ Hopes Soar –The particle collider at CERN will soon restart. “There could be a revolution coming,” scientists say, reports Dennis Overbye for the New York Times Science. “Even before its renovation, the collider had been producing hints that nature could be hiding something spectacular. Mitesh Patel, a particle physicist at Imperial College London who conducts an experiment at CERN, described data from his previous runs as “the most exciting set of results I’ve seen in my professional lifetime.”
Google’s AI Spotlights a Human Cognitive Glitch: Mistaking Fluent Speech for Fluent Thought, reports Singularity Hub. “It is perhaps unsurprising that a former Google engineer recently claimed that Google’s AI system LaMDA has a sense of self because it can eloquently generate text about its purported feelings.”
Mystery Of What Triggered The Last Ice Age May Have Been Solved, reports IFL Science. “Two mysteries have been a head-scratcher for many paleoclimate experts: Where did the last ice age’s ice sheets come from, and how did they grow so fast? A new study published in Nature Geoscience may have solved these mysteries, proposing an explanation. These findings could also be applied to other historic glacial periods.”
A geomagnetic storm hit Earth at a million miles an hour and nobody saw it coming, reports Interesting Engineering. “Solar scientists have been watching the skies with anticipation of solar activity after a sunspot grew enormously earlier last week, and then a huge coronal mass ejection (CME) was spotted on the solar surface. A big solar storm was expected due to the latter, but scientists were not very sure if it was heading towards the Earth.
Why do tortoises live so long? It’s the shell, reports Big Think. “Anecdotal evidence suggests that cold-blooded animals age slowly, but until now, no one has studied this on a large scale in the wild. Researchers debunked this, finding that some cold-blooded animals (like tortoises) didn’t seem to age at all, whereas others age much quicker than warm-blooded animals. The cold-blooded animals that aged the slowest often had protective traits, such as a shell or poison.”
A longevity diet that hacks cell ageing could add years to your life –-A new diet based on research into the body’s ageing process suggests you can increase your life expectancy by up to 20 years by changing what, when and how much you eat, reports New Scientist.
The story of the Higgs boson defies normal narratives –Finding the Higgs boson is the compelling story behind Elusive: How Peter Higgs solved the mystery of mass. But Frank Close’s book lives up to its title as both the man and his particle ultimately slip through the net, reports New Scientist.
Four things physicists still wonder about the Higgs boson, reports Symmetry Magazine. Does the Higgs boson interact with itself? How does the Higgs couple to other particles? Are there other Higgs particles? and, Is the Higgs connected to dark matter or other unusual particles?
Solve the impossible ‘100 Prisoners Riddle’ that has the internet puzzled. It seems impossible, but it’s actually not, reports Interesting Engineering. First proposed by the Danish computer scientist Peter Bro Miltersen in 2003, it’s a mathematical problem in probability theory and combinatorics that seems completely impossible to solve.
The haunted city –The city, for all its mechanical speed, artificial light and industrialization, is the most uncanny of human habitats, reports Aeon.com. “Our lives in cities are shaped by invisible hands, body-less voices and an eerie automation of infrastructure.
Controversy Grows Over Whether Mars Samples Endanger Earth –Planetary scientists are eager to bring Red Planet rocks, soil and even air to Earth, but critics fear the risk of contaminating our world’s biosphere, reports Scientific American.
They Uncover New Fossils, but They Also Bite –Harvester ants in Nebraska unearthed thousands of fossilized teeth and jaw bones, leading scientists to the discovery of 10 new species, reports The New York Times.
Tonga Volcano Blasted Out Pressure Waves “Very Close to The Theoretical Limit” –-The massive eruption from the underwater Tonga volcano in the Pacific earlier this year generated a blast so powerful, it sent massive pressure waves rippling through the atmosphere and around the globe.
After The Largest Extinction Event on Earth, These Animals Were The First to Recover. reports Science Alert. “The Permian–Triassic extinction event, which happened roughly 252 million years ago, is colloquially known as the Great Dying because of the way it obliterated life on Earth – almost ending it completely. It’s the most severe extinction event in history.”
The nation where your ‘faceprint’ is already being tracked, reports BBC Future. “Australia’s unique use of facial recognition technology has caused controversy and stoked privacy fears, but there is a chance that it could become a world leader in regulating its use.”
Earliest Pacific seafarers were matrilocal society, study suggests –DNA analysis of 164 individuals from 2,800 to 300 years ago shows men would move to be with their wives, reports The Guardian.
Ancient ‘bear dog’ found in France named after child-murdering cyclops, reports Jennifer Nalewicki for Live Science. “Researchers have unearthed the jawbone of one of these extinct carnivores in the Pyrenees mountain range in Europe, shedding light on just how deadly bear dogs were, and confirming how widely they were distributed around the world.”
The race to reclaim the dark –“Some 200 places around the world have now achieved Dark Sky status. Frankie Adkins explores the benefits nights without light pollution can bring.”
The mystery of how dinosaurs had sex, reports BBC Future. “The sordid details of how dinosaurs got it on have long eluded scientists. Now there’s a new idea emerging – could their most eccentric features tell us how they did it?”
A huge comet will make its closest approach to Earth in July. Here’s how to watch it live, reports Space.com. One of the farthest active comets ever spotted will make its closest approach to Earth on July 14, and you can catch the action live online.
Whale-Sized Marine Reptiles Once Ruled the Seas –Paleontologists are beginning to learn how and why ichthyosaurs evolved into giants, reports The Smithsonian.
Dogs May Have Evolved From Two Different Wolf Populations –A massive new wolf family tree dating back 100,000 years could help researchers understand where dogs were first domesticated, reports Smithsonianmag.com
Scientific American: The Supreme Court’s Latest Decision Is a Blow to Stopping Climate Change –By deciding in favor of fossil-fuel interests and limited regulatory authority, the Court has hampered the EPA’s ability to mitigate power-plant carbon pollution.
Curated by The Daily Galaxy Editorial Staff
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