Popular Science8 min readRobotics
These Space-bound Robots Could Transform The Field Of Emergency Medicine
IN ONE OF HUMANITY’S many possible futures, the fearless explorers tasked with climbing cloud-splitting mountains in oxygen-poor atmospheres or charting the low, darkened craters of various alien landscapes would never perish from injuries during per
Popular Science2 min readIntelligence (AI) & Semantics
How Popular Is AI Art?
As chatbots, machine learning, and other automated technologies flood the world, here’s a deep look at what life in the age of AI will be like. HANDMADE ART can be an enchanting expression of the world, whether it’s displayed above a roaring fireplac
Popular Science3 min readIntelligence (AI) & Semantics
Will AI Teach Me To Be Better At Chess?
As chatbots, machine learning, and other automated technologies flood the world, here’s a deep look at what life in the age of AI will be like. YOU ARE NEVER going to beat the world’s best chess programs. After decades of training and studying, you m
Popular Science3 min readIntelligence (AI) & Semantics
How Do AI Chatbots Answer My Questions?
As chatbots, machine learning, and other automated technologies flood the world, here’s a deep look at what life in the age of AI will be like. CHATBOTS MIGHT APPEAR to be complex conversationalists that respond like real people. But if you take a cl
Popular Science4 min readIntelligence (AI) & Semantics
Can AI Manipulate A Presidential Election?
As chatbots, machine learning, and other automated technologies flood the world, here’s a deep look at what life in the age of AI will be like. A DYSTOPIAN WORLD fills the frame of the 32-second video. China’s armed forces invade Taiwan. The action c
Popular Science2 min read
What Is Reality?
THIS IS THE REAL ANNIE COLBERT writing to you, not an AI trained on thousands of random tweets, hours of Zoom calls, and a deep dive into half-finished Google Doc drafts. I did, however, ask PopSci’s design director to give my headshot a little sizzl
Popular Science3 min read
This Gadget From 1930 Let People ‘Talk’ To The Dead—with A Magic Trick
MAGIC FIRST took shape from the occult—from unseen forces once more popularly believed to flow from the spirit world to alter the course of mortal events. Throughout history, magicians were seen as aloof figures mysteriously granted secret knowledge
Popular Science2 min read
Popular Science
Editor-in-Chief Annie Colbert Senior Deputy Editor Purbita Saha Managing Editor, PopSci.com Marina Galperina DIY Editor John Kennedy Technology Editor Rob Verger Multimedia Editor Jessica Boddy Editor-at-Large Rachel Feltman Social Media Editor Chels
Popular Science11 min read
Why Paleontology Needs Fake Fossils
THERE ARE BONES EVERYWHERE. Black- and purple-painted models of the horn-faced carnivore Ceratosaurus nasicornis lie arranged by anatomical element in boxes. The cranium of a crocodile-like creature called a phytosaur rests on a worktable. Skeletons
Popular Science4 min read
Life After Death Never Looked So Beautiful
WHEN YOU LIVE in a big city, sometimes nature comes at you secondhand—a photo from the apple farm upstate, eggs in the grocery store. But for Miami-born and Brooklyn-based Divya Anantharaman, the founder of Gotham Taxidermy, nature is hardly that bin
Popular Science4 min readIntelligence (AI) & Semantics
How Harmful Are Biased AIs?
