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Like truth and beauty, pain is subjective and hard to pin down. What hurts one moment might not register the next, and our moods and thoughts color the experience of pain. According to a report in April in the New England Journal of Medicine, however, researchers may one day be able to measure the experience of pain by scanning the brain—a much needed improvement over the subjective ratings of between one and 10 that patients are currently asked to give....

Dear EarthTalk: I heard that goats are being used to prevent some of those catastrophic fires that seem to happen increasingly. What’s the story with that? —Ali B., New Canaan, CT As wildfires consume parts of California larger than some smaller states, everyone is talking about how we can prevent such disasters from getting going in the first place. One novel approach is to enlist goats. Not as firefighters—although their surefootedness and determination would probably serve them well in such situations—but as grazers to keep the forest underbrush clear of the tinder-like grasses, bushes and small trees that allow flames to jump to the higher forest canopy and get further spread by the wind....

By Geoff BrumfielA spacecraft designed to study the faint afterglow of the Big Bang has discovered a rash of new galaxy clusters, along with details of our own Milky Way.Orbiting the Sun roughly 1.5 million kilometres from Earth, the Planck space-based telescope is scanning the sky for ultra-cold objects. Its instruments are chilled to just a tenth of a degree above absolute zero and are designed to pick up the faint microwave afterglow from the Big Bang, which scientists hope can tell them about the earliest moments of the Universe (see ‘The test of inflation’)....

The Joy of X Steven Strogatz Houghton Miffli Harcourt, 2012 ($27)Strogatz, an applied mathematician at Cornell University and author of Sync, has compiled his immensely popular series of New York Times columns and added new material. The Joy of X’s six parts, each divided into several short chapters, move from number basics through algebra, geometry, calculus and statistics to the frontiers of math, where conjectures about prime numbers are still floating around unsolved....

The recent Supreme Court decision in the case known as West Virginia v. Environmental Protection Agency weakened the EPA’s ability to regulate carbon emissions from power plants. At the heart of this ruling is the capacity of the U.S. federal government to regulate the release of substances that can be harmful to American people. The EPA had been using the Clean Air Act to assist utilities and power companies in the transition from fossil fuel–based electricity generation to less carbon-intensive sources, such as wind or solar power....

In his stand-up and best-loved comedies, including Aladdin and Mrs. Doubtfire, Robin Williams was known for his rapid-fire impersonations and intensely playful energy. His most critically acclaimed work, however, including his Oscar-winning turn in Good Will Hunting, married humor with sharp introspection and appreciation for melancholy. Reports of his death from apparent suicide on August 11 at the age of 63 have prompted much speculation about the actor’s personality and mental health....

Economic opportunity has always been a big part of the allure of urban life, yet most cities are at least pockmarked by areas of extreme poverty. Often the scope of the problem eludes government agencies as well as the impoverished communities themselves. Poverty atlases that map the extent of privation have existed for decades as a means to alert urban leaders to areas lacking basic services, such as water, electricity and sanitation....

Days before it was supposed to start circulating protons again after a two-year hiatus, the world’s largest particle accelerator has developed a short circuit. The team behind the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is now evaluating its options to determine whether the problem will cause a delay of days or months. “An intermittent short circuit to ground in one of the machine’s magnet circuits was identified on March 21 and is under investigation,” says a March 24 statement from the CERN, Europe’s particle-physics lab near Geneva, Switzerland, which hosts the LHC....

I say “hybrid car”; you say “Prius.” Toyota’s fuel-sipping sedan has become iconic for gasoline–electric hybrid technology, so much so that the model seems to cast a green aura over the world’s largest car company. Owners can burn less gas when they drive, and so release fewer carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions. During the past decade, Toyota has controlled around three quarters of the U.S. hybrid market, with worldwide sales of the Prius and luxury Lexus hybrids nearing two million vehicles—more than half of them Priuses....

Sight and hearing get all the glory, but the often overlooked and underappreciated sense of smell—or problems with it—is a subject of rapidly growing interest among scientists and clinicians who battle Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. Impaired smell is one of the earliest and most common symptoms of both, and researchers hope a better understanding will improve diagnoses and help unlock some of the secrets of these incurable conditions. The latest offering from the burgeoning field is a review published in June in Lancet Neurology....

