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man woman children tossing disposable plastic items into the air

The Undying Miracle: The Strange Afterlife of Plastic

Editors Pick, Science / /

From the optimism of postwar consumer culture to contemporary concerns about microplastics and environmental persistence, plastics have become one of the defining materials of modern industrial society. This article traces the history, chemistry, and cultural legacy of synthetic polymers, examining how a material once celebrated for its durability and convenience became associated with some of the most complex environmental challenges of the twenty-first century.

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Editors Pick, Science
Making vaccinations in labs

Immunity Explained: What We Know and What Remains Uncertain

Editors Pick, Science / /

Few biological encounters have shaped human history more subtly than surviving disease. Long before immunity became measurable in laboratories, societies had already observed its effects in uneven patterns of survival. Thucydides, writing about the plague of Athens, noticed that those who recovered could tend to the sick without falling ill again. Centuries later, Ottoman inoculation practices would travel through diplomatic correspondence into England, while exposure itself increasingly came to be understood not simply as danger, but as a form of biological instruction. Vaccination emerged from this slowly accumulating recognition, that is, the body can be altered by encounter long before it understands what it has encountered.

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Editors Pick, Science

The Science of Climate Prediction: Why Forecasting the Future Is So Difficult

Science / /

Predicting the future of Earth’s climate is one of the most complex challenges in modern science. Researchers must combine atmospheric physics, ocean dynamics, and enormous datasets to understand how the planet’s systems behave. Climate models have become the primary tools scientists use to study these processes. Yet even with advanced technology, predicting climate change remains

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When Science Questions Itself: The Replication Crisis and the Limits of Certainty

Science / /

Science is often presented as a steady accumulation of reliable knowledge. Yet in recent years many scientists have begun to question whether some published findings are as dependable as once believed. The debate has produced what researchers now call the replication crisis, a development that is reshaping how scientific research is conducted and evaluated. For

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