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The question of whether we have "free will" has kept philosophers occupied for at least 2000 years. Wouldn't it be nice if science came along and sorted the whole thing out?

Scientists have discovered the amino acid glycine, a critical component of all living things, hiding in samples from the comet Wild 2. It's the first

Strive as we might to make sense of the world, some mysteries still confound us. Here are 13 of the most perplexing - cracking any one of them could yield profound truths

"Basically, any computing device (or switch, or router) that is based on light requires a nonlinear interaction between different light beams, but light doesn't like to do nonlinear stuff. With current technology, you can get efficient nonlinear optical interactions, but the hardware is kind of bulky or very delicate. Not the sort of thing you want to put in a billion devices. What my friends in Barcelona have demonstrated is that it's possible to create a relatively efficient optical nonlinear interaction in a nano-structured metallic surface. "

The last thing hatchling dinosaurs might have seen were giant snakes, researchers say. Scientists found the nearly complete remains of an 11-foot-long, 67-million-year-old serpent coiled around a crushed dinosaur egg right next to a hatchling in the nest of a sauropod dinosaur, the largest animals to have ever walked the Earth. "We think that the hatchling had just exited its egg, and that activity attracted the snake," explained researcher Dhananjay Mohabey, a paleontologist at the Geological Survey of India. "It was such a thrill to discover such a portentous moment frozen in time."

By watching how energy moves across a tiny device akin to a springing diving board, Cornell researchers are a step closer to creating extraordinarily tiny sensors that can instantly recognize harmful substances in air or water.

Peak Oil is the point at which petroleum production reaches its greatest rate just before going into perpetual decline. In "Peak Oil and a Changing Climate," a new video series from The Nation and On The Earth productions, radio host Thom Hartmann explains that the world will reach peak oil within the next year if it hasn't already. As a nation, the United States reached peak oil in 1974, after which it became a net oil importer. Bill McKibben, Noam Chomsky, Nicole Foss, Richard Heinberg and the other scientists, researchers and writers interviewed throughout "Peak Oil and a Changing Climate" describe the diminishing returns our world can expect as it deals with the consequences of peak oil even as it continues to pretend it doesn't exist. These experts predict substantially increased transportation costs, decreased industrial production, unemployment, hunger and social chaos as the supplies of the  fuels on which we rely dwindle and eventually disappear. Chomsky urges us to anticipate the official response to peak oil based on how corporations, news organizations and other institutions have responded to global warming: obfuscation, spin and denial. James Howard Kunstler says that we cannot survive peak oil unless we "come up with a consensus about reality that is consistent with the way things really are." This documentary series hopes to help build that consensus. Click here to watch the introductory video, and check back here for new videos each Wednesday.

ScienceDaily (May 13, 2011) - Parents know the unparalleled joy and wonder of hearing a beloved child's first words turn quickly into whole sentences and then babbling paragraphs. But how human children acquire language-which is so complex and has so many variations-remains largely a mystery. Fifty years ago, linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky proposed an answer: Humans are able to learn language so quickly because some knowledge of grammar is hardwired into our brains. In other words, we know some of the most fundamental things about human language unconsciously at birth, without ever being taught.

"(PhysOrg.com) -- People naturally sort words and objects into categories, a key process in forming memory. But when it comes to how things are mentally organized, cultures dramatically differ in their strategies."

ScienceDaily (July 5, 2011) - Have you heard the saying "You only remember what you want to remember"? Now there is evidence that it may well be correct. New research from Lund University in Sweden shows that we can train ourselves to forget things.

Brain, bodily awareness, and the emergence of a conscious self: these entities and their relations are explored by Germanphilosopher and cognitive scientist Metzinger. Extensively working with neuroscientists he has come to the conclusion that, in fact, there is no such thing as a "self" -- that a "self" is simply the content of a model created by our brain - part of a virtual reality we create for ourselves. But if the self is not "real," he asks, why and how did it evolve? How does the brain construct the self? In a series of fascinating virtual reality experiments, Metzinger and his colleagues have attempted to create so-called "out-of-body experiences" in the lab, in order to explore these questions. As a philosopher, he offers a discussion of many of the latest results in robotics, neuroscience, dream and meditation research, and argues that the brain is much more powerful than we have ever imagined. He shows us, for example, that we now have the first machines that have developed an inner image of their own body -- and actually use this model to create intelligent behavior. In addition, studies exploring the connections between phantom limbs and the brain have shown us that even people born without arms or legs sometimes experience a sensation that they do in fact have limbs that are not there. Experiments like the "rubber-hand illusion" demonstrate how we can experience a fake hand as part of our self and even feel a sensation of touch on the phantom hand form the basis and testing ground for the idea that what we have called the "self" in the past is just the content of a transparent self-model in our brains. Now, as new ways of manipulating the conscious mind-brain appear on the scene, it will soon become possible to alter our subjective reality in an unprecedented manner. The cultural consequences of this, Metzinger claims, may be immense: we will need a new approach to ethics, and we will be forced to think about ourselves in a fundamentally new way. At

The development and advances in material science research are going to change all these things. We will soon have light weight cars, transportation items, highly durable paper, nano gadgets and many more.

First full geological map of a non-earth object. Sign of things to come.

Are you a self-starter, energetic, creative and determined individual? Simply, in one word are you an entrepreneur? An entrepreneur does not only chase his/her dreams, ideas and convert them into something tangible but also has to keep himself/herself motivated, maintain a work-life balance, manage a gazillion of things and a lot more. So, here are 5 apps which may help you strike 'that' balance.

Henry the schnoodle just did a remarkable thing. Understanding a pointed finger may seem easy, but consider this: while humans and canines can do it naturally, no other known species in the animal kingdom can. Consider too all the mental work that goes into figuring out what a pointed finger means: paying close attention to a person, recognizing that a gesture reflects a thought, that another animal can even have a thought.

"This Disgraceful video was published by the European Commission for a campaign designed to attract more women to a career in science. The commission said that the video had to "speak their language to get their attention" and that it was intended to be "fun, catchy" and strike a chord with young people. "I would encourage everyone to have a look at the wider campaign and the many videos already online of female researchers talking about their jobs and lives," The original video was taken down after it received so many negative comments. "

Gain weight technique is standard, however gain height? Extraordinary! If you are one among the short individuals who eager to induce taller at least 2 Inch from your height currently, you're in the correct track. Getting taller means anything to everyone. You gain respects from others, no a lot of rejection from the alternative sex, and your boss can even promote you since you have a nice posture of turning into a manager. So what you thing..?