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. — Despite the grounding of NASA’s storied space shuttle fleet, American spaceships are expected to make three trips to the International Space Station in the coming months. All of these visits, however, will be by private vehicles. The California-based company SpaceX is set to launch its Dragon capsule toward the station on Nov. 30 on its second and final orbital test flight, NASA officials announced last week. And if all goes well, the firm could launch another Dragon capsule on its first operational cargo-carrying mission three or four months later....

On December 10, Alfred Nobel’s wish to recognize the contributions of scientists whose work confers “the greatest benefit on mankind” will be honored for the 105th time. The Royal Swedish Academy will present this year’s Nobel Prize laureates with their prize, including medals and diplomas, at a ceremony in Stockholm. For more details, visit www.nobelprize.org. —Alison Snyder PHYSICS: John C. Mather of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and George F....

Take a look at the cup of coffee in front of you. Think of how badly you want it. Think of the warmth it will bring as it slips past your pursed lips and reaches through your body’s core. The inviting astringency that lingers on your tastebuds, and that can only be abated by another sip. Once you have worked yourself into a caffeine-deprived frenzy, reach out your hand and try and grasp your liquid gold....

Art conservationists, curators and scientists from around the world are gathering this week in Caracas, Venezuela, to address some of the burgeoning concerns about the state of art and artifact collections around the world—particularly those in tropical climes, which are under assault from mold, fungus and insects. At the Forum on Cultural Heritage Conservation, researchers are highlighting the many macro-abilities of microorganisms in the art world, which range from detecting whether a gallery’s air quality might be harmful to delicate objets d’art to actually cleaning a dirty piece with helpful bacteria....

In a 1946 essay in the London Tribune entitled “In Front of Your Nose,” George Orwell noted that “we are all capable of believing things which we know to be untrue, and then, when we are finally proved wrong, impudently twisting the facts so as to show that we were right. Intellectually, it is possible to carry on this process for an indefinite time: the only check on it is that sooner or later a false belief bumps up against solid reality, usually on a battlefield....

An unsuspecting worker ant in Brazil’s rainforest leaves its nest one morning. But instead of following the well-worn treetop paths of its nest mates, this ant stumbles along clumsily, walking in aimless circles, convulsing from time to time. At high noon, as if programmed, the ant plunges its mandibles into the juicy main vein of a leaf and soon dies. Within days the stem of a fungus sprouts from the dead ant’s head....

The night was settling from cool to downright cold as Holly Hicks drove out into the northern Arizona grasslands with an endangered black-footed ferret in her backseat. It rode in a pet carrier lined with paper shavings during the three-hour drive from Phoenix, where it had been recently treated for injuries. During a brief layover at a house that serves as headquarters for Arizona Game and Fish Department black-footed ferret recovery staff, the animal peered out through the grate and chattered....

Did you like this article? Editorial Review This article has been reviewed for accuracy, reliability and adherence to academic standards prior to publication. Enheduanna (2285-2250 BCE) is the world’s first author and was the daughter (either literally or figuratively) of the great empire-builder Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279 BCE). Her name translates from the Akkadian as high priestess of An', the god of the sky or heaven, though the name An’ could also refer to the moon god Nanna (also known as Su’en/Sin) as in the translation, en-priestess, wife of the god Nanna' or to the Queen of Heaven, Inanna, a goddes Enheduanna helped create’....

Irene Pepperberg is associate research professor at Brandeis University and the author of a new book, Alex and Me. She and Jonah Lehrer, the editor of Mind Matters, discuss what Alex and other African Grey Parrots can teach us about the evolution of intelligence and the concept of zero. LEHRER: What first got you interesting in study avian intelligence? After all, to say someone has a “bird brain” is insulting....

More people survive cancer than ever before. With early detection, for example, women stricken with breast cancer are often successfully treated and go on to live long lives. But concomitant with this cheering rise in cancer survival is a worrying increase in complaints about cognitive impairment as life goes on. Some cancer survivors have trouble with concentration or fatigue. New research shows this is not just in their minds but, in fact, in their brains....