For decades, many scientists have relied on the "hard steps" model to suggest that intelligent life is rare — the improbable result of a series of unlikely evolutionary leaps. But new research by ...

When scientists describe “Earth-like” planets, the phrase often brings to mind worlds scattered across the galaxy, quietly waiting to host oceans, forests, and perhaps civilizations. A recent ...

The red sky paradox is a difficult problem for astronomers. On the one hand, we know for certain that life exists here on Earth around a G-type yellow dwarf star. On the other hand, this type of star ...

A popular model of evolution concludes that it was incredibly unlikely for humanity to evolve on Earth, and that extraterrestrial intelligence is vanishingly rare. But as experts on the entangled ...

When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Homo sapiens 'may be the probable end result of biological and planetary evolution … rather than ...

The “MacGuffin” is a term that will be familiar to students of classic Hollywood. Hitchcock called it “the thing the spies are after” — an object of unknown origins and untold value, which remains ...

Editor’s note: The Focus on Research column highlights different research projects and topics being explored at Penn State. The following originally appeared on The Conversation. A popular model of ...

Add Yahoo as a preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. New models of planetary atmospheres and stellar radiation suggest that worlds capable of supporting intelligent life may be far ...

Some of the greatest evolutionary biologists of the 20th century famously dismissed the prospect of humanlike intelligence beyond Earth. Elen11 Elen11/Getty Editor’s note: The Focus on Research column ...