The Polyglot Neuroscientist Resolving How the Brain Parses Language
Even in a world where large language models (LLMs) and AI chatbots are commonplace, it can be hard to fully accept that fluent writing can come from an unthinking machine. That’s because, to many of us, finding the right words is a crucial ...What Are Lie Groups?
In mathematics, ubiquitous objects called groups display nearly magical powers. Though they’re defined by just a few rules, groups help illuminate an astonishing range of mysteries. They can tell you which polynomial equations are solvable,...‘Reverse Mathematics’ Illuminates Why Hard Problems Are Hard
When it comes to hard problems, computer scientists seem to be stuck. Consider, for example, the notorious problem of finding the shortest round-trip route that passes through every city on a map exactly once. All known methods for solving ...Particle Physicists Detect ‘Magic’ at the Large Hadron Collider
Ninety million times a year, when protons crash together at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), they produce, in their wreckage, a top quark and an anti-top quark, the heaviest known elementary particles. In the trillionth of a trillionth of a...A Cell So Minimal That It Challenges Definitions of Life
Life’s fundamental structure is the cell, and so the main things that a cell does — processing biomolecules, growing, replicating its genetic material and producing a new body — are considered hallmarks of life. But earlier this year, scien...A New Bridge Links the Strange Math of Infinity to Computer Science
All of modern mathematics is built on the foundation of set theory, the study of how to organize abstract collections of objects. But in general, research mathematicians don’t need to think about it when they’re solving their problems. They...Cosmic Paradox Reveals the Awful Consequence of an Observer-Free Universe
Tinkering at their desks with the mathematics of quantum space and time, physicists have discovered a puzzling conundrum. The arcane rules of quantum theory and gravity let them imagine many different kinds of universes in precise detail, e...Old ‘Ghost’ Theory of Quantum Gravity Makes a Comeback
The force we experience most intimately remains the most mysterious. Physicists understand how vast migrations of particles called photons light up our homes, and how swarms of “gluon” particles hold together the cores of our atoms. But the...Mixing Is the Heartbeat of Deep Lakes. At Crater Lake, It’s Slowing Down.
On a radiant July afternoon, a pair of scientists hung their heads off the side of a boat and peered into the brilliant blue water of a lake known for its clarity. They were watching for the exact moment when a black-and-white, dinner plate...New Proofs Probe Soap-Film Singularities
In the mid-19th century, the Belgian physicist Joseph Plateau — who had been designing and conducting scientific experiments since he was a child — submerged loops of wire in a soapy solution and studied the films that formed. When he bent ...To Have Machines Make Math Proofs, Turn Them Into a Puzzle
The mathematical conundrums that Marijn Heule has helped crack in the last decade sound like code names lifted from a sci-fi spy novel: the empty hexagon. Schur Number 5. Keller’s conjecture, dimension seven. In reality, they are (or, more ...Physicists Take the Imaginary Numbers Out of Quantum Mechanics
A century ago, the strange behavior of atoms and elementary particles led physicists to formulate a new theory of nature. That theory, quantum mechanics, found immediate success, proving its worth with accurate calculations of hydrogen’s em...How Your Brain Creates ‘Aha’ Moments and Why They Stick
Here are three words: pine, crab, sauce. There’s a fourth word that combines with each of the others to create another common word. What is it? When the answer finally comes to you, it’ll likely feel instantaneous. You might even say “Aha!”...What Is a Manifold?
Standing in the middle of a field, we can easily forget that we live on a round planet. We’re so small in comparison to the Earth that from our point of view, it looks flat. The world is full of such shapes — ones that look flat to an ant l...In a First, AI Models Analyze Language As Well As a Human Expert
Among the myriad abilities that humans possess, which ones are uniquely human? Language has been a top candidate at least since Aristotle, who wrote that humanity was “the animal that has language.” Even as large language models such as Cha...Carlo Rovelli’s Radical Perspective on Reality
Sitting outside a Catholic church on the French Riviera, Carlo Rovelli jutted his head forward and backward, imitating a pigeon trotting by. Pigeons bob their heads, he told me, not only to stabilize their vision but also to gauge distances...Shark Data Suggests Animals Scale Like Geometric Objects
It’s a universal fact that as any 3D object, from a Platonic sphere to a cell to an elephant, grows outward in all directions, its total surface area will increase more slowly than the space it occupies (its volume). If the object’s geometr...First Shape Found That Can’t Pass Through Itself
Imagine you’re holding two equal-size dice. Is it possible to bore a tunnel through one die that’s big enough for the other to slide through? Perhaps your instinct is to say “Surely not!” If so, you’re not alone. In the late 1600s, an unide...The Game Theory of How Algorithms Can Drive Up Prices
Imagine a town with two widget merchants. Customers prefer cheaper widgets, so the merchants must compete to set the lowest price. Unhappy with their meager profits, they meet one night in a smoke-filled tavern to discuss a secret plan: If ...How Soon Will the Seas Rise?
In May 2014, NASA announced at a press conference that a portion of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet appeared to have reached a point of irreversible retreat. Glaciers flowing toward the sea at the periphery of the 2-kilometer-thick sheet of ic...