The Dunning-Kruger Effect Shows that People Don’t Know What They Don’t Know
David Dunning explains how people can avoid overestimating their own knowledge, a psychological bias called the Dunning-Kruger effect
Stories by Corey S. Powell
Corey S. Powell is co-editor of OpenMind.
The Hunt Is On for Alpha Centauri’s Planets
Astronomers could soon learn whether or not the nearest neighboring star system harbors habitable worlds
Have We Mismeasured the Universe?
New studies of the oldest light and sound in the cosmos suggest novel physics—rather than systematic errors—could explain an unsolved scientific mystery
Pluto Probe Encounters a Pristine World in the Solar System’s Suburbs
Ultima Thule, the most-distant object ever visited by a spacecraft, is revealing our solar system’s deepest history—and, just maybe, revolutionizing planetary science
20 Years Later--a Q&A with the first Astronomer to Detect a Planet Orbiting Another Sun
Michel Mayor and grad student Didier Queloz were the first astronomers to identify an alien world as it circled a sunlike star
After Einstein, a New Generation Tries to Create a Theory of Everything
A new generation of physicists hope to succeed where Einstein failed
Science in Court
Reflections on science truth in an asbestos trial
Rivers of Fire
The SOHO spacecraft finds intricate plasma flows coursing through the sun
Crash and Burn
Radio eyes witness the mass births and deaths of stars
Life Goes for a Spin
A topsy-turvy earth may have triggered an evolutionary big bang
Return of the Space Snowballs
Did a blizzard of icy comets give the earth its oceans?
It's a Bird, It's a...Dinosaur?
Fossil finds heat up the debate over the origins of our feathered friends
Vanishing World
Could the first planet discovered around a sunlike star be a mirage?
The Greening Of Europa
Are the satellites of giant planets a place to look for life?
By Jove!
A MIRROR, CHEAPLY
Coof low-budget astronomymputer power opens a new era
All in the Timing
A quick-seeing satellite catches cosmic cannibals in the act
Rethinking the Speedy World
An international conference dares to ask, 'Is it time for the world to slow down?'
All in the Timing
A satellite observes the lightning-fast flickerings of cosmic objects
Science Goes to the Movies
An unusual concentration of science fact graces the silver screen
Bugs in the Data?
The controversy over Martian life is just beginning
Subatomic Logic
Researchers nudge closer to the goal of quantum computing
Interview with Jaron Lanier
A cyberspace Renaissance man reveals his current thoughts on the World Wide Web, virtual reality, and other silicon dreams
The Inside Story
Detailed computer simulations help scientists delve into the Earth's interior