We Have Concerns

Researchers in Paris recently proved that the brain can continue to classify words into categories even after it has gone to sleep, causing Jeff and Anthony to wonder what scientists do to make their…

A new article about the phenomenon of "phantom" phone notifications - those strange moments when you senses a vibration from your cell phone that didn't actually happen - has Jeff ranting on the craz…

In an attempt to better understand pop music, Dr. Lior Shamir created an algorithm that can correctly identify and track the Beatles artistic output over the evolution of their career.  Now, the same…

Across all cultures and geographies, humans scrunch up their faces in the exact same way when they are angry, and a new article examines several possible evolutionary explanations for the consistency…

Jeff found an article in the Atlantic that posits that a certain type of negative thinking, called defensive pessimism, might actually be more conducive to productivity and well-being than thinking p…

Anthony found an article explaining how astronomers gussy up space photography to convey the scope and beauty of the cosmos, and now he has to break it to Jeff that every image he's ever seen of the …

Researchers have now successfully transferred words from one conscious mind to another over long distances... is a sentence that is technically true, but the details of how they did it reveal that tr…

Cooking a Chinese delicacy, a chef in Guangdong province died when the head of a cobra he was preparing bit his hand - long after it had been severed from its body.  This freak accident has Jeff and …

A museum in Japan devoted entirely to mayonnaise prompts Anthony and Jeff to discuss the proper ways to consume condiments, the joys of seeing mundane "attractions", and the usefulness of obsession. …

An article about how one Chinese gamer turned his "gaming addiction" into a profitable business prompts Anthony and Jeff to discuss dreams, responsibility, passion, and choosing the right career.  Al…

There is evidence to suggest that a microbe that lives inside the human stomache may be the key to ending deadly peanut allergies.  Indeed, the microbiome that each of us carries around all the time …

Several high profile colleges have teamed up to create a universal index of basic knowledge for robots.  The theory is that robot brains will need to know how to process even the most elementary inte…

Plug your email address into a particular part of Google and you'll see a map of everywhere you (and your smartphone) have been in the last month.  Anthony isn't surprised and thinks anyone who is wo…

When a monkey grabbed his camera in Indonesia, snapped the perfect selfie, and the photo went viral, British photojournalist David Slater assumed he'd make a pretty penny from the iconic image.  But …

Researchers in California are planning to treat Alzheimer patients by replacing their blood with blood of young people.  Even crazier, there is reason to believe it may work, since old mice have beco…

A writer for Wired clicked 'like' on every single article, update, or advertisement that Facebook presented to him over the course of two days, and described what it did to his feed. It turns out, th…

The "impossible" propulsion drive, which uses microwaves and invisible matter to theoretically power space travel - and which seems to violate the laws of physics, has actually been validated by NASA…

Humans controlling waterways by building dams has caused major problems for salmon, who must return to fresh water to breed. But a new company - Whooshh Innovations (not making that up) - has develop…

Researchers have determined that individual ant colonies have their own distinct personalities, and that these personalities are shaped by their environments.  This leads Jeff and Anthony to wonder i…

Fossils discovered in the Antarctic reveal a penguin that reached the approximate size of Lebron James, 6'8 and 250 pounds.  That's a big penguin.  Jeff and Anthony try to figure out exactly how they…