Researchers at the University of California, Riverside and the University of Lisbon have proposed a bold new argument in a 2026 working paper: consciousness may be able to arise in physical systems far different from the carbon-based biology found on Earth. Their claim reaches across philosophy, astrobiology and artificial intelligence, asking whether minds could exist…
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Researchers at Yale University have created the largest map yet of Denisovan-inherited DNA in Near Oceanian populations, revealing thousands of ancient genetic variants that still influence gene activity in people today. The study, published on June 11, 2026, in Science, shows that DNA inherited from extinct human relatives continues to shape biology in modern populations…
A study in Antiquity has identified a previously undocumented Maya city called Valeriana in Campeche, Mexico, after researchers reexamined environmental lidar data collected for forest monitoring. The discovery shows how a dataset built for one scientific purpose can reveal an ancient urban world beneath dense tropical vegetation. The city came into view when Luke Auld-Thomas,…
A study in Quaternary Science Reviews has found that rare charcoal fragments from Gesher Benot Ya’aqov in northern Israel preserve a surprisingly detailed record of how early humans kept fires burning nearly 780,000 years ago. The work suggests that firewood was a major part of daily survival at the ancient lakeshore site. The study focused…
