A journal of science, thought, and action.

Sep

2019

Tree Huggers

Thermography shows why Koalas hug trees.

Sep

2019

in vino veritas

Art and science making wine.

Perfect Gifts

Our marketplace offers Hi-Res prints on either polished metal or museum-quality paper.
Browse images of travel, adventure, and nature from elite photographers and visual media creators.

Archive Highlights

Conserving, The Mother Load

Avoiding another Dust Bowl.

19 Mar 2019

Video Highlights

Kraken Mare

In ancient Greek legends, the Kraken was a sea monster that came from the deep to devour unsuspecting fishermen and sailors. JPL has located the Kraken's actual home on Saturn's moon Titan.

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Eight U.S. states are working toward getting more electric cars on the road, making it easier and cheaper to charge them. They hope to up the number of electric vehicles in America from 165,000 to more than three million.

[Mitsubishi's electric car.]

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Black Holes Might Have a Wall of Fire Around Them

At the event horizon of a black hole, there might be a "wall of fire" that destroys everything.

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Saturn Mosaic

Cassini continues to surprise us with a mosaic of multiple images acquired from Saturn.

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The View from Above

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Telepathy Just a Few Years Away

You can watch your own dreams, and scientists can read your mind.

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Why Are We Here?

We don't have any idea why there is something rather than nothing.

File:Woher kommen wir Wer sind wir Wohin gehen wir.jpg

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Sea Change: The Pacific Ocean's Perilous Turn

A the 1960's mantra was: think globally, act locally. Craig Welsh illustrates the duality of the phrase in his excellent essay on threats to the sustainability of the oceans.

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Fire Season in OZ

Australia's fire season began 3 months early this year. Models had predicted the continent would be a lab for the effects of a rapidly changing climate.

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Create Your Own Eclipse

What if you could make your own lunar eclipse?

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Panda Cam Proves: Baby Panda Learned to Talk

By Reilly Capps

The gov't shutdown shut down the panda cam at the national zoo. While the camera was off, the panda grew by two pounds -- from three to five pounds. She also, by the looks of this video, learned to talk:

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A World of Hurt

"As CO₂ and other greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, ocean bio-geochemistry is being altered in ways that could potentially impact nature and mankind."

So begins an article published by the Public Library of Science/Biology.

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An Ode to Debt or paying: the Bills, Bills, Bills

The new Americana band from the Hudson Valley, Uncle Wade, offers their perspective with an ode to debt: Bills, Bills, Bills.

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Blue Dunes...Who Knew?

If we could see in the infrared, dunes on Mars would look blue. Who knew?

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The Real Origin of Genius

By Reilly Capps

If you want to know about human genius, you can read biographies of scientists and marvel at the origin stories of some of our greatest theories. But that would involve reading, which is boring, and it wouldn't even be right.

Here's the truth about how our most important and cherished discoveries came into being.

[At right: the very indecisive Werner Heisenberg.]

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In Praise of Bees

Everyone should give praise to bees. The MacArthur Fellow, Marla Spivak, gives a TED Talk on why.

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The Colorado: Our River, Our Story, Our Time

Environmental conservation is often presented as a concern of people with white Anglo-Saxon heritage. Neustro Rio contradicts this characterization.

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The Whale Updates

Great friends and past contributors to Riled Up, Wayne & Pam Osborn, have recently completed another season of whale monitoring in Australia. They've been busy.

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Pinocchio Found...no lie!

In the classic Italian folk tale, Pinocchio, the puppet's nose would grow whenever he didn't tell the truth. A real-life Pinocchio has now been found and that's no lie.

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Big News on Nukes -- Fusion May Be Close

By Reilly Capps

Fusion may be closer than ever, as scientists get more energy out of a fusion reaction than they put in. Fusion could be cheap and clean energy. If it works, a lot of our troubles could be over.

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The Monkeywrencher Takes on Harvard

By Reilly Capps

The convicted felon Tim DeChristopher is now a divinity student at Harvard, proving that there is life after prison. And he's already taking on the president of the most prestigious college in the country -- his college -- essentially accusing her of using the moral logic of slaveowners. "I guess I only made it a month without stirring the pot at Harvard," Tim emailed me. "I'm pretty sure this is exactly what they had in mind when they gave me my scholarship, right?"

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Penguin-cam, live for now

The Penguin Camera silently watches penguins on Torgersen Island in Antarctica. It is live for now.

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Rover Doodle

The Mars Curiosity rover seems to have a bit of artistic talent as a recent "doodle" illustrates.

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Worst Fashion Moments in Science this Week

Lucas Gardner counts down the biggest fashion faux pas in the science world this week.

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Jellyfish Chipper

Jellyfish come in all shapes, sizes, and can be both beautiful and deadly. They can also be very environmentally destructive when they occur in massive "blooms".

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Apocalypse Now. Apocalypse Everywhere.

By Reilly Capps

In which the author wonders why the news has gone batshit lately, and why everyone is predicting

apocalypse, why we're all weatherman who see the sky as not cloudy or sunny but falling, especially when most things are so good, why we worry about things that do not appear to be catastrophes, and he wonders where this paranoia comes from, and dismisses it, and then presents his own paranoid belief about impending doom, which he fully believes -- because that's the way paranoia works.