Lonely Magnetic Northpoles Could Actually Exist, Physicists Find

Magnets always have two poles. Meaning, if you break a magnet in half, both of those halves will also have two poles. But some physicists think that particles with just one magnetic pole might exist – these theoretical particles are called monopoles. However, up until now, theories have shown that the existence of monopoles would cause a paradox by breaking up indivisible particles. Now, a group of physicists have published a new paper explaining that paradox, and monopoles might be back on the menu. Let’s take a look.

Did Climate Change Actually Make The LA Wildfires Worse?

During the recent wildfires in Los Angeles, the media briefly latched on to a study which apparently blamed climate change for making the blazes more likely to occur and also more intense. But is that really what the study says? Let’s take a look.

Why I think the new quantum gravity theory is wrong

Last year, Jonathan Oppenheim’s theory of post-quantum gravity was the only theory that made it into my Best of 2024 summary. Post-quantum gravity is one of the most interesting theories for merging quantum physics with gravity, which in turn is one of the most important problems in physics. Now, researchers say they’ve come up with a way to test the theory, though technology needs to advance before that test is possible. In this video I explain why I think it’s likely that post-quantum gravity will be falsified.

Microsoft’s Topological Qubits Probably Don’t Exist, Researchers Warn

Two weeks ago, Microsoft made a big splash in the media by claiming that they’d found a way to build a scalable quantum computing platform which could reach one million qubits in a short period of time. They claimed this was possible with the help of a type of topological qubit called Majorana states. But it appears there are several… issues with the company’s published research. I have a quick summary.

I Was Wrong About Geothermal Energy.

In the past, my outlook on geothermal power was… less than optimistic. But times have changed, and geothermal power technology has improved by leaps and bounds in a variety of ways. Today I have a quick update.

Our Universe Has Two Different Sides, Physicists Confirm

Physicists have a lot of questions about our universe. Here’s one more to add to the list: Why is it so asymmetrical? New research has confirmed an anomaly named the Hemispherical Power Asymmetry, which states that the cosmic microwave background has more fluctuations in one side of the universe than the other. The weirdest part about this is that no one even has a theory for why this might be the case.



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Should we defund academia?

In this video I explain why I think that academia will be mostly defunded in the coming decades. In a nutshell it’s because it’s for all practical purposes a planned economy and extremely inefficient. I go through the most common arguments for academia and explain why they all fail.

AI Gets Rapidly Smarter, And Makes Some Of Us Dumber

So much has happened in AI in the past week, it's hard to keep track. Grok-3, Google's AI co-scientist, GPT-5 rumours, and a Microsoft study that says AI is making us stupid -- at least some of us.

Earth’s Magnetic Field has a Hole, and it’s changing

Earth's magnetic field has a hole located over the South Atlantic Ocean. It’s called the South Atlantic Anomaly and according to NASA and the ESA, it’s changing. Could this be a sign that the Earth’s magnetic field is about to flip? I’ve had a look.

No Audible Boom from First Test Flight of Supersonic Passenger Plane

The company Boom Supersonic recently completed the first test flight of the prototype for their supersonic passenger jet. It was the first time since the Concorde flights were discontinued that a civil aeroplane crossed the Mach barrier. According to people who watched the event, no supersonic boom was audible on the ground. Are we close to seeing the return of supersonic passenger flights?

Microsoft Exaggerates Quantum Computing "Breakthrough"

A brief summary of what Microsoft's recent announcement for a topological quantum core, Majorana-1, means -- and doesn't mean.

This New Solution to a Quantum Paradox Can Improve Quantum Computing

Physicists have reexamined a decades old quantum paradox and found a way to make quantum computers more efficient — in 37 dimensions. I set out to understand what this means and here is my best attempt at explaining it.

AI at CERN can reveal how Universe Will End, New Director Says

According to the incoming director of CERN, Mark Thomson, the large hadron collider (LHC) can tell us whether or not the universe will fall apart into pure energy What is he even talking about? I have a brief summary.



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Trump and Musk Attack Academia

Donald Trump and Elon Musk are in full control of the U.S. government, and they’re using that power to attack “woke” DEI programs and slash federal funding for academic research. Let’s take a look at how those cuts have played out and how they could affect scientific research going forward.

What’s Behind the Nuclear Fusion Startup Backed by Sam Altman?

AI will require lots of energy. So it makes sense that AI supporters would invest millions of dollars into nuclear fusion, the holy grail of clean energy. One fusion startup in particular, Helion Energy, has garnered lots of support – and $1 billion in funding. What’s so special about them? I’ve had a look.

I was asked to keep this confidential

I want to read you an email that I was asked to keep confidential because I think it explains some of my worries about academia.

This New Idea Could Explain the Laws of Nature

Most physicists believe that our universe began with a Big Bang. But how did the laws of nature – for example, the strength of gravity, the speed of light, and the strength of electromagnetic interaction – come to be the way they are? A group of physicists have just put forth an interesting hypothesis on that question in a new paper. Let’s take a look.

