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Every year, the government funnels tens of billions of dollars toward scientific research — research that you help pay for with your taxes. These government-funded investigations give rise to an average of 65,000 peer-reviewed papers a year. Many of these papers, however, remain inaccessible to you unless you happen to subscribe to the journal in which they're published, and some of these journals are pretty expensive. More »
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Brachiosaurus is estimated to have weighed close to thirty metric tons. Put two of these behemoths together, and you're dealing with upwards of 125,000 pounds of dinosaur. More »
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Tons of cat owners have Toxoplasma gondii, the common feline parasite. We've known for quite some time that T. gondii makes rats lose their fear of cats, making them more likely to be eaten. We've also known that the parasite causes humans to become more reckless, and in some cases hornier. More »
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The story of an author meeting his own fictional characters is a common one — and usually it becomes some kind of metafictional meditation on the nature of authorship and what it means to be a fictional character. But what if that fictional character comes from a weird post-apocalyptic world, and it was kind of a shitty story? More »
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io9 is proud to present fiction from Lightspeed Magazine. Once a month, we'll be featuring a story from Lightspeed's current issue. This month's selection is "Her Words Like Hunting Vixens Spring " by Brooke Bolander. Enjoy! More »
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Atrazine is an herbicide marketed by agribusiness company Syngenta. It has been shown to "chemically castrate" frogs, turning males into females that are capable of rearing offspring; it is associated with birth defects, low birth weights, and menstrual problems in humans; and its use has been outright banned by the European Union. More »
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The New York Times has published two thought-provoking opinion pieces relating to Attention Deficit Disorder and the medications used to treat it. More »
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Only one character in Alien has the wits and wherewithal to survive to the end of the movie at Ripley's side: Jones the cat. While everyone else on Nostromo was screaming like chickens with their chests ripped open, Jones exhibited the cool becoming a cat. Now Jones finally gets to tell his side of the story, one filled with naps, food, and yes, the occasional alien. More »
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Every year, Edge.org poses a question to a hand-picked group of the world's "most complex and sophisticated minds." Then they publish the responses. More »
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When Edgar Rice Burroughs published A Princess of Mars in 1912 (originally published as a serial in the magazine All-Story, as Under the Moons of Mars), he gave birth to the iconic character John Carter and his wondrous vision of Mars (or as the natives call it, Barsoom). With this setting and character, Burroughs created something that has enthralled generation after generation of readers. Now, a hundred years after the series first debuted in print, new generations of readers—thanks, in part, to the new Disney film—are still finding and discovering the adventures of John Carter for the first time. More »
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It's hard to perform a Michael Jackson routine night after night, lipsynching to the king of pop. But it gets a lot more complicated when you're being stalked by a psychotic robot — and it can only get worse when the robot decides that it's a Michael Jackson fan. More »
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Featured in the latest issue of Playboy is a totally engrossing profile — written by The Loom's Carl Zimmer — on astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson, director of the Hayden Planetarium and one of the most highly regarded science communicators of our time. More »
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io9 is proud to present fiction from Lightspeed Magazine. Once a month, we'll be featuring a story from Lightspeed's current issue. Here's our first selection, "How Many Miles to Babylon?" by Megan Arkenberg. Enjoy! More »
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Greg Bear returns to the Halo universe with Primordium, out next week. But you don't have to wait until then to start delving into Bear's second installment in the Forerunner Saga. Tor.com has the first chapter of Primordium, and the second chapter is live over at Halo Waypoint. More »
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You may have read Arthur C. Clarke's 1993 space-disaster novel Hammer of God — but have you read the original 1992 short story it was based on? Originally published in Time Magazine, that story is now available for free over at Lightspeed Magazine, and it's a potent dose of cosmic wonder. More »
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Navigating the uncertain terrain of the dating world can be tough for just about anyone, but it is often especially challenging for people with autism spectrum disorders, who typically suffer from impaired social skills that can make establishing strong interpersonal connections difficult. More »
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Ryan Boudinot's Blueprints of the Afterlife is probably the strangest post-apocalyptic novel in ages, including a scale model of Manhattan built in the middle of Puget Sound. We talked to Boudinot about his bizarre story a while back, and now we're excited to give you an exclusive look at one chapter from the novel. More »
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Everybody wants to date a robot. They're hot and sexy, and they're programmed to protect human life above all other priorities — even seeing humans harming each other can cause robots' brains to melt. What could be better? But it turns out that dating between robots and humans is a social minefield — especially when a robot has a young three-day-old son, who needs to be taught what types of pornography are okay for a young robot. More »
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Over the course of the last century, the exponential expansion of industry has seen the production of materials like steel, aluminum, cement and plastics skyrocket. It is estimated that the amount of these so-called energy-intensive materials produced every single year comes to 10 times the total weight of every living person on Earth, and accounts for a fifth of the world's carbon emissions. More »
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If you've been wondering just what's wrong with unemployed people, and why they won't just go get a job, then Ursula K. Le Guin has some answers for you. In the time-honored tradition of fantasists and fabulists, she's phrased her answers in the form of a fable. More »
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Many of you may have noticed that today's Google Doodle honors famed physicist and chemist Marie Curie, in celebration of her birthday. But this year also marks the centennial of her second Nobel Prize. (It bears mentioning that Curie was not only the first woman to win a Nobel Prize, she is also the only woman to win in two fields, and the only person ever to win in multiple sciences.) More »
