[ad_1] There have been several headlines over the past week about an AI chatbot officially passing the Turing test. These news reports are based on a recent preprint study by two researchers at the University of California San Diego in which four large language models (LLMs) were put through the Turing test. One model –…
[ad_1] May 2025: Science History from 50, 100 and 150 Years Ago Old-time graffiti; balloon deaths By Mark Fischetti 1975, Computer Chip: “Microprocessing unit if the Motorola microcomputer is an integrated circuit laid down on a single-crystal silicon chip 0.210 by 0.217 inch, enlarged in this image. The chip bears about 5,400 transistors. Black lines…
[ad_1] The amount of matter present in the universe simply hasn’t added up. Astronomers accounting for all the normal matter in the universe that makes up stars, galaxies, and gasses have fallen far short of the amount they should find produced by the Big Bang 13.6 billion years ago. About 85 percent of the universe…
[ad_1] The colossal squid, a mysterious creature lurking in the Antarctic abyss, has finally made a cameo, a cohort of scientists say. You may have heard of the giant squid, which is famous from mariners’ legends and for its epic battles with sperm whales. The colossal squid is even bigger and more mysterious. It’s so…
[ad_1] Scientists have discovered that Mars’ iconic rust-red appearance likely developed in a wetter environment than previously thought, challenging a longstanding theory about the planet’s geological history. For decades, researchers believed the Red Planet got its distinctive hue from anhydrous hematite, an iron oxide that forms in dry conditions. But a new study published in…
[ad_1] When most people think of shapes, they imagine a triangle, a rectangle, or maybe even a fancier- sounding rhombus or trapezoid. But to mathematicians, shapes encompass a vast universe of surprising forms, from one-dimensional loops to polytopes (geometric objects with flat sides that can exist in any desired dimension). A related category, surfaces—collections of…
[ad_1] The story of the birth of quantum mechanics is often told, but not always correctly, in my opinion. Introductory quantum physics classes focus on the famous equation written by Erwin Schrödinger in 1926, which describes quantum waves. I think the emphasis on these waves has generated a confusion that persists today. The birth of…
[ad_1] For people with food allergies, even a simple dinner out can become stressful. Figuring out whether every ingredient is listed on the menu and asking the server a dozen questions are necessary steps just to avoid dishes that might seem harmless to most, but can be dangerous — even fatal — to someone with…
[ad_1] NASA astronaut Don Pettit and two cosmonaut colleagues will return to Earth from the International Space Station (ISS) on Saturday night (April 19), if all goes to plan. The journey home for Pettit, Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner will begin Saturday at 5:57 p.m. EDT (2157 GMT), when their Russian Soyuz spacecraft undocks from…
[ad_1] We all had to make adjustments as the COVID-19 pandemic unfolded – even zoo animals who were suddenly not seeing crowds of visitors pass by every single day. In a study published in 2022, researchers discovered how primates reacted to that shift, looking at the behavior of bonobos, chimpanzees, western lowland gorillas, and olive…