Around the world and throughout history, we find remarkably similar constellations defined by disparate cultures, as well as strikingly similar narratives describing the relationships between them.
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Analysis and Comment
Remote Queensland farmers are among the least "digitally included" communities in Australia, according to a new report that documents the impacts of low access, affordability and digital ability for families and communites.
Reconsidering an old ecological conundrum comes up with a new perspective on migration, contact and trade in the Australia and Asia-Pacific region.
Fossil flies from what is now Denmark reveal some striking similarities between insect eyes 54 million years ago, and our own vision today.
For all their good intentions, accidents happen when fallible humans intervene in complex systems they don't understand.
Our body knows how it is moving and where it is because of a sense called proprioception, a 'sixth sense' that helps your body know where it is in the world. And it works even while you're asleep.
An entire industry exists to trade on your personal data - everything from your shopping habits to your political views and medical conditions. The results can genuinely harm consumers.
Have you ever walked into a room and realised you can’t remember what you were looking for? We tend to do this more when we are thinking of a few things at once or doing two things at the same time.
We should celebrate the 'deplatforming' of the 8chan message board, linked to the El Paso shootings, as a win for the fight against online hate speech. But its removal does not mean the fight is over.
The newly discovered Heracles inexpectatus stood nearly a metre tall. And its fossil bones sat undiscovered on a museum shelf for more than a decade before its hefty status was finally appreciated.
It helps if you imagine the ground here on Earth as a big heater. It keeps us warm, and if you move away from the heater you feel cold.
Google and Facebook attract plenty of users and advertising dollars in Australia, but the ACCC will have to work with other watchdogs overseas on any effective regulation.
Cooperation or theft? New observations show wild leopard seals sharing food when targeting king penguins in Antarctica.
Under controversial national security laws, parts of your mobile phone data is accessible by federal police and counterterrorism agencies. But in reality dozens of other organisations can access it too.
Matt Agnew is on the hunt for love as star of the new Bachelor Australia series. But whoever he picks (and he already has, apparently) will have to compete with TESS. So who, or what, is TESS?
Today's the official birthday of all race horses in Australia which means the breeding season is just a month away. It's about to get very busy for stallions and mares on the stud farms.
Australia should be involved in any new mission to the Moon: we have the interest and the expertise so let's be part of the race.
If you got too close to a black hole, it would suck you in and you'd never be able to escape, even if you were travelling at the speed of light.
This point of no return is called the event horizon.
Algorithms are only human (well, designed by humans) but we need to trust they'll do what they're supposed to do. And that means we need a better way to test them.
The idea that robots will take our jobs is not radically new – but artificial intelligence is now completely reorganising the global economy. Australia must act now to keep up with the world.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission says the sheer dominance of Google and Facebook has distorted other businesses' ability to compete on their own merits.
A 100-metre-wide asteroid passed just 70,000km from Earth on Thursday, and we had little warning it was about to happen. What threat is posed by asteroids and how do we find them?
'Phatic sharing' reclaims Twitter as a truly social network, rather than simply as a source of breaking news or a place for public debate between politicians, journalists, and activists.
It can be tough to train a dog – but mainly because humans are even more prone to distraction and inconsistency than our canine companions. Wearable technology might help us be a bit more consistent.
Yes, the Sun absolutely spins. In fact, everything in the universe spins. Some things spin faster than the Sun, some are slower and some things spin 'backwards'.
FaceApp is surging in popularity. But if things go sour, the fine print says you waive your right to take legal action unless you wrote to the app's Russian HQ, via snail mail, within 30 days of downloading.
Australia played a vital role in beaming the Apollo 11 Moon landing to the world. But since then we've passed up the opportunity to cement our place in exploring outer space.
Instagram's experimental move to hide the 'like' count on social media postings could lighten the mental strain for many users - or simply turn comments into the new likes.
What’s the next ‘giant leap’ for humankind in space? We asked 3 space experts.
The Conversation, CC BY27.3 MB (download)
What's the next thing that will blow us away or bring us together the way the Moon landing did in 1969? Moon mining? Alien contact? Retirement on Mars? Three space experts share their predictions.
