Humans likely butchered 6-foot-long armadillo-like animals over 20,000 years ago, according to a report in PLOS ONE. These findings not only represent an interesting dietary choice (and make one wonder just what ancient armadillo must have tasted like), but they also bump back the time of known human occupation of South America by about 6,000 years.Pleistocene ButchersScientists analyzed cut marks on parts of the pelvis, tail, and body armor of a creature called glyptodont, also referred to as N ...read more
Isaac Newton would never have discovered the laws of motion had he studied only cats.Suppose you hold a cat, stomach up, and drop it from a second-story window. If a cat is simply a mechanical system that obeys Newton’s rules of matter in motion, it should land on its back. (OK, there’s some technicalities — like this should be done in a vacuum, but ignore that for now.) Instead, most cats usually avoid injury by twisting themselves on the way down to land on their feet.Most people are not ...read more
When I was in middle school, my biology teacher showed our class the sci-fi movie “Star Trek III: The Search for Spock.”The plot drew me in, with its depiction of the “Genesis Project” – a new technology that transformed a dead alien world into one brimming with life.After watching the movie, my teacher asked us to write an essay about such technology. Was it realistic? Was it ethical? And to channel our inner Spock: Was it logical? This assignment had a huge impact on me.Fast-forward ...read more
The problem of misinformation isn’t going away – and may be getting worse, in the wake of the assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump. Internet platforms like Facebook and X have taken some steps to curb its spread and say they are working on doing more. But no method yet introduced has been completely successful at removing all misleading content from social media. The best defense, then, is self-defense.Misleading or outright false information – broadly called “misinform ...read more
Blue whales are the Earth’s largest species and can stretch beyond 100 feet in size — even their young measure at above 20 feet on average. Great white sharks, meanwhile are quick, powerful, and highly efficient predators. What happens when these two face off and do great white sharks actually pose a threat to these true titans of the ocean? The short answer, says Chandra Salgado Kent, marine ecologist and associate professor at Edith Cowan University, in most cases, likely not. Fit adult bl ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine