mastodon 4.8.0-nightly.2026-10-06The Universe is expanding, cooling, and dark. It started with a bang, and I'm here to bring it all to you!
Earth’s oldest trees reveal history’s strongest solar storms
The 1859 Carrington event was our first recorded example of a solar storm.
But over 1000 years earlier, we've forensically identified even bigger ones: imprinted in ancient trees.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/oldest-trees-solar-storm/
One blip isn’t enough to declare “dark matter has been detected”
The LUX-ZEPLIN dark matter candidate event is the most interesting experimental physics result in years.
But one event does not a detection make.
Just ask Blas Cabrera about 1982.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/one-blip-dark-matter-detected/
The information paradox at the heart of every black hole
Einstein's general relativity gives us black holes with zero entropy.
That can't be right, according to quantum physics.
How will the black hole information paradox be resolved?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/paradox-black-hole/
Do gravitational waves show evidence of wave-particle duality?
All particles, both fundamental and composite, exhibit wave-particle duality at some level.
If gravitational waves do, too, then gravity can be proven to be quantum in nature.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/gravitational-waves-wave-particle-duality/
Ask Ethan: Do white holes, the opposite of black holes, physically exist?
Black holes definitively exist, and hundreds have now been directly detected.
Mathematically, white holes are just as permissible.
So where are they?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/white-holes-exist/
Cosmic birefringence: the signal that could upend cosmology
The biggest observational anomaly in cosmology is the Hubble tension.
But second-biggest is much less well-known: the cosmic birefringence signal in the CMB.
(And yes, YOU can understand it!)
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/cosmic-birefringence-signal-cosmology/
Only four days each year are actually 24 hours long
"The day is 24 hours long" is something we all say, but however you measure it, it's only precisely true for four days out of the year.
Planetary motion is complicated!
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/day-isnt-24-hours/
Can we be certain that time really exists?
Some claim that time is merely a persistent illusion.
But there are good reasons, physically, to believe that it really does exist in a meaningful way.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/does-time-exist-182965/
The worst thing about the age of AI is how evident it's become that so many people have no interest in or passion for learning or understanding topics that have fascinated me my whole life.
Who cares about "getting the right answer" if you don't know how to get there yourself?
Does the expanding Universe stretch space or create new space?
The Universe expands.
Does that mean space itself is stretching, that new space is getting created, or some other option for which our conventional understanding breaks down?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/universe-expand-stretching-creating-space/
Congratulations to Emily Levesque on becoming the new AAS journals editor-in-chief!
Emily succeeds Ethan Vishniac, who is awesome and did a wonderful job.
Emily is also awesome and I'm sure will also do a wonderful job! Great choices by AAS!
https://aas.org/press/emily-levesque-named-editor-chief-aas-journals
Ask Ethan: How did atoms come to be?
The Universe made more quarks than antiquarks, hadronized, created protons and neutrons (plus an electron asymmetry), and underwent nucleosynthesis before making atoms.
Did it have to?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/how-atoms-come/
“Dirty snowballs” have joined together since the planets formed
Many objects found in the Kuiper and asteroid belts are conjoined: with multiple "lobes" of distinct origin.
The first contact trinary, Nysa, deepens the story even further.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/dirty-snowball-planet-form/
It's hard to believe, but the 60th anniversary of Star Trek is upon us!
In honor of that, I just did an interview with Kieran Mulvaney about Star Trek, Technology, and hope.
Here in 2026, it's the message we need to heed more than ever.
https://www.history.com/articles/inventions-star-trek-inspired
This viral image of Saturn isn’t real; it’s AI slop
A new image of "Saturn's North Pole" has gone viral.
Too bad it's an AI fake.
Here's what the real things look like, and how you can tell for yourself.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/viral-saturn-real-ai-slop/
New podcast!
Starts With A Bang #133: The Milky Way's center
All at once, the galactic center is the most evolved part of our galaxy, and also our window into its most primitive stages.
Listen to Cara Battersby and I discuss this amazing place in space!
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/starts-with-a-bang-podcast-133-the-milky-ways-center/
This physics trick allows you to beat the speed of light
The speed of light in a vacuum is the ultimate speed limit for any information-carrying signal through spacetime.
But not everything is a vacuum, and that's the key to defeating it!
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/beat-the-speed-of-light/
Ask Ethan: Can someone possibly see the edge of spacetime?
In all directions, the Universe goes on, almost perfectly uniform, as far as we can see.
But if we had been born close to the edge of our hot Big Bang's bubble, what would the edge reveal?
Yes, the Sun is a star, but it’s far from typical
It's a remarkable scientific fact that our Sun is a star: just like all the ones we see in the night sky.
But it's perhaps equally remarkable how atypical we are.
Find out by how much!
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/sun-typical-star/
The act of measuring reality alters what you’ll observe
The most annoying part of quantum mechanics is that masuring a system doesn't just "determine" its state, but alters the experimental outcome.
The double slit setup reveals how.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/measuring-reality-affect-observe/
The strongest experimental hint that gravity is quantum in nature
We still don't know whether gravity is truly quantum or classical in nature.
But the purely quantum Aharanov-Bohm effect doesn't just work for electromagnetism.
Gravity activates it, too.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/quantum-gravity/
Gravity can’t be an instantaneous force
In Newton's gravity, the force was instantaneous and worked across infinite distances.
According to Einstein, that can't be right.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/gravity-doesnt-happen-instantly/
The “perfect cosmological principle” isn’t true for our Universe
On the largest scales, the Universe is the same everywhere in space.
Could it also be the same everywhere in time?
That's the Perfect Cosmological Principle: fascinating, but untrue.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/perfect-cosmological-principle/
Flying clocks in opposite directions around the world proved Einstein right
If you fly a clock around the world, its time gets dilated.
But if you fly 2 round-the-world clocks in opposite directions, they dilate differently from each other.
Here's why.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/flying-proved-einstein-right/
The sky is blue. The ocean is, too. But the reasons why are very different.
The sky is blue, and the oceans are blue.
But the reason for each one is very different, and has nothing to do with "one reflecting the other" like you might've heard.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/why-sky-ocean-blue/
I'm sure this is fine.
This is fine.
Surely nothing bad could ever come from this.
Right, @sundogplanets@mastodon.social?
https://techcrunch.com/2026/04/27/meta-inks-deal-for-solar-power-at-night-beamed-from-space/
New video: Largest-scale cosmic test ever favors dark matter over MOND
If you can measure the kinetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich from the CMB plus large-scale structure, you can test the law of gravity on giant cosmic scales.
Who's right: Einstein or MOND?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/cosmic-test-dark-matter-mond/
Ask Ethan: Does uneven cosmic expansion change our fate?
Recent evidence, although not yet a slam-dunk, claims our Universe is expanding differently in different directions.
If that's true, what would that mean for our cosmic fate?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/uneven-cosmic-expansion-fate/
The science case for why Pluto still isn’t a planet
Sure, we lived in a simpler time when we had 9 planets, including Pluto.
But we've learned a whole lot since 1929, and can't in good conscience ignore it to suit our comforts.
How did Artemis II break Apollo’s distance record?
If you ask google how Artemis II broke Apollo 13's distance record, it'll lie and say "because the rocket was more powerful."
But these three reasons, combined, are how it really happened.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/how-artemis-ii-break-apollo-distance-record/
Ask Ethan: Why are astronauts weightless while still in Earth’s gravity?
Astronauts in space, including on the ISS, are still heavily influenced by Earth's gravity, accelerating at ~90% their value on Earth's surface.
So why, then, are they weightless?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/astronauts-weightless-earth-gravity/
Why the world needs all three 30-meter class telescopes
The leap from the 10 meter class of ground-based optical telescopes to the 30 meter class will be scientifically profound.
Here's why we need all 3 of them, and how to get there.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/world-three-30-meter-telescopes/
Ask Ethan: How empty are the depths of space?
We often talk about "the vacuum of space" as being a place where pressures and particle densities drop to zero.
But outer space is never truly empty, even in the emptiest places.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/how-empty-depths-space/
I made a video!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iz3RA5iUyh8
What makes up the Universe? We know that normal matter alone, with Einstein's gravity, can't explain all we see.
Is there a bunch of unseen mass: dark matter?
Or must we modify the laws of gravity instead?
This new test holds the key!
NASA’s Hubble opens the earliest window into the young Milky Way
Studying our galactic center's globular clusters reveals evidence of the oldest merger in Milky Way history: 11.8 billion years ago.
Hubble has now recovered our earliest relic ever.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/nasa-hubble-earliest-milky-way/
Ask Ethan: Are there really charm quarks inside the proton?
Everyone knows there are two up quarks and one down quark inside a proton.
But when we smash things into them, we suddenly can find evidence for charm quarks inside them, too.
https://bigthink.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/protonboy-1.jpg
JWST peers inside a dying star’s “exposed cranium”
In 2013, NASA's Spitzer observed PMR 1, finding a structure that resembles a human brain.
Today, JWST actually resolves the Exposed Cranium Nebula, revealing what's inside.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/jwst-dying-star-exposed-cranium/
"The future of American science" with me and Salman Hameed.
Bonus points if you can spell my last name right!
Dark matter passes a new cosmic test, while MOND fails
A new cosmic test has finally, with CMB and large-scale structure data, become realistic: using the kinetic Sunyaev-Zel'dovich effect to test dark matter vs. MOND.
Guess who wins?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/dark-matter-new-cosmic-test-mond-fails/
The flimsy case for evolving dark energy
There's been a lot of talk about evolving dark energy, and how DESI data demands it.
But the case for this remains somewhat weak, while the true underlying puzzles remain unsolved.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/flimsy-case-evolving-dark-energy/
Dark matter in the Bullet Cluster celebrates 20 years
It was our first empirical proof of dark matter, using the natural lab of the Universe.
Contrarians argue against it, but the evidence speaks louder than any ideologically-driven voice.
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/dark-matter-bullet-cluster-595214/
Starts With A Bang podcast #127 – Satellites and space pollution
There are many excellent technological uses of satellite technology, but also many harms associated with the pollution of the environment around Earth.
When they clash, must we all lose?
https://bigthink.com/starts-with-a-bang/starts-with-a-bang-podcast-127-satellites-and-space-pollution/