When Neil Armstrong stepped on to the Moon 50 years ago this month, Australians saw the images first. Australia even defied bad weather to bring the historic images to the world.
Just 12 people have walked on the Moon and they'll know better than anyone just how big (or small) the place is. But we can make some comparisons with things on Earth to get a measure of the Moon.
Just 12 people stepped on the Moon during the Apollo missions, but they left more than just footprints. It's a legacy that needs protecting from damage by any future Moon missions.
From heavy metal to lighter than air gas, these elements and others from the Periodic Table are transformed into artworks that go on display from today.
The Apollo missions to the Moon helped our understanding of the cosmic origin of craters on our lunar neighbour, and here on Earth.
Our brains create new memories, and forget old ones, by forging and breaking connections between nerve cells. Now researchers can do something similar using a light-sensitive electronic chip.
A new study shows the enigmatic hominin species Australopithecus africanus may have breastfed young for around 5-6 years – a very costly practice for the mother.
The short answer is yes, but it’s really, really difficult.
New research outlines how the ancestors of modern humans interbred with several archaic human groups on the passage from Africa to Australia.
When the first Jurassic Park film came out, we didn’t know which dinosaurs had feathers. But a few years later, a very important discovery was made that changed our thinking on how dinosaurs looked.
Our sense of touch lets us know how hard or soft something is, how solid or pliable it is to handle. That's an important skill if you want robots to handle things safely.
With the benefit of hindsight, we might finally see that the iPhone was the opposite of minimalism.
The very hottest stars actually glow blue.
In order to reach younger audiences, social media apps must get past the gatekeepers of preteen online engagement: the parents.
In the future we might get sick of hearing people tell their stories about going to the Moon. Perhaps the Moon will just be like thinking about today's Antarctica – a remote but accessible place.
New findings suggest the core has been leaking for the past 2.5 billion years, and that could help scientists understand how the core was formed.
Electricity happens when electrons move from one atom to another.
People are more willing to participate in fitness tracker-based insurance policies when they are in control of their participation.
Instead of worrying that emoji is replacing competent language use, we can celebrate that emoji are creating a richer form of online communication that returns the features of gesture to language.
Research and News
With the launch of the Libra cryptocurrency, Mark Zuckerberg reveals his dreams of building a new virtual country, perhaps inspired by the Roman Empire.
Year of the elements
For too long silver has been used to mark second best but this element deserves more recognition thanks to its antibacterial properties.
The periodic table is one of the classic images of science that is found in labs as well as on t-shirts, mugs, even set to music. But what exactly is the periodic table?
Titanium is a tough but light metal that makes great replacements for bone in our body. But it has plenty of other uses in industry as well.
On its own it's just tin. But mix it with other elements and it turns into a material that helped shape the ancient world.
How do you return Aboriginal remains to their place of origin when you have no record of where they came from? Look to a chemical element that's laid down in teeth as people grow up.
Curious Kids
The earliest typewriters had the letter keys in alphabetical order. The trouble was that if you hit two keys quickly the levers would jam.
When a sound is made, it spreads. And when it hits a hard surface that is far away, it bounces back and comes back to where the sound was made. That's what we call an echo.
When water turns from a gas into a liquid, it forms droplets. Whether those droplets are dew or rain depends on where the droplet forms.
Robots are not yet as good as humans at working with other humans or even working with other robots.
Shooting stars are not stars at all. They are tiny space adventurers who accidentally wander into our sky and get sucked toward us by Earth's gravity. Here's the story of a shooting star's journey.
There are three ways heat can be shared: conduction, convection and radiation. Find out which one lets heat travel through space.
We can't make it rain. But you are already helping if you don't use more water than you need. And you can talk to your parents about the planet getting warmer, because the heat makes drought worse.
As a police officer, I was involved in many pursuits, investigated serious accidents and later became a researcher. Here's what I've learned about how police make decisions in a pursuit.
As gas from your stomach comes up your food pipe, it makes the surface of the upper part of your oesophagus rattle and vibrate. It is a bit like windows that rattle during a windy storm.
