Humans are meant to be around one another. It’s been that way for millennia. We needed each other to hunt, construct homes, procreate, care for our offspring and protect one another against the saber-toothed tigers and dire wolves that meant to harm us. We also need each other to be happy and to take up the burdens that sometimes weigh us down. All told, being a human is exceedingly difficult when life is lived alone.Research shows that socialization is so engrained in our survival that when ...read more
If you've been hoping for a reprieve from extreme weather, I've got disappointing news: While there are no guarantees of what it will bring, El Niño is growing and the odds that it will peak as a strong event are stronger now than scientists believed just one month ago.According to the latest forecast, the climate phenomenon almost certainly will stick around through March of 2024. And there's now a greater than 70 percent chance that it will peak this winter as a strong episode. That's up from ...read more
In 2022, Richard D. Hansen led a team in Guatemala’s Mirador-Calakmul Karst Basin and found Mayan structures consistently spread over a 650-square-mile area (slightly larger than modern London). They identified 964 previously unknown sites aged 1000 B.C. to A.D. 150 and 110 miles of raised causeways connecting them. While it was already known that Mayan civilization was spread throughout Central America, many assumed tropical forest settlements were an obstacle to creating complex societies. ...read more
Did you know it's possible for scientists to trick your brain into thinking you have an additional appendage? A participant might stand in front of a mirror placing their left hand in such a way that the thumb doesn’t show. A researcher then strokes the non-thumb side of the left hand at the same time as stroking the side with the thumb. In the space of a few moments, the participant begins to feel as though they have a second thumb on the wrong side of their hand — even though they can clea ...read more
In Stone Age sites all over the world, archaeologists have found rounded stone “spheroids” that fit in the palms of their hands. A bit too heavy for tossing around, the balls have cropped up in Africa, Asia, Europe and the Levant, the countries gathered near the eastern shore of the Mediterranean. No one knows what purpose the balls served, be it practical, personal, aesthetic or something yet unimagined.Scientists have also disagreed on whether early humans made the objects intentionally ...read more
Author Vishay SinghPosted on Categories Discover Magazine
