456 years ago today, a true champion of scientific thought was born. GALILEO GALILEI was one of the major luminaries of the Scientific Revolution. His works spurred major intellectual development and scientific growth, efforts on his part which, owing to the dark parochial periods of the time, nonetheless dearly cost him. Despite his unrelenting attempts […]
Read more "A Trailblazer of Science"En tant que formes de vie transitoires, nous ne sommes simplement pas équipés pour appréhender les étendues inimaginables de l’espace qui nous entourent. C’est en grande partie à cause des limites de perception qui sont inhérentes à nos systèmes biologiques. Ce que nos sens perçoivent et enregistrent n’est rien d’autre qu’un simple fragment de toutes […]
Read more "Quelle est la taille de l’univers?"It is December 31st, 2018. The world eagerly awaits 2019, with lots of celebratory events planned. For many people, “New Years” herald a new beginning. They signal the start of a new cycle where things can recommence anew. But, indeed, the notion is a very subjective one. A “New Year” is a chronological marker by […]
Read more "2019."In the midst of all the celebratory merriment centred around Christmas, it is all too common for people, in their revelry, to forget about the birthdays of remarkable individuals. One such revolutionary figure who, all too often, gets overshadowed on this festive day is the great scholar of physics Sir Isaac Newton, a super character […]
Read more "Mortals Rejoice At So Great an Ornament of the Human Race"An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump is a remarkable 1768 oil-on-canvas painting. It depicts a period of time characterized by a great upheaval in philosophical thought – a high point of the Age of the Enlightenment that saw the fascination with a mechanical philosophy defined by reasoned knowledge and empirical method and that […]
Read more "An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump"Today would have marked the 137th the birthday of influential biologist Sir Alexander Fleming, most notably known for his work with penicillin for which he won the 1945 Nobel prize in Medicine along with colleagues Howard Florey and Ernst Chain. Fleming’s story highlights the underlying serendipity behind many of the greatest discoveries in science, particularly […]
Read more "The Wonder Drug"The most recognizable scientist of our times has, sadly, left us this week. Stephen Hawking ushered in fundamental contributions in physics and cosmology and greatly revolutionized our understanding of black holes. It is no doubt that he left a remarkable legacy of scientific inquiry and his passing is a huge loss to the scientific community […]
Read more "From Singularities to Black Hole Mechanics: Hawking’s Scientific Endeavour"Epigenetic mechanisms which involve biochemical alterations to DNA structure have been documented to result in heritable changes in gene expression. Unlike mutations, however, epigenetic changes do not involve changes in the primary DNA sequence, such that a nucleotide would change into a different nucleotide. Nevertheless, the field of epigenetics has been a fertile ground for […]
Read more "The Charade of Epigenetic Evolution"A deep connection exists between the microscopic world of atoms that holds together small molecules and the features of the macroscopic world around us, typified by complex structures, the likes of which include life, stars, and galaxies. The properties of the universe at large that have allowed biological life to evolve are determined by the […]
Read more "Diverse Scales"Whenever we speak of the truth, we tend to divide it along a certain objective-subjective dichotomy. But, the very idea that that there is such a thing as “subjective truth” hardly does justice to the concept of truth itself. The term “subjective truth” is largely an oxymoron and has given rise to common philosophical tendencies […]
Read more "The Assault on Truth"