Animals that evolved in cold parts of the world usually have lighter skin. If a light-skinned animal has blood vessels close to the surface of their ear skin, this will make the ears look pink.
Volcanologists study the formation and eruptions of volcanoes - surely one of the most interesting jobs around. However, it can also be very dangerous.
Scientists say humans are pretty similar to chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans. So why don't we have fur like they do?
The students of class 3E, Ferny Grove State School, want to know if astronauts get space sick when travelling to the International Space Station.
X-rays are like light rays, but they can pass through more stuff. Some of the x-ray's energy is blocked by bone, which is why you can see bones so clearly on x-ray scans.
Ferns came along more than 200 million years before the dinosaurs walked the Earth. They were food for plant-eating dinosaurs and they're really great survivors. Heather, age 8, wants to know more.
While we move soap around, it lifts up invisible oil that holds germs onto your hand.
50th anniversary of Moon landing
In the future we might get sick of hearing people tell their stories about going to the Moon. Perhaps the Moon will just be like thinking about today's Antarctica – a remote but accessible place.
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In episode 2 of The Conversation's new podcast series, we look at how people reacted to the moon landing – and why some still believe it was a hoax.
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The first episode of a brand new podcast series to mark the 50th anniversary of the moon landings looks back at what going to the moon taught us and why we stopped sending people there.
Tourism, mining and new settlements are possibilities for our Moon. But what rules and regulations should govern our behavior there?
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Eyes
Having different coloured eyes is quite unusual, but it happens in many species throughout the animal kingdom.
Patterns
Alan Turing's last published paper revealed the mathematics behind the beautiful patterns that adorn the natural world.
Uncertainty
Heisenberg's famous Uncertainty Principle is put to the test to see if things really are uncertain in the quantum world.
Uni hacked
The worst-case scenario is that hackers still have access to the university systems via a backdoor and are siphoning off critical data as it emerges.
So many sats
The first 60 satellites from Elon Musk's planned low orbit internet network have lit up the skies. But with more planned, astronomers say the satellites could ruin their work.
Shipwrecked
Finding the wreck of SS Iron Crown, lost underwater for more than 70 years, was the (relatively) easy part. It's what we can learn from now on that's the challenge.
Poor Pluto
The dwarf planet Pluto is heading away from the Sun and that's having a devastating impact on its atmosphere.
Faking it
Archaeologists have uncovered a 2,000-year-old amber bead scam. But humans have been making fake jewels and icons for much longer than that.
Tassie devils
Tasmanian Devils can be incredibly aggressive during mating season and their biting can have fatal consequences.
AI and ethics
Artificial intelligence has the potential to transform the way we live, work, communicate and travel. So long as it's designed that way.
Internet for all
Labor’s 2019 NBN election policy will disappoint those hoping for a fast-tracked return to that party's 2009 vision of high-speed fibre for (almost) everyone.
Black hole image
Astronomers say they have "seen what we thought was unseeable" in releasing the first image of a supermassive black hole. So how did we get to this historic observation?
Goodbye Winx
It's the last race for Winx this weekend and she's been an incredible race horse. But what makes a good race horse?
Livestreaming
The Commonwealth Criminal Code now has two substantive new criminal offences aimed at limiting live streaming of crime. Both target technology companies, not terrorists.
The Facebook boss's calls for outside help to draft new rules on what is acceptable behaviour online should be welcomed. So what's his next step?
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Events
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What is good practice in urban humanitarian response? — UNSW
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Sydney Ideas - Seeing the unseen: from brains to black holes — University of Sydney
How we are different
10 reasons
Most Read past week
- New research shows that Antarctica’s largest floating ice shelf is highly sensitive to warming of the ocean
- Eye-opening discovery: 54 million year old fossil flies yield new insight into the evolution of sight
- Why do different cultures see such similar meanings in the constellations?
- Regulating Facebook, Google and Amazon is hard given their bewildering complexity
- How ancient seafarers and their dogs helped a humble louse conquer the world
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