A Big Nuclear Bomb Could Fix Climate Change, Physicist Says

A physicist suggests that we fix climate change with a 50 Gigaton nuclear bomb. This isn’t a joke. And I think it might actually work. A brief summary of this and other improbable physics fixes.

AI makes great progress at taking over the world

The release of DeepSeek’s R1 model has thrown the world of AI into chaos, with US firms dropping their safety guardrails in order to keep up, and there have been a couple other concerning stories across the industry, such as the finding that AIs can fake alignment and that we might be headed for a “gradual disempowerment” Let’s take a look.

Good news for faster-than-light travel. Bad news for time travel.

Time travel is cool science fiction tech, but it seems to directly contradict our current understanding of physics. But what about, instead of moving a whole person back in time, we try to move just a bunch of quantum particles? That’s the focus of a new paper, which came to an interesting (but also not interesting) conclusion. Let’s take a look.

Everyone Is Giving Up On Climate Goals

With the Trump administration fully in control of the U.S., it appears that the tides are changing in the climate change discussion. The White House has already withdrawn from the Paris climate agreement, Trump wants to end what he’s calling “the green new scam,” and corporations around the world are abandoning their carbon neutrality pledges. How will this affect the climate change situation? Let’s take a look.

Could this help us calculate the entire universe?

Physicists think that our universe started out as just a lot of quantum fluctuations. That means, if you’re able to calculate wave-function of those quantum fluctuations, you can learn how the universe ended up the way it is now. In a pre-print, a group of physicists around Nima Arkani-Hamed say they’ve worked out a new powerful method to calculate the wave function of the early universe, and they’re calling it the “cosmohedra.” Let’s take a look.



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A new theory of everything based on tensors?

I got a lot of questions about a new theory of everything that supposedly explains dark energy and quantum physics by way of the "Alena Tensor". I had a look. It's not the worst idea I have had on my desk recently.

Sam Altman Thinks We Need To Change Our Social Contract

Recently, social media has been circulating a clip of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman discussing the idea that we will need to reconfigure society as we continue to improve AI. Is that true? What does it even mean? And how will the emergence of a truly intelligent AI reshape our society? Let’s take a look.

This startup wants to build a conscious quantum computer

A new startup in Canada wants to build the first “conscious” artificial intelligence using quantum computing. What’s their definition of consciousness? Well, it’s based on Roger Penrose’s ideas about consciousness, ORCH-OR. I find this rather confusing because Penrose thinks that consciousness is not computable, so how are we now going to compute it?



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Countries sign up for human vaccines against bird flu. Have we learned the COVID lesson?

American viewers might have noticed the price of eggs going up (again), despite Trump’s promises to bring it down. That’s because the bird flu is spreading through America’s animals like wildfire. But should we be worried about a human pandemic? Let’s take a look.

Did DeepSeek burst the AI bubble or will the Stargate Project make it worse?

Today I have a brief recap of the Stargate Project, recently announced by the Trump administration and OpenAI, the DeepSeek r1 and Janus Pro releases, what experts have said about it, and why I am reasonably confident that this isn't the end of the AI Bubble yet.

Is String Theory Inevitable?

Last month, physicists published a paper claiming that string theory’s Veneziano amplitude is the only way to complete a quantum theory of gravity. The popular science pressed took that to ask whether string theory is inevitable. What is this all about? I've had a look.

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AI Super Agents are coming. Allegedly. What does this mean?

OpenAI recently released a research preview of their first AI agent “Operator”. But that’s not all. Apparently, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is set to meet with White House officials on January 30 in order to discuss something called an “AI PhD-level super agent.” I have no idea what this is, but I have some speculations.

A New Ice Age For Europe Is Becoming More Likely

As humanity appears all too happy to keep warming up the planet, the consequences of our actions are catching up with us. Recent measurements indicate that climate change appears to negatively affect the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). This ocean current transports warm waters from the equator towards the Earth’s poles. If the AMOC collapses, middle and northern Europe might be in for a new ice age as temperatures could dip by up to 10 degrees Celsius on average. But it’s not just a problem for Europe, it would be a global disaster. Let’s take a look.

What is “gravitic propulsion” and could the US government hide it?

The Cybertruck bomber’s mention of a “gravitic device” ignited rumours that the U.S. government might be trying to hide developments in physics, similar to what it did when the country was developing the nuclear bomb. Would that even be possible? Here’s what I think.

Physicists Claim They Solved a Big Problem in Quantum Physics

A group of physicists has claimed that a key motivation for the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics is unnecessary. They seem to think that the many worlds interpretation is necessary for conservation laws (energy, momentum, angular momentum) to be fulfilled. This is all nonsense, but quantum mechanics does indeed have a problem with conservation laws. Let me explain.

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What Everyone Gets Wrong about AI

Most politicians totally misunderstand the trouble that artificial intelligence is going to bring. This isn’t a race for profit, it’s a race for power. And that power will be in the hands of a few very rich people. Does that sound like a good future?

