ffikretow/Shutterstock Viruses are often termed “the invisible enemy”. They aren’t visible with the naked eye, or even by using a standard optical microscope. So how do we know they exist or what they look like? There are biochemical methods, such as the ones used to confirm COVID-19 infection, that lookContinue Reading
What will be Britain’s place in the world after Brexit? Since the publication of the UK government’s research and development (R&D) roadmap, one part of Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s answer to this question has become far clearer: the future of the UK is, apparently, as a “science superpower”. At firstContinue Reading
Jolanda Aalbers/Shutterstock The internet is filled with blogs and articles offering advice for parents who are trying to coax children into eating greens. Anyone with kids can relate to stories of mealtimes becoming a succession of attritional confrontations, where you cycle through ineffectual strategies before accepting the reality of theContinue Reading
Tom Wang/Shutterstock What makes language special is part of what makes us special, so understanding what language is made of and how we learn it brings us closer to our human nature. Is language special because it runs on its own unique piece of mental software written into our DNA?Continue Reading
Franzi/Shutterstock There has long been a general assumption that human beings are essentially selfish. We’re apparently ruthless, with strong impulses to compete against each other for resources and to accumulate power and possessions. If we are kind to one another, it’s usually because we have ulterior motives. If we areContinue Reading
The scale of public anger over the automated downgrading of thousands of students’ A-level results highlights how much social and political power algorithmic decision-making now has. As well as students’ grades, algorithms are now deciding all sorts of things that hugely impact ordinary people’s lives, from loan applications to jobContinue Reading
Ascannio/Shutterstock The UK government has begun a trial of its new, revamped COVID-19 contact-tracing app for England, after its previous attempt failed to work as required and raised concerns over privacy. Unlike the previous app, the new version stores information about who each user has come into contact with onContinue Reading
Klein Ongaki Hamdi was just an infant when his relatives first brought him to the Dadaab refugee camp in north-eastern Kenya to be registered as a refugee – despite the fact he was a Kenyan citizen. Like many ethnic Somali citizens of Kenya living in the vicinity of the camp,Continue Reading
The novel coronavirus is affecting our brains, whether we've caught it or not. Teo Tarras/Shutterstock Whether you have contracted COVID-19 or not, your brain is likely to have changed over the past few months. The virus itself can cause a number of neurological problems, along with anxiety and depression. TheContinue Reading
Quantum computers may be more trustworthy. Yurchanka Siarhei/Shutterstock MIP* = RE is not a typo. It is a groundbreaking discovery and the catchy title of a recent paper in the field of quantum complexity theory. Complexity theory is a zoo of “complexity classes” – collections of computational problems – ofContinue Reading
