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Science

Essays and videos exploring physics, evolution, cosmology and other frontiers in science
The panspermia theory | Aeon
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video

Biology

The idea that life on Earth originated elsewhere is not as far out as it seems

6 minutes

The book of leaves | Aeon
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video

Biology

Flicker through the eclectic beauty and biological diversity of 2,400 leaves

3 minutes

Connecting the human body to the outside world | Aeon
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video

Biotechnology

What it’s like to wear a prosthetic that ‘feels’

6 minutes

Ed Yong: the hidden world of animal senses | Aeon
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video

Biology

To understand the limits of human senses, look to the wild world of animal cognition

45 minutes

The science of symmetry | Aeon
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video

Evolution

Symmetry rules life on Earth – but it comes with many fascinating exceptions

9 minutes

Moths and beetles in slow-motion flight | Aeon
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video

Biology

There’s no one way for an insect to fly, but they’re all amazing in close up and slo-mo

7 minutes

Fortune favours the shrewd | Aeon
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essay

Evolution

Fortune favours the shrewd

Attaining and maintaining power lies at the heart of almost all animal societies. And it’s as devious as human politicking

Lee Alan Dugatkin

Wrought | Aeon
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video

Biology

Dazzling timelapse shows how microbes spoil our food – and sometimes enrich it

22 minutes

Why whale song is like pop music | Aeon
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video

Biology

Like pop music, humpback whale songs spread, mutate, and fall out of fashion

9 minutes

A touch of moss | Aeon
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essay

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

Bird of prey | Aeon
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video

Biology

Journey deep into the Philippine forest in search of the world’s largest, rarest eagle

95 minutes

Seeing life | Aeon
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essay

Biology

Seeing life

Driven by insatiable curiosity, early histologists revealed the hidden structures of cells in works of sensual artistry

Benjamin Ehrlich

What does dying really feel like? | Aeon
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video

Ageing and death

Death is a trip – how new research links near-death and DMT experiences

9 minutes

Minmini (Fireflies) | Aeon
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video

Ecology and environmental sciences

Experience the dazzling displays that fireflies create when humans are far away

5 minutes

The dreams of animals | Aeon
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essay

Sleep and dreams

The dreams of animals

The psychic lives of nonhuman dreamers reveal colours, harmonies and beauties of which we had little inkling until now

David M Peña-Guzmán

The incredible life of Maria Sibylla Merian | Aeon
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video

Biology

In the jungle of Suriname, Maria Sibylla Merian discovered insect metamorphosis

4 minutes

The split-body problem | Aeon
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essay

Biology

The split-body problem

Why we need to stop thinking about parents, offspring and sex when we try to understand how life reproduces itself

Gunnar O Babcock

Modular cognition | Aeon
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essay

Cognition and intelligence

Modular cognition

Powerful tricks from computer science and cybernetics show how evolution ‘hacked’ its way to intelligence from the bottom up

Michael Levin & Rafael Yuste

The many disguises of Australian walking sticks | Aeon
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video

Evolution

The master-of-disguise creature whose whole life is an elaborate lie

5 minutes

Slow sex, long life | Aeon
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essay

Biology

Slow sex, long life

Tokyo’s imperial archives advise what science now confirms: the secret of longevity lies in the gentle arts of the bedroom

Denis Noble

How to restore a savanna | Aeon
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essay

Ecology and environmental sciences

How to restore a savanna

Massive tree-planting programmes have come to substitute for the tradeoffs and complexity of restoring real ecosystems

Francis E (‘Jack’) Putz

Insects take flight | Aeon
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video

Biology

How insects become airborne, slowed down to a speed the human eye can appreciate

8 minutes

How to ride a pterosaur | Aeon
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video

Biology

It’s a massive, winged Cretaceous beast – could a human ride one?

9 minutes

Phenomena: magnitudes | Aeon
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video

Biology

The astonishing resonances between patterns in nature, microscopic and cosmic

5 minutes