Attention to the Unseen

Neima Jahromi writes: The story of the fifteenth element began in Hamburg, in 1669. The unsuccessful glassblower and alchemist Hennig Brandt was trying to find the philosopher’s stone, a mythical substance that could turn base metals into gold. Instead, he distilled something new. It was foamy and, depending on the preparation, yellow or black. He called it “cold fire,” because it glowed in the dark. Interested parties took a look; some felt that they were in the presence of a…

Read More Read More

Veronique Greenwood writes: New ideas advance in science not just because they are true, but because their opponents die, physicist Max Planck wrote in 1948. He was referring to a fundamental theory that, at the time, provoked a nasty feud, yet today is taught in nearly every high school physics classroom. The belief that science advances one funeral at a time is the kind of folk mythology in which any researcher might indulge in a discouraging moment, says Kevin Zollman,…

Read More Read More

GeoSpace reports: Ancient, distinct, continent-sized regions of rocks, isolated since before the collision that created the Moon 4.5 billion years ago, exist hundreds of miles below the Earth’s crust, offering a window into the building blocks of our planet, according to new research. The new study in the AGU Journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems used models to trace the location and origin of volcanic rock samples found throughout the world back to two solid continents in the deep mantle. The new…

Read More Read More

Adam Rogers writes: Imagine a billionaire with an abiding interest in science, but also in having sex with young girls. He’s famous, our billionaire, and he associates with what used to be called boldface names, some of whom know—they’d have to, right?—about his habits. But they let it go. And eventually the billionaire’s name gets associated with all sorts of do-gooderish public endeavors, before the truth gets told—mostly after the billionaire’s death under salacious and suspicious circumstances. To be clear—not…

Read More Read More