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Ann VanderMeer's award-winning tenure at Weird Tales was cut short when the magazine was bought by a new crew — but the print world's loss is the internet's gain. VanderMeer and her husband, Jeff VanderMeer, have started a new online magazine, the Weird Fiction Review, which just launched today. More »
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Orion Magazine's Sy Montgomery has written a wonderfully funny, informative and heartfelt article about the enigmatic octopus and its mysterious mind. More »
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Even in decidedly "wealthy" countries, human health is not always guaranteed. In fact, studies show that the best indicator of a country's health is not its overall wealth, but how that wealth is distributed. Time Magazine's Maia Szalavitz reports: More »
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We already live in a world where corporations are regarded as legal persons — but what happens if corporate personhood becomes more valid than that of organic beings? That's the provocative premise of a new story by Vonda N. McIntyre, called simply "Supreme Court of the United States Defines Personhood." More »
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If you love the John Carpenter version of The Thing and are dreading the remake coming to a theater near you, or if you just love stories that successfully represent a truly alien point of view, then you need to read Peter Watts' Hugo-nominated story "The Things." It's the John Carpenter flick, but from the point of view of what humans call "the thing" — a creature who has a hive mind, and knows no boundaries between itself and everyone else. Watts is the author of the novels Blindsight and Starfish, and "The Things" is one of the best stories you'll ever read by the master of scifi mindfuckery. More »
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Last week, scientist Ralph Steinman became the first person in history be be awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine posthumously; just three days prior to the award announcement, Steinman passed away following an extended bout with pancreatic cancer. More »
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The New Yorker's Adam Gopnik has written an excellent retrospective on Norton Juster's The Phantom Tollbooth, in recognition of the iconic book's fiftieth anniversary. More »
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You probably already think you know why immortality is a bad idea — after all, Torchwood just got done showing us, and there's a whole complicated computer model of why immortality would suck. But trust Ursula K. Le Guin to make immortality seem terrifying all over again. More »
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Why would chipmaker Intel want to commission science fiction authors to write stories? So that the technology-focused company can start thinking more in terms of user applications. The Tomorrow Project, a new anthology that Intel published online a few months back, aims to help Intel's engineers imagine how people will actually want to use technology in the future, so they can design better products. More »
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Amazon's Kindle Singles has just published a long, fascinating essay about the cultural meaning of Comic-Con by Douglas Wolk, author of the Eisner-winning book Reading Comics. If you're interested in a sympathetic but critical analysis of the Con that rules the world of genre writing, filmmaking, TV and art, this essay is a must-read. It's only $0.99 from Amazon, and 70% of proceeds go right to Wolk, so you're supporting a good writer with your purchase! More »
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Kelly Link's latest short story sneaks up on you — at first you think it's just a concentrated dose of weirdness, a jarring head-trip like being suspended by your ankles over the ocean. But then her strange world-building starts to make sense, and you think the whole thing is becoming a demented thought experiment. More »
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To celebrate the paperback release of Charles Yu's incredible novel How To Live Safely In A Science Fictional Universe, we're running an exclusive, never-before-seen-by-humans story that Yu wrote about the origin of the strange world where his time-traveling main character lives. More »
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Lightspeed recently republished a classic story by Carolyn Ives Gilman, "Frost Painting," about a mysterious art colony in Montana that the locals say is inhabited by aliens — or maybe humans who have become alien. It's also the tragic, wistful story of an art critic who falls in love with an artist whose greatest works are designed to disappear. More »
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Can a relationship between two people who see the future ever work out? Especially if they see the future in very different ways? My novelette "Six Months, Three Days," up now at Tor.com, explores this idea. More »
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To celebrate the publication of award-winning author Michael Swanwick's new novel Dancing with Bears (Night Shade Books), we're running Swanwick's complete short story "The Little Cat Laughed to See Such Sport." It's a story about Darger and Surplus, the protagonists in Dancing with Bears, and was originally collected in Swanwick's short story collection, The Dog Said Bow-Wow,, from Tachyon Publications. Like what you read? Join the Darger and Surplus Caravan and read more adventures from Michael Swanwick by joining the Night Shade Books newsletter before May 28th. By joining the newsletter you will have access to more Darger and Surplus stories and the opportunity to enter to win a copy of Dancing With Bears. More »
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Apex Magazine has just published my short story about a young materials scientist who develops a very peculiar superpower: vaporizing cars. It's called "Twilight of the Eco-Terrorist." More »
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Predator is probably the most unflinchingly macho film in existence, but does the blockbuster's chain guns and shoulder cannons and cigar smoking hide a much more nuanced tale of sexual awakening? Here's a cheeky psychoanalysis of everyone's favorite Yautja thriller. More »
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I recently urged my friends on Twitter to consider writing a version of H.P. Lovecraft's "At The Mountains Of Madness" from the perspective of a shuggoth slave rebellion. Which resulted in many people reminding me of Elizabeth Bear's incredible novelette, "Shoggoths In Bloom," which originally appeared in Asimov's and won the 2009 Hugo for best novelette. Now you can read this weird tale of the Old Ones' polymorphous slaves in World War II - it's free on Bear's website. There are no slave rebellions here, but there's a horrific apprehension of what it means to be both monster and slave. More »
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Can't wait to read China Miéville's first foray into hard space opera? Neither can we. So we're thrilled that the first chapter is already available for free online, at Pan MacMillan UK's site. More »
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