TECHNOLOGY Archives

TECHNOLOGY

Could You Tell if Your Burger Was Grown in a Lab?

Some people avoid meat for health reasons, while other vegetarians do so because they’re not comfortable with the idea that animals are raised and slain for food. For the latter, cultivated meat offers an ethical solution: You can enjoy a juicy burger knowing the cow it came from is still grazing on a farm. This […]

How Baking Soda Does… Everything

You won’t find many products that are equally useful for making cookies, soothing bug bites, and unclogging toilets. But there’s a compound that claims all of those abilities and many more besides, like some kind of magical potion gifted to humanity. That compound is baking soda, and its uses extend far beyond its namesake purpose. […]

SCIENCE
How Does Morse Code Work?

On May 24, 1844, inventor Samuel F.B. Morse tapped out the first telegraph message. Instead of using the English alphabet directly, he used a series of short and long taps — his eponymous Morse code — combining the two into patterns that represented each letter of the alphabet. Derived from the Bible, the message was […]

CULTURE
10 Things Your Body Does on Autopilot

We like to think we have control over our everyday lives, but in reality we don’t even have control of our bodies — at least not entirely. Yes, we do have many voluntary functions — everything from walking and running to smiling and chewing. These are controlled by your somatic nervous system. But for every […]

HEALTH
Why Do Hot Roads Look Wet?

People often use the term “mirage” to describe a false promise, but it’s a real scientific phenomenon. Your first encounter with the concept was probably in animation, as many classic cartoons feature a recurring trope where a character wandering the desert will hallucinate a tropical pond — or occasionally some other desirable feature — only […]

SCIENCE