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Top posts
Every blog post that took off on Hacker News, ranked by the votes of its best submission. 409 posts.
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Perfect pitch study: Why can’t we identify music notes as well as colors?
Neuroscientists explore how people with absolute pitch process sounds
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Conservation should be allowed to pay its own way on public lands
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) auction in February, 2016, for oil and gas drilling rights near Arches National Park was unremarkable. The high bidder, Tempest Exploration Co. LLC, paid $2,500 for the 1,120 acre lease by credit card and began paying annual rental fees. What soon did prove remarkable, though, was…
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Why Does the Sunlight Always Come from the North in Shaded Relief Maps?
If you've got a sharp eye and a knack for details, you might have noticed the sun coming from an unrealistic angle in most shaded relief maps: the north. In this article we explain why.
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Greenland Sharks
Greenland shark swimming under an ice flow in the Canadian arctic WIKIMEDIA COMMONS (CC BY-SA 4.0)
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A Meta-Scientific Perspective on Thinking: Fast and Slow (2020)
2011 was an important year in the history of psychology, especially social psychology. First, it became apparent that one social psychologist had faked results for dozens of publications (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diederik_Stapel). Second, a highly respected journal published an article with the incredible claim…
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23andMe to merge with VG Acquisition Corp. to become publicly-traded company
23andMe to Merge with Virgin Group’s VG Acquisition Corp. to Become Publicly-Traded Company Set to Revolutionize Personalized Healthcare and Therapeutic Development through Human Genetics January 15, 2021 Medscape study in collaboration with 23andMe finds Primary Care Physicians are increasingly more comfortable with…
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Irish teen invents magnetic liquid trap to remove microplastics in water (2019)
Read about the Irish teenager who won the Google Science award for the magnetic liquid trap that could clean an ocean of microplastics.
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How death rates from Covid-19 differ between vaccinated and unvaccinated
To understand how the pandemic is evolving, it’s crucial to know how death rates from COVID-19 are affected by vaccination status.
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The Gaslighting of Science
Final Installment of the Misinformation Trifecta
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Two conspiracy theories about cola
Does cola contain a drug to prevent you from throwing up from the sugar? And is Mexican Coke somehow better than American Coke?
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US Should Create Strategy by End of '22 to Reduce Increasing Ocean Plastic Waste
Reckoning with the U.S Role in Global Ocean Plastic Waste concludes plastic waste in the U.S. is ubiquitous and increasing. Worldwide, at least 8.8 million metric tons of plastic waste enter the world’s oceans each year — the equivalent of dumping a garbage truck of plastic into the ocean every minute — and in 2016…
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Turtle visual cortex is non-retinotopic
Most of the visual cortex studies I’ve read have been about mammalian vision. But mammals are not the only organisms with cortex, or at least tissue resembling cortex. This paper explores turtle visual cortex, in an area known as dCx. This dorsal region plays the role of the turtle primary vision center — as close as…
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Has the lead-crime hypothesis been debunked?
A couple of months ago a new paper was released that examined the lead-crime hypothesis. Its conclusion is that there's little evidence for an association, and if there is one it's pretty small. I haven't commented on it, but not because of its negative conclusion. It's because the paper is a meta-analysis. I'm fairly…
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Machu Picchu older than expected, study reveals
The first science-based estimation of the site’s founding and occupation, the Yale-led study has implications for our wider understanding of Inca history.
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A Browsable Petascale Reconstruction of the Human Cortex
Posted by Tim Blakely, Software Engineer and Michał Januszewski, Research Scientist, Connectomics at Google In January 2020 we released the fly “he...
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Perceptual distortions in late-teens predict psychotic symptoms in mid-life
Are there early indicators that could help predict which individuals will go on to develop this serious mental illness? New research by Distinguished Professor Mark F. Lenzenweger could point the way.
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What did Einstein mean by “spooky action at a distance”?
Science News, Physics, Science, Philosophy, Philosophy of Science
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Ergodicity, What's It Mean
Ensemble averages and time averages
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Better drainage of brain debris improves Alzheimer's disease therapies
In most of the organs of our body, the lymphatic system is responsible for conducting lymph between different parts of the body. The lymphatic system processes an average of 3 liters of lymph per day. Lymph lies between the blood vessels and the cells. The lymphatic system provides a return route to the blood vessels…
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A remote island's battle against seabird-killing ants (2015)
At the world’s remotest nesting colony, the Crazy Ant Strike Team beats back its seabird-killing enemy with spray guns, poison... and cat food.
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New research highlights the damage caused by processed food
A landmark paper proves that obesity is not just energy in and out; the type of food matters. And while one study shows we’re eating more processed food, another reveals what can be gained if we clean up our act.
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How Ray Kurzweil’s 1998 predictions about 2019 are faring
This is the fourth…and LAST…entry in my series of blog posts analyzing the accuracy of Ray Kurzweil’s predictions about what things would be like in 2019. These predictions come from hi…
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Scientists begin building highly accurate digital twin of our planet
A digital twin of our planet is to simulate the Earth system in future. It is intended to support policy-makers in taking appropriate measures to better prepare for extreme events. A new strategy paper by European scientists and ETH Zurich computer scientists shows how this can be achieved.
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Antioxidants Vitamin C and Vitamin E associated with lower risk of Parkinson’s
MINNEAPOLIS - People who consume high levels of vitamin C and E in their diet may have a lower risk of Parkinson’s disease than people who get only small amounts of these nutrients, according to a new study published in the January 6, 2021, online issue of Neurology ® , the medical journal of the American Academy of…
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Losing Covid-19 antibody immunity after six months after Pfizer vaccine
Case Western Reserve University researchers, in partnership with Brown University, examine vaccine’s effectiveness over time on seniors and their ca...
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