Audio
essay
Teaching and learning
Learning styles don’t exist
A teaching approach that is based on students’ preferences sounds laudable. But this misunderstands how learning happens
Carl Hendrick
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Space exploration
There’s no planet B
The scientific evidence is clear: the only celestial body that can support us is the one we evolved with. Here’s why
Arwen E Nicholson & Raphaëlle D Haywood
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Music
Enter the conductrice
Will a new generation of women on the podium perpetuate the tyrannical charisma of their male predecessors or overturn it?
Xenia Hanusiak
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Stories and literature
The honesty of pornography
Often vilified as a weapon of male supremacy, pornography in fact has much to tell us about ourselves and our culture
Kathleen Lubey
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Ethics
Moral mathematics
Subjecting the problems of ethics to the cool quantifications of logic and probability can help us to be better people
Elad Uzan
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The ancient world
Wanderlust of the ancients
The Roman Empire enabled an early version of globalisation that offered travellers adventure, novelty and opportunity
Fabio Fernandes
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Beauty and aesthetics
Attuned to the aesthetic
The ultimate value of the world can be discovered if you are sensitive to what is beautiful
Tom Cochrane
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Space exploration
Telescopes on the Moon
Our future in space relies on settling the Moon and using it as a base to probe the deepest questions in the cosmos
Joseph Silk
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Religion
Blue-eyed Buddhist
The story of a working-class radical from Ireland who became a celebrated monk and challenged the British Empire in Asia
Laurence Cox
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Human rights and justice
Exhuming the truth
Thousands of victims of political executions lie in anonymous graves. Forensics offers hope for the ‘forgotten’ ones
Nicole Iturriaga
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Animals and humans
Happy the person
She has deep emotions, complex social needs and a large, elephant brain. Her legal personhood should be recognised too
Lori Marino
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Biology
A touch of moss
Inside a rainforest or on the city pavement, moss asks so little yet offers so much: a tactile encounter with time itself
Nikita Arora