The rise of the private space industry may mean allowing Earth microbes to escape to other worlds, but is it worth the risk? Space 11 December 2019 By Leah Crane Imagined Mars settlements may make…
How international conservation groups are betraying indigenous peoples
Discrimination towards indigenous communities is rife among conservation groups – and sometimes enforced at the barrel of a gun, says Curtis Abraham Environment | Comment 11 December 2019 By Curtis Abraham THE murder of “guardian…
Smart doorbells may be fun, but we don’t…
This changes everything | Training facial recognition algorithms requires masses of data, and big tech companies can go to extreme lengths to get that, says Annalee Newitz Humans | Comment 11 December 2019 Nest Hello…
Martin Rees: We will become a new species…
Heading into deep space will lead to a new species of human evolving, says the UK Astronomer Royal - and could pave the way to immortals who can conquer the galaxy Space | Comment 18…
The world started to wake up to climate…
At last, the public is calling for urgent action to tackle global warming and politicians are falling over themselves to get on board, says Adam Vaughan Environment 18 December 2019 By Adam Vaughan Sarah Silbiger/Getty…
Encryption scheme lets police access your phone, but…
By Chris Baraniuk Smartphones are increasingly being encryptedTeerayut Chaisarn/Getty Images It’s the argument that just won’t go away. For decades, governments have been lobbying for encryption “backdoors”: ways of accessing people’s private messages should law…
Facebooks AI mathematician can solve university calculus problems
By Gege Li Veronica Vacis/EyeEm/Getty Images Machines are getting better at maths – artificial intelligence has learned to solve university-level calculus problems in seconds. François Charton and Guillaume Lample at Facebook AI Research trained an…
Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft fails to reach ISS due…
By Leah Crane A long-exposure image of Boeing’s Starliner launchTerry Renna/AP/Shutterstock Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft will be unable to reach the International Space Station during its first test flight. The spacecraft launched as expected on 20…
Everyone is jumping on the quantum computing bandwagon,…
By Leah Crane IBM is one of many firms developing quantum computersIBM Research Quantum computing is booming, but is it a bubble? At a gathering of experts on this technology in California last week, nobody…
Weird jaguar catfish is covered in spines and…
By Jake Buehler Spinipterus moijiri lives in Peru and BrazilThe Fisheries Society of the British Isles/John Wiley & Sons, Inc. What is covered in spines, lives in a log and has a jaguar’s spots? A…