Wait, How Does Ice Freeze? (Quanta Magazine)
by Elise Cutts
The process of water turning from liquid to solid is a lot more complicated than you might think. For one thing, it often doesn’t happen at 0 degrees Celsius. It depends on many factors, including the tiniest faults in the surfaces on which it forms and the evolutionary strategies of microbes.
Art and Community (The New Yorker)
by Adam Gopnik
Philosopher Charles Taylor is among the foremost contemporary critics of individualistic Enlightenment thought. Can his ideas about the central place of art and spiritual feeling in human life convince anyone who’s not already inclined to agree?
How a Computer Innovator Claimed Her Full Legacy (The Conversation)
by Mar Hicks
Lynn Conway was among the developers of computer chip technologies that paved the way for today’s electronics, despite working in a sexist industry that failed to fully acknowledge her contributions. And that was only after she was forced to secretly restart her career after being fired for coming out as trans.
Life is Earth (Sequencer Magazine)
by Max G. Levy
We often talk about life on Earth. But in a very real sense, life is an integral part of the planet, influencing changing conditions from soil and rock to the atmosphere—and being influenced by those changes in turn.
How to Go Back in Time (Big Think)
by Ethan Siegel
Is it possible to travel backward in time? Theoretically, it might be. But the way the physics would work makes it impossible to meet your own grandfather and change your life before it began.
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