In November 2013, the New Yorker published a profile of Eliot Higgins – or Brown Moses as he is known to almost 17,000 Twitter followers. An unemployed finance and admin worker at the time, Higgins was…
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Sweaty-palmed and reciting facts over and over in their heads, the hordes of university and school students sitting down to exams this month will have precious little time to think about how their exam…
Jeremy Clarkson is in the soup again for saying the wrong thing. This time he has been accused of using deeply offensive, racist language, in a Top Gear outtake two years ago. The usual gang of anti-Clarksonites…
A bloom of new jellyfish started appearing in the Gulf of Venice last autumn. They were first detected by a fisherman from Chioggia in north-east Italy when hundreds of the beautiful yellow species filled…
There is nothing worse than having a fake healer offer a cure that does absolutely nothing. History is full of tales of frauds and quacks offering a cure for all, which eventually turn out to be nothing…
The Conversation organised a public question-and-answer session on Reddit in which Anders Sandberg and Andrew Snyder-Beattie, researchers at the Future of Humanity Institute at Oxford University, explored…
Gamers around the world are snapping up a new device that promises to give them an edge on competitors by boosting their gaming focus. It is certainly easy to see the appeal of being able to improve your…
Tap on me, click on me, publish me! We live in an era of a digital selfie obsession. There is a growing tendency to create self-centred digital environments. You only need to look at a few Facebook profiles…
Nintendo is facing a storm of criticism over its decision not to allow gamers to play as gay characters and form same-sex relationships in the life-simulation game Tomodachi Life. There has been disquiet…
In the age of listicles, the life of a science journalist gets harder and harder. Explaining research clearly and accurately while holding onto readers’ attention has never been easy. Doing so when there…
In the age of listicles, the life of a science journalist gets harder and harder. Explaining research clearly and accurately while holding onto readers’ attention has never been easy. Doing so when there…
We all know the feeling, you’re chatting with your friend or even your boss over the internet and you interrupt them awkwardly. A silence ensues as you both try to let each other talk. Then you interrupt…
Almost all of the reflections and eulogies of Colin Pillinger, who passed away on May 8, will focus on his role in the Beagle 2 space mission to Mars. But this only occupied a small part of his career…
Market research reports have indicated that many office employees in the UK spend at least one hour of their day at work on non-work activities. They are booking holidays, shopping online, posting messages…
British supermarket Waitrose is marketing “bubbleberries” in some of its stores, describing them as resembling a small strawberry that is “beautifully fragrant, with the unmistakable taste of bubblegum…
London recently found itself in a state of gridlock. A group of taxi drivers created a deliberate traffic jam near the Shard as a protest. The cause for this cabbie consternation? A taxi rank – or lack…
I have personal interest in arachnophobia – the fear of spiders – because I am a spider expert, but also because my daughter has it. She is not alone. According to the American Psychiatric Association…
Differences between the sexes are one of those endlessly intriguing cases, begging for explanation. People categorised as belonging to different sex categories seem to behave differently, make different…
Genetic risk is the contribution our genes play in the chance we have of developing certain illnesses or diseases. Genes are not the only deciding factor for whether or not we will develop certain diseases…
As a species, human beings are obsessed with the idea that there may be aliens out there, somewhere beyond our planet. This obsession really took off in the late 19th century, when suggestions that there…
Universities and researchers all over the world have a problem with Microsoft. It’s not just that the company forces expensive and dated software on customers. Using products like Microsoft’s email service…
Eyes and wings are among the most stunning innovations evolution has created. Remarkably these features have evolved multiple times in different lineages of animals. For instance, the avian ancestors of…
The residents of Trout River in Newfoundland, Canada have a stinking whale of a problem. What to do with the 81-feet-carcass of Balaenoptera musculus on their shore? While such an occurrence is not uncommon…
Sea life can be fascinating and terrifying at the same time. Some creatures look beautiful on the outside but harbour darkness within. Some of the scariest tactics of the deep sea go on display when these…
Recently, the car manufacturer Mazda recalled 40,000 cars because of a “spider invasion”. This is not the first time it has happened with Mazda cars. In 2011, a similar reason was given for recalling 52,000…