As chatbots, machine learning, and other automated technologies flood the world, here’s a deep look at what life in the age of AI will be like. THE FIRST TIME Joy Buolamwini ran into the problem of racial bias in facial recognition technology, she wa
Popular Science14 min read
Boardwalk Bouncers
NESTLED IN the beach town of Ocean City, New Jersey, a nondescript summer home stands among rows of vacation rentals. Inside in the darkness, a hawk snoozes, a hungry falcon flaps its wings, and an owl stares intensely with orange eyes. This birdy ha
Popular Science2 min read
Pumped For What’s Next
“I AM HANS. And I am Franz. And we want to pump you up.” Yes, that’s a three-decade-old reference to a Saturday Night Live sketch. I process most things through a lens of pop culture, with memories dislodged at random. Blame a childhood entertainment
Popular Science9 min read
The Last Hope For The ‘Russian Nesting Doll’ Of Space
SCHIAPARELLI WAS OUT OF CONTROL. As the probe entered Mars’ atmosphere on October 19, 2016, an onboard computer miscalculated its altitude, prematurely jettisoning the craft’s parachute. The disc-shaped probe with what looked like a futuristic World’
Popular Science2 min read
Popular Science
Editor-in-Chief Annie Colbert Senior Deputy Editor Purbita Saha Managing Editor, PopSci.com Marina Galperina DIY Editor John Kennedy Technology Editor Rob Verger Multimedia Editor Jessica Boddy Editor-at-Large Rachel Feltman Social Media Editor Chels
Popular Science4 min read
Meet The Apex Predators Of The Plant Kingdom
TIME AND AGAIN, plants have evolved the ability to eat animals. From Madagascar to North Carolina, wildly different kinds of flora have figured out how to thrive in nutrient-poor soils by adding crunchy insect snacks to their diets. Lacking the power
Popular Science10 min read
Respect The Rump
BUMS. HEINIES. FANNIES. DERRIERES. Few muscles in the human body carry as much cultural clout as the gluteus maximus. “Butts are a bellwether,” writes journalist Heather Radke in her 2022 book Butts: A Backstory. Radke goes on to explain that our fee
Popular Science3 min read
What Are The Most Underexcercised Muscles?
Workout 360 takes you through all the steps to make fitness feel good. TO MAINTAIN a healthy level of physical fitness, everyone should commit to at least 30 minutes of moderate aerobic exercise or strength training a day. That’s easier said than don
Popular Science3 min read
What Are 6 Things Every Workout Should Include?
Workout 360 takes you through all the steps to make fitness feel good. MOST PEOPLE have a certain mindset when it comes to working out: They tend to stick to a familiar plan and will push their bodies to the brink to achieve their fitness goals. But
Popular Science12 min read
I Lift Heavy Weights And Have Fibromyalgia—here’s What The Science Says
I THINK THE BARBELL SAVED ME. Before that, I was toiling under the bar as a sports-bra-clad 20-something, lifting heavy things off the floor in pursuit of vain aesthetic goals. Then one day, that version of my life evaporated over a small bowl of rol
Popular Science3 min read
Getting The Thrust Of It
THE NEXT TIME you travel on an airplane, consider the giant engines that muscled it into the sky. Technically known as turbofans, they inhale massive amounts of air and blow it out the back to generate enormous thrust. In fact, one of the engines tha
Popular Science3 min readDiet & Nutrition
What’s In Your Pre-workout?
Workout 360 takes you through all the steps to make fitness feel good. DO YOU HAVE a big tub of pre-workout powder sitting close by? Look at the label. How many ingredients do you recognize? Protein used to be the “it factor” in fitness supplements.
Popular Science3 min read
A 1967 Foot-powered Tool You Could Build Today—if You Wanted To
FROM ANCIENT treadwheel cranes to modern guitar effects pedals, the creative energy of our feet has come a long way. Roman aqueducts, medieval castles, and Gothic cathedrals were raised, mega-stone by mega-stone, by machines powered by human-size ham
Popular Science3 min read
What’s The Best Way To Recover From A Workout?
Workout 360 takes you through all the steps to make fitness feel good. BEING SORE SUCKS. Anyone who’s exercised to any extent can probably complain about the stiffness, pains, or—worse—injuries the next day. But as annoying as the achiness gets, it’s
Popular Science14 min read
The Power Of Slow Water
WHEN VALER CLARK and Josiah Austin moved to El Coronado cattle ranch in southern Arizona in the 1980s, the seasonal rain didn’t soak into the soil but roared through arroyos and washes, cutting them deeper into the earth. The erosion was threatening
Popular Science15 min read
Flight Risk
GROWING UP IN a small Danish town, Carsten Olsen didn’t have much access to information about space. Until the internet came along. Once connected, Olsen started frequenting discussion forums, where real rocket scientists and even astronauts came to
Popular Science2 min read
What Are The Best Kinds Of Homes For Off-the-grid Living?
OFF-THE-GRID LIVING is experiencing a renaissance. Dwellings devised to support a sustainable lifestyle could help us adapt to some of our biggest present-day challenges—from a lack of housing for the world’s growing population to pollution and extre
Popular Science12 min read
The Pure Power Of Poop
I AM STANDING in the basement of 1550 Mission Street in San Francisco—a new high-rise in the city’s prime real estate location—listening to the steady hum of human grime being filtered. Above me, residents on 38 floors are showering and brushing thei
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