Science touches so many aspects of modern life that it's hard to keep up. Through our programs and this website, Science for the Public provides up-to-date information about scientific innovations, discoveries, and issues that are shaping modern knowledge.
Section #1 explains the AI basics: GenAI, AGI, ASI; GPT; how AI is "trained"; AI errors, AI "consciousness"; and AI hype
Section #2 explains the multiple impacts of AI: AI databases; copyright; jobs; cognition
Section 3 discusses important AI threats: AI deceptions; political AI; military AI; and AI disobedience
Section 4 describes the warnings of many AI leaders and experts: that the potential damage of AI is very real, and that governmental controls are absolutely necessary.
Most of the mass of the universe is invisible and undetectable and is known only by its effects....
Lynn Margulis's theory of how microbe combinations led to complex cells in evolution was rejected by the scientific establishment for years.
Mounting evidence suggests a link between chemicals in consumer products and breast cancer.
What's so important about an atmosphere? Find out here.
Many of the most important advances in scientific understanding were initially rejected or ignored.
In an era of global science, other nations are increasing their science budgets. Why aren't we?
The necessary ingredients and conditions; formation of life's molecules; Last Universal Common Ancestor (LUCA) ....
01/14/21 Mathematics is the foundation of everything in Nature: structures, dynamics, processes. Understanding that foundation changes our perception of Nature. Lakshminarayanan Mahadevan
06/18/24 WGBH Forum Network webinar. CERN’s Large Hadron Collider has made very significant discoveries (including the Higgs boson), but physicists now need to expand the probe. Tulika Bose
03/19/24 A prominent biologist explains the crucial importance of biodiversity for life on Earth, and how the sixth mass extinction fractures that stability. Michael Reed.
01/13/15 How culture influences science and why we should be aware of that relationship. David Kaiser
10/25/17 Finally, an explanation of how voting districts can be unfairly sliced and diced. Justin Solomon
04/09/19 What caused Earth's five mass extinctions --and most important--are we headed for a sixth? Andrew Knoll
07/09/13 the unique "antifreeze" blood and skeletal mutations of the Antarctic Icefishes provide insights into both climate change adaptations and human disease. H. William Detrich, III
12/22/15 Can the great Himalaya ecosystem adapt to the dual assault of rapid development and climate change? Maharaj Pandit
12/09/21 A distinguished geologist compares the human impact on our planet with the impacts of natural catastrophes over billions of years. Based on his book, A Brief History of Earth, this discussion is a sequel to an earlier conversation. Andrew Knoll
04/08/14 A world authority on how environmental toxins affect brain development brings the evidence to the general public. Philippe Grandjean
04/20/17 A tour of some innovative medical nano-devices at the Tufts University Nano Lab. Sameer Sonkusale
02/09/24 GBH Forum Network webinar (noon ET) The extreme level of atmospheric CO2 is well beyond a “capture and storage/sequestration” solution, yet the hype persists that some clever extraction innovation will resolve the problem. Charles Harvey
05/21/15 Conversion to wind and solar power is entirely possible now in the U.S. Mara Prentiss
A distinguished geophysicist who has been instrumental in discoveries of deep-sea volcanoes and other ocean ridge geological phenomena.
A researcher who tracks the evolutionary relationship between life and environment