physics
Your room gets messy on its own. It never gets clean on its own. That's not a personal failing — that's a law of physics. The second law of thermodynamics says that disorder in a closed system always increases or stays the same. It never spontaneously decreases.
physics
Energy cannot be created or destroyed. That single sentence, known as the first law of thermodynamics, is arguably the most important statement in all of science. Every joule of energy that exists right now existed at the Big Bang. Not a single joule has been added since. Not a single
physics
Energy cannot be created or destroyed. That single sentence, known as the first law of thermodynamics, is arguably the most important statement in all of science. Every joule of energy that exists right now existed at the Big Bang. Not a single joule has been added since. Not a single
physics
Newton didn't invent gravity. Gravity existed for 13.8 billion years before Newton was born. Apples fell from trees, planets orbited stars, and tides rose and fell for eons without anyone writing a single equation about it. What Newton did, in his 1687 work Principia Mathematica, was describe
physics
Newton didn't invent gravity. Gravity existed for 13.8 billion years before Newton was born. Apples fell from trees, planets orbited stars, and tides rose and fell for eons without anyone writing a single equation about it. What Newton did, in his 1687 work Principia Mathematica, was describe
physics
Physics class usually starts by handing you F=ma on day one, like you're supposed to care about a formula before anyone has told you why it matters. That's backwards. Here's what they should say first: everything in the universe is either moving or
physics
Physics class usually starts by handing you F=ma on day one, like you're supposed to care about a formula before anyone has told you why it matters. That's backwards. Here's what they should say first: everything in the universe is either moving or
chemistry
You started this series with one atom. Hydrogen. One proton, one electron, 75 percent of everything that exists. Nine articles later, you've built from that single element outward — through the periodic table, through element personalities, through bonds, reactions, acids, the mole, organic chemistry, and energy. Each piece layered
chemistry
You started this series with one atom. Hydrogen. One proton, one electron, 75 percent of everything that exists. Nine articles later, you've built from that single element outward — through the periodic table, through element personalities, through bonds, reactions, acids, the mole, organic chemistry, and energy. Each piece layered
chemistry
Every chemical reaction involves energy. Every single one. The match that lights, the food that digests, the battery that drains, the ice that melts, the plant that grows. Energy is not a side topic in chemistry. It's the driving force behind every reaction you've studied in
chemistry
Every chemical reaction involves energy. Every single one. The match that lights, the food that digests, the battery that drains, the ice that melts, the plant that grows. Energy is not a side topic in chemistry. It's the driving force behind every reaction you've studied in
chemistry
There are about 118 known elements. One of them — carbon — has so many compounds that it gets an entire branch of chemistry to itself. Organic chemistry. A whole field, a whole course in college, a whole industry of textbooks and tutors and terrified pre-med students. All because of one element