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We know that all the other forces governed by quantum mechanics are transmitted by indivisible particles: photons for the electromagnetic force, which governs light and the basic chemistry of matter; gluons for the strong force, which sticks together protons and neutrons inside atoms; and W and Z bosons for the weak force, which enables certain particles to radioactively decay. If gravity has the same underlying theory as these forces, it should also be carried by its own particle: a graviton. Now researchers, including Claudia Du Rham at Imperial in London, are in the hunt for these mysterious and vanishingly weak particles.

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About New Scientist:
New Scientist was founded in 1956 for “all those interested in scientific discovery and its social consequences”. Today our website, videos, newsletters, app, podcast and print magazine cover the world’s most important, exciting and entertaining science news as well as asking the big-picture questions about life, the universe, and what it means to be human.

New Scientist.
https://www.newscientist.com/

By popular request we’ve begun adding playlists of the show as Podcasts on Youtube Music, I’ll try to add a new one every 2–3 days till we have most of our inventory up there, but given today’s Episode is *Cities of the Future*, a collection of all of those seemed a good idea https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLIIOUpOge0LuyCbYUhy-79RQKkOXonmx4 These are the (tentatively named) upcoming playlists/podcasts list I’ll be adding, in no particular order: Megastructures & Extreme Engineering The Fermi Paradox & Alien Civilizations Space Colonization & Habitats Post-Scarcity & Future Civilizations Transhumanism & Human Evolution Propulsion & Interstellar Travel Terraforming & Planetary Engineering Mind, Machines & Alien Intelligence Future Warfare & Defense Strange Worlds & Alien Life.

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While you won’t see a trace of this exoplanet or alien life, it’s easy to spot the red dwarf star that warms its surface.

You may never come face to face with your favorite rock star, but you can attend their concerts or listen to a music recording. Celestial bodies can be like that. Amateurs can’t see black holes, exoplanets, and accretion disks, but we can detect their presence by how they interact with their surroundings. At the very least we can picture them in our mind’s eye.

For example, a likely exoplanet orbits the 1st-magnitude star Pollux in the Gemini twins. It even has a name — Thestias. At public events, I point to Pollux and explain that a planet twice as massive as Jupiter orbits the red giant every 590 days. When it comes to novae, including the woefully-behind-schedule T Cor Bor, it’s fun to imagine the “single” star as a pair of tightly orbiting suns. One pilfers hydrogen from the other until enough material accumulates on the thief’s surface to detonate in a brilliant thermonuclear explosion. Voilà — a nova!

What if the galaxy isn’t empty—but locked in a silent Cold War between ancient alien empires? This episode explores the Dark Forest Theory, Interdiction Bubbles, and what it means if our galaxy is shaped by dormant, watchful civilizations playing a long game of survival and subtle dominance.

Watch my exclusive video Antimatter Propulsion: Harnessing the Power of Annihilation — https://nebula.tv/videos/isaacarthur–… Nebula using my link for 40% off an annual subscription: https://go.nebula.tv/isaacarthur Get a Lifetime Membership to Nebula for only $300: https://go.nebula.tv/lifetime?ref=isa… Use the link gift.nebula.tv/isaacarthur to give a year of Nebula to a friend for just $30. Visit our Website: http://www.isaacarthur.net Join Nebula: https://go.nebula.tv/isaacarthur Support us on Patreon: / isaacarthur Support us on Subscribestar: https://www.subscribestar.com/isaac-a… Facebook Group: / 1,583,992,725,237,264 Reddit: / isaacarthur Twitter: / isaac_a_arthur on Twitter and RT our future content. SFIA Discord Server: / discord Credits: The Alien Cold War: Silent Competition Among Dormant Empires In A Dark Galaxy Episode 497; May 1, 2025 Written, Produced & Narrated by: Isaac Arthur Edited by: Donagh Broderick Graphics: Darth Biomech, Jeremy Jozwik, Ken York YD Visual, LegionTech Studios, Sergio Botero Select imagery/video supplied by Getty Images Music Courtesy of Epidemic Sound http://epidemicsound.com/creator Markus Junnikkala, “A Fleet Behind the Moon” Phase Shift, “Forest Night” Kai Engel, “Endless Story About Sun and Moon” Chris Zabriskie, “Unfoldment, Revealment”, “A New Day in a New Sector”, “Cylinder One” Taras Harkavyi, “Alpha and…” Stellardrone, “Red Giant”, “Billions and Billions“
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Credits:
The Alien Cold War: Silent Competition Among Dormant Empires In A Dark Galaxy.
Episode 497; May 1, 2025
Written, Produced & Narrated by: Isaac Arthur.
Edited by: Donagh Broderick.
Graphics: Darth Biomech, Jeremy Jozwik, Ken York YD Visual, LegionTech Studios, Sergio Botero.
Select imagery/video supplied by Getty Images.
Music Courtesy of Epidemic Sound http://epidemicsound.com/creator.
Markus Junnikkala, \

Love this short paper which reveals a significant insight about alien life with a simple ‘back-of-the-envelope’ calculation! — “We find that as long as the probability that a habitable zone planet develops a technological species is larger than ~10^-24, humanity is not the only time technological intelligence has evolved.” [In the observable universe]

Free preprint version: https://arxiv.org/abs/1510.

#aliens #astrobiology #life #universe


Abstract In this article, we address the cosmic frequency of technological species. Recent advances in exoplanet studies provide strong constraints on all astrophysical terms in the Drake equation. Using these and modifying the form and intent of the Drake equation, we set a firm lower bound on the probability that one or more technological species have evolved anywhere and at any time in the history of the observable Universe. We find that as long as the probability that a habitable zone planet develops a technological species is larger than ∼10−24, humanity is not the only time technological intelligence has evolved. This constraint has important scientific and philosophical consequences. Key Words: Life—Intelligence—Extraterrestrial life. Astrobiology 2016359–362.

This week, researchers uncovered the negative pressure mechanisms plants use to communicate stress. Linguists found that the melody of spoken language in English functions as its own, distinct language. And there was also depressing news! Like the Trump administration slashing NASA’s budget, which could scrap the James Webb Space Telescope right at the beginning of its operational life (they’re also pushing to scrap the completed Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope before its launch).

Additionally, researchers found that the video game Dark Souls has positive psychological effects on players; a physicist made a new contribution to the theory that the universe is a computational process; and scientists in Spain mapped the brain connectivity patterns of psychosis patients: