Museum of Science and Industry

Ever hear someone refer to math as "the universal language?" It seems like a reasonable idea: after all, 2 + 2 = 4 no matter what language you use for those numbers. Yet researchers are starting to find evidence that certain mathematical concepts might not be perceived in the same way by all people.

Researchers from the University of California at San Diego traveled to a remote valley in Papua New Guinea to study the way adults there conceptualize a "number line"—a visual representation of...

Think human beings are the only ones that can calculate and create efficient road systems? Think again! It turns out that slime molds aren't half-bad at it. An international team of scientists recently analyzed slime mold "roads," created by putting bits of food representing major cities on fourteen countries' road maps and letting the...