If you need a present for the curious person / nerd in your life, my book The Genesis Quest is what you want. It's about how life on Earth began - one of the biggest mysteries in science - and it's full of fascinating ideas and personalities. THREAD🧵 on where to buy it:. 1/9

The @NewScientist Feedback columnist recently wasted a lot of time watching YouTube videos of dirty rugs being cleaned, and consequently they have some thoughts about The Algorithm.

Good news in @NewScientist!. We're a step closer to understanding myalgic encephalomyelitis, aka chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS):. A big genetic study has linked eight regions of the genome to the condition.

We will all go together when we go,.All suffused with an incandescent glow. No one will have the endurance.To collect on his insurance,.Lloyd's of London will be loaded when they go.

If you haven’t yet read Amanda Gefter’s incredible story about the forgotten philosopher Peter Putnam, I can’t recommend it enough. This man worked as a janitor - but previously came up with a groundbreaking theory of the human mind.

If you lose a tooth, the dentist will offer you a metal replacement. What if, instead, you could grow a whole new tooth? @NewScientist.

I was excited to write a piece for the @UNESCOCourier, UNESCO's official magazine, about the current state of archaeology. TL:DR Thanks to a host of new techniques and finds, many "classic" narratives of human history and prehistory are being rethought.

As AI-generated music swamps streaming services, @NewScientist's Feedback asks: what should these fake bands call themselves? . Some suggestions that were cut for space: Fairport Compression, Nick Cache and the Back Ups, R.O.M.

Most invitations to scientific conferences are pretty boring, but the invite to a meeting about sex with robots was electrifying, says Feedback (whoever they are) at @NewScientist.

Ancient humans in Africa changed their behaviour in a major way 70,000 years ago. It could explain how their descendants managed to people the rest of the world - @NewScientist.

A company in Indonesia dredged up a load of seafloor sediments to build an artificial island - and uncovered the remains of ancient humans called Homo erectus. For @ScienceNews, I explained what the fossils tell us and what else might be down there.

I went on the @NewScientistPod to tell hosts @RowHoop and @PennySarchet about the first complete genome of an ancient Egyptian, and what it tells us about life 4500 years ago.

The latest issue of @NewScientist is out now and includes my feature on lost human populations from prehistory - along with this gorgeous cover art (for which I can take exactly zero credit).

Yet another potential use for AI: make the prose in difficult books easier to read, regardless of how awful the result is. @NewScientist's Feedback reimagines the opening of Pride and Prejudice: "Everyone knows that rich, single men want to get married.".

The first complete genome of an ancient Egyptian has been sequenced. It hints that Egypt had connections to Mesopotamia, far to the east - @NewScientist.

Over tens of thousands of years, waves of Homo sapiens set out across Europe and Asia, only for their societies and cultures to mysteriously vanish. Meet the lost souls of prehistory, in this week's @NewScientist.

Out now: @NewScientist's latest Concepts special issue. Me on animal consciousness, @RowHoop on symbiosis, @DownHereOnEarth on quasiparticles and much more. It's a cornucopia (not like in The Hunger Games).

The nameless Feedback writer at @NewScientist has a real bee in their bonnet about "no shit, Sherlock" scientific studies that laboriously demonstrate the obvious. Take this thing about the sexually-cannibalistic spiders, for instance.

Women’s pelvises have become narrower over the past 150 years. For @NewScientist I asked: What's behind this change? And what does it mean for childbirth and women's health?.

Most biologists have assumed for decades that animals are not conscious. But there is growing evidence that common sense is correct and in fact all animals are conscious. Yes, including insects. My contribution to @NewScientist's Concepts special.

RT @newscientist: The first skull of a mysterious human ancestor has been discovered 💀. Unearthed originally in 1930, the ‘Dragon man’ skul….