Science
essay
Anthropology
Memories within myth
The stories of oral societies, passed from generation to generation, are more than they seem. They are scientific records
Patrick Nunn
essay
Earth science and climate
The return of silvopasture
This ancient practice, nurturing animals and trees in an ecological system, fights climate change and restores the land
Liz Carlisle & Niki Mazaroli
video
Earth science and climate
A biologist on the sorrows of documenting the Great Salt Lake’s collapse
6 minutes
essay
Environmental history
Disturbance
How atomic doomsday experiments, fuelled by Cold War fears, shaped then shook ecologists’ faith in self-healing nature
Laura J Martin
essay
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
essay
Earth science and climate
Our Earth, shaped by life
Darwin was the first to see that all lifeforms, from worms to corals, transform the planet. What does that mean for us?
Olivia Judson
essay
History of science
A singular scientist
James Lovelock was a visionary whose greatest ideas were made possible by his unshakeable independence
Roger Highfield
essay
Oceans and water
Tomorrow’s corals
A warming planet and acid oceans will radically transform marine ecosystems. How will our beloved reefs survive?
Klaus M Stiefel & James D Reimer
video
The environment
Photographs of rainforests dissolving in acid strike a beautiful note of warning
10 minutes
video
Ecology and environmental sciences
To renew Yosemite, California should embrace a once-outlawed Indigenous practice
6 minutes
essay
Earth science and climate
The Antarctic paradox
The most protected place on Earth has become one of the most threatened – and threatening. Can its problems be solved?
Alejandra Mancilla & Peder Roberts
essay
Earth science and climate
A new Earth rises
How did the planet replace the nation-state to become the prime political object of the 21st century?
Erik Isberg
video
Childhood and adolescence
When Paradise, California burned, its teens became instant climate refugees
23 minutes
essay
Archaeology
Poseidon’s wrath
Vanished beneath the waves in 373 BCE, Helike is a byword for thinking about disaster, for ancients and moderns alike
Guy D Middleton
video
Earth science and climate
How much can science really tell us about the future of climate change?
24 minutes
video
Earth science and climate
‘Ice has a memory’ – an Inuit poem contemplates scientific exploration of Greenland
28 minutes
essay
Archaeology
The deep Anthropocene
A revolution in archaeology has exposed the extraordinary extent of human influence over our planet’s past and its future
Lucas Stephens, Erle Ellis & Dorian Fuller
video
Earth science and climate
Climate change science is centuries, not decades old, and it was pioneered by a woman
5 minutes
idea
Ecology and environmental sciences
Is there a limit to optimism when it comes to climate change?
Fiacha Heneghan
idea
Meaning and the good life
What Viktor Frankl’s logotherapy can offer in the Anthropocene
Ed Simon
video
Family life
For Dulce, the rite of passage of learning to swim might soon be her means of survival
11 minutes
video
Earth science and climate
From 20,000 miles up, our home planet is a hypnotic swirl of the familiar and the sublime
16 minutes
idea
Earth science and climate
Nuclear power is not the answer in a time of climate change
Heidi Hutner & Erica Cirino
essay
Earth science and climate
Flash!
It ignited life on Earth, propelled evolution, and now signals climate change. Yet what sparks lightning remains a mystery
Sidney Perkowitz