There’s a Third Type of Particle and We Never Knew

Up until last week, physicists believed that matter is made up of only two types of particles: those whose spin has full-integer values (bosons) and those whose spin comes has half-integer values (fermions). But in a new paper, a group of researchers turned the world of physics upside down by mathematically proving that a third type of particles – the “paraparticles” are possible.

New Study Finds Alien Life Must Be Similar To Us

Everybody probably wonders how aliens might look – if they even exist. Will they look like the classic bug-eyed martian men? Or maybe more like octopuses? Nobody really knows but a group of researchers recently claimed they have figured out universal rules for howlife must evolve.

Physicists Claim This $2 Billion Experiment Can Tell Us Why We Exist

Fermilab has spent almost $2 billion on its Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment (DUNE). Physicists have claimed that the experiment is worthwhile because learning more about neutrinos will tell us why we exist, why the universe hasn’t disappeared, and why the universe is full of something rather than nothing. None of that is true.

Community Notes are a Bad Idea

As the Trump inauguration approaches, Mark Zuckerberg announced that Meta is changing its content moderation policies. They are doing away with fact-checkers and will instead implement community notes similar to X/Twitter’s. Rumours say that YouTube is working on a similar feature. I think this is a bad idea, and it won’t end well, both for social media companies and us.

Climate Engineering Is Coming, But Not Like You Think.

Climate engineering is a last ditch effort to protect humans from climate change – and we’re getting closer every day. Unfortunately, attempts of scientists to study the consequences of climate engineering have been stalled by environmental activists repeatedly. It’s a problem because climate engineering will come, and we would be better off if we understood the consequences.

Physicists Say They Know How Cold Fusion Works

Nuclear fusion reactors require massive amounts of heat and pressure to re-create conditions similar to those at the center of the Sun. Cold fusion (sometimes called “Low Energy Nuclear Reactions”) is the idea that we could make nuclear fusion work instead at much lower energy within certain materials, typically palladium. This research area has been plagued by fraud, hype, and just bad science. But now, a group of physicists say they've figured out the theory for how it works.



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I Believe The Universe Might Be Able To Think.

In my second book, Existential Physics", I wrote about the possibility that the universe might be able to think. You might think I’m joking, or gone off the deep end, or both – but hear me out.

Have Researchers Found The First Evidence For String Theory?

The BBC claims that researchers have found the first evidence for string theory, citing a recent discovery of long-wavelength gravitational waves that might indicate the existence of so-called “cosmic strings.” Crazier still, they think that this could allow time travel! But do these gravitational waves actually mean that cosmic strings exist? And what, if anything, does it have to do with time travel?



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Is Carbon Dioxide Removal the Next Stock Market Bubble?

According to the New York Times, carbon dioxide removal tech is “the new climate gold rush.” Investors have poured billions of dollars into the tech, and market analysts predict that it might become a trillion-dollar industry in the future. But does reality match the hype? Let’s look at what the numbers really say.

String Theory Can Be Proven Wrong, String Theorists Say

String theory is one of the leading theories of everything, but it’s been criticized for being impossible to prove wrong – if it can’t be falsified, there’s no way to test it against empirical evidence. Now, though, a group of scientists claim they’ve found a way to prove the theory wrong, making it more legitimate. I am not convinced.

Will We Get AGI In 2025?

The recent announcement of OpenAI’s o3 has caused rumours that Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) has arrived. According to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, a model that’s smarter than humans at “a lot of hard problems” will be available by the end of 2025. But what does that even mean, and what can we expect for 2025?

The Hydrogen Bubble Is Finally Bursting

Over the past decade, governments all over the world have invested heavily into the hydrogen economy, that is the idea to use hydrogen to store and transport energy from intermittent renewables. Over the past year, stocks of most key companies in the business have tumbled by as much as 50%. There are good reasons for this.

Quantum Hype Goes Crazy. But Why?

Late last year, quantum computing stocks saw a massive spike in value, with companies like D-wave, Rigetti, and Ion Q jumping by more than 600%. What’s behind this sudden shift? Is it all hype, or something else? I recently came across an interesting recording of a panel discussion that sheds light on what is going on. Let’s take a look.

Climate Scientists are Very Confused

Over the course of 2024, global temperatures hit record highs, yet again. Climate scientists are beginning to worry that temperatures are increasing faster than their models led them to expect. A paper that recently appeared said that the reason for the rapid warming is a reduction in certain types of clouds. If this is correct, and if that’s a trend, it’s very bad news. Welcome to 2025.

Dark Energy Is Not Real, New Data Analysis Finds

According to our current understanding of astrophysics, the universe is not only expanding, but also growing at an ever-increasing rate. The most-accepted model for this expansion attributes the accelerated expansion to dark energy – but what if it’s wrong? A group of astrophysicists have offered up a different explanation, which they call the “timescape” model. They claim that it fits the data better than dark energy. Let’s